Cinema Hype

I’ve sort of wanted to be BFFs with comedian/actor/woman-about-town Charlyne Yi for awhile now. You might remember her one-episode stint as Grace Park, Kenneth’s Jerry Maguire-misquoting love, on an old episode of 30 Rock (I tried to find an embeddable video of this, as it’s one of my favorite 30R moments ever, but was foiled by the weak-but-apparently-not-that-weak copyright law on the internets); she also pals around with Judd Apatow’s pack (”Apatown,” apparently) and turns up in the odd movie. Now her own movie, Paper Heart, has won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at Sundance, and is due out in August. It’s almost too coyly cute to be believed:

Doesn’t it look adorable, and yet also infuriatingly cute? The question here may be phrased in terms of another hipster touchstone movie: will Paper Hearts be like the first ten minutes of Juno (i.e. unwatchably twee) or like the last hour and a half (honest and funny and kind of a heartbreaker)? Alternatively, which will wear out first: Michael Cera’s charm or his penchant for playing awkwardly lovable young men? (You’d think we’d be getting towards the end of that particular rope, but the facts indicate otherwise.) I bet it also has a killer soundtrack.

Paper Heart is a “hybrid documentary”—not a mockumentary, but a mix of fiction and documentary. One assumes that the road-trip footage, and maybe the parts with her friends/crew, are the unscripted part, and that the Yi/Cera storyline (they play themselves) came with at least some forethought, though it’s hard to tell where that particular line sits—which is probably the point. Either way, I’m excited to see more of Yi’s work out there. And, hey, I still want to hang out. Even if you don’t like hair-braiding and boy-story-telling, I’m always up for a good script-polishing session! Call me!

Charlyne Yi, Paper Heart, Michael Cera, Sundance, Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award, hipster movies, Juno

I’m just going to get this out there: Ryan Gosling makes one fine-looking crack addict. Give the man some skinny-guy clothes and a few swipes of undereye shadow, and he still looks better than, say, John Mayer on a good day.

I’d also argue that not many actors would pull off the role of Dan Dunne, history teacher/addict extraordinaire, as convincingly as Gosling does. It’s not the angsty drug-addled parts that show him off; any Christian Bale will do for the serious-eyed stuff. What makes Half Nelson a brilliant intersection of actor and character is the charisma he brings to the rest of Dan’s life—he tells little jokes and makes silly faces and relates to his eighth-graders like he actually cares about them. He’s cute. He’s funny. He has a cat. He’s a mess, but he makes us like him, even as we know what he does on his summer vacation. And that—the normalizing, the un-tragicizing, of a drug addict—is not nothing.

Gosling’s likability, then, goes a way towards softening the blow of Half Nelson, but it’s still not exactly Finding Forrester: addict teacher forms (platonic) relationship with 13-year-old on the brink of becoming a dealer herself. Who saves whom—assuming that anybody is saved, period—is up in the air. It’s a sad little movie, more about hope and hopelessness (or maybe change and repetition) than about actual drugs, and it makes you want good things for Dunne and Drey even as you’re not sure those good things are likely to happen. And that’s probably the best thing about Ryan Fleck’s movie: the setting and the past and the future and just about everything else are murky, but the emotional imperative remains clear. You will like these people, and you will root for them. And if you come out with any hope for them, then that’s a step in the right direction.

dvd, dvd reviews, ryan gosling, ryan fleck, half nelson

You know, when it comes to the future, there seems to be a lot of hubbub around flying cars. Of all the Jetsons-style technology that children of the 70s have craved over the years, it seems like the hovercraft/personal spaceship is the big-ticket item, and there’s some degree of unrest over the fact that most of us still have four wheels on the ground. Me? It’s not that I don’t want to be airborne, but I’m willing to look elsewhere for evidence that The Future is Now.

Like, say, the internets. (Surprise!) Remember Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Joss Whedon’s absurdly popular internet movie in three acts? How it was the first big-name internet project to come about without the backing of a studio? Well, now the Information Superhighway can add to its resume The Princess of Nebraska, a full-length independent film by well-known director Wayne Wang, which will be offered online for free in September.

You may not know Wang’s name, but you know his movies: he directed The Joy Luck Club, plus a slew of so-so dramas (Anywhere But Here, Because of Winn-Dixie), as well as the gloriously titled but apparently lesser-known Life is Cheap…But Toilet Paper is Expensive. The Princess of Nebraska, about a pregnant Chinese girl in the Midwest, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival to generally positive reviews, and it turns out it’s a companion piece to a theatrical release, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers, which means each film might give the other a boost in viewership. Although free online releases for studio films sound unlikely at best, it’s notable that this is even happening. Whether they know it or not (I suspect they do, and probably don’t look kindly on it), this is competition for viewers’ time and attention—just one more step towards a new system of movie-making and movie-releasing.

So I can totally wait for my flying car.

Man, you guys. What a week we’ve got, film-wise. So much to look foward to: Drama! Suspense! Random bursts of musical hilarity! What have we got? The Dark Knight? Transsiberian? Mamma Mia!?

Dr. Horrible’s Singalong Blog. OBVIOUSLY.

Teaser from Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog on Vimeo.

Today’s a big day for Whedonites and possibly for the internet film “industry” alike–on this auspicious Tuesday, writer/director/cult deity Joss Whedon brings big names to the small, small screen in the form of Dr. Horrible’s Singalong Blog, his three-act musical short film, and just might jump-start a nascent corner of online movie-making and movie-watching.

For Whedon fans, this is a crumb of sustenance to stave off starvation between Serenity, his last big-screen release, and Dollhouse, his ridiculously well-hyped series on FOX, due out this winter (pre-fans are already pre-planning to pre-save it, natch). It’s got everything fans of Buffy, Angel, and Firefly require: thrilling heroics (or possibly thrilling antiheroics), Nathan Fillion’s very existence, and a satisfyingly non-network-related venue on which to definitely not be cancelled.

Dr. Horrible is also something of a red-letter event for the less Whedon-obsessed, or at least it should be. It’s not that nobody’s ever made a movie for the internet before; it’s more that nobody with any name recognition has ever made a non-advertising-related film for the internet and had anybody actually watch it. The final product is short—eighteen minutes total—but it’s a precedent. Will other writers and directors ditch the studios and turn to the internet to fulfill their own creative visions? If there’s enough money—both in funding and in capital—maybe. And that could be the dawn of a new age.

Look for Dr. Horrible in three installations: Act I today, July 15; Act II on Thursday, July 17; and Act III on Saturday, July 19. All three acts will stream for free until midnight on July 20 and will later be available for download and on DVD.

Dr. Horrible, Dr. Horrible’s Singalong Blog, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog, short film, Joss Whedon, Nathan Fillion, Neil Patrick Harris, musicals, Buffy, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, Serenity

I’m pretty sure I can state the essence of Junebug in fifteen words or fewer, but I’m also pretty sure what I have to say is not the same as what writer Angus MacLachlan would say about his movie, or even want to hear about it. I’m also convinced that I speak for the people. Want to hear it?

Him, paraphrased: Junebug is about connection and lack of connection, about family, and about the fragmentation of modern life.

Me: Junebug is about Amy Adams and her enduring talent and general awesomeness.

If nothing else, I believe I have the Academy voters on my side: they nominated Adams’s performance for Best Supporting Actress in 2005, and not for nothing. Her performance is an early indication of what she does best: committing fully to being the sweetest (but not the brightest) girl in the world. For example:

I’m not going to lie: Junebug might have been called The Movie Where Amy Adams Makes Me Laugh and Cry, and Not Much Else Happens. She’s just that good, and the material works hard for her. To be fair, the rest of the cast also puts in a good effort. Embeth Davidtz goes above and beyond her usual cool-as-a-cucumber routine—she and Adams work some surprisingly good chemistry—and Ben McKenzie and Alessandro Nivola do what they can. But the script ultimately doesn’t help them out. Even if the performances are good, there’s not enough story articulated to include the viewer. It’s like trying to read MacLachlan’s mind, as if he had everything planned out but misjudged the amount of information the audience would need to stay connected, and the overall sense is more one of frustration than anything else—we want to know, but we’re left trying to follow threads that don’t really lead anywhere. If MacLachlan really was going for lack of connection, he got it. Too bad, too.

Amy Adams, Embeth Davidtz, Alessandro Nivola, Ben McKenzie, Junebug, Best Supporting Actress 2005, Angus MacLachlan

I get that it’s International Indiana Jones Week, and all, but it seems to me that everybody I know has the same song in their heads: not John Williams’s vine-swinging, triumphant Indy theme, but the hip-swinging, suggestive Sex and the City beat. (Oh, you’re singing it right now, aren’t you?) NBC just showed the series finale—so great!—and it looks like we’re all ready for just one more go with our favorite Ladies Who Brunch.

In the mean time, check out this awesome short film, written by Hanelle M. Culpepper, recommended by the fine folks at Cinematical and hosted by YouTube. I give you Six and the City:

The best thing is, they kind of sound like the Sex ladies, don’t they? Well played, all.

Sex and the City, SexandtheCity, Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda, Samantha, YouTube, short film

I think I first knew I’d love Once when I watched the Oscars. “Falling Slowly” won for Best Song, and then there was that incident with Glen Hansard using all of Marketa Irglova’s talking time to give a wholly endearing victory speech, prompting Jon Stewart to let her come out and give her own adorable and inspirational remarks. I don’t have a ton of experience with low-budget Irish indie-music romantic dramas, but somehow this confluence of events—these people, rather—appealed to me.

Deep down, Once isn’t so far off the romance-movie track, complete with one especially improbably-lit scene involving a grand piano and an unfinished song. But then, if you can believe it, it’s also far simpler than most of what makes it to the theater: Boy meets girl, boy likes girl, girl likes boy, boy and girl record music together. Something like that. In fact, the straight-arrow plot is refreshing, considering the obvious and recitable formula we see in so many studio romances. Once lacks wacky friends, over-witty dialogue, and any kind of mid-wedding/pre-flight confrontation at the end—it turns that standard on its ear, actually—but instead, it has feeling and timing and a kind of quiet watchfulness that’s like a good, bittersweet folk song. (It’s also worth mentioning that this is a musical—not a massive dance-numbers-in-the-streets musical, but a story told through music. Be prepared.)

One of the best and most surprising parts of Once is how Hansard and Irglova—both professional musicians—wear the hat of “actor” so convincingly; neither comes across half as self-consciously as half the trained actors in Hollywood. If someone told me that Hansard—who looks, kind of hilariously, like a combination of Hugh Laurie and Dr. Cox from Scrubs—were the only lonely Irish musician in Dublin (or at least the loneliest Irish musician in Dublin), I’d probably believe it. Irglova sings and plays the piano beautifully, but even more importantly in this instance, she sparks. She’s the chemistry behind the movie; the light and warmth she brings to her onscreen relationship with Hansard isn’t far off from what she brings to their songs. This is a movie where the main characters don’t even have names (the credits call them “Boy” and “Girl”), but where character is built from the inside out and speaks without shouting, and the writing and acting mesh so that all the audience gets is ambience, in the best way.

Check out Once. You’ll get a song and a story stuck in your head, but you probably won’t mind too much.

Once, Glen Hansard, Marketa Irglova, The Frames, folk music, Dublin, Irish movies, Oscars, Best Song, Falling Slowly, Jon Stewart, Hugh Laurie, Scrubs

Hey, you! Hollywood-itis got you down? Can’t handle another Christmas season full of The Santa Clause 3 and its minions? Does the plight of the WGA and its members make you want to curl into a ball in the corner (or could you just not care less, as long as your shows come back soon)?

Why not check out an alternative? Say…cinema that is truly independent, unaffiliated with The Man (unless YouTube is The Man, which: debatable), and often at the cutting edge of the creative impulse? This is rough time for big-screen movies, but it’s also a great time to seek out new talent, support filmmakers operating outside the studio system, and still get your movie fix.

To start, check out filmmaker and friend-of-the-blog (or, really, friend-of-the-blogger) Timothy Sloat and his collection of short films. Want a preview before you click alllll the way over to YouTube? Here’s Tim’s latest movie, Adopted, for your viewing pleasure:

Cool, no?

(Fun fact: The score to this film was derived from a recording of a single percussion concert recording made by Tim, then manipulated digitally. Even the crowd’s applause makes it in. Can you “spot” it? I dare you.)

For more filmic brilliance, check out the afore-linked YouTube page for Tim and his production company, Fidget Films. (If you like The Office, things that are funny, and/or have ever worked for, attended, or walked by a church, you have to watch his Church Office series. In a word: HEE!)

independent film, indie film, Tim Sloat, Adopted, YouTube

The more I think about Lars and the Real Girl, the better I like it. By now, the quirky small-town romantic dramedy co-starring Patricia Clarkson isn’t such an anomaly. We’re used to it. But how many of those quirky small-town romantic dramedies also feature an “adult companion doll” embraced by that small town, volunteering at the hospital and getting elected to the school board?

I didn’t think so.

The point of Lars, of course, isn’t Bianca the doll, but Lars (Ryan Gosling), the pathologically shy young man who orders her and begins to treat her as his girlfriend. Unsurprisingly, Lars is going through a few things. Even more the point, perhaps, are the people who come with Lars whether he wants them to or not: his brother and sister-in-law, his coworkers, and the residents of his rural northern town. This is a story of concentric rings–not just an individual, but a family; not just a family, but an entire community. As such, it’s not so much strange as it is slow and sweet and a little bit funny but a little bit sad, and surprisingly unpretentious.

It’s hard to identify Lars as a comedy or a drama, mostly because it tends to be both at the same time, or at least it can be. Much of the humor comes from a clash of two schemes of logic: there’s the internal logic of the movie, where Bianca is a treasured member of the community and a vital part of Lars’s life, and there’s the logic of the audience, where Bianca is a sex doll ordered off the internet and carried around a rural town for a few months. The visuals of this external logic superimposed over the goings-on in the script mean that practically any moment can be funny–just look at what’s happening on the screen and think about it rationally for a minute. Even better, check out the sexy, faux-interested smirk on Bianca’s face, and then check out what’s going on around her. See? Instant humor!

One look at the ads for Lars show that it’s a bit of a weirdness minefield, one of those films that threatens to bury itself in too many layers of quirky characters and dialogue. So it’s surprising, afterwards, to look at the movie and realize that writer Nancy Oliver has neatly sidestepped most of the obnoxious traits of the genre–nothing stands out as a wrong note or an embarrassing moment. This is a victory for indie filmmakers everywhere, as well as indie-film audiences, who just can’t take much more. The cast is also pleasingly indie-friendly without taking it overboard: there’s the aforementioned Clarkson spotting, Gosling disappears flawlessly into Lars and his social issues and his truly unfortunate mustache, and it’s always nice to run into Paul Schneider. Emily Mortimer is pretty unconvincing as a pregnant non-Brit (she weighs twelve pounds, baby belly included, and kind of looks like she’s recently comes traipsing off the moors, no matter what she does), but she pulls through where it counts: she’s utterly believable and totally sympathetic as a woman who cares deeply for her brother-in-law. The cast is rounded out by a whole passel of familiar-looking folks playing Lars’s loved ones, or rather, those by whom Lars is loved. It all fits together nicely, quietly, with a minimum of fanfare but just enough zip to keep things interesting. Well done.

Lars and the Real Girl, movie review, Ryan Gosling, Emily Mortimer, Patricia Clarkson, Indie film, Nancy Oliver