Growing Older Through Film (Discussion)

Lately I've recognized a bounty of films that deal with aging—childhood, growing up, etc. Is it just my own heightened sensitivity to this subject or is it true that numerous films dealing with growing older have clustered together? OR, has it always been the case that filmmakers are interested in aging and that a vast number of films tackle this issue, sometimes without us noticing it?

Where The Wild Things Are, the Toy Story re-releases and Away We Go are examples that come to my immediate attention, but there have been many others recently. Although I happen to like this popular theme, it just seems more used than ever before (yes, I know Toy Story is not technically a 2009 movie—but it's coincidental). But, I do think that I personally seem to tend to these films, as many that deal with aging and childhood are animated, films meant (sadly? ironically? rightfully?) for a young audience, a genre that has always been one of my favorites.

It's easiest to answer this question in the light of my third option above, but I think that does not do justice to the subject at hand. Yes, of course, filmmakers, artists and humankind in general is and always has been interested in mortality and the innocence of childhood and the sentimentality involved in growing away from such innocence and carelessness and downright fun. But, I think now more than ever do we see films tackling this issue, and I think this goes beyond the obvious. Maybe it's that the world is getting older, we, as a civilization, are feeling our age. This could be a stretch, but stick with me on this one.

In earlier times, perhaps even as early as 30, 40 years ago, we, as a global society, looked to the future and saw something grand. The alienating times of post WWII and the Cold War forced people to look to the future with positivity: It's gotta be better than this! But nowadays, I think we've grown tired, we feel old. Movies feel old. I feel old. Maybe dramatic, yes, but like I said, there is something to it.

The bright side is this: movies on childhood are some of the best, and it's a genre that I wouldn't trade for just about any other. And most of the time, movies like Where The Wild Things Are and Toy Story don't just make us nostalgic and teary-eyed, they make us happy to remember, or be aware of, the innocence, the fun, we all once had, and can continue to have throughout our lives. So I guess it's a good thing that we have these films, and a plethora of them, because, and I don't know about you, I don't want to forget to have fun.

Paranormal Activity (Review)

With a tense, grinding build-up that lasts the majority of the film, Paranormal Activity shows a patience that few thrillers can manage to compete with. The jump-starting fright phenomenon is slow to begin, but when the lights start to illuminate the theatre, there's no denying that this film will keep you up at night.

The film follows young couple Katie and Micah as they attempt to capture on tape evidence of the paranormal presence that has supposedly followed Katie throughout her life. Produced for around $15,000, the entire film is shot through Micah's portable camera he goes nowhere without.

Paranormal Activity is a combination of The Blair Witch Project (1999) and Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Kairo (2001), mixing a low-budget, documentary style with the chills of ghosts, demons and poltergeist. The film's realism is what drives it, as those who are blind going into the film question throughout: Did this actually happen?

Paranormal Activity, unlike many of its horror/thriller rivals of the day, is more concerned with quality than quantity. Katie and Micah are full, three-dimensional characters whose personalities effect the plot instead of vice versa. Who they are and how they manage as a couple effects how they deal with being terrorized by the thing they can't explain.

Much like Blair Witch, Paranormal Activity makes the camera its own character. As its being hauled around, peaked around corners and subject to what the couple does not see while they sleep, the audience begins to feel like the kid that's forced to go first into the haunted house. In this way, viewers actually play a role through the eye of the camera, making the film that much more real and that much more terrifying.

The quality is also in the pacing: the film stacks up the tension bit by bit, letting the audience relax on occasion between night scenes, but is relentlessly warning of the further terror to come. When the couple isn't dealing directly with demonic possession, they are slowing piecing together information and discussing their next move, a progression that only further adds to the suspense.

The only problem with this structure is its repetitiveness. The audience is in constant wait of a climax, which bodes well for a thrilling ride, but frustrates when that climax doesn't come when expected. This becomes a distraction late in the film as viewers lie in wait for something “big” to happen, constantly questioning when the movie will pick up.

It's refreshing to see a horror movie return to its genre's roots, focusing on what's “horrific” about how humans view the world rather than what in the world scares us. How Micah sees his role as a human being in relation to what exists around him becomes the truly terrifying subject of the film. The fact that we are not always in control—of our loved ones, of ourselves and of the other beings of this world—is what scares us the most in Paranormal Activity.

Nary a cheesy or laughable moment exists throughout the couple's experience, as queues from shows such as “Most Haunted” and “Ghost Hunters” are seemingly replicated in depicting a truly eerie demonic presence. The sounds of the house prove to be one of the scariest elements of the film—the repeated thud of footsteps on the stairwell becomes a trademark of the evil in pursuit of Katie. Even the always-present whir of the camera—what might be called the film's only soundtrack—is enough to push viewers down into their seats.

The ending, which supposedly was altered upon Steven Spielberg's suggestion, in my opinion, could have been done differently, but still serves justice to the overall picture. The lack of credits is another way Paranormal Activity feeds the realism, a trick first time writer-director Oren Peli was smart to use.

With a calculated, intelligent script and an uncanny knack for realism, Paranormal Activity is the best scare cinema has had to offer in a long time. The film's unbelievably low production cost coupled with its break-neck shooting time (reportedly 7 days) proves that good movies rely on the fundamentals of film making, not the size of its star's salary.

John Ford's Unspoken Law (Essay)

WARNING: Very formal, Read at your own risk.

In John Ford's My Darling Clementine (1946), two forms of law exist: expressed law and implied law. Expressed law is governmental law, written law that formally dictates how society in the grandest sense should operate. Implied law, a less clear but more heavily respected and represented form of governance throughout Clementine, is treated differently by different people, but in general reflects an unspoken code of honor, one that may be upheld by vengeful and sometimes seemingly underhanded tactics.

The newly appointed marshal of Tombstone, Wyatt Earp, uses his form of implied law, which includes strong-arming and an eye-for-an-eye ideal, to exert Ford's sentimental view of justice over a city out of control. Earp's ironclad reverse-bullying technique employed in a scene opposite the Clanton brothers (00:31-00:36) and his treatment of Chihuahua, the sympathetic tramp, in an earlier scene (00:17-00:21) define the marshal's sense justice as inevitable and brutal, but personal and forgiving—the kind of justice that Ford maintains is the only answer to a world in conflict.

The Clanton family, a father and four sons, is depicted as a sinister group from an early point in the film. In the very first scene, father Clanton offers to buy Earp's cattle herd for what is expressed as a cheap offer, illustrating both his greed and willingness to swindle others. The tension between the Clantons and the marshal reaches a boiling point later in the film, when Earp goes on the hunt for a visiting actor, Granville Thorndyke, who has gone missing, and finds him shortly thereafter amongst the Clantons at a bar. The scene illustrates Earp's sense of implied law when it comes to violence. Violence, to him, is an instinctive means to solving disputes, and an especially necessary reaction to violence from another source. The only way in which to deal with thugs (i.e. the Clanton brothers) is to teach them with violence. As Earp moves to return the actor, one Clanton grabs Thorndyke and makes a move for his gun. Earp quickly smashes the man in the face with his pistol and shoots at a second Clanton who also reaches for his weapon. This decisive act of violence is committed with the utmost confidence and sense of righteousness, as if Earp already knew he was going to have to exert violent rule over this family.

Like Ford's angel of America, Earp was crafted with the perfect sense of the strict implied law—how to react when someone threatens you—which serves as a cure-all to what plagues society. As the tension settles, father Clanton offers a short apology, which Earp answers with, “Sure, I figured they were just having themselves some fun” (00:35). He then leaves, making no arrest or collecting no one's weapon, accepting in how justice has been served in his brutal display of violence. In Earp's actions, the film advocates for a sense of personality within the law, the idea that each crime is personal and must be dealt with between the involved parties, but mediated by someone with the perfect ideology of right and wrong. In this case, Earp decides best how to solve the problem as both marshal and as a personally effected party, resulting in the best way to cleanse the society of thugs: violence.

In how he deals with the trouble-making Chihuahua, Earp continues to define and enforce implied law, which, in its practice, is represented by the film as the best way (or at least the most effective way) to deliver the city from evil. Earp's willingness to act outside of expressed law to meet a justified end is, the film argues, what makes him fit to “save” society. When Chihuahua helps another man cheat in poker against Earp, the marshal drags her outside. Chihuahua refuses to listen to his threats and slaps him in the face, to which Earp responds by dunking her in a trough (00:20). Once again, Earp does not arrest her or even see that she returns home for the night, instead he reacts brashly and childishly, but he effectively shows her what kind of law he abides by and what he intends on doing to those who land on the other side of it. The personal vendetta he holds with those who break the law, especially when the case involves him personally, is most evident in this scene. It is this subjectivity in practicing the law—specifically in Earp's case alone—that the film advocates.

Without one who understands not only right from wrong, but more importantly, how to deal with those who do not know right from wrong, society is doomed. Earp's form of tough-love governance is the answer to cleansing the entire city, just as he soaks Chihuahua with no hesitation. What motivates Earp to treat Chihuahua in such a way is developed earlier in the scene, when she tries the marshal's character, first with flirtation and sex, then with a hidden threat, a suggestion through song that she knows about his missing cattle and slain brother (00:17). Earp, in his ability to resist both temptations and to recognize where justice needs to be righteously exacted (it is suggested that previous marshals have gone through the same test and failed), is the clear candidate for the city's savior and the model of civilization's (inside and outside the film) path to decency and goodness.

My Darling Clementine depicts Wyatt Earp as a man not above the law, but a man among “certain gifted persons in a society...who carry the law with them” (Mast and Kawin 302). His subjective view of how society should run, the film argues, is the only way in which evil can be detached from good, and disposed of accordingly. Whether it's by violence or mere unexpected recognition and coequal punishment, the film charges that the way Earp does away with wrongdoing is indeed our own solution—as citizens of today—to a happier, healthier, more united civilization.

Works Cited

Mast, Gerald, and Bruce Kawin. A Short History of the Movies. New York: Pearson Education, Inc., 2008.

My Darling Clementine. Dir. John Ford. Perf. Henry Fonda, Victor Mature, Cathy Downs and Linda Darnell. 1946. DVD. 20^th Century Fox Home Entertainment, 2007.

Couples Retreat (Review)

While Couples Retreat shows a genuine effort to be a funny movie that tackles serious issues about marriage and relationships, the end result is an ultimately familiar and flaccid, albeit amusing, attempt at meaningful comedy.

Couples Retreat stars Vince Vaughn as the same character he has been playing for 10 years. Dave is abrasive and overbearing, dealing out the fast-talking one-liners like carrots at a fat camp, but only in an effort to mask his heart of gold.

Dave and a group of his friends, four couples in all, go on a trip to Eden, an island getaway intended for couples that need to rekindle their love. When they arrive they realize that the “couples skillbuilding,” what only one couple, Cynthia (Kristen Bell) and Jason (Jason Bateman), has come to experience, is required for all. Wackiness ensues.

Each couple is representative of one form of a relationship: one that isn't ready and won't work, one that has dried up and lacks togetherness, one that has forgotten faithfulness and communication and one that is over-regulated and out of sync. However convenient it is to see each form laid out clearly for all to see, by stereotyping relationships the film contradicts its own meaning.

By systematically categorizing the problems couples face, the film upends the theory it promotes throughout: each couple is individual by nature, and must deal with their problems in different ways. The couples of the film, despite their accuracy in resembling some real-world relationships, are flat; they lack the nuance we relate with deep relationships, thus making it hard to truly attach oneself to the characters.

The acting is what one would anticipate from the troupe of comedy regulars, yet the material given to them allowed little to work with. Even the charm of Jason Bateman, who has been in every film made since 2006 (how does he find the time to be in so many movies?!), cannot spice up this film's average flavor.

Vaughn, who co-wrote the film with Jon Favreau and Dana Fox, brands the film with his unmistakable style of comedy. Much like a conversation with a relative, the film incites viewers to simply smile and nod until its over. Some lines prove giggle-worthy, but beyond that expect sex jokes that fall flat by the truckload.

Obviously judging from the aforementioned criticisms, Couples Retreat is not a great film, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's terrible. It's average, mundane, run-of-the-mill—it's the Burger King of movies. Yes, you'd rather have MacDonald's, but at least it's something.

Couples Retreat is too easy. It's a cop-out. The shallow characters and basic story structure is fine for something one could turn on and fall asleep to on a Saturday afternoon (the definition of a Vince Vaughn movie), but it will not be the crown jewel of your collection when it comes out on DVD.

The Invention of Lying (Review)

It's no surprise that Ricky Gervais would come out with a movie about lying. The English comic, who brought us shows such as “The Office” and “Extras,” has made a career out of showing us the awkward underbelly of society in its efforts to hide, distort and wish away the truth.

The Invention of Lying plays with the same idea, but in expected Gervais fashion, the film grounds itself in a sentimentality that challenges viewers to question how we judge the world and what we deem to be and not to be.

Where the potential for comedy thrives in the idea of one liar in a world of truth, the social setting is not one primed for side-splitting antics.

The film is set on an earth where lying does not exist. In fact, fabrication of any sort is out of the picture, and society's only concerns are with what it defines as the truth. Fat people, people without jobs, poor people—they're all seen as “losers” (a term that comes up many times throughout the film) who have little potential to succeed and therefore become invisible to those who are rich, attractive, powerful or talented.

Twenty minutes into the film, it is clear that the world of the “truth” is quite depressing. This is not just for the fact that what people say to each other is harsh and blunt (what makes up for most of the comedy of the film), but it's that everything coming out of people's mouths is a negative—a put down, a sad piece of their lives, a pessimistic, self-hating mantra that works to bring down the audience instead of make us laugh.

Society's inability to fabricate seems coupled with their inability to care. That's not to say that merely niceties and forced complements are absent: care in any form is hard to come by.

In one scene, Mark Bellison (Gervais) visits his mom after being insulted and rejected by his previous night's date and tells her he suspects that he may lose his job. He expresses how he has little hope for the future, that he has no money, no prospects and little to look forward to, and she shrugs him off.

“Things could be worse,” she says. “We could be homeless.”

This of course is followed by Bellison getting evicted, which pushes him to the end of his wits.

About midway through the film, after Bellison discovers lying, the narrative takes an odd turn and begins to give its own take on Christianity and the Ten Commandments when Bellison tells the world of how there is a “man in the sky” who dictates what happens to people when they die.

In dangerous criticism of Christianity and religion in general, The Invention of Lying depicts a society that relies too heavily on what others think and say and believe, and relates how that attitude reflects our own culture's misuse of what started as a mere story, a fabrication, of what governs our existence.

In a telling scene near the end of the film, Bellsion is accosted from behind and, upon requesting an admittance of fault, is met with further disrespect and rejection of compassion. Despite the fact that this society knows now to be good and kind and understanding, its view of the world has not changed in the least.

This allegorical backdrop is the film's most interesting aspect, as the cheeky, improv-style comedy and awkward romance fail to deliver. It's disappointing to see Gervais, who shared writing and directing credit with Matthew Robinson, not live up to what we're all used to even surrounded by a star-studded cast with cameos by Jason Bateman (Extract), John Hodgman (“The Daily Show”), Tina Fey (“30 Rock”), Edward Norton (everything) and Christopher Guest (This Is Spinal Tap).

The Invention of Lying is the result of a good idea warped and faded, with its situational comedy too dreary to be funny, but not enough so to come out the other end as a more dramatic, yet entertaining, creation.

Pandorum (Review)

Pandorum, directed by Christian Alvart, is the latest telling of a sci-fi soap-opera. Two sole men wake up aboard an enormous spacecraft with no recollection of their mission, and even littler knowledge as to where the rest of the crew went. As it plays out, Pandorum feels more like a video game than a film, as it provides exhilarating action sequences and skilled camera work, but lacks on character development and dialogue.

The film starts with a timeline of humankind's landmarks in space exploration with the corresponding population of the earth. The last date is 2174, the year our protagonists' ship is sent out into space; earth's population is more than 20 billion.

In this early scene, space is humankind's refuge, our chance to start anew. Space, despite its ominous presence, is a lifeline. Throughout the rest of the film, Alvart and screenwriter Travis Milloy upend this ideology, proving to a horrific measure how unforgiving space can be and how much we should cherish the place we are.

Pandorum exhibits a plethora of innate human fears, each of which space and the spacecraft, which serves as the film's only physical setting for nearly the entirety, prey upon throughout the film.

Viewers are tossed quickly into the nightmarish fray, as Bower (Ben Foster), our protagonist, violently wakes out of cryo-sleep half-covered in ice. He screams wildly in vein as the camera pulls away from his frozen pod to reveal only darkness.

This is an early example of Alvart's ability to relay a feeling of terror; he does not back us into the experience, he plunges in.

A key component to horror film making is setting a tone, and Pandorum does this well. The combination of freezing temperatures, still darkness and silence warn audiences of one thing: lifelessness.

Viewers are not called upon to simply watch these opening events take place, but we are forced to live them. The camera's sporadic movement inside the pod as Bower struggles to escape lends to a sense of panic, a subjectivity that will remain throughout the film.

Soon Bower is released and helps one more crew member, Payton (Dennis Quaid), Bower's commanding officer, wake up. The rest of the film follows Bower as he journeys through the ship in search of the engine room, where the ship's reactor must be manually reset in order to avoid certain death.

Along with isolation, Alvart introduces claustrophobia in an early scene in which Bower crawls through the ship's vents. This incremental introduction of challenges and terrors is simple, but effective.

As the vent becomes tighter and tighter, darker and darker, Bower begins to panic once more. His claustrophobia becomes the audience's, as the camera is pushed in on by piping and darkness.

With only the threat of a cold room and a tight squeeze, these two opening sequences illustrate how simple it is to instill a sense of horror through film making; this opening is a refreshing reminder that film can create horror as long an ideology of fear is present.

The rest of the film, I'm disappointed to say, does not continue along the same path as it starts. Following the two opening sequences, much of the horror comes from freakish, humanoid monsters that hunt Bower.

Adding monsters to an already frightening experience only dulls the suspense the film works to achieve in the first place. As Bower and company run away from and do battle with the beasties, it felt strange to not be holding a controller in my hand.

One particular scene near the end of the film is laughable in how close it resembles a video game in pacing and composition.

Developed as the leader of the monsters, the strongest creature corners one of Bower's friends who finds himself unarmed. In the classic “boss battle” format, the two square off head-to-head from opposite sides of the shot (think Mortal Kombat) ... but not before the monster throws his foe a weapon, as a true gentleman should.

The overall story arc is underdeveloped and poorly delivered, but remains to hold on to viewers' attentions to the very end—an end that is halfway unique and halfway predictable, but, oddly, wholly satisfying.

Pandorum will not be the sleeper hit of the year that it very well could have been, given a less central reliance on cliché sci-fi monsters and more character background and development. However, for those seeking cheap thrills with an attempted backbone, you can't go wrong.

I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell (Review)

The introduction to Tucker Max's web site states, “My name is Tucker Max, and I am an asshole.” I couldn't have said it better myself.

I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell is an adaptation of Tucker Max's book by the same title, which showcases Max's unbridled recklessness in the face of all that is decent and good. The blogger phenom spends his time drinking, having sex and mixing the two together to come up with the most unbelievable (but supposedly true) stories any shallow, college-aged boy—that's right, “boy”—would envy not being a part of ... and now he's made a movie.

The film follows three friends, Dan, Drew and Tucker Max as they set out to have the craziest bachelor party possible a la The Hangover, but where the latter succeeded in its uncharacteristic plot structure and uproariously funny dialogue, Hell force-feeds viewers cheap, quippy jokes in its portrayal of who must be the saddest men on Earth.

Featuring non-stop beer, a Halo-centered plot device and enough naked women to rival Hugh Hefner's roster of girlfriends, Hell plays like a 13-year-old's wet dream—needless to say it doesn't appeal to anyone seeking any sort of depth beyond a feigned attempt at character development.

As the film drags on, it becomes apparent that Max is a self-driven meathead who is willing to abandon and recklessly disregard the well-being of his friends in the search of a good story. However, as the film parades as an attack on the bigoted, chauvinistic tendencies of modern young, white men represented by Max, it bolsters just the opposite in doing so.

No real consequences come in response to Max and company's actions, which, telling in the film's true motives (be they conscious or not), are glorified throughout.

Tucker Max, who co-wrote the film with Nils Parker, definitely has a knack for storytelling ... but this doesn't mean it's a good story. What I'm guessing started as a truly entertaining tale told to a gang of university beer pong experts does not translate well to the big screen. In a world where absolutely anything can happen, drinking and strippers fail to amaze.

The film's production qualities are some of the lowest of any wide-release movies of late. The acting, aside from unknown Matt Czuchry (Tucker Max), ranges from bad to sickly, as it seems many of the characters were played by the rejects of the most recent high school production of “Jesus Christ Superstar.”

The dialogue is equally atrocious. What might have read as clever and sharp, sounds overworked, unrealistic and, despite consisting primarily of vulgarity and “yo momma”-esque comebacks, pretentious. Think Juno on crack.

Hell, like many films created with the college crowd in mind, has every right to tout its high level offensiveness, but in no way does the number of people a movie can turn off constitute a success of any degree. Usually offensive material suggests an underlying theme, a carefully interwoven social allegory, commentary on the state in which we live—Max's film contains none. Hell is a pointless, circular, self-congratulating mess, as shallow and dry as the lonely, sex-addicted man it revolves around.

I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell is the opposite of what a comedy should be. It's shameful anecdotes on drinking and women, the abuse of which Max observes as males' “destiny as men,” are advocated for under the guise of satire, making the film feel more like a white-power rally than anything else. O, and in answer to the title, no: they didn't serve any at the theatre.