So I decided to cheat and do a few posts per day. :)
The least favourite film I’ve ever seen is not an easy one to name because there have been so many that I didn’t like. I suppose that the least favourite film should have the least redeeming qualities; bad acting, shitty editing, lousy story, etc. Unfortunately, if it really would have been that bad I simply would’ve switched it off and not watched more of it. So instead of picking my least favourite, I’ll pick the one that was the most disappointing to me.
No matter how you set up your film as a film maker, there has to be some consistency. If you tell us that women can fly and men can eat stone, then fine, but then within those rules and convines remain consistent. That was the reason why I was so incredibly disappointed in the film Revolver by Guy Ritchie. I had pretty high expectation of Ritchie’s work after Lock, Stock… and Snatch, but it wasn’t just that he didn’t deliver with Revolver, but rather that after twenty minutes I thought I had gotten stuck in a David Lynch film without the internal consistency of a Lynch film that helps you suspend your disbelief. Revolver was probably supposed to be mysterious, but instead it was just frustrating. The acting was terrible and one dimensional and it couldn’t be saved by veterans Ray Liotta or Mark Strong.
So I decided to try to do the 30 day movie challenge. Instead of doing it on Facebook and annoying everyone with embedded trailers and such, I thought I’d do it here instead. Day one starts off with a bang as they ask for your favourite film and why you picked it. I think this should be the very last item on the list, so that you get 29 days to sift through your own thoughts about films and come to a particular conclusion about your favourite one. It’s like quitting a $20 a day heroine habit cold turkey.
So what does a “favourite film” require? It doesn’t have to be the “best film,” just your favourite one. So it’s the one that you’d love to see the most, with infinite rewatchability and entertainment value. There are many films in the running; Predator, Aliens, The Crow, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, Sunshine…but I think I’ll have to settle for The Warriors.
This was probably the first film I ever got fascinated by when I discovered it on a VHS tape my parents had laying around. I love the visuals, the music and the atmosphere of the film. The story is simple but effective and the characters are strong but simple. It planted the seed for many of the fascinations and interests I have today.
It’s not the best film, but it’s likely to be my favourite film.
It’s been a long time since I’ve reviewed a film, other projects and a string of less than stellar films were the reason for my disinterest in devoting time to an extensive review, but I’ve decided to do a review of Repo Men, mostly because I wasn’t disappointed by it, nor found the subject matter absolutely impossible to tackle in a meaningful review. (Which was the reason why I never reviewed A Single Man, simply because it was a little bit too much for me to handle and still do it justice.) No, I had absolutely no expectations other than that it wouldn’t be Citizen Kane, which probably went a long way to making this film the an enjoyable one. Well, that and the extensive amounts of gore.
.: Online
I have been following the development and the marketing campaign behind the film for a little over six months now and I have to say that it came close to the brilliance displayed in the campaign to promote District 9, with seemingly life-like, high resolution posters (see below) advertising living irresponsibly, drinking excessively and eating all the junk-food you could lay your greedy hands on since “The Union Cares.” You can have all your organs replaced with cybernetic “artiforgs” that often work better and longer than your normal, flesh-lumps would. You could get your heart replaced for a mere 975,000 dollars with an 18% APR on the first year and 24% the following years. In this fashion the Union provides hearts, kidneys, eyes, spines, livers and limbs. Check out the brilliantly designed http://www.theunioncares.com, the official site of The Union, and see which Union payment plans suit your lifestyle!
Brilliant, just brilliant. I always like it when they supplement an already compelling and extensive fictional universe with well thought out and designed cross-overs into our own world, blurring the lines between the real and the fictional and creating a deeper, more immersive film experience.
.: The Story
The Union is a company selling artificial organs to anyone willing to extend their life by cybernetic means. Repo Men repossess the organs from people who are more than 3 months overdue with their payments, breaking into houses, knocking people unconscious while asking a series of standard questions before cutting you open on your kitchen floor and retrieving the liver you decided not to make payments on.
“Would you like to have an ambulance present to drive you to the hospital after I’m done with the procedure?”
“Are they going to give me a new heart?”
“No, not with your credit history.”
The Union works the same way credit cards companies do, offering you a product that will allow you to extend an already toxic lifestyle into infinity, while making huge amounts of money off the interest you pay on the loans they offer to pay for these life extending products. Some people take great care in making sure to pay off the loans on time, but most people tend to fall behind on the enormous payments they’ll have to make. And that’s where the Union makes their money, retrieving the organs and selling them to someone else and starting the cycle all over again.
Remy (Law) is a level 5 Repo Man, the best in the business, working alongside his best friend Jake (Whitaker), who have been inseparable since the third grade, went to school together, went into the military together, shared everything together. Then married Carol (van Houten) and had a son and slowly but surely Carol wants Remy to do less dangerous work, pressuring him to take a job in sales. Obviously reluctant to give up the life of a repo man, Remy keeps putting off talking to his his boss, Frank (Schreiber), who runs the local Union branch, being too content to repo other people’s organs with his friend Jake. His entire world is turned upside down when he decides to do one last repo and something goes wrong and he gets hurt. After having spent a few days in a coma he wakes up with an artiforg heart (including the stranglehold contract) and his wife unwilling to continue with the relationship. More importantly, he finds himself strangely afflicted by a conscience, unable to perform the repos that he used to do with ease. His savings dwindle and he quickly falls behind on his payments until he is driven into the company of Beth (Braga) a girl he always admired from afar who’s dealing with the same trouble as he is. The both of them decide to run, hiding out in the abundant dilapidated tenements in the ghetto’s, far away from the skyscrapers and the luxury of the life he came from and hunted by his ex-colleagues who are trying to repo his heart.
.: The Production
The production on this film is beautiful, allowing the sleek design of hypermodernity to stand beautifully juxtaposed against the excessive violence, the gory repos and the deplorable state of the ghettos. It’s a post-modern world where people have embraced the seamless integration of man and machine without their being an emphasis on overly cybered individuals, which is often the case with films that depict worlds where people opt for cybernetic modification of their bodies. The worst you see is a man with an obvious cybernetic limb, the rest of the cybernetics are all subtle, seemless and discrete. Not that there aren’t cybernetic freaks, but that’s not what the films focusses on as it looks at what happens when a normal person falls behind on payments. It would’ve been too easy to inject the film with too many displays of the fringe cyberfreaks. (Not that it wouldn’t have been fun, I just admire the self-restraint.)
The acting is average, but Whitaker once again takes the crown, closely followed by the overlooked Schreiber-powerhouse. Seriously, why don’t we see more of these two guys? Jude Law looks in shape without being overly muscled, just about what I would expect his character to look like, but his effete accent is somewhat out of place. Braga does not deliver a particularly good performance, but she does seem to fit the roll well. I have the feeling that van Houten’s performance mostly ended up on the editing room floor. It ended up being a distraction and not much of a critical plot element.
All in all, it’s an enjoyable film, with great visuals and a compelling universe and a rock solid performance by Whitaker who seems to be getting better and better with each time I see him on the silver screen.
.: Review
The best example I can come up with of a film that builds up your affection for the characters you’re watching, only to completely break it all down, is Goodfellas. It does it so masterfully that you don’t even care that the characters you’re rooting for are really amoral and intensely bad people. Hollywood, like many other film industries, likes to root for the bad guys. It likes to root for the underdog, and it likes drama.
And Mike Tyson delivered all of that.
This documentary chronicles the life of Mike Tyson, narrated by Mike Tyson in his now almost iconic, high-pitched, rambling, ranting way. It starts with him talking about his childhood, about the crimes and the drugs and the juvenile detention centers. How he found boxing and how he was taken in by his first trainer, Cus D’Amato. How he lived in his house, was trained by him, in both the mental as well as the physical art of fighting. D’Amato was everything to him, the very first person to ever make him believe in himself. The way Tyson talks about him is very moving, very touching. Very honest. I guess that’s the prevailing sense; honesty. He tells things how they happened, either real or imagined.
It’s obvious he’s a deeply troubled individual with some deep-rooted psychological problems. He’s beyond redemption, knowing that he’s broken but ultimately unable to fix things. You can see that he’s older, wiser and that the sharp edge in his personality has dulled considerably. He’s got his rage under control to the point where he can discuss his problems without getting angry, without losing his temper and without lashing out at everything and everyone.
He’s also, obviously one of the most gifted boxers to ever live. The reason he started losing later on in his career, after he went to jail, is because of either complacency or his inner demons standing in his way. But when he was in his prime, his speed was crazy and his punching power far above that of his size; a small heavy weight at 220 pounds. His footwork, his stamina, his ferocity and his accuracy were only matched by his speed and power. It’s amazing to watching him shadowboxing at the age of 18.
This documentary is a recommendation for anyone with an interest in boxing, Tyson, or to watch someone tell the story of his own self-created trainwreck.