Movies

It seems that I've only been watching movies by directors I know recently. Last night I watched Frank Capra's You Can't Take It With You and thought it was pretty bad. The box said it was supposed to be a screwball comedy, but I think I actually failed to laugh during the entire two hours. For one, there was no focus: it was partly a love story between Jimmy Stewart and Jean Arthur, but not really, because, like most Capra films, it was about how business is corrupt and the people are right and good. I don't really like Lionel Barrymore that much, and he was the old guy who showed the rich business magnate (Edward Arnold) how to live. It was kind of idiotic, not only because it automatically assumes that all people implicated in either business or government are corrupt or that all poor people are inherently good and friendly, but it tells us so in long, boring speeches. There are a few memorable images, but for the most part I was bored out of my mind.

True Romance both fascinated and repulsed me in the same way as Reservoir Dogs. The dialogue sparkled but I found myself unable to revel in the violence as seemed to be intended. Mainly I noticed that the main character, Clarence, is a sort of Tarantino figure, working in a little store selling pop culture and obsessed with movies (especially kung fu), which makes sense since this is Tarantino's first script, and most first major projects tend to be autobiographical in some way. There's also the moral ambiguity that really comes out in Pulp Fiction. Clarence isn't really morally defensible, since he is kind of guilty of murder, theft, and drug smuggling, but he's still our guy, kind of like Bruce Willis's down-and-out boxer. Tarantino supplies the key to understanding most of his heroes when Clarence mentions this within the movie to Alabama, his future wife, when he tells her about the main character in the kung fu movie, played by Sonny Chiba:

He ain't so much a good guy as he's just a bad motherfucker. Sonny don't be bullshittin'. He fucks dudes up for life. Hold on, a fight scene's coming up.

What was most interesting was how Clarence and his call-girl wife act out their fantasies by going to Hollywood, the "dream factory", act like "bad motherfuckers" and generally do and survive things that can clearly only be done and survived on screen. Also, Brad Pitt's commentary on his scenes was really smart, especially compared to some of the others.

I saw Charlie and the Chocolate Factory today and thought it was pretty okay. I would agree with some critics that Johnny Depp's Wonka is perhaps less than perfect, but he has his moments. The father-son backstory for Willy Wonka is pretty annoying when you realize it's just Tim Burton doing the same thing he did in Big Fish. I liked the use of technology on the Oompa Loompas and especially the self-reference to the technique in the Television Room. I feel like I caught more references in the theater than I can remember now, but the way Mike Teavee walked out of the factory reminded me of Nightmare Before Christmas. The first time Depp appears in the foreground onscreen he's holding a pair of scissors so that his hand is hidden within the sleeve of his coat. The employment of the Oompa Loompa's seems like a discussion of globalization and outsourcing, fairly positive except that Charlie's grandpa lost his job.

I could swear Augustus was computer-generated, maybe because of the way his skin shone or the unnatural smoothness of it or something, but I can't find any mention of it. I also kept seeing in Depp's Wonka both a lot of Jim Carrey and some female figure, either Frances McDormand or Jane Kaczmarek, although Roger Ebert suggests Carol Burnett, which I think is closer to the mark even though she looks less like this Wonka. I can see some of the Michael Jackson connections, but overall I don't feel they're all that strong. So, I guess Edward Scissorhands is still the only Tim Burton movie I've REALLY liked, but this one was pretty much okay.