IN REVIEW: LEONE'S LEGACY

Review of ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA, INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS, and THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE WEIRD now available here.

THE DAY A PIG FELL IN THE WELL

New review at the oneonefour.com:

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/29/in-review-the-day-a-pig-fell-in-the-well-hong-sang-soo-1996/

PIFF Overview

I have just published an overview of the 13th Pusan Film Festival, which consists of a conversation between myself and William Empey, who also attended a number of screenings. It can be found here.

More PIFF Reviews

Here are some more reviews from the Pusan Film Festival:

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/13/day-five-at-piff-in-review/

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/15/day-six-at-piff-in-review/

Reviews from PIFF

I've been posting some quick reviews from the Pusan International Film Festival at the One One Four:

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/11/piff-day-two-in-review/

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/12/piff-day-three-in-review/

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/13/piff-day-four-in-review/

CLOSER TO HEAVEN and Melodrama in Korean Cinema

A discussion of melodrama and Korean cinema:

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/10/01/in-review-closer-to-heaven-park-jin-pyo-2009-and-melodrama-in-korean-cinema/

In Review: THIS CHARMING GIRL

I have just posted a review of Lee Yoon-ki's first film, This Charming Girl (2004). It's available here:

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/09/24/in-review-this-charming-girl-lee-yoon-ki-2004/

Review of THE HOUSEMAID

I have just posted a review of Kim Ki-Young's The Housemaid (1960), along with an overview of theauteurs.com. You can find it at theoneonefour.com.

PIFF Top Ten

I have just posted my preview of the Pusan Film Festival. You can check it out here:
http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/09/15/the-most-anticipated-screenings-at-the-2009-piff/

Review of MOTHER and MEMORIES OF MURDER

New review of Bong Joon-ho at theoneonefour.com

MADE IN USA (Jean-Luc Godard, 1966)

For many years, one of the more difficult to see of Jean-Luc Godard's 1960s films was Made in USA, a film Godard makes in between a number of what I feel are among the greatest in film history. It is made after Pierrot le Fou (1965) and Masculine Feminine (1966) and before Two or Three Things I Know About Her (1967). This run of films by Godard, and in fact the whole decade of his 1960s filmmaking, mark one of the most incredible runs in film history. This is not to say that Godard has not continued to make great films. Rather, this time period allowed for the unique convergence of experimentation taking place by a highly visible celebrity artist (Godard's celebrity in France at the time was rather enormous). The fact that Godard had the ability to act as a public intellectual while continuing to make aesthetically dazzling work remains one of the great achievements in cinema history. And, luckily, the Criterion Collection has gradually been releasing many of these works on high quality DVD packages over the last number of years. Most recently, Made in USA and Two or Three Things I Know About Her finally made their appearance on the Criterion label, and as usual the quality of the productions in great, both in terms of the image and the supporting extras.

Seeing Made in USA for the first time was quite a surprising experience. Being made after the essay-like Masculine Feminine and before the even more anti-narrative films like Two or Three Things, La Chinoise, and Weekend, I was expecting Made in USA to be something similar. However, with Godard, it shouldn't have been a shock that it didn't fit into my expectations. Made in USA is more in line with something like Pierrot le Fou or Alphaville, or even the much earlier A Woman is a Woman. It is a genre piece, a detective story, and is filled with a huge number of references to Classic Hollywood. Old actors and detectives dominate the character names and dialogue to a very blatant degree for any cinephile, and it is clear where Tarantino gets his influence. Of course, the similarity between the two stops there. As the excellent Criterion supplemental reference guide points out, the cinema references are only one context of allusion: there is also literature and, most critically, politics. And while I got most of the cinema references, the politics of the period were less familiar. What this did was make me learn this context, which Criterion helps provide, at least as a starting point.

Now, the question arises as to how "entertaining" all of this is, and it is a legitimate question to try to answer. But it is not one we should answer uncritically. Most younger film fans, when asked about whether they prefer Godard or Tarantino, would answer Tarantino, provided they even heard of Godard, because Tarantino gives a much easier access to cinematic pleasure. Tarantino does not want to question, at least on any fundamental level, the dominant mode of cinematic address. Godard clearly does, but I would maintain that he does so in a highly entertaining manner. The images of this film are incredibly pleasurable and arresting. The problem lies in Godard's lack of interest in telling generic stories. Unlike Tarantino, he was unwilling, almost from the start, to play the game. He does not want to break expectations as much as destroy them from the start and have the audience approach the film in a radically different way. In another of the extras from the DVD, Godard biographer Richard Brody states that Made in USA, despite being dedicated to Nicolas Ray and Samuel Fuller, does not show the influence of either Ray, Fuller, or the whole film noir tradition. This is true narratively, but certainly not in terms of the actual dedication, which is to the sounds and images of the two directors. Looking at Made in USA, the work of Ray in particular cannot be ignored. If Godard was willing to give in to audiences in terms of story, I'm convinced his images would be capable of mass appeal.

But I hardly think we should want this kind of concession from Godard. And I'm not trying to simply dismiss Tarantino (whose work I very much like) or popular narrative in general. But I do feel someone like Godard, given the rather easy acceptance of the cultural industry given by most fans and even many scholars, is still very valuable and needs to be seriously considered in today's cultural world. This is why I highly recommend checking out his work on these Criterion DVDs, which really provide a wealth of additional material that properly contextualizes Godard and can lead to greater enjoyment of his very challenging and still important work.

The Battle for the Soul of Jesse Eisenberg

I recently watched Adventureland (Greg Mottola, 2009), newly released on DVD, an indie romantic comedy that I really enjoyed. It stars Jesse Eisenberg, who is also the lead of two other very good comedy-dramas, Roger Dodger (Dylan Kidd, 2002) and The Squid and the Whale (Noah Baumbach, 2005). These three films have a great deal in common, especially in terms of the characters that Eisenberg plays. In all three, Eisenberg is positioned between different concepts of masculinity, especially in relation to women. Eisenberg's characters are all very similar, sensitive young men who want to respect women and find romantic love. They are in many ways post-feminist young men who want to join in rejecting traditional masculinity. However, in each film, there is an older male character who tempts the character into rejecting their sensitivity and embracing their "natural" sexual urges. Of course, these natural urges involve viewing sexuality in a physical rather than idealist light.

This biological argument gets expressed in the great opening scene of Roger Dodger, with Roger's opening line: "What's happening right now is important only in the context of our continuing evolution as a species." Roger (played by Campbell Scott) explains to his colleagues that man is only useful as long as he has a utility to women. Once that function ceases, which he believes is coming in the future with technology that will allow procreation without men, the result will not be "equality" but rather "natural selection"; the role of the male gender will thus become first servitude and then elimination. It is a dazzling speech and performance, as indicated within the film by the applause he is given by his colleagues after he concludes, and sets up Roger as a seducer, not only or even primarily of women but of his young nephew (played by Eisenberg). It clearly sets up the character's hatred of women as being intimately linked to his vulnerability. But this vulnerability is actually not biological in any way. It is primarily social and cultural, a result of Roger's own difficult relationship with his father. This scene sets the stage for the drama not only of Roger Dodger but of the later films as well. Both the father in The Squid and the Whale (played by Jeff Daniels) and the carnival maintenance worker in Adventureland (played by Ryan Reynolds) make similar arguments about sexuality being something that is a physical need in order to justify their own behaviour, and Eisenberg in each case is lured into rejecting his former values and following this path. By the end of each of these films, however, the character comes to a better understanding of the jaded and rather pathetic nature of these characters (only in Roger Dodger does this character also come to some self-realization) and rejects them.


Adventureland is especially interesting because Eisenberg's character is now older (post-graduate) and in many ways the battle is not as difficult. He easily rejects Connell for the loser that he is, and even forgives his girlfriend for cheating on him. This is why I think the most interesting character in the film is actually Em (played by Kristen Stewart), who is also torn between two different types of masculinity and has difficulty rejecting the older form. Again, this is less biological than social, given the difficulty she has in her own family situation. Still, although it is about slightly older characters, Adventureland still has a youthful idealism and concludes on a beautiful shot just before Eisenberg enters into the world of sexuality. What will be interesting will be if Eisenberg continues to get cast as similar characters as he gets older. Because in many ways the battle he will face going forward will be much more internal, an attempt to maintain a certain idealism in the face of social reality.

Overview of Chungmuro Film Festival at The One One Four

I just completed my first assignment working as a contributing editor for Film at the One One Four website, a English language blog covering the arts and culture scene in Korea. Most of my writing will now appear here, although I will occasionally post items that may be outside of their concerns on this website. And I will continue to link to my pieces at the One One Four here as well.

My article on the Chungmuro Film Festival can be found here:

http://www.theoneonefour.com/2009/09/02/news-and-reviews-from-the-chungmuro-film-fest/#more-4140

Chungmuro Film Festival

The 3rd Chungmuro Film Festival will take place August 24th to September 1st in the Chungmuro district of Seoul. Chungmuro has been a festival that caters to older cinema, and that continues this year with a number of retrospectives. The Cine Classic section includes a great lineup of Classic Hollywood (All About Eve, How Green Was My Valley, Gigi, and others), British Cinema (The Third Man, Olivier's Hamlet, Hobson's Choice, and others), the French New Wave (Chabrol's Les Cousins and Godard's Alphaville), pre-New Wave (Bresson's first film as well as one the New Wave's bete noire's, The Wages of Fear), as well as New Hollywood (The Godfather trilogy). There is also a tribute to Marilyn Monroe, showcasing a number of her films. Korean cinema is also represented by a large retrospective of films from fifties and sixties.

The difference with the festival this year is the inclusion of newer releases, with dozens of recent films from around the world. Chungmuro seems to be modelling itself on the Jeonju festival, with its mixture of retrospectives and new releases, although it is still on a smaller scale. However, I do have to question the timing of the festival during the last week of August, before many people return from vacation/ arrive to Korea to teach. But, then again, it may be a better time for the local Korean audience, taking place before classes begin again in September. I'm returning from holiday on the 28th and hope to be able to see a few films before the festival concludes.

Cine-Vacances at the Cinematheque (August 4-30)

The August program at the Cinematheque has been announced and is available here. Among the highlights include a huge retrospective on the films of Don Siegel, along with a day of Jacques Demy films on Tuesday, August 4th (although no subtitle information is given). There is also two screenings of Sergei Bondarchuk's 1968 War and Peace in four parts.

Film Quiz

The following film quiz originated over at the blog Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule. You can find it here.


1) Second-favorite Stanley Kubrick film.

The Killing

2) Most significant/important/interesting trend in movies over the past decade, for good or evil.

internet's effect on film criticism/ reception

3) Bronco Billy (Clint Eastwood) or Buffalo Bill Cody (Paul Newman)?

not familiar with either

4) Best Film of 1949.

The Third Man

5) Joseph Tura (Jack Benny) or Oscar Jaffe (John Barrymore)?

Joseph Tura

6) Has the hand-held shaky-cam directorial style become a visual cliché?

yes, like most

7) What was the first foreign-language film you ever saw?

honestly can't remember for sure, but maybe Breathless

8) Charlie Chan (Warner Oland) or Mr. Moto (Peter Lorre)?

again, neither

9) Favorite World War II drama (1950-1970).

Army of Shadows

10) Favorite animal movie star.

the birds

11) Who or whatever is to blame, name an irresponsible moment in cinema.

rape scene in Irreversible

12) Best Film of 1969.

again, Army of Shadows

13) Name the last movie you saw theatrically, and also on DVD or Blu-ray.

theatrically: Drag Me to Hell
DVD: Gone With the Wind

14) Second-favorite Robert Altman film.

Short Cuts

15) What is your favorite independent outlet for reading about movies, either online or in print?

Girish Shambu's blog

16) Who wins? Angela Mao or Meiko Kaji? (Thanks, Peter!)

no idea

17) Mona Lisa Vito (Marisa Tomei) or Olive Neal (Jennifer Tilly)?

Mona Lisa Vito

18) Favorite movie that features a carnival setting or sequence.

again, The Third Man

19) Best use of high-definition video on the big screen to date.

Zodiac

20) Favorite movie that is equal parts genre film and a deconstruction or consideration of that same genre.

Shoot the Piano Player

21) Best Film of 1979.

Scream from Silence

22) Most realistic and/or sincere depiction of small-town life in the movies.

The Wind Will Carry Us

23) Best horror movie creature (non-giant division).

the brood

24) Second-favorite Francis Ford Coppola film.

The Godfather

25) Name a one-off movie that could have produced a franchise you would have wanted to see.

Zero Effect

26) Favorite sequence from a Brian De Palma film.

museum scene in Dressed to Kill

27) Favorite moment in three-strip Technicolor.

opening color scene of The Wizard of Oz

28) Favorite Alan Smithee film. (Thanks, Peter!)

none

29) Crash Davis (Kevin Costner) or Morris Buttermaker (Walter Matthau)?

Crash Davis

30) Best post-Crimes and Misdemeanors Woody Allen film.

Deconstructing Harry

31) Best Film of 1999.

The Wind Will Carry Us

32) Favorite movie tag line.

no idea

33) Favorite B-movie western.

not sure if I've seen one

34) Overall, the author best served by movie adaptations of her or his work.

James Cain

35) Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn) or Irene Bullock (Carole Lombard)?

Susan Vance

36) Favorite musical cameo in a non-musical movie.

The Yardbirds in Blow Up

37) Bruno (the character, if you haven’t seen the movie, or the film, if you have): subversive satire or purveyor of stereotyping?

subversive satire

38) Five film folks, living or deceased, you would love to meet. (Thanks, Rick!)

Godard, Fuller, Bogart, Welles, Hitchcock

Call for Proposals (SCMS)

Type of Posting: Panel

Proposed Panel/Workshop Subject: Hong Sang-soo

Organizer Name(s): Marshall Deutelbaum and Marc Raymond

E-Mail Address: mraymond_1918@yahoo.co.uk

Summary: This panel will examine the films and career of South Korean director Hong Sang-soo. We invite either analysis of individual films or comparative studies looking at the evolution of Hong's work and welcome a variety of critical and theoretical perspectives. Our goal is to provide a number of different readings and approaches that will open up discussion and illuminate Hong's filmmaking career.

Please send 250-300 word abstract by August 12th to the email address listed above. Response will be given promptly by August 15th.

Send individual topics & summaries to organizer(s) by: E-Mail

Nagwon Music Film Festival

From July 21 to August 2, the Seoul Cinematheque will be showcasing a lineup of music related films, from American rock concert films to Soviet musicals. Films showing in English or with English subtitles include:

The Last Waltz (Martin Scorsese, 1978)
Hair (Milos Forman, 1979)
Pink Floyd: The Wall (Alan Parker, 1982)
The Doors (Oliver Stone, 1991)
The Commitments (Alan Parker, 1991)

Tractor Drivers (Ivan Pyryev, 1939)
A Better Tomorrow on the Street (2008)

Also, the Puchon Fantastic Film Festival continues running until next week.

THE HURT LOCKER (Kathryn Bigelow, 2009)

By far the most critically acclaimed film of the year so far is Kathryn Bigelow's Iraq war action film The Hurt Locker. When discussing the film, people inevitably point out that it is an "apolitical" Iraq film, usually claiming this as one of the reasons it is so successful. In my opinion, there is no such thing as an "apolitical" film, but I understand what the critics are referencing. Unlike many of the other Iraqi films, there is no overt political stance, nothing polemical about the story. It is an action film set in Iraq, about an elite three man bomb squad. Most of the film concerns the men doing their job, with brief moments away from battle in between. It has the feel of a Howard Hawks film, of professionals at work. But, it is also, I think very clearly, a film about America in Iraq. The political may be subtext here, but it is nevertheless very present. (WARNING: Some spoilers ahead)

After an opening in which the first group leader is killed, the film follows the new group leader, Sgt. James, along with Sgt. Sanborn and Specialist Eldridge. Clearly, James is the lead of the movie, a character with tremendous charisma, a man who seems, especially through the first part of the film, to be exactly the type of man and leader war requires. He may be crazy and have a death wish, but the film also romanticizes this as the type of bravery and courage one needs in battle (he is reminscient of the character of Kilgore in Apocalypse Now). He is also very paternal, especially to young Eldridge, who is seeing a army doctor because he is having difficulty adjusting to the stress of his job.


The major set piece of the film is a sniper battle, and although it is a great example of filmmaking from Bigelow, it is also the most ideologically dubious part of the film. It ends up having the feel of a video game, in which we can take pleasure and thrill from long distance murder. This takes place roughly halfway through the film. Fortunately, the last hour works towards questioning the heroism it initially celebrates.

This begins right after the battle, when the three men have a drunken evening together. At the end of this night, James puts on the helmet he uses when going into diffuse bombs. It is the only thing he feels comfortable doing. In the next scene, the men discover a "body bomb" which James believes is the young Iraqi boy he has befriended. This drives him towards revenge, in which he recklessly puts his men's lives in danger.

On one of these ill-advised missions, Eldridge is wounded and sent home, denouncing James before he leaves. Shortly afterwards, we learn that the young Iraqi boy is actually still alive, making James' actions even more absurd. The final mission before leaving is trying to diffuse a bomb strapped to an innocent Iraqi man. This time, however, James is unable to save the man and the bomb explodes.

James and Sanford survive, although their faces show the effects of the shrapnel. They have an extended talk about the dangers of their lives, in which Sanford claims he hates the country and wants to leave. James, however, is a different case.

We see him back at home, but for James, this world is more strange and disconcerting than anything in Iraq. Bigelow films the supermarket in a way that would not seem altogether out of place in Godard and Gorin's Tout Va Bien. James, like America, or at least a part of America, has become an addict. In his case, as the opening states, the drug is war itself.


Early in the film, we are given a deadline heading: 38 days left in Bravo Company's rotation. However, the film ends by reversing this expectation, as James goes back to Iraq for another year of duty. The critique of America comes through this lead character, who cannot stop living this life of war. Still, Bigelow does not make this too overt. Here, she is similar to Hawks, who would often subtly critique his heroes but also maintain a certain macho admiration for them. The last shot of The Hurt Locker does this as well. It shows the absurdity of James going back into battle for another 365 days, this time into an increasingly desolate Iraq. But the use of slow-motion and loud music also gives this sequence a grandiose quality that comes across as "cool". Like most mainstream American films, The Hurt Locker is not so much apolitical as it is contradictory and incoherent at the ideological level, working on both those in favour of and opposed to America as a military force. This is a limitation and a plus: we have both a great action movie and a critique of that mentality. Ultimately, any critique of something that also becomes it is inconsistent and even hypocritical. At the same time, only the most closed-minded viewer will fail to ponder the mentality of war addiction this story puts across.

Recent Films

I've seen a few more new films over the past two weeks, bringing my total of 2009 films up to 13, a very high number for this time of year. Usually there are few films of interest until later in the year, but the new films at the Jeonju film festival, the release of new films by Korean auteurs, and a few interesting genre exercises have made this first half of the year relatively strong.

The most recent three films I have seen in the theatre are all explorations of familiar genres: Bong Joon-ho's Mother, Rian Johnson's The Brothers Bloom, and Sam Raimi's Drag Me To Hell. The best of the group is the later, a great, fun, low-budget horror homage by the now very mainstream director Sam Raimie. Of course, this isn't actually "low-budget", but rather, like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's Grindhouse (2007), a tribute to those films, the difference being Raimi was once an actual director of these types of movies with his Evil Dead trilogy. Any fan of horror films will be familiar with what Raimi is up to and there are plenty of great and inventive sequences on display here. But, for the student of horror films this one works on an ideological level as well, with a pretty clear critique of capitalism and the "values" it embodies. This is another way in which it is a throwback, recalling the great cycle of horror films from the 1970s. The Brothers Bloom is the most self-conscious and self-reflexive of the bunch, a con film that uses the genre as a metaphor for myths and storytelling in general. It is too heavy-handed and the ending is not successful, but it is very well-written and acted and I quite enjoyed it on that level. Mother, Bong's deconstruction of the maternal melodrama, is not a very "fun" film, especially over the first half. But, after Bong has set up his plot, the concluding act works very well. It also is dark and unusual enough to stick in the mind.

All three films are still in theatres here and I think they are all worth seeing, and Raimi's in particular is really one that works great in the theatre with an audience. But, just a warning, it's a loud one.