251. Being John Malkovich

Song .- Binnen (Marco Borsato)

Movie: Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999)

In these supposedly enlightened times nobody has yet made a mainstream screwball comedy about a husband and wife cheating on each other with the same person. In some respects, that would probably be truer to the spirit of Frasier than the current reboot, but until someone reactivates the writers room of "The Ski Lodge", we'll have to make do with Being John Malkovich. When Craig Schwartz (John Cusack) discovers the portal to the actor's head, he notes that this opens up all kinds of philosophical questions, about the nature of self and the existence of souls. "Am I me? Is Malkovich Malkovich?" Craig, Maxine (Catherine Keener) and Lotte (Cameron Diaz) quickly lose interest in those questions, instead exploring how they can use Malkovich to live out their absurd (mostly sexual) fantasies. I have liked everything I've seen from Charlie Kaufman, but I do find it a bit unfortunate that he has become more self-consciously intellectual since Being John Malkovich.  His latter movies are not only more serious-minded explorations of the workings of the mind, but also strain a bit to be seen as such, even if I do find Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind his best work. 

The witty, intelligent inventiveness of Being John Malkovich stands out in part because it doesn't overplay its weirdness. Floor 7 1/2 is in every way recognisable as an ordinary corporate floor; its denizens dress in standard business-casual and perform their tasks with a professional demeanor. It's just that everyone has to walk around with their head cocked because the ceilings have been lowered. The introduction explaining the history of the floor is funny and absurd, but also works as a satire of business culture. It's essentially a propaganda video that sugarcoats cost-cutting measures disregarding wokers' safety with cutesy quirkyness, highlighting how special one must feel to work in this environment. And even when the real fun starts, with Craig discovering the portal, that is depicted without too much fuss and with minimal special effects. You crawl through a muddy hole in the wall until you are suddenly sucked in and end up looking at the world through the eyes of John Malkovich. After 15 minutes you leave the man by falling out of the sky near the New Jersey Turnpike. It does get more complicated if it's Malkovich himself going through the portal or if someone is trying to be John Malkovich when another person is already in the actor. The former leads to the most (justifiably, not-to-be-spoiled under any circumstance) famous scene of the film, and the latter to a fantastically surreal chase sequence through Malkovich's unconscious that plays like a dry run for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. 

While the film goes to some cynical and dark places, and has a final scene worthy of a great Polanski horror movie, I also find it immensly charming and likable. Much of that is on John Malkovich, who plays 'himself' without any hint of vanity and is ridiculosly good in callibrating his performance based on who's in him. His interpretative dance aside, he does this with a lot of subtlety, grounding the film in its own reality and providing a sort of baseline for how nuts it can get without flying of the rails. It's strange that he didn't get an Oscar nomination for it. Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman deserved theirs, but this was their first feature and their giddiness in making it is so palpable it's easy to imagine them losing control over it with more unhinged performances/characters (everything involving Orson Bean is the weakest part of the film). That slightly juvenile giddiness also works in the film's favor though. All of Kaufman's films invite themselves to be seen as (at least somewhat) auto-biographical and Craig is his dumbest, least flattering alter ego. Most Kaufman characters face existential dread because they are sensitive souls too aware of the world's vast irrationality and unknowability. Craig's issues are more basic and more internal. When puppetteering he is too clever for his own good, and in the rest of his life he is a control freak too horny for his own good. If he was slightly more self-aware, he might have been able to make a film (or at least a puppet show!) like Being John Malkovich.  

250. Marie Antoinette

Song - Killer Queen (Queen)

Movie: Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola, 2006)

Quite remarkable how patiently this movie reveals its true colors. Much of the opening consists of Marie Antoinette (Kirsten Dunst) going through the neccessary rituals before her wedding to Louis XVI (Jason Schwartzman). At every step she is greeted by aristocrats with oddly-shaped pompous faces in heavy make up. The audience is not there to honor the new queen, but to control her, to make sure that at no point she deviates from the protocol. Marie never does, but Dunst always highlights her discomfort with the whole thing, portraying her with a youthfully naive rebelliousness and vulnerability, as if she has come straight of the set of one of her contemporary teen comedies. Schwartzman's ridiculosly funny performance - he plays Louis as a limp wimp coming straight from the set of Wes Anderson's most awkward film - creates even more sympathy for the young princess. Boh actors do a great job of highlighting how little all these rituals matter. The king and queen's first dance at their wedding may well be the most literal depiction of "going through the motions" ever put on film. And Coppola is so meticulous in showcasing the hollow ridiculousness of all this, that she has somehow even made the horses gallop in line with her vision. One of the funniest scenes is a simple shot of horse carriages moving across the Gardens of Versailles. 

The film continues mercilessly tearing through Versailles after the wedding, presenting the court as a hotbed of gossip where everyone is just keeping appearances. Marie is one of the main targets of that gossip, due to her childless marriage. As getting a heir to the throne to cement the friendship between Austria and France is the main reason for the union in the first place, Marie constantly receives chiding letters from her mom Maria Theresa (Marianne Faithfull) commanding her to get on with it, which seems to also be the main function of Ambassador Mercy (Steve Coogan). Meanwhile, Louis spends all his waking hours in a state of confused terror, and the film leaves it ambigous whether that terror extends to his sex life, or whether he is gay. In any case, his wife keeps getting the blame for it. 

This depiction of the tragic, oppressive absurdity of Versailles is funny, just and convincing, but also a bit monotonous and obvious. It's not that sophisticated or challenging to take the piss out of European monarchy, especially not for Americans. I still enjoyed the righteously contemptous glee and the sense of showmanship Coppola brought along for the ride, but was a bit miffed that this was seemingly all there was to it. And just when I resigned myself to it, the film suddenly shifted gears. With Marie adjusting to life at the court and even enjoying it, Coppola moves away from her self-reflexively ironic tone to revel in the opulence of it all. The film takes its time to depict all the gowns and shoes Marie gets to wear, and the joy she gets out of wearing and choosing them. We get close ups of delectable desserts, and see Marie and her friends at the court have fun dancing to anachronistic punk music (the film is good for many reasons, but if bringing Siouxsie and the Banshees and Bow Wow Wow to my attention was all it did, it would have been enough) at masked balls where men and women have all the freedom to flirt and frolic. And yet, still, when Marie finally does get a baby, it is involuntarily taken away from her to be breast-fed by the correct people. 

Considerations of Sofia Coppola and her movies often end up focussing on her wealth and privilege and her supposed inability to make movies outside of it. It's obvious that being the daughter of Francis Ford Coppola has helped her enormously in getting a career, but it's equally obvious that she is a great and intelligent filmmaker who has very much thought about the world beyond her bubble. I was too young when I saw Lost in Translation and don't think I'll like it much more now, but really loved The Beguiled and The Bling Ring. Marie Antoinette may be her best though as it becomes about more than just the queen herself. Coppola has a lot of sympathy for the excessive demands put upon Marie Antoinette to always act in a correct way, and to be the woman and wife the world around her expects her to be, but she also knows that this is not unique to her. In fact, the rituals at the royal court don't serve to reflect society, but to shape it. If the queen doesn't perform her marital duties and procreate how can the rest of France be expected to? Marie Antoniette's struggles are those of many women, but it's easier to bear them when you are rich and powerful. Towards the end of the film, Marie Antoinette has become a happy mother and wife and powerful queen, yet still influenced by her past as an insecure teenager and political pawn. All of that shapes how we view her, and Coppola challenges us to embrace conflicting, contadictory feelings. In the final scenes she mourns along with Marie when she loses one of her kids, but gets back to her ironic distance when she is oblivious and indifferent towards the French Revolution coming for her head.  

249. When Harry Met Sally...

Song - Every Time I Think Of You (The Babys)

Movie: When Harry Met Sally... (Rob Reiner, 1989)

In some corners of the internet, Martin Scorsese was already the devil for not allowing people to uncritcally enjoy Marvel movies. Now, those same people are pissed he doesn't let them piss. When some theaters decided to put in an arbitrary intermission in Killers of the Flower Moon, editor Thelma Schoonmaker disgruntled some moviegoers, noting that this was a violation of the film. While her choice of words is a bit strong, she is absolutely right. Filmmakers don't just think about what people see in their movie, but also how they see it, and theaters don't just have the right to make unilateral cuts. The accumulating terror that slowly builds up in Killers of the Flower Moon, and is especially pronounced in the middle stretch that culminates with that surreal fire sequence (the most oppressive vision of hell Scorsese has yet imagined) would be far less effective with an intermission. Making it a difficult watch is part of the intent. 

I think Killers of the Flower Moon is a great movie, and so is When Harry Met Sally..., for precisely the opposite reason. I don't just mean that it is a comforting romantic comedy. Reiner is also always making choices to make sure the audience has the best possible time watching it. One of the loveliest parts of the film is a montage sequence showcasing life in snowy New York. We see happy children sledding towards the camera, beautiful shots of a white Central Park, some Christmas shopping, some romantic ice skaters. It's not a coincidence that this sequence comes right after the famous 'faking it' scene. I had not seen this movie or that scene before, but it is indeed as uproariously funny as advertised. The Christmas scenes following it serve as a sort of mini-intermission before the main business of the film continues. They let the audience compose itself, and let out out a few more stray laughs without missing much of the story, It's necessary too, as the next scene is the first New Year's dance, one of the key moments in the film. It sets up the ending and is the first time Harry (Billy Crystal) and Sally (Meg Ryan) become truly conscious of the possibility of love. 

For the audience that possibility of love is never much in doubt. Right from the opening scene, which doesn't waste any time setting up Harry and Sally, it is pretty obvious how the film will end. That predictability isn't a problem because almost every other scene is a classic, and because the writing is terrific. The film hits all the beats it needs to hit, but every decision our two lovers make, feels true to their characters. It is also one of those films that understands how interesting it is to fall in love with a friend. It gets that it's a situation that slows down your faculies for delicacy and tact, right at the moment when delicacy and tact are most needed. The movie has been criticised for putting its characters in sitcom situations, but while scenes such as Meg Ryan's big moment are indeed unrealistic, they are emotionally true and authentic expressions of the chaotically jubilant inner turmoil Harry and Sally experience. 

To come back full circle (and admittedly, be a little pretentious), there is a shorter distance between Harry and Ernest Burkhart (Leonardo Di Caprio's character in Killers of the Flower Moon) than we'd probably like to admit. Killers of the Flower Moon has been praised for its ending that implicates the audience and itself. I think the audience is far more implicated by Ernest himself, which is why so much writing goes out of its way to present him as a complete idiot or a complete sociopath. He is neither, he just acts in a way that we have all acted at some point in our lives; convincing ourselves that we can negotiate between two incongrous states of being, knowing deep down that we gotta make a decision at some point that might hurt somebody. 

248. Wall Street

Song - Money (Pink Floyd)

Movie: Wall Street (Oliver Stone, 1987)

The phone rings, followed by a pulsating drum beat announcing excitement and danger. Half asleep, Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) picks up to be greeted by "Money never sleeps, pal". Gordon Gekko (Micheal Douglas) is on the other end of the line hyping his protégé up with arrogantly confident wisecracks about how much money and sex he will provide him with, until the sunrise stops him in his tracks. Awestruck he exclaims "I've never seen a painting that captures the beauty of the ocean in a moment like this". He says it with an affected emphasis aimed to seduce Bud, but that doesn't make his sense of wonder less genuine. The scene ends with a half-dressed, speechless, heavily breathing Bud, and the return of that fabulous drum motif, that appears in a number of scenes, and always for just a couple of seconds. Just enough to excite you for what's coming, and to want more of it. 

The sunrise described by Gordon Gekko is decent. But Stone's filmmaking choices (and Douglas' acting choices) make you feel that the sunrise is indeed the greatest goddamn sunrise the world has ever seen. And when, in another scene, Charlie Sheen quotes Art of War back to Michael Douglas, you will almost forget that they have just been humiliatingly put in their place by a rich British aristocrat, played by Terence Stamp. By the time the camera glides past the sksyscrapers of the Upper East Side and Bud notes that "this is home" in a montage set to the Talking Heads nobody will even think of Stamp, or the (im)morality of Wall Street trading anymore. In no way is this a knock on the film, which I abslolutely loved. Stone wants to put you in the mindset of Bud Fox, and to a lesser extent, Gordon Gekko, to evoke how it feels to be in the position they are in, or rather, believe themselves to be. Gekko, and in his footsteps, Fox, are influential Wall Street businessman with a lot of money, power, connections and access. Though the film explores this, it is equally, if not more, interested in how this reality distorts their worldview and makes them experience life as if they are untouchable giants on top of the world. It's absolutely intoxicating and when Stone and Douglas tell they are surprised by real Wall Street traders telling them that Gordon Gekko is their hero, they should not be believed for a second. The film is designed to elicit exactly that reaction, at least until the moment Gekko wrecks Bluestar, and the film puts Martin Sheen's (I like that he plays Charlie's dad) perspective more to the foreground. 

The famous "Greed is Good" line is one of those moments people like to cite when discussing how easily audiences miss the point of the film. Douglas' lines though come in the context of a longer speech in which he theatirically complains about the decline of America as an industrial nation, but is spot on (even when looking from a more leftist perspective!) about the issue at hand, namely that a corporation shouldn't have 30 vice-presidents who are nothing but symbolic paper pushing figureheads producing nothing, yet earning millions of dollars in salary. If greed is the opposite of that, as Gekko implies, it's at least not bad. Gekko also proceeds to note that greed in all its forms is good, not just greed for money, but also for life, knowledge, and love. And well, who can argue that greed for knowledge is bad? Of course, it's ridiculous for Gekko to put his greed in oppoistion to the greed of the vice-presidents, but there is a lot more going on the scene than just "look at this capitalist idiot, propagating that greed is good, when greed is, in fact, bad." This is even further complicated by the fact that Oliver Stone is just about the least modest mainstream filmmaker out there. The man will exploit every filmmaking resource he has at his disposal to make his movie, and more often than not, it's damn good. 

Daryl Hannah is also good. She got a Razzie Award for her role, and though it's been well documented by now that the Razzie folks are nothing more than attention-seeking smug bastards, neither the cast and crew of Wall Street nor herself were very happy with her role and performance. It suprised me to find that out, because she is really the one character that embodies both the seductiveness of Wall Street life and its rottenness. She is essentially a high-class prostitute 'used' by Gordon Gekko to lure young folks like Bud into his inner circle. She can't escape this life, but also enjoys it. She gets to express herself as an interior designer, and genuinely falls in love with Bud. Yet she also knows that she only has as much freedom as Gekko allows her, all of which gets to the forefront in her final, fantasitcally written and performed, scene with Bud.  She is the film's most complex character, and I don't think it would be nearly as great without her.

247. First Spaceship on Venus

Song - The Final Countdown (Europe)

Movie: First Spaceship on Venus - Der schweigende Stern (Kurt Maetzig, 1960)

American professor Hawling is part of an international crew of scientists, engineers and astronauts on a spaceship bound for Venus. When not working, he likes to play chess against his fellow passengers, usually beating them soundly. The one opponent he can't defeat is the ship's robot Omega. After the umpteenth mate, Sumiko, the Japanese doctor on board, confronts Saltyk, the Polish developer of the robot. She explains that while Omega may be an impressive technical feat of machinery, it lacks a heart. Saltyk listens to her, rewires Omega, and when the robot lets the professor beat it, a rejuvenated Hawling immediately starts bragging to his team about his great chess prowess, completely oblivious to what has happened. 

This little subplot is a good example of the film's good-natured corniness, for better and for worse. It's easy to feel sympathetic towards a film that has such a sincerely utopian view of the potential of peaceful international cooperation to improve humanity. We are told that beyond just discovering extraterrestrial life, the Earth's greatest minds on board of the ship are also close to eradicating hunger and physical labor. The world will then see the value of international, interracial solidarity (worth noting though that the black passenger on the ship is the only one without a nationality - he is 'African' - and the only one who speaks German with an accent) and come together to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons and end the Cold War. But the film is afraid to make any interesting/fun/artistic choice that could distract it from bringing its message across. The acting and the dialogues are so wooden that the actors may as well stand in front of a Powerpoint and give a presentation. 

I didn't realise this before watching it, but this is a film produced by DEFA, the state-owned film studio of East Germany. That does put the punch-line of the chess story in a different view. In an American film this would have been a pointed, sharp joke that's worth thinking about. In this context, it is state-approved messaging, regurgigated propaganda that's not even ferocious enough to work as serious criticism (the film's many reminders that the Americans are responsible for Hiroshima are at least a bit saltier). Now, some would argue that on the global political stage, even during the Cold War, the Americans were the biggest power 'colonising' the world with their culture and their capitalism, and that the communist state-produced films were a subversive corrective to that. But that glesses over the question of why the Americans were/are more succesfull in promoting their culture and lifestyle to the rest of the world. Part of the answer is that you will see in American movies jokes about dumb Americans that are critical of the very fundaments of American life. In First Spaceship on Venus there is not a single lighthearted moment that would allow for even a little doubt or ridicule of a communist idea. 

246. A Canterbury Tale

Song - Solsbury Hill (Peter Gabriel)

Movie: A Canterbury Tale (Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, 1944)

Allison Smith's (Sheila Sim) plans are altered the moment she gets out of the train station in Chillingbourne. She has come to the (fictional) town as a Land Girl, a woman called on to work on a farm to replace the men off fighting the war, only to become the latest victim of a mysterious figure who sneaks up on women in the dark and puts glue in their hair. Together with Peter Gibbs (Dennis Price) and Bob Johnson (John Sweet, an actual sergeant in his only acting role), respectively a British and an American soldier, she sets out to uncover the identity of the "glue man". 

A Canterbury Tale can't reach the great heights of A Matter of Life and Death (few things can), but it does share its genuine love of people, and their interactions. There are many movies (that present themselves to be) about the importance of human connection, but it's much rarer for a movie to be about the process of human connection. There is a short scene where Bob is calling his buddy in London to tell him he is delayed, He is observed from the background by a bemused Peter. There is no deeper meaning or subtext to this scene. It is simply about how wonderful it is to express interest in what your friend is up to, and more generally, how wonderful it is to be willing to engage with the world around you and feel at ease in doing so. It does matter here that Allison, Bob and Peter are all presented with poise, confidence and earnestness, qualities that Powell and Pressburger seem to find vital for being able to experience and approach the world and the people in it with comfort, curiosity, joy and moral seriousness. Above all else, expressing how great it is to be able to be like that, is what both A Canterbury Tale and A Matter of Life and Death are utimately about. 

I wonder if A Canterbury Tale influenced Twin Peaks. In particular the relationship between Bob and Peter almost plays as a blueprint for Dale Cooper and Sheriff Truman. The development of their friendship is as important for them as solving Laura's murder/finding the identity of the glue man, but more than that, it's about their heightened awareness of how fulfilling it is to behave in ways that give you the opportunity to experience the joys of humanity (including damn good tea/coffee!). Both Twin Peaks and A Canterbury Tale see this as a sacred, miraculous experience, that is crucial to be able to withstand, though not necessarily defeat, the ultimate evil, whether that's BOB, or Nazi's. In Twin Peaks this is mostly communicated through the shamelessly melodramatic formal choices; in A Canterbury Tale mostly through the performances and the constant reminders of the spiritual context around Canterbury. The film insists that the characters are not only aware of their connection to each other, but also to the nature and history of their surroundings, seeing them as basically direct descendants of the pilgrims of Chaucer's time.  

What stops the film from greatness is that the glue man is essentially a stand-in for Powell and Pressburger. Once caught, he explains that he wants to stop the women from going out with the soldiers in town. His reasoning has nothing to do with the war effort or with sexual morality. Rather, he is simply a raconteur who has always dreamt of preaching about the history of Canterbury, without being able to find a right audience. Now that his little town is filled to the brink with bored soldiers, he can finally fulfiill his dream explaining Canterbury's special place in the history of England. The film itself is even preachier. Almost every plot point ultimately serves to teach a moral, practical or historic lesson, with the overarching message being that Americans and Britons have much in common, and should be friends who work together to make the world a better place, whether that entails unmasking the glue man or beating the Nazi's. Some of these scenes are really infantilising, in both content and form. For example a point about the idiocy of American isolationists is disguised as a joke to not come off as cheap propaganda, but it is so blatantly the latter that the attempt to disguise it only makes a very valid argument come off as insidious manipulation. 

245. Ladyhawke

Song - Total Eclipse Of The Heart (Bonnie Tyler)

Movie: Ladyhawke (Richard Donner, 1985)

In the early days of this project I wrote up The Fabulous Baker Boys, lacking the vocabulary to talk about 'Makin Whoopee' without it coming off as creepy or boringly obvious. But I can say that it's a curse on the audience to cast 80's Michelle Pfeiffer and then make her appear half the time in the guise of a hawk. Out of jealousy, the Bishop of Aquila (John Wood) has damned her and her lover Navarre (Rutger Hauer); she, Isabeau, is a hawk by day, while he is a wolf by night. And every sunset and sunrise they are tortured by an ephemeral glimpse of each other's human bodies. They can only bring an end to this ordeal by appearing together at the Bishop during a solar eclipse. That's why they need Gaston (Matthew Broderick), the only one to have ever escaped out of the prison beneath the Bishop's palace. Of course, the real reason for Gaston is that without him this would have to be an austere film about two cursed lovers silentily battling the forces of nature and of the Bishop. That  would have required a lot physically from Hauer and Pfeiffer but the real pain would have been for the producers, who would not have gotten their return on investment. 

Still, you should be able to satisfy commercial demands without being unfavorably compared to Black Knight. Who doesnt't remember the 2001 comedy about a stereotypical black comedian who has to adapt to his surroundings when he is magically transported into medieval times? It's much better than Ladyhawke, which essentially imagines how a stereotypical 80's high school teen would behave when transported into medieval times. Firstly, Martin Lawrence is inherently funnier than Matthew Broderick. Secondly, Broderick plays Gaston as a lazy student who gets accidentally sent to 14th Century Italy and now has to use his rudimentary knowledge of history to survive. That could be quite funny, but Gaston is conceived as a pickpocket from the actual Middle Ages, and the film wants him to be both that and a time-travelling Ferris Bueller. Which leads to a lot of irritatingly daft lines, often enunciated by Broderick as if he is participating in an oral exam. 

The film's attempts to merge the medieval with the contemporary also extend to the score produced by Alan Parsons. It's typical 80's synth-heavy (I think) pop with sudden ocassional outburts that make it seem as if you are listening to an orchestral score for a traditional epic. I quite liked the music, but it never really meshes with the action and the images on screen, making it feel a bit too disparate from the movie. The truth is that Hauer is the only one who succesfully adapts to what the film is trying to do. He portrays Navarre as a stoic courageous romantic who would rather express his love for Isabeau and his honorable family history than his discontent with Gaston. He is often given sarcastic zingers in response to Broderick's shenaningans, but he delivers them as if they are beneath his dignity, as if he feels that he shouldn't be saying what he does.

244. Son of Mine

Song - Bestel Mar (Rowwen Heze)

Movie: Son of Mine - Gluckauf (Remy van Heugten, 2015)

You can't tack on a redemption arc in the final 15 minutes after spending 1,5 hour wallowing (convincingly and entertaingly!) in bleak violent nihilism. It's not only absurd to ask for sympathy for one of the most irredeemable brutes I've seen recently, it's also a betrayal of the writing and Bart Slegers's performance. The film is really strong in portraying Lei and his son Jeffrey (Vincent van der Valk) as figures fully devoid of humane qualities, or any capacity for moral introspection and goodness. Both men act as if they are driven purely by greed and prehistoric survival instincts - one of the film's most memorable moments is van der Valk's evil, lecherous little laugh as he discovers that he gets to transport some young foreign prostitutes for a crime boss. He doesn't end up doing anything to the women, but that laugh is horrifying enough. 

The aforementioned crime boss Vester is played by Johan Leysen as if Christoph Waltz was the film's first choice. He carries himself with an unearned air of sophistication, pretending that he is trying to save ghouls like Lei and Jeffrey from themselves, while desperately needing them for his dirty jobs. He is a ruthless killer giving orders in farmers overalls, befitting the setting. The film takes place in the mining villages in the southern part of the Dutch province of Limburg and all the actors speak in dialect. Van Heugten smartly does not tie any social considerations to Jeffrey and Lei's behaviour, while still showing how their lives are shaped by context-specific details. A meeting with gangsters from Liege is quite notable as it reminds that in a big city these men would hide in the underwould, while in the Limbug vilages they are part of the fabric of society, living their lives alongside everyone else. As none of the villagers are introverted types, this leads to some tense and darkly funny conforntations that always have the potential to explode in many different directions. That makes its key plot twist, expressed only with a quiet cut, only more effective.

I was so surprised and enamored by how van Heugten set up the final act that I thought he could do only one thing to lose me, and, well he did. To be fair, Lei's sudden desire to do good and be absolved for his sins doesn't entirely come out of nowhere. The film is not shy to show the crosses he wears, even if it never considers how the idea(l)s behind them may shape his life. Even so, Lei starts the film blithely shooting a rifle at his ex-wife's house, effectively kindapping his son, and only gets more brutal from there. It's hard to believe how anyone working on the film could think the last 15 minites sentimentalising him were a good idea. Still, Son of Mine was in 2016 the big winner of the Dutch equivalent of the Oscars. Even with a better ending that should have been Sam de Jong's Prins. 

243. Alice's Restaurant

Song - Massachusetts (Bee Gees)

Movie: Alice's Restaurant (Arthur Penn, 1969)

I have a lot of love for the (American) counterculture movement, but its ideals tend to be better than its movies. Alice's Restaurant is an adaptation of Arlo Guthrie's 18-minute breakout song Alice's Restaurant Massacree, essentially a glorified podcast in which Guthrie rambles on about a rather insignificant incident, with a superficial anti-war message added to the back of it. The film has Pete Seeger cover Woody Guthrie's (Arlo's father) Pastures of Plenty and an unknown singer perform Joni Mitchell's Songs to Aging Children Come. Both songs barely last three minutes, but evoke much stronger images and feelings just through their lyrics and performances than anything the movie actually visualises. That's perhaps understandable; Alice's Restaurant Massacree is such a literal-minded song that the movie doesn't really have anywhere to go.

Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger and Joni Mitchell are probably three of the greatest American artists of the 20th century and it is not entirely fair to complain that Arlo Guthrie is not as poetic as them. Unfortunately, there are many other reasons why he is the main problem with the film. For one, he has barely any screen presence and can't act. In a previous post on Trading Places, I wrote how much I love Eddie Murphy for essentially always breaking the fourth wall between him and the audience. Well, Guthrie seems to be breaking the fourth wall between him and the director. You get the feeling that he is concentrating so much on making sure that Penn approves his line deliveries and expressions that he is barely able to convincingly interact with his fellow actors. The bigger issue is that this also seems to be his attitude towards the counterculture in general. Alice's Restaurant Massacree feels like the equivalent of an overexcited teenage boy telling his older friends about the first time he bought alcohol, without yet knowing how to drink it and experience its pleasures. To an extent, that's understandable as Guthrie was 20 when he wrote the song, but what makes the whole thing even more grating is that he combines his childish affect with ironic swerves that are meant to make him seem more knowing than he is. 

Guthrie's strained presence permeats the whole film, There are too many stiff and stilted scenes that peter out indifferently and as a result there is so little connecting tissue between individual moments that everything feels even more inconsequential than it is on paper. Some dialogue scenes come off as so affected it almost feels as if the actors have been dubbed. Thankfully, in the second half, the focus moves away a bit from Arlo towards Alice (Patricia Quinn) and her boyfriend Ray (James Broderick). Aside from owning a restuarant in Stockbridge, Massachussets, they also own a deconsecrated church where they host (parties for) various fellow travelers in the counterculture movement. Alice sleeps with many of these visitors, but always returns to the much older (and seemingly monogamous) Ray, who is a bit of a mysterious figure. It is unclear whether he is a genuine believer in the ideals of his communitiy, or a con man who uses the movement to exert power and manipulate the people close to him. Alice and Ray's relationship is a fascinating one (they are not good for each other, but are ultimately all they got) and leads to broader questions about the counterculture movement as a whole. Whether it's secular or not, Alice's church sees much of the same rituals.

242. The Third Man

Song - Vienna (Ultravox)

Movie: The Third Man (Carol Reed, 1949)

It's not as great as Casablanca, but similarly to it, The Third Man is about a man who has to choose between the greater, moral, good and his personal feelings towards an important figure from his past. And like Rick Blaine, Holly Martins (Joseph Cotten) is a foreigner stuck in a city that has become a hotbed of international intrigue. Unlike Rick, however, Holly believes that doing the right thing will also get him the girl, failing to realise that 1949 Vienna is way too complex for straightforward expressions of love and loyalty. The city is divided into four sectors, ruled by the Americans, Brtions, Sovjets and French, with its central area designated as an international zone and the ravages from the war still highly visible. Not an ideal state of affairs, and as The Third Man shows, one that was for obvious reasons not much liked by the locals. Yet, the film also paints a vivid picture of Vienna as a place of opportunity and escape for a diverse crowd of intellectuals, diplomats, spies, hustlers and outcasts, turning it into a perversely appealing city where you can forge new identities, make fortunes on the black market, and have the freedom to operate in the shadows, to be disreputable outside the control of traditional and centralised institutions. At least, if the Russians don't get you. 

The Third Man may portray a world that has long disappeared (though Vienna is still a city of immigrants and one of the centres of international spycraft), any contemporary freelance (copy)writer will recognise a part of them in poor Holly Martins. Holly is technically an author of mediocre pulp paperback westerns, but low on income, he has been forced to accept his old friend Harry Lime's (Orson Welles) invitation to come to Vienna and write up his new self-funded healthcare startup. Alas, just upon arrival in Austria, Holly finds that his friend has died in a mysterious car accident and decides to investigate the situation. In the process he falls in love with Harry's bereaved lover Anna (Alida Valli), mostly because a beautiful, kind woman talking to him seems to be a rare phenomenon in his life these days. Holly should know better than to pursue her, but the film is partly about how hard it is to reconcile your feelings with the cold hard facts.  

It's easy to see why Reed's direction has become quite iconic. Admittedly, he does overuse the Dutch angles a bit; there are a number of scenes where he goes to such great lemgths to get a canted shot, it almost stops the film in its tracks. You always see what he is going for, but there are some cases where a more straightforward shot would have made more sense, both narratively and aesthetically. But it is interesting how succesfully he combines this stylised approach with a more documentarian one that sets you right in the middle of Vienna and provides a great sense of life in the city, of the atmosphere in its restaurants and streets, and of how the strange political situation influences ordinary lives. It is particularly attentive to how all these foreigners work to overcome language barriers, and the frustration of the Austrians to not be able to speak in their own language to the people in charge of their city. Reed's exaggerated noirish expressions help evoke that unease, the feeling that nobody truly knows anyone in the city, that you don't really have a sense of what could happen at any given point, and the ensuing  impossibility of making long term, permanent plans, knowing that everything could change in an instant. 

241. Maradona, the Hand of God

Song - We Will Rock You (Queen)

Movie: Maradona, the Hand of God - Maradona, la mano di Dio (Marco Risi, 2007)

When the Maradona's first leave the poverty of Villa Fiorito, Diego's mom responds angrily to a shopkeeper who sells her fruit twice as expensive as she is used to. It's a scene that sets up Diego's meeting with the love of his life Claudia, but also works on its own as a sensitive and sympathetic depiction of the honor and dignity of people who escape poverty. Diego's dad gets a similar scene a bit later when his son asks him to not work anymore - Maradona's football skills will support the family, his father can rest. The combination of pride and hurt on Roly Serrano's face in response to that request may be the best acting moment in the film. What makes it even more effective is that Serrano only shows his true emotions once his son has left the scene. It's evident that director Marco Risi is very much in his comfort zone unobstrusively filming subtle, authentically humane moments in the ordinary lives of ordinary citizens. That's a pretty great skill to have when you are not making a movie about Diego Maradona.

When you are making a movie about Diego Maradona, you need a touch of Brian De Palma or Oliver Stone. Risi does understand that, but he never goes as far as he should and his heart isn't really in it, with the exception of a couple of scnees, for example the first time Maradona makes love to Claudia. Rosi cuts between Maradona's orgasmic movements and his memories of his football successes. As the scene progresses the cuts become quicker, leaving you to confusingly realise that, yes, the lovers are a different age every time the film cuts back to them. It's a remarkably weird sequence, and it's the only time the movie truly gets Maradona's obsessive indulgency across, expressing how it feels to be in his mindset that seems to lack any sort of self-control. It almost gets there again during his overlong wedding speech in which he barely spends time on his love for Claudia and his family, instead listing all his grievances and the people, some long forgotten, who have wronged him. The film is most helped though by Juan Leyrado, playing Guillermo Coppola, Maradona's greedy agent, as if he is the devil incarnate. It is only when he is on screen that the film feels like it is set in the kind of absurd unreality Maradona evoked. 

The International Film Fesival of Rotterdam once screened the film Nazidanie, a pseudo-documentary about Zinedine Zidane, that basically turns his story into a biblical, mythical prophecy that culminates with him headbutting Marco Materazzi. Not every film about enigmatic sporting heroes can be like that, but a film about Maradona that calls itself 'the Hand of God' needs to go much more into that direction than this one does. Maradona is one of the most fascinating figures of the 20th century, whether you like football or not. There are very few people in the world who can say that they have singlehandedly reconfigured the entire identity of a city. The film's problem is that the man's Godlike stature in Argentina and Naples is not just related to his football greatness, but also (or even, more so) to the fact that he achieved football greatness despite breaking every possible rule of how to get there. He would neither be as tragic or as popular if he had been less deviant and less self-destructive, but it's hard to make a mainstream film that toes that line. Risi's struggles are quite understandable, as he can't either explictly condemn or glorify his lifestyle and drug addiction. As a result he ends up whitewashing Maradona in the final scenes in a way that feels quite dishonest. It's not needed too; I don't wanna be a conspiracy theorist, but I am susceptible to the idea that as the rules of football increasingly benefit the super rich, football is increasingly implementing measures that make it harder to deviate from those rules. VAR sucks for other reasons too, and will only make Maradona's "hand of god" goal more iconic. 

240. At Eternity's Gate

Song - Vincent (Don McLean)

Movie: At Eternity's Gate (Julian Schnabel, 2018)

Paul Gaugain (Oscar Isaac) is tired of impressionists! He tells van Gogh (Willem Dafoe) that painting shouldn't be anymore about objective reproductions of reality. Rather, painters should give their own interpretation of how they see the world. In other words, a van Gogh painting of a mountain should primarily tell you something about van Gogh's worldview, rather than the characteristics of the mountain. This would be a revolution, notes Gauguin: "The faces you paint are yours. And they'll stay because of you. People will be known because you painted them and how you painted them, not because of who they are. And people will go to museums to see paintings of people, not to see people who were painted." These words pretty much summarise Schnabel's approach to making the film. It is quite telling that the scene in which they appear is essentially the only one that places van Gogh in a broader context.  

There is very little resembling a traditional narrative here. Its key scenes are three long conversations van Gogh has while in treatment. One of those is with a priest played by Mads Mikkelsen, the other two with doctors played by Mathieu Amalric and (unknown to me) Vladimir Consigny. In all three scenes, but especially in the one with Consigny, Schnabel goes out of his way to show as little as possible of van Gogh and his conversation partner in the same frame together, and he also rarely has an actor speak while the camera is on the other person. Moreover, during these conversations, Dafoe is filmed in a medium close up, while the other actors are often seen in an extreme close up, with their heads barely fitting the frame. The result is that it never feels like we are watching a conversation between two people who talk directly to each other, in the same space. And when van Gogh is asked why he paints, he always gives different, somewhat evasive, answers, never letting us feel as if we have a comprehensive understanding of what drives him. 

There are more formal gambits Schnabel makes throughout the film. At certain points the lower half of the frame is blurred, while the upper half is presented clearly. Some scenes are shown from van Gogh's point of view, essentially turning his eyes into a roving camera, but not all these POV shots share the same visual markers. Sometimes, a grey-yellow-ish filter has been put over them, reminding you of the visual palette of van Gogh paintings, without going so far to make them resemble the actual style of these paintings. Other times these subjective shots share the exact same color and lighting as the objective ones, but are filmed with a shaky handheld camera. The handheld camera is also used to film van Gogh in third person, showing him painting, or wandering through nature. As a result several sequences feel like they come from a 19th century home video, where we see things from exceedingly odd camera angles. At some point we get a shot of van Gogh's feet with the camera seemingly placed on the floor. There are also multiple scenes where dialogue between the characters is repeated in voiceover, sometimes before the 'original' sentence has even ended. In a similar way, images fade in and out of each other, repeating mulitple times in a single scene.

Especially at the beginning, this strange, incosistently applied blend of filmmaking aesthettics can be quite frustrating, as there seems to be no rhyme or reason behind it. It is not an approximation of van Gogh's style, and it gives the impression that the film is somewhat confused about its own view of the painter. As the film went on though, I started to appreciate it as a sensory experience that reflects van Gogh's frazzled mind. After a further while you realise that it also respects his mind. The film is much more interested in exploring how van Gogh may have expressed himself, and in his thoughts about his life, work and mental state, rather than in telegraphing all the ways in which he is suffering. Finally, there is also something to be said for making a film about van Gogh purposefully alienating. Schnabel doesn't follow the conventions of either contemporary biopics or of contemporary arthouse cinema, daring people to be somewhat put off by it and its vision, and disregard it, risking that his film will have the same fate as van Gogh's paintings. Worth noting here that I found most of Schnabel's experimentation quite cool. Even if it doesn't always work, these are not things you see every week in movies.  

The film's individuality only makes its postcript more questionable, noting that van Gogh died after being accidentally shot by some kids. This is not the official account of van Gogh's death, but a theory put forward by two historians. It seems to me like the kind of theory that mostly serves to give attention to its creators, and though it is less damaging than, say, the idea that, due to his poverty, Shakespeare couldn't have written his works, it still seems like the kind of dumb thing you should stay away from.  I have written before that I really like art that knowingly presents false/alternative versions of history and mixes facts with fiction and mythmaking. I think that this can be more insightful about history and historiography than a straightforward retelling of the facts. Nonetheless, there are good and bad ways to do that. At Eternity's Gate's ending is I think an example of the latter, as the film is explicitly subjective throughout its running time, presenting nothing about van Gogh as objective fact, except for this alternate account of his death. It should have at least made clear that its claim is contested. 

239. Trading Places

Song - The Wall Street Shuffle (10cc)

Movie: Trading Places (John Landis, 1983)

In a famous scene in Trading Places, Eddie Murphy looks incredulously into the camera as the Duke Brothers (Ralph Bellamy and Don Ameche) condescendingly explain the concept of a BLT sandwich to him. It is technically the only scene in the film that explicitly breaks the fourth wall, In practice, there is never much divide between Eddie Murphy and the audience. It's one of the many reasons why when I was a kid/teenager, he was pretty much my hero. There is most likely no film I've ssen more than Beverly Hills Cop, except maybe Beverly Hills Cop III, and there are still very few scenes that make me laugh more than the introduction to Serge or the malfunctioning superweapon. Murphy's willingness to get silly and ridiculous, while at the same time confidently and irreverently taking the piss out of the world around him is unmatched. And while some actors disappear into the movie and make you forget that they are acting, in his heyday, Murphy was the opposite; it was always clear that he was performing for the people watching, and committing so much to it that he almost felt like a friend who did everything he could to share his joy, energy and humor with you. His closest equivalent may well be Freddie Mercury, and it's no coincidence that Queen has become one of my favorite bands, or that Seinfeld has become one of my favorite shows. That's great because of, rather than despite, Jerry's inability to keep a straight face. Take Pulp Fiction too. When I first watched it, it was blowing my mind pretty much from the start, but I only truly fell for it during Tarantino's scenes that have very little purpose beyond expressing how much fun it is to be able to act/goof around and do cool/silly stuff for an audience. That's the real reason why you wouldn't readily see a scene like that in a movie today.  

Eddie Murphy is of course an infinitely better actor than Tarantino or Seinfeld and it shows in Trading Places. It was only his second feature film and it is still expecting that Murphy acts in the service of the story, rather than pretty much building everything around him. Yet, Murphy is so good at what he does that even this film can't stop him from going off on superbly improvised comedic setpieces. That does ocassionally mess up the film's rhythm a bit, especially in the first scenes with Murphy, and it takes until the New Year's train for everyone in the film to align and execute the kind of sublimely escalating comic chaos Murphy and Landis (The Blues Brothers is still one of the most exhiliratingly fun movies ever made) were so good at. It's the one sequence in the film that takes time to set up characters and situations that are inconsequential to the plot and provide space for throwaway jokes that also serve as buildup to even funnier moments. 

If Trading Places wasn't as supremely funny as I remembered (I have probably not seen this movie since I was a teen. Same goes for my other Murphy favorites, The Beverly Hills Cop's, Coming to America, The Distinguished Gentleman and Bowfinger), it makes up for that by being much sharper than I remembered. It is genuinely scabrous in its depiction of the super rich, their empty rituals, and their treatment of their (often black) servants, without making it seem as an over the top joke. The close up of 'The Heritage Club's' motto "With Liberty and Justice for All" after the club's black housekeeper kicks Murphy away is a nice example of the film's subtlety, as are the wonderful opening credits. Providing snapshots of diverse locations in Philadelpia, they are a great reminder of how easily urban divides are taken for granted and normalised. And I really liked that the film proves Randolph Duke right, nurture is indeed more important than nature, but not in the way he thinks. Louis Winthorpe (Dan Aykroyd) does turn to crime when stripped from his wealth, but he also becomes kinder and more humane when hanging out with people like Ophelia (Jamie Lee Curtis). In turn, the moment Ophelia gets access to a butler, she immediately starts treating him like her personal property. This also sets up the film's great ending, that is both happy and cynical. 

238. Romeo Is Bleeding

Song - Always (Bon Jovi)

Movie: Romeo Is Bleeding (Peter Medak, 1993)

In the video clip for Always, a dude (Bon Jovi himself) cheats on his girlfriend with her roommate, which sets up a ridiculously gaudy melodrama filled with inexplicable behavior and overemoting actors. In typical 90's fashion, the clip is obsessed with video imagery. Bon Jovi and his girl flirt by filming each other erotically and both women first discover Jon's exploits in bed through a video screen. Upset to see him with the roommate, the other woman runs away in distress and somehow ends up at the house of an expressionist. The guy paints her in a way that slightly distorts her face and body, making her so distraught that she calls up Bon Jovi. Upon seeing the painting, in a fit of rage he destroys the entire apartment. 

Bon Jovi made a career out of living out the fantasy of a carefree sex-symbol rock star, doing pretty much nothing else but romanticising and glorifying how awesome it was to be a carefree sex symbol rock star. In the 80's and 90's there was probably nobody who did that kind of thing better and more sincerely. and I've always enjoed his music and his whole act. That does make those final scenes in Always more than a little funny. You get the feeling that the slightly off-kilter painting is just about the most grisly thing Bon Jovi can possible imagine or accept in his art. That could explain why he would remove Always from the soundtrack of Romeo Is Bleeding, after specifically writing it for the film. This is a film in which a one-armed (we see her cut off her injured arm!) Lena Olin, dressed in a revealing leather outfit, holds a corrupt cop under gun point, forcing him to dig a grave for the mafia don she is about to kill. It's also a film in which Roy Scheider has the time of his life playing the mafia don in question. He gets to be menacingly threatening while pontificating about the perils of pacifism and British World War 2 poets. The whole film is kinda stupid, but I will always have a soft spot for mischievous, grisly pulp that lets good actors throw their charisma around and chew the scenery with juicy dialogue. 

The best actor in the film is neither Scheider nor Olin, but Gary Oldman. He plays the corrupt cop Jack Grimaldi as a guy who knows the difference between right and wrong, and would do the right thing if he just could resist sex and money a little bit. In the vicinity of either, Oldman responds with a great combination of weary resignation and unbridled desire. Equally wonderful is the spring in his step whenever he senses excitement coming his way, portraying it both as the behaviour of a young ambtious man with endless irrational confidence and a way of masking his insecurities and uncertanity around the people he needs to outsmart. Unfortunately, the amount of people he needs to outsmart keeps growing and with every action he takes he keeps ending up in a bigger and bigger hole. That's also the kind of thing I have a soft spot for, and, no matter how much of a mess the rest of it is, I think the film's (and Oldman's) consideration of Jack's inexperience is genuinely good and insightful. He has discovered that he can make a lot of money playing both sides, but doesn't yet know all the tricks of the trade. So he is playing it by ear, hoping that he doesn't drown, until he realises way too late he is out of his depth, and has no way out. That's more interesting than seeing him fall just because of greed and immorality. 

All of this makes it much easier to tolerate the horrible "too cool for school" narration (that switches from third person to first person in the middle of the film, setting a very obvious point up as a major reveal), the overbearing jazz score, the film's inability to decide whether it wants to be pulp fiction or a moody noir, and the horribly written relationship between Jack and his mistress Sheri. She is played by Juliette Lewis and I still haven't figured out whether most directors have no idea what to do with her or whether I just find her a completely unappealing actress. What does seem obvious here is that making her play a bewigged Marylin Monroe-channeling cocktail waitress brings out even more her incessant, bordering on whiny, neediness that seems to be at least a little bit there in all her roles. 

237. Detour

Song - Another 45 Miles (Golden Earring)

Movie: Detour (Edgar G. Ulmer, 1945)

I very much like 40's/50's noirs, and in particular their sense of the uncanny. The heroes are plunged in a world full of inscrutable forces that move their lives into directions they can't anticipate or understand, in part because the inner thoughts and feelings of the characters are a bit of a mystery, both to themselves and to us in the audience. I found Detour a tad disappointing as it only really evokes that feeling of unknowability at tbe beginning, when B-rate New York pianist Al Roberts (Tom Neal) falls in love with singer Sue (Claudia Drake), only to see her move to Hollywood a week before they were siupposed to be married. As Al narrates how much they loved each other and how surprised he was by her decision, Ulmer's direction casts some murkiness over his story, emphasising Al's subjectivity. You would not bet your savings that Sue would share Al's account of their time together, but you also can't quite discount that Al may be right.

My favourite little flourish in the film comes when Al explains that he tried to call Sue in Hollywood. Ulmer  cuts to a switchboard operator working in New York, then the camera moves along a highway stretch filled with telephone masts, followed by a cut to a switchboard operator in Los Angeles. Such a visualisation of a journey of a long distance phone call is really cool to see in 2023, but it would have been effective in 1945 too as it both emphasises the distance between Al and Sue, and the sheer wonder of long distance calls being possible. It makes an ordinary act seem strange. And when we eventually do see Sue pick up the call, we only hear Al's end of the conversation. Similarly, another shot I liked is of Sue singing in LA, flanked by three silhouetted musicians we only see from the back. It's never clear whether these are the shadows of the musicians, or their 'real' selves. It could also be that they only exist in Al's imagination.

In any case, after his call to Sue, Al decides to hitchhike to Las Angeles, getting to Arizona when he steps into the car of Charles Haskell Jr (Edmund MacDonald). On their journey to L.A., Haskell dies, and Al responds to this as if it is his fault, taking on the identity of the dead man, and effectively becoming a convict, despite being innocent. The real trouble begins once he picks up hitchiking Vera (Ann Savage), who knows Charles and starts blackmailing Al. From that moment on, the film becomes a bit repetitive, without any sense of ambiguity to Vera and Al's' behaviour. It doesn't help that, unlike at the beginning, Al's narration now doesn't complicate what we see on screen, but merely reinforces it, turning it into a rather straightforward story of a sullen, pouty and self-pitying man who made bad decisions perfectly consistent with his character, and now faces the easily explicable consequences of those decisions. There is ultimately very little mystery to Detour. It does have a gloriosly fatalistic ending and a wonderful live-wire performance of scornful sarcasm by Ann Savage, that seems to have been studied by the likes of Frances McDormand and Holly Hunter. It's not a surprise these two are Coens regulars, but while Detour is an obvious influence on them, I think their (and many other) films have improved on it. 

236. Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House

Song - Our House (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young)

Movie: Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (H.C. Potter, 1948)

The American Dream is overpaying to buy a historic country house in Connecticut, because you feel cramped in your four-room apartment in the heart of Manhattan. This is a charming, lightheartedly funny film that both celebrates and lampoons the 'we are the best, and only getting better' feeling of post-war America. It is a film about how there are few meaningful constraints for white middle-class American families to pursue everything they want, as long as they don't get high on their own supply. 

The film likes the Blandings and presents them lovingly and sympathetically, but there is a reason why it turns Mr. Jim Blandings (Cary Grant) into an advertising executive. He of all people should know better than to fall for an ad for Connectictut property that feels too good to be true, but then again, his entire family seems to have fallen for the idea that they can get and be everthing they want, simply by virtue of being upstanding middle-class American citizens. That may be true in a financial sense, but you still need to listen to engineers, architects and legal experts when building your dream house. The Blandings' resistance to do so, their unquestioning belief that they can and should be fully in control of realising their dream, informs most of the comedy in the film. In the end they do succeed, in part because their black housekeeper saves Mr. Blandings' job by accidentally coming up with a great slogan for the ham he needs to market. 

The film begins with a narrator talking about the greatness of New York, sarcastically set against images that contradict his words, e.g. when talking about the best tranportation system in the world, we cut to a crowded metro station with people unable to enter the train. The narrator then breaks the fourth wall and we find out that he is Bill Cole (Melvyn Douglas), a lawyer and a friend of the Blandings, who may or may not be gay. He introduces us to the family, as Jim and Muirel (Myrna Loy) wake up in separate beds. This sets up a sequence in which Cary Grant shows that he could very well have been Charlie Chaplin. In long takes we see him do great physical comedy as he navigates his small apartment, trying go through his morning routine without bumping into doors or being disturbed by falling objects. This is immediately followed by a sharply written breakfast scene where the Blandings' daughters exasperate their father with stories about their 'progressive' school teacher and her stance on advertising. And so, in less than ten minutes and three scenes, the film has employed three different styles of comedy to tell its story,  Throughout the rest of its running time it will make use of many more. It's very miuch worth seeing. 

235. 8 Mile

Song - Owner Of A Lonely Heart (Yes)

Movie: 8 Mile (Curtis Hanson, 2002)

8 Mile pays great attention to the crumbling infrastructure of Detroit and its suburbs, highlighting how its dirty streets, abandoned properties, creaky houses and cars, and barely liveable trailer parcs contribute to a sense of despair. Even if jobs were available, the desolated surroundings don't make it attractive or motivating to look for them. Young people have little else to do then observe their environment and make snide comments about it, and each other. Add a beat and a rhythm and you have rap. Each neighborhood has its own challenges, which also means it has its own distinct raps. That creates rivarlies between neighborhoods, leading to rap battles spilling out on the streets and becoming actual fights. 

I like stories that show how artistic/cultural movements and expressions are shaped by their local contexts. There also aren't that many mainstream American movies that present such a realistically bleak view of a major American city. But while this approach is in some ways commendable, it also both diminishes and whitewashes Eminem. For the best writing about him, it's worth seeking out a critic called Sheila O'Malley, in particular her piece on the song Kim, a 6 minute cry of despair in which Eminem takes on both the role of himself and his girlfriend Kim as he imagines choking her to death. The song alternates between helpless rage, self-humiliation and utterly hopeless despair. It's quite unpleasant to listen to it, but it's also a genuinely artistic expression of Eminem's struggles with his darkest fears and feelings. It is a nightmarish fantasy of what could happen if he were to succumb to the ugliest parts of him. Most of his songe are more or less about that, only more playfully so. He would be probably less controversial if most of his work was in the same vein as Kim, but his genuinely absurd sense of humor is what makes him slippery and interesting. Aside from that, his guiding principle seems to be that any wordplay is permissable no matter how ridiculous it gets, which leads to lyrics like 'I solemnly swear to treat this roof like my daughters and raise it." I will not insist that this is genius writing, but it certainly doesn't impoverish the English language. 

Eminem's demons and idiosyncrasies are not merely the result of the social state of Detroit, but 8 Mile for the most part disregards these personal elements in his music, making him a far less interesting, distinct artist. The film consists of him going around town with his crew from hood "313". They spend their time joyriding, participating in impromptu rap battles and tauntiing their rivals, "The Leaders of their Free World." B, Rabbit, Eminem's alter ego, always participates in these shenanigans, but he is at every point presented as the most restrained and the most responsible and wise. That's also how he is depicted in his relationship with his mother (Kim Basinger) and little sister, and during the rap battles. While his black opponents insult him with raps about how he doesn't belong in this scene, because of his whiteness, he magnanimously never makes any reference to their skin color, 'winning' the battles mostly becuase he paints the other rappers as inauthentic compared to him. The film even includes a scene in which he interevenes in a homophobic taunt, rapping that the insulting party is the actual "faggot". As a result Eminem's status as an underdog non-gangster white guy becomes the main reason why we should root for him, and the main characteristic that distinguishes him from the other rappers. 8 Mile won Eminem an Oscar for "Lose Yourself". It's notable that the song is not heard by any of the characters in the film, but it's far better (and funnier!) than anything that is played diegetically.

234. Love & Basketball

Song - Zij Maakt Het Verschil (De Poema's)

Movie: Love & Basketball (Gina Prince-Bythewood, 2000)

Watching people who desperately want things negotiate often conflicting interests in the pursuit of their hopes and dreams, is inherently compelling. That’s one reason why sports movies are so reliable. As long as they are competently made, it’s hard not to find at least a little enjoyment in them. They also require more suspension of disbelief than your average science-fiction film. That’s not just because scripted narratives can’t ever convey, and are in direct opposition to, the unpredictability of sports, but also because most of us watch sports on television, and sport broadcasts around the world are pretty much unified in their visual grammar. A basketball game in Brazil will be presented in much the same way as a basketball game in Nigeria, South Korea or Serbia. A film is unable to follow these visual rules when showing sports and as a result the final ‘big game’ never quite has the impact that it’s supposed to have. You are always aware of its staginess, the awkward flow, and the unnatural movements of the actors. In its climax Love & Basketball handles this ‘problem’ better than any film I’ve seen. 

I was enjoying this film very much, but wasn’t sure whether it was truly great or just incredibly effective at pandering exactly to my sensibilities. This is after all an epic basketball romance spanning multiple decennia, divided in four chapters it calls first, second, third and fourth quarters, that consistently tries to find original ways of dramatizing the games. In one case, it shows it literally from the point of view of Monica (Sanaa Lathan), putting us right in the middle of the court and even allowing us to hear her thought process as she is attacking the basket or defending an opponent. In addition to all that, it’s also a nuanced look at how basketball players deal with getting to, being in, and having to leave, the (W)NBA. It’s wonderful throughout, but its ending turns it into a classic. 

Prince-Bythewood turns the final pick-up game into a sports match whose outcome doesn’t merely depend on the basketball talent of Monica and Quincy (Omar Epps), but also on their personal feelings. They are asked to negotiate between following their natural instincts as ballers and their willingness to potentially hurt each other, with the added complexity of both of them knowing that love and basketball are intertwined. Betraying one could mean betraying the other. As such the awkwardness and hesitation of their basketball moves here is both a natural expression of how these people would behave in this particular situation, and an integral part of an intensely competitive game with an outcome we are uncertain of, but highly invested in. The scene is pretty much what movies are for and it’s probably the closest a sports film will ever come to reimagining the story of Orpheus (at least, its most famous part). 

It's a slight shame that Prince-Bythewood doesn’t end on Quincy’s great final line, but the actual final scene of Monica as a professional WNBA player watched by her daughter is also an intelligent one, as the film is also about Monica’s struggle to identify herself as both a woman and a basketball player. Love and Basketball begins with Monica arriving at a basketball court dressed as a boy, only to show herself as a girl when Quincy and his friends allow her to play with them. Throughout her childhood she fights with her mom about her unwillingness to wear dresses and make-up and do other girly things. The film lets Monica be unsure whether she does that because she doesn’t fit mainstream gender roles, because she wants to imitate her idol Magic Johnson, or because she fears exclusion from basketball if she acts too womanly. Whatever the answer is, she has found peace at the end. 

233. Key Largo

Song - One Way Wind (The Cats)

Movie: Key Largo (John Huston, 1948)

In the war Frank McCloud (Humphrey Bogart) was the commanding officer of a soldier who died tragically at the battlefield near San Pietro. Frank has now come to 'Largo Hotel' to meet the solider's father Mr. Temple (Lionel Barrymore) and widow Nora (Lauren Bacall). The war stories he tells are presented solemnly, with Huston's direction, helped by the mournful score, putting all emphasis on conveying the gravitiy of Frank's words, and the moral sacrifices of his fellow soldiers. Having done its duty, the film quickly turns cynical, questioning and complicating the sentiments and ideas expressed in those early scenes, and the positve self-image of post-war America. Films that go against the grain are always interesting, but Key Largo is a bit too literal-minded and it takes some huge leaps to make its case. Also, the ending is way too tidy and too happy for its noirish tendencies. 

When a hurricane approaches the hotel, Frank and the Temples are taken hostage by the notorious Johnny Rocco (Edward G. Robinson) and his equally vicious henchmen. The gangsters are shown without any shade of grey. They are purely defined by their villainy and presented in the most unsympathetic possible way. Led by Robinson, almost all of them have distinctly wicked appearances, their faces suggesting histories you want to know as little about as possible. They seem incapable of showing any humanity, and devoid of any feelings but self-serving callousness and greed. We barely find out about their motivations or goals and mostly see them debasing and humiliating themselves and the people around them. There is undoubtedly a lot of truth in this portrayal, but Key Largo uses it to explicitly argue that the victory in World War 2 didn't have much positive consequences as the Nazi's were simply replaced by nihilistically violent gangsters, an argument that is wrong on many levels. More interesting is the film's questioning of what it means to be a hero and how heroic narratives in war are shaped, as are the reminders that America has its own questionable history of treating foreigners and other groups as undesirable. Throughout all this, Huston has a lot of fun exploring all the different ways in which he can block two opposing sets of characters stuck in the same place. 

It's wonderful to see Bogart wrestle here with his inability to truly understand, replicate and appreciate his war heroics. Unfortunately none of the other characters are given even a smidge of that complexity. And the ambivalencies around Bogart get away during the film's climax when he acts too easily as a conventional Hollywood hero. Previously I wrote that Magnolia honors its somewhat overcooked dialogue; in the same vein, when a film has lines like "When your head says one thing and your whole life says another, your head always loses" and "It's better to be a live coward than a dead hero", it should leave you with at least a hint of dread or a funny feeling that something you can't quite put your hands on is amiss. Key Largo doesn't and never fully commits to the alienated, angsty mood lines like that are meant to evoke. As a result its cynicism feels like an inauthentic put-on for its own sake. The one exception is when the hurricane reaches its high point, the whole hotel starts trembling and even Johnny Rocco starts showing genuine fear on its face. It's the scene that best evokes the idea that when you deal with forces beyond your control, it doesn't matter much if you are a hero or a coward. Dumb luck will decide your fate. 

232. Magnolia

Song - Have You Ever Seen The Rain? (Creedence Clearwater Revival)

Movie: Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999)

Magnolia is a mess, as it should be. If you are gonna build your film around characters exclaiming things like "As the book says, we might be true with the past, but the past ain't through with us", "I have sickness all around me, and you fucking ask me about my life", "I really do have love to give, I just don't know where to put it", "Now that I've met you, would you object to never seeing me again" and "Respect the cock! Tame the cunt", you better make sure that you are on their level. It's a film about desperate, often grieving, people trying to express themselves, to exorcise their demons, to repair long-broken relationship, and to connect and make sense of the world and the people around them, sometimes all at the same time. It wiuld be a failure if it isn't at least a little unhinged.

You could probably argue that there is a more emotionally piercing film hidden here somewhere, one that is happy to mostly focus on the storylines of William H. Macy, John C. Reilly and Melora Walters, and further build up their characters. But that would require a great understanding of who these characters are and their thoughts and feelings. Anderson lacks that, which only works in Magnolia's favor. He is as unsure about how he feels about what's on screen and about what exactly he wants to say as the people he depicts. He and Tarantino like to compare their work and should consider screening Magnolia as a double feature with The Hateful Eight, which has been critcised for its uninformed/unsophisticated view of history. It is indeed evident that its historic and cultural connections, implications and insights stand on shaky ground, but that's the most interesting thing about it. More films should be able to explore subjects they don't quite know how they feel about.  It's a shame that when talking about diversity in Hollywood the conversation too often leads to urging directors like Anderson and Tarantino to 'stay in their lane', rather than enabling non-white, non-male artists to move out of their lane. Movies whose reach exceeds their grasp tend to go to a lot of unexpected places, and at their best feel like a joyously playful invite to the audience to discover the world together.

Having said that, it is worth noting that Magnolia is more than just an unsophisticated airing of Paul Thomas Anderson's emotional baggage. He famously wrote the film after his father died, but while it sometimes does feel like an attempt to process every feeling he had in the aftermath of that, it's no coincidence that Anderson broke through with a film about the porn industry. What he is above all interested in exploring is how people use, for lack of a better world, performance, to function in the world, to conceal their true feelings and identities and to manipulate others. It's why the discussion around Licorice Pizza was so dumb. That is indeed about a relationship buillt on exploitation, but it ain't Haim doing the exploitation. It is Gary who is using his acting and storytelling talents to sell waterbeds and pinballs and to manipulate his way into money and girls. It covers much of the same ground as Inherent Vice. That was about how the free love movement self-destructed, because it missed the reactionary forces hiding around in its midst, commodifying sex, durgs and rock and roll. In Licorice Pizza, the 'victim' of that commodification is the (independent) film industry. In Anderson's movies the people who are incapable of seeing through others' performance, or who are only able to be their authentic selves, often get the short end of the stick. 

All of this gets extremely to the forefront in Magnolia. Julianne Moore breaks down because she now needs to confront that she really loves her dying husband, instead of merely pretending to so. William H. Macy gets in trouble when he is unable to obtain braces he doesn't need to look more like his crush. His desperation arises out of his inability to function as his adult self, always reverting to being "Quiz Kid" Donnie Smith. Tom Cruise loses it when his true identity is revealed, showing just how much of a pathetic act his mysoginist pick up artist is. He is found out by a black female journalist, played by April Grace, who is likely repulsed by him, but presents herself as simply a kind curious reportrer with genuine interest in his life and work. Philip Seymoru Hoffman gets a breakthrough when he pretends he is acting out in a movie the actual scene he is acting in. John C. Reilly is constantly reminding himself of how much in control he is and puts on the air of a gravely serious cop anytime he is on the beat, concealing how unsuited he is for his profession. Philip Baker Hall is a trusted kids show host, who is secretly a philandering pedophile, and his quiz gets derailed when its latest star's image of being an indefeatable genius can't be reconciled anymore with the reality that he is also a vulnerable kid. Finally, there is Melora Walters, portraying the only character in the film who is at all times herself, wearing her insecurities and pains on her sleeve. It's no coincidence that her finding a sliver of happinness is the final scene of the film. I think that in this context of 'performance' many of the film's famous sequences, such as the frogs falling from the sky, the Wise Up singalong, and the opening narration become more interesting. They add a layer of artificiality to the film, distancing it from reality, as do the many long takes, sweeping camera movements, outsized performances, and the absolutely wonderful self-consciously stylistic dialogue.

231. City of Hope

Song - Dancing in the Dark (Bruce Springsteen)

Movie: City of Hope (John Sayles, 1991)

Everybody wants some!! That's not just Richard Linklater's greatest work, but also a fantastic premise for a movie, and a good basis for understanding the world. John Sayles knows it, and in the wonderful opening scenes of City of Hope the film slowly introduces its characters as they walk, drive, bicker, and above everything else, negotiate their interests on the main street of an unnamed city in New Jersey. There is great urgency to every conversation, as the city is a busy hotbed of different, often opposing needs, where finding the right connection at the right time can make a huge difference in your fortunes. It's not as great (and certainly not as laid back) as Slacker, Linklater's breakthrough that came out a year before, but it takes a similar approach, especially during those early scenes. It finds a group of people as they walk through the street, follows them on to a convenience store, only to leave them behind when it discovers a more interesting set of folks scheming in an aisle. It decides to follow them around for a bit, until it changes direction when some other exciting characters cross its path. It's great when it's essentially just a portrait of the city and its inhabitants, patiently revealing the different (mis)connections between them, and a little less great in the second half when, having established what its main characters and storylines are, it cuts more conventionally between them. 

The centerpiece of the film is Nick Rinaldi (Vincent Spano), the layabout son of property developer Joe (Tony Lo Bianco). Joe owns, and feels sincere responsibility for, an apartment block in the poorest part of town that the municipality wants to destroy to let Japanese investors build expensive condos. The residents of the apartment block are politically represented by the idealistic councilman Wynn (Joe Morton), who has to work hard to gain both the trust of the white men in power and his black constituents who see him as an Uncle Tom. He is not, but as the husband of college professor Reesha (Angela Bassett) it is undoubtedly true that he and his wife have different class interests than most black people in town. That becomes an even bigger problem when two black kids falsely accuse a (liberal) professor of inappropriately touching them in the park. The eventual reveal of the proferssor's subject of expertise is so knowingly on the nose, it becomes one of the many great touches of levity in the film. But the funniest scene is a robbery gone wrong.  It's one of those scenes American (indie) directors seemingly perfected in the 90's of young overcondident motormouthed men clumsily executing a mischievous illegal scheme that was badly and irrationally thought out in the first place, leading to consequences that are both darkly tragic and sublimely hilarious. In this case, the robbery (thwarted by Wynn's brother-in-law, an ex-con night watch on his first day of work) sets into motion a series of events that allow Joe to be blackmailed and put the lives of his apartment's residents in grave danger. 

Beyond creating a city portrait with vividly drawn characters, Sayles is critical of the organisation of society around the idea of trickle-down economics. He presents it as a gateway to clientelism and corruption, not just in politics, but in every aspect of life, giving the rich and powerful inherent advantages and plenty opportunities to exploit  ordinary citizens, especially when they are non-white. In those opening scenes on the street, the exclusive aim for everyone in almost any conversation is to obtain something that will give them an advantage in life, in their career, or in politics. This idea that people are purely assets that only serve to be sold or bought is a bit too bluntly literalised through Asteroid, a mentally deficient man who goes around town repeating marketing mantras he hears on TV. It's an immensely thankless, useless character that goes nowhere interesting, somehow portrayed by David Strathairn, one of Sayles' most trusted and talented collaborators. One more, final, critical point worth making is that, when push comes to shove, Nick is the film's most heroic character. He is (indirectly) resposnible for most of the despair, but the film goes to great lengths to make clear that all his actions are a form of resistance against the culture of clientelism. It rings false here to turn him into the character with the most (however misguided) integrity, the one who is most willing to take on the film's self-identified 'villain'.

230. Tender Mercies

Song - Easy Livin' (Uriah Heep)

Movie: Tender Mercies (Bruce Beresford, 1983)

I got what the film's title was going for, but wasn't aware of its actual meaning, or that it comes directly from the Bible. Rosa Lee (Tess Harper) baptises her kid, sings in her church's choir and prays for 'tender mercies'. She has lost her husband in Vietnam and now lives as a single mother on the Texas backroads. Here she owns a farm, a hotel and a gas station, surrounded by nothing but grassland. Rosa Lee takes the teachings of her faith seriously when she provides shelter and work to Mac Sledge (Robert Duvall), a broken down alcoholic and a formerly great country/western singer who has lost his fortunes, as well as any contact with his ex-wife and daughter. For Mac, this is a good opportunity to sober up (Rosa Lee agrees to him staying only if he stops drinking) and put his life back on track. In most cases, this would be what the whole movie is about. Here this all happens in the first 10 minutes, covering about 5 months, and a marriage, It turns out that Tender Mercies will not be a film about Mac's alcoholism, but about the ordinary domestic trials and tribulations of Rosa Lee and Mac. Aside from a major tragedy near the end, this is a subdued, plain film, that is mostly interested in exploring how the values and histories of its characters affect their lives. I liked it much more than expected, especially for how deftly it avoids embellishing conflicts and emotions. 

Bruce Beresford is from Sydney and like his countrymen he knows how to frame his characters against a backdrop of isolated emptiness - near the end, Mac and Rosa Lee's conversation, filmed in one shot, at their allotment is an especially stunning example of this. And the film's only 'suspenseful' sequence works by emphasising the silence around Rosa Lee's motel and heightening our awareness of every car that passes it by. More importantly though, Beresford understands how the isolation shapes its characters' behaviour. It's more urgent to believe in God when you can't depend too much on other people saving you, and when most of those other people you meet in church. Similarly, the film understands there is a reason why in seemingly every country, New Year's concerts are dominated by stars like Dixie (Betty Buckley) who may not be the greatest artists in the world, but are extremely capable of bringing the audience along for the ride through overtly emotional peformances and lyrics that may be trite, but express highly recognisable feelings. Sometimes the point of music is not to be art, but to create a community. The film doesn't present the activities of the church or the country bars as particularly fashionable, or its characters as sophisticated, and sees this neither as a source of pride or of shame, though it is notable that Mac Sledge's first singing performance in the film, his long-awaited come back, happens just after being baptised (together with Rosa Lee's son). On stage, he looks extremely cool in his cowboy hat, flanked by a giant Texas flag

The film takes a similar approach in showing the relationship between Mac and Rosa Lee. It's unquestionable that their love is real, but it is not driven by romance. Beresford doesn't show the wedding and their decision to get married happens after a couple of scenes in which they work together, and help each other with their daily tasks, way before the film shows any sort of emotional or physical bond between them. A short kissing scene, later on, is not the epitome of chemistry either. It would go too far to call this a marriage of convenience, but it's much closer to being that than a marriage of love as we conventionally understand it. The film shows that the choices Mac and Rosa Lee make are rather sensible in context. They have few feasible options that would make their lives better and happier than getting married. What makes Tender Mercies much better than too many contemporary films that are unabashedly conservative, is that it knows that values are shaped by behaviour, feelings and personal and societal contexts, rather than the other way around. As a result it doesn't insist that its conservatism is inherently moral, but shows that it is simply a matter of circumstance. 

Tender Mercies also unflinchingly observes the ills of its society. Tess Harper has a great monologue explaining to her son how the American government lied about her husband's death in Vietnam, while we also learn that she got her kid at 16.  Almost every character in the film comes from, or leaves behind, a broken family and is shaped by an ill-advised teen marriage. It's fitting too that the film ends with a game of catch between father and son. Aside from the Vietnam War, the framed posters of the Dallas Cowboys in the kid's room are basically the only reference points to the whole society that exists beyond its characters' narrow reality. Finally, it's worth noting that while Robert Duvall is (reliably) great and won an Oscar, the real knockout here is Harper. She is fantastic portraying Rosa Lee as a way too young matriarch who has learned to be strong-willed and doesn't quite realise that the weight she has on her shoulders is deeply unfair. 

229. The Departed

Song - Gimme Shelter (The Roling Stones)

Movie: The Departed (Martin Scorsese, 2006)

Martin Scorsese is getting a little overrepresented here, but if you are connecting movies to songs and don't link Gimme Shelter to Scorsese, you may as well pack it up. More to the point, his use of this song in The Departed is a great example of how great his famous collaboration with editor Thelma Schoonmaker works. We hear Gimme Shelter twice in the movie, first during the opening scenes giving the film an immediate jolt of energy, further amplified by Jack Nicholson's delightfully smirky narration. The second time we hear it, it's during one of the more calmer scenes. In both cases the song perfectly fits and shapes the mood the film is going for. The Departed makes use of both an original score by Howard Shore, and previously recorded songs, and many times they blend together. The second time we hear Gimme Shelter it can hardly be characterised as a needle drop. The song seems to flow naturally out of the preceding soundtrack. And everything is just synced perfectly to the rhytms of the editing and the movements of the actors. 

I don't think The Departed is among Scorsese's greatest works, but, aside from After Hours, it's mabye his most seamlessly flowing film, even if some shots look a bit uncannily fake. It sometimes feels as if Scorsese is struggling to get the same authenticity out of Boston, as he gets out of New York. Still, it's hard to find many films with more entertaining performances. It asks some of the greatest, most compelling actors alive to play exactly to their strengths, givest them juicy dialogue, and then helps them even further by having every shot, camera movement and music choice perfectly match their energy and their character's vibe. Alec Baldwin and Mark Wahlberg could deliver their banter in their sleep and make it funny, but The Departed pretty much hands them their lines and performances on a silver plate. It's quite a shame that because of their pompous egos we are unlikely to see similar performances of Wahlberg and Baldwin any time soon. It's even more unfortunate that this looks to be Jack Nicholson's last relevant movie. Though Nicholson fully takes advantage of his freedom to show off, it's not a vain performance. His Frank Costello is steaming out of every pore, and in close ups you can almost smell the saliva and snot of his face, His highly visible squalidness is both a symbol of his decay and of his remaining power.

Leonardo Di Caprio and Matt Damon are equally great as, respectively, the undercover cop and Costello's mole who have to identify each other. Damon has pretty much perfected playing overeager overambitious strivers who are way in over their head, but pretend they have everything under control, and he gives probably the best performance. This is also though where the film's weaknesses come in. Stylistically Scorsese turns The Departed into a pulpy thriller, but narratively this tries to be a serious crime drama. In that regard the film is not so succesfull as it never bothers to put any thought into how the lives and actions of its main characters would look like if they were more than just plot devices. It's a shame that the film treats such a great setup with such flippancy and as a result many scenes are not as tense as they should be. It's often too obvious that everything is only happening because the film needs it, rather than because it makes sense in the context of the characters. It's especially a miracle how Damon's Sullivan survives for as long as he does. He should be found out way before the film's halfway point. 

228. Star Wars

Song - Con Te Partiro (Andrea Bocelli)

Movie: Star Wars (George Lucas, 1977)

I had never seen it before! Annie Hall will always eat its lunch, but it's real good. Calling something a 'space opera' will quickly turn me into another direction, while few things sound more appealing than a hangout movie taking place over the course of a single night. American Graffiti was always the Lucas classic that had my priority and after intensely dislking that (the cheekily cynical end title cards were the final nail in its coffin) my interest in Star Wars waned even further. That was also connected to Star Wars seemingly becoming more a business property than a piece of entertainment. I was put off by its seemingly eternal inescapability, obnoxiously finding its way into every corner of pop culture, forever. In doing so, it basically became the model for current Hollywood blockbuster cinema which, led by Marvel, has turned movies into content generators perfectly designed to make profits and not do much else interesting. 

The Hollywood business practices influneced/enabled by Star Wars still deserve criticsm, but having seen it now, it's hard to blame people for craving and creating ever more Star Wars content. It's the result of the film's greatest artistic achievment; its world and creature design is simply spectacular. The sequence at spaceport Mos Eisley in particular is astonishing in how matter-of-factly it presents strange life forms of different shapes, sizes, colors and organisms, most of whom can not be (and are not) identified by any recognisable category. We learn of course that Chewbacca is a wookie, but have no idea what that is, what it can do, or what the other creatures we meet are. Yet they are all designed with great attention to specificity and detail,  and presented as fully functioning residents of this world, who speak to each other using strange sounds we can hardly identify or understand. There are no rules established to this world, no explanation given to its existence. It is just a fully realised completely alien world, not beholden to any constraints. It's easy to imagine a limitless amount of different stories happenning in it. 

It's at Mos Eisley that we first meet Han Solo. As played by Harrison Ford, that's another aspect of Star Wars that fully lives up to its reputation. I have sometimes found Ford a stuffy and dull actor, but his brashy laconic confidence as Han Solo (it absolutely helps that this, and Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader are just fantastic character names) is pretty much iconic from his first frame. Ford, like Alec Guinness, hated his dialogue, but it's worth noting that he gets some really good lines that are both exquisite zingers and build up his character without tiresome backstories. It's a good example of how good dialogue is also about what is not being said. We get to know The Force similarly to how we learn about Han Solo. There is no major explanation for why and how Jedi have access to it, or what it exactly is. We (like the characters themselves) are simply asked to have faith that it's some sort of special power that gives them special abilities. That too separates Star Wars positively from modern superhero blockbusters, which go to great lengths to establish why and how Iron Man, Thor or Captain America obtained the powers they did, creating very specific rules and circumstances for what makes them special. That limits the imagination of what's possible rather then expanding it. 

Star Wars is unfortunately a bit less successful in its action scenes. In particular the climactic destruction of the Death Star takes too long, and consists of shots of green lasers coming out of airships, exterior shots of the planes flying through an extremely narrow walled path, and interior shots of the pilots excited frenzy as they are flying their planes towards their destination The whole sequence repetitively cuts between a version of these three shots, and fails to build any momentum or tension. It doesn't help that Mark Hamill doesn't have the charisma and screen presence of Ford and Guinness (neither does Carrie Fisher). For the most part though, that doesn't matter too much. Ford and Guinness are so good they manage to lift their co-actors up whenever they share the screen together. The final, joyously happy, hug, between Han, Leia and Luke makes you immediately want to see their next adventure together. 

I have actually seen The Force Awakens and the Last Jedi (as well as The Phantom Menace, when I was very young at a friend's birthday in the cinema. I remember really liking it). I am eager to see The Empire Strikes back and can understand some of the criticism of the latest trilogy for failing to reunite Ford, Fisher and Hamill. The bigger problem is that I don't see how any modern Star Wars film can recreate the magic of the first film/trilogy. Even now that you know eveything that came after, Star Wars, the actual 1977 film, plays as the little movie that could. Annie Hall is now maybe an underdog, but it's easy to see how in real time a film about neurotic intellectual New Yorkers discussiong their love lives, childhoods and worldviews, featuring cameos by Marshall McLuhan and Truman Capote was a more obvious Oscar winner, a more obvious choice of the establishment, than a film that starts with anthropomorphised scrap making weird sounds as it walks through a desert. The sweetly corny ethos of that opening sequence is maintained throughout the rest of the film. The Americans went to the moon with rusted metal and Swiss Army knives and it looks like that may have inspired Lucas. Many of the sets deliberately look like they are held together by duct tape, with doors and walls that are visibly scratched, and technology that looks secondhand, giving the film a DYI look and feel, even when deploying the most expensive special effects to that point in film history.