Capsules!

I have seriously neglected my movie reviews. I've been too excited to be living back in America to attend to my blogging duties. So, in brief, here are the movies I have seen in the past month:

Equinox Flower and Late Autumn, two Japaneze movies directed by Yasujiro Ozu that are already blurring together in my mind. That sounds like a bad thing, but it isn't. Ozu had a tendency, like Cassavetes, or Almodovar, or any other smart director, to use the same actors over and over, in similar roles. That causes the movies to run together in my mind, but insofar as they become larger than the sum of their parts: Ozu has created a bittersweet, wry, thoughtful portrait of Japanese postwar familial crises and the rising role of the modern, independent woman. My guess is that watching more of his late movies would only enrichen that portrait, without feeling redundant.

Nothing could stray farther from Ozu than Live Flesh, a tradmark Almodovar drama. The plot is so fantastic I can only tell you the first five minutes: A boy is born on a bus during a harrowing night in Madrid in 1970. Fast forward 20 years. He loses his virginity to a junkie; she makes a date with him. He calls her and she breaks her date. He confronts her and they tussle and he accidentally knocks her out. A neighbor, hearing the noise, calls the police. The cops are arguing and the driving cop is dead drunk (problems with his wife). They arrive on the scene, while in the meantime the boy has confiscated a gun from the junkie and, terrified that he'll get in trouble, takes the junkie hostage. The sober cop tries to talk him down, while the drunk cop antagonizes him. Finally the drunk cop attacks him to wrestle the gun away. The sober cop pulls the junkie towards him and away from the fight, and you can tell she's fallen in love with him at first sight. The boy and the cop tussle; the gun fires; and the sober cop is shot.

Then the story REALLY starts, and involves quite a few twists, as usual, with gorgeous cinematography and sensual liaisons and high drama in that way that Almodovar does so well. I loved this movie so much that instead of watching it for half an hour and going to sleep like a responsible person on a weeknight, I had to stay up for the whole thing and was exhausted at work the next day. It was worth it.

A comedy that rather surprised me was Role Models. I watched it because it was on in the living room and I had nothing better to do. I ended up laughing consistently throughout the movie. Paul Rudd is so, so funny, mostly because he is such an asshole in this movie. I'm not a huge fan of Sean William Scott (Stiffler! Ugh. American Pie.), but I love the boy he mentors in the movie. "Fuck you, Miss Daisy," is now one of my new favorite movie quotes. I highly recommend it, because it's got some really good jokes, and because it's part of this bizarre genre of movies that seems to be ever more popular, the bromance. I find them fascinating.

One movie I haven't seen since I was a child is The Gods Must Be Crazy. It is still so good! I can't believe this movie isn't more of a cult classic. I've never met anyone else who's seen it. I highly, highly recommend it. It's slapstick and mockumentary and delicious irreverence, long before Spinal Tap. It's a political satire of African postcolonialism and the malicious encroaching of modernity, with lots of Chaplinesque falls and sightgags. I laughed so hard at such timeless gags.

I re-watched An Affair to Remember. I can never see this movie too many times. I don't know how I'm so in love with Carey Grant, but I am. I can't tell if it's because he had great taste in picking roles or if he just makes all his roles that memorable, but I can't think of a movie where I haven't thorgoughly enjoyed him. I just love the sassy exchanges between him and Deborah Kerr. I also love that this movie is a truly High Romance. Directors like Almodovar reinterpret High Romance in their own kooky ways, but this is original. This is essential. It must be seen, if only for the moments when the two leads are inspecting their respective soon-to-be-insignificant-others as their boat pulls into port. It is priceless.

Lastly, I re-watched Magnificent Obsession. Rock Hudson. Jane Wyman. Less fabulous than All That Heaven Allows, but still agonizing if you don't know how it ends, and merely touching and beautiful if you do. I recommend watching All That Heaven Allows first, then seeing Magnificent Obsession for healthy comparison. Also has Agnes Moorehead, looking strange and forbidding as usual.