kentuckyfriedpanda42 Reviews

Maniac (2012)

Impressive remake of one of the nastiest, violent and utterly scummy slasher films of the 1980's

[9/10 · 20 August 2012]

The world wasn't exactly crying out for a remake of 1980's "Maniac". Starring Joe Spinnel and directed by William Lustig, it was one of the most intense, jarring, violent and in your face horror films of the entire decade. Surprisingly, someone got the idea to remake it. The results are surprisingly close to the original in its refusal to compromise and the highly disturbing and troubling psychological terrain it traverses.

Not so much powered by anything resembling a conventional story, the film is very much in the tradition of character based cinema very much in the vein of 1970's New Hollywood cinema-films such as "Midnight Cowboy" and, of course, "Taxi Driver", which it wears its influence loudly and proudly.

Elijah Wood absolutely stuns in this remake-he truly is the glue that holds it all together. Frank (Wood) is very much torn between something resembling a normal life and his more psychotic tendencies. The film really gets you in this character's highly disturbed and disturbing frame of mind and psychology.

Apart from a truly astounding and fearless performance from Wood, where this remake really excels is in its visual and sound design and look and sound. When Frank is plagued by constant migraine headaches, the frame starts to blur around the edges, accompanied by a high pitched sound. Also, with a few exceptions, the film is very much told visually in a first perspective, point of view manner. We only see Frank via reflection in something like a mirror or a window, illustrating beautifully the man's fractured and shattered mind.

Be warned, though. Although not constantly violent, when it is, this film, like the original, takes absolutely no prisoners whatsoever! This, coupled with the unnerving, dark terrain it covers, will, like the original, make it something of an acquired taste. If you've got the nerves and stomach for it, prepare to be shocked and stunned. A true exception to the rule about all remakes being watered down, compromised and awful.

Enter the Void (2009)

Astounding and infuriating all at the same time!

[9/10 · 23 August 2010]

Where to start? I saw this film nearly a month ago at Melbourne International Film Festival. I haven't quite been able to shake it from my brain since! Firstly, let's get the negatives out of the was. The film is at least an hour to long and, especially in the latter half, at times ridiculously self-indulgent.

However, as a whole, the film has this dreamy, hallucinogenic quality that absolutely entranced me. I admire and respect "Irreversible" a great deal; however, the at times raw emotional quality of "Enter The Void" struck a greater chord with me as a viewer. I love the scene where Linda finds out Oscar has died. One of the best uses of selective focus I've seen in film in a very long time.

This is a film that demands to be seen in a cinema. Noe's command of sound and vision is truly astounding to behold. On both a physical and psychological level, he really gets you into the heads of the characters. Apparently, Noe spent two years planning the camera-work on the film. This sense of attention to detail definitely shows in the finished product. A month after seeing the film, moments and images of it are burnt into my brain.

I will be the first to say that "Enter The Void" is absolutely an acquired taste and definitely not for everyone. However, if you have the mind and sensibilities for it, I can't recommend it enough. While not as deeply disturbing as "Irreversible", it is,in many ways, infinitely more challenging.

I have always loved films that can push me, provoke me and take me somewhere I have never been before. "Enter The Void" does all three. I can honestly say that, in all my years of watching films, I have never seen anything quite like it.

Can't wait to see what Noe does next. This film proves he is truly an artist in all senses of the word.

Fight Club (1999)

This film changed my life.

[10/10 · 23 April 2008]

Where to start?

It's been nearly ten years since "Fight Club" was released. I saw it for the first time in about four years yesterday. I still find it both truly inspired and truly inspiring. Some of the themes and concepts that the film explores have become even more relevant in this day and age.

Why?

This is the film that crystallized a great deal of pain, rage and emotion with a great deal of viewers, including myself. When I first saw this, I worked a job I hated for a phenomenally racist and homophobic person, I'm not gay, but I'm semi-intelligent, speak politely, like foreign films and alternative bands. Therefore, people with small minds judge me as a result.

"Fight Club" taught me to be true to myself. It was also one of the first building stones that lead to me quitting the profession in which I worked. Not probably the normal reaction, but the scene where Tyler says to the bodega worker that if he comes back and sees him working the same job made me start crying.

This film and Darren Aronofsky's masterpiece "Requiem For A Dream" helped me to find the courage to change my life in so many different ways and to embrace this life and live it to the fullest.

For that, I say thank you.

Control (2007)

Beautiful and haunting.

[10/10 · 22 August 2007]

Making an auspicious feature film debut, Anton Corbjin brings the same wonderful sense of essence and truly understanding to his subject matter in "Control". What I've loved over the years with Corbjin's work as a photographer is how he manages to capture the essence and spirit of his subject matter whatever it may be. He does this to a remarkable degree in "Control".

"Control" is a biopic/portrait of Ian Curtis, lead singer of the Manchester band Joy Division. Just as the band was beginning to build a name for itself, Curtis took his own life in 1980. He was only 23 years old.

With any biopic where the central character is deceased, there lies the inherent problem of maintaining audience interest when the conclusion of the story is known. Corbjin does this beautifully via a number of things he does in "Control". The very striking cinemascope black and white photography has a very warm and tactile feel to it. It sounds like a cliché, but one feels that time and place that the film depicts.

The extraordinary cinematography is combined with a strong, sympathetic script and wonderful performances from a largely unknown cast. Sam Riely is an absolute revelation as Ian Curtis. Having only seen this actor in a small role in Michael Winterbottom's "24 Hour Party People", which covered some of the same ground that "Control" does, Riely really holds the screen as Curtis. While not physically identical, he absolutely manages to capture Curtis' feeling of displacement and depression. Definitely a young actor to watch.

The only 'name' actor in the film is Smantha Morton, who plays Ian's wife Debbie. An exceptional actress who doesn't disappoint here. The actors who play the other members of Joy Division are quite effective and bring a welcome sense of humour and gravity to what is, at times, an intense and depressing story.

Highly recommended. My pick of 2007 so far.

2:37 (2006)

Whiny, self-pitying glorified student film.

[1/10 · 22 August 2007]

I truly hate and despise this film and the filmmakers behind it.

Sure, I'm all for making a hard hitting and honest film about youth and youth culture.1987's "River's Edge" is an excellent example of a well-made teen drama. However, what I take exception to is the infantile, grubby and sensationalist approach that the makers of "2:37" took.

A prime example is how it raises so many issues and yet fails in any significant way to comment or reach a resolution on even one of them.

My other major problem with this film, apart from its complete plagiarism of Gus Van Sant's "Elephant" (surprised Van Sant didn't sue) is its 'bull loose in a china shop' attitude to quite delicate issues such as incest and particularly suicide.

In short, avoid this film like the plague and anything that this filmmaker ever is involved with subsequently. I've heard that his motivation for making "2:37" may or may not be based on lies. Having seen the substandard result, this doesn't surprise me in the slightest. This is a glorified student film exercise that has no place whatsoever being in a cinema or on DVD. Pure and simple.

Dr. Plonk (2007)

Painful. One of the worst films I've seen in the past 10 years.

[1/10 · 22 August 2007]

This is without a doubt one of the most excruciating and truly painful film experiences I've endured in a very long time.

Apart from being in love with its own cleverness, it really has nothing to offer in the form of entertainment. It truly fails to engage the viewer on any level. This film had little to no story or character development other than people slapping each other.

"Dr Plonk" is a horrible example of a director coming up with an idea or concept and at the same time forgetting simple cinematic concepts such as controlling their actors and making the audience care.

A worthless and painful cinematic exercise. I'd give it 0 out of 10 if I could.

Requiem for a Dream (2000)

Film Of The Decade!

[10/10 · 22 August 2007]

I don't say the above summary comment lightly.

"Requiem For A Dream" is by far one of the most brutal, honest and incredibly uncompromising films about drugs and drug abuse ever made.

Films about drugs tend to either glamourise or preach. "Requiem" does neither; it manages to stay impartial. The only other films about drugs I've seen that have managed to do this are Gus Van Sant's wonderful "Drugstore Cowboy" (1989) and Danny Boyle's flat-out masterpiece "Trainspotting" (1995).

Essentially, "Requiem" follows four characters over the course of three seasons, starting at summer- Tyrone, Marion, Harry & Sara. What I admire about this film so much is that it has the guts to show how and why people are attracted to drugs. In Sara's case, to lose weight. In the case of the other three, because they like getting high and, in the case of Harry & Tyrone, making money. This is where the illusions to the concept of the so-called "American Dream" are clearest for me.

Aronofsky also shows what happens when everything spins out of control with drugs;the downward spiral. Using an arsenal of cinematic effects such as fast cuts,split screen and Snorricam (where a camera is attached to the actor), Aronofsky and his cinematographer Matthew Libartique really put the viewer in the headspace of a user. The film has a strong emotional resonance to it. You feel every misfortune and blow that these characters are hit with. The overall effect is simply devastating. This is filmaking from a very psychological pont of view and not the "MTV" filmaking style that it has been accused of.

The performances from all four of the lead actors- Jared Leto, Jennifer Connelly, Marlon Waynes (in a rare dramatic role) and Ellen Burstyn -are outstanding and display a commitment to the material rarely seen on screen these days.

I must make mention of Ellen Burstyn as Sara. This is one of the most electrifying, heartbreaking performances ever committed to film. Her performance is truly the beating heart of this film. If, as a viewer, you're not moved of affected by Burstyn's phennomenal performance in "Requiem", you truly have a heart of stone. It shows why she is considered on of the greatest actresses working today.

Be warned. This film is not for the faint of heart. My wife said she felt physically ill after seeing it due to both subject matter and the way that it was presented. It is one of the few films in recent memory that has left me physically shaking after seeing it for the first time. I've known too many people who have had their lives affected by illegal drugs in some way or another as well as facing my own demons on that front many years ago. This film rings all too true.

It is a shame that the film is restricted to an over-18 year old audience in Australia. I would suggest that this be mandatory viewing for anyone around the age of fifteen or so. If it could stop one person from doing hard drugs, that the film has succeeded at what I feel it was trying to do.

This is an essential and truly timeless film.

Thank you, Darren Aronofsky. Thank you.

Once Upon a Time in America (1984)

Extraordinary film. Reminds me why I love cinema.

[10/10 · 21 August 2007]

I love this film. It is one of the films that truly made me fall in love with cinema as an art form. "Once Upon A Time In America" is one of the rarest of films where all cinematic elements such as writing,directing,acting, cinematography and score simply fit together and compliment each other so perfectly.

The story concerns the rise and fall of Jewish gangsters in New York during the Prohibition period. However, there is much,much more to this film than that. In a post-Tarantino cinematic landscape, just about every crime or gangster film has a post-ironic, knowing sense of its own 'coolness' and posturing. Most of the time, this comes off as pretentious and lazy filmaking.

"Once Upon A Time In America" is truly a film without irony. There is this very powerful sense of melancholy and regret that infuses just about every frame of the film where the characters are adults. In the early flashbacks to the characters as children, this is absent until the scene of Bugsy's murder and the subsequent arrest of Noodles.

There is an unforgettable and key scene with Noodles in the back of the police wagon waving goodbye to his friends as he's taken away to jail. The sense of regret and sheer emotional pain that Noodles will feel as the story and his life progresses is first evident in that extraordinary sequence.

This is an incredibly ambiguous film that is very much open to one's own interpretation. A viewer could watch the film believing that everything on screen takes place. However, another way of looking at the story is that nothing progressed past 1933 and that the 1968 sequences were in fact an opium-induced dream that Noodles was having while in the opium den. I can see both sides and try not to make a decision either way. I love how this film can be viewed and interpreted in so many ways.

The acting in this film is an absolute joy to behold. This is one of the best De Niro performances.While an unlikeable character, Noodles is a very interesting study of a broken life. He is matched every step of the way by an exceptional James Woods as Max. Woods has said that this is his favourite performance of his. The younger cast members, including a 10 year-old Jennifer Connelly, are especially effective during the flashback sequences.

I cannot recommend this film highly enough. Admittedly, it is a very demanding film upon its viewer. However, concentrate and the rewards will be immense. I still find myself going back to it every so often. This film and David Lynch's "Blue Velvet" are the two films that taught me a great deal about subtext and how to truly 'watch' and appreciate cinema when I was discovering a love for this art form.

For that, I'll always have a soft spot for this film. This is undoubtedly my pick as Leone's best film.