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CARRIER: (USS NIMITZ)

LOOKING FOR ERIC

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Up in the Air REVIEW

DISTRICT 9 REVIEW

CALLING ALL FILM REVIEWERS!!

NEWS FLASH: BlipTV dumps Paramount!

THE LOVELY BONES Two Trailers Released

IRON MAN 2 TRAILER JUST RELEASED!

PUSH

Iron Man 2: new sneak peek poster revealed!

The Storm Warriors: review with trailer

more Up In The Air sneak peek trailers!

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How To Train Your Dragon

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

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Screen Trek - An Intersection of Movie Reviews, Articles, Essays and Conversation

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Screen Trek - August 2009

MODERN MUSIC VIDEOS: THREE OF THE BEST DOING THE ROUNDS RIGHT NOW III

August 31st 2009 07:43

Friday night used to be the sole domain for the beguiling rhythm of the music video. The Internet has changed all that, however, and when you're sitting at your computer trying to squeeze out some mid-week inspiration, a quick search for music videos is bound to torpedo your already loose grasp on time management. In digging up the following clips I stumbled on many other candidates for a quick write-up, but nothing right now quite competes with these three short slices of brilliance.

Miike Snow - Animal

Perhaps the best new music video released in a long, long time, director Anthony Dickenson and Pulse Films slaved away on this production for five weeks. The final result, a dazzling combination of animation, sculpture, projection and band footage, was definitely worth it.

Eels - In My Dreams

Take it from me, hiking in high heels is a bitch. But Eels make it look and sound like a great old time, especially if you're hanging out with a kid who's wearing a werewolf mask. Beautiful little video to a sweet song.

Phoenix - 1901

Phoenix are known for their precise approach to writing pop music, so it's fitting their latest music video is just as fastidious. Directed by Dylan Byrne and Ben Strebel, the beauty of this clip is its simplicity, plus a dazzling array of lighting effects, applied both during and after production. The song's not half bad either.

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DISTRICT 9: SCI-FI'S NEW TERRITORY

August 27th 2009 05:36

Sharlto Copley isn't seeing things so clearly in District 9.

Every once in a long while a film comes out that is so left of field it flies almost completely under the radar, before landing in cinemas, shaking patrons like a fizzy drink, and then letting them explode out of the theatre, spreading word in a wildfire about the dazzling piece of celluloid they just witnessed.

District 9 is one of those films, being the best piece of sci-fi to hit theatres in a very long time. You may have been getting by on Star Trek, disappointed by Terminator Salvation and waiting for Avatar, but Kirk and Spock can’t compete with this, and who needs the greatest action filmmaker of all time when you have the young Neill Bloomkamp, a screenwriter and director who looks to have studied the James Cameron playbook in fine detail.

District 9 matches a clever concept in an unusual setting with rock solid storytelling. A Hollywood executive would giggle with glee at the conventional but precise artistry on display in the film’s script, before getting on the horn to see if McG was available to piss all over the project.

Thankfully, things never went in that direction, the movie being put into production by Peter Jackson’s Wingnut Films. The New Zealand company gave Bloomkamp the opportunity to direct his own script – cowritten with Terri Tatchell – and a $30 million budget to work with.

The final result is a mind-boggling extravaganza - an unnerving mix of old-fashioned screenwriting and very contemporary production work.

In District 9, first time actor Sharlto Copley plays Wikus Van Der Merwe, a bumbling bureaucrat within the massive Multi-National United (MNU), a private arms and security contractor.

It's been 28 years since an enormous alien spacecraft came to a ghostly standstill over the city of Johannesburg, South Africa, with scientists finding thousands of malnourished extraterrestrials after cutting into the inert hulk. Authorities eventually ushered the aliens down to solid ground and set them up in District 9, a makeshift refugee camp that soon became a shanty town, replete with crime, vice and a Nigerian crime lord.

Now the people of Johannesburg want the aliens gone, with MNU being assigned the task of evicting them to a new site 200 kilometres outside of town, and heading up this mission will be an out-of-his depth Wikus. But MNU is more concerned with harnessing the genetically locked weaponry of the aliens (derogatorily referred to as "prawns" due to their crustaceous appearance) than actually looking after their welfare. Unfortunately, things become complicated when Wikus is inadvertently exposed to an alien power source, prompting a metamorphosis that makes him the most wanted man on the planet.

Despite its relatively small budget, District 9 is a big film with big ideas. It overflows with metaphor, subtext and satire, throwing its messages right into the laps of the audience. But at its heart, District 9 possesses a cracking narrative, and that’s what really makes this film tick: it’s willingness to stick to its protagonist’s character development as he’s dragged through a series of outrageous events.

The alien spaceship becomes an oddly familiar part of the scenery in District 9.

Wikus works because he starts out the film as a hopeless twit. He’s controlled by events, and only won the opportunity to lead the eviction team through connections with his father-on-law, the CEO of MNU. But Bloomkamp and Tatchell understand what makes a movie character, and through the course of the film Wikus undergoes a spiritual transformation that mirrors his more physical changes.

Supporting characters are equally well defined. David James plays Wikus’s arch nemesis, Koobus, with relish, attaching himself securely to his character’s well-grafted ticks – his habit of referring to Wikus as ‘Dickus’ being an obvious and hilarious example. Wikus’s eventual alien ally, Christopher, is also rendered with a deft touch, the computer generated, non-English speaking, giant crustacean generating plenty of sympathy from the viewer.

And taking their script to the screen, the filmmakers have pulled off the story with almost effortless style. The shaking camera is a device used too arbitrarily in contemporary films, but Bloomkamp and cinematographer Trent Opaloch pull off a small coup by making their application both relevant and watchable. Bloomkamp illustrates a keen eye for action scene geography during the second half of the film, breaking up the documentary style footage with wider explanatory shots, often cleverly done through the lenses of a watching news or security cameras.

Everything just comes together brilliantly in District 9. It’s filmmaking that marries big ideas to economical, often understated implementation, the result being a bracing experience. It’s perhaps a film that will be skipped by some mainstream audiences, which is a shame because it’s difficult to think of a contemporary piece of cinema more exhilarating than this.

Check out the trailer for Distrct 9 below:

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TYSON: HEAVYWEIGHT'S HEAVY MEMORIES

August 25th 2009 07:45

You could easily imagine Mike Tyson as being any one of a number of things: a fearsome fighter; a reckless brute; a convicted criminal. His public life is seemingly a litany of aggression, some of it trained for, much of it not.

It’s perhaps harder to think of the former heavyweight champ as a talker, but talk he can. Tyson is in fact the Lloyd Dobbler of professional fighters, his mouth moving too slowly for the torrent of information trying to tumble out of it. He’s the guy entrenched in your kitchen at 3am, long after the rest of the party goers have gone home, eating room temperature hors d’oeuvres and wanting to chat about the deep stuff.

It’s that constant need to communicate that director James Toback has tapped into for his documentary, Tyson. Toback sets the camera up like an adversary, staring down its subject, and Tyson, trained to never look away from an opponent, talks like his life depended on it.

And you get the impression from Tyson that his life does depend on this documentary. It’s his chance to tell his story.

So he does, information pouring out of the man like he’s scared of the tape running out mid explanation, mid confession. He talks about his early life, surviving in the slums of Brooklyn, learning from an early humiliation to impose himself physically on others. Tyson’s realisation of his ability to outmuscle his street side competitors leads to a teenage life of petty crime, and eventually a place in juvenile detention.

But what would be the end of the line for any other young delinquent turned out to be a turning point for Tyson. He fell into boxing, and quickly came under the tutelage of Constantine ‘Cus’ D’Amato. D’Amato virtually adopted the young man, built his skill set, and helped create a modern sporting marvel.

It was D’Amato’s death in 1985 that Tyson now acknowledges as the beginning of his own descent. Without his beloved father figure, the newly crowned heavyweight champ fell into a troubled life of excess, eventually landing in jail for three years in the early 90s, convicted of statutory rape.

It’s fascinating stuff, watching Tyson muddle through his life, trying to put the pieces of his personal jigsaw into place. Toback is a true friend of Tyson’s and it shows - not because he’s easy on his subject, but because he doesn’t let Tyson avoid the more dangerous aspects of his own personality. The former champ admits to having trouble relating to women (although he still denies having raped Desiree Washington in 1991), and acknowledges his susceptibility to fits of unrestrained anger.

Iron Mike isn't afraid of self reflection in Tyson.

The whole film is a strange sort of penance: a washing of hands of a troubled past by a philosophical former fighter. Throughout, Tyson is unexpectedly engaging company: he’s thoughtful and self aware, often plainly emotional and frequently funny. It’s interesting to get his interpretation of events, the film having plenty to say about the cult of celebrity through its illustration of popular media’s depiction of Tyson, which usually had him pegged as an out of control monster.

Technically, things are tight and efficient. Toback lets Tyson unspool his thoughts, but never allows things to dwell for too long on any one topic. The film benefits from fantastic footage of Tyson’s life under the wing of D’Amato, and includes some deftly cut fight montages. In fact, Aaron Yanes’s editing is brilliant all round, cleverly playing on Tyson’s verbosity by splitting the screen and overlapping different parts of the interview, before whittling things down to a single potent strand.

Approaching this documentary it’s reasonable to be cynical; the film’s subject is after all listed as an executive producer. But Tyson turns out to be a rewarding viewing experience. It may tell only one side of an incendiary personal story, but the other popular version of a modern day monster has been peddled more than enough times. Tyson is sharp, gripping documentary making, the man himself sitting down with no interruptions and nobody propping him up, allowing you to watch as he goes to work, slowly washing away his sins.

Check out the trailer for Tyson below:

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RETROSPECT: THE INSIDER (1999)

August 21st 2009 10:33

Al Pacino as Lowell Bergman in The Insider.

What do you think about when I mention the name Michael Mann? Probably cops, robbers and a lot of brilliantly choreographed shoot-outs.

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RETROSPECT: RAISING ARIZONA (1987)

August 18th 2009 03:05

Holly Hunter and Nicholas Cage in Raising Arizona

Holly Hunter and Nicholas Cage kickstarted their film careers in Raising Arizona.

Joel and Ethan Coen turned plenty of heads with their 1984 debut feature, Blood Simple. Tightly wound and riddled with the blackest of black humour, the crime thriller marked the brothers as being exceptionally talented filmmakers.

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PUBLIC ENEMIES: THE NOT SO FLAMBOYANT JOHN DILLINGER

August 14th 2009 06:24

Johnny Depp stars as John Dillinger in Public Enemies

The story of legendary depression-era gangster John Dillinger would seem tailor made for filmmaker Michael Mann. Guns, banks and girls; charismatic men of deeds versus tenacious men of the law: it’s all stuff that the stylish director/screenwriter is expert in.

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CHE: PARTS I & II REVIEWED ON 20/20 FILMSIGHT

August 14th 2009 02:22

Sigh - another month, another biopic. Except that with Che, director Steven Soderbergh and chums didn't just tackle some esoteric politician or unsung sportsman. Instead, they chose to focus not one but two films on the legendary revolutionary, Che Guevara, perhaps the most important figure in the modern political left's history. But how to tackle one of the truly mythical figures of recent times? On this point, the filmmakers seemed to hit a snag, and the result is a pair of flaccid and unsatisfying films. For a full review, check out my write-up on 20/20 FIlmsight.

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RETROSPECT: DELIVERANCE (1972)

August 12th 2009 07:18

Ned Beatty, Jon Voight, Ronnie Cox and Burt Reynolds in Deliverance.

While the 1970s is regarded as a landmark decade for American cinema, few films from that remarkable era have grown on the collective conscience like Deliverance. In an age when the American dream has all but evaporated, Deliverance’s strong questions regarding nature over nuture and the loss of innocence perhaps pack more potency than ever before.

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VAN DIEMEN'S LAND @ THE BRISBANE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

August 3rd 2009 08:20

Oscar Redding is quietly convincing as Australia's best remembered cannibal, Alexander Pearce.

If you’re at all familiar with the legend of Tasmanian cannibal, Alexander Pearce, you’ve perhaps wondered why this gruesome true story hasn’t been grafted onto celluloid sooner. The Irish penal convict’s man-eating exploits have become part of Australian folklore, frightening the pants off campfire kids and adults alike.

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THE FIRST G.I. JOE-COBRA WAR, AS RECOUNTED BY SLATE

August 1st 2009 06:33

Channing Tatum and Marlon Wayans in the new G.I. Joe film.

In retrospect, the 80s was a strange decade. Looking back, it’s now hard to believe such a period ever existed, with its odd mix of ‘modern’ technology and old-fashioned values. It meant you could ride in your limousine, talk on your car phone and play video games while still being patronisingly racist towards minorities and sexist towards both your wife and secretary. Out of this politically incorrect time of technological plenty came some bizarre toys and cartoons, one of the strangest being G.I. Joe. Fighting the nefarious and fashion-deficient Cobra Command, the Joe saved the world, one slightly offensive episode at a time. Now, with the G.I. Joe film upon us, Slate has taken the opportunity to recount the ridiculously bloodless first conflict between the Joe and Cobra Command. The results are frequently hilarious. Enjoy.

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