Thumbsucker (2005)

Thumbsucker, 2005

Written & Directed by Mike Mills
Based on the novel by Walter Kirn




In a marketplace where film, television, music, and tabloid journalism are increasingly difficult to tell apart, an "exciting new star" is someone who dabbles in the first three but exists mainly for the fourth. While I'm sure his exquisitely androgynous face won't sell a single supermarket rag all year, I will still firmly declare that 20-year-old Lou Taylor Pucci is the most Exciting New Star of 2005.

Pucci first made a splash in May, with his performance as the devastatingly anonymous John Voss in the HBO adaptation of Empire Falls. Where this film gave him but a few scenes to portray a lifetime of secret suffering, Thumbsucker gives him nearly every scene of the film to explore a character, and he does so with astonishing confidence and skill, invoking the loner spirit of James Dean but with a personality all his own.

Pucci plays Justin Cobb, a high schooler with the Title Quirk. He is both bored and angry with life, and in moments of personal crisis, turns to a bathroom stall or the privacy of his bedroom to indulge his embarrassing habit -- make that embarrassing and teeth-warping, as he has already had corrective dental work, and at the rate he's going, he'll need a second procedure. As Thumbsucker unfolds, Justin trades addictions, first weaning himself off of his thumb in exchange for psychiatric meds and Debate Club (!). Pucci embraces Justin's extremes, from his most endearing to his most obnoxious, in a clear-eyed portrait of teenage confusion.

Director Mike Mills, in his feature film debut, tells the story with an attentive eye and an unobtrusive hand, and coaxes rich, honest performances from every last cast member. Tilda Swinton and Vincent D'Onofrio portray Justin's "Audrey and Mike" -- they don't like to be called Mom and Dad, it makes them sound old -- with equal parts concerned, devoted parent and flawed, struggling human being; they are not the ineffectual and easily faulted parents that a lesser film would present. Vince Vaughn, allowed to keep his nervous energy, but painted on the canvas of a complete nerd of a debate club teacher, is a bizarre casting choice that proves worth the gamble. Benjamin Bratt brings swarthy humor to his brief role as a TV star Audrey crushes on. Even Keanu Reeves, who I have hated in everything I have ever seen him in, isn't half bad as Justin's dopey-spiritual dentist. (Draw what conclusions you will about that actor-character match-up.)

Another sort-of cast member is the late Elliott Smith, playing the same voice-of-the-film role Cat Stevens did in Harold and Maude, and even covering one of Stevens's songs used in that film. It's awfully ambitious, and a little foolish, to openly court such a comparison, but Thumbsucker, with its misfit sensibility, can get away with it.

Grade: A-

NEWS FLASH: Ellen DeGeneres to Host Oscars

Ellen DeGeneres hosts the primetime Emmy awards on November 4, 2001. Photo by Michael Caulfield of wireimage.com.



Did you hear me scream this morning?

After years of hoping, my wish has come true. Ellen DeGeneres will be hosting the Oscars.

Huzzah!

Ms. DeGeneres's hosting credentials are two gigs at the primetime Emmy awards, as well as her perennially daytime Emmy-winning talk show. Her HBO standup specials have all been great. She's going to be awesome.

She is also only the second woman to host the show in its 79 years.

Ms. DeGeneres is the third consecutive first-time host; it looks more and more promising each year that the era of the same damn people hosting all the time is over. Billy Crystal is great, but he has done his thing, his status as a classic host is secured, so hooray for the newblood.

By the way, can you name what Ellen DeGeneres and her predecessor, Jon Stewart, have in common? If you said her brother Vance DeGeneres was a correspondent on Stewart's The Daily Show, pat yourself on the back.

Oscar Hosts: A Look Back

I have been watching the Oscars since the 66th awards (held in 1994), and the only host I haven't liked is Whoopi Goldberg. You thought I was going to say David Letterman, didn't you? Letterman may have been out of place in '95, but he was fantastically out of place, and I'll take his smart-ass shenanigans over Goldberg's not-updated-since-Clinton-was-elected routine any day. Letterman was also responsible for my favorite filmed segment ever, the "Would You Like to Buy a Monkey?" audition reel. Another of my all-time favorites was Chris Rock's interviews at the Magic Johnson Theatre in L.A., asking "regular" people if they had seen any of the Best Picture nominees. By the way, what do these two bits have in common? If you answered "Albert Brooks," pat yourself on the back.

Speaking of Chris Rock, he is another unjustly maligned host. I think people were so certain (and possibly eager) he was going to fail, that they overreacted to his every joke. Any reasonably intelligent person who has been watching this show for a few years would recognize that his so-called "barbs" at Jude Law and Tobey Maguire were no more pointed than any other cracks previous hosts have made about their peers.

My favorite hosts have been David Letterman, Steve Martin, Chris Rock, and Jon Stewart. What do they all have in common? If you answered they have the irreverence, absurdity, and biting wit necessary to cut through the opulence and ass-kissing of Oscar pageantry, pat yourself on the back.

Crash (2005)

Crash, 2005

Directed by Paul Haggis
Written by Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco




Two young black men walking the streets of Los Angeles have a reasonably thoughtful conversation about race. They see a white woman draw her purse closer to her body as she approaches them, and they criticize her for her racist assumption that they will rob her. Then ... they rob her.

Welcome to Crash.

In the Crash universe, everyone in Los Angeles (and, we are to assume by extension, the United States) has a racist monologue percolating under their tongue, just waiting to be delivered when anyone of a different race does anything to piss them off. And so a small army of some of the best (and worst) actors in the business line up for a series of skits in which one or all of them gets to declare why they hate blacks, Latinos, Asians, Arabs, Eskimos, Visigoths, rodeo clowns, etc. The white woman who was robbed earlier chews out her Latino housekeeper and locksmith because she was just robbed by ... two black guys. A black guy snipes about Latinos to his Puerto Rican/Salvadoran girlfriend because ... well, no real reason. A sound man on the set of an Afro-American television show tells the director that one of the actors has suddenly dropped his Ebonic speech pattern. (Hmmm ... racism, or just plain continuity?)

Writer-Director Paul Haggis trots out one punishing scene after another, rubbing the audience's face in shit without any further commentary or insight; face rubbed in shit is enough. The trouble with Crash versus other racial relations films (Do the Right Thing, for example) is the lack of portrayal of the joy, pride, and humanity of these characters. Because when Haggis eases off on the ugliness, he bypasses honest human behavior and goes straight into schmaltz, with eye-rolling coincidences and phony uplift. By the time all the plotlines have started intersecting, and we are teased with the possibilities of various characters being killed, it's hard to decide which outcome to root for: Do I want another breast-beatingly tragic death scene, or do I just want this character dead so I don't have to see them anymore?

Crash is not without a few merits. There are three standout scenes which are expertly directed and leave a haunting impression. These scenes all star the best performances in the film, from Matt Dillon, Terrence Howard, Thandie Newton, and Michael Pena. In the first, Dillon, a police officer, pulls over Howard and Newtown as they are driving home; in the second, Dillon and Newtown unexpectedly meet again; and in the third, one of the central conflicts erupts at Pena's home. The last two require a certain suspension of disbelief, but if you can accept the fantastical scenario, they do pack a raw, emotional punch, and much of the credit goes to these four exceptional actors. Unfortunately, the cast as a whole is uneven, with blank-faced Ryan Phillippe and Brendan Fraser in over their heads, and Sandra Bullock gratingly over-the-top.

Fans of Crash argue this is an important film because it shows prevalence of racism. If you think the only agents of racism in this country are people dressed in white hoods and burning crosses, then by all means, watch this film and be enlightened. But if this idea seems more than obvious to you, you will do well to skip it.

Grade: C-

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Little Miss Sunshine, 2006

Directed by Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris
Written by Michael Arndt



The trailer for Little Miss Sunshine promised two things: a dynamite cast and a screaming child. Therefore, I was simultaneously prepared to love and hate it. The good news is that the tempting cast -- Alan Arkin, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, and Greg Kinnear -- is every bit as good as you would hope, and the better news is that the screaming child (Abigail Breslin) just screams that one time, and isn't an annoying or cutesy character at all. So everything else is just gravy.

Sunshine follows a bitterly askew family on a long road trip to a beauty pageant in which their sweet, unpretentious daughter Olive (Breslin) is an unlikely contestant. It's a familiar journey, hitting many of the touchstones of the dysfunctional-family and road-movie genres, but writer Michael Ardnt and co-directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris have the good sense to employ the genre conventions that work best, and to keep them fresh with the specificity of their characters and earnestness of their cast. (My favorite unlikely detail: The rebellious teenage son [Paul Dano] wants to stick it to the man by joining ... the U.S. Air Force.) The actors never step out of character to ironically comment on the absurdity of their situation, which keeps them welcome traveling companions for the duration of the film.

Oddly, the most out-of-place element in the film is its best performance. Steve Carell is so haunted as the suicidal uncle that he doesn't belong in this sunny comedy. The character is given a few scenes towards the beginning that suggest a rich backstory, but once the family hits the road, his pathos are no longer convenient for the main plot line, and so he is mostly swept aside and expected to be all better in order to participate in the rest of the film. I hope Carell soon finds a film where he can have a full go at such a dramatic character.

I don't want to spoil the ending, so I'll just say that the most enjoyable aspect of the movie is the absurd, unintentionally-beating-them-at-their-own game finale, and from an absent character's boomerang effects on the family's fate. It's just the right conclusion to this kooky, rag-tag film.

Grade: B+

Prairie Home Companion, A (2006)

A Prairie Home Companion, 2006

Directed by Robert Altman
Story by Garrison Keillor and Ken LaZebnik
Screenplay by Garrison Keillor, based on his radio program



Garrison Keillor's radio variety program in Minnesota is adapted for the screen into a fictional telling of its last broadcast. He has found an ideal director in Robert Altman, a filmmaker most comfortable with large, bustling casts. Here, Altman orchestrates the rotating musical acts and backstage dramas of a live broadcast with the wisdom of his 81 years and the energy of a filmmaker half his age. If Altman retires on this one, it's a worthy career-capper.

The Fitzgerald theatre (named for one of the state's favorite sons, F. Scott), is going to be bought and torn down by a Texas tycoon (Tommy Lee Jones), so Garrison Keillor (playing himself) rounds up his favorite musical acts for one last hurrah. Attending the bittersweet homecoming are the Johnson sisters, Rhonda and Yolanda (Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep), the cowboy duo Dusty and Lefty (Woody Harrelson and John C. Reilly), and many of the actual "Prairie Home Companion" musicians portraying themselves. Tomlin and Streep are nothing short of extraordinary as the sisters haunted by their past who must keep on singing as though their very lives depended on it; their improvisational scenes together are breathlessly engrossing. They are the melancholy yin to Harrelson and Reilly's boisterous yang, a casting match made in doofus-heaven. (I can't believe no one has thought of pairing them sooner.) Their folksy but unforced banter culminates with a ditty called "Bad Jokes", one I'd love to see nominated and performed on the Oscar telecast next year.

Rounding out the gilded cast are Kevin Kline as the humorously-named semi-narrator Guy Noir, Virginia Madsen as an ethereal mystery visitor, and Maya Rudolph as the put-upon stage manager. Unfortunately, the only cast member who stumbles is Lindsay Lohan, not quite convincing as Streep's gloomy daughter, but this I blame more on the poorly fleshed-out character (teenager = depressed) than her performance. The film also fumbles a bit when the story takes an ill-fitting turn towards the supernatural. Still, Prairie is as warm and involving as Gosford Park was cold and detached, and makes for a graceful and satisfying movie experience.

Grade: B+

Thank You For Smoking (2006)

Thank You For Smoking, 2006

Written & Directed by Jason Reitman
Based on the novel by Christopher Buckley















In Broadcast News, Albert Brooks asked, "What's the devil going to look like when he's around? Nobody's gonna be taken in by a guy with fangs and a pointy tail." The devil would do well to look like Aaron Eckhart, handsome enough to bewitch and average enough to be unthreatening, and with more charm than a box of Irish-themed marshmallow cereal. Eckhart relishes the role of Nick Naylor, the maddeningly likeable face of the industry we love to hate: Big Tobacco. Naylor is a guy who can hawk cigarettes while sitting next to a child with cancer (and yes, the boy is bald from the chemo), and yet Eckhart still makes him compulsively watchable.

Naylor keeps company with other cheery-faced Merchants Of Death (or, The M.O.D. Squad), in alcohol spokeswoman Polly Bailey (Maria Bello) and firearms spokesman Bobby Jay Bliss (David Koechner.) He wheels and deals with the Big Daddy of tobacco (Robert Duvall), a former star of cigarette advertising (Sam Elliott), and two vacuous Hollywood types (Rob Lowe and Adam Brody), and faces off against a liberal Vermont senator (William H. Macy.) All these adventures, vigorously portrayed by this first-rate cast, make for brisk and lively satire. (Less game is Katie Holmes, too dewy in the role of a ruthless reporter.)

Director Reitman makes the material crackle, but ultimately, Thank You is all about ideas, not character. The attempt to humanize the story -- a subplot with Naylor's young son who may be influenced by his father's glorification of cigarettes -- feels too tacked-on to count as an emotional hook. Thank You may not sustain your hunger for a good story, but it still leaves you with some tasty ideas to chew on.

Grade: B

Lady in the Water (2006)

Lady in the Water, 2006

Written & Directed by M. Night Shyamalan



It seems M. Night Shyamalan's purpose as a filmmaker is to marry the genres of fantasy and family melodrama. Shall we call it emo-fantasy? It's a purpose I can dig in theory, because in a filmscape littered with impersonal work, Shyamalan's belief that nothing is scary or thrilling unless rooted in human relationships is especially welcome. I would still be a huge fan of The Sixth Sense if it had no twist ending (in fact, I'd probably be a bigger fan), because of the indelible mother-son relationship that gives me a lump in my throat just to think about it. The Lady in the Water continues the emo-fantasy tradition, with the great Paul Giamatti as the wounded, doggedly beating heart of the film. Giamatti turns in a heart-breakingly earnest performance as Cleveland Heep, the lonely landlord with a secret who finds himself the caretaker of a mystical sea creature named Story (Bryce Dallas Howard.) The relationship between Cleveland and Story is delicate and unbashedly touching, and effectively taps into the storytelling archetypes of two wayward souls who heal each other and in the process heal themselves.

So how was this screwed up so badly?

The answer lies in the ridiculously overstuffed backstory Shyamalan has saddled to his wisp of a tale. Supposedly, he wrote the script based on a bedtime story he told his own children. I find this very hard to believe, because it would probably take 110 minutes (the film's running time) to tell the whole thing, at which point any child would be extremely ornery if not out-cold asleep. See, Story has been sent to our world to bring enlightenment, but only if the weird wolf-like creatures don't kill her, and the only way to stop them is to stare them in the eyes, but only if you are the chosen Guardian, but then there are the tree monkeys, who ... well, at this point you can abandon all hope of following the logic of Shyamalan's universe, because a new convoluted rule is introduced on the average of every five minutes. As if the obstacle course for Story's arrival to and safe escape from earth weren't loony enough, the only person who knows all the rules to this bedtime-story-come-to-life is a cranky Korean woman who, of course, needs to have her sass-talking daughter translate for her, but that's only if Cleveland agrees to ... ah, forget it.

Rounding out this clusterfuck is the motley-crew of tenants in Cleveland's building. Here, Shyamalan the director shines just a wee bit, bringing together strangers united by a common address and the goodness of their hearts, in a way that would be exciting and uplifting if Shyamalan the screenwriter wasn't making them jump through such absurd hoops. Worse still, in one of the grossest cinematic miscalculations I've seen in recent memory, is the nauseating character of Mr. Farber, perpetrated by -- say it isn't so! -- Bob Balaban. He plays a snotty film critic who spouts precisely the sort of withering bon mots that have been directed at Shyamalan's ever-slumping career, and delivers such groan-inducing lines as "This is like a scene out of a horror movie" and other gratingly self-referential bits worse than anything in Scream. Shyamalan isn't content to bury the audience in bullshit; he also wants to make sure we know that he doesn't care if we hate his movie, because critics are jerks, so THERE!

Cleveland and his rag-tag team struggle throughout the film to align all the elements for Story's escape: If they do their job, an eagle will swoop from the sky and carry her away. Watching The Lady in the Water, one wishes an eagle would swoop down and carry Giamatti's and Howard's tender performances into a better film.

Grade: D

Inside Man (2006)

Inside Man, 2006

Directed by Spike Lee
Written by Russell Gewirtz















"Whodunit" is not the question posed by Inside Man; from the very first scene, we know the "who" is Dalton Russell (Clive Owen), because he tells us as much in a tightly-coiled whisper directed at the fourth wall. Dalton is the title character, here to show us the "howdunit" of his crime.

Dalton and a small gang of cohorts descend upon a Manhattan bank and take its employees and customers hostage for the duration of the robbery. Detective Keith Frazier (Denzel Washington) comes in to negotiate the hostage situation. As the game of strategy between Dalton and Keith unfolds, the story intercuts with the ending, the rescued hostages talking to the police. But still, the "ending" is not given away, as the more the hostages explain what happened, the more muddied the truth becomes, and the blurrier the distinction between victims and perpetrators.

Screenwriter Russell Gewirtz has fashioned a fascinating jigsaw puzzle of a narrative, one that tantalizes with its growing mystery, but grounded enough in its own reality that it keeps the viewers from throwing their hands up in defeat. It is the rare film that is as enjoyable to unravel after the credits have rolled as it is to do so while the film is still in progress.

This story may not sound like a Spike Lee joint, certainly more commercial than most if not all of his previous work. Lee's directorial touch, which elevates the film above the crime genre, is his focus on the cross-section of New Yorkers tangled in the web of the heist. Lee is more interested in the humanity of the hostages, policemen, firemen, construction workers, and neighborhood characters than he is with the more traditional crime story focal points of the brilliant thief or the heroic detective. Washington and Owen both turn in compelling performances, but they do not outshine a cast of mostly unknown players who vividly portray the multi-ethnic populace. Though the film offers plenty of twists and turns, perhaps the most surprising aspect is that the heart of the film is something of a valentine to the proud, stubborn, bitchy, hard-working, good-humored, humane, and colorful spirit of New York.

Grade: B+