Season of the Witch 2011 Dominic Sena

I'm sort of fascinated by Nicolas Cage and his desperate need to pay off the IRS and not be broke.  He seems to accept any role offered to him, and because he says yes, some really iffy movies get made.  Sometimes they're awesome - Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans - sometimes they're awesome trash - Drive Angry - and sometimes they're just trash.  This joins Knowing in the trash pile.

Nicolas Cage and Ron Perlman play buddies in the Crusades.  Before every battle, they make a bet on who will kill the most infidels.  Whoever comes up short has to pay the bar tab that night.  Sounds fair.  Then Nicolas Cage discovers that -oh my god- they kill women and children too in this Crusade thing!  That's not fair at all, so the two buddies decide to quit this whole Crusade bag and hit the road.

Since the Church is like the mob - once you're out, they pull you back in - Nic and Ron get blackmailed into pulling one last job, and then they're out for good.  This time they have to escort a team of religious folks who are taking a witch to an abbey to be burned at the stake.

Things don't turn out well for most of the people involved, but honestly, I kind of tuned out at this point.  And I didn't miss anything.  I mean, I saw when characters died, and I even correctly guessed how and when certain characters would go, but I just didn't care.  At all.  There's nothing worse than a bad Nicolas Cage movie that's also boring.  It's not even fun bad.  It's just lame.

Pay your bills, buddy.  At least you'll be able to stop making movies like this one.

Ode to Billy Joe 1976 Max Baer Jr.

Welcome to another edition of "Why The Hell Isn't This On DVD?".  The movie in question is Ode to Billy Joe.  It was made in 1976, was a big hit, and promptly disappeared.  Now it's back, thanks to Netflix Instant Watch, and it's pretty fantastic.

The movie follows in the grand tradition of films based on songs.  What's that?  No good movies were ever based on songs?  What about Convoy?  Or Take This Job and Shove It?  This movie's different, though.  I swear.  Yes, it was directed by Jethro from the Beverly Hillbillies, but still.  I'm not going to bother with the plot details - listen to the song, it's all there.

The film looks fantastic.  It was shot on location in Mississippi, near the spots mentioned in Bobbie Gentry's song.  I was surprised to see that the cinematographer basically did years and years of TV shows after this, which is a real shame.  It would look spectacular on Blu-ray.  Most of the extras in the movie appear to be locals, which adds to the realism of the film.

Then there's Robby Benson.  When I was a kid, Robby Benson was in everything.  HBO had a habit of running the same 10 movies for what seemed like months at a time, which meant that alongside the Robby Benson-free  Beastmaster and Young Doctors in Love, I saw Ice Castles, One on One, and Running Brave pretty much nonstop.  When I saw Kon Ichikawa's Tokyo Olympiad, which contains the real Billy Mills running his real gold medal race, I thought "Oh my god, he really does look like Robby Benson!"  And guess what?  Robby Benson totally comes through in this movie, too. 

That's not to say that his love interest, Bobby Lee Hartley (Glynnis O'Connor), is anything special, though.  Billy Joe does jump off the Tallahatchie Bridge, after all.  Bobby Lee does nothing except radiate overwhelming plainness.  Glynnis O'Connor is a good actress - she has a great scene near the end with the sawmill owner (James Best - Roscoe P. Coltrane, himself!) - but she doesn't seem to be worth all the trouble.

But it is a story about young lovers, after all, so maybe Robby Benson's uncontrollable urges are understandable in that light.  They even got Michel Legrand to do some appropriately romantic music for the film.  He did the score for The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, one of the most romantic movies of all time, so he knows what he's doing.  In fact, they loaded up talented people on both sides of the camera for this film.  Not bad for a movie based on a hit song.

It's certainly better than Harper Valley P.T.A..

Brannigan 1975 Douglas Hickox

He was supposed to be Dirty Harry, but he turned it down.  Then Dirty Harry became a huge hit, and the old cowboy had to leave the ranch to prove that he could still handle the punks of today (1975).  Because of that, we have Brannigan - in which 68 year old John Wayne plays a tough as nails Chicago cop sent to London to bring back a gangster named Larkin (John Vernon).

Since that would be a boring and short movie, hijinks ensue, and Brannigan, his Scotland Yard boss Sir Charles (Richard Attenborough), and driver Jenny (Judy Geeson) have to find Larkin before other bad guys kill him.  It really doesn't matter, though.  The whole movie is just an excuse to have The Duke amble through London insulting everyone and causing property damage.  I actually think that this movie is a huge reason for the "Ugly American" stereotype.  John Wayne thinks all English people are simple, and goddamn it, he's not giving up his gun!  He's from Chicago!  He needs his gun!  He still speaks like this is a western!  He does what he wants!  USA!  USA!  USA!

Probably the most famous sequence of the movie happens when Brannigan goes into a pub to talk to a suspect.  Through his very special John Wayne powers, he causes a brawl.  Not just any brawl, but a full fledged saloon brawl!  He's punching people and calling them "Pardner".  People are being thrown at the piano player, and one guy even falls through the breakaway railing on the upper level.  The only things missing are cowboy hats.

It's not that bad of a movie - it's just a little sad to see John Wayne look so out of place.  He has the same problem as Kiera Knightley - he just doesn't look like he belongs in the present.  John Wayne should never be in a car.  Or a pub.  Or a bathroom.  It just feels wrong.  But he is still likeable, and through it all, you really want to see him catch the bad guy, even if he is visibly loaded in a few scenes (especially the showdown with Larkin's kidnappers - I could smell the booze through my TV!).  Don't go thinking he's too old for this, though.  Sylvester Stallone's making The Expendables 2, and when that comes out, he'll be a ripe, old 66.  Food for thought, isn't it?

The Tree of Life 2011 Terrence Malick

Remember 8 1/2?  Federico Fellini's movie about how hard it was to be himself?  Whoever hasn't seen 8 1/2, raise your hand.  Have you seen All That Jazz?  Bob Fosse's movie about how hard it was to be Bob Fosse?  Well, now we have Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life.  It might not specifically be about how hard it is grow up Terrence Malick, but it's rreeaallly close to being about that exact thing.

Before he got into making movies, Terrence Malick taught philosophy at MIT.  It's a good thing to keep that in mind while watching this film, because it takes serious cojones to make a semi-autobiographical film about your experiences growing up, and also include the beginnings of life on Earth as part of your story.  That sequence is fantastic, but c'mon - no one is that important.  Look!  There's a lifeless ball of rock in space!  There's the sun!  Now there's life!  OOOOOH, DINOSAURS!!!!!  There's that meteor....so long dinosaurs.....Look!  It's Terrence Malick - I mean, a baby being born! 

Maybe I'm being a little hard on this movie.

It is pretty fantastic, mostly.  I actually loved every second of it for about the first hour.  Then it got a little long.  Then it got a lot longer.  At this point I started watching all the fantastic cinematography and stopped paying attention to the story, such as it is.  It was at this time I realized that you could show this movie, with the score intact, but no dialogue and it would be the greatest movie ever made.  With the dialogue there, it becomes pretentious from time to time, probably moreso if you're not in the mood to watch an introspective, slow film about human life.

The funny thing is - as I'm writing about this movie, I want to see it again.  Pretentiousness aside, it's something everyone should see.

Rubber 2010 Quentin Dupieux

This is a simple story about Robert, a tire.  One day Robert wakes up, learns to roll, and starts to explore his world.  He's also telekenetic.  He uses his powers to blow up his enemies.  If you're a bunny, crow, bottle, or human head - look out!

Now you might be asking yourself "Why would I watch a movie about a homicidal tire?  That's ridiculous!"  Well, it is, but in the best possible way.  It's also got a lot more going on than just your basic homicidal tire movie.  It's definitely a love it or hate it move.  I love it.  I love everything about it.  Just when you think there's nothing else they can do with this movie, it takes a turn into more and more absurd territory.

Everybody should check this out.  Even if you hate it, you've never seen anything quite like it.  That's more than I can say about most movies out today.

Fellini's Casanova 1976 Federico Fellini

Oh, look!  It's another fantastic movie that's not on DVD in the US!  Imagine that!  It's on DVD in Europe, because it's Fellini.  Not here, though. Thanks again to Netflix Instant Watch for streaming this movie for a few months.  Hopefully, there will be a Criterion release of this sometime in the future.  It's that good.

This being Fellini's Casanova - key word being Fellini - it's not exactly a faithful telling of Casanova's life.  There's plenty in there, but it's been jumbled around and compressed to make room for the Fellini-esque parts of the film.  I was wondering how he would work in his love of circuses and clowns into the story of a man who slept his way through Europe.  Never fear - Fellini finds a way.  The sex scenes themselves are fairly acrobatic and circus-like.  Donald Sutherland as Casanova is completely unrecognizable under his wigs and makeup.  He looks like an aristocratic Ichabod Crane.  Since this was the age of overdubbed Italian films, he also speaks Italian.  After a while, you'll forget you're watching a famous American actor and lose yourself in this strange scarecrow's amorous adventures.

The entire film looks and feels like a cross between Baz Luhrmann at his Moulin Rouge-iest and Tarsem Singh's The Fall.  Oh yeah, it was directed by Federico Fellini, so it has the emotional impact of 8 1/2 as well.  You might feel a little silly watching Casanova row his way across acres of black trash bag waves, or have Clash of the Titans flashbacks (the original one) when you see his favorite erotic toy, but you'll be suprised at just how emotionally invested you are in the character at the end.  There are more sequences of cinematic beauty in this film than most filmakers achieve in their entire career.

Prison breaks, phantom carnivals, stuffed whales (Hello, Werckmeister Harmonies!), giant women, man-made women, spectacular chandelier maintenance and more await anyone lucky enough to see this movie.  If you've never seen a Fellini movie before, check this out.  If you have seen a Fellini movie before, get ready for one of his best.  I can't wait to see it again.