So I had heard that they (the all-powerful and all-vague They) were making a movie about GW Bush, and I might have even heard that it was going to be controversial for being the first presidential biopic to come out while the president is still in office, but I just got the details of this shindig, and hoo-boy.
Directed by Oliver Stone, starring Josh Brolin (after No Country for Old Men, I'm definitely a fan) as Bush, Richard Dreyfus as a startlingly similar-looking Cheney, and (I have to throw this in because I love her) Ellen Burstyn as Barbara Bush. I don't know if it's going to be any good, but my curiosity is definitely piqued. Check out these pictures.
http://movies.yahoo.com/photos/movie-stills/gallery/921/w-stills#photo0
Anyway. In addition, now that I'm a film student I get to take all of the random ideas and theories floating around up top and (maybe) actually write papers on them. Here's a potential paper topic for my Film History/Historiography class. Here are some thoughts:
Some of this class' readings made me start thinking about historical fiction, and how it's always been such a popular medium both for novels and cinema, and yet there is always such an inevitable backlash from people claiming the writer/filmmaker was in a certain sense trying to pull a fast one on us, trying to convince us of a history that is entirely inaccurate. I don't think that most novelists or filmmakers that set out to create "historical fiction" are really trying to give us a history lesson (that's why it's called fiction), at least not in the way that such critics claim, but that whole idea of the "spirit of the truth," or at least the framework of the truth used for the purposes of entertainment, is really interesting to me.
Obviously I would have to narrow it down quite a bit or else risk a "I'm interested in historical fiction" "well good for you I'm interested in stamp collecting, what's your point?" sort of issue. Maybe I could choose one particular historical event that has frequently been used in cinematic and literary adaptations (the life of Anne Boleyn, for the sake of argument) and compare both the historical evidence of the event itself to various "adaptations" of it (perhaps the present tv show "The Tudors" and Lubitsch's film "Anna Boleyn") and examine both the changes/liberties that the director has taken with historical fact, as well as audience reactions. Have people ever really taken such things as bona fide history lessons? For that matter, could works like this, at least in some way, be constructively used as such? Or are questions like that far too subjective?
So yeah. that's what I got so far.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Burn After Reading
(Look at me, all writing on a recent release and everything...)
If/when I see Burn After Reading again, I'll make a point to count the number of times the phrase "what the fuck?!?" is uttered. These three words basically summarize the "plot" as well as the "point" of the Coen Brothers' new film, if it can be said to have either (hence the scare quotes). It's like a farce of old, characters constantly acting at cross-purposes (intentionally or unintentionally), confusing each other and themselves, foiling allies, helping foes, and everyone sleeping with each other.
As the CIA Superior instructs the officer briefing him of the situation says, "Well... report back to me when any of it makes sense."
The movie feels like less of a finished masterpiece like No Country for Old Men, Fargo, or even The Big Lebowski, and more like the Coen bros. just got high one Saturday afternoon and decided, "hey man, let's call over some friends and make a fuckin movie man. let's just do it. I'll get a keg, you call George." And the film does feature a number of Coen frequent fliers-- George Clooney and Frances McDormand most notably. Much has been made of the film's "frivolous" nature in critical reviews, and while in one sense I agree, on the other hand I'd ask what's so wrong with frivolity. The film is hilarious.
The cast is fabulous and makes the ridiculous morass of a plot work; McDormand as a gym employee obsessed with financing a set of cosmetic surgeries and John Malkovich as a hot-headed recently-unemployed intelligence agent are particularly funny. Much has been made of Brad Pitt's turn as a beautiful dumb-as-a-doornail fitness trainer and, while he is funny, it's tough to compete with the likes of Malkovich and McDormand. That's not to say he doesn't have moments of being really quite funny, but it comes off once or twice as being just-ever-so-slightly overplayed.
I think what I liked most about Burn After Reading was the fact that it was so much of a classical farce, but made postmodern (that's right, I said fuckin po-mo) by the fact that the characters constantly call attention to the farce with the aforementioned "what the fuck?!?" A number of characters say this over and over again, especially the CIA Superior, and given the weird-and-getting-weirder events of the film, it's a natural question to ask. But usually it's the job of the audience to ask such questions; here, the film points out its own absurdity. And I like that. I also like that even though we get attached to the characters, we don't really care that much when most of them die by the end. But what kind of tragic-comic farce would it be if they didn't?
Anyway, it's a fun ride, and after No Country for Old Men, I can see how the Coen Brothers needed a little frivolity. It's not a masterpiece, but it's solid entertainment with a pleasing dose of self-consciousness. I give it a solid four out of five muffins.
If/when I see Burn After Reading again, I'll make a point to count the number of times the phrase "what the fuck?!?" is uttered. These three words basically summarize the "plot" as well as the "point" of the Coen Brothers' new film, if it can be said to have either (hence the scare quotes). It's like a farce of old, characters constantly acting at cross-purposes (intentionally or unintentionally), confusing each other and themselves, foiling allies, helping foes, and everyone sleeping with each other.
As the CIA Superior instructs the officer briefing him of the situation says, "Well... report back to me when any of it makes sense."
The movie feels like less of a finished masterpiece like No Country for Old Men, Fargo, or even The Big Lebowski, and more like the Coen bros. just got high one Saturday afternoon and decided, "hey man, let's call over some friends and make a fuckin movie man. let's just do it. I'll get a keg, you call George." And the film does feature a number of Coen frequent fliers-- George Clooney and Frances McDormand most notably. Much has been made of the film's "frivolous" nature in critical reviews, and while in one sense I agree, on the other hand I'd ask what's so wrong with frivolity. The film is hilarious.
The cast is fabulous and makes the ridiculous morass of a plot work; McDormand as a gym employee obsessed with financing a set of cosmetic surgeries and John Malkovich as a hot-headed recently-unemployed intelligence agent are particularly funny. Much has been made of Brad Pitt's turn as a beautiful dumb-as-a-doornail fitness trainer and, while he is funny, it's tough to compete with the likes of Malkovich and McDormand. That's not to say he doesn't have moments of being really quite funny, but it comes off once or twice as being just-ever-so-slightly overplayed.
I think what I liked most about Burn After Reading was the fact that it was so much of a classical farce, but made postmodern (that's right, I said fuckin po-mo) by the fact that the characters constantly call attention to the farce with the aforementioned "what the fuck?!?" A number of characters say this over and over again, especially the CIA Superior, and given the weird-and-getting-weirder events of the film, it's a natural question to ask. But usually it's the job of the audience to ask such questions; here, the film points out its own absurdity. And I like that. I also like that even though we get attached to the characters, we don't really care that much when most of them die by the end. But what kind of tragic-comic farce would it be if they didn't?
Anyway, it's a fun ride, and after No Country for Old Men, I can see how the Coen Brothers needed a little frivolity. It's not a masterpiece, but it's solid entertainment with a pleasing dose of self-consciousness. I give it a solid four out of five muffins.
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