Images That Thrill

Ever thoughtful critic Joel “MovieMan0283” Bocko recently celebrated the end of his second full year of blogging at The Dancing Image by cosponsoring a meme with Stephen of Checking On My Sausages. The directive is to come up with a collection of similarly themed images that celebrate the “thrill of cinema.” I’m a big fan of screen-capture posts, and even though they seem easy (compared to writing), perhaps I should be doing more of them. (Cinema is a visual medium, after all!) In recent weeks, unrelated to this meme, I’ve tremendously enjoyed Joel’s gallery tracking the rise and fall of Anakin Skywalker (oh, if only those Star Wars prequels didn’t have dialogue!) and Sheila O’Malley’s terrific ode to doorway shots in The Searchers.

So, here’s my contribution to the meme. See if you can spot the (somewhat loose) theme. I’ll eventually list it at the end.

What Goes Up …: The Birth of Big Air

As irritating as David Blaine has become in recent years due to his tedious, surprisingly lusterless stunt (un)spectaculars, whenever I’m flipping through the channels and stumble upon the 1996 documercial David Blaine: Street Magic, I put down the remote control. By now I’ve seen the Leonardo DiCaprio-hosted special enough times to know all the tricks, even if I can’t explain how they’re pulled off. And although I’m still impressed by Blaine’s skill (I’ve always loved magic), the pure excitement I get from watching him turn an Ace of Diamonds into a 6 of Spades has long since passed. Meanwhile, Blaine’s undoubtedly effective stage presence, from his monotone monologues to his dramatic exhaustion shtick, has become downright tiresome. Yet still I watch. The difference is that I no longer watch Blaine. The genius of Street Magic is that in addition to allowing us to observe Blaine’s sleight of hand, the film also – and sometimes exclusively – allows us to watch the awed faces of Blaine’s marks. No matter how many times I encounter Street Magic, the sight of people staring in absolute amazement as they try to process the apparent reality of the seemingly impossible is nothing short of thrilling.

Incredibly enough, that leads us to the latest documentary in ESPN Films’ “30 for 30” series, The Birth of Big Air, which has nothing whatsoever to do with street magic but nonetheless has similar charms. Profiling a BMX daredevil named Mat Hoffman, the 50-minute film is peppered with moments in which Jeff Tremaine’s camera stares into the dumbstruck faces of people trying to process stunts so incredible that they might as well be illusions. That some of the stunts happened as many as 24 years ago, and that many of the guys shaking their heads in amazement have performed numerous gravity-defying feats of their own, makes their present-day wonderment, captured in talking-head interviews, all the more poignant. It’s one thing for a stuntman to dazzle in the moment. It’s another thing to pull off tricks so incredible that a decade or two later people still get goosebumps remembering what it was like to discover photographs of the tricks in trade magazines. Mat Hoffman earned his fame, and served as a trailblazer for his sport, by doing things on a bike that no one else could. Hoffman earned his legend, however, by nailing tricks no one else even imagined.

Pinches on Salt

Walking out of the theater, I had no intention of writing about Salt. But then I read Matt Zoller Seitz’s review at Capital. Now I can’t resist. Seitz calls the movie “the best pure action film to come out of Hollywood in a long time.” He puts its action scenes in the class of Die Hard. And he suggests that “there’s real intelligence in the writing, the directing and the performances.” I disagree on all counts. But that’s not why I feel compelled to write. Rather, I’m drawn in by Seitz’s suggestion that “inattentive critics” and “unimaginative viewers” might overlook many of Salt’s admirable qualities. Written by another critic, I might take those as fighting words, but not when they come from Matt, who many readers here know isn’t just a talented critic but also a responsible and ridiculously generous one. (I can’t think of anyone who has done more to support and encourage nonprofessional criticism, in all forms, than Seitz.) I don’t always agree with Seitz’s reviews, but I’ve read enough of his criticism to trust his motivations. And so where other critics might use words like “inattentive” and “unimaginative” to separate themselves from the pack, patting themselves on the back for their genius, I’m confident Matt is simply imploring audiences to look closer. But that’s the thing: Though, like Seitz, I went into Salt expecting it might be a “big, loud, incoherent, derivative action film without a single smart bone in its plasticized body,” I did look closely, I was attentive. That was the problem.

The closer I looked, the less Salt made any sense to me. Some of this is by design. As Seitz writes, “Kurt Wimmer’s screenplay keeps you guessing,” and Angelina Jolie’s Evelyn Salt is “a (deliberate) blank-slate character whose real mission is to keep you wondering who she is and what she’s up to.” Damn straight. Indeed, the film’s principal pleasure is our inability to pin down the film’s heroine, or villain, or heroic villain, or whatever else Salt might seem to be from one scene to the next. Trouble is, Salt’s structure withholds key pieces of information from the audience and asks us to buy into its suspense anyway, and sometimes that’s dramatically problematic. It’s one thing to watch Salt running – and there’s a lot of running in this picture – with a mistaken understanding of what she’s running to or from. It’s another thing to watch her running and have no clue what she’s trying to achieve. Seitz argues that the film’s ambiguity creates excitement, and in some cases I’d agree. But there’s a fine line between engaging curiosity and maddening aimlessness. Too often I was on the wrong side of that line, not wondering, “Hmm, what is she up to?” so much as, “What’s her motivation?” And that question repeatedly led to this one: “Why do I care?”

Limbo! How Low Can You Go?!: Inception

If Christopher Nolan set out to stretch the limits of cinema with Inception, his mind-bending film set in a world of dreams (and dreams-within-dreams and dreams-within-dreams-within-dreams … and limbo), he did all too well. Inception is too big, too complicated and too ambitious for its own good. The film is overloaded with plot, plot explanation, action and, not to be outdone, urgency. If the first three excesses might be the most annoying, it’s the last one that’s truly damaging, because urgency overkill makes Inception the one thing Nolan desperately wanted it never to be: flat. In his previous film, The Dark Knight, Nolan successfully juggled the interweaving storylines of his four principal characters with a frenzy that could have made George Lucas slack-jawed, but he also respected the plot’s dramatic peaks and valleys. Inception, by comparison, isn’t necessarily more adrenaline-filled or powerful, it’s just lacking those crucial undulations in intensity. Through its pacing, cinematography, music, plot and even the rhythm of its dialogue, Inception gives the impression that nearly every second of the film is infused with severity. Hans Zimmer’s score doesn’t just contribute to the urgency, it symbolizes the unfortunate effect of the film’s unrelenting approach: those haunting, booming, groaning strains, so significant to the energy of the film’s tantalizing trailers, might as well be the sound of a film attempting to consistently operate at the high point of a crescendo.

Zimmer’s score could also double for the sound of a film buckling under its own weight. And what an incredible amount of weight it is – each pound earned with yet another law, term or twist in the film’s exhaustingly complicated narrative. Nolan has written intricate screenplays before – Memento and The Prestige, for instance – but never anything like this. For a film concerned with mazes, Inception is appropriately labyrinthine, yet the best comparison might be to a Jenga tower: a tightly coupled structure that could tip over if just one piece is out of place. To Nolan’s credit, Inception wobbles regularly but it never quite collapses. At least not while you’re watching. With a great deal of thought, I’m sure that numerous plot holes could be identified (at this point, they probably have been), but it passes the initial sniff test, and in this case that’s no small feat. Also, for a movie that exists on several supernatural planes simultaneously, Inception is surprisingly easy to follow, at least broadly speaking. The film’s coherency can in part be attributed to Nolan’s clever decision to slip heist-film elements into his fantasy world, giving us something familiar to latch on to, and to the film’s lack of character complexity, which though disappointing overall does give us one less thing to think about. But the biggest reason Inception is less vague than a David Lynch mindfuck is that nearly every five minutes, if not sooner, one of Nolan’s characters pauses to explain what’s happening, like a math student showing his work. Inception is a lot of things, but unforthcoming isn’t one of them.

Valley of Darkness: Restrepo

It is late October 2007 in the Korengal Valley, then not just one of the most dangerous places in Afghanistan but in all of the world. On this day the U.S. Army is taking the fight to the Taliban in Operation Rock Avalanche. Already gunfire has been exchanged in the rugged terrain. At the moment, members of the 173rd Airborne Brigade’s Battle Company scamper up a ridge in pursuit of the enemy, a camera trailing behind them. All are running, until all of a sudden they aren’t – stopping when they come upon a U.S. soldier standing with his back to the battlefield’s vague frontline, his weapon lowered. It’s an unexpected sight that doesn’t make sense, until we see the body at the soldier’s feet. Now another soldier crests the ridge, bewildered that his fellow troops have halted their advance. Instantly he knows something is wrong. Then he spots the body, covered in a poncho except for one exposed boot. One of his brothers in arms is dead. Upon this realization, the soldier reacts. Severely. Heartbreakingly. Even irrationally. This is a scene no outsider should ever see. It’s too personal. The emotional carnage is too graphic. This is a moment that should be witnessed only by those unfortunate enough to live through it, and then it should be lost to time. Alas, this is war.

Without scenes like that one, Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger’s Restrepo would too easily fulfill Truffaut’s maxim that no war movie can be an anti-war movie. Instead, Restrepo is a devastating yet ambiguous documentary that exists in the overlap between anti-war and pro-soldier. Chronicling a year spent serving one of the army’s most dangerous and dreaded tours, Restrepo examines the meaning of life within war. It’s not a political or historical film so much as a human one, hence its title. The film is named after Battle Company’s remote outpost on a hilltop in Afghanistan, which was named in honor of the soldier whose death inspired the outpost’s construction. After 20-year-old medic Pfc. Juan S. “Doc” Restrepo was killed, Battle Company felt inspired – strategically and emotionally – to take the high ground. Ascending one of Korengal’s many hills at night with shovels and guns, Battle Company alternated between shoveling and shooting until a small but significant U.S. position was secured. From there, O.P. Restrepo grew, becoming a place of strength and symbolism. Proudly observes one solider: O.P. Restrepo stuck out like a raised middle finger aimed at the Taliban, which was kind of the point.

Notebook: Night, Noomi and Nolan

NIGHT
As depressing as it is to observe M. Night Shyamalan’s once promising career hemorrhaging like a narf that’s been mauled by a scrunt, I enjoyed the thoughtful (and often funny) analyses of fellow bloggers in the comments of my review of The Last Airbender. My interest in the best of worst of Shyamalan is so severe that I’ve come to realize it is my calling to at some point analyze Shyamalan’s career in more comprehensive detail, perhaps with a video essay (or two). Alas, with various other commitments (including that darn day job), I won’t be getting to that anytime soon. So, while they’re still fresh, here are a few leftover thoughts about Shyamalan in general and The Last Airbender specifically.

M. is for Moodless: The most shocking failure of Shyamalan’s past two films (in a three-film slump) has been his inability to create or sustain a visceral or convincing mood. This is especially shocking because over his first four films Shyamalan seemed able to create mood just by falling out of bed.

Blowing in the Wind: The Last Airbender

It’s come to this. With The Last Airbender, M. Night Shyamalan manufactures what is arguably the most shocking conclusion of any of his seven signature films simply by delivering approximately 10 minutes of truly worthwhile cinema. Alas, Shyamalan follows those 10 minutes with a clumsy sequel teaser that obliterates the emotional harmony of the preceding crescendo like a gong at the end of a harp recital, but no matter. After roughly 290 minutes of almost pure suckitude, over the course of Lady in the Water, The Happening and all but the very end of The Last Airbender, even M. Night mediocrity would be worth celebrating. Instead, for the first time in a long time, Shyamalan reaches deep and gives us something genuinely special, a scene that triggers childlike wonderment – even though the scene’s big CGI effect was foretold by the film’s trailers, even though the scene’s tension is interrupted by an unnecessary flashback that visualizes an episode that had already been described in satisfactory detail. Despite such imperfections, when the pint-sized titular character reaches into his soul to lift an ocean, in triumph over a personal trauma and in protection of a peaceful city, Shyamalan creates something that all six Harry Potter films have struggled to realize: a depiction of magic that is indeed magical.

Unfortunately, the effects of the spell are fleeting. Shyamalan can’t even make it to the closing credits without dashing the hopes of his most ardent fans (because, to be sure, it’s only his ardent fans who have any hope left) by shilling for a sequel that no sane person would ever want to see. What’s disheartening isn’t the nakedness of the product placement so much as the obviousness of Shyamalan’s obliviousness: he doesn’t realize that he hasn’t earned it – hasn’t earned our butts in the seats of his next film, hadn’t really earned our butts in the seats of this film and, if his recent pictures are evidence of where he’s going, hasn’t earned the right to put his own butt in the seat of a director’s chair anytime soon. Shyamalan’s latest three films have been supreme disasters, movies highlighted by erratic pacing, cringe-inducing performances, illogical and/or inscrutable plots and dialogue so atrocious that even George Lucas would be entitled to groan in its direction (at least once).

Getting Bent After The Last Airbender

Two years ago it just so happened that Hokahey of Little Worlds made his annual Washington, DC-area visit on the debut weekend of The Happening. Hardy fans of M. Night Shyamalan, particularly Unbreakable and The Village (we're in the minority on the latter, we know), Hokahey and I were left reeling from encountering a movie that was two times worse than what we figured would be Shyamalan’s rock bottom, Lady In The Water. The atrociousness of The Happening led to our transcribed post-movie discussion. And a few days later, I paid a mocking tribute to the film with a parody ad.

Well, wouldn’t you know it, this year Hokahey’s visit coincided with the national debut of The Last Airbender. A proper review should come along later this week, I hope, if I can juggle projects successfully. In the meantime, here’s some more mocking tribute, entirely shot and edited on the morning and afternoon of July 4, starring Hokahey.

(As always, allow the video to buffer before playing. Watch the video in a larger player on Vimeo, here.)

Southern Discomfort: Winter’s Bone

One of the most striking things about the Sundance hit Winter’s Bone is that it’s as straightforward as it seems. Adapted from a novel by Daniel Woodrell and directed by Debra Granik, the film tells the story of Ree Dolly, a 17-year-old girl wandering through rural Missouri in a desperate attempt to track down her meth-cooking, bail-jumping father so that he’ll see his day in court. In many movies, particularly independent movies, this quest would be nothing more than a front, a basic narrative device employed as a means to a more profound end. But not in Winter’s Bone. Here, Ree’s mission to find her father isn’t a metaphorical search for her soul or the meaning of life, it’s just her reality: a task she must perform in order to keep herself, her catatonic mother and her two siblings in the house that her father used as collateral for his release. None of this is to suggest that Ree doesn’t reveal herself or learn a thing or two over the course of her journey. Rather it’s to point out that Winter’s Bone is free from boldface/italicized demonstrations of meaning. Granik’s film is exactly what it appears to be: a gripping, gothic, Grimm fairy tale.

That Winter’s Bone is “only” that makes it unusual for the art house, where symbolism often trumps narrative cohesion, but it doesn’t cheapen the film. There’s nuance here, and emotional depth. But in the end this is a good old-fashioned yarn, an Alice in Fucked-Up Wonderland tale in which Ree’s moment-to-moment interactions are so compelling that her inevitable destination is an afterthought. That’s no small thing. Winter’s Bone is soaking wet with the dark, cold atmosphere of its setting – a place where men go by names like Thump and Teardrop and where the women are equally intimidating. It’s a place where nearly everyone seems to be related by blood but in which family is determined by one’s adherence to an understood moral code. Watching Granik’s film, we get the sense that there’s a lot of truth in this depiction of poverty, violence and crime. But even though the movie was shot on location in southern Missouri (one could scarcely imagine a suitable substitute), realism isn’t the film’s primary aim. When it comes down to it, Ree Dolly is Henry Hill and Winter’s Bone is Goodfellas of the Ozarks. It’s a glimpse of a somewhat unimaginable world that’s based in reality but not grounded in truth.