(November 6)

——Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006)——

Borat easily stands up as the funniest movie of the year, a sort of Jackass movie where the real Jackass isn’t the guy rolling around naked in a conference hall with a fat hairy guy (also naked), but the average American. Sacha Baron Cohen has created a genius character, a lovable, if extremely misguided Kazakhstani journalist in America to make a film about what makes America so great, so that he can take it back to his own country to teach them how to be just like us. It’s a fictional set-up with a documentary-like twist: Cohen uses real people as the other characters in his film, not at all in on the joke. So what we really have is a film that tells us a lot about who we really are in this post-9/11 George W. America. People are surprisingly eager to let it be known how much they hate Jews, homosexuals and foreigners.

If that were all the movie were about, though, it wouldn’t be as good as it is. Borat’s innocence makes some extremely offensive jokes amazingly funny, even if you do have to groan at the same time. When Borat tries unsuccessfully to buy a gun to protect himself against the Jews (not unsuccessful because he wants to kill Jews, but because he isn’t a US citizen), he buys a bear to protect himself instead. That’s what makes the film work. Very often it is a satire, but it also works as a straight out comedy at the same time. Watching a group of kids run up to their ice cream truck only to find a bear in the back is classic comedy.

Not everyone is going to like this movie. It is very offensive. It can be painful to watch at times. It has a big fat hairy naked guy (remember him?). But if you can get past all of that, you’ve got a hell of a treat in store for you.

(MUST SEE)

(November 10)

——A Good Year (2006)——

This is a classic example of cinematic comfort food. You feel good watching it, but there is absolutely no substance to it, so you forget the film almost instantly after leaving the theater. I love Russell Crowe, and he’s good in this, but he’s not the character, at least not enough to make this film something better. He plays a stockbroker, a real prick in need of a life of some substance. He spent summers as a kid at his uncle’s vineyard in France, learning the joys in life, but somehow he forgot all of those things once the greedy bugger in him took over. When his uncle dies, he has to go to France to sell the place, but of course gets stuck there and starts to remember what he loved about it in the first place. Pretty standard stuff, really.

The script is…eh. It’s functional, but it doesn’t really go anywhere. No zingy dialogue, no great buildups of tension. The film feels like going on vacation to the vineyard of the film. Yeah, it’s beautiful, but after you leave you realize that you didn’t really do anything while you were there. You saw some pretty sights, but did you get anything out of the experience other than that? Not really. This is a minor Ridley Scott film.

(MISS)

——Cars (2006)——

Ca-chi-GA! Ca-chi-GA! That’s become the new rally cry at work. (If you’ve seen the movie, you know what I’m talking about.) We started using Cars as our First Wow demo in the store, and let’s just say that I’ve seen the end of this movie more times than I care to count. Which was why I decided to watch this DVD with my folks so soon after the film came out on DVD, so that I could see it one more time untainted before watching it looped a billion times made me resent it.

I really love this movie. As I mentioned in my previous review after seeing it in the theaters, the trailers for this didn’t make it look great. A lot of people thought that Pixar had finally lost it. But the movie turned out to be an instant classic. I haven’t talked to anyone yet who doesn’t just like it, but loves it. It’s super funny, amazingly beautiful, and filled with enough hidden in-jokes to keep you laughing after multiple viewings. You’ll want to have a big screen, hi-def TV after watching it just to take in all of the stunning details. I instantly want to drive Route 66 every time I see it. Pixar made another winner and if you haven’t seen this yet, what the heck are you waiting for?

(MUST SEE)

——Our Man Flint (1965)——

Made at the height of Bond mania, Our Man Flint is both an homage and a spoof of 007 at the same time. At times the film is played completely straight (or at least as straight as a James Bond movie can be), but it is hard to take it seriously because Flint himself is so over the top. Flint knows everything (he can look at some chemical compounds and know that they come from a dish only served in a certain part of France), can do anything (including karate, which the gangly James Coburn makes look hilarious in practice), doesn’t need gadgets (except for his lighter with 82 different functions), and has FOUR girlfriends (by the end of the movie, make that five). He’s like Bond on steroids.

A criminal organization has developed a device that can alter the world’s weather, effectively hurrying up global warming, and they are holding the world at ransom. All of the government’s computers point out that Derek Flint is the best man for the job of thwarting them, but Lee J. Cobb doesn’t want him because he is impossible to manage. But as he’s the only man who can possibly do the job, our man Flint is in. The midsection of the film lands a little flat, as it is just like a standard Bond film without quite as much Bond-ness. But it kicks into high gear again at the end when Flint emerges on the secret volcano layer/pleasure island. You can see why Austin Powers loves these films. The henchmen wear the same outfits, die the same senseless deaths and look just as stupid. The island is the epitome of 60’s cool. Like I said, it’s straight out of a Bond movie.

What makes it worth watching though, is when Flint finally meets the scientists that lead this criminal organization. They actually don’t seem that bad. They are pretty mild mannered and are just holding the world ransom so that all the major superpowers will destroy their weapons so we can all live in peace. The only thing even remotely bad about them is that they take uncooperative women and hypnotize them into being willing sex slaves to keep the henchmen worker drones happy. I’m not sure Flint would have even minded that, except for the fact that they had hypnotized his four/five girlfriends too. What’s great is when Flint starts destroying the island lair and the scientist plead with him to join them. “We’re just trying to get peace in the world! Why won’t you join us?” Flint’s response is that “It’s not my kind of peace!” Even though it was a pretty good idea, because it wasn’t Flint’s idea he isn’t going for it. There really isn’t an ethical debate in his mind, at least none that I could see.

If you like these kinds of movie (aka, classic James Bond movies or at least movies that would make Austin Powers giddy) check out Our Man Flint.

(SEE)

(November 11)

——Winchester ’73 (1950)——

I’m really digging the Anthony Mann directed, James Stewart Westerns. This is the third one I’ve gotten to so far, and by far my favorite. It’s gritty, raw and filled with tension. With Anthony Mann Westerns you tend to forget all about those lame images of Westerns you had in your head, where the good guy always wore a white hat. In his Westerns the lines are always blurred.

Lin McAdam (Stewart) is a hotshot rifleman who enters a shooting contest to win a one-of-a-kind Winchester rifle, trying to smoke out another expert rifleman who also just happened to kill his pa. The two are the finalists in the contest, but Stewart wins by shooting a stamp out of a small ring thrown in the air. He takes the rifle, but does keep it for long before the man he’s looking for jumps him and takes the rifle. The movie follows the rifle as it changes owner, from our film’s bad guy to a gun dealer, to an Indian chief who kills him for the gun and a settler who’s trying to make a good life for himself, but can’t seem to shake off unsavory characters. The gun finally finds itself circling back to our main characters and their final showdown, where it is revealed (SPOILER ALERT) that the man Stewart is looking to kill is really his brother.

The black and white cinematography does an excellent job of accentuating the darker undertones of the story, and all of the actors do a fantastic job with their roles. This is a true classic, must see for anyone wanting to see all of the great Westerns.

(MUST SEE)

——Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961)——

Breakfast at Tiffany’s was my introduction to the stunning beauty that is Audrey Hepburn, way back senior year of college, and if you are going to start somewhere, this is as good a place as any. I think most people remember her for this movie, which makes sense because it’s a quirky, unique film that rises above other similar films of this period. There is a lot of hidden subtext that really isn’t all that hidden (although I have to admit that I didn’t remember a lot of it from the first time around). Wrapped in the disguise of a traditional romantic dramedy is a rich story (lifted from Truman Capote’s novel) about a call girl (Who pays a girl $50 to go to the powder room?) who lacks the security of a real identity or a real feeling of having a place to call her own. She’s just like her alley cat, named Cat, wandering from one gutter to another looking for something she’ll never find in the gutter. A gigolo/writer moves in upstairs, falls in love with her unique attitude towards life, and tries to show her that she can have real love. She doesn’t need to land a rich millionaire to attain happiness in this world. All she needs is someone who really loves her for her.

The overall story is pretty heavy stuff, so it’s good that the movie is also packed with so much comedy. Holly Golightly lives in a whirlwind world of constant parties filled with bizarre bohemian New Yorkers and their various hanger-ons, and Audrey Hepburn makes you love this quirky character who just takes everyone and every situation as it comes along. It’s fun stuff, definitely something you should see if you haven’t already.

(MUST SEE)