"Go West" (1925)

Buster Keaton is often praised for being the Great Stone Face. True enough Keaton's dead pan expression at all the increasingly crazy antics in Go West is one of its most notable aspects. The humor stems from the disconnect between Keaton and the slapstick he performs with dutiful commitment. But it also comes from Keaton playing characters that are totally serious and dedicated. Keaton isn't emotionless; he's a Charlie Brown-esque figure sighing a wearing, aware sigh at the lot life has dealt him. This makes it much easier to accept the plot of Go West, which is essentially about Keaton (credited as "Friendless") befriending a cow, Brown Eyes. Sure it's a silly plot but it's not one Keaton entirely wants us to take seriously. Keaton's character takes it so damn seriously that we're meant to rightfully laugh in the face of the absurdity of it. Keaton spends the back-half of the film trying to save the cow from going to the slaughterhouse while getting the rest of the herd to their destination -- the second task he takes upon himself because he's simply too darn earnest not to help out his boss. The train the cattle is on gets put off course by a group of bandits and Keaton is forced to take an alternative route. In the film's most memorable sequence, he lets loose the hundreds of cattle upon an unsuspecting city where they upset traffic and at one point make good on the expression "bull in a china-shop". Then the film's best moment is its final joke; "I want her," says Keaton pointing, presumably to the boss's daughter. Nope, to the cow. It should be cheesy but the expression on Keaton's face sells the moment home. He means it and because he believes it so do we, and thus we can't help but laugh.

Grade: A-

Left on the Cutting Room Floor: Films I Watched But Didn't Review This Year

For various reasons I occasionally don't review films that I watch and though it's a rarity it sometimes makes me feel as though there's a lack of completism to the blog. So I decided to dig up the films that for one reason or another I didn't feel like or didn't have time to write about.

Breathless (1959) - The deeply influential French New Wave film about a petty criminal fleeing to Paris from cops after he kills a police officer is filled with then groundbreaking technical innovations, but what stands out about Jean-Luc Godard's debut film is its attitude. It still feels lively and bursting with energy and ideas despite how long it's been since its release. 

Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 2 (2013) - It's not as though it's the worst film I've seen (I've seen lots of less watchable films than Twilight just in this year alone) but I was feeling unmotivated to write about a movie where there doesn't feel as though there's much to say beyond how lazy and uninspired it is. And as it seems so patently obvious and widely acknowledged that came across as redundant to me.

Jaws (1975) - Steven Spielberg's horror classic helped establish the summer blockbuster but it feels so far removed from the blockbusters it helped inspired that it almost feels quaint to describe it as a blockbuster. Spielberg was a New Hollywood brat and he fills the film with little, artsy touches that make it more than just a horror film. Although he does provide plenty of exciting horror in spades. The mechanical difficulties with the shark forced Spielberg to be more creative and show it less which helps make the film into something so thrilling: the biggest fear we have is that of the unknown.

Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004) - Wes Anderson has always had a droll visual flare that makes him the dictionary definition of quirky. He supplies plenty of melancholy underneath his well-manicured, highly stylized fantastical visions, but some of the human element gets lost in Life Aquatic (possibly the worst of Anderson's oeuvre). It's humorous and whimsical but the tale of an Jacques Cousteau-like oceanographer, documentary maker feels a little too hollow for its own good.

North by Northwest (1959) - Alfred Hitchcock had made and would continue to make some of the best suspenseful thrillers anyone ever has but few were quite as purely fun as North by Northwest. The crop-duster and Mt. Rushmore scenes are two of the most expertly crafted action sequences in cinema and otherwise the film is a cracker-jacking good time of mistaken identity, wordplay, and espionage.

Run Lola Run (1998) - The kinetic and highly stylish film about a young woman tasked with getting 100,000 dollars in twenty minutes or her boyfriend will die comes at you like a jolt of lightning. The film is shot with a frenetic and pulsating style that makes it utterly cool and exciting to watch.

Citizen Kane (1942) - What can I say about Citizen Kane that hasn't already been said. Widely regarded as one of the greatest films ever made -- if not the greatest -- and rightfully so. Orson Welles' modernist masterpiece broke new grounds by synthesizing film techniques into a brilliant examination of power, perception and loss.

Touch of Evil (1958) - Yet another fantastic film by Orson Welles about a seedy American-Mexican border town at the peak of the noir tradition. It's shot in a fabulously moody lighting scheme and features one of the most iconic opening sequences in all of cinema, an amazing unbroken long take.

Double Indemnity (1944) - Billy Wilder's masterful, picthblack noir about a femme fatale who ensnares and conspires with an insurance salesman to kill her husband and walk away with the insurance money. Wilder's brilliant screenplay features sparkling, immaculate dialogue that is beautifully recited by Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, and Edward G. Robinson.

Dancer in the Dark (2000) -  Lars Von Trier provokes and emotionally manipulates at every turn in this wrenching human tale of a slowly going blind factory worker saving money to stop her son from suffering the same physical fate. In order to escape the misery of her existence (a misery that grows to disturbing limitations of tolerability), Selma (singer Bjork) imagines herself in musical numbers that grow organically out of the noise of the environments around her and save her from confronting the tragedy of the life surrounding her. 

This Week in Film (9/29/13 - 10/5/13)

In recent days I have been both bogged down with school work and coming down with a cold. That's unfortunately detracted from my ability to both watch and write about movies. Though my output has declined a bit (and I can't necessarily say that will change as next week is in some even more hectic), I'm strong in my resolve to keep at it as best that I can. This previous bit of polite statement likely sounds a little strange since I did still manage a number of reviews during this time. Movies (and to be fair television shows as well) are my comfort and my escape, and to give up on them in the face of the ups and downs of life, well, that just seems silly.

Let's tally it up:

Breaking Bad: "Felina" - The finale of Breaking Bad hasn't detracted from its well-earned place in the pantheon of great television dramas but it's been somewhat divisive critically with some feeling it wrapped up a bit too neatly. I agree but I also enjoyed and appreciated what took place in the finale too much to let that entirely dissuade me.

The Rules of the Game (1939) - Jean Renoir's masterpiece comedy of manners that sneaks in some sly -- and then extremely controversial -- class critique. It's hilarious even as it's deeply humanistic. 

The Great Dictator (1940) - Charlie Chaplin's transition into sound film isn't the most concise effort but even in its shakiness there's still a lot of brilliant comedy that could have only come from the great comic director's imagination.

Cat People (1942) - The first of the Val Lewton horror films that displays the low budget scares of implying the supernatural forces just offscreen and in turn creating something far more frightening than anything that could actually be shown to us. 

Seven Up (1964) - I provide some thoughts on the first film in this renowned documentary series that stops in on a group of individuals every seven years starting at the age of seven.

My Man Godfrey (1936) - A classic screwball comedy about a homeless man turned butler for a nutty aristocratic family.

"My Man Godfrey" (1936)

The plot of My Man Godfrey is one of those narratives that if you blink twice it all falls apart. The film takes place in one of those heightened realities that's more live action cartoon than anything in real life. This is part of the film's charm. People talk fast and do silly things, and it all comes across with a loose, off-the-cuff style (much of the film was improvised). And in this way it's in that fine tradition of screwball comedies from the 1930's and 1940's. Godfrey (William Powell) is a homeless man living in the city dump until by a string of circumstances far too intricate and wacky to describe -- it's best to see it for all it's delightful absurdity and hilarity -- he becomes the butler for an aristocratic family the Bullocks (who have such a fitting name). The family proves to be, put politely, kooky; they have exceedingly ridiculous demands and whims. They're selfish and reckless, especially in their expenses and their lavish lifestyle. The eldest daughter (Gail Patrick) tries to get Godfrey fired over a petty slight. The youngest daughter (Carole Lombard) obsessively, stalkerishly pines for him. The matriarch (Alice Brady) seems to be constantly in a state of flight of fancy inebriation. The only level-headed one is the father (Eugene Pallette) who is henpecked and ignored to the point of uselessness. They bicker and talk over one another and Godfrey keeps a level head through all their increasingly absurd antics. In a bit of Great Depression era social commentary, Godfrey, who we learn once came from wealth and now understands the pettiness of the wealthy, is grateful for the opportunity given to him even as he's bemused and turned off by the Bullocks. Yes, it's implausible but sometimes implausibility doesn't really matter when it's this deliriously fun. 

Grade: A-

Thoughts on "Seven Up" (1964)

It's not entirely fair to review Paul Almond and Michael Apted's Seven Up on it's own so take this more as some brief thoughts on the film. I say that it's not fair as the film gains a weight and poignancy when taken in concert with the other films of the "Up" documentary series (fair warning that I haven't seen any of the others ones yet). The film series stops in every seven years with the same group of people, starting from the age of seven. The first film was never made with the intention of following up with these participants. The goal was to see what the lives of children across the socioeconomic spectrum of Britain were like. While the first film isn't bad, it often times feels far too lightweight and frivolous. There's great humor and irony spun out from the questions asked about race, gender and class but it never feels as though the film really gives us a sense of who these different children are. Some are referred to by name but the film sketches in broad strokes and never really gets at the pressing question at its heart about how social class standing affects the lives of individuals. I give Seven Up the benefit of the doubt though because it is an entertaining and interesting thought experiment in action and because I can tell from just this first film how -- if done right -- the later installments will really make this film carry much more meaning and weight in hindsight.

"Cat People" (1942)

Cat People is all about those untamed, repressed passions people have lingering deep down inside of themselves. Cat People's id comes in the form of Erena's (Simone Simon) black panther, her outward representation of her inner jealousy and raucous sexual appetite -- the kind well-to-do gentlemen, especially in the 1940's, fear to find their wives have. When her husband (Kent Smith) starts drifting away from her as Erena grows jealous and distrustful, she snaps and is lured in by that primal -- and supernatural -- desire to exact vengeance on those who've wronged her. Unlike that untamed feline rage though, Cat People is very collected in terms of its storytelling; it's not until late in its run time that we actually get any real action but in that time it builds a creeping sense of paranoia. The cat is playing with that ball of yarn and slowly unspooling the thread. The horror is almost entirely suggestion and director Jacques Tourneur turns those moments of  horror into scenes palpable with tension; in the tradition of the best horror, it's all shadowy lighting, eerie sound design and the implied presence of dark things just outside the frame. The lesson of classic horror such as Cat People is that fear of the unknown is the most powerful and potent fear of all. The film's own brand of mysterious sexual danger only makes it that much more unnerving.

Grade: A-

"The Great Dictator" (1940)

The most infamous moment in The Great Dictator -- and the one that has since inspired countless Charlie Chaplin kind of looks like Adolf Hitler jokes -- doesn't occur until the last ten or so minutes in the film. It seems so strange that this moments plays out for such a short length of time; the film goes back and forth between the story of a Jewish barber and a fictional dictator so clearly standing in for Hitler (both played by Chaplin) that we're constantly anticipating the moment when their two stories will collide -- though the moment itself is actually a bit tedious and dull sadly enough. Though the dictator is not Hitler but the tyrant of fictional Tomainia, Chaplin's mocking jabs are so specific in their aim at Hitler that it's hard to think of anything else. Back upon its release in 1940, more Americans would have been familiar with Chaplin than Hitler. Today the opposite is probably true. But you don't need to be familiar with Hitler or Nazi Germany to get in on Chaplin's joke; The Great Dictator is many things (a critique of tyrannical governments and megalomaniac personalities, a scathing satire of the Third Reich, a sweet, sentimental romance) but above all else it's pretty darn funny. Chaplin mixes social commentary with his ever committed slapstick. But there's also just a lot of really inspired silliness; his clearly fake use of German (politically incorrect but damn if it isn't funny all the same) or the dictator dancing with a giant balloon shaped like the globe. Though some of this wears its welcome out, much of it is simply too clever to ignore. Chaplin was ahead of his time with the political message; the U.S. had yet to enter the war, the government was neutral on their position towards Hitler, and he was making a bold statement. Though that statement sometimes seems quaint today, it still doesn't take away from the film's frequently winning humor.

Grade: A