Since Hollywood likes to remain topical (what with the World Cup and all), it was announced today that Swingers director Doug Liman is taking on the newest unnecessary remake to be announced – John Huston‘s WWII POW/soccer/prison break drama starring Michael Caine, Pelé, Max von Sydow and Sylvester Stallone (of course) is up for duty now. The basic premise of the film is that a mixed soccer team of POWs are forced to play against the Führer’s racially and athletically superior team as a show of good will. So, let’s think about this – a film that takes place in a POW camp behind enemy lines during WWII where a large portion of the prisoners happen to be all-world soccer players (there are representatives from Ireland, England, Poland, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Scotland and Norway). What possible reason can there be to update this film? It can’t be transferred to another, more recent war. Does this work in Iraq, Afghanistan or even Vietnam? Not a fucking chance. Even with Gavin O’Connor writing the script, I just don’t know how this works.
The wall with Stallone at the back. Germans beware…
This is just so fucking pointless, it makes my damn head hurt. Liman has had a decent career doing some fairly original material. Why does he have to stoop to this? The almighty dollar prevails, I guess. And how many people can ever live up to Pelé‘s delivery of the all-important “You can do it, Hatch” line? This is wrong on so many levels. Sigh.
So, once again, Hollywood execs – you and your sequel/remaking asses can suck it. Somewhere out there, there is an original, thought-provoking script just waiting to see the light of the big screen and you deal us this shit. Bah. If I didn’t love the movies so much…
End rant.
Here is the trailer for the original and triple awesome film:
P.S. I will admit I don’t appreciate that it’s the Irishman whose arm is broken so that Stallone can join the team. Always the Irish…
And better yet, here is Pelé doing what he does best:
I’m a sucker for dystopian and/or apocalyptic films. Perhaps that’s the product of being a child who grew up in the 70s and 80s with the ever present spectre of possible nuclear annihilation hanging over our heads like the Sword of Damocles. I can’t say for sure. What I can say is that films like Nicholas Meyer‘s The Day After, John Hillcoat‘s The Road (based on the fucking amazing novel of the same name by Cormac McCarthy) and especially Alfonso Cuarón‘s recent Children of Men hit a spot where others cannot. Bong Joon Ho‘s Snowpiercer gives them all a run for their money because it shows something that none of the other films like it – utopia and dystopia working in conjunction with one another to balance what is left of the human race. The juxtaposition that this creates is unexpected and powerful. Based on the French graphic novel Le Transperceneige written by Jacques Lob, Benjamin LeGrand and Jean-Marc Rochette, Snowpiercer gives us the action film that most summer blockbusters attempt to achieve but rarely deliver.
The film’s opening hits home as details are given about a substance, CW7, that has been introduced into the atmosphere to combat global warming. What scientists didn’t expect was that it would act to cool the Earth so much that introduced an ice age that could not be stopped and caused the near extinction of all life on Earth. Had it not been for the foresight of an inventor named Wilford (played by Ed Harris), humanity would have died out. How did he save humanity you ask? Well, that’s a good question. He created a self-sustaining train with a perpetual route circumnavigating the planet that housed the last of the human race.
Curtis (Chris Evans) and security expert Namgoong Minsoo (Kang-ho Song).
Flash forward 17 years…the train is still going. However, as we immediately are place in the tail of the train, the “back of the bus” in the future, life is not so good for those who live there. Filthy, emaciated, stacked on top of one another and threatened by armed troops, life really couldn’t be any worse. It is here we are introduced to our protagonist, Curtis (Captain America himself, Chris Evans). He is disillusioned about the station of life of everyone in the tail section. He is vocal and pissed and he has a gang of like-minded people surrounding him.
Gilliam (John Hurt), sage of the tail section.
However, Curtis and everyone else are led by a hobbled, one-armed, one-legged man named Gilliam (John Hurt). It is daily that they plot the uprising that will break them free of their oppression at the hands of Wilford and his goon squad. But waiting for that right moment has them all on edge. When the opportunity presents itself after two of the tail-riders’ children are stolen from them, Curtis and company incite an epic battle for control of the train. Flanked by his best friend Edgar (Jamie Bell), and the mother (Oscar-winner Octavia Spencer) and father (Trainspotting‘s Ewen Bremner) of the two boys taken, Curtis must make careful choices balancing his own thirst for revenge and his mindfulness to protect his mentor in Gilliam and the rest of his fellow tail-riders.
Mason (Tilda Swinton), caporegime of Wilford, scourge of the tail-riders.
Along the way, Mason (Tilda Swinton) does her best to shut down the revolt by reinforcing to Curtis and company that Wilford loves them and takes great care of them. After all, they could be outside in the cold freezing to death (a careful reminder is shown later in the film of several escapees who made it only 7 steps from the train until the froze to death). Slippery as any dictator’s right hand is, Mason becomes a coveted target of Curtis and his fellow revolutionaries. After her capture, she agrees to aid them in their journey through the train to the sacred engine. As Curtis and his band migrate ever closer to the front, they are able to see just how wide the division of class is on the train and it makes the slum-like conditions that they’ve been forced to live in all these years all the worse providing more and more incentive for them to carry on.
Let’s dance, bitches. A battle for the ages ready to begin.
This film is as stark and claustrophobic as it comes. The tight spaces that confine what’s left of humankind constantly squeeze the characters until they nearly burst. Bong‘s superb direction keeps the audience engaged and invested and the script’s twists and turns are certainly enough to keep attention focused on the narrative, which keeps you guessing literally until the end of the film. While it is hard to believe that a scenario like this could actually happen (come on, a train that never stops and can produce its own food enough for all of the people riding it?), Bong sells it and I’m buying. This is one of the five best films I’ve seen all year and I think if people give it a chance, they might get something out of it. I will say this – there’s a reason that Harvey “Scissorhands” Weinstein wanted to cut 20 minutes out of this film – most Americans aren’t prepared for what’s depicted in this film (hint: shit is real and it isn’t designed to give you a happy bullshit resolution). thaAnd we all know that Harvey is willing to take some chances (see Troy Duffy). Lucky for us, the film we will see if the director’s cut and frankly, I can’t imagine 20 minutes being excised from this film. I love that this is being released smack in the middle of tentpole, mindless summer movie season. It’s nice to have an alternative this time of year. And the performances are incredibly solid – Evans picks up where he left off in Sunshine, one of the most underrated films of the 2000s and Swinton is a knockout. The supporting cast is everything you’d expect. This is a just a finely crafted film from top to bottom. So get out there, bitches, and check this one out. It will leave you thinking after its over. That’s certainly a rarity in the May-August film window at the multiplexes.
Capturing the essence of an artist seems to me to be one of the hardest things to do. So much of what makes one an artist (I assume) happens in one’s head, an interior monologue that Terrence Malick would be jealous of utilizing. Sabine Lidl‘s entrancing documentary, Nan Goldin – I Remember Your Face, seems to get pretty close to doing so.
The film obviously follows Nan Goldin, the world renowned photographer, as she negotiates time in Paris and Berlin, meeting with friends and colleagues, old and new, talking us through her trials and tribulations as a woman in the world she has chosen to inhabit. She lives up to the perception many might have of what an artist of her stature is like -an eccentric who details her obscure tastes in the art she collects (Catholic in nature), tells tales of wild times living in squats with 40+ people, describes her spiral into drug addiction and subsequent drying out as well as the numerous people she has fallen in love with only to have that love unrequited, all of which is included in or fueled her work. And its her work that is foremost in her mind. Books to publish, narrated slideshows to produce, new style collage combining themed work juxtaposed with famous art works by masters – all of it consumes her and occupies her every moment (at least as laid out in the film).
Goldin is an extremely mesmerizing character and I was all too willing to let her be my guide into this world. With her shock of curly red hair and her Janis Joplin-like voice (created by the enormous amount of cigarettes she smokes, no doubt), Goldin walks us through 40+ years of her own history in places like New York City and Berlin and captivates the entire time. Her energy is infectious and palpable even through the screen and it’s obvious that the people around her feed off of it as well. Even though the film runs barely over an hour, I couldn’t help but to get the sense that I really a chance to see what make Goldin tick, even through her quirks and foibles.
Almost episodic in nature, director Lidl shuttles us between many different places and people in Goldin‘s life, but keeps the viewer grounded in Goldin‘s journey without leaving us wondering where the hell we are and, most importantly, why are we there. To me, it’s as rare to see an artist like Goldin doing what she does to make it all happen as seeing a komodo dragon in its natural habitat, unmolested by the forces that surround it. I found this film to be deeply satisfying and completely engrossing and its short running time left me wanting more. Lidl‘s handheld camerawork allowed her to be present in the tale being told, not just existing as an observer and that is incredibly key to painting the portrait of Goldin laid out in the film. None of it seems contrived or manufactured and what we get is Goldin distilled into a 62-minute block. If art/artist/artistic process interest you, then this is a film you should see. This film is being screened daily at the Quad Cinema June 13-19 as part of the Kino! Festival of German Films in New York City.
It’s inconceivable (get what I did there?) to think that on a blustery Indiana spring morning that I would have the pleasure of speaking with Wallace Shawn, the Wallace Shawn of infinite stage fame and hero to many for his roles in films like The Princess Bride, the Toy Storytrilogy, Vegas Vacation, My Dinner with Andre and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, The L Word and Clueless on the small screen. And a pleasure it was. And what were we speaking about, you ask? That would be Dan Fogler and Michael Canzoniero‘s Don Peyote. So when Wally (as he’s more affectionately known) called me from NYC, we had a quick chat about the film and a few other things as well.
First off, let me describe the film so you have a frame of reference. Warren (played by Fogler) is a graphic novel writer who is about to be married. He has some trepidation about the way his life is going and how to proceed. When he gets knocked down by an End-of-the-Worlder (you know, the guys who carries signs around sandwich boards stating that the world is going to end?), a drip of his sweat falls onto Warren and he is instantly changed, as if he had ingested 3,000 tabs of acids. His mind scrambles and he dives deeper and deeper into his own consciousness trying to figure out everything means. He begins to make a documentary about the end of he world, employing real-life conspiracy theorists and apocalypse believers to speak about their beliefs. This pushes him further into his own mind and makes him reconsider everything he has ever believed. Needless to say he passes through some pretty heavy shit and in the process alienates his fiancee (Kelly Hutchinson), ends up in a mental institution and in the end, assumes the role of the Apocalypse Predictor holding the sign warning everyone of the End Times. Along the way, he meets many crazy characters (usually played in surprise cameos by very recognizable faces like Anne Hathaway, Jay Baruchel, Abel Ferrara, Topher Grace, Josh Duhamel and of course, Wallace Shawn). The descent into the mind of Warren is scary at times, inexplicable in others, and downright confusing most of the time. But that’s neither here nor there.
Wallace Shawn, doing the mental gymnastics with Warren (Dan Fogler).
So back to Wally…
I was curious how he was cast in the role of the inattentive psychiatrist to listens to Warren detail his predicament:
I have no idea. I suppose those guys [Fogler and Canzoniero] had watched too much television. I wonder who that old bald guy is and if he’d be good (laughs). I was available and I’ve played quite a few psychiatrists in my day, so it made sense. In fact, when I was thirteen I wanted to be a psychiatrist. Why? It’s easy to sit in a chair and listen to people. It’s an enjoyable way to spend time.
What interested you most about the film?
I thought the writers came up with some really interesting characters that were brought in and then whisked away. I couldn’t really tell if it was all a joke or if maybe [Warren] was actually right, that the world was coming to an end.
This of course led to me to ask about the ideas of multiple conspiracy theorists that appear in the film and occurrences like Superstorm Sandy that hit New York in November of 2012.
Extinction of human beings on planet earth is a very real possibility. If everything goes on as it is now, there might be some superstitious or preposterous ways of thinking, but I think what they’re sensing is something that is absolutely undeniable.
It was hard to speak with Wally and not ask him what his favorite film role he’s had is. Of course, I fully expected him to say Vizzini from The Princess Bride as it is his most memorable role, although I’m sure there are many that would argue otherwise. He did not say this, however.
The film I’ve just finished with Jonathan Demme and Andre Gregory, The Master Builder based on the Ibsen play. It’s a character (Halvard Solness) that I’ve worked for 30 years to perfect.
And we finished with a quick convo about how he and Demme are supposed to be bringing that very film to the Indiana University Cinema where I live at some point in the future.
I would certainly love to come there. I have family in Illinois and have a fondness for the midwest.
And with that, Mr. Shawn was whisked away to another interview and I bid him adieu. A pleasant conversation and one that I’m terribly excited to have had.
Warren has snapped…
The next day, I was fortunate enough to get one of the brains behind this film, writer/director/star Dan Fogler, to chat with me about the evolution of this project and his intentions when he set out to make it. Fogler is more known for his brand of Chris Farley-esque physical comedy in films like Fanboys, Take Me Home Tonight and Balls of Fury. He steps outside of that zone and inserts himself into the self-penned and directed role of Warren.
My first question was what was it like to work on both sides of the camera?
I had done a horror/slasher/comedy film called Hysterical Psycho (on VOD now) and I caught the bug. I envisioned a scene in [Don Peyote] and pitched it to Christopher Walken who I wanted to take the role. He was busy, though. It kind of grew from there. It was an organic process. I wanted to employ the same philosophy I used on Hysterical Psycho – working with my friends, not worrying about budget, ask a lot of favors and just shooting it. If you let people play, you can find something in the editing. You can create a whole new film in the editing room and that’s what we did here.
After mentioning that I had just seen Roger Corman in person when he showed his film The Trip, I asked him if there were any films or directors that influenced Don Peyote:
Movies of 60s and 70s were influences. Happy and peace type shit. Easy Rider and [John] Cassavetes were big influences. Run and gun, point the camera and just film what happens. Being There with Peter Sellers, genius idiot savant that changed the world is another film that was an influence. Another was Dr. Strangelove – films with a message at the core. [Stanley] Kubrick, Annie Hall (breaking the fourth wall), Alice in Wonderland…down the rabbit hole – all of those. I wanted to do an homage to Wizard of Oz with the first part of the movie then change it into a [Terry] Gilliam film.
Since Warren is kind of a slacker and is prone to getting stoned all the time using an apple as his delivery mechanism, I assume there was symbolism there, yes?
The apple is a multi-layered metaphor – his fiancée doesn’t want him to smoke, but he can get rid of the evidence quickly if needed. Also, I look at the apple of as the apple of knowledge, information taken in through a new way. Warren is searching (like in high school and college) for new information.
After seeing the film, I looked up a few of the people appeared in it as “experts” on end of times scenarios/conspiracies and such. Were they apprehensive about appearing in the film?
Some experts had trepidation – some people wanted to be blurred, some didn’t want their real names used. Some loved the idea of being in a movie. The majority were excited to be a part of the film.
And to finish up, I asked him about any future directing projects he has on the horizon:
Hysterical Psycho/Moon Lake – like Twilight Zone on THC. Trying to build a TV show out of that. A few other ideas kicking around as well.
All said, Don Peyote is a big change in direction from prior films Dan Fogler has been involved with. There is still sophomoric humor, yes, but at a different level. And by different I don’t necessarily mean good. Warren’s best friend in the movie, unfortunately named Balance (played by Yang Miller), ironically fails to provide what his namesake is for his friend, absent at times when he is needed and when he is present, he is not needed. This lack of equilibrium is what tips Warren further and further into the abyss, never to return. As stated above, there are various asides and dips into and out of consciousness, but they are so haphazardly stitched together that the film lacks any kind of cohesive shift from one to the other which weighs down the pacing to the detriment of the film as a whole. While it is nice to see actors like Fogler step out of the arena he’s known for, I’m not sure this film works. He was extremely personable in the interview and I think he has found a niche in film. I think this one might have been too big a stretch, however. Ultimately, you need to decide for yourselves if Don Peyote is for you. Maybe you’ll find something in it that I didn’t. That’s why we go to the movies, I suppose.
Since Hollywood likes to remain topical (what with the World Cup and all), it was announced today that Swingers director Doug Liman is taking on the newest unnecessary remake to be announced – John Huston‘s WWII POW/soccer/prison break drama starring Michael Caine, Pelé, Max von Sydow and Sylvester Stallone (of course) is up for duty now. The basic premise of the film is that a mixed soccer team of POWs are forced to play against the Führer’s racially and athletically superior team as a show of good will. So, let’s think about this – a film that takes place in a POW camp behind enemy lines during WWII where a large portion of the prisoners happen to be all-world soccer players (there are representatives from Ireland, England, Poland, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Scotland and Norway). What possible reason can there be to update this film? It can’t be transferred to another, more recent war. Does this work in Iraq, Afghanistan or even Vietnam? Not a fucking chance. Even with Gavin O’Connor writing the script, I just don’t know how this works.
