Christopher Lee played Dracula many times for Hammer Studios but famously disliked their treatment of the character. Franco directs Lee's single non-Hammer Dracula film and, because of its faithfulness to the plot and tone of the source material, this became Lee's favorite outing as the count. And its easy to see why. Lee shows off some fearsome acting that brings a deadness and evil that is lacking in his more famous roles. The entire film is modestly budgeted, but the minimalism serves the foggy atmosphere and Gothic staging. This is one of Franco's finest examples of restrained directing. His touch is evident in the moments of extreme horror (like Dracula's brides eating a baby) and his excellent use of inner montage through zooms and understated motion. The highlight of this impeccable production is probably the fine casting, including Soledad Miranda in her first vampire role. From the get-go, she is as elegant and seductive as possible. Her tragic aura was never more pronounced and useful to a film and you can see Franco slowly falling for her beauty. This film is an important step in Franco's career as he finds a special muse and gravitates to truly tonal, disturbing horror and away from the simpler, poppier horror stylings of his Orloff films.
I revisited "Other Side of the Mirror" and it feels like a tone poem to Soledad's abrupt death and the dashed romantic feelings he held for her. Its interesting how that film is the rare example of Franco indulging in realism and overt dialogue about philosophy. I bring that film up to highlight that Franco's spacey minimalist indulgence in imagery was a concentrated style that he could break away from if he desired. That helps process his more extreme explorations in style. He knew exactly what he was doing.
NHATD is the most extreme work of cinematic style Franco ever gave us. It makes Diabolical Dr Z look like a Dragnet episode. Its essential in understanding Franco's aims and roots as an artist. The entire experience is not dependent on its thin plot for anything but visual tone and a physical stage for his actor subjects. Almost nothing of incident or attraction happens. I'm blanking on anything happening at all besides some love-making and a 30 second shot of Lina Romay walking slowly towards frame. How is this the most beautiful film I've seen? Because its almost pure documentary of reality except for Franco's experiment with time and editing. All actors are shown lifeless, tranced, ghostly, subjected. Are they in a dream or a ghost world? By simply erasing the action, cutting and sounds we expect, Franco uses our expectations against us and lets our imagination create its own sense of dream space. Its comparable to the effect of Charleton Heston spending reels of "The Omega Man" wandering alone through a psychological warzone to minimalist jazz. But this is way more radical. Franco doesn't give us any surreal or supernatural reason for this affected realism. Its simply his darkly romantic vision of life.
My theory is that Franco's entire aesthetic derives from Soviet montage theorists like Eisenstein and Pudovkin. Franco, perhaps more than any director ever, synthesized their unique views into a style of montage adaptable to any and all narratives. His entire career is practice in applying his profound knowledge of montage to as many films as possible but as economically as possible. NHATD is maybe the culmination of a lifetime of craft and his analysis of the very hypnotic effect of cinema itself. He is asking "What is cinema"? At the depths of finance and obscurity, he finally has the courage to make a film that is anti-commercial and only interested in exploring the power of the camera. And it is triumphant & transcendent.
Monday, January 29, 2018
Sunday, January 28, 2018
The Toxic Avenger Parts 2 & 3 / 1989
One of my clearest childhood memories is discovering the VHS copy of the first 3 Toxic Avenger movies at a restaurant/gas station's mini-video store. I don't even know if such things exist anymore. The VHS tapes they stocked must have been mainly independent but the Toxic Avenger 2 was distributed by Warner Bros home video, amazingly. And so these two films capture the peak and fall of Troma in a movie business sense. Coming off of the gritty, tasteless but ambitious "Troma's War", Toxic 2 is the most professional production Troma ever made. Lloyd Kaufman and Michael Herz shared directing duties as usual, but they had help from 4 different units. Not so crazy when you realize they shot on location on 2 continents, had to meet semi-major studio Lorimar's post-production schedule and only had a mild breather before shooting Toxic 3.
Toxic 2 comes very close to being Troma's masterwork. Kaufman & Herz have the balls to take their biggest opportunity at mainstream exposure and make a brilliantly original and entertaining statement against Illuminati controls in an era where no one really even knew about the corporate enslavement of America. The film opens promoting a utopian paradise in "Tromaville" of multicultural citizens trading freely and dancing in the streets, until a Bilderberg meeting of yuppie satanists, gangsters and puppets plot to kill Toxie among other things (like blowing up the World Trade Center to disrupt trade). In the commentary for Pt 1, Kaufman reveals that he read some early anti-NWO book back in his 70s Yale days which ultimately informed his future radical film business. Seems like he had a real conflict in making this film and couldn't help but load it with as much commentary and anti-mainstream sentiment as possible. I think this makes it a marvel. Where the film ultimately failed is in its editing.
For some reason, the film has a very unnecessary and unmotivated narration dub that spoils many gags and visuals. Also, many Japanese actors are re-dubbed in offensive Engrish (even though Troma's TA2 trailer keeps their voices). But the fatal blow is a tacked on 20 minutes of story that is under-shot overkill after an already fun, serviceable climax. Maybe the boys at Troma were excessive or maybe they had to rush a cut out to Lorimar/WB. I am very curious to find out.
But still there's 80 minutes of gold here that is the best Troma ever produced. Toxie was a major merch and cartoon mascot at the time (can we speculate "Captain Planet" is Turner execs' Toxie ripoff?), so Toxic 2 is more kid-friendly and lighthearted. The gore, villainy and heroism is still hard-edged but cartooned to an extreme surrealism that perfectly matches the superhero/comic book style. Anyone knocking the film's broad humor, flat dimension, childish logic or gritty execution doesn't get that this is political theater for 80s fanboys and fantasy fans.
The film's most memorable sequence is an epic choreographed ballet of cartoon violence aiming Death Wish/Taxi Drive vigilantism at the film's heirarchy of symbolic bad guys. The Toxic Avenger, a kind of pan-racial, gender-crossed (the tutu is an amazing superhero costume) and transhuman knight who slays representatives of corrupted proletarians. Gays, hillbillies, Jews, sports stars, the church, punk rockers. Every subculture that has been turned against their own interest is lampooned for their own devisiveness and reduced to pawns in a Satanic scheme of corporate world domination. The brutal violence that flows in Kaufman's work reflects an intense fear and hatred of Nazi methodology and these films are catharsis.
The film itself is extremely well-shot, better staged than anything else Troma has done, with plenty of camera coverage, impressive effects and locations and even convincing effects. I think the plot is quite good too. The Toxic Avenger begins a fish-out-of-water journey to Japan to work through his paternal issues and this was meant to bridge to Toxic 3's buried subplot about Toxie's mother issues. I might be stretching, but the unique format of the film seems like a direct influence on Home Alone 2, the only other extremely violent "lost in the city" film for kids.
Now as awesome as Part 2 is, Part 3 is an utter disaster. Plotwise, its maybe better, but the execution is terrible. I assume the funds were pulled on Pt 3 after Pt 2 either offended, abused budget or failed monetarily. Because of this, Troma makes it a much darker and amateur film. Its made with a meaner spirit and higher drama. It really would've worked if it was as well-made and fun as Pt 2. Its maybe twice as ambitious but not nearly as memorable. It feels like a long string of leftover footage from Pt 2 and it even recycles whole scenes from that film for absolutely no reason. I'm confused because Troma always claims that the films were shot at the same time, but its clear some time has passed as Kaufman's infant daughter has aged at least a year, the fashion styles have changed and the quality of the camera had definitely fallen. Its very similar in production style (and script) to the Class of Nuke 'Em High sequels made at the time. Lots of clumsy crowd scenes, weak humor, under-directing and a half-baked message about ecology and yuppie-ism... with lame heavy metal pandering. Toxie 3 would be remade essentially as Sgt Kabukiman NYPD which is probably a better film, but Toxie 3 does have its key sequences (mainly gore fx courtesy of Redneck Zombies' Pericle Lewnes).
Troma would rebound quality-wise with Tromeo & Juliet but would never make films as balanced or big as Toxie 2 (or arguably Toxie 3). Its a shame. The Toxic Avenger is an amazing symbol of freedom and cinematic heroism. I hope there's some happy ending for Troma and that their greatest creation never ends up as any corporation's unspectacular, nostalgic "intellectual property". Thankfully, Troma is such a fringe company, like Full Moon, that big studios are probably afraid of buying them in fear of looking too greasy or leftist themselves. Or maybe today's execs have never seen a Troma films. Thats wishful thinking. But somehow suburban & urban fart-sniffers need to discover these films and support them to make better ones. Thats was a titanic feat in the 1980s and it hasn't gotten easier. Whatever the solution is, its out there and I hope Lloyd and Michael find it soon enough.
Edit: I would be remiss if I didn't mention the sweeping anti-Asian racism in Pt 3's depiction of the devil. Is it camp or serious? The devil is a green-skinned dragon with a "fu manchu" mustache. The Japanese funded most of Pt 2 but pulled out on Pt 3 too. It kinda feels like a nationalist F--k You and couldn't be well received by the Asian audience. That really hurts Troma. Sgt Kabukiman is sort of intentionally ignorant and racist about Japanese culture as well, but its also flattering in some ways but still definitely exploitative. Is Troma Zionist? They hate Disney. They love violence and have a pro-military streak but they never show any extremist capitalist or nationalist politics like Cannon, not beyond the average NY/NJ conservatives. Troma are somewhat conservative socially but extremely conservative with their savings, which has given them long life but hasn't inspired their workers or helped their product become professional. Its a weird situation. They have the right morals but don't practice what they preach and don't exactly live up to what they sell. Thats the Z-grade cinema world. But its better than an F.
I would say Troma are Green Party these days and were early NeoLiberals before becoming Anarchist Capitalist in the 80s and then just Conservative Democrats through Clinton until Bush made them really seek the Far Left. I would appreciate a 2018 Troma film now more than ever, specifically a Toxie 5.
Toxic 2 comes very close to being Troma's masterwork. Kaufman & Herz have the balls to take their biggest opportunity at mainstream exposure and make a brilliantly original and entertaining statement against Illuminati controls in an era where no one really even knew about the corporate enslavement of America. The film opens promoting a utopian paradise in "Tromaville" of multicultural citizens trading freely and dancing in the streets, until a Bilderberg meeting of yuppie satanists, gangsters and puppets plot to kill Toxie among other things (like blowing up the World Trade Center to disrupt trade). In the commentary for Pt 1, Kaufman reveals that he read some early anti-NWO book back in his 70s Yale days which ultimately informed his future radical film business. Seems like he had a real conflict in making this film and couldn't help but load it with as much commentary and anti-mainstream sentiment as possible. I think this makes it a marvel. Where the film ultimately failed is in its editing.
For some reason, the film has a very unnecessary and unmotivated narration dub that spoils many gags and visuals. Also, many Japanese actors are re-dubbed in offensive Engrish (even though Troma's TA2 trailer keeps their voices). But the fatal blow is a tacked on 20 minutes of story that is under-shot overkill after an already fun, serviceable climax. Maybe the boys at Troma were excessive or maybe they had to rush a cut out to Lorimar/WB. I am very curious to find out.
But still there's 80 minutes of gold here that is the best Troma ever produced. Toxie was a major merch and cartoon mascot at the time (can we speculate "Captain Planet" is Turner execs' Toxie ripoff?), so Toxic 2 is more kid-friendly and lighthearted. The gore, villainy and heroism is still hard-edged but cartooned to an extreme surrealism that perfectly matches the superhero/comic book style. Anyone knocking the film's broad humor, flat dimension, childish logic or gritty execution doesn't get that this is political theater for 80s fanboys and fantasy fans.
The film's most memorable sequence is an epic choreographed ballet of cartoon violence aiming Death Wish/Taxi Drive vigilantism at the film's heirarchy of symbolic bad guys. The Toxic Avenger, a kind of pan-racial, gender-crossed (the tutu is an amazing superhero costume) and transhuman knight who slays representatives of corrupted proletarians. Gays, hillbillies, Jews, sports stars, the church, punk rockers. Every subculture that has been turned against their own interest is lampooned for their own devisiveness and reduced to pawns in a Satanic scheme of corporate world domination. The brutal violence that flows in Kaufman's work reflects an intense fear and hatred of Nazi methodology and these films are catharsis.
The film itself is extremely well-shot, better staged than anything else Troma has done, with plenty of camera coverage, impressive effects and locations and even convincing effects. I think the plot is quite good too. The Toxic Avenger begins a fish-out-of-water journey to Japan to work through his paternal issues and this was meant to bridge to Toxic 3's buried subplot about Toxie's mother issues. I might be stretching, but the unique format of the film seems like a direct influence on Home Alone 2, the only other extremely violent "lost in the city" film for kids.
Now as awesome as Part 2 is, Part 3 is an utter disaster. Plotwise, its maybe better, but the execution is terrible. I assume the funds were pulled on Pt 3 after Pt 2 either offended, abused budget or failed monetarily. Because of this, Troma makes it a much darker and amateur film. Its made with a meaner spirit and higher drama. It really would've worked if it was as well-made and fun as Pt 2. Its maybe twice as ambitious but not nearly as memorable. It feels like a long string of leftover footage from Pt 2 and it even recycles whole scenes from that film for absolutely no reason. I'm confused because Troma always claims that the films were shot at the same time, but its clear some time has passed as Kaufman's infant daughter has aged at least a year, the fashion styles have changed and the quality of the camera had definitely fallen. Its very similar in production style (and script) to the Class of Nuke 'Em High sequels made at the time. Lots of clumsy crowd scenes, weak humor, under-directing and a half-baked message about ecology and yuppie-ism... with lame heavy metal pandering. Toxie 3 would be remade essentially as Sgt Kabukiman NYPD which is probably a better film, but Toxie 3 does have its key sequences (mainly gore fx courtesy of Redneck Zombies' Pericle Lewnes).
Troma would rebound quality-wise with Tromeo & Juliet but would never make films as balanced or big as Toxie 2 (or arguably Toxie 3). Its a shame. The Toxic Avenger is an amazing symbol of freedom and cinematic heroism. I hope there's some happy ending for Troma and that their greatest creation never ends up as any corporation's unspectacular, nostalgic "intellectual property". Thankfully, Troma is such a fringe company, like Full Moon, that big studios are probably afraid of buying them in fear of looking too greasy or leftist themselves. Or maybe today's execs have never seen a Troma films. Thats wishful thinking. But somehow suburban & urban fart-sniffers need to discover these films and support them to make better ones. Thats was a titanic feat in the 1980s and it hasn't gotten easier. Whatever the solution is, its out there and I hope Lloyd and Michael find it soon enough.
Edit: I would be remiss if I didn't mention the sweeping anti-Asian racism in Pt 3's depiction of the devil. Is it camp or serious? The devil is a green-skinned dragon with a "fu manchu" mustache. The Japanese funded most of Pt 2 but pulled out on Pt 3 too. It kinda feels like a nationalist F--k You and couldn't be well received by the Asian audience. That really hurts Troma. Sgt Kabukiman is sort of intentionally ignorant and racist about Japanese culture as well, but its also flattering in some ways but still definitely exploitative. Is Troma Zionist? They hate Disney. They love violence and have a pro-military streak but they never show any extremist capitalist or nationalist politics like Cannon, not beyond the average NY/NJ conservatives. Troma are somewhat conservative socially but extremely conservative with their savings, which has given them long life but hasn't inspired their workers or helped their product become professional. Its a weird situation. They have the right morals but don't practice what they preach and don't exactly live up to what they sell. Thats the Z-grade cinema world. But its better than an F.
I would say Troma are Green Party these days and were early NeoLiberals before becoming Anarchist Capitalist in the 80s and then just Conservative Democrats through Clinton until Bush made them really seek the Far Left. I would appreciate a 2018 Troma film now more than ever, specifically a Toxie 5.
Friday, January 26, 2018
George Lucas' Jedi story is the story of Buddhist/Shinto samurai and their moral decline into Ronins and Shoguns. The inept Disney reboots see Jedi's as Superheroes and all references to religion are erased and replaced with good ol' white male atheist Satanism. This is Hollywood white washing/reprogramming/racial purifying in its newest form. Totally ignorant historically and elementary morally and lacking any nuance beyond anarchistic spectacle and flippant brain-farting. It becomes masturbation of commerce and nothing else. This is what Hollywood always wanted Star Wars to be and it sadly became that with Return of the Jedi, but at least that was a decent popcorn film based on populist beliefs. This new shit is just insulting.
There is no spiritual growth in the new characters. Mild emotional flings and nothing else. There is no wisdom spoken. No grand gestures that evoke powerful statements. They lost the action theater that Kurosawa passed along to Lucas from Asian Opera. We deserve a real Star Wars film, not shitty military commercials for white teens. You're an idiot if you think Star Wars is simply an American war movie. Its much bigger and better. Thats why Lucas didn't want to make the typical 1950s war rom-com that he rejected with Spielberg's 1941 and Coppola's The Godfather. They all attacked the dried up sentimentalist war porn and provided an anti-war fantasy for children to become good hippie communists and make art and live in nature. Disney wants to pack suburbia with air-conditioned camps of consumers and give them no hope of escaping except in expensive episodic dreams of space. The new exploitation of Star Wars is toxic and anti-American.
There is no spiritual growth in the new characters. Mild emotional flings and nothing else. There is no wisdom spoken. No grand gestures that evoke powerful statements. They lost the action theater that Kurosawa passed along to Lucas from Asian Opera. We deserve a real Star Wars film, not shitty military commercials for white teens. You're an idiot if you think Star Wars is simply an American war movie. Its much bigger and better. Thats why Lucas didn't want to make the typical 1950s war rom-com that he rejected with Spielberg's 1941 and Coppola's The Godfather. They all attacked the dried up sentimentalist war porn and provided an anti-war fantasy for children to become good hippie communists and make art and live in nature. Disney wants to pack suburbia with air-conditioned camps of consumers and give them no hope of escaping except in expensive episodic dreams of space. The new exploitation of Star Wars is toxic and anti-American.
Entourage (2004-2011) / Entourage 2015
I spent the last week bingewatching the 8 seasons of the Entourage TV series to review the movie. Why? The film bombed and the show is regarded as totally offensive & stupid entertainment for aging conservative hipsters. I needed to finally watch this to understand the mindset of Republicans, especially Hollywood Republicans and to try and empathize and sympathize with them.
I enjoyed the first 5 seasons as naive Bush Era comfort food for a post-9/11 generation who needed to drown out the horror and heavy concepts with crunk music, softcore TV porn and lots of mean-spirited humor. The Middle Eastern war is hardly referenced but it dictates the tone of the entire run. We're following a group of low class "street kids" from Queens, NYC who slowly reach the top of Hollywood. It happens slowly and for the most part realistically as they face setbacks of capitalist social climbing. The "epic" arc of this show is a bare-bones how-to guide from Mark Walhberg on the characters, methods, stories, lingo, dangers and rewards of becoming a Hollywood actor. But it only concentrates on the school of acting, directing, producing, writing and craftsmanship of moviemaking for white republican Gen Xers; and pretty much only the males.
See we follow the targeted circle of shady business from ethnic corporate characters who never question their servitude to such a corrupt system of exploitative globalized local ideology. No one questions the negative effect of their actions on anyone, not even their closest allies, family and friends. Except the protagonist, "E", who is the straight-and-narrow Catholic white kid who can hang with "the wiggers" and keep them on track to reaching bourgeois means of living. But he never becomes accepted by the rich and he, his actor best friend and their posse of social connections, business partners and soft muscle keep their gainful employment growing more and more amoral. I do not condone that kind of living nor that kind of writing unless its satirical and headed for a climax that is pro-democracy, pro-equality, socially moral and self-improving FOR those who need the instructions: kids, invalids, oppressed, depressed, vegetated and not pro-active. For all its warts, Entourage does inspire the watcher to act in both senses. To carve out a stake in life to live good later, to build a next egg. But the characters never make the world a better place. They simply play a part in a chaotic "God plot " that mirrors society only in that its based on the propaganda that supports it. Entourage ("E") starts as a hard-edge camp nostalgia piece that serves as nostalgia for those who lived it and ultimately fizzles, underperforms when it ends as a darkly crazed Ayn Rand piece of absurd rightwing revisionist history and a kind of Satanic bible on ruining your life. The Hollywood Ending of the show is a total cop-out. Was this intentional?
By the time the film was made, the cast seem totally checked out and repulsed by their characters. The show promotes a kind of Hollywood that is toxic for most people and is secretive in its real crimes and existential horrors. But now America and the world is rebelling to this cheap puppetshow Illuminati social rigging. It attaches itself to any majorly successful young show or star. Walhberg is like a soldier preaching his abusive "neoliberal" conservative government monopoly. The negative turn the show takes in Season 6 is quite gross and deadening. As the country shifts from the culture of George W Bush to the culture of Obama, things get much darker, Satanic and passive aggressively conservative. There's a short pointless subplot where E learns to dishonestly claim racism to land an actor job for his untalented young black male friend and first official client. Its such an awful display of white nationalist Neo-Nazi genetic hierarchy programming, which is the most extreme and horrific display of mental illness, economic oppression and sadomasochistic indirect torturing of the bullying bourgeois to the trusting, naive, left-in-the-dark minorities who don't fit the pyramidal ideology for 1% of the population. Corporate Hollywood's entire purpose is to put people to sleep so they make the rich richer and forget their own socio-economical struggles. The show flirts with subverting this but ultimately accepts "the way things are".
Whats tragic is that the show builds progressiveness, democracy, economy, wit and a unique passion initially in those special first 5 seasons and its powerful because of its dude-bro trappings. The show is supremely bro-mantic, almost to a homoerotic level. It starts as a queasy and then tranquil even blissful pill to make you love these characters despite their deep failures as young men. They play realistically and beautifully in a decent Scorsese style of comedic drama and dramatic comedy... "dramedy". What might account for the switch in creative tone is the gradual HBO franchising that happens with every decent show HBO picks up. I thought Entourage worked best as a tone poem on the loneliness of Mark Wahlberg's search for identity and struggle to grow up. But the showrunner, who eventually directs the movie and writes most of the last seasons, gives into to being a total network shill who spoils all of the tender interplay, loses the transgressive even radically leftist elements to make a repetitive "cast of writers"dark sitcom fusion of The OC, The Simpsons, Sex & the City, The Sopranos and whatever still had ratings at the time. This works well as the "comeback season" Season 7 feels as experimental, respectful, engaged and electrified as the writing ever was. The Story Editors weave the plots well and the directing is quite brisk. But more and more the show becomes a soapbox for a Judeo-Christian egomania of judgment, violence, chauvinism and eventual White Boy self-worship. It provides a unique example of the failure of self-awareness. If the show made fun of itself more, became genuinely inclusive or changed the face of TV in any way, I would consider it a classic show. Its not.
It never touches The Larry Sanders Show in fusing comedy and drama and it never reaches that show's poignancy or hilarious wit. It wants to be a tell-all about show business and the struggle to make art commercially, but the humor of the show becomes a sad self-criticism of the bleak separation of lowly TV actors and the Hollywood puppeteers they serve. The show loses its credibility as working class blues and becomes an ugly mirror to the silent abuses that we are supposed to enjoy seeing played through these stifled talents to sell a dollar. This show, like the film version of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, is the high level of farce that is not even aware of how farcical, phony and unflattering it is. They cannot let go of George W Bush's Republican lies or correctly process or politely react to the liberalism of Obama's American values. You see the redeeming human qualities dirtied by an intense racist rejection of each other. By the show's end, it becomes the dated, pathetic exploitation of dried up actors that it hoped to lampoon, help and prevent. Its a real anticlimax that I do not enjoy after a few days of investment. If the show painted filmmaking as a quest for quality and not a hunt for money, maybe it would've ended in a grand way.
The show had its strengths in the acting (at least early on), some of the directing and the growth of the character Ari Gold. See, the show starts as a character study of E and eventually includes his Italian-American sidekicks... and their sidekicks. But Jeremy Piven is electric as one of a few stars who is an HBO veteran and a modest name. The show starts as a far right expensive sitcom for white and black yokels in the American South but, thanks to the creative control Piven puts into his award-winning performance, the show gets some class and the actors up their game and the writers have something to write for. He also includes as much camp gay-friendly content in the intense gay-bashing as he can and tries to add an arc to the overall characterization. I think his direct say in the A plot's direction was nil, but they certainly bounced off of him as much as he bounced off of them. Its a case of the actor becoming the auteur but not given the total control he needed and deserved. Because the only boss in Hollywood is the head of execs, as the show obsessively writes into the show causing almost ALL of the show's decline. In fact, the show's A plot becomes the humbling and defanging of Ari Gold's Jewishness to the corporate capitalism of Aryan people. Thats what ruins the show: so much transcendant positive change in the reflection of leadership gets highjacked and replaced with in-your-face propaganda for capitalist White Pride, White Nationalism, rightwing-ism, republicanism and ultimately the creation of a NeoNazi elite class that presides over a distinctly whites-only utopian communism. Its bourgeois anti-art. Propaganda.
Yet I do not regret watching it through at least once to have some knowledge of what the world is up against and how the modern media sees itself. Its a history lesson for future generations not to repeat and to rebel against. Very much, this is the new type of modernism that artists now must deconstruct and post-modernize. I prefer totally new content if its good, but this type of bad art can be used to subvert its own prejudices. Unfortunately there is a massive bulk of cinema that is more Triumph of the Will than The Great Dictator. Is there goodness in badness? Is their badness in goodness? Is everything really gray? Is the brightness of childhood a fleeting illusion only sustained by physical youth? Or is it simply a projection of one's own sense of legend and experienced illusion?
Is Entourage a good show? If you view it in a Twin Peaks way where each run of the series is its own series. This is the typical style of global television. TV originally was closer to the diverse microcosm of anthology than the macro world-building of novels and epic films. Entourage works in the first 5 seasons as a comic book manchild fantasy that is almost essential to modern spectatorship's disintegration of white rightwing chauvinist patriarchy. Its the monkey minded-ness of the social group who are most anti-monkey mindness. We all are experiencing the group's exorcism of bigotry and hate in its most bigoted and hated minority. The sad truth is that the white man has made himself the most targeted minority and the most outwardly violent group because of their own competitive spirit against themselves. Thats what is bred from any social hierarchy's "winner of the lotto".
But remember that this show failed, is regarded shitty by the new press and Hollywood is determined to clean up its messes. Its sad that many names associated with the show have fallen into terrible career failure. Some have been accused of the sexual harassment that is even previously written into the show. By the final stretch the cameos in the show are simply favors for Wahlberg and the usual Hollywood republicans who need work: David Spade, James Woods, Andrew Dice Clay, Dennis Hopper, James Cameron. They are the real "entourage" who look out for each other. The entire show is a metaphor for Republican exclusiveness, The Elite. Its damning evidence of its own collective crimes. Is this intentional? Was a Marxist steering this asinine celebration of excess and materialism? To make it a lucrative but essential demystification and anti-propaganda to sabotage capitalism? Nah, I think its just a bad show. But its a bad show people still love. But we don't need anymore bad shows like Entourage.
You can sum up the emotional resonance of the show in the bromantic sadness of the phrase "later, bro" as you part from someone you really can't get along with but you're related by blood. Thats how the world sees America now.
The story ends with a shallow triumph that isn't really earned just to satisfy fans if the show never returns for a proper finale. The movie is a reboot for a 9th season that erases the mistakes of the 8th season. That I appreciate and see as a brilliant David Lynch level power play by Doug Ellin, the showrunner, writer and director, AND Mark Wahlberg who seems to be the major producer and free from network control. The show had an overly Romantic, sell out ending, akin to Objectivist standards. But the film, if its not a true ending, sets up another quest for a mature, darker, wiser story where the Entourage actually learn to be humans again. Could it ever become the progressive, leftist documentary of changing attitudes it aspired to be? Maybe. It is unfinished and left in a gray middle that is neither the show's highs or its lows. A sad ending if final but a good cliffhanger too. And thats sort of the most common type of ending in life. Maybe not the most preferred or important, but its the popular measure of mediocrity.
The show is a crystallization of white male egomania, the desperate urge to stay young and cool forever to fuck younger, cooler girls. Thats what Hollywood star system is filled with and motivated by and catering to. Its not a cancer of human thought but a symptom of a worse mental illness, the rejection of God and the quest to become AntiChrist, the superego, the man-god so separate bu equal to Creation that it is above all other living things. Its a collective oneness except exclusive for this genetic breed. As much as I liked some seasons more than others, I think the entire show is basically white supremacy porn, totally in service to fascism and oppression of laborers. And shows like this shouldn't be made the way this is ultimately executed. Its a shame, because its a decent show idea but its not popular except to the rich white audience who make it and the poor whites who want to buy into it. How sick is the American dream? You can watch Citizen Kane reject it or Entourage worship it. I think the choice of superiority is evident.
I enjoyed the first 5 seasons as naive Bush Era comfort food for a post-9/11 generation who needed to drown out the horror and heavy concepts with crunk music, softcore TV porn and lots of mean-spirited humor. The Middle Eastern war is hardly referenced but it dictates the tone of the entire run. We're following a group of low class "street kids" from Queens, NYC who slowly reach the top of Hollywood. It happens slowly and for the most part realistically as they face setbacks of capitalist social climbing. The "epic" arc of this show is a bare-bones how-to guide from Mark Walhberg on the characters, methods, stories, lingo, dangers and rewards of becoming a Hollywood actor. But it only concentrates on the school of acting, directing, producing, writing and craftsmanship of moviemaking for white republican Gen Xers; and pretty much only the males.
See we follow the targeted circle of shady business from ethnic corporate characters who never question their servitude to such a corrupt system of exploitative globalized local ideology. No one questions the negative effect of their actions on anyone, not even their closest allies, family and friends. Except the protagonist, "E", who is the straight-and-narrow Catholic white kid who can hang with "the wiggers" and keep them on track to reaching bourgeois means of living. But he never becomes accepted by the rich and he, his actor best friend and their posse of social connections, business partners and soft muscle keep their gainful employment growing more and more amoral. I do not condone that kind of living nor that kind of writing unless its satirical and headed for a climax that is pro-democracy, pro-equality, socially moral and self-improving FOR those who need the instructions: kids, invalids, oppressed, depressed, vegetated and not pro-active. For all its warts, Entourage does inspire the watcher to act in both senses. To carve out a stake in life to live good later, to build a next egg. But the characters never make the world a better place. They simply play a part in a chaotic "God plot " that mirrors society only in that its based on the propaganda that supports it. Entourage ("E") starts as a hard-edge camp nostalgia piece that serves as nostalgia for those who lived it and ultimately fizzles, underperforms when it ends as a darkly crazed Ayn Rand piece of absurd rightwing revisionist history and a kind of Satanic bible on ruining your life. The Hollywood Ending of the show is a total cop-out. Was this intentional?
By the time the film was made, the cast seem totally checked out and repulsed by their characters. The show promotes a kind of Hollywood that is toxic for most people and is secretive in its real crimes and existential horrors. But now America and the world is rebelling to this cheap puppetshow Illuminati social rigging. It attaches itself to any majorly successful young show or star. Walhberg is like a soldier preaching his abusive "neoliberal" conservative government monopoly. The negative turn the show takes in Season 6 is quite gross and deadening. As the country shifts from the culture of George W Bush to the culture of Obama, things get much darker, Satanic and passive aggressively conservative. There's a short pointless subplot where E learns to dishonestly claim racism to land an actor job for his untalented young black male friend and first official client. Its such an awful display of white nationalist Neo-Nazi genetic hierarchy programming, which is the most extreme and horrific display of mental illness, economic oppression and sadomasochistic indirect torturing of the bullying bourgeois to the trusting, naive, left-in-the-dark minorities who don't fit the pyramidal ideology for 1% of the population. Corporate Hollywood's entire purpose is to put people to sleep so they make the rich richer and forget their own socio-economical struggles. The show flirts with subverting this but ultimately accepts "the way things are".
Whats tragic is that the show builds progressiveness, democracy, economy, wit and a unique passion initially in those special first 5 seasons and its powerful because of its dude-bro trappings. The show is supremely bro-mantic, almost to a homoerotic level. It starts as a queasy and then tranquil even blissful pill to make you love these characters despite their deep failures as young men. They play realistically and beautifully in a decent Scorsese style of comedic drama and dramatic comedy... "dramedy". What might account for the switch in creative tone is the gradual HBO franchising that happens with every decent show HBO picks up. I thought Entourage worked best as a tone poem on the loneliness of Mark Wahlberg's search for identity and struggle to grow up. But the showrunner, who eventually directs the movie and writes most of the last seasons, gives into to being a total network shill who spoils all of the tender interplay, loses the transgressive even radically leftist elements to make a repetitive "cast of writers"dark sitcom fusion of The OC, The Simpsons, Sex & the City, The Sopranos and whatever still had ratings at the time. This works well as the "comeback season" Season 7 feels as experimental, respectful, engaged and electrified as the writing ever was. The Story Editors weave the plots well and the directing is quite brisk. But more and more the show becomes a soapbox for a Judeo-Christian egomania of judgment, violence, chauvinism and eventual White Boy self-worship. It provides a unique example of the failure of self-awareness. If the show made fun of itself more, became genuinely inclusive or changed the face of TV in any way, I would consider it a classic show. Its not.
It never touches The Larry Sanders Show in fusing comedy and drama and it never reaches that show's poignancy or hilarious wit. It wants to be a tell-all about show business and the struggle to make art commercially, but the humor of the show becomes a sad self-criticism of the bleak separation of lowly TV actors and the Hollywood puppeteers they serve. The show loses its credibility as working class blues and becomes an ugly mirror to the silent abuses that we are supposed to enjoy seeing played through these stifled talents to sell a dollar. This show, like the film version of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead, is the high level of farce that is not even aware of how farcical, phony and unflattering it is. They cannot let go of George W Bush's Republican lies or correctly process or politely react to the liberalism of Obama's American values. You see the redeeming human qualities dirtied by an intense racist rejection of each other. By the show's end, it becomes the dated, pathetic exploitation of dried up actors that it hoped to lampoon, help and prevent. Its a real anticlimax that I do not enjoy after a few days of investment. If the show painted filmmaking as a quest for quality and not a hunt for money, maybe it would've ended in a grand way.
The show had its strengths in the acting (at least early on), some of the directing and the growth of the character Ari Gold. See, the show starts as a character study of E and eventually includes his Italian-American sidekicks... and their sidekicks. But Jeremy Piven is electric as one of a few stars who is an HBO veteran and a modest name. The show starts as a far right expensive sitcom for white and black yokels in the American South but, thanks to the creative control Piven puts into his award-winning performance, the show gets some class and the actors up their game and the writers have something to write for. He also includes as much camp gay-friendly content in the intense gay-bashing as he can and tries to add an arc to the overall characterization. I think his direct say in the A plot's direction was nil, but they certainly bounced off of him as much as he bounced off of them. Its a case of the actor becoming the auteur but not given the total control he needed and deserved. Because the only boss in Hollywood is the head of execs, as the show obsessively writes into the show causing almost ALL of the show's decline. In fact, the show's A plot becomes the humbling and defanging of Ari Gold's Jewishness to the corporate capitalism of Aryan people. Thats what ruins the show: so much transcendant positive change in the reflection of leadership gets highjacked and replaced with in-your-face propaganda for capitalist White Pride, White Nationalism, rightwing-ism, republicanism and ultimately the creation of a NeoNazi elite class that presides over a distinctly whites-only utopian communism. Its bourgeois anti-art. Propaganda.
Yet I do not regret watching it through at least once to have some knowledge of what the world is up against and how the modern media sees itself. Its a history lesson for future generations not to repeat and to rebel against. Very much, this is the new type of modernism that artists now must deconstruct and post-modernize. I prefer totally new content if its good, but this type of bad art can be used to subvert its own prejudices. Unfortunately there is a massive bulk of cinema that is more Triumph of the Will than The Great Dictator. Is there goodness in badness? Is their badness in goodness? Is everything really gray? Is the brightness of childhood a fleeting illusion only sustained by physical youth? Or is it simply a projection of one's own sense of legend and experienced illusion?
Is Entourage a good show? If you view it in a Twin Peaks way where each run of the series is its own series. This is the typical style of global television. TV originally was closer to the diverse microcosm of anthology than the macro world-building of novels and epic films. Entourage works in the first 5 seasons as a comic book manchild fantasy that is almost essential to modern spectatorship's disintegration of white rightwing chauvinist patriarchy. Its the monkey minded-ness of the social group who are most anti-monkey mindness. We all are experiencing the group's exorcism of bigotry and hate in its most bigoted and hated minority. The sad truth is that the white man has made himself the most targeted minority and the most outwardly violent group because of their own competitive spirit against themselves. Thats what is bred from any social hierarchy's "winner of the lotto".
But remember that this show failed, is regarded shitty by the new press and Hollywood is determined to clean up its messes. Its sad that many names associated with the show have fallen into terrible career failure. Some have been accused of the sexual harassment that is even previously written into the show. By the final stretch the cameos in the show are simply favors for Wahlberg and the usual Hollywood republicans who need work: David Spade, James Woods, Andrew Dice Clay, Dennis Hopper, James Cameron. They are the real "entourage" who look out for each other. The entire show is a metaphor for Republican exclusiveness, The Elite. Its damning evidence of its own collective crimes. Is this intentional? Was a Marxist steering this asinine celebration of excess and materialism? To make it a lucrative but essential demystification and anti-propaganda to sabotage capitalism? Nah, I think its just a bad show. But its a bad show people still love. But we don't need anymore bad shows like Entourage.
You can sum up the emotional resonance of the show in the bromantic sadness of the phrase "later, bro" as you part from someone you really can't get along with but you're related by blood. Thats how the world sees America now.
The story ends with a shallow triumph that isn't really earned just to satisfy fans if the show never returns for a proper finale. The movie is a reboot for a 9th season that erases the mistakes of the 8th season. That I appreciate and see as a brilliant David Lynch level power play by Doug Ellin, the showrunner, writer and director, AND Mark Wahlberg who seems to be the major producer and free from network control. The show had an overly Romantic, sell out ending, akin to Objectivist standards. But the film, if its not a true ending, sets up another quest for a mature, darker, wiser story where the Entourage actually learn to be humans again. Could it ever become the progressive, leftist documentary of changing attitudes it aspired to be? Maybe. It is unfinished and left in a gray middle that is neither the show's highs or its lows. A sad ending if final but a good cliffhanger too. And thats sort of the most common type of ending in life. Maybe not the most preferred or important, but its the popular measure of mediocrity.
The show is a crystallization of white male egomania, the desperate urge to stay young and cool forever to fuck younger, cooler girls. Thats what Hollywood star system is filled with and motivated by and catering to. Its not a cancer of human thought but a symptom of a worse mental illness, the rejection of God and the quest to become AntiChrist, the superego, the man-god so separate bu equal to Creation that it is above all other living things. Its a collective oneness except exclusive for this genetic breed. As much as I liked some seasons more than others, I think the entire show is basically white supremacy porn, totally in service to fascism and oppression of laborers. And shows like this shouldn't be made the way this is ultimately executed. Its a shame, because its a decent show idea but its not popular except to the rich white audience who make it and the poor whites who want to buy into it. How sick is the American dream? You can watch Citizen Kane reject it or Entourage worship it. I think the choice of superiority is evident.
Wednesday, January 24, 2018
Nightmares Come At Night (2nd review) 1970 / The Girl From Rio 1969
Nightmares Come At Night was one of my early favorites when I'd only seen a handful of Jess Franco films. I'm still rather impressed but its clearly 2nd tier Franco, more of an experimental film than a big personal work or radical storytelling. But it IS quite shocking, moving and timeless as I stated in the first review. But this time I was more aware of how the film has Franco really juggling his familiar tropes in a big departure. This film explores his usual dark vixens as victims of oppressive Aryan so-called feminism. He subverts and deconstructs the subtly racist "Betty and Veronica" tropes in Western media, as David Lynch would much later and Hitchcock had already done to a more conservative degree. Franco pulls no punches in exploring the sexual intimidation and systemic degradation by white Europeans to their Latin brothers and sisters. Around this period Jess moved further to a so called "primitivism" and tribal art. The film is full of African and Eastern sounds and shapes and our heroine has a Hindu ceremony before transcending her bleak situation. I imagine Franco was deeply moved by Thich Quang Duc, the Vietnamese Buddhist who set himself on fire famously in 1963, and is lampshading his sacrificial suicide with this film's climax.
The Girl From Rio is a film I can watch endlessly. Its a James Bond-sploitation film that finds its star in "Goldfinger" actress Shirley Eaton who plays a villain more clever, cruel and human than Blofeld. The narrative concerns a Feminist revolution standing in the way of our generic male lead and his useless MacGuffin. In the end, the women triumph and its the greedy nationalist agency that suffers. Its a great plot that luckily has a budget to allow lots of toys for Jess to play with. The film is full of gags, action, setpieces, powerful compositions and elaborate staging. Here he is allowed to run wild into pure surrealism and create a phantasmagorical experience of the cinematic world. This was a major break for him. He never again got a budget to make anything so visually explosive or epically designed, but this solidified his hallucinogenic trademarked style. Maybe he knew this was his final big commercial work and decided to go out with a bang and abuse his budget to make a film as challenging and stylistically daring as possible, career be damned. And he never looked back.
I can't believe these films were made a year apart. That year shows everything Franco gave up and everything he gained. And in short he did it to be the feminist director that was not yet tolerated in mainstream world markets. Two films in two different arenas and decades but both baring the same bold genius.
The Girl From Rio is a film I can watch endlessly. Its a James Bond-sploitation film that finds its star in "Goldfinger" actress Shirley Eaton who plays a villain more clever, cruel and human than Blofeld. The narrative concerns a Feminist revolution standing in the way of our generic male lead and his useless MacGuffin. In the end, the women triumph and its the greedy nationalist agency that suffers. Its a great plot that luckily has a budget to allow lots of toys for Jess to play with. The film is full of gags, action, setpieces, powerful compositions and elaborate staging. Here he is allowed to run wild into pure surrealism and create a phantasmagorical experience of the cinematic world. This was a major break for him. He never again got a budget to make anything so visually explosive or epically designed, but this solidified his hallucinogenic trademarked style. Maybe he knew this was his final big commercial work and decided to go out with a bang and abuse his budget to make a film as challenging and stylistically daring as possible, career be damned. And he never looked back.
I can't believe these films were made a year apart. That year shows everything Franco gave up and everything he gained. And in short he did it to be the feminist director that was not yet tolerated in mainstream world markets. Two films in two different arenas and decades but both baring the same bold genius.
Lucky the Inscrutable 1967 / She Killed In Ecstasy 1971
Watched 2 more Franco movies and its amazing the growth of this director within a few years.
"Lucky" is a very polished, commercial spy spoof with heavy NeoRealism influences. It builds to a shocking ending that totally changes the context of everything you've watched. Even as a young populist Spanish director, Jess was transgressive and never afraid to lampoon Western ideas, especially the sexist, racist and morally corrupt greed of the US & UK. But he makes sure to deliver a stunning and well-executed product for his producers. Here he works on a Spanish-Italian coproduction so he ups the slapstick, eye candy actors, lavish color and obligatory Romantic elements. The films most understood by Franco's own fans are ones like "Lucky" where he flirts with selling out only to finally transgress or TRANSCEND the restrictive, repressive nature of the subject matter to make a statement of protest. There's a scene where the hero makes love to the Communist female villain (played fabulously by the legendary Rosalba Neri). Franco's following love scene is a bizarre montage of comic book and porno mag images with the faces of Karl Marx and Mao floating through. His anti-hero makes love literally to the idea of Communism within a film thats supposed to sell Nationalism, fascism, white supremacy. There are plenty of 60s James Bond spoofs but how many are well informed Anti-Bond films?
Flash forward a few years and Franco is within a dark, lonely yet liberating transition. His films are becoming much smaller, depressed, sensual and outspoken. "Ecstasy" has the same revenge plot of so many Franco films like Venus in Furs, Other Side of the Mirror and Jack the Ripper (which follow an arc). But Ecstasy's inspiration is a shattered romance, cultural and generational revolution, economic disenfranchisement, scientific liberalism and many other themes that can be tied to his producer's strict "plot" necessities. Its been said that Franco hated plot. Wrong. He simply saw it as tool for artistic expression and, when forced to work within the conservative genres of low budget filmmaking in Europe, he used the Nationalist or Capitalist issued "plot rules" to simply deconstruct themselves and call attention to the futility, materialism and unreality of mass media propaganda.
So again he returns to films about corrupt authorities, spies, detectives, prisons, Nazis, predatory lesbians, criminals, psychopaths and abusers of power to cut them down and exorcise the psyche of the viewer and himself to create films that are closer to reality at least in psychology. He uses the absurd dreamlike phenomenology of fantasy films to unlock the truths that the timid and conservative call frightening or unpleasant. Jess Franco used commercial cinema like a sugarpill to deliver the medicine of existentialist, nihilist and ultimately socialist thoughts of democratic revolution and utopian change. His films are political protest films but they hide their academic meanings in lurid masks that appeal to the sadomasochistic voyeur in a bourgeois culture of slaves labor and exploitation. His films were for the people who don't need entertainment. They needed art, the one thing the powerful don't want them to have.
"Lucky" is a very polished, commercial spy spoof with heavy NeoRealism influences. It builds to a shocking ending that totally changes the context of everything you've watched. Even as a young populist Spanish director, Jess was transgressive and never afraid to lampoon Western ideas, especially the sexist, racist and morally corrupt greed of the US & UK. But he makes sure to deliver a stunning and well-executed product for his producers. Here he works on a Spanish-Italian coproduction so he ups the slapstick, eye candy actors, lavish color and obligatory Romantic elements. The films most understood by Franco's own fans are ones like "Lucky" where he flirts with selling out only to finally transgress or TRANSCEND the restrictive, repressive nature of the subject matter to make a statement of protest. There's a scene where the hero makes love to the Communist female villain (played fabulously by the legendary Rosalba Neri). Franco's following love scene is a bizarre montage of comic book and porno mag images with the faces of Karl Marx and Mao floating through. His anti-hero makes love literally to the idea of Communism within a film thats supposed to sell Nationalism, fascism, white supremacy. There are plenty of 60s James Bond spoofs but how many are well informed Anti-Bond films?
Flash forward a few years and Franco is within a dark, lonely yet liberating transition. His films are becoming much smaller, depressed, sensual and outspoken. "Ecstasy" has the same revenge plot of so many Franco films like Venus in Furs, Other Side of the Mirror and Jack the Ripper (which follow an arc). But Ecstasy's inspiration is a shattered romance, cultural and generational revolution, economic disenfranchisement, scientific liberalism and many other themes that can be tied to his producer's strict "plot" necessities. Its been said that Franco hated plot. Wrong. He simply saw it as tool for artistic expression and, when forced to work within the conservative genres of low budget filmmaking in Europe, he used the Nationalist or Capitalist issued "plot rules" to simply deconstruct themselves and call attention to the futility, materialism and unreality of mass media propaganda.
So again he returns to films about corrupt authorities, spies, detectives, prisons, Nazis, predatory lesbians, criminals, psychopaths and abusers of power to cut them down and exorcise the psyche of the viewer and himself to create films that are closer to reality at least in psychology. He uses the absurd dreamlike phenomenology of fantasy films to unlock the truths that the timid and conservative call frightening or unpleasant. Jess Franco used commercial cinema like a sugarpill to deliver the medicine of existentialist, nihilist and ultimately socialist thoughts of democratic revolution and utopian change. His films are political protest films but they hide their academic meanings in lurid masks that appeal to the sadomasochistic voyeur in a bourgeois culture of slaves labor and exploitation. His films were for the people who don't need entertainment. They needed art, the one thing the powerful don't want them to have.
Tuesday, January 23, 2018
Jack the Ripper 1976 / The Perverse Countess 1974
The Jess Franco train ride continues...
I'm back to reviewing that wonderful cult director who was the king of a few subtly influential genres. This time its a horror period piece and an S&M sexploitation piece.
There are Jess Franco films that are beautiful works of surrealist extravagance and moral radicalism. These two fit that effort. Jack the Ripper finds a lyrical tragedy and masochistic love of "grotesque monstrosity". Ofcourse its done in a camp heir of social satire and historical mirror that is tasteful and actually a blissful thrill. He codified a type of poetic means to producing proud, intelligent thought through the most raw excommunicated self-evolution on the bottom of the economic totem pole. He relates through his jazz and his cinema the pain of indigenous cultures that are colonized, reprogrammed and treated as self-hating cattle. Franco has grown to be one of my favorite humanistic directors and storytellers. I think his philosophy is mostly his own so I can't classify him neatly as anything but a Marxist. And he doesn't use his art for lucrative commerce or egomanicial statements (because he's far too shy and feeling to compete or hurt others). Franco is one of the pure souls in filmmaking who seems scary, craven or mad, but he was simply a genius who was so ghettoized that he looks insane to those who only sip the mainstream.
Whew! Thats all in these films but - ideology ignored - the technical aesthetics are fabulous. Some of the most emotionally directed films I've ever watched but it may lose viewers with his paper-thin plot details, totally faked "dream logic" and lack of fear for "the extreme". Franco revels in the fact that he is not castrated or forced to be timid. He makes his films his way and only the pure hearted such as him can hope to make art. Its commerce or propaganda without a soul's voice fighting to remain independent but unify the world. I think Franco identified as communist but that doesn't fully explain his brilliant viewpoint which seems shaped by a Napoleonic complex of stifled popularity and lust for respect. But he also grew up under the Nationalist leader Generalissimo Franco so he had no chance of reaching leadership or uncensored journalism, so he rejected Franco and adopted a stylized synthesis of both his namesakes - "Jesus Franco". He explores the dichonomy of Self, of man, of a Spaniard, or a beatnik, of a jazz musician, of a person of color. He purges the psyche of the world in each film for each moment of time during production and release, but most importantly prep.
His films always feel worked on in a blustery drug-assisted creative upheaval in his soul or vomit from his eyes... or Third Eye as he often acknowledged beliefs of Eastern mysticism. Often he highlights the creative properties of tribal music, jazz, classical music, African, Renaissance & Baroque painters. Like Picasso, he grew up in a Latin Europe that was still honest and not yet so colonialized, programmed or commercialized. He's a big art class whiz kid who suffers having to work to sell his art. Its the classic case. His work is evidence that it pays off. Imagine how his Earth would've lost such a pure voice of human honesty if he sold out for any master or group. He's a true independent, a true socialist and a true leader that influenced all of cinema from absolute obscurity. The rock band The Residents has a theory that this is the only way true world-changing art is made. Franco is one of those who creates his own story to change the world's story. There are similar and comparable artists but, at least in cinema, Jess Franco is my favorite.
I guess he saw himself a Jesus messiah to a Franconian satanism. In a sense, he sums up most perfectly the psychological "illness" of the modern Ego. He deconstructs and mythologizes The Bible while indulging in anti-pulpit politics and systemic exploitation, enslavement and monetary control. Researching his work in the first half of 2017 and then engaging in the learned ideologies helped me survive such a Hellish 2nd half of friends committing suicide, sinners repenting, injustices coming to light and balance violently taking control from fascist wars.
And as a cinephile I feel like I've come into my own finally finding a director I can unapologetically name as an influence. Thanks for inspiring me, Jess. I hope to spread more of your positive influence through filmmaking.
I'm back to reviewing that wonderful cult director who was the king of a few subtly influential genres. This time its a horror period piece and an S&M sexploitation piece.
There are Jess Franco films that are beautiful works of surrealist extravagance and moral radicalism. These two fit that effort. Jack the Ripper finds a lyrical tragedy and masochistic love of "grotesque monstrosity". Ofcourse its done in a camp heir of social satire and historical mirror that is tasteful and actually a blissful thrill. He codified a type of poetic means to producing proud, intelligent thought through the most raw excommunicated self-evolution on the bottom of the economic totem pole. He relates through his jazz and his cinema the pain of indigenous cultures that are colonized, reprogrammed and treated as self-hating cattle. Franco has grown to be one of my favorite humanistic directors and storytellers. I think his philosophy is mostly his own so I can't classify him neatly as anything but a Marxist. And he doesn't use his art for lucrative commerce or egomanicial statements (because he's far too shy and feeling to compete or hurt others). Franco is one of the pure souls in filmmaking who seems scary, craven or mad, but he was simply a genius who was so ghettoized that he looks insane to those who only sip the mainstream.
Whew! Thats all in these films but - ideology ignored - the technical aesthetics are fabulous. Some of the most emotionally directed films I've ever watched but it may lose viewers with his paper-thin plot details, totally faked "dream logic" and lack of fear for "the extreme". Franco revels in the fact that he is not castrated or forced to be timid. He makes his films his way and only the pure hearted such as him can hope to make art. Its commerce or propaganda without a soul's voice fighting to remain independent but unify the world. I think Franco identified as communist but that doesn't fully explain his brilliant viewpoint which seems shaped by a Napoleonic complex of stifled popularity and lust for respect. But he also grew up under the Nationalist leader Generalissimo Franco so he had no chance of reaching leadership or uncensored journalism, so he rejected Franco and adopted a stylized synthesis of both his namesakes - "Jesus Franco". He explores the dichonomy of Self, of man, of a Spaniard, or a beatnik, of a jazz musician, of a person of color. He purges the psyche of the world in each film for each moment of time during production and release, but most importantly prep.
His films always feel worked on in a blustery drug-assisted creative upheaval in his soul or vomit from his eyes... or Third Eye as he often acknowledged beliefs of Eastern mysticism. Often he highlights the creative properties of tribal music, jazz, classical music, African, Renaissance & Baroque painters. Like Picasso, he grew up in a Latin Europe that was still honest and not yet so colonialized, programmed or commercialized. He's a big art class whiz kid who suffers having to work to sell his art. Its the classic case. His work is evidence that it pays off. Imagine how his Earth would've lost such a pure voice of human honesty if he sold out for any master or group. He's a true independent, a true socialist and a true leader that influenced all of cinema from absolute obscurity. The rock band The Residents has a theory that this is the only way true world-changing art is made. Franco is one of those who creates his own story to change the world's story. There are similar and comparable artists but, at least in cinema, Jess Franco is my favorite.
I guess he saw himself a Jesus messiah to a Franconian satanism. In a sense, he sums up most perfectly the psychological "illness" of the modern Ego. He deconstructs and mythologizes The Bible while indulging in anti-pulpit politics and systemic exploitation, enslavement and monetary control. Researching his work in the first half of 2017 and then engaging in the learned ideologies helped me survive such a Hellish 2nd half of friends committing suicide, sinners repenting, injustices coming to light and balance violently taking control from fascist wars.
And as a cinephile I feel like I've come into my own finally finding a director I can unapologetically name as an influence. Thanks for inspiring me, Jess. I hope to spread more of your positive influence through filmmaking.
G.I. Joe Retaliation 2013
Another Obama Era film from 2013, one of my favorite recent years for cinema. It was such a highly political year for films and Hollywood was just starting to embrace the voice of social media and not yet trying to control it. In 2012, they fed into the hysteria of Mayan calendar apocalypse and with 2013 the bipartisan executives and stars either saw Obama as the Muslim Illuminati antichrist or flipped off the racist paranoid conspiracy theories. A few in the middle saw him for what he is: a popular NeoLiberal puppet with questionable authority but a typically human guy.
GI Joe 2 is interesting because it can't make up its mind and rather cowardly but fiscally walks the line. It casts Dwayne Johnson (Hollywood's Obama surrogate) as its hero. The Rock, like Obama, is a decent person with mediocre skill but a unique star magnetism. Interestingly, as "Roadblock", The Rock plays a militant lackey who is only in authority because the first GI Joe film's All-American white boy protagonist is killed. Already we get rightwing whistleblowing that blacks are subordinate and this liberal change is only temporary. The film shoehorns in some Asian characters for the Asian market but always reminds us that they are inferior to Snake Eyes. That would be true to the source material but its offensive here because Snake Eyes is barely in the story at all and the Asian characters are very important to the plot. In Michael Bay fashion, women are stripper-ish eye candy who are just skilled enough to not come off as mannequins. There's also the lame homophobia and colorism that comes along with every Dwayne Johnson role. Can we admit this guy is a sellout already? If he thinks Barack failed to live up to Ronald Reagan I would say The Rock has failed to live up to Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The topper is the plot set-up by the 2009 predecessor's cliffhanger ending: that The President is a plant from the shadowy Deep State terrorist group Cobra. Now this would be a fair criticism of Obama's NeoLiberal and CIA ties, but "Retaliation" goes out of its way to draw parallels to Isis and The Illuminati. The entire film is a rightwing nut's militaristic fever dream that stops short of Reptilians ruling the planet (ironically, that IS the plot of the far superior 1987 GI Joe animated film).
Obama wasn't the superhero the Democrats claimed he was, but he was far from a bad guy. He was bad at national security, instituting crazy government abuses of surveillance and drone strikes and, when the Dems actually got control of the Senate, he didn't do much for the American citizen unless you were gay or rich. Because he played to whatever the leaders of the party wanted. This is what EVERY president has done since Kennedy. So why cast Obama as a demon? Why replace him with Trump? Because really, as this moronic meathead film displays, Republicans just want strong old school white male values in place with everyone lower than them on the pyramid food chain. Just... because. It feels right to them and this film disgustingly feeds that insanity, selfishness and inferiority. Oh yeah. For no real reason, the 2nd half of the film throws in a pointless role for Bruce Willis to browbeat The Rock, shoot people and give the Joes old white men as backup.
Its odd because while far from egalitarian or radically progressive the G.I. Joe franchise is very much against the regression, racism and sexism in this film. This film lacks the dark faces, estrogen and democratic patriotism that even Stephen Sommers brought to the childish 2009 film.
I love the G.I. Joe cartoon and comic books. This shitty, cynical film has nothing to do with it. It lacks the heart and most of the characters that G.I. Joe fans love. I'm not even talking about kids. A gritty Christopher Nolan style G.I. Joe film isn't a bad idea, but it should avoid everything this film is. But it shouldn't be "Dunkirk" either.
GI Joe 2 is interesting because it can't make up its mind and rather cowardly but fiscally walks the line. It casts Dwayne Johnson (Hollywood's Obama surrogate) as its hero. The Rock, like Obama, is a decent person with mediocre skill but a unique star magnetism. Interestingly, as "Roadblock", The Rock plays a militant lackey who is only in authority because the first GI Joe film's All-American white boy protagonist is killed. Already we get rightwing whistleblowing that blacks are subordinate and this liberal change is only temporary. The film shoehorns in some Asian characters for the Asian market but always reminds us that they are inferior to Snake Eyes. That would be true to the source material but its offensive here because Snake Eyes is barely in the story at all and the Asian characters are very important to the plot. In Michael Bay fashion, women are stripper-ish eye candy who are just skilled enough to not come off as mannequins. There's also the lame homophobia and colorism that comes along with every Dwayne Johnson role. Can we admit this guy is a sellout already? If he thinks Barack failed to live up to Ronald Reagan I would say The Rock has failed to live up to Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The topper is the plot set-up by the 2009 predecessor's cliffhanger ending: that The President is a plant from the shadowy Deep State terrorist group Cobra. Now this would be a fair criticism of Obama's NeoLiberal and CIA ties, but "Retaliation" goes out of its way to draw parallels to Isis and The Illuminati. The entire film is a rightwing nut's militaristic fever dream that stops short of Reptilians ruling the planet (ironically, that IS the plot of the far superior 1987 GI Joe animated film).
Obama wasn't the superhero the Democrats claimed he was, but he was far from a bad guy. He was bad at national security, instituting crazy government abuses of surveillance and drone strikes and, when the Dems actually got control of the Senate, he didn't do much for the American citizen unless you were gay or rich. Because he played to whatever the leaders of the party wanted. This is what EVERY president has done since Kennedy. So why cast Obama as a demon? Why replace him with Trump? Because really, as this moronic meathead film displays, Republicans just want strong old school white male values in place with everyone lower than them on the pyramid food chain. Just... because. It feels right to them and this film disgustingly feeds that insanity, selfishness and inferiority. Oh yeah. For no real reason, the 2nd half of the film throws in a pointless role for Bruce Willis to browbeat The Rock, shoot people and give the Joes old white men as backup.
Its odd because while far from egalitarian or radically progressive the G.I. Joe franchise is very much against the regression, racism and sexism in this film. This film lacks the dark faces, estrogen and democratic patriotism that even Stephen Sommers brought to the childish 2009 film.
I love the G.I. Joe cartoon and comic books. This shitty, cynical film has nothing to do with it. It lacks the heart and most of the characters that G.I. Joe fans love. I'm not even talking about kids. A gritty Christopher Nolan style G.I. Joe film isn't a bad idea, but it should avoid everything this film is. But it shouldn't be "Dunkirk" either.
Anchorman 2 2013
When I saw this in theaters, I was maybe the only person laughing. While it does lose steam in the 2nd half, this satire of news media and specifically rightwing Fox News was a bold Hollywood "fuck you" to the masses that is even more appreciated now in a post-Trump world where media is regressing into conservativism, lowest common denominators and commerce over art.
The film underperformed and had cold reactions from fans of the original Anchorman and was ignored by the "serious film" snobs who failed to see the humor in it. While AM1 was an ironic W. Bush-era celebration of republican white male incompetency, younger audiences missed the joke and saw it a string of catchy one-liners that were paying liberal lip-service. AM2 rectifies this by being aggressively critical of "The Patriarchy". It doesn't play footsie with fratboys and is over giving homage to the lowbrow dad humor comedies of the 70s/80s. Where the first film held a loving mirror up to the dated liberalism of the Ford/Carter administrations, this sequel is a no-hold-barred reflection of Reagan Era racism, sexism, capitalism and cultural irresponsibility. Fans of Will Ferrell should be aware of this light/dark, safe/radical schism in his career sensibility. The 2 "Best of" SNL volumes for Farrell reflect this well.
I would love an Anchorman 3. It seems even more necessary than Part 2, which was a valiant defense of moderate liberalism and an overly gracious resistance to rightwing America's bigoted anti-Obama rhetoric. But we're dealing with a much worse threat now in Trump, who is the exact foot that this great comedy legacy was made to lampoon. An Anti-Trump Anchorman 3 would do be moral support for the entire country and depower the witless white nationalists trying to influence the mainstream. Oh, and it would probably make a fortune too.
But besides the brilliant political satire, the film is just a great exercise in film comedy. Director Adam McKay's formula of improv dialogue, campy acting and ensemble scenes wins... mostly. I think this film suffers from too many celebrity cameos, a terribly unfunny child actor and not relying enough on the cast chemistry of the original. The original 4 comedians are electric together but they don't have many moments to shine. Steve Carrel has a bigger part as he became a bigger star in 9 years, but half of his screentime is dedicated to the less funny Kristine Wiig, who has since fizzled as a comic. Christina Applegate is mostly replaced by Meagan Good and its actually delightful, but then she returns in the duller 2nd half. Hollywood's pro-Hillary agenda is way too distracting here and the politics of star egos is palpable. Thankfully we are past Hillary and Paul Rudd (who is fabulous here) has become a star with a No 1 film to his name.
The only issue with an Anchorman 3 is setting it in an appropriate time span. Would it be set during the first George Bush era? I think that would be an unpopular masterstroke. Sure, no one under 30 remembers that era. Who cares? There's a lot of late 80s/1990s nostalgia and that was such a hilariously lame transition in pop culture. And yet its a rich moment in comedy history to highlight, analyze and lampoon. Caddyshack 2, anyone? SNL Season 10, anyone? "Donnie Darko" nailed that obscure but important time period beautifully so McKay and Ferrell can do it justice.
I can hear the cheesy Whitesnake soundtrack already.
The film underperformed and had cold reactions from fans of the original Anchorman and was ignored by the "serious film" snobs who failed to see the humor in it. While AM1 was an ironic W. Bush-era celebration of republican white male incompetency, younger audiences missed the joke and saw it a string of catchy one-liners that were paying liberal lip-service. AM2 rectifies this by being aggressively critical of "The Patriarchy". It doesn't play footsie with fratboys and is over giving homage to the lowbrow dad humor comedies of the 70s/80s. Where the first film held a loving mirror up to the dated liberalism of the Ford/Carter administrations, this sequel is a no-hold-barred reflection of Reagan Era racism, sexism, capitalism and cultural irresponsibility. Fans of Will Ferrell should be aware of this light/dark, safe/radical schism in his career sensibility. The 2 "Best of" SNL volumes for Farrell reflect this well.
I would love an Anchorman 3. It seems even more necessary than Part 2, which was a valiant defense of moderate liberalism and an overly gracious resistance to rightwing America's bigoted anti-Obama rhetoric. But we're dealing with a much worse threat now in Trump, who is the exact foot that this great comedy legacy was made to lampoon. An Anti-Trump Anchorman 3 would do be moral support for the entire country and depower the witless white nationalists trying to influence the mainstream. Oh, and it would probably make a fortune too.
But besides the brilliant political satire, the film is just a great exercise in film comedy. Director Adam McKay's formula of improv dialogue, campy acting and ensemble scenes wins... mostly. I think this film suffers from too many celebrity cameos, a terribly unfunny child actor and not relying enough on the cast chemistry of the original. The original 4 comedians are electric together but they don't have many moments to shine. Steve Carrel has a bigger part as he became a bigger star in 9 years, but half of his screentime is dedicated to the less funny Kristine Wiig, who has since fizzled as a comic. Christina Applegate is mostly replaced by Meagan Good and its actually delightful, but then she returns in the duller 2nd half. Hollywood's pro-Hillary agenda is way too distracting here and the politics of star egos is palpable. Thankfully we are past Hillary and Paul Rudd (who is fabulous here) has become a star with a No 1 film to his name.
The only issue with an Anchorman 3 is setting it in an appropriate time span. Would it be set during the first George Bush era? I think that would be an unpopular masterstroke. Sure, no one under 30 remembers that era. Who cares? There's a lot of late 80s/1990s nostalgia and that was such a hilariously lame transition in pop culture. And yet its a rich moment in comedy history to highlight, analyze and lampoon. Caddyshack 2, anyone? SNL Season 10, anyone? "Donnie Darko" nailed that obscure but important time period beautifully so McKay and Ferrell can do it justice.
I can hear the cheesy Whitesnake soundtrack already.
Friday, January 12, 2018
Mr and Mrs Smith 2005
Bush-Era police state porn. Brangelina find out they are rival spies, become targets of each other's spy agencies, stick together, kill tons of people and get their jobs back.
Now as Gen X rom-com its fairly strong at addressing domestic tensions and blowing off steam with cute one-liners from its 2 relatable stars, but its also very troubling ideologically. Neither spy is identified as working for the government, but its obvious that they represent left and right wings of the CIA. The entire film is a "How To" on mixed-party marriage. So obviously its lens is a centrist neoliberal take thats not pro-Bush but not anti-Bush either. The film is pro-torture, pro-assassination, pro-unaccountable privatized government agencies and . I mean, its playing off the public's preconceptions anyway but it doesn't have to normalize and idolize the bloodthirsty, authoritarian security policies of America. This is freshly post-9/11, so there its forgivable.
Whats less forgivable is the toxic treatment of its protagonists. Jolie plays the uber female spy. She's impulsive, always right, seductive, impossibly strong and tough and abuses power constantly. Its weird how neolib Hollywood is so supportive of sociopathic traits in women as cute or warranted. Pitt of course is the meat headed, somewhat crass but endlessly redeeming and "perfect" Aryan macho Ken doll. He's only inferior to his woman when he chooses. I wonder if this was inspired by The Clintons.
I really disliked this era of Hollywood and its aged so quickly and revealed itself as heavy Deep State propaganda. Its not as harsh or browbeating as recent Hollywood, but its still faux-progressive, materialistic, amoral and empty outside of its glitz and escapism.
Now as Gen X rom-com its fairly strong at addressing domestic tensions and blowing off steam with cute one-liners from its 2 relatable stars, but its also very troubling ideologically. Neither spy is identified as working for the government, but its obvious that they represent left and right wings of the CIA. The entire film is a "How To" on mixed-party marriage. So obviously its lens is a centrist neoliberal take thats not pro-Bush but not anti-Bush either. The film is pro-torture, pro-assassination, pro-unaccountable privatized government agencies and . I mean, its playing off the public's preconceptions anyway but it doesn't have to normalize and idolize the bloodthirsty, authoritarian security policies of America. This is freshly post-9/11, so there its forgivable.
Whats less forgivable is the toxic treatment of its protagonists. Jolie plays the uber female spy. She's impulsive, always right, seductive, impossibly strong and tough and abuses power constantly. Its weird how neolib Hollywood is so supportive of sociopathic traits in women as cute or warranted. Pitt of course is the meat headed, somewhat crass but endlessly redeeming and "perfect" Aryan macho Ken doll. He's only inferior to his woman when he chooses. I wonder if this was inspired by The Clintons.
I really disliked this era of Hollywood and its aged so quickly and revealed itself as heavy Deep State propaganda. Its not as harsh or browbeating as recent Hollywood, but its still faux-progressive, materialistic, amoral and empty outside of its glitz and escapism.
Thursday, January 11, 2018
We don't need new movies. Don't we have enough? They only exist to support the economy and serve no other function. Its ultimately commercial fiction to distract from the horror of reality and produce more fantasy and apathy. Well, thats what its been for 99% of cinema's history. Cheap propaganda for the banking system. Consumption is the number one message in all of filmmaking. And by simply watching we agree to its ideology. Are we just meaningless creatures who fuck and fart while waiting to die and cinema and art are just a futile striving for art but ultimately shallow means of "comfort"? What else can they be?
Cinema is the search for knowledge from the technology. Its application of human spirit in the maybe pointless but still romantic idea of bettering its Self. Someone might love 10000s of films. Having seen just as many, I love maybe a handful. Not because I'm an elitist asshole. Its because thats how little of life actually counts. Is it worth it to slog through empty years and a million bad films just to have a few profound moments of spectator-ship? I think it is, if its shared with someone else. The only reason you don't kill yourself slowly every second (which most people do) is because you look forward to something. Movies can fill that void if you don't have love or faith or some principle cause. And in many ways, those things are lies and movies lie too, but you always know a movie is a lie. Except children.
I think all art is a reflection of life's horror and maybe the natural, unnatural and false beauty opposed to it. But horror movies are rarely about real horror. If cinema is about lies, horror cinema is typically about the obscuring of real horror. Vampires, Leatherface, Get Out. These are about the brutal system of evil that is murdering you as we speak. But its coded in some fantastical context where its sanitized, made more insane and maybe even so tragic that its laughable.
Cinema is the search for knowledge from the technology. Its application of human spirit in the maybe pointless but still romantic idea of bettering its Self. Someone might love 10000s of films. Having seen just as many, I love maybe a handful. Not because I'm an elitist asshole. Its because thats how little of life actually counts. Is it worth it to slog through empty years and a million bad films just to have a few profound moments of spectator-ship? I think it is, if its shared with someone else. The only reason you don't kill yourself slowly every second (which most people do) is because you look forward to something. Movies can fill that void if you don't have love or faith or some principle cause. And in many ways, those things are lies and movies lie too, but you always know a movie is a lie. Except children.
I think all art is a reflection of life's horror and maybe the natural, unnatural and false beauty opposed to it. But horror movies are rarely about real horror. If cinema is about lies, horror cinema is typically about the obscuring of real horror. Vampires, Leatherface, Get Out. These are about the brutal system of evil that is murdering you as we speak. But its coded in some fantastical context where its sanitized, made more insane and maybe even so tragic that its laughable.
Monday, January 8, 2018
I was literally blocked from a facebook group for writing:
Blade Runner: About people who don't know if they are real or created (asking if life is predestined or if free will exists)
Blade Runner 2049: About a guy who already knows he's created finding out he's programmed. Boring.
BR works because Deckard doesn't know he's a replicant. K knowing already kills any reaction when he finds out he's protecting some twin sister or any sympathy when he finds he's not the chosen savior. This was crappy NeoLiberal white "feminist" propaganda garbage like The Last Jedi, Wonder Woman and Ghost in the Shell to make Hillary look flawless and heavensent. 2049 is another sequel that shouldn't have been made and doesn't even have a reason to exist.
If there was ever a Blade Runner 2 it was clearly set up to be Deckard and Rachel leading a revolution. Who cares about old ass Deckard and some made up daughter in the desert fighting Jared Leto?
Safe to say Facebook is a zionist neoliberal "classic republican" website but this was on a page for cyberpunk, a genre committed to criticizing the abuses of capitalism in an advanced society. But like these assholes don't comprehend liberalism they think its just a fanboy manchild genre where we can worship toys and video games and plot to fuck robot prostitutes. There's so much apathy insincerity and mental laziness in America and the UK and it starts with neoliberalism, the more deceptive and demoralizing side of conservatism.
Blade Runner: About people who don't know if they are real or created (asking if life is predestined or if free will exists)
Blade Runner 2049: About a guy who already knows he's created finding out he's programmed. Boring.
BR works because Deckard doesn't know he's a replicant. K knowing already kills any reaction when he finds out he's protecting some twin sister or any sympathy when he finds he's not the chosen savior. This was crappy NeoLiberal white "feminist" propaganda garbage like The Last Jedi, Wonder Woman and Ghost in the Shell to make Hillary look flawless and heavensent. 2049 is another sequel that shouldn't have been made and doesn't even have a reason to exist.
If there was ever a Blade Runner 2 it was clearly set up to be Deckard and Rachel leading a revolution. Who cares about old ass Deckard and some made up daughter in the desert fighting Jared Leto?
Safe to say Facebook is a zionist neoliberal "classic republican" website but this was on a page for cyberpunk, a genre committed to criticizing the abuses of capitalism in an advanced society. But like these assholes don't comprehend liberalism they think its just a fanboy manchild genre where we can worship toys and video games and plot to fuck robot prostitutes. There's so much apathy insincerity and mental laziness in America and the UK and it starts with neoliberalism, the more deceptive and demoralizing side of conservatism.
Friday, January 5, 2018
Air 2015 / A Most Wanted Man 2014 / Se7en 1995
Directed by the guy who directed the Manhunt & Red Dead Redemption video games, Air stars Norman Reedus (who is also an exec producer) and Djimon Honsou as two men protecting the last survivors of an nuclear winter. The film uses an interesting device where it seems to confirm racist stereotypes only to subvert them in the end. But beyond this progressive twist there is a disturbing message of elitism. What makes our hero the hero is that he is protecting "the best of humanity" unquestionably as opposed to the antagonist's disdain for the 1% and resentment that they let the rest of the world die. There is a sacrificial act to save the future of mankind that is excused because of the sacrificial animal's selfishness, nihilism and pessimism. But this character doesn't express the very real concerns in the reality of this situation: Is murder, betrayal, sabotage all excused for the interests of the majority? What does it say that humanity must commit evil to preserve itself?
I can't tell if I like this film's message or not. Its a murky mix of philosophical ideas that might confound a college class and thats more than I can say for most films. For its ambition and aesthetic design, its a recommended film. But be warned there are some very conflicted arguments put forth. Its part clever portrait of the death of white supremacy but also a problematic NeoLiberal hope of a more colorblind and romantic bourgeoisie utopia. Half-hearted, half-educated media like this is what led to the unpopularity of the current democratic party. Its dead on in its attack of the Rightwing but it doesn't provide any real confidant answers to its own ideologies' weaknesses.
I was thoroughly absorbed by A Most Wanted Man's detailed and highly realistic plot and the wonderfully designed direction by Anton Corbijn (who I mostly associate with his amazing music videos for Depeche Mode), but I was distracted by the very off-putting casting of American actors as Europeans. Its not for any political reason, I simply thought their accents were weak. The late Philip Seymour Hoffman is the worst offender, coming off more like a caricature performance than a person (something I think applies to his entire career). But thats not enough to put off the film. It does a ho-hum job trying to humanize and sympathize with Islamic jihadists but it could've done more. It relies more on its tight plot of spy intrigue than any original observation about modern politics or humanism. I assume the John Le Carre novel that inspired it is much more interesting, but this is a good film simply because its a realistic departure from the usual cartoon spy films.
I had never seen Se7en before and, considering it was released in 1995, it lived up to its reputation and exceeded my expectation. Because its a David Fincher film, I expected a more cute "buddy cop" deconstruction with lots of sadism. Actually, maybe because this is a younger, less established Fincher, its much more cerebral, restrained and focused on its themes and characters than any dressing or gimmicks. This is before Fincher pursued his "Millennial Hitchcock" aesthetic but it has the Hitch influences. Its very formal, very pitch black in humor and builds to a tense climax. Fincher never throws out the emotional intelligence of his scripts but Se7en has him very much in sync with the dark themes and worldview, probably because this was his rebound from Alien3. Not perfect, but a great film from a period where Hollywood films were garbage and it plays like a masterpiece compared to today's shit and most poorly aged "Classic Hollywood".
I can't tell if I like this film's message or not. Its a murky mix of philosophical ideas that might confound a college class and thats more than I can say for most films. For its ambition and aesthetic design, its a recommended film. But be warned there are some very conflicted arguments put forth. Its part clever portrait of the death of white supremacy but also a problematic NeoLiberal hope of a more colorblind and romantic bourgeoisie utopia. Half-hearted, half-educated media like this is what led to the unpopularity of the current democratic party. Its dead on in its attack of the Rightwing but it doesn't provide any real confidant answers to its own ideologies' weaknesses.
I was thoroughly absorbed by A Most Wanted Man's detailed and highly realistic plot and the wonderfully designed direction by Anton Corbijn (who I mostly associate with his amazing music videos for Depeche Mode), but I was distracted by the very off-putting casting of American actors as Europeans. Its not for any political reason, I simply thought their accents were weak. The late Philip Seymour Hoffman is the worst offender, coming off more like a caricature performance than a person (something I think applies to his entire career). But thats not enough to put off the film. It does a ho-hum job trying to humanize and sympathize with Islamic jihadists but it could've done more. It relies more on its tight plot of spy intrigue than any original observation about modern politics or humanism. I assume the John Le Carre novel that inspired it is much more interesting, but this is a good film simply because its a realistic departure from the usual cartoon spy films.
I had never seen Se7en before and, considering it was released in 1995, it lived up to its reputation and exceeded my expectation. Because its a David Fincher film, I expected a more cute "buddy cop" deconstruction with lots of sadism. Actually, maybe because this is a younger, less established Fincher, its much more cerebral, restrained and focused on its themes and characters than any dressing or gimmicks. This is before Fincher pursued his "Millennial Hitchcock" aesthetic but it has the Hitch influences. Its very formal, very pitch black in humor and builds to a tense climax. Fincher never throws out the emotional intelligence of his scripts but Se7en has him very much in sync with the dark themes and worldview, probably because this was his rebound from Alien3. Not perfect, but a great film from a period where Hollywood films were garbage and it plays like a masterpiece compared to today's shit and most poorly aged "Classic Hollywood".
Tuesday, January 2, 2018
The danger of today's cinema is the poor taste of the mass audience. Saw many social media sites calling 2017 a "shockingly amazing year" for movies. We're in this braindead age of people coping by any means necessary and lying about how bad things are. This isn't my cynicism. This has been the case in the past (1990s, 1950s).
Films like IT, Power Rangers, Justice League, Split, etc are so cringeworthy now that you can properly label it "future kitsch". Because these films think they are much more grand and intelligent than they are, their disposable nature is more tragic. Hopefully these films will be laughably lame in 20 years. But its crazy that people (ok, mainly under the age of 40) view these films as high art comparable to the greatest films ever made. Get Out was the best film of the year and its not even one of the top 250 films period.
Bad films will keep making fortunes and people will keep seeing them. But the counterweight is missing. Is there some way we can go back to the good old days where low budget amateur productions can have their own boom and marketplace where Hollywood can't step on them or, Heaven allow it, can actually play next to big famous films? Its such an easy way to boost the economy of the working class to take the ridiculous corporate monopoly out of filmmaking, advertising and distribution. Hollywood is the perfect example of all the corruption in America and is an easier, weaker target than its ever been.
Films like IT, Power Rangers, Justice League, Split, etc are so cringeworthy now that you can properly label it "future kitsch". Because these films think they are much more grand and intelligent than they are, their disposable nature is more tragic. Hopefully these films will be laughably lame in 20 years. But its crazy that people (ok, mainly under the age of 40) view these films as high art comparable to the greatest films ever made. Get Out was the best film of the year and its not even one of the top 250 films period.
Bad films will keep making fortunes and people will keep seeing them. But the counterweight is missing. Is there some way we can go back to the good old days where low budget amateur productions can have their own boom and marketplace where Hollywood can't step on them or, Heaven allow it, can actually play next to big famous films? Its such an easy way to boost the economy of the working class to take the ridiculous corporate monopoly out of filmmaking, advertising and distribution. Hollywood is the perfect example of all the corruption in America and is an easier, weaker target than its ever been.
Monday, January 1, 2018
Commercial Hollywood has its place. But as conglomerate propaganda? Pass
The Last Jedi tanked critically because, with Hillary NOT winning office, neoliberal's coercive methods are revealed, as the plot of Kathleen Kennedy's Disney franchise reboot was mapped to coincide with Hillary's pre-election. The series has trashed Han Solo and Luke Skywalker as desperate old guys who were better off dead and retired while Carrie Fisher maintain power and reverence in this 100% government-driven narrative that is feminist, liberal, inclusive, progressive, but still Neo Liberal: matriarchal, racist, capitalist, authority worshiping, fetishistic and demonizing of "the other". This is the exact weak morality that the Prequels warned and fought to expose when it attacked Bush Jr.
With Baywatch and Jumaniji, you see Obama's surrogate representative in Hollywood - The Rock - totally exposed for what he is. And the conservative, anti-progressive, faux-youth rights, religion-pandering, sexually confused and disrespectful to their own roots. Barack Obama was not of the people he represented, the working class blacks, the middle class whites. But he did a lot for Africans, Hawaiians, the gays, the CIA and a sentimental list of private interests that don't effect my life positively at all. So I don't reminisce or cherish the Obama years. Especially with the parade of hate spewed constantly at him - racist hate, religious hate, xenophobic hate, personal hate. It all came from Donald Trump, his most famous heckler. But plenty of rich people hated Obama just for being less conservative and more economically fair than they are.
Most of Hollywood's past in Republican or NeoLiberal. Which is to say they love slavery, love exploiting workers, love being in a high ruling class and love showing off expensive fashion and meaningless crappy melodramas for the poor. Soap operas are the elite's original brainwashing. Working class women in a newly rich economy, packed tightly into suburbia, listening to the radio and watching TV 24/7 as kids learned and husband worked and climbed the ladder meant only for middle class white men. That demographic has always been the company's first priority: conservative white women. They make her their trophy that everyone else aspires to and has to do more than, meanwhile she helps the white man keep dominance and mental slavery by government vote. White women are most guilty of many crimes against humanity. Women in general, but white women are the worst.
So no I am not impressed with Star Wars' long history of white feminism and making it the focus of the saga is probably not the direction George Lucas would've gone. He made Padme the ultimate example of white women's attraction and blind support of criminal white nationalist capital control. Lucas then married a black woman, so I think his next female protagonist would've been a more drastic leap than "Rey". This new character has no purpose that is original. She simply exists to make sure the next Jedi Master is white. Making her English, a peasant girl who becomes "princess", is classic Disney European monarchism. Walt Disney had that creepy fetish for little princess girls and it lives on. But in Star Wars? Thats too far. Disney has finally fucked itself beyond repair, at least in this generation's eyes.
Blade Runner 2049 also had a white feminism/NeoLiberal/pro-Hillary thing. Its not that this is evil or altogether terrible, but its such cowardice. "We will hand over White Male Supremacy only to someone who will hand it right back". We see through you, Warner Bros.
I respect that this is painful circumstance is inevitable with how closed and segregated white communities are and how its institutionalized and most people are asleep to its horror or they are trained to authorize it. But fucking get a clue and stop supporting these bloodthirsty industries and making billionaires out of old child rapists with the morals of vampires.
What else sucked? Power Rangers. You can't make a film that is famous for its identification with a certain generation and time period just to ignore all of it to brainwash, ego-stroke and "consumerize" kids. "Fuck you, Gen Y. Its all about these Beiber/Young Thug faggots." How dare you when Prince and David Bowie just died penniless compared to talentless bean counters who live 24/7 on island resorts. I hope global warming fucks them up first.
I enjoyed Ninja Turtles 2. I think its much more inspired than the majority of Hollywood movies, but its still mostly tone deaf, clueless, poser and without any positive direction. Because the first film, like the Transformers films, are just crappy commercials for the police, military, prisons, counter-intelligence, espionage, hacking, the whole industrial complex of protecting you from yourself. They feed crime more than prevent it. Its another empty racket that has nothing to do with movies, yet has taken over movies.
And I think its accidental 3/4ths of the time. Commercial product is inherently propagandist. They are advertisements ALWAYS. Every work of art is advertising an idea. But most shit just advertises "Advertising". Its just mindless consumption, "dog eat dog" cannibalism and self destruction. To be alive is to be famished and always seeking to be full. We are enslaved to our beast dimensions. Why? Because we don't let the intelligent run things. Leadership shouldn't be based on political maneuvering or even prior experience. Its on how well you pass the test without cheating. But the artists don't run things. The geniuses don't make the laws and the scientists don't map our futures. I say this is calling for revolution. Nature itself is disgusted with humanity's actions and that effects our collective mood and decision-making. The planet is being forced to change positively or suffer negatively.
How does cinema or art in general play into this? Should I be doing something? What can my camera do to help? Just help. Help in any way. Small or big. Its a start. Inspire others to help. This I believe is the ultimate message of all art and all communication. The aggressive noise is just animal barking, clouded bestial thinking and its been beaten into men & women for too long.
Check out filmmakers that make a difference positively: Bunuel, Jodorowsky, Franco, Ozu, Kurosawa, Coppola, Bertolucci, Kubrick, Spielberg, Lynch, Hitchcock, Greenaway, McQueen, Cronenberg, Argento, Godard, Snyder, Fellini, Chaplin, Kaufman, Waters, Bergman, Tarkovsky, Fassbinder, Truffaut. There are so many great stylists and technicians, but how many make you feel better, make you feel alive?
Enough of the pretty camerawork and moody lighting and scared models who can't act and who look like children. Well, most directors fall into using those tricks to get eyeballs, but they brought more to it. They brought themselves and a wealth of knowledge about more than just "craft". They were teachers, not "masters".
The Last Jedi tanked critically because, with Hillary NOT winning office, neoliberal's coercive methods are revealed, as the plot of Kathleen Kennedy's Disney franchise reboot was mapped to coincide with Hillary's pre-election. The series has trashed Han Solo and Luke Skywalker as desperate old guys who were better off dead and retired while Carrie Fisher maintain power and reverence in this 100% government-driven narrative that is feminist, liberal, inclusive, progressive, but still Neo Liberal: matriarchal, racist, capitalist, authority worshiping, fetishistic and demonizing of "the other". This is the exact weak morality that the Prequels warned and fought to expose when it attacked Bush Jr.
With Baywatch and Jumaniji, you see Obama's surrogate representative in Hollywood - The Rock - totally exposed for what he is. And the conservative, anti-progressive, faux-youth rights, religion-pandering, sexually confused and disrespectful to their own roots. Barack Obama was not of the people he represented, the working class blacks, the middle class whites. But he did a lot for Africans, Hawaiians, the gays, the CIA and a sentimental list of private interests that don't effect my life positively at all. So I don't reminisce or cherish the Obama years. Especially with the parade of hate spewed constantly at him - racist hate, religious hate, xenophobic hate, personal hate. It all came from Donald Trump, his most famous heckler. But plenty of rich people hated Obama just for being less conservative and more economically fair than they are.
Most of Hollywood's past in Republican or NeoLiberal. Which is to say they love slavery, love exploiting workers, love being in a high ruling class and love showing off expensive fashion and meaningless crappy melodramas for the poor. Soap operas are the elite's original brainwashing. Working class women in a newly rich economy, packed tightly into suburbia, listening to the radio and watching TV 24/7 as kids learned and husband worked and climbed the ladder meant only for middle class white men. That demographic has always been the company's first priority: conservative white women. They make her their trophy that everyone else aspires to and has to do more than, meanwhile she helps the white man keep dominance and mental slavery by government vote. White women are most guilty of many crimes against humanity. Women in general, but white women are the worst.
So no I am not impressed with Star Wars' long history of white feminism and making it the focus of the saga is probably not the direction George Lucas would've gone. He made Padme the ultimate example of white women's attraction and blind support of criminal white nationalist capital control. Lucas then married a black woman, so I think his next female protagonist would've been a more drastic leap than "Rey". This new character has no purpose that is original. She simply exists to make sure the next Jedi Master is white. Making her English, a peasant girl who becomes "princess", is classic Disney European monarchism. Walt Disney had that creepy fetish for little princess girls and it lives on. But in Star Wars? Thats too far. Disney has finally fucked itself beyond repair, at least in this generation's eyes.
Blade Runner 2049 also had a white feminism/NeoLiberal/pro-Hillary thing. Its not that this is evil or altogether terrible, but its such cowardice. "We will hand over White Male Supremacy only to someone who will hand it right back". We see through you, Warner Bros.
I respect that this is painful circumstance is inevitable with how closed and segregated white communities are and how its institutionalized and most people are asleep to its horror or they are trained to authorize it. But fucking get a clue and stop supporting these bloodthirsty industries and making billionaires out of old child rapists with the morals of vampires.
What else sucked? Power Rangers. You can't make a film that is famous for its identification with a certain generation and time period just to ignore all of it to brainwash, ego-stroke and "consumerize" kids. "Fuck you, Gen Y. Its all about these Beiber/Young Thug faggots." How dare you when Prince and David Bowie just died penniless compared to talentless bean counters who live 24/7 on island resorts. I hope global warming fucks them up first.
I enjoyed Ninja Turtles 2. I think its much more inspired than the majority of Hollywood movies, but its still mostly tone deaf, clueless, poser and without any positive direction. Because the first film, like the Transformers films, are just crappy commercials for the police, military, prisons, counter-intelligence, espionage, hacking, the whole industrial complex of protecting you from yourself. They feed crime more than prevent it. Its another empty racket that has nothing to do with movies, yet has taken over movies.
And I think its accidental 3/4ths of the time. Commercial product is inherently propagandist. They are advertisements ALWAYS. Every work of art is advertising an idea. But most shit just advertises "Advertising". Its just mindless consumption, "dog eat dog" cannibalism and self destruction. To be alive is to be famished and always seeking to be full. We are enslaved to our beast dimensions. Why? Because we don't let the intelligent run things. Leadership shouldn't be based on political maneuvering or even prior experience. Its on how well you pass the test without cheating. But the artists don't run things. The geniuses don't make the laws and the scientists don't map our futures. I say this is calling for revolution. Nature itself is disgusted with humanity's actions and that effects our collective mood and decision-making. The planet is being forced to change positively or suffer negatively.
How does cinema or art in general play into this? Should I be doing something? What can my camera do to help? Just help. Help in any way. Small or big. Its a start. Inspire others to help. This I believe is the ultimate message of all art and all communication. The aggressive noise is just animal barking, clouded bestial thinking and its been beaten into men & women for too long.
Check out filmmakers that make a difference positively: Bunuel, Jodorowsky, Franco, Ozu, Kurosawa, Coppola, Bertolucci, Kubrick, Spielberg, Lynch, Hitchcock, Greenaway, McQueen, Cronenberg, Argento, Godard, Snyder, Fellini, Chaplin, Kaufman, Waters, Bergman, Tarkovsky, Fassbinder, Truffaut. There are so many great stylists and technicians, but how many make you feel better, make you feel alive?
Enough of the pretty camerawork and moody lighting and scared models who can't act and who look like children. Well, most directors fall into using those tricks to get eyeballs, but they brought more to it. They brought themselves and a wealth of knowledge about more than just "craft". They were teachers, not "masters".
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