Tonight at the Shattuck Cinema, Northern California will get its first official look at Don Coscarelli’s newest genre defying film John Dies at the End. Spoiler alter: John does not die at the end. He dies about a third of the way through, but that doesn’t really matter because death doesn’t really matter because time, the universe, and all that jazz is some kind of cosmic pretzel. It all makes sense, but mostly it is just a hell of a fun ride.

Let me describe the opening of film. Our hero David hacks the head off a man with a cheap ax from Home Depot. In the process, he breaks the ax handle. He goes to the hardware store and gets a new handle for the ax. Another event causes him to break the ax head. He goes to the hardware store again and replaces the head. When he gets back home, the reanimated man he killed at the beginning (his head reattached with plastic weed trimmer line) comes back. He sees the ax and says, “That’s the ax that slayed me!” David posits the question, “Is he right?”

Ah! That’s the way all horror films should start: with a good philosophical question about the nature of reality. It really all does depend upon your definition of what is is. And what John Dies at the End is is a lot of stuff: gore fest; film noir; amputee romantic comedy; and, of course, treatise on the question of existence.

The film is nothing so much as a reminder that David Cronenberg used to make really great movies. This film reminded me a lot of Videodrome and especially eXistenZ. But, perhaps for personal reasons, I think that John Dies at the End is better than anything Cronenberg ever did. I always feel like an outsider while watching Cronenberg—his obsessions are not mine. But in John, I was fulling plugged in. Over the last few years, I’ve become more and more a mystic; existence is far more bizarre than we can imagine.

Consider, for example, this discussion of the nature of the universe (this is from A Brief History of Time):

To be honest, I’m not sure what I’m supposed to think about this story. But what I do take away from it is that the old lady was right: turtles all the way down. When you start thinking about the nature of existence you are forced one way or another to just shrug your shoulders. Some find such thoughts really boring. Others, like me, find them forever fascinating.

John Dies at the End provides a concrete way to think about such things. Plus a lot of blood. And jokes.

I recently got the new Criterion Collection version of Seven Samurai. It is a great film—maybe even Akira Kurosawa’s greatest film. It certainly isn’t my favorite, however; Yojimbo is a lot more fun. But it is masterful filmmaking. This latest edition includes a tag-team commentary by five experts: Stephen Prince, David Desser, Tony Rayns, Donald Richie, and Joan Mellen. I am kind of a fan of Prince, and would have been content just to have him for the almost four hour film. But it is very edifying to get all the different input, especially from Joan Mellen. But I want to discuss the commentary from the original release, which is done by Michael Jeck.

At the beginning of the film, the bandits look over the villiage and decide not to attack it until the barley is ripe. They all ride away. Jeck comments, “Now why are they galloping? It was only on the fifteenth viewing that I thought even to ask the question. Of course, because it makes it more exciting. But it took me fifteen viewings because Kurosawa is so subtle and begins in medias res.” Oh my!

This bit sums up the entire commentary. Right off the top, you have to ask: was it really necessary to throw in that Latin phrase? Wouldn’t it have been easier and better to just say that the film starts right in the middle of things? But okay. Film commentaries are generally pretentious endeavors. But it doesn’t exactly bode well for the rest.

What is most troubling in this commentary is that he makes a big deal out our Kurosawa’s decision to have the bandits gallop away. I feel quite certain that he did that because that’s just the way it is always done in movies. Yes, it is exciting. This is why it has been done at least since The Great Train Robbery, back in 1903. It would have been silly if the lead bandit had said, “We will return when the barley is ripe. Now everyone off your horses! They are tired and need to rest!” The reason that Jeck didn’t note why the bandits galloped away until his fifteenth viewing is because it is in no way worthy of note.

And this gets to the heart of what is wrong with Jeck: he accepts the auteur theory. This is the idea that a film is the result of the director’s creative vision. There is much to be said of the theory. In most regards, it is the director who has the final say as to how things are done. But as we learned with our “decider” President George W. Bush, there is a big difference between coming up with your own ideas and just selecting from three that Vice-President Cheney presents to you. This is normally the way that directors work with all of their department heads.

It is true that Kurosawa has a distinctive look to his films. But this is not entirely due to him. It is also thanks to Takashi Matsuyama’s art direction. And the cinematography of Asakazu Nakai. And the amazing costume design in Seven Samurai by Kohei Ezaki. And his many other experts and actors. Certainly, the films have qualities that only Takashi Shimura and Toshiro Mifune would add. Unfortunately, Jeck tells us over and over that this or that was put in the film because Kurosawa wanted it that way. Surely, this is not always true.

There is something to say for Jeck, I suppose. I remember going to see Fargo with a friend and she asked me a telling question afterwards. The film starts with a car driving toward the camera. It dips below the horizon and then back above it because of the changing elevation of the road. She wanted to know if that just happened to be the way the road was or if it was planned that way. I told her it was planned that way. But that is as far as I’m willing to take it. It might have been planned from the start. It might have been the image that the Coen brothers started with. It is also possible it was something improvised by the second unit cameraman. “You know, if we set the camera here, we’ll see the car, then it will disappear, and then we’ll see it again.” The truth is that there are a lot of really creative people who make films, and it is an insult to them to turn directors into gods who come up with every good idea in a film. Just the same, damned little that appears on screen is an accident.

What is most sad about the commentary is that Michael Jeck has a lot of knowledge to offer. He understands Japanese history and so he explains many things that a western viewer would miss. And mostly he is right on about what is important from a film standpoint. But there are only so many times that I can be told that it is windy because Kurosawa wanted it that way rather than it just being windy on the day of shooting.

Afterword

Of course, you should own this version of Seven Samurai. And Yojimbo. And Sanjuro. (Use the links above to buy it from Amazon and you can donate a few nickles to this site.)

If you are looking for a tedious film to slog through tonight, you could not do better (Worse?) than 1990’s romantic comedy sensation Green Card. Rarely has Gerard Depardieu been less annoying, and by that I mean really annoying, but not as annoying as in, says, My Father the Hero or The Man in the Iron Mask. And never has Andie MacDowell been more or less lifelike. But neither of these “fine” actors (As in: those two? Actors? Fine! Whatever!) are really what makes this such a tedious slog. No, the real problem is the script.

Green Card is written, directed, and produced by Peter Weir. Ah, that got your attention, didn’t it?! He’s directed some good films: Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Year of Living Dangerously, and The Truman Show. But here’s the thing: he didn’t write those films. Wanna know why? Because he can’t write.

The film has its moments. Gerard Depardieu is amusing at times. Andie MacDowell smiles in some scene. Frowns in others. But overall, the film isn’t any one thing. It is just a little comedy here, a little romance there, and little farce some place else. A good example of this is how the film deals with MacDowell’s current boyfriend. He is chased off by Depardieu, claiming that he will find out what’s going on. We never see him again. Whatever!

And “Whatever!” is right. Because the plot of Green Card is the second worst thing about it. The very worst thing about it is that the characters have all the depth of Andie MacDowell’s acting. That’s right: the characters are make-up thick. Weir seems to be capable of creating two kinds of characters: stereotypes and boring types. The best friend, the boy friend, and the Frenchman are a stereotypes. The female lead is a nonentity, which at least explains why they picked MacDowell: type casting.

So why did I pick Green Card to watch tonight? Part of it was that I wanted to see if the film was better than I remembered it being 22 years ago. In fact, it turned out to be much worse. But it was fun to hate it so much, knowing what a fucktard Depardieu is. Look at him there with Putin.

I don’t know what to say. Should I attack or praise? On the one hand, Terry Gilliam created a really mediocre film in Time Bandits. (Just calm down: I’ll explain in a minute.) On the other, Terry Gilliam created one of my very favorite films in 12 Monkeys. And you know what the difference is? Madeleine Stowe. No. Just kidding, even though you can definitely throw Stowe on my ever increasing list of woman I have a crush on. No. The difference is the script.

There is much to like about Time Bandits. It has some wonderful comic bits. It has what I have come to think of as “Terry Gilliam art direction.” And the mostly optical special effects are surprisingly good. (Compare them to the original Star Wars effects and you’ll see the difference.) And I’ll admit, when I saw this film as a kid, I liked it. At least, that’s how I remember it.

But it’s a mess. It is nothing more than an excuse to do a bunch of scenes with different costumes. And despite its flashes of brilliance, it just isn’t engaging. Whenever you get involved with a part of the film, you are ripped to another time. In a very real sense, it is an episode of Monty Python without being truly funny. With a really pretentious third act.

Compare it to Gilliam’s later film, 12 Monkeys. This is a film that could easily have been just as disconnected and meaningless as Time Bandits. But it is grounded in as good a screenplay as I have ever seen by the incredibly talented David Peoples (along with his wife, Janet). In a sense, it was the perfect combination: the right script for Gilliam, who I otherwise find wanting.

Time Bandits starts and never really ends. It just meanders on and stops. I learned from an interview on the DVD that the ending with Sean Connery wasn’t even planned. Gilliam and co-writer Michael Palin just planned to leave the little boy parentless at the end of the film with no thought of where he might go from there.

12 Monkeys has one of the most satisfying endings of any movie I can think of. James Cole learns that the memory that has been haunting him since childhood is the witnessing of his own death. What’s more, even though the film moves through various times, we are never confused. There is dramatic momentum throughout, and the fact that we do not end where we think we are heading makes it all the better.

I don’t mean to rag on Time Bandits as much as gush about 12 Monkeys. I understand that Time Bandits is a children’s film. Just the same, Frankenweenie, ParaNorman, and the extremely great Babe: Pig in the City are all far better. I do not see what the big deal is about Time Bandits. I do not think it is even effective as pure entertainment. On the other hand, if you have not seen 12 Monkeys, you should. It is one of the very best big budget Hollywood films ever.

Update (18 February 2013 10:34 pm)

On my most recent viewing of Babe: Pig in the City, I was not as impressed. But it is still a fine film.

I can’t watch a western without thinking, “They didn’t have duels like that!” And this tends to ruin these movies. Does anyone think that when a life is on the line that a man will stand on ceremony and wait for his opponent to draw first? Or that, on seeing his opponent draw, he would be able to react fast enough and draw even faster? There is a word for this kind of thing: silly.

But I like the idea of the western. I like the moral clarity or, in the more interesting cases, the clear moral ambiguity. But I don’t like the duels. So if I’m to not be limited to The Ox-Bow Incident (great as it is), I have to look elsewhere. And there is nowhere else that is better than Japanese samurai movies. There are lots of duels in them, but they mostly don’t defy belief.

I think there is more than just that, though. There is much to like in Japanese cinema. Now, I’ll admit that I’ve over-sampled from the Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune wells. But I rather like Japanese film, in general. I even like the Gamera films, which featured a “terrifying” giant turtle—sort of the low-budget answer to Godzilla. However, what I really like are the more highbrow films. They deal with subjects that speak to me.

One such film is Samurai Rebellion, which I have had sitting around for a few months without watching it. In the last week, I’ve watched it twice. Frankly, I picking it up for two reasons: it stars Toshiro Mifune and it has “Samurai” in the title. On this second account, the film is kind of disappointing: it doesn’t have that much sword fighting action. It has some, of course; and it is rather well done; but Yojimbo it ain’t. In particular, it has a wonderful fight between Mifune and Tatsuya Nakadai: the two who had that great fight at the end of Sanjuro.

Samurai Rebellion is a film about honor. And despite what many of my readers may think, honor is a big issue for me. In fact, it is one of my great disappointments with politics: politicians are too dedicated to their ideologies and moneyed interests to do what is best for their constituencies. And we will see when the debt ceiling comes up: will conservatives really be willing to damage the world economy in the name of fanciful economic policies? In Tokugawa period Japan, the Samurai Class would never have allowed such a thing.

The film tells the story of Isaburo Sasahara, the best swordsman in the land. The local ruler forces Isaburo’s son to marry one of the ruler’s ex-concubines, because she has become troublesome, even though she is the mother of the ruler’s heir. Isaburo’s son marries her and the two fall in love. But then the ruler dies and the ruling elite want the woman to come back and live at the castle, because she is the mother of the new (child) ruler. The couple refuse to do this, pushed on by Isaburo himself, who is in a loveless marriage and is inspired by their love. So they rebel. It does not go well.

As usual for Japanese films of this time (1967), it is beautifully shot. It also has the traditional settings that seem as though they were made to be filmed. There are also strong performances all around. I’ve really come to appreciate the more intense acting in the Japanese cinema of that time. Since then, as with films like Vengeance Is Mine, the acting has become more naturalistic. I’m not sure that’s a good thing.

Regardless, the film works primarily because it tells a very engaging story. After months of discussion of fiscal cliffs and gun regulation that will never get enacted, it is nice to watch people who stand for something other than wealth and power. Check out Samurai Rebellion; I think you will enjoy it.

Afterword

I just checked and the film has a 100% “fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Reinhold Weege died last week. The Los Angeles Times has reported that Weege died of natural causes on 1 December. He was only 62.

When I heard the news, I recognized the name. I am very much a geek about comedy writers and I pay close attention to the writing credits of any movie or TV show that I like. And Weege wrote a lot on one TV show I still really like, Barney Miller. He is known mostly for creating the show Night Court, for which he wrote a lot of the episodes.

Reinhold Weege co-wrote one of my favorite episodes of Barney Miller with Tony Sheehan, “Christmas Story.” The main story is about Nick Yemana and a date he sets up with a woman who, unbeknownst to him, is a prostitute. It is very sweet. Here are all of these scenes cut together (6:41):

Enjoy your rest, Reinhold Weege.

Afterword

For the record, Nick Yemana is my favorite character on the show. There are two reasons. First, Jack Soo is a brilliant comedic actor. Second, the character is so compromised as a cop. He is something of a gambling addict and his being in a relationship with a prostitute is completely in keeping with his character. He died very young at 61. Interestingly, the actor playing Dorothy, Nobu McCarthy, also died young at 67. The “Christmas Story” curse? I leave that to you.

This is my favorite scene from Jaws:

There are a couple of things about this speech. First, it was not written by Peter Benchley or Carl Gottlieb. The idea for Quint having been on the USS Indianapolis came from Howard Sackler (The Great White Hope). Most of the writing of the speech itself seems to have been done by Robert Shaw himself. (John Milius has also taken substantial credit, but I don’t find that very likely, and not just because I don’t like Milius.) For the record, it is surprising that Jaws was a best-selling novel. It is not that interesting. Most of the drama in the book has to do with the infidelity of Brody’s wife.

Also, what Quint says about the sharks is not really true. Most of the men died of exposure, desquamation (skin peeling), and thirst. There were still a lot of shark attacks and undoubtedly the sharks feasted on the dead as well. The majority of the sharks were not Tiger but rather White Tip. According to one of the episodes of Planet Earth, White Tip sharks are responsible for more human deaths than any other sharks, because of attacks on survivors of downed ships and planes.

Finally, over 300 men died on board the Indianapolis, so only 880 actually went into the water. Roughly 560 died in the water. Of the 321 who were rescued, 317 survived.

Don’t go near the water!

Afterword

This is from Wikipedia and speaks to the intelligence of the Great White shark. Just to clear up what Jaws may have taught you about the shark, “Mr. Vaughn, what we are dealing with here is a perfect engine, an eating machine. It’s really a miracle of evolution. All this machine does is swim and eat and make little sharks, and that’s all.” Not really. Great White sharks are very complex:

Last night I watched Midnight in Paris. It is quite a good film with lots of honest fun for the intellectually or artistically inclined. On the down side, it is a Woody Allen film. By this I mean that it was continuously delightful but never transcendent. Of course, it will likely also be the best film you will see in the next year.

The main thing that bugged me was how heavy handed the film was about its theme of illusion and reality. It came to a head in the third act where Gil Pender has taken Adriana from her world in 1920s back to the world of 1890. Just as Gil wanted to escape the modern world and live in the 1920s, Adriana wanted to escape back to the 1890s. When Adriana wants to stay, Gil explains the problem. Most of it is unbearable. But like a good neurotic, Allen pulls it back to the reality of better living through chemistry:

As a side issue that doesn’t much get in the way, this is all fine. But to make a big deal about it? It detracts, to say the least. Not only is it old news that people dream of a better time. It is old news that people have always known it was old news. This is from 1859:

But as I said, it is a fun movie. Unfortunately, Modigliani did not live long enough to be one of the characters.

But we’ll always have this: