Author: Village Vidiot

  “Barbershop,” 8 February 2003 (2002), DVD.  This is a funny, kind, largely loving look at an African-American barbershop in Chicago. Calvin (Ice T) inherits the shop from his father but has greater dreams for himself. Life in the shop provides a look at the community and this very important institution. Some fine acting from…

  “Y Tu Mama Tambien,” 25 January 2003 (2001), DVD.    This made lots of “best of” lists in 2002, and I think it’s a tad overrated. Still, both Bronwen and I liked this road/buddy/older woman look at youth, sex, politics, and (this is Mexico, after all) death. A pair of stoner high-schoolers, one rich,…

“Austin Powers in Goldmember,” January 15, 2003 (2002), DVD. Won’t I ever learn?. Oh well, hope springs eternal, I guess. I did not like this latest Austin Powers entry at all. I thought the writing was bad, the production boring, and the moralizing ridiculous. Still, I laughed a little at Mini Me and a set…

“Sunshine State,” 12 January 2003 (2002), video.  Latest from John Sayles, this look at the struggles around land development in Florida. Very nice work by most of the actors, especially Jane Alexander as the little theater lady, Edie Falco as her restraunteur daughter, Ralph Waite as their blind husband/father in the swirl of change, Timothy…

  “The Wild Thornberrys Movie,” 25 December 2002, theater.   I went with the kidlet to see this animated flick based on the TV show. It had the usual eco/environmental babble but was still fun. A lovely song by Paul Simon brightens the movie considerably. Nice subplot about family stuff. B- still enjoys this level of…

“The Importance of Being Ernest,” December 17, 2002, video.  Smart, visually pleasing adaptation of the O Wilde classic, it has great lines, but is fundamentally an empty look at empty people for whom form and money are everything. Funny, but not deep in any way. Two men who have fallen for two women who love…

  “The Man Who Wasn’t There,” December 15, 2002, video.  We really liked this dreamy neo-noir piece from the Coen Brothers starring Billy Bob Thornton as a quiet barber who blackmails his wife’s (Francis McDormand) boss and lover (James Gandolfini) who has embezzled from the store he manages. The barber gets his money, but Big…

  “Minority Report,” November 17, 2002, theater.  This film really worked for a cautionary tale about allowing a system to arrest people in relation to their ‘future’ acts. Very well done by S Spielberg, with a fine job by Tom Cruise, it only breaks down in the last 15 minutes or so. Otherwise, a fine…

  “Mulholland Drive, October 17, 2002 (2001), video.    This is an excellent, very weird David Lynch film about fantasy and reality and the confusion between the two. Although I am writing this months after seeing the film, it sticks with me for its amazing twists on dreams and reality, its use of actresses in…

  “Insomnia,” October 15,  2002, theaters.  Very unsatisfying American ripoff of the Norwegian one. It has to be neatly sown up at the end, whereas the European version has all sorts of ambiguity built into it. Pacino and Williams are ok, if predictable. Hilary Swenk is fun to watch.

  “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets,” September 1, 2002.  The four of us, my mom also went along, really enjoyed this very true to the book rendition of the book. I think it would have worked better if it was cut about 15-20 minutes, but it was an ok film. Kenneth Branagh is…

  “Fahrenheit 9/11” August 17 2004, theater.  We enjoyed this M Moore polemic against Bush and Republican idiocy. Some stellar footage, although Moore is an inconsistent demagogue and really should decide if Bush is too weak or too tyrannical. What is he disgusted by beyond the whole package? A double barreled attack that’s worth seeing…

  “Monsoon Wedding,” August 17 2002 (2001), theater.    This film about an Indian wedding and culture in the “world’s largest democracy” started slowly, with set pieces that were predictable, but it evolved rapidly into a captivating piece about family and class in India, about love and obligation, about what matters to people. It is…

  “Italian for Beginners,” June 17 2002 (2000), theater.  This lovely, humane, touching and disturbing, comic Dogma film from Denmark looks at the various people who are taking an Italian class together. It’s the lightest and cheeriest of all the Dogma films I’ve seen and is marred only by the overly happy and optimistic ending….

  June 17, 2002 (2001), video  This ambitious conceit examines the issue of consciousness as one man sleeps? Dies? It is interviews animated over. A fascinating film worth seeing in this age of boring crap. Still, do not see it as I did, while exhausted after watching “Italian for Beginners”. I fell asleep.

  “Memento,” March 17, 2002, video.  Very fine, weird and demanding conceit of a movie about a man who loses his short-term memory in a horrible rape of his wife. Was she murdered?. He thinks/knows so. But he knows so as he tattoos his body with the clues he thinks he needs to hunt down…

  “Pi,” March 17, 2002 (1998), tv/IFC.  This is a scary and disturbing, yet gripping drama about a young computer genius who is trying to find the numerical hook for predicting stock market fluctuations. In the process, he both achieves his goal and attempts to find the numerological/kabbalistic hook into the Bible. Wonderfully played in…

  “SLC Punk!,” March 17, 2002 (1998), tv/IFC.   The first 2/3 of this movie is really fun and in your face. Then it can’t sustain the courage not to moralize. It is a fun and sort of depressing romp through 80s punk culture in Salt Lake City (who’d of thunk it!). A pleasant antidote to…

“Tampopo,” December 17, 2001, video.  I liked this 1987 film about food, culture, sex, and identity in Japan less than I did when it first came out. A trucker-cowboy helps a young widow master noodle culture and climb the ladder to meaning and success. Fun stuff about the Japanese/European connection. Zen through noodles, movies as a…

  “Amores Perros,” December 17, 2001 (2000), video.    We both survived this brutal Mexican look at a society literally going to the dogs. Three interlocking stories geared around a car crash and dogs all take one into the brutalities of modern Mexico, its connection to cynicism and lost radicalism, tradition recreation (dog fighting) and…

  “The Shower,” December 17, 2001 (1999), video  This is an interesting look at the issues of modernization versus traditional family values in China. A successful, modern Chinese businessman hurries home when he receives a cryptic note from his retarded brother and thinks his father has died. The father and brother run a traditional men’s…

  “Life As a House,” December 15 2001, theater.    We both liked this incredibly sentimental, melodramatic weepie about a divorced architect, George (Kevin Kline), who loses his job and finds out he’s dying from cancer. The movie follows his efforts to reconcile with his rebellious and outrageously self-destructive 16-year old son Sam (Hayden Christensen)…

  “Shrek,” November 17, 2001, video.    Very funny animated comedy about an ogre who sets out to save a princess to protect his land from an evil noble. Celebrity voices. This thing works for kids and adults. Really quick and playful.

  “State and Maine,” September 17, 2001 (2000), video.    This very funny David Mamet version of Trufaut’s “Day for Night” works as a troupe of actors descends on a small NH town to make a film. Led by their director William Macy, they include a pedaphile, Alec Baldwin, and a shy leading lady, Sarah…

“Under the Sands,” theater, August 17, 2001.  Remarkable French film starring Charlotte Rampling about the aftermath of a death/suicide/disappearance. A couple goes to the shore. He is very depressed, she’s in denial. They go to the beach, he says he’s going for a swim and never returns. Her inability to cope, to accept, to come…