TONY PORCO’S MOVIE REVIEW NEWSLETTER–WINTER 2008-09 EDITION

Hey, folks–I hope you find time during the holiday season to take a break and watch some movies! By the way, I recently found excerpts from the Spiral Jetty movie by Robert Smithson (which I reviewed way back in the January 2000 issue) on YouTube; one of them can be viewed at this link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTx4Pp4aPXA

This excerpt is from the very end of the movie, and the voice you hear is Smithson’s own. It’s quite spectacular to watch even if you’re not very interested in modern or conceptual art.

ON SCREEN:

NICK AND NORAH’S INFINITE PLAYLIST: There’s quite a lot to like about Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist; it’s an odd combination of romantic comedy, Kevin-Smith-style comedy-of-bad-manners, and mystery/adventure film. The eponymous Nick (Michael Cera, who is one of my favorite actors younger than myself) is a musician utterly unable to get over the recent loss of his gorgeous-but-snooty girlfriend, Tris (Alexis Dzenia, who vamps as well here as she did in Broken Flowers). He keeps making compilation CD’s for her, which she throws away; a young classmate of hers named Norah (Kat Dennings) shares Nick’s love of music for reasons we learn later in the movie, and gets intrigued when she finds the disposed-of CD’s. The three principals, along with Norah’s perpetually-drunk friend (Ari Graynor), a van full of Nick’s gay bandmates, and various other accumulated hangers-on, spend one long evening searching New York City for each other, and for the secret location of a gig by a rock group called Where’s Fluffy, which is where the mystery/adventure part comes in. As my description hopefully makes clear, the plot is both wonderfully complicated and fun, sometimes veering off in unpredictable directions, and other times relying on running gags like Nick’s vintage yellow Yugo, which keeps being mistaken for a cab. The real treat of the movie, however, is the banter and eventual understanding between two shy, but also clever and interesting, young people. While the rest of the plot isn’t always believable, the long night of complications, shared awkwardness, arguments, and mutuality is paced and timed just slowly enough to win us over. Perhaps it says a lot about the movie that for all the emphasis on the latest technology that the title implies, it’s the more dated items the characters use, like Yugos and pay phones, and their shared interests that really bring them together. It gives the film a pleasant timelessness that makes it more than just the latest teen hit. RATING: 8.

ON TAPE:

THE QUIET DUEL: The Quiet Duel may not be the best or the most famous movie that Akira Kurosawa ever made, but that doesn't mean it isn't powerful and moving. The duel of the title begins in a nameless, hellish, rainy jungle somewhere in the World War II Pacific theater. Brave Dr. Fujisaki (played by Kurosawa regular Toshiro Mifune) needs his nerve endings to save a patient's life, so he momentarily takes his gloves off. Moments later, he cuts his hand on a scalpel, and is then horrified to learn that the man he saved has the dread disease of syphilis. The closely-controlled performances of Mifune, Takashi Shimura (playing his father and business partner), and Noriki Sengoku (playing a nurse and eventual follower) really make the film. Kurosawa’s photography is minimalist and straightforward, not showing the elaborate touches of Dreams, the other work of his that I’ve seen recently. That said, it does have artful touches, especially images of winter in Japan that he and his cinematographer use to show the passage of time and the seriousness of the doctor’s condition and commitments. One of the few disappointments is Miki Sanjo, playing the doctor’s fiancee; her role seems melodramatic and underused. Overall, however, this is well worth seeing if you get the chance. RATING: 8.

PARTING GLANCES: In 1985, at a time when "faggot" was just about the worst insult you could sling at anyone in my high school (and in many other places all over the country), it took a lot of courage to make a movie, even a small-time independent movie, that featured gay characters. It took even more courage to make one in which the gay characters took center stage, had reasonably normal and happy lives, and had a friend who was dying of AIDS. Such a movie was made, however, and this is it. Surprisingly, while the clothes and decorations are a bit dated, the late Bill Sherwood's script is actually not dated at all; it's witty, trenchant, and filled with observations that are telling whether you are gay, straight, or whatever (in that way, it's much like Kissing Jessica Stein, another "gay" movie I reviewed a few issues ago). Steve Buscemi, as the friend with AIDS, gives by far the best performance, partly because he's given the meatiest role: a tough New York cynic who might, or might not, really want to be loved inside, a biting debater who is also a loyal friend, a dying man who wants to be idealistic, but perhaps understandably can't find the reason, or the hope, he needs for that task. A scene where he confronts, Christmas Carol style, the ghost of an old friend who died of the disease early on manages to be wise, haunting, and funny, all at the same time. The other two leads (a couple played by Richard Ganoung and John Bolger) aren't horrible (Ganoung is better, mostly because he’s not as flat as Bolger), but inevitably suffer by comparison, not least because their story comes off as a bit melodramatic. The other problem, an ending that was beautifully conceived and filmed but still comes off as disappointing, is more serious, but I was still happy to get a chance to see the movie. Mention must be made of the soundtrack, which mixes two incongruous elements--Brahms and the 80's dance-club group Bronski Beat--without missing a beat (pun intended) or sounding strange. I liked it, even though I'm not a huge Bronski Beat fan. Fans of the terrific 1990 indie movie Metropolitan should see this as well, since Parting Glances seems to have influenced the later film. RATING: 8.