Joe Strummer, The Future is Unwritten

Joe Strummer, The Future is Unwritten captures the punkin', politican’, rockin' RAD Clash member through testimonies around the camp fire from former early band members, women who loved him, and celebs like John Cusak and Bono. I knew a lot about the music of the Clash but very little about Joe Strummer. This documentary, while all a mish mash of video clips, remembrances, and even scenes from the animated Animal Farm, gave me a good idea of who he was and what he was like. And Strummer seemed like the kind of guy who would be very fun to hang out with but not so easy to live with. I really enjoyed learning about this sad and crazy musician.

The Kite Runner

I finally saw The Kite Runner after meaning to see it for a while, but I was reluctant. After reading the book, I knew what gruesome and sad events that awaited me in the movie and never really felt like putting myself through that. (this was another movie that I kept moving down on my queue) I liked but didn’t love the book but found the movie to be a worthy recount of the book. The movie is definitely a tear jerker, esp. when the adopted and damaged boy Sohrab (sp.?) tries to assimilate into life in America. The young actor who plays this boy had such a sad look on his face that it is heartbreaking. The movie does a good job of putting you in another world; the view of Kabul and a city in Pakistan is fascinating and is one reason to see the movie.

Lawrence of Arabia

The American Film Institute extols Lawrence of Arabia as one of the greatest films, EVER. Since I had never seen it, I figured I'd better. Especially after I read somewhere that it was compared to Reds, which is one of my favorite films, EVER. It took me three nights to get through Lawrence, it is after all nearly 4 hours long. And while I liked all the cool desert visuals, and thought Peter O'Toole was super cute in it. I didn't really get its greatness. Actually, I didn't 100% get it, at all. There were a lot of battles that had to do with Arab tribes, Turks, stuffy British dudes, grunting camels etc. And it is one of the AFI's number one of ten top epic movies.
AFI Top 10 Epic Films
1. Lawrence of Arabia
2. Ben-Hur
3. Schindler's List
4. Gone with the Wind
5. Spartacus
6. Titanic
7. All Quiet on the Western Front
8. Saving Private Ryan
9. Reds
10. The Ten Commandments

John Adams

John Adams, the HBO miniseries, is based on David McCullough's exhaustive biography of this signer of the declaration of independence and 2nd president. The miniseries tries to do justice to McCullough's tome by paying attention to all the details of America's conception, all the documents written involving Adams, all the conversations Adam's had with all the great men of the time, and all the settings where he negotiated, primarily Philadelphia and France. In addition, the miniseries chronicles the story of his marriage with the great Abigail with whom he relied on for counsel and reassurance. So it's interesting and thorough, but at times dull. I liked learning about all of these events but an instructive, beautifully detailed movie does necessarily make for a breathtaking thrill ride. It's no Reds, in other words. And, besides that, Paul Giamatti's Adams is such a dour grumpy-frumpy man, one tires of him. Laura Linney, even appears lifeless after a while, and I love her. So if you want to learn a lot and see some fantastic historically accurate sets, John Adams is right for you. Otherwise, I would pass.

AFI 10 Top 10

The American Film Institute recently came out with top 10 movie lists by genre. The genres include Animation, Romantic Comedy, Western, Sports, Mystery, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Gangster, Courtroom Drama, Epic. You know I like a good list and was most interested in their Romantic Comedy List:
1. City Lights
2. Annie Hall
3. It Happened One Night
4. Roman Holiday
5. The Philadelphia Story
6. When Harry Met Sally
7. Adam’s Rib
8. Moonstruck
9. Harold and Maude
10. Sleepless in Seattle

Roman Holiday, Philadelphia Story, and Adam’s Rib are also on my list of Classic Romantic Comedies (see side bar). I know little about the Charlie Chaplin silent film, City Lights, and question the addition of Sleepless in Seattle, but overall I think it seems like a respectable list. Except Moonstruck, while I thought it was good movie, I never really liked Cher and Nicolas Cage as romantic leads.

Definitely, Maybe

Romantic Comedies have so much potential to be good and so often go astray, that I have kinda given up on them (In an earlier blog I wrote about the modern preponderance of slacker-striver types of romantic comedies that have added to my disappointment in this genre). So when my friend Ruth insisted that Definitely, Maybe, the recent attempt at romance with Ryan Reynolds, was better than most, I thought I would give it a try. And yeah, it was alright. It had a suspenseful plot and the final happy couple did seem right for each other. The romantic comedy conventions (find each other in a cute way, face an obstacle, overcome said obstacle) made sense and did not seemed forced. There was even a nice bit having to do with the novel Jane Eyre that was fresh. It wasn't another movie-potential-gone-terribly-wrong like in 27 dresses; however, it still succumbed to over the top attempts at humour that are just painful to watch, such as when school children were raving at their parents after they received a sex-ed lesson at school. One reason to watch is Rachel Weisz who is so interesting to watch that you wish she were in the movie more.

Reds

Reds (1981) is a one of those movies that I have such nostalgically fond memories of that I feared it would not stand up to my seasoned adult standards. Happily, I find that it does stand up and is even better than I remembered. I didn’t remember it providing so much food for thought about communism, the Bolshevik Revolution, the individual’s power to make a difference, the United States political system, journalism and so on… I didn’t really quite get the movie back when I first saw in the theater, I guess. And besides it being really about something important, it is also very entertaining. I could barely do a crossword and watch this movie (that means I REALLY liked it). This early 20th Century love story of John Reed, journalist and American Communist, and writer Louise Bryant, is so fun to watch develop. The lovers are played by Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton. Beatty is much cuter and more charming than I remembered and Keaton, after reflecting on her recent light-weight roles, is a much better actress than I remembered. The two challenge each other intellectually with witty and smart banter. It is indeed a feat to make a movie that is a sweeping 3 hour saga that doesn’t get bogged down by stray storylines or indulgent scenes by the actor/director/producer Beatty. The structure of the film is anchored by Reed and Bryant leaving each other and finding one another in unexpected and suspenseful ways: at a party, in a New York apartment, on a train heading toward Russia, and finally and most memorably when they reunite, again in Russia, in a train station. It’s one of the great scenes of filmdom! So, if you’ve never seen Reds, you must, and if you have vague fond memories, seeing it again is very enjoyable.

By the way, it is also fun to watch the DVD extras where Warren Beatty reflects in 2006, 15 years later about the making of the film. The extras on this DVD are actually interesting.