The Cinematic Experience of Forizzer

More brief reviews. The list will become less and less obscure over the next bit so don’t expect, like, more Ramblers-esque stuff. Oh, and I forgot to mention, I’m doing this list based around first theatrical release (excluding festival releases) as opposed to my general “going by US release” fixation, if you’re curious.

To be fair, any of the films from the current trilogy (on the verge of being a quadrilogy if Greengrass is semi-successful with Green Zone or something) could have made this list — I decided to narrow it down to one per series to be fair to the competition, so here I decided on my favourite (of course) which is 2004’s The Bourne Supremacy.

Looking back on it now, this was one of the more inspired decisions this decade in giving Paul Greengrass the opportunity to helm such a large project, given his lack of experience by that time. Especially considering his only film before this was 2002’s Bloody Sunday which wasn’t an American production or too financially impressive, even though the film itself was. Here he finds himself breeding the habitual tension Liman imbued in the first installment — 02’s The Bourne Identity – with his penchant for the handheld. His decisions behind the camera revitalized (see: redefined) action sequences and now have become a near necessity for people to really take to hand-to-hand combat in film.

While its performances aren’t the best and the story captivating but not near brilliant, the entirety of this film’s (and The Bourne Ultimatum’s) success lays solely on Greengrass’ shoulders. In an industry where sequels are often of lesser quality than their predecessors, Paul Greengrass launched this into a darker atmosphere and brought everything one would hope to follow the first part into fruition. One of the best action films there has ever been.

I wrote a review for this last June, so I’ll link to it. However, I would just like to take this time to say if you haven’t seen the film yet, see it now. Especially if you’re apart of people who love to do personal awards/keep up with current cinema. A contemporary masterpiece and Souleymane Sy Savane’s warmth and genuineness is the purest I’ve bared witness to in a long, long time. Here’s the review.

I deviated greatly into Gaspar Noe’s only film of the decade — unless you count festival releases, which I don’t; which is why Enter the Void isn’t on this list — in a review that I posted pre-TIFF. Yeah, I loved this film. The combination of Noe’s unrelentingly depressive vision and a bitter, bitter story that leaves you feeling dirty, this is really something else. The second most immersing feature I’ve bared witness to — only bested by Enter the Void. Review: Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible.

One of the first films I sought after in my youth to help me gain perspective on “quality” cinema was Lars von Trier’s Dogville. Not only did it shape the way I viewed film, but I’m sure in some depressing way it also helped shape the way I view the world.

In Dogville, the lead character Grace (Nicole Kidman in a, well, graceful portrayal that is head and shoulders above anything she’s ever done) is a woman getting out of dodge, so to speak. She’s not in tune with society the way her mobster family is, so she scurries off to some desolate little village filled with some of the most glib and loathsome patrons cinema has provided… ever. There are a few good spirits, but it seems to be the town’s intent to collapse this woman’s pure foundations. She’s put through hell and it’s essentially three hours of watching the most loving person being tortured. Many people are familiar with von Trier’s so-called misogyny which is basically an empty criticism of people disliking his work to perpetuate with some “factual” argument. All of his characters are miserable people and he’s stated he writes his female protagonists as himself. Yeah, he’s self-deprecating — not Neil LaBute.

While the story is harrowing, there always has to be an extra element for me to adore a feature. Here it’s von Trier’s collision of beloved styles; the Dogme 95 aesthetic set on a stage platform. Even the film’s biggest detractors admire von Trier’s visual independence here; it understandably takes this anti-American tirade to a far more artistic plateau. The cinematography, the “set design”, the editing — it’s a fascinating directorial project with heart. von Trier’s first film in his Grace trilogy, which is yet to be completed, has as much soul as it does a peculiar vision; even if both are filled with melancholy and hatred.

I wrote a review for this a few months ago. This is Nobuhiro Yamashita’s second appearance on this list and I am overly excited to get through the rest of his filmography. The review is the final one of the post located here.

I first caught this in early 2003 and between the Lord of the Rings trilogy and this, Steven Spielberg’s Catch Me If You Can, I found myself becoming a film fan fairly fast.

It’s a popular enough film, so I can avoid any preliminary plot discussion. I think what I’m most drawn by by this film is the allure of the vision. Spielberg’s got some swagger inside him and he expels it in large qualities here. Giving Tom Hanks the most honest work in his career (meaning I believed this could be a guy I bump into on the street on any given day and he’d be this way, not that it’s his best performance), Leonardo DiCaprio the most bubbly and boisterous work he’s ever turned out, Christopher Walken a lovable fatherly role that everyone loved and Amy Adams her big break in one of the most adorable turns ever. Spielberg’s vision has never been more concise. Here he shows humility in the themes he tackles, which allows for a much more natural connection between his viewer with his film; at least on this particular occasion.

There’s an essence so compelling in Frank Abagnale Jr’s life that I find myself adorning each time I sit down and re-experience a life so well lived. It doesn’t hurt that the story is told from a genuine perspective that lends a favorable view to the criminal and a bitter one to the police — a manipulative decision that I tend to hate in cinema, but love here — but the quiet projection of a young man’s rut being snowballed into something genius and rather epic touches me. That, even if all hope is lost, you can lie your way to an honest gathering of self. Spielberg’s best and I doubt he’ll ever top himself.

Back-to-back Leonardo DiCaprio? I suppose I’m showing my true colors now… Anyways, after his most disjointed directorial job coming in 2002 that had many questioning Martin Scorsese’s aging mind, he came back two years later with one of the best biopics I’ve ever been subject to in The Aviator. Be it because Howard Hughes’ life was a ride in and of itself or that the film touches on cinematic and neurological escapades, there’s enough interest to sustain this three hour feature without having to compensate for any plotting mistakes.

Taking place between the late 1920s and mid 1940s, Martin Scorsese’s second collaboration with Leonardo DiCaprio in as many films resembles cinema of that era. Be it the extravagant design that feels as grandiose as any of the era’s films or the histrionic performances that are mirror to anything those years produced, this film’s long reaching themes and obtusely scaled universe is done in such a remarkable manner that you could believe that, if Howard Hughes were alive, this would be a film he would have produced.

A longstanding escapade that ne’er sports a scene that feels out of place and continually perpetuates the pros and cons of big industry. And as a large fan of Leonardo DiCaprio, I easily label his performance as Howard Hughes as his best work yet. His being cast as the millionaire was as ineluctable as the man’s disorder.

E. Elias Merhige: a director best known for his penchant for the bizarre with his first feature Begotten where no soundtrack or dialogue is heard and the visuals displayed are a far shot away from happenstance. However, I’m here to salivate over Shadow of the Vampire so lets get to that.

Although it’s only 80 minutes long — if you subtract the overly long opening and closing credits — E. Elias Merhige’s latest film packs as potent a punch as any three hour spectacle. Perhaps it’s because it’s so compact that the clout this 2000 feature delivers is found so powerful, but this punch is also attributed to a fantastic ensemble — headed by a literally unrecognizable Willem Dafoe — a macabre tale of the obsessive and a morale that will leave you gasping for air. Of course, the factual way this fictional story is presented makes it all the more harrowing and this semi-horror about the making of Nosferatu is exponentially more sorrowful, distressing and overall horrific than the film from which this concept derives itself.

Apparently what is submitted to audiences when a twisted director directs a tale about a twisted director is a masterpiece of sorts. The dialogue defines its characters intent and the performers define their souls. Each character from the daffy and obsessively portrayed F.W. Murnau (fantastically accosted by John Malkovich) to the meager actor Gustav (played with intimate trepidation by Eddie Izzard) is a fully fleshed figure and a creature to behold. Of course, the cherry on top of all of this is Willem Dafoe’s paradigm for scary figures. An asphyxiating realization based upon the hearsay of yore in a film that I wish was six hours long.

Perhaps the first really quality film I saw in the theaters, at the meager age of 10 I caught The Royal Tenenbaums with my uncle at a second run theater known as The Revue. Fitting I review it years later proclaiming it one of the best of the decade. On with the snippet, shall we?

The first Wes Anderson film to attack the myriad of problems that a family encounters because of family — as opposed to singular participants in his films like Rushmore and Bottle Rocket – the director/writer expands his horizons and thematic scope to accompany this larger interpretation of the family dynamic. With the majority of characters being lovelorn and neurotic, what this family lacks in variety is made up for in authenticity. Although these people hold peculiar beliefs regarding the purpose of life and career occupations, the parents in Royal and Etheline fortify the sentiment that their vanity is cause for their offspring’s (and one adopted child’s) ablation. Carefully constructed, Wes Anderson’s tacit revelation of suburban sadness has found its significance amongst contemporary cinema and speaks more truths than the bottoms of Snapple caps.

If this was not enough, The Royal Tenenbaums holds a rather extraordinary ensemble headlined by one of my utmost favourite performances in history with Gwyneth Paltrow’s rousing of Margot Tenenbaum. Her tessitura of an adult’s teenage angst and a marooned adornment for her brother Richie (a depressing evocation of said fleeting love by Luke Wilson) causes Paltrow’s diminutive stature to ferment amongst an already disheartening tale. With desiccated humor and acrimonious characters, it’s a wonder how warming this film tends to be.

Do you know when you watch a film and are immediately stricken by it, so you watch it again in succession? This is one of the few films that gets such an honor by me and one that I watched three times of the course of two days; I don’t believe I can say the same for any other film.

Produced by Netflix, The Duplass Brothers’ The Puffy Chair is as minimalist as they come. A feature about the fleeting romances that this generation produces and attempting to rekindle the cadence that comes with a functioning family, the story follows Josh (Mark Duplass) and Emily (Katie Aselton), a couple on the verge of a breakup. After it’s made clear Josh cares more for his hardly rewarding occupation as a band manager — blowing his girlfriend off for call after call — he pulls a Say Anything and blares a cutesy indie song through her window, asking her to come along with him in picking up a puffy chair for his father’s birthday. With Josh’s brother Rhett coming along for the ride midway through the feature – a character who gives the contrasting opinion of Josh’s clear obsession with the materialistic – the three differentiating characters will hit you on three levels. Whether you’re compassionate, salacious or are penitent (among other things), the characters will cause you at least an inkling of self-reflection. If you’re like me and see yourself in each of the characters, well the more examination cinema can cause of one’s self the better.

Intelligent comprised of benevolently commonplace humor and dialogue that you’ve heard or spoken at one time or another, the greatest offspring that mumblecore has provided doesn’t mind taking its story one step at a time, walking its way to a genuine conclusion that will leave you pensive. Fantastic amateur actors and without a spurious note, The Puffy Chair is scant with its comfort and as serious as banal existence can be.

THE TOP THIRTY OF THE 2000s (thus far)

30. The Paper Will Be Blue (Radu Munteau, 2006)
29. Stuff and Dough (Cristi Puiu, 2001)
28. Don’t Worry, I’m Fine (Philippe Lioret, 2006)
27. The Class (Laurent Cantet, 2008)
26. The Ape (Jesper Ganslandt, 2009)
25. Linda Linda Linda (Nobuhiro Yamashita, 2005)
24. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu, 2007)
23. The Sea That Thinks (Gert de Graaff, 2000)
22. Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (Shane Black, 2005)
21. Sin City (Robert Rodriguez, 2005)
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20. The Bourne Supremacy (Paul Greengrass, 2004)
19. Goodbye Solo (Ramin Bahrani, 2009)
18. Irreversible (Gaspar Noe, 2002)
17. Dogville (Lars von Trier, 2003)
16. Ramblers (Nobushito Yamashita, 2004)
15. Catch Me If You Can (Steven Spielberg, 2002)
14. The Aviator (Martin Scorsese, 2004)
13. Shadow of the Vampire (E. Elias Merhige, 2000)
12. The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson, 2001)
11. The Puffy Chair (Mark + Jay Duplass, 2006)
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10. Stay Tuned…
09. Stay Tuned…
08. Stay Tuned…
07. Stay Tuned…
06. Stay Tuned…
05. Stay Tuned…
04. Stay Tuned…
03. Stay Tuned…
02. Stay Tuned…
01. Stay Tuned…

Because I’m doing a top 30 of the decade (and perhaps a top 50 when I’m done with my purging of the decade’s worthy titles over the course of the next few months), I decided to pop them off in 10s. So there’ll be three parts with brief reasons/reviews as to why they make this list. So today you’re getting numbers 30 to 21. Thursday or Friday 20 – 11 and Sunday (as always) the top ten with lengthier reviews. Oh and other superfluous lists like “top directors of the decade”. OK, lets begin!

After having seen this in April of 2008, I immediately understood that this was the key war film of the decade. While there are other great features that have been omitted here (one that placed 31 was Israel’s Lebanon which sports a similar thematic element), Radu Muntean’s The Paper Will Be Blue (Hirtia va fi albastra) mixes not only the feverish and exhausting components of Romanian New Wave, but is also the first of the European boom to embark on the soldier’s mentality. Not only does this work beautifully in capturing mindset of your average soldier during the Romanian Revolution in the late 80s, but it extends its reach into more topical wars such as the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Muntean’s collaboration with his actors — Paul Ipate in the lead as Costi to Costi’s best friend Dragos in Dragos Bucur and their fermenting lieutenant established naturally by Adi Carauleanu — mesh this into a controlled situation of fragmentation that both tiptoes amidst the animosity in frantic war and touches hearts with its implied conclusion.

Oh no you didn’t! Oh yes, I just did — back to back Romanian New Wave! Cristi Puiu’s inception into cinema, Stuff and Dough (Marfa si banii) is a typical crime story told with the utmost patience, stripping away conspiracy and speculation – a genius fabrication considering the heart of the story is a concealed box that must be driven across the country. This also marks Dragos Bucur’s second consecutive appearance on this list as best friend of the protagonist, Vali. After Ovidiu (portrayed by a half-bored, half-invested Alexandru Papadopol as the film’s prime detriment) is told by Doncea (Doru Ana in a subtly intense performance) that if he delivers an ordinary box of “stuff” from their humble village to Bucharest he’ll pay him, Ovidiu takes the opportunity in hopes of becoming a sort of crime prodigy to Doncea, though that is never as explicitly stated. Even though he’s told to travel alone, his pal Vali tags along because his girlfriend Bety (the always lovely Ioana Flora) needs a trip. So the trio — together in an unstable automobile with a peculiar box that Vali sporadically wants to open — sets off on a most peculiar of road trips. It isn’t all quiet as events occur that make you more suspicious of the box, as the activity it generates is quite worrisome. Permeated with great dialogue that speaks of little stories that defines each of these characters without any pressure to, Mr. Puiu’s debut explains why he’s one of the filmmakers to keep an eye on (even if you aren’t too fond of The Death of Mr. Lazarescu like I am).

Being fortunate to catch this before Melanie Laurent’s name became a synonym for greatness, Philippe Lioret’s Don’t Worry, I’m Fine (Je vais bien, ne t’en fais pas) excels as much in projecting Melanie Laurent’s habitual talent as it does initiate one of the most questionable and morally speculative mysteries of the decade. The best of it all? It doesn’t lunge at the opportunity to exploit its viewers curiosity as a Zodiac would, but rather allows the feature to breathe as its audience does. A simple tale told delicately, Mr. Lioret’s adaptation of Olivier Adam’s first novel of the same name speaks of austere truths within the human condition. Back from a holiday, Lili (Melanie Laurent) comes home to understand that her twin brother Loic — the only member of her family that she’s ever been open with — has gone missing. Her father Paul (remarkable expose of guilt by Kad Merad) fuming that Loic had abandoned his job as a son in the family, her mother Isabelle (Isabelle Renauld) with an peculiar disposition and the world wondering where the sensitive Loic is. Lili faces personally established trials — refusing to eat, manipulating her jovial demeanor to be lethargic — in fret for her brother’s well-being. When a letter comes that inspires a new conquest, Lili takes on the mystery of her brother’s whereabouts to extremes. Like a “who-dun-it” caper without an abrasive score and roughneck tactics, Don’t Worry I’m Fine takes the finest qualities from successful mysteries; molding them together to create an a chillingly demure tale of passion that holds no boundaries. Perennially beautiful and expertly affecting — most of which stems from Ms. Laurent’s leading portrayal.

A review I wrote for this feature in early 2009 can be found here. It’s a tad weary, but it was during my initial growth as a reviewer.

Back to back films where I can just redirect you to reviews written? Nice. It’s the first review written: Jesper Gandlandt’s The Ape (Apan)

OK, this is getting a little ridiculous. Three in a row. I’ll prompt a small snippet for this one because I feel my fingers getting bored. Overly delightful, chipper than dog chasing cars and more energized than that pink bunny, contemporary Japanese genius Nobuhiro Yamashita’s tale about an all girls punk-pop band preparations before they play a track list before they disband and head off to colleges is a story so potent with its theme that it’ll be found a better experience and leave you with a larger smile than any concert can provide. Full review here.

The third Romanian New Wave on my list, Cristian Mungiu’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (4 luni, 3 saptamani si 2 zile) is one of the more exhausting features… ever. Clocking in at 113 minutes it feels more like 311 as the plot drips away, hitting deeply emotional strings on its way down before eventually finding itself at the center of a repulsive tale with one of the more morbid themes this decade has given light to. The key component of this film that keeps it from becoming a begrudged viewing for myself and most viewers alike is that it has a mellisonant protagonist. Anamaria Marinca plays Otilia, a good friend of an irritating woman seeking a back alley abortion (as they were illegal in the 80s, the era in which this is set) in Gabita. Otilia ‘assists’ — if you can call the hurdles she jumps for her friend merely assistance — her friend in finding a place for the abortion to occur and an abortionist to perform the task. His name is Bebe (Doru Ana) and he fits the part of executioner with more ease than that of a doctor. While attempting to balance her romantic promises with boyfriend Adi, keep prepared for her examinations and help her friend through a cumbersome predicament, Otilia’s foundations slowly begin to crumble thanks to the different weights of stress being applied upon her shoulders. It’s this performance by Anamaria Marinca that is indescribable (there are literally no words for me mush together to explain my adoration for her work here) that both personifies Mungiu’s morbid fixation and embeds a sense of mortality in this tale. Although 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days has its share of issues, Marinca’s performance elevates this feature into a whole new atmosphere, where to be melancholic is to breath and to behold grueling happenstance is to turn your head in a different direction.

Alright, I somewhat cheated. I threw this film on — it was the first on my “to see” list of the aughts — a few weeks ago when I was getting used to the idea of diving into films from the ’00s that I hadn’t seen. So this is formally the first film from that list to crack my decade list. A little seen gem from the Netherlands, The Sea That Thinks (De zee die denkt) is what you get when you blend the fragility of the contemporary mind with French New Wave filmmaking along the lines of Bresson’s Diary of a Country Priest. Here the story — if you can call it as such it’s ne’er a narrative — is  an expose on a frustrated novelist Bart Klever (Bart Klever) as he expels his rants pertaining to society through draft after draft of a novel he can’t find a soul in. Gert de Graff’s first (and so far only) feature is composed primarily of narration and peculiar symbolic gestures which cover the screen in an attempt at hitting you on duel levels. It’s a very poetic piece that ruminates heavily upon existentialism and as usual it does cross into pretension now and then, but these flaws are minimal in comparison to the abundance of truth spoken — or rather, pondered — in this film. There’s one piece amongst the ranting that boils down to: people are conditioned to inflict pain upon their existence through a vicious circle of trying to obtain what they want rather than understand who they are; that objects cannot define a person, that people are so blinded by media initiated ostentation that they lose sight of themselves. Films like these are why I keep my DVD rotation at a high level and it’s films like these that allow desolate viewers to know they’re not alone. Lucid abstraction — as paradoxical as this Dutch masterpiece.

Witty, complex, fascinating, identifiable, thrilling — each of these words represents a facet that can be easily found in Shane Black’s Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang in an archetypal formula that is entirely palpable, but the cause of ebullition if attempted to be recreated. A one and only and here’s why: First, you’ve got Robert Downey Jr. in his most eager as the protagonist Harry Locke, an inept thief who is thrown into a topsy-turvy world filled with circumstance and people further from criminal abolition than he is himself. This, mind you, all stems from his stumbling into an audition room for a role as a private eye while leading police on a footrace. After the audition, he finds himself at a party where he meets Gay Perry (a never better Val Kilmer), a private eye who suggests Harry tag along with him to get a better feel for the character he’ll be portraying. Toss in the conspicuous death of a struggling actress who Harry takes a shine to followed by 80 minutes of the most hilarious exploitation of happenstance in cinema and you’ve got one of the utmost winning formulas of the decade. Its representation of “neo-noir” puts the easily malign feature with plentiful uncertainty into perspective and hits just about every note along its path to a rather sweet conclusion. Apart from being a tad rushed at the end, Mr. Black’s directorial debut is everything a film fan could want in a film (and more).

Reaching the end of part one is Robert Rodriguez’s Sin City — a film that is as cunning with its color palette as it is cleverly edited and skillfully performed. As this is by far the most accessible film on my list thus far, I feel it less necessary to indulge in the synopsis. Essentially: The Roark Family, while sitting upon a holy throne or a political office, is controlling Basin City. There are four stories that are either directly or indirectly tied into The Roarks: Marv (one helluva performance by Mickey Rourke that singlehandledly revitalized his career) and his vendetta against everyone suspect of killing his one night stand in Goldie; Dwight (Clive Owen) and the Old Towne girls not wanting to be tread upon; Hartigan (Bruce Willis) and his attempt at securing a child he saved from being raped as a kid — now a woman — in Nancy, while fending off That Yellow Bastard, aka Senator Rourke’s son. Each story is composed with Robert Rodriguez wittily mixing both classic film-noir elements with the erratic tendencies that he founded a decade prior in From Dusk Till Dawn. There’s a security in Rodriguez’s brutes that makes such an absurd environment feel safe and nearly friendly. This allows viewers to escape into this demi-realm with more ease and a longer lasting impression. It’s one of my personal favourites to rewatch as the visual design becomes increasingly more compelling with each replay, if for nothing else. It’s not flawless, but beauty seldom is. Give me a round two already.

THE TOP THIRTY OF THE 2000s (thus far)

30. The Paper Will Be Blue (Radu Munteau, 2006)
29. Stuff and Dough (Cristi Puiu, 2001)
28. Don’t Worry, I’m Fine (Philippe Lioret, 2006)
27. The Class (Laurent Cantet, 2008)
26. The Ape (Jesper Ganslandt, 2009)
25. Linda Linda Linda (Nobuhiro Yamashita, 2006)
24. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu, 2007)
23. The Sea That Thinks (Gert de Graaff, 2000)
22. Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang (Shane Black, 2005)
21. Sin City (Robert Rodriguez, 2005)
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20. Stay Tuned…
19. Stay Tuned…
18. Stay Tuned…
17. Stay Tuned…
16. Stay Tuned…
15. Stay Tuned…
14. Stay Tuned…
13. Stay Tuned…
12. Stay Tuned…
11. Stay Tuned…
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10. Stay Tuned…
09. Stay Tuned…
08. Stay Tuned…
07. Stay Tuned…
06. Stay Tuned…
05. Stay Tuned…
04. Stay Tuned…
03. Stay Tuned…
02. Stay Tuned…
01. Stay Tuned…