I'm Here Trailer is the Reason I Love Spike Jonze

I'm Here is a thirty minute short film that Spike Jonze made that just premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Read the synopsis below:

Funded by Absolut Vodka, I’m Here is a robot love story celebrating a life enriched by creativity. The movie is set in contemporary L.A., where life moves at a seemingly regular pace with the exception of a certain amount of robot residents who love among the population. A male robot librarian lives a solitary and methodical life — devoid of creativity, joy and passion - until he meets an adventurous and free spirited female robot. The film stars British actor Andrew Garfield (Boy A, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, The Social Network) and Sienna Guillory, one of Maxim’s 100 sexiest women.


If that isn't enough to get you excited about this short film, the trailer is pretty much magically. It basically gave me the same sense of wonder that I felt when I watched the first trailer for Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are. That and the buzz from Sundance says that the film is just as wonderful as its trailer.

Watch the trailer below and get excited.

Source: /Film

Spider-Man 4 is No More

For about a month now, there have been rumors of turmoil on the behind-the-scenes front of Spider-man 4. The production recently went on a month's break due to director Sam Raimi's problems with the latest draft of the script. It appeared that he wanted the film to focus on the villain of the Vulture (who was to be played by John Malkovich). Sony, on the other hand, wanted the film to focus on literally any other villain.

It was this disagreement over villains and story that led to the utter failure of Spider-man 3. However, unlike that unfortunate venture, Raimi stood his ground on this one. Many thought that this would only lead to a delay of production and another script re-write. However, it's much worse than that.

Earlier tonight, Spider-man 4 was scrapped. Sam Raimi and Tobey Maguire have both walked away from the production.

This is really surprising news... and it's kind of upsetting. I really wanted to see Raimi make a respectable comeback in this series. He's been very vocal about the failure of Spider-man 3 and has been equally vocal about wanting to right his wrongs. Unfortunately, it looks like we'll never get to see this happen. Still, I'm proud of him for standing his ground and not letting all of this crap happen again. I can't believe Sony would be so ungrateful and belligerent after the man gave them two really wonderful superhero films. It's just insulting.

Sony will be picking up the pieces of this shut down by doing a Spider-man reboot, set for a 2012 release date. It will be scripted by James Vanderbilt (Zodiac) and will focus back on Peter Parker's high school days. While it will be nice to see Spider-man from a new director's eyes, I'll always be angry with Sony for denying Sam Raimi his chance to make one more respectable Spider-man film. It's just not fair to him.

Source: /Film

A Review of The Road

A few years ago, I began the journey of becoming a fiction reader. An English professor, Dr. James Potts (who would go on to be my adviser), sparked my interest in American literature. As I got to know Dr. Potts, I discovered that his dissertation focused on two huge American literary icons: William Faulkner and Cormac McCarthy. When it came time to sign up for classes, Dr. Potts didn't ask me to take his Faulkner course. He told me to enroll in it. I took the class. While the material was difficult, especially for a young reader like I was (and still am), I was blown away by Faulkner's characters, the devastation and heartbreak found in his fictional Yoknapatawpha County. Though Dr. Potts's passion for Faulkner was undeniable, he consistently referenced the author Cormac McCarthy, saying, "This guy switches between writing like Faulkner and Hemingway like you wouldn't believe." My interest was piqued.

I hate to say it, but I bought my copy of The Road from Wal-Mart. I suppose after Oprah hyped the novel, Wal-Mart figured they could make a few bucks off of it. Still, critics and authors had praised the work. Friends championed the book, saying it was magnificent. I'd been to the Kissimmee Social Tribe formal that weekend, and the backseat of the car had grown a bit dull. When I came across the novel at Wal-Mart of all places, I bought it. If you find gold in the trash heap, don't pass it by.

The first few lines carried a sadness with them I'd never encountered: "When he woke in the woods in the dark and the cold of night he'd reach out to touch the child sleeping beside him. Nights dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each one than what had gone before. Like the onset of some cold glaucoma dimming away the world." I read the book slowly, making it last. The pages "each one" more lovely and gripping "than what had gone before." What a story. The novel went on to win the Pulitzer Prize, and rumors of a film adaptation began circulating. With any great novel, a fear of how the story will translate on the big screen is always present. The Road was such a powerful and moving piece of literature. For the story to have been botched by Hollywood would be tragic.

The Coen Brothers certainly proved that with the right atmosphere and storytelling McCarthy's work can be powerful on film. No Country for Old Men blew me away, but could John Hillcoat (director) and Joe Penhall (writer) do The Road justice? I wasn't without skepticism, considering that Billy Bob Thornton's film version of McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses was pretty disgraceful. How would The Road fare in comparison to No Country for Old Men and All the Pretty Horses? I was fairly anxious to see the picture, especially after it was delayed twice from release in 2008. Like a lot of great movies, the picture did not come to Mississippi. My initial attempt to see the movie was thwarted due to flooding in New Orleans, and my prepaid tickets were wasted. However, thanks to a pretty awesome girl in my life, I was able to catch the movie in Memphis the next weekend.

For those unfamiliar with The Road's premise, it is a post-apocolyptic story involving a father and his little boy journeying across scorched America. How things have become so bleak we are never told. It doesn't matter. What matters is that humanity has been reduced to the most depraved and bare bones existence imaginable. The earth continues to die. Cannibalism runs rampant. Food is scarce at the very best. It is cold, "cold enough to crack rocks." All that spurs the father on is his love for his child; all that keeps the boy alive is his love for and trust in his father. Pretty bleak stuff to capture on screen, but Hillcoat did not fail. Not even a little, really.

For the most part, McCarthy's story is very much in tact. The grey, somber, and desperate imagery is dead on. You can always see the character's breath in front of their faces; everything is wet; the clothes are tattered and dirty; bones jut out from beneath each character's skin; scorched bodies hide in every crevice. This picture is haunting, but its ability to paint a bleak picture doesn't make the movie ugly to look at. It's quite beautiful.

The father and son travel south, doing their best to find the warmest place possible. They face cannibals, victims of cannibalism, those trying to survive as they are. They search for food, often coming across surprises like a can of Coca-Cola which the boy has never before tried. Here and there they can catch their breath, but they must always be wary, must always be on the run. The father carries a gun containing two bullets. "One for you and one for me," he tells his son. "We'll do it together." Suffering is so likely that they have a plan for suicide. Some of the most intense and suspenseful scenes involve their hectic decision to commit suicide or to try fleeing. It's gut-wrenching stuff.

The acting is superb. It isn't atypical for a child in a movie to overact or make it abundantly clear that they are beginners. The Boy is played by Kodi Smit-McPhee, a newbie to the screen and an excellent choice for the role, as he authenticates McCarthy's character. When the Father says about his son "If he is not the voice of God, God never spoke," we believe it. Viggo Mortensen is a pleasure to watch as the father. He embodies a desperate man attempting to survive against all odds. Their interaction is charming, and its easy to get attached to them. The same can be said for all supporting actors, including Robert Duvall and Guy Pearce (who makes a great appearance at the movie's end). I can't remember a weak moment.

The film differs from the novel in its description of the Father's marriage. Charlize Theron plays the Father's wife, who ends up leaving him and the boy behind to die alone in the cold. These scenes come as flashbacks, interrupting the narrative as dreams or recollections. Some critics have said that this causes the movie to be unstable as a narrative, switching back and forth between the present and the past. While these flashbacks are not present in the novel, I think it works for the movie. Had Penhall kept strictly to the novel, the movie would have been a long, hard, and painful slog: two full hours of trekking across dead America, searching for food, trying to survive. McCarthy gets away with it because his language is so gorgeous and the reader is free to put the book down when he or she needs a break. With the addition of the loss of the wife, however, the film maintains the same sense of urgency that the book does, without forcing the viewer to endure an entire two hours of sheer hopelessness. Perhaps the flashbacks are too numerous, but I'm not sure how the movie would have fared without them.

By the last scene I had tears in my eyes. The Road, as both a film and novel, has left me humbled and jealous. Few movies/stories break my heart like this one has. Few stories translate as beautifully as this one has on film. If filmmakers continue to do justice to McCarthy's novels the way the Coen Brothers and Hillcoat have, it's possible that these movie adaptations could become as important to me as his books have. McCarthy isn't for the faint of heart. Candidly, my body sort of ached after this movie was over. I have trouble recommending the movie based on its graphic nature. However, the acting is excellent, the imagery beautiful, and the story timeless. It'll be in my collection.

Music Videos of Note #1

With it being a new year, I've decided to start a new column on YDKS Movies called Music Videos of Note. For those of you who do not now, many great directors such as David Fincher, Michel Gondry, Spike Jonze and Mark Romanek all got their starts directing music videos. Through this column, I'd like to showcase their work as well as music videos that I feel show great originality or artistic merit. There are a lot of great things that can be achieved in a music video, despite all the trash that is played on MTV and VH1 today. Through this column, I hope to showcase all that can be powerful in a well-made music video.

The first video I would like to showcase on here is a personal favorite of mine. It is the music video for Nirvana's "Heart-Shaped Box." It was directed by the very talented Dutch photographer and director Anton Corbijn. 

The concept of the video was originally developed by Kurt Cobain to such an extent that Corbijn almost didn't take the job. However, once he took the job, he was able to add a lot of connection and fluidity to Cobain's bizarre ideas. 

This is a very strange but powerful video. It features imagery of an old man in a Santa hat on a cross, a little girl in KKK attire trying to grasp fetuses hanging from trees and an overweight inside-out angel walking in place. It's all set in a surreal landscape that looks like it's out of a nightmare version of The Wizard of Oz. The video was originally filmed in black and white and was later colorized in post production. The result is a video that is at times unsettling but ultimately beautiful to look at. 

The video won two MTV Video Music Awards in 1994 for Best Alternative Video and Best Art Direction. Unfortunately, by this time, Kurt Cobain had committed suicide so the awards were accepted by bassist Krist Novoselic, drummer Dave Grohl and back-up guitarist Pat Smear.

Watch the video below.

The Most Hateable Characters in Film (Part 1)

Throughout film history, there have always been characters that we have loved to hate. After all, without a good villain, a film just isn’t as good. I can remember as a kid actually hating the villain in movies. When they were played just right, they truly could make you actually want to cause them physical harm. Today, I’m not as affected by film villains. Still, I felt like I should do a list to honor some of the most hateable characters in film history.

 

If you haven’t seen the film in question for the character I am covering, I would advise that you don’t read my opinion on why the character is so hateable. There will be some spoilers for the films I discuss.

 

I hope you all enjoy the list.

 

Part 1 of 3.

 

15. Chigurh from No Country for Old Men

 

Chigurh is a hard character to encounter. Mentally, he’s pretty unstable. He believes in his own little code that doesn’t necessarily make sense to anyone else. And he’s really good at killing people. In a sense, he is the perfect killing machine. And that’s what makes him so frustrating. Throughout the entirety of No Country for Old Men, Chigurh is unmatched in wits and brawn. He pretty much kills everyone. While the car crash he gets in towards the end of the film hints at the fact that he may not be completely unstoppable, the fact that he gets away with no real punishment is very frustrating to the viewer. There are times when Javier Bardeem’s amazing performance makes Chigurh charismatic and even cool. Still, I couldn’t help but hate him and wish he received punishment for all of his actions.

 

14. Frank Fitts from American Beauty

 

Chris Cooper’s rendition of Frank Fitts almost exemplifies what I think of when I think “strict military dad.” Fitts is ultra strict, doesn’t mind using physical punishment and is pretty homophobic. The scene where he beats the crap out of his son for moving his old Nazi plate is pretty much all you need to hate the guy. However, things get really complex at the end of the film when you find out that he’s actually struggling with his own feelings of homosexuality. And how does he deal with this? By awkwardly kissing Lester Burnham in the garage and then later blowing Lester's brains out for no reason. Yeah, I hated this guy.

 

13. Richard Strout from In the Bedroom

 

Todd Field’s 2001 film In the Bedroom pretty much banked on the fact that you had to hate Richard Strout. The movie told the story of a likeable young college boy Frank (Nick Stahl) who is having a summer romance with the recently divorced Natalie Strout (Marisa Tomei). Everything’s going good until ex-husband Richard breaks into Natalie’s home one day and shoots Frank in the face with a handgun in cold blood. And then, guess what? He gets off with no jail time. Frank’s parents Matt and Ruth (Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek) then have to grieve over the sudden violent loss of their son all the while running into his killer on the streets on a daily basis. So when Matt finally decides to seek revenge, you’re all for it. Richard Strout has to die. He has to.

 

12. Warden Norton from The Shawshank Redemption

 

Warden Norton is a unique character. At first, he seems like an all right guy. Then, he has Tommy shot to death because he knows information that could free Andy Dufresne from the prison walls of Shawshank. That’s when we learn that this prison warden will do anything to keep his prisoners down and under his control. That and he’s been laundering money for years. So when Andy finally bests him and the warden blows his own brains out, it’s beyond satisfying. Never has the audience been happier.

 

11. Colonel Hans Landa from Inglourious Basterds

 

Christoph Waltz’s performance as Colonel Hans Landa (a.k.a. The Jew Hunter) in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds was the one thing everyone talked about after walking out of the movie. Somehow, Waltz made the villain funny, charismatic, beyond intelligent and ultimately hateable all at the same time. In a sense, Landa exemplifies evil. He’s very polite and well spoken but deep down there’s something horrible and sinister boiling. We don’t ever get to see this sinister side to Landa except for one moment (when he savagely strangles a character) but when we do it’s truly a horrible thing to witness. I think the thing that makes Landa so hateable is the fact that he is so intelligent. For the entire movie, he is one step ahead of everyone. He has everything figured out perfectly and no one stands in his way… not even Hitler himself. Unfortunately, his one fatal flaw is underestimating Aldo Raine and his Basterds. This results in a horrific but crowd-pleasing moment to end the epic film. 

Stay Tuned for Parts 2 and 3.