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Off to the Movies!
Jul. 5th, 2002 09:34 amBatya and I saw two cinematic treats within the past week or so, one on the (more-or-less) big screen and one at home, and two films cannot be more opposite in style.
The first - seen at a local theater with not particularly large screens or theaters - was Minority Report. This is a tour-de-force from Spielberg, but one very different than many of the films I know him for. The sentimentality that underscored his films of the 70s and 80s (I haven't seen a Spielberg work since Schindler's List) is gone, replaced with a colder realism that suits the material. And while there a good deal of FX spread around the film's future Washington DC, they support the film and its actors more rather than steal it.
This is a very cerebral film, harder science fiction than we've been seeing of late on the big screen, but also very much a series of interlocking mysteries. The film owes as much to Hitchcock as it does to the author of the original short story, Philip K. Dick. Serious questions of fate and destiny, of civil liberties, of free will, of power and authority, are asked, albeit gingerly. But we are left to ask those questions more by ourselves as the film develops the mystery, seemingly solves it, and then twists around itself.
In the hands of a lesser director and cast, this could have been much more cliched. Thankfully, Speilberg knows his way around cliches well enough to avoid overusing them, and the cast is superb. I've never been a big fan of Tom Cruise, but works like this show why he can be called an actor and not a star. Supporting actors Colin Farrell and Max Von Sydow are also great.
Yesterday, at the other end of the spectrum, we saw Moulin Rogue! Aside from starring the other half of Hollywood's current reigning divorced couple - Nicole Kidman - it is heartfelt rather than smart, set in the past rather than the future, cluttered and noisy and joyfully unreal. That is works at all is a tribute to its cast - mainly Kidman, Ewan McGregor and Jim Broadbent - and to director Baz Luhrman's determination to make it work. I can't say what would inspire anyone to make a musical set in 1899 that uses recent rock and pop hits as its score, but once Luhrman sets the stage, I found it impossible not to buy into it. It's all a form of opera, reflected to a degree through a postmodern prism. Sometimes, it's satiric or self-mocking, but usually it's earnest.
Again, though, without the cast buying into it as well, this would have been a dud. Luhrman overuses camera tricks quite often, and if the actors don't hold your attention, those tricks can overwhelm you. Indeed, I wonder if I would have been overwhelmed anyway had I see this on the big screen. But riveting performances - and surprisingly good singing - drags the viewer away from the glitz at the edges and into the simple (almost simplistic), old-fashioned musical theater plot.
Be warned, though, that hearing music by the likes of Elton John, Kurt Cobain, and Queen in this setting will be jarring. No matter how many times we were introduced to something in a strange context, each new reimagining of a song was a bit of a shock. But Luhrman knows what to do with such music. I just doubt I'll ever hear some of these songs the same way again.
The first - seen at a local theater with not particularly large screens or theaters - was Minority Report. This is a tour-de-force from Spielberg, but one very different than many of the films I know him for. The sentimentality that underscored his films of the 70s and 80s (I haven't seen a Spielberg work since Schindler's List) is gone, replaced with a colder realism that suits the material. And while there a good deal of FX spread around the film's future Washington DC, they support the film and its actors more rather than steal it.
This is a very cerebral film, harder science fiction than we've been seeing of late on the big screen, but also very much a series of interlocking mysteries. The film owes as much to Hitchcock as it does to the author of the original short story, Philip K. Dick. Serious questions of fate and destiny, of civil liberties, of free will, of power and authority, are asked, albeit gingerly. But we are left to ask those questions more by ourselves as the film develops the mystery, seemingly solves it, and then twists around itself.
In the hands of a lesser director and cast, this could have been much more cliched. Thankfully, Speilberg knows his way around cliches well enough to avoid overusing them, and the cast is superb. I've never been a big fan of Tom Cruise, but works like this show why he can be called an actor and not a star. Supporting actors Colin Farrell and Max Von Sydow are also great.
Yesterday, at the other end of the spectrum, we saw Moulin Rogue! Aside from starring the other half of Hollywood's current reigning divorced couple - Nicole Kidman - it is heartfelt rather than smart, set in the past rather than the future, cluttered and noisy and joyfully unreal. That is works at all is a tribute to its cast - mainly Kidman, Ewan McGregor and Jim Broadbent - and to director Baz Luhrman's determination to make it work. I can't say what would inspire anyone to make a musical set in 1899 that uses recent rock and pop hits as its score, but once Luhrman sets the stage, I found it impossible not to buy into it. It's all a form of opera, reflected to a degree through a postmodern prism. Sometimes, it's satiric or self-mocking, but usually it's earnest.
Again, though, without the cast buying into it as well, this would have been a dud. Luhrman overuses camera tricks quite often, and if the actors don't hold your attention, those tricks can overwhelm you. Indeed, I wonder if I would have been overwhelmed anyway had I see this on the big screen. But riveting performances - and surprisingly good singing - drags the viewer away from the glitz at the edges and into the simple (almost simplistic), old-fashioned musical theater plot.
Be warned, though, that hearing music by the likes of Elton John, Kurt Cobain, and Queen in this setting will be jarring. No matter how many times we were introduced to something in a strange context, each new reimagining of a song was a bit of a shock. But Luhrman knows what to do with such music. I just doubt I'll ever hear some of these songs the same way again.
