Went to see it last night and I was not disappointed. I was excited by the trailer. It indicated that just because the film was for children did not mean it would be any less of a Wes Anderson film. I laughed more than I have for any adult comedy I can remember seeing at the cinema recently. The deadpan delivery and quirky comedy remains similar to his early films but the combination is yet to tire me.
Jason Schwartzman as Ash, Fantastic Mr. Fox's son, is basically playing the role he perfected in Rushmore but is the highlight of a film that moves quickly and effortlessly to its finale. His jealousy of cousin Kristofferson holds the biggest emotional pull of the film. Other mentions should go to the characters of Kylie the possum (Wally Wolodarsky) and the rat (Willem Dafoe) who steal most of the good lines after Ash.
It's the type of film I wish had been around when I was a kid, a film I could love then but then look back to as an adult and find it even better, and not just for nostalgia's sake. It's also the type of film that I would force my future kids to like to try and shape them into mini versions of me. I guess that's as big a compliment I can give.
Wednesday 28 October 2009
Monday 26 October 2009
LES FLEURS DU MAL
Last week I finished reading Baudelaire's lengthy collection of poems. Well, what I read was the latest edition, kind of like a ultimate edition dvd of a movie that's been out for decades but they keep on adding, I don't know, a ten-minute interview, so all the mugs have to buy the thing for a ultimate price. It had the original french text as well as the "new" english translation with far too many notes. The poems themselves didn't quite live up to my expectations bar a few notable exceptions. Une Charogne or A Carcass is a rather obvious favourite but I found it to encapsulate the best of Baudelaire's work in one poem:
It got all the morbid, provocative stuff that Baudelaire's infamous for but, unlike some of the lesser poems in the book, maintained a message and truth rather than feeling like mere attempts to outrage. In fact the poem felt close to the best Smiths songs, those that deal with miserable subjects but are lit with a, albeit twisted, glint of optimism. Beauty amidst the drudgery. Light at the the end of Moz's darkened underpass. I don't think I can fairly comment on Baudelaire as I think that poetry, much more so than novels or plays, really suffers in the translation for, in my opinion, the dense sentences of Proust or Genet seem more poetic than the sometimes clumsily translated (especially where the translation is attempting to keep Baudelaire's rhyme structure) Flowers of Evil .
-And you, in your turn, will be rotten as this:
Horrible, filthy, undone,
O sun of my nature and star of my eyes,
My passion, my angel in one!
It got all the morbid, provocative stuff that Baudelaire's infamous for but, unlike some of the lesser poems in the book, maintained a message and truth rather than feeling like mere attempts to outrage. In fact the poem felt close to the best Smiths songs, those that deal with miserable subjects but are lit with a, albeit twisted, glint of optimism. Beauty amidst the drudgery. Light at the the end of Moz's darkened underpass. I don't think I can fairly comment on Baudelaire as I think that poetry, much more so than novels or plays, really suffers in the translation for, in my opinion, the dense sentences of Proust or Genet seem more poetic than the sometimes clumsily translated (especially where the translation is attempting to keep Baudelaire's rhyme structure) Flowers of Evil .
GIU LA TESTA/ ONCE UPON A TIME...REVOLUTION
Tonight I got a real desire to watch Giu la Testa again and it was well worth it. It's probably the film that I disagree most with its critical and popular reception. Even comparing the film with the rest of director Sergio Leone's filmography it stands out for its quality, and alongside that, how undervalued it is. Two scenes in particular should be listed alongside the shoot-out in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and the opening scenes of Once Upon a Time in the West as truly iconic (a word so overused today I hesitate to employ it) cinema moments.
The scene in which Juan (Rod Steiger) unintentionally frees the masses of revolutionaries held prisoner in the Mesa Verde bank employs all of Sergio Leone's distinctive strengths: inventive editing and shot selection, seamless marriage of visual track to a Ennio Morricone score; great attention to detail in terms of the mise-en-scene and a course, tongue-in-cheek sense of humour. The peasant's reluctant rise to a "grand, glorious hero of the revolution" is one of the greatest heist scenes in cinematic history, yet belongs to a largely forgotten film.
The second scene that really stands out and should be seen by any film fan regardless of their opinion of Westerns, Italian Cinema or Leone. That is the scene where Dr. Villega (Romolo Valli) informs on his comrades in the rain. With the only on-screen lighting a car's headlights Leone creates a chiaroscuro portrait of betrayal. We see from Villega's point-of-view through the rain-swept windshield while his interrogator manually wipes in a clever use of altered perspective typical of Leone. We also see the scene, both visually and emotionally, from Sean Mallory's (James Coburn - one of my favourite actors cf. The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape, Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid) as he finally loses all faith in revolution and the men who enact it. Leone, according to Christopher Frayling, wanted the scene to resemble one of Goya's Disasters of War paintings and does so. In the hands of a Fellini or De Sica the scene would be heralded by every pretentious critic out there but it remains fairly obscure.
The film as a whole never quite reaches the level of the two scenes described but is a veritable success and should be seen, especially by those fond of Leone's similarly toned Once Upon a Time in America and Once Upon a Time in the West.
The scene in which Juan (Rod Steiger) unintentionally frees the masses of revolutionaries held prisoner in the Mesa Verde bank employs all of Sergio Leone's distinctive strengths: inventive editing and shot selection, seamless marriage of visual track to a Ennio Morricone score; great attention to detail in terms of the mise-en-scene and a course, tongue-in-cheek sense of humour. The peasant's reluctant rise to a "grand, glorious hero of the revolution" is one of the greatest heist scenes in cinematic history, yet belongs to a largely forgotten film.
The second scene that really stands out and should be seen by any film fan regardless of their opinion of Westerns, Italian Cinema or Leone. That is the scene where Dr. Villega (Romolo Valli) informs on his comrades in the rain. With the only on-screen lighting a car's headlights Leone creates a chiaroscuro portrait of betrayal. We see from Villega's point-of-view through the rain-swept windshield while his interrogator manually wipes in a clever use of altered perspective typical of Leone. We also see the scene, both visually and emotionally, from Sean Mallory's (James Coburn - one of my favourite actors cf. The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape, Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid) as he finally loses all faith in revolution and the men who enact it. Leone, according to Christopher Frayling, wanted the scene to resemble one of Goya's Disasters of War paintings and does so. In the hands of a Fellini or De Sica the scene would be heralded by every pretentious critic out there but it remains fairly obscure.
The film as a whole never quite reaches the level of the two scenes described but is a veritable success and should be seen, especially by those fond of Leone's similarly toned Once Upon a Time in America and Once Upon a Time in the West.
MISSION STATEMENT
To attempt to blog about the things that matter to me. Books, Music, Film and Sport. I'm Alex, another nobody who thinks his two cents are worth a fortune. Typing them up here so everyone can read them, like the blind prophet who imagines he has a crowd gathered at his feet, mistaking the pigeons for followers.
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