Heaven's Gate

3.5 Stars (out of four)

Heaven's Gate is both a tragic and cautionary tale.  The follow-up film to the Oscar-winning The Deer Hunter, Michael Cimino set out to make the greatest western ever made.  Through well-intentioned, but ultimately crushing artistic hubris, Cimino would make one of the most beautiful, criminally underrated film of the last century.  A film that would literally bankrupt a film studio (United Artists).

The story is actually fairly simple.  A lawman born into wealth attempts to stop Wyoming cattle barons from murdering immigrant families encroaching on their land and stealing their cattle.  It is based on the true events of the Johnson County War, a set of events in April 1892 that saw a group of armed thugs and a sheriff's posse that led to a protracted gun battle that forced the intervention of the US cavalry under orders from President Benjamin Harrison.  The movie goes further saying saying that the lawless actions of the cattlemen were sanctioned, at least tacitly, by both the Governor of Wyoming and the President of the US.

The movie is, like Mary Poppins, practically perfect in every way, except...that it is LOOOONG, clocking in at 216 minutes, basically 3.5 hours.  Now, I actually didn't have a problem with this.  The length is the only criticism I have of it, because there are scenes that could use trimming, even a lot of trimming.  But the movie is so beautiful with gorgeous vistas, beautifully framed and lit shots, great choreography and scoring, and a fascinating story.  This is one of those movies, like Cleopatra and John Carter From Mars, that are actually pretty good but suffered from toxic pre-release press that stuck onto them forever, creating an unfair shackle they could never shake.  All three of these movies have been very underrated as a result and all deserve a second chance.

Now, as I said, it is a cautionary tale as well.  The sad tragedy of all this is that everyone got into it with good intentions.  United Artists was known to be one of the most friendly studios in Hollywood to artists.  Indeed, it had been formed by Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, D.W. Griffith and Mary Pickford precisely for that reason, to be an alternative to studios that were stifling creativity in artists under the old studio system.  UA essentially gave Cimino a blank check to create another Deer Hunter, to give the newly installed heads of the studio some artistic cred.  Cimino's girlfriend was his producer, so she did not rein in his overspending.  He also knew how to play the game, telling the studios what they wanted to hear but not changing anything.  He overspent his initial budget by well over 300% at $44,000,000 (approx $128,000,000 in today's dollars). 

The movie was savaged by bad press stories from hostile reporters who weren't allowed on set until one got hired on as an extra.  He wrote a savage piece of a set out of control that delighted the press who immediately picked up the story everywhere.  When the initial 219-minute cut was released for the premiere, Vincent Canby of The New York Times eviscerated the movie gleefully.  After one week, Cimino himself pulled the movie and reedited it to a more manageable 149 minutes.  As you can probably imagine, it became an incomprehensible mess, which Canby and other critics smashed it even harder, and after the dust cleared, the movie grossed a paltry $3 million in the domestic box office after only a two week run, which made it the biggest box office bomb until Cutthroat Island.  It now stands as the 10th worst box office bomb when adjusted for inflation (the others, in order at the time of this writing are: The 13th Warrior, The 47 Ronin, Cutthroat Island, Mars Needs Moms, Final Fantasy: The Spirts Within, The Adventures of Pluto Nash, The Fall of the Roman Empire, Sahara, and The Lone Ranger (2013) in case you were wondering).

The the tragedy was it ended the careers for Cimino and it's star Kris Kristofferson.  They made other movies, of course, but the stink of failure, the one truly unforgivable sin in Hollywood, never really left them.  All of which is unjustified.  Everything in this movie works, except for length, and should be reconsidered.  The other lasting legacy of the film is that all film companies have a producer on set to be "the enemy" to the creative people.  Through one man's hubris, he ruined for everyone else to come, and that is the warning.

Sharknado

BOMB: 0 Stars (out of four)

Sharks being sucked up in tornadoes terrorize LA.  Need I say more?

Okay, I hotly debated with myself whether I should review this big, steaming turd.  (If that doesn't let you know how I feel about it, I don't know what will.). I ultimately decided to do it to get something off my chest that needed saying.  There are some bad movies because of unfortunate circumstances or bad decisions like Waterworld, Heaven's Gate or Xanadu.  There are bad films because they just don't communicate or translate well, such as any Bruce Lee movie, The Song Remains The Same, Zardoz or Eyes Wide Shut.  There are other bad films because, frankly, the creators are to up to the task because they really are talentless, clueless hacks like Plan 9 From Outer Space, Ilsa: She-Wolf of the SS (or any Ilsa movie for that matter), Kiss Meets The Phantom of the Park or Superfuzz.  Or there are movies that are just genuinely bad where there is absolutely nothing good to say about them like Life Is Beautiful, Ishtar, Showgirls, or any Godzilla film except the first one.  But the worst kind of bad movie, one deserving of execution for all those involved, is one that sets out to be bad like Movie 43, Snakes On A Plane, Angel's Revenge, The Toxic Avenger and now...Sharknado.

The usual explanation/excuse is that "We're doing a send-up of whatever genre."  But that is full of sh&t because other, good movies have done that same thing, such as Scream, Attack of the Killer Tomatos, Tremors, Deep Blue Sea, The Expendables, Monty Python & The Quest for the Holy Grail, This Is Spinal Tap, Airplane!, oh I could go on and on.  When the filmmakers deliberately set out to make a bad film, it says a couple of negative things about their attitudes, and we, the audience, should be really pissed about this.  First, many times, they are cynically trying to manufacture a cult film, the same way record producers try to make Justin Bieber a powerhouse talent.  It is artificial and reeks of disdain for the audience as they are trying to cobble together elements they think that sell in order to get your money.  There are two mistakes in this thinking.  You can't deliberately make a cult film.  Cult films find their audiences usually  for totally unexpected reasons that can't be quantified in any way.  The tragedy to this thinking is that a good, original movie could have been made for that money.  Thus, we get the double whammie of being stuck with a piece of crap combined with being denied what could be the next Matrix, Halloween, Duel, Mean Streets or Nightwatch.

It also demonstrates an arrogance and disdain towards the audience that says, "Yeah, we know it's crap, but we know you're going to pay to see it anyway because you, the audience, are stupid enough go pay for anything with a pretty person in it.  Unfortunately, maybe because people do precisely that, not only do these films get made, they breed sequels and even worse copies.  Troma Films and porn companies have made a small empire on these types of films.  At least porno delivers on one promise, it gives you sex.  Sharknado is an example of all of these things.  Subpar visual effects, stilted or bad acting from some people who can act, an incomprehensible bad storyline, totally dues ex machina plot twists and humorless jokes.  And it has bred a sequel: Sharknado 2: The Second One.  Don't support this crap.  Only by your non-participation will these films stop being made.  Do it, if not for yourselves, than...sniff!...for the children.

V/H/S

3 Stars (out of four)

The horror genre is, I believe, one of the hardest to do.  It is usually the worst offender of my biggest rule in moviemaking - NEVER INCLUDE ANYTHING IN A FILM FOR ITS OWN SAKE.  Now, I'm not a prude.  I really don't care what is in a film so long as it is serves the story.  Whether it be language (Bad Boys, My Cousin Vinny), sentimentality (Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, Field Of Dreams), very disturbing themes (A Clockwork Orange, Irreversible or Wild Things), graphic violence (Saving Private Ryan, Pulp Fiction, Robocop, The Sixth Sense, The Reanimator) or even graphic sex (Basic Instinct, Boys Don't Cry, Boogie Nights).  If it serves a point, it should be included.  If it is there to titalate or shock, it is gratuitous and unnecessary, and frankly, desperate.  Horror usually breaks every rule, mostly because we've seen it all and the only way to make a dent is to up the ante in gore and nudity.  While V/H/S has a lot of both, it is spellbinding and totally original.

The plot is incredibly simple.  A group a small-time scumbags who videotape all of their illegal exploits, are hired by a mysterious contact to break into the house of a man to steal a particular videotape.  When asked which one, he says, "You'll know it when you see it."  The group breaks into the house to find the owner dead and scores of unlabeled VHS videotapes.  So, they start watching them.  What follows are five vignettes of different horror stories, all directed by up and coming young bucks in horror.  It is another one of the "found footage" films popularized by The Blair Witch Project.

First, I'll say what's right about this film.  It is the most original presentation of found footage I have seen yet.  What a great idea to show off the talents of some new guys on the field, with short stories.  The stories are engaging, genuinely creepy and a hoot to watch.  A word of caution though.  The subject matter is EXTREMELY disturbing and not for everyone.  Now, all the stories may not have the same effect as it depends on what gets under your skin, but there is something in here for everyone.  Whether it be a succubus, haunted house, alien abduction, demonic possession, supernatural killer or home invader, there is something guaranteed to scare you.  They are extremely violent and disturbing, all of them, and there is not really a touch of humor at all.  This harkens back to truly scary films like Psycho, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Halloween and The Silence of the Lambs.  They are not misunderstood comedies, but are truly horrifying.  That said, they all use my much hatred vomit-cam, the bouncy, hand-held look so common by younger directors today, especially by the "found footage" genre.  It literally makes me nauseous to watch and I can't sit through an entire movie, thus significantly lowering the enjoyment for me.  This is why it only gets 3 stars.  I know younger filmmakers like it due to its perceived "realness," but it just looks like you're a hack who flunked out of film school when you use it primarily.  I would love to see some of these stories made into full-length film, especially the first, which is my favorite.

A Most Wanted Man

4 Stars (out of four)

Let's get the obvious out of the way.  As this was Philip Seymour Hoffman's last completed role before he died, there is going to be a lot of critics and others falling over themselves to like it since he was so undeniably good in his career.  Whether or not they really mean that praise, I have no idea.  But I have to say, I have liked him since I first saw him in 1996's Twister, but became a real fan of his from 1997's Boogie Nights.  That was a seminal role for him and showed that we had a great new talent on the scene.  Since then, he has been nothing but an asset on any film he has been on, a consummate professional who never phoned it on.  He doesn't have certain signature tools like Robert DeNiro (What did I tell you?  What did I tell you?), "Shouty" Al Pacino (She's got a...GREAT ASS!), and John Malkovich (I-must-now-e-nun-ci-ate), merely just great performances time and time again, even when they weren't necessarily needed (Catching Fire or MI III, anyone?).

Based on the great John Le Carré novel of the same name, Hoffman plays Günther, a German spymaster who runs a counterterrorist squad that is quasi-illegal in Hamburg.  He is being punished after ruining an earlier assignment in Beirut.  The squad is tasked with building intelligence networks among the immigrant Muslim populations.  He is trying to find evidence that a local businessman is secretly financing extremist organizations.  So he begins to build a network from a local illegal Chechen to catch larger and larger fish.  That's really it.

The genius of this film is that it portrays what spycraft is probably really like.  As exciting as James Bond and Jason Bourne are, they are really not what espionage is about.  It is more the drudgery of dat-to-day work to find that one nugget than can make a difference.  Running spy networks is really about gaining trust from your sources, just as any policeman or journalist will tell you.  It is a dirty, I exciting, but necessary business.  Most movies do a horrible job portraying this side, but a couple go good recommendations if you like this type of story include The Little Drummer Girl, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (both by Le Carré as well), The Counterfeit Traitor and to a lesser extent, Spy Game.  Hoffman is the perfect choice for this role both for his talent, but also his unassuming appearance.  Good spies don't look good, like Daniel Craig or Angelina Jolie.  They should blend into the background or else they draw attention to themselves.  Hoffman delivers an incredibly controlled performance that shows empathy and yet detachment from everything around him.  He also brings an earnestness to the role as well as he is trying to make the world safer, is good at his job, but is unappreciated by those above him.  When taken together, it is such a nuanced performance that is utterly believable.  And not just because this is his last completed role.  He has been delivering like this for close to 20 years, and while we will see him again in Mockingjay, that will not be worthy of his talent a movie like this was.  See it, and see it again, for a truly intelligent experience that will entertain as well.

Snowpiercer

2 Stars (out of four)

I went into this film really wanting to like it.  It is a fairly original idea, based on the 1982 French graphic novel Le Transperseneige and I was reading and hearing nothing but good things about it.  And it is good, just not great.  After reading the graphic novel, I could see the potential of a great story, and try as they might, they just couldn't pull it off.  And that's too bad, because this one could have been one of the great ones.

Snowpiercer starts off in a post-apocalyptic world.  The world has been plunged into a non-stop winter.  In the novel, it is after a nuclear war, but in an effort to make it more "topical," I guess, it's now because of the unintended effects of an effort to stop global warming.  In any case, the rest of humanity is riding on a 1000-car train that never stops.  Of course, to make the symbolism even more obviously dumb, they are broken into 1st class, economy and overpacked cattle cars.  The evil, white overseers are cruel to the people in steerage, for lack of a better term, with expected harsh and undeserved punishments meted out pretty arbitrarily.  The conditions in steerage are also deplorable, with no way of advancing out.  Because of this, a popular uprising takes place, and for the rest of the movie, we journey up the train on an ever-increasingly surreal trip of blood and cruelty.

So where does the movie go wrong?  I think a few ways.  One, we don't really care about anyone.  We don't know any of the backstories of anyone who dies.  All we see is the horrible living conditions and the deplorable state of affairs they are subjected to.  When the revolt starts, we are curiously detached from the events happening.  We don't care about the people, so we have no stake in the fight.  It's like reading an encyclopedia account of a world event.  Only once a person dies do we understand the motivations, and each one is pretty powerful.  If we had known this before, we would care about their passing and would have an emotional stake in their well-being.  Second, I am beginning to get a little tired of the hackneyed plot device that the only bad people in the world are white, European descent and they hold the keys to the machinations of the world.  This film is no exception.  With the exception of the leader of the revolt, Chris Evans, every white person is horrible and untrustworthy, and the richer they get, the more depraved they are.  This simplistic view of the world is childish and starting to get old.  There are good and bad people everywhere, but films like this keep pushing a tired stereotype that the world is run by 10 or 20 rich Jewish men in a smoky back room of a bank somewhere.  They are the puppet masters of this world and don't care about anything but wealth.  This type of childish thinking is what makes it easy to dehumanize a person or race and paint them as the enemy.  This is regressive thinking and not particularly conducive to forward progress for history.  I'm sorry to get so political here, but movies like Snowpiercer are trying to promote this backward thinking and are trying to make a political point.  The only reason I rate this movie so high is that there is a great twist at the end.  It is also very beautifully shot.  There are scenes of horrible beauty.  But in the end, I find kind of insulting.  It is not the only film to put forth this world view, but this is just one of the most recent examples.  I would recommend it because it is well-made, but it is simplistic and hackneyed, and assumes that we, the viewers are just as dumb and small-minded as the filmmakers themselves.

Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes

3 Stars (out of four)

When I saw Rise Of The Planet of the Apes a few years ago, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, especially after the disastrous remake in 2001.  I was absolutely shocked how good it was.  It had drama, action and most importantly, real pathos.  I was totally enthralled and I didn't expect to be.  The power of low expectations, I suppose.  It also holds up with repeated viewings.  So when I went to see Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes, I was a little scared.  The first was so good that I didn't want its legacy to be ruined by a money-grabbing, subpar sequel as the first movie from the 60's was.  It turns out I needn't have worried.

This new one starts essentially where the first left off.  A global pandemic of "simian flu" hits the world and wipes out approximately 98% of humanity.  Ten years later, the only people left are the ones genetically immune to it.  Civilization is in shambles.  The apes, on the other hand, have evolved into the beginnings of a new civilization, with Cesar from the last movie as the alpha male.  One day, a couple humans come across some apes and shoots one of them.  This causes great consternation with the apes, with Koba leading the dissenting voice against Cesar.  Cesar still remembers that some men are good, so they follow the men back to San Francisco where one of the last outposts of humanity are.  The humans were in the apes' territory to restart a hydroelectric dam to power the town.  Cesar convinces the apes to make a show of force and and all of them show up in Frisco.  Cesar says for the humans to stay out of their territory and the apes will do likewise.  But the humans convince Cesar to help start the dam, which he agrees.  Because of this, Koba, with a stolen gun, shoots Cesar and blames the human.  Open war then breaks out.

I don't want to give anything else away because that is where the movie gets interesting.  The movie's primary theme, like the first, is prejudice and the damage it sows.  It isn't an accident that the apes live in the forest, in a metaphorical Garden of Eden and what happens when evil walks into it.  It's a little ham-handed in its symbolism, but what can one expect today?  Most moviemakers and moviegoers aren't really big into thinking when it comes to big action movies like this, but it is nice to see studios try to make something more than just the usual cynical, mindless claptrap like Transformers again and again.  One can hope this won't end up like the first series, just one dumb movie after another.  The movie is a little intense for youngsters, but otherwise, it is entertaining and smart and worth the price of admission.