A slower month for viewing for me than regular, as the leaves fall from their branches and the winter air starts to breathe for the first time in months, my nights have been filled with bothersome things like delightful friends and crowds of laughter. Luckily I was able to afford myself some nights of solitude and was able to enjoy a handful of greats (and not-so-greats). This month, at the movies…
Cooley High
The high school film is something that every generation has, a film that encompasses exactly their transition from child to adult. While sometimes a generation is lucky enough to receive that film while they are still in the middle of this transition (Superbad is that film for me) many times it’s only with the benefit of hindsight that filmmakers are able to look back on that time and truly wrestle with what they were going through. That is the case with Cooley High, a film that looks back to Chicago in 1964 with humor and foreboding.
Director Michael Schultz takes us on a whirlwind week through the lives of Preach (Glynn Turman) and Cochise (Lawrence Hiton-Jacobs) as they fall in love, try and get laid, get drunk, get high, and get in trouble. The film is light on its feet and incredibly fun, but it never forgets that when you’re a teenager everything is life or death, and when you’re a poor black teenager in the 1960s sometimes that means literally. The film doesn’t shy away from the tragedies that lurk around every corner for these boys, but still allows them to live a life, not focusing on what could happen but instead focusing on the now. They are young, and they will make mistakes in their youth, some harsher than others, but that is the price paid to shed one’s childhood.
The Elephant Man
The film chosen by readers for this month’s special features article The Favourites, paid subscribers can read my essay on kindness, horror, and finding truth in a bleak world here.
The Equalizer 3
I am a big fan of Antoine Fuqua and Denzel Washington’s first film in this unlikely franchise The Equalizer. Following an ex-CIA operative as he decides to come out of retirement to protect a young girl he’s recently befriended, the film is a slick action thriller with exciting fight scenes and solid if not groundbreaking storytelling. And it seemed to have a very replicable formula, simply putting Washington’s Robert McCall against a new big bad every movie, wash, and repeat. Unfortunately, the first sequel was a major disappointment, with poorly paced fights and a cookie-cutter plot. Still, with the third and final film in the franchise, The Equalizer 3 I held hope that they could recapture the magic of that first film.
Unfortunately, it seems that this franchise would’ve been better off as a singular entry. While there are many interesting and exciting scenes sprinkled throughout this film, the film is bogged down by a deeply uninteresting premise, a useless side plot, and the final boss is laughably underwhelming compared to the villains we’ve seen McCall go up against before. The film opens with a fantastic scene of bloodshed and action, and it attempts to set up a moral quandary in the actions of our hero, as the steps he takes in his pursuit of vigilantism become harsher and more brutal. But this attempted thought provoking nature is quickly abandoned and replaced by a simple, by-the-numbers thriller that, while containing moments of brilliant thrills, doesn’t come close to the original.
Ghosts of Girlfriends Past
I do not consider myself a film snob. While my taste in the art does venture wide, I do not consider myself above the mainstream romantic comedy in any way. I love to be taken away in a heartfelt, comedic retread as much as anyone else. So when a classic tale such as A Christmas Carol is set to be reimagined in the genre, while it may seem a little obvious from the outset, I can see myself enjoying a version of that story. Add in Matthew McConaughy only a few years out from getting his Oscar, Emma Stone, Michael Douglas, and a personal favourite Breckin Meyer, and there’s at least some juice to this movie.
Unfortunately, I don’t think anything could have saved this movie from being misogynistic, mindless crap. Ghost of Girlfriends Past may be the worst film I watch this year, with absolutely nothing of value one can watch out for. You’ve seen this story before, these characters before, these jokes before, everything is a photocopy of a photocopy. Douglas and Stone both have fun in the roles they’re given, but everyone else is dead on arrival (sorry Breckin). A joyless film.
The Haunted Palace
My Roger Corman/Edgar Allen Poe adaptation binge continues this month, with a dash of H. P. Lovecraft tossed in. The Haunted Palace features Vincent Price once again, this time as a man who comes to a small village after inheriting a castle, only to discover the townsfolk are bitter and distrustful, believing him to be a long-dead witch returning for vengeance. Their fears are proven true as Price’s mind is slowly turned over to the witch, with deadly results.
The film is the weakest of the Corman/Poe adaptations that I have seen, lacking the camp of The Raven and the genuine creepiness of The Pit and the Pendulum. Needing to add in additional material from a Lovecraft tale shows that there were evident limits to the story, and the combination of the two writers leads to a messy story with side pieces that never make sense or fully connect. A dull film with a lack of scares or unique ideas, this one can be left.
Hoop Dreams
Considered by many to be one of the greatest documentaries of all time, Hoop Dreams follows two prospective NBA players as they navigate the trials and tribulations of a career path as teenagers. The film starts when the two young men (William Gates and Arthur Agee) are scouted at a very young age and follow them through their teenage years as they pursue the ultimate American dream. It explores aspects of not just their sports glory dreams but their education and their home life, all of which revolve around the idea that their dreams will, must, come true.
An incredible, epic journey that has as much to say about the American Dream as a broken promise as it does basketball, the filmmakers shot over 500 hours of footage that they then cut down to the three hours the audience is treated to. In those three hours, we see dreams dashed, hearts broken, families torn asunder, and hope prevail. A masterpiece in documentary storytelling, a must-see for all dreamers and disbelievers alike.
In the Mood For Love
You’re walking down the street on a chill autumn day, the sun shines and the leaves softly crunch under each footfall. You round a corner and pass a stranger, your eyes briefly meeting. You note their scarf, their jumper, the smile that touches their lips, and then they are gone. But as they go their scent, sweet and warm and familiar, takes you away. You are helpless to it, as images of ache and love and a life you didn’t know and will never know flash for a moment, brilliant in clarity and hazy as a dream. As suddenly as they appear they are gone, as you keep walking, your stride falters only a quarter second as you return to this world. A life that was a mirage has come and ceased in a matter of a moment. That is the essence of what In the Mood For Love creates.
Possibly the most luscious film ever made, In the Mood For Love is Wong Kar-Wai’s Taiwanese drama about a man and a woman discovering that their spouses are having an affair. These two parallel spirits, perfectly in sync yet forever separate, mourn the loss of their previous loves while this new one blossoms, a love neither can abide by, no matter how deep the desire runs. A film about the space between heartbeats. Yearning as a colour palette. A must-see for everyone everywhere.
Josie and the Pussycats
I recently had a discussion with a friend about the slew of great comedies we’ve been seeing in theaters this year. Even if all of them didn’t quite hit the mark for me it’s undeniable that we’re in a comedy renaissance with films such as No Hard Feelings, Joy Ride, Theater Camp, and Bottoms making waves on the big screen. One thing that many of these films had in spade that seemed to go out of style during the mid-2000s when Judd Apatow began looming large over the comedy industry (not a slight to the man, he’s good at what he does) is pure absurdity. With Josie and the Pussycats, we get a healthy dose of that broad, silly, and outlandish humor that went out of favor shortly after its release.
A reclaimed cult classic that certainly deserves that moniker, Jose and the Pussycats as an absolute blast. It takes big swings across the board, from performances to production design to camerawork, everything has been turned up to the extreme in this comedy. Not all of these swings hit, but it’s so earnest that one can’t help but fall for its charms. Rachel Leigh Cook reminds everyone she should still be a star, Parker Posey and Alan Cummings are both absolutely devilish as over-the-top music executives looking to insert subliminal messages into pop music, and best of all the music is an absolute jam. Fun, fun, fun.
The Sisters Brothers
Westerns are a genre that is much maligned in today’s cinematic climate. While many classics of the genre are derided for their rather simplistic and black-and-white presentation of heroes and villains, modern westerns are often so overtly trying to avoid or comment on these cliches that they fail to reckon with their own story over stories already told. While The Sisters Brothers falls closer to the latter in this category, it is able to save itself from the cliches of deromanticizing the genre and plays on the concepts that the progenitors laid out while telling it’s own story beautifully. A blood-soaked tale of desire, redemption, and the sins in our blood.
Following a pair of mercenary brothers (Joaquin Phoenix and John C. Reilly) as they track down a chemist (Riz Ahmed) and the man who is supposed to be their point man (Jake Gyllenhaal), the film journeys brazenly across the equally vibrant and barren American West. The brothers are yin and yang, opposites in ways but intrinsically intertwined, with Reilly being both deeply sensitive yet unable to break the bonds of bloodlust that have so enraptured his brother. Ahmed and Gyllenhaal, in contrast, show what can happen when you break free from the bonds that your past and society have placed upon your shoulders. When these couplings meet, the dynamic of both shift, falter and are forever changed.
The landscape shots are absolutely stunning, and the action sequences are well-staged and feature unabashed violence. Reilly gives a wonderful performance as a man torn between his allegiance to his brother and his desires for the mythical “better life”. Phoenix, forever on the edge of a breakdown, is taut and terrifying, and the final twenty minutes take the world of the film and the characters we’ve met and turn them on their heads. A wonderful deconstruction.
Spice World
It would be very easy to dismiss Spice World outright. You wouldn’t be the first, and you absolutely won’t be the last. The 1996 comedy is chock full of problems, from the overuse of full songs from the bands (including less-than-stellar music videos sprinkled into the narrative) to the non-existent story to the fairly lame humor. The film is a classic case of a pop artist taking their chance at another career path and having it simply fall flat. But I can’t dismiss this film, not completely, because of just how much fun almost everyone is obviously having.
This film is aware that it is dreck, that it is disposable in the most obvious sense, and it leans into this with ferocity. It is more concerned with poking fun at itself and the subjects of the film than being something it is not. It’s a campy, bubblegum romp, the 1990’s version of A Hard Day’s Night, and each of the Spice Girls are more than game to poke fun at their own image. It takes a chance that many of today’s over-managed pop sensations wouldn’t dare to, and while in the end, it struck out, you gotta admire the swings it takes.