Summer Film Famine

After several false starts, I finally managed to pry myself away from home on the last day of my vacation and found my way into a movie theater, the first time since DJANGO UNCHAINED. In retrospect, I should have found something else to occupy my time. Like whittling.

As a lifelong cinephile, it pains me to my core to admit my increasing apathy concerning the state of film today. The passion is going out of the romance and it's breaking my heart. My attendance to my local multiplex or any cinema for that matter has dwindled down to rare occasions. While I hesitate to ring the death knell for the movie going experience, the truth of the matter is that I
feel partially responsible for its possible extinction.

Frankly, the lack of desirable product in the marketplace makes it difficult to care. This was no more evident than when I scanned Entertainment Weekly's Summer Movie Preview issue back in April and barely mustered up an audible "Meh".It just seemed more of the same, summer reruns, Hollywood-style with rehashes of all too familiar formulas: remakes, sequels, superheroes and generic sci-fi, giving me an interest rate of nil. Summertime is normally chock full o' fluff at the multiplex, so that isn't a surprise. The 2013 fluff model is more recycled than ever as though it's helping the environment. The lack of counter programming was appalling. A few held a glimmer of promise, but nothing held that Must See Movie factor.

I opted for ELYSIUM, mainly for writer/director Neill Blomkamp whose DISTRICT 9 garnered a deserved Best Picture Oscar nod after its release in 2009. Unfortunately, his new film has that been there/done that look and tone that made it feel like a sequel to his superior debut. It is apparent that Blomkamp is a visionary, but he seems disappointingly short-sighted, tossing in ideas and conceits from films, stories and TV shows into a Cuisinart and slathering it with his own warmed-over gravy. Matt Damon's Everyman persona serves him well as the hero of the piece, though without much distinction. Shartto Copley, so wonderful in DISTRICT 9, is so miserably annoying here. And Jodie Foster wins the Madonna Misguided Accent Award for this, the worst performance of her career. Some action sequences in ELYSIUM delivered necessary punch, enough to fill a movie trailer but not a whole film. By the end credits, Blomkamp's sophomoric sophomore effort was about as nutritious and satisfying as as a leftover Happy Meal.

So I chose badly. Big deal. I let the lauded FRUITVALE STATION slip through my fingers and could have caught BLUE JASMINE instead of ELYSIUM but I missed the showing by a half-hour. Oh, the sluggishness that apathy produces...

There is hope in this upcoming Fall crop of films coming up with new works by favorites of mine like Martin Scorsese, The Coen Brothers, David O. Russell and Alexander Payne, though many nabobs and nitwits will ignorantly label their work Oscar bait. And then there is Mark Cousins' documentary THE STORY OF FILM, an extensive history lesson as soon through fresh eyes and currently showing in weekly installments on TCM through December. It is a celebration of the art of cinema from the esoteric to its most commercial, a reminder of film's power and beauty from its humble beginnings through its finest hours and how, as I've said so myself, in the dark, we can see the light.

The irony that I am watching that particular show on TV doesn't escape me, but it doesn't matter. It helps restore the passion that has waned in the past couple of years. As for my displeasure over this last season, well, maybe I'm just not cut out for summer romances any longer.

True to the Grit

A remake of a classic film is a double-edged sword to be sure. On one hand you have the purist mentality that sides in favor of the original, as if another version of the same material, especially one of an iconic nature is somehow sacrilegious and will tarnish its image if even attempted. History bears this out as many a remake, re-imagining, rehash, rerun has been handled without the necessary ingredients: script, direction, passion, point. Do these horrid attempts to cash in on the good names of the initial offerings besmirch their good names? Not necessarily. Many times, it makes them stand out so much more. However, clogging the system with crap of the same name can bury the original under a pile of trash and a movie-going public, without any sense of historical perspective, will never knows the pleasures of a great old film because, well, the new one sucks. In the case of TRUE GRIT, you have a new version of Charles Portis' novel that follows the source material much closer than the Henry Hathaway version from 1969 which featured the Academy Award winning performance by John Wayne. This version is almost the swan song of a bygone era all of its own-the typical Hollywood western and few did it better in the 1960s better than Hathaway. With HOW THE WEST WAS WON (of which he shared duties with John Ford and George Marshall), NEVADA SMITH and THE SONS OF KATIE ELDER with The Duke, Hathaway was a real A-list studio talent with a style that was rapidly going out of fashion as he turned the last corner into the 1970s. Along with Wayne, GRIT starred a too-old Kim Darby as Mattie Ross, though she bring a lot of gumption to the role. Then there's Glen Campbell as Texas Ranger LaBoeuf who is green as a dollar bill in the acting department, though he isn't the embarrassment he could have been. For some reason, the studio-or Wayne himself-stuck the Duke with a lot of pop singers in his westerns to supposedly boost the box office draw, using with less than middling results-Ricky Nelson in RIO BRAVO, Frankie Avalon in THE ALAMO, Fabian in NORTH TO ALASKA, Bobby Vinton in BIG JAKE. The supporting players featured a fine cast of character actors including Robert Duvall as Lucky Ned Pepper, Jeff Corey and a just moments before EASY RIDER Dennis Hopper. Hathaway's take on Portis delivers the goods in a grand style that just screams Hollywood studio system, but still manages to remain true to the source in a roundabout way that doesn't insult the material, even if it does shine it to a high gloss. As for The Duke, he really does pull out the stops one last time, one of the few characters he allowed himself to play without being, well, The Duke. He really could be a damn good actor if he tried and his Rooster would a high benchmark to aim for any future interpretations. I really get a kick out of his exit line: "Well, come see a fat old man sometime!" before riding off into the sunset once more time. As adapted and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, the 21st century TRUE GRIT adheres to Portis' book and pays ever so slight homage to its first incarnation in very satisfying ways. In fact, when the final shootout occurs with the same dialogue, it is as rousing a film moment as any I've felt in the past five years, since it combines the best of all three worlds to make one for the ages. The tone of the film is somber, but playful, in keeping with the Coen Brothers style. The look of GRIT is splendidly bleak with cinematography by Roger Deakins, the best in the business. My only criticism lies with the editing, the Coens cutting way too sharply occasionally from scene to scene, upsetting the flow in places. This weight of the story falls on the strength of the Mattie Ross character, played this time by the believably feisty Hailee Steinfeld, who rises to the challenge like an old pro. She is one of the best young acting discoveries in ages. Matt Damon elevates the LaBoeuf role into something to be cherished, a fine supporting turn that reminds us again of what fine work he is capable of doing, even if he doesn't sing the title song. (Advantage: Campbell!) And Barry Pepper as Lucky Ned Pepper (a descendant perhaps?) is much like the movie itself, a mash-up of both Robert Duvall from the first and Henry Dean Stanton. And of course Jeff Bridges plays Rooster Cogburn with such an infectiously ornery spirit that makes one forget that he's really something to be feared-a raging alcoholic with a badge and a gun. In the end, Bridges finds the heart and soul of Rooster and the real hero within. I see Bridges' Rooster as an elder version of his character in Robert Benton's BAD COMPANY, a sensational and underrated western from the early seventies that has much in common with this TRUE GRIT. Bridges' long career culminates in the last couple of years, but I think if he hadn't won an Oscar last year, he would have for this performance, much like The Duke himself. If I had a preference-the Coke vs Pepsi Challenge where I would have to choose one over the other, I'd have to give to the Coens. They've made the best oater (as Variety used to call westerns) certainly of this new decade, a dubious honor to be sure since there have been, what, this one, JONAH HEX and a couple on the Hallmark Channel? But this TRUE GRIT proves that westerns are still a viable cinematic genre, especially where it counts for Hollywood-at the box office. Maybe remakes are the only way new westerns can get the green light in this day and age, other than something like COWBOYS VS ALIENS. If so, they might at well continue panning for gold in the John Wayne catalog. RIO BRAVO, anybody?