Logan's Movie Blog

There’s a speech that Hugh Grant gives at the beginning of Love Actually that just gets me every time. He talks about watching people at the airport as they greet their loved ones, and how none of the phone calls from the planes on 9/11 were messages of hate, but ones of love to family and friends. I’d like to say that it gets me just because he mentions that horrific day in such a beautiful context. But, that’s not it.

Christmas means alot of things for me. Mostly though, it’s about family. Too many times it’s about forgiving all the things we’ve done to each other throughout the year. It’s about finding the right presents and not spending every dime I have. Often it’s about buying myself something else I don’t really need. It’s about stretching myself thin to try and spend time with all the important people in my life. It’s definitely about the pancakes. And, like EVERYTHING else in my life, it’s about the movies.

Since my brother and I were old enough to go, every Christmas Eve my Dad has taken us to the show. What we’ve seen the last few years has been determined by the new edition to the group, my four yeard old brother (and most favorite person in the world) Avi. To put that into context, I turned 30 this year.

So, last year it was Bolt, before that it was Alvin & the Chipmunks, and before that it was Night at the Museum. This year, of course, it will be the “Squequel” starring Alvin and the gang, but, honestly, I don’t mind. In fact, I pretty much enjoyed the first one.

The funniest thing is probably that I remember the bad movies more than I remember the good ones (Street Fighter and Toys spring immediately to mind…Dungeons & Dragons as well.). Of course, there was the three year affair with Peter Jackson and his Lord of the Rings trilogy. Yeah, they’re good films…but so very, very long…I’m not sure we’ve ever gone to see a Christmas movie on any of those outings…

Which brings me to this: My favorite Christmas movies!

I love Christmas movies…but, there’s a catch. I love Christmas movies that aren’t NECESSARILY about Christmas. With two huge, glaring exceptions. Guess I should get them out of the way first, huh?

Christmas Vacation may not only be the funniest Christmas movie ever made, but it’s one of the funniest films of all time. If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, Clark W. Griswold will probably burn for eternity. Easily one of the most fully realized characters ever put to film, he’s not the husband or father you’d like him to be, but he is one we all know and love. During the course of this movie, as well as the series’ other installments, he commits all manner of sins. But, in the end, no matter what he does, no matter how depraved or insane he gets, you still root for the guy to come out on top. Maybe it’s because we’ve all been there. Maybe not specifically in his shoes, but standing next to him as he cuts down the tree in the front yard, perhaps? He’s not doing it because he wants to, he’s doing it because he HAS to. Because his family deserves to have the best Christmas EVER, and if that means he has to run up a million dollar power bill, or go to jail to achieve it, then, well, that’s what he has to do. It’s because he does the crazy things so unselfishly that we can forgive him his weaker moments, like fantasizing about adultery or holding people hostage. He does it all for his family.

Then there’s Elf. Who would have EVER thought a movie about a human being raised as one of Santa’s elves could be so touching. Beyond the goofiness of it all is the story of someone who just wants to fit in, who wants to be part of a family. I’ve never really thought about the similarities between Elf and Christmas Vacation…but they are there. Buddy does everything he thinks he’s supposed to do to try and show his love for his new-found family, it’s usually naive, sometimes it’s incredibly sweet, and sometimes it’s borderline creepy. But, because he does it out of love (and the need to feel loved back) it somehow makes it all okay. The perfect example is when he stumbles onto Jovie singing in the shower and decides to sit and join her. Easily one of the nicest, sweetest, funniest moments of the movie…but it’s soooooo creepy, isn’t it? But, for Buddy he’s just doing what he thinks is okay, and why shouldn’t it be? It’s funny, it’s poignant and it shines a light onto what kind of people we’ve turned ourselves into; that we mistake innocence for creepiness, kindness for indifference and love for selfishness. It’s almost the perfect Christmas film.

Like I said, only two Christmas movies I like are ACTUALLY about Christmas. The others, well…they’re still about family, kind of.

John McClane’s desire to work things out with his wife and put his family back together leads him to possibly the worst night of his life…Die Hard is a Christmas movie, there’s no arguing it. “Now I have a machine gun, ho ho ho.”

Vicious little creatures terrorize a small town. A kid, his girlfriend, his family and an albino Ewok reject have to save Christmas before the Gremlins destroy it. But, the most horrifying thing about this Christmas tale of terror isn’t the monsters trying to eat the townsfolk, it’s Kate’s story about finding out how Santa Clause isn’t real. It’s the saddest, most horrible story ever told, and it makes me laugh Every Single TIME.

What’s this, what’s this? A town where they celebrate Halloween year round? How delightful! No, turns out it’s boring, so when Jack discovers Christmas and tries to bring it back to Halloweentown, it makes for quite an exciting mish-mash of creep and sweet. It’s like turning everything you know about Christmas on it’s head, making it absolutely terrifying, and somehow still emotionally satisfying.

I hate romantic comedies. HATE them. Mainly because they’re drivel. Horribly acted and usually undeserving of the emotion the slowly try to drag out of you. Except Love Actually. From Alan Rickman’s devastating ”I’m a classic fool” to young Sam’s hopeful “Let’s go get the shit kicked out of us by love,” the end of this movie runs the absolute gamut. And it does it successfully. If there is an emotion the human body can feel, you feel it here. Exploring every single type of love one can find in this world, this is hands down the best movie about that subject ever concieved. So many great moments, so many great lines. “Worse than the total agony of being in love?” “Oh. No, you’re right. Yeah, total agony.”

Finally…is there ANYTHING more satisfying that watching Carol Kane hit Bill Murray in the head with a toaster? I guess this might TECHNICALLY be about Christmas, but not any kind of Christmas I’ve ever seen celebrated. Other than Groundhog Day and Ghostbusters, this might be Murray at his best, comedically. His slow mental break from reality is sobering and hilarious. Yeah, you learn something at the end, but it’s the laughter that makes the sap easier to swallow.

There are more; Lethal Weapon, It’s a Wonderful Life, The Ref, Bad Santa, Home Alone, Trapped in Paradise, The Family Stone…all great, none of them I own, I don’t watch them every year. The other 7…well, they never fail to put me in the mood for my favorite day of the year. Man I can’t wait to eat some pancakes.

There are people who will tell you about how certain smells trigger memories in their brain, I’m not one of those people. I love the smell of sugar cookies and fresh baked cinnamon rolls, but they don’t bring up memories of a happy childhood, my mother baking in the kitchen, they just make me hungry. But movies…

I’ve talked before about my association between memory and film, specifically Jurassic Park and I think (briefly) The Shawshank Redemption. More than just about any other movies, those two make me reminisce (Con Air too…a story for another time). But, the one that takes me back more than those is a western starring John Wayne, Dean Martin, Walter Brennan and Ricky Nelson. Yeah, Rio Bravo.

I think it could be because it’s the one movie that precedes the realization of my love of cinema. (Well, there’s Star Wars, but as a kid they weren’t really movies to me, they were extensions of my imagination, or maybe the beginnings of it, and also a story for another time.) Rio Bravo is one of those movies that has always been for me. What I mean is, I never discovered it.

Example: I love, love, LOVE Breakfast at Tiffany’s, but it’s a movie I had to find my way too, Rio Bravo has always been there. And, really, there’s a number of people who carry the responsibility for that, the biggest one probably being my Grandmother.

Now, it wasn’t her favorite film, that honor belonged to the 80’s classic Dirty Dancing. I’m a man of faith, so I believe in Heaven, and while I was saddened that Patrick Swayze passed away this year, I couldn’t help but smile at the fact that somewhere, my Grandmother was taking dance lessons from a man she had, to put it bluntly, lusted after for years. She would sit on that ratty old couch in her trailer, clapping her hands and smiling while Johnny taught Baby the mambo, along with a few of life’s harder lessons. So, no, it wasn’t her favorite film, but if she had a second, I’m pretty confident that this was it.

The story of the movie is really inconsequential, at least as far as this post is concerned. In fact, I’ll be upfront and say that anything positive I have to say about the actual details (story, dialogue, acting, directing, editing, etc.) of this film is probably skewed by my memories (It does have an 8/10 on IMDB though). I’ve read plenty of negative comments about the movie, and never found a single ounce of merit in one of them. This is a perfect film for me, or at least as close as there could possibly ever be to one. And that has a lot to do with those memories.

I do believe it’s my Uncle Bink’s favorite film, and it’s really high on the list for my Father and his other brother, my Uncle Glen. It’s also a favorite film of my twin brother and well as my Uncle Glen’s wife, Joann. So, yeah, it’s a family affair, and I think that all goes back to my Grandmother.

She passed away five years ago on December 10th. At once that seems like it was a lifetime ago and just last year. She had moved to Oklahoma with my two Uncles and their families and lived out her last few years there. I didn’t get to see her after she left, and only had the occasional phone call, usually on holidays or birthdays. It’s something I still regret, but eventually it just got too hard to make time with her that way, and when her mind started to go it was just too damn painful.

Before that though, years before her health problems started to get the best of her, there wasn’t anything I loved more than hanging out with my family in that crappy old trailer. There were a lot of things we watched on TV in that place; Falcons football, Braves baseball, every game show that came on TV (I wish she’d lived long enough to get the Game Show Network and the Western Channel), weather, news (that TV gave me and m Uncle Bink the first report of Mickey Mantles death, we had just come from a late night/early morning baseball card run to the local Wal-Mart), reruns of Dick Van Dyke and Andy Griffith…in fact, when her cabinet color TV started to go, we had a special taped episode of Andy Griffith (the Citizens Arrest episode with the feud between Barney and Gomer) that we would have to put in to get the color to come back. I’m still not sure why that worked, and it often required a little fiddling with the contrast and such, but it did. And no one could get it to work faster than my brother Ryan. And we watched Rio Bravo, alot.

I can see her kitchen table as clear as if it were sitting next to me. I mentioned baseball cards with my Uncle…that table might have seen more trading cards than any other kitchen table before or since. For a good long wile it was an obsession with us (me, my brother, my Uncles, my Dad, my cousin Jacob). There was a time in my adult life where I slept on a bed that was supported by giant plastic bins of trading cards. But, there were a lot of great, meaningless conversations held around that table, and a lot of them were had while tearing open packages of those cards. I’ll still stroll by the card aisle in Wal-Mart or Target and pick up the occasional pack, relishing the sound of the plastic as it tears, the smell of the fresh ink on the cards (there’s a smell memory I have!), the excitement of getting a chase card in the pack, and the disappointment of not getting one. Only now I don’t get to share that experience with anyone, it’s just me opening them, but it’s still nice to bring back those memories like that.

And if it wasn’t cards it was games. We loved a good board game. My Grandmother’s favorite was a game called Pollyana. My dad still has the board we played on, as well as most of the dice we used. We all had our own dice, see…we kept them in this big, oversized glass cup she had. I can’t remember what everyone else’s dice looked like, but mine are etched into my brain like some invisible tattoo. They were red and wooden, and kind of tiny. They’d once had gold paint in the divots, but that flaked off pretty early on. THOSE were MY dice. I’m not sure if my Dad still has them or not, but it doesn’t matter, I’ll never forget what they looked like.

If it wasn’t Pollyanna, then it was probably Canasta, a game at which my Grandmother and Aunt Joann (Aunt Jody to us, actually) were UNBEATABLE. The point of that card game was never to win, it was simply to beat them. To this day I think they cheated. Occasionally we played Rummy or maybe even penny poker, but Canasta…that was one that she loved to play the most…probably because she always won…

That table also saw a lot of jigsaw puzzles. And, I have to say, of all the things I miss about that table, putting puzzles together is probably at the top of the list. For us, assembling the pieces wasn’t a race, it was more like a marathon. One we’d run over the course of a month. It wasn’t too often that there’d be more than two or three of us sitting there putting it together, but by the end of it we’d likely all participated in it’s reconstruction. People came and went as they pleased in that trailer. Her door was always open. So, if there was a puzzle to be assembled, they’d sit down at the table, asking her about her day as she carefully studied the pieces, or asking her what the score of the game was as she sat on the couch watching her favorite teams play and they plugged in their own contribution. As long as you remembered to do the edges first, she didn’t care how much or how little you did. And, usually we’d save the very last piece for her…if we didn’t lose it.

I can still see that table, so very clear in my mind. And, when I watch Rio Bravo, I’m not watching it from my bed, or the couch, or my chair. I’m watching it from that table, from those uncomfortable wooden seats, with their crappy padding. I’m playing Canasta, or Pollyana, or putting a puzzle together.

When she died we made a mix tape of music to be played at her wake. I still have a copy of it somewhere, but I don’t listen to it because it’s just too much for me. Patrick Swayze singing “She’s Like the Wind” was most certainly on there, but so were tunes from Rio Bravo. Every time I watch the movie, when Ricky, Dean and Walter hole themselves up in that jail and start singing, I can still see the smile on my Grandmother’s face, her legs moving to the beat, hands clapping.

When I say that her move to Oklahoma tore our family apart, I do mean it literally. As long as she was here there was the hope that my Uncle’s and Aunts and cousins would movie back. After she left to live with them that hope went with her. I don’t begrudge them their life in OK, but I miss them, all of us still here in Georgia do, they’re family. But things change, whether we want them to or not.

Her birthday is in four days (As my Father would say: “December 5th, a day that will live in infamy!”). She would have been 80 this year. In her lifetime she gave a lot to the people around her, usually her gifts were those of story or food, because, well, those were the things she liked to do, but sometimes her gifts came in more difficult packages, like taking her to do her grocery shopping or having to drive all the way out to Ladonia just to bring her a hamburger. The last gift she ever gave, she gave at her funeral, and at the time it was of the more difficult variety.

Due to some really strange circumstances she was, indeed, late to her own funeral. It was here, in Columbus, and so my family from OK naturally came home. As we waited for her to get here, all of us laughing at the insanity of what was going on so as to keep from crying, we got to spend one more week, all of us, together again. All of us except her, because, well, she was stuck in Oklahoma! At her wake they had a table set up, four chairs around it, but one of those chairs was tilted up and in, it’s neck leaning on top of the table. That used to be a sign that a player had left. She was out of the game.

That was the last gift she gave us, one more moment that she brought us all together, but it’s not my favorite. No, the best thing Alice “Johnnie” Polk ever gave me was Rio Bravo. A movie that doesn’t just bring back the memory of watching it in that tin building she called a home, but the memory of a life spent with her, the memory of what it meant to be a family. She was born December 5th 1929 and died five days after her 75th birthday. I remember the last conversation I ever had with her was on her birthday. I didn’t get her anything, I didn’t even send a card, I think we all knew what was coming, and we were all preparing ourselves for it. Doesn’t matter though, nothing I ever gave her could be as wonderful as the memories that this movie conjures up.

So, for one week every December, Rio Bravo is my favorite film of all time. It’s so damn close to perfect that I’d hate to have to live on the difference.

I love you Nannie, and I miss you more than I could ever express. Happy birthday.

And try to take it easy on Swayze.

This is another one that I can’t find a clip of, so my description will just have to suffice.

The Darjeeling Limited

I love Wes Anderson. The man has not made a bad film. In fact, he’s made four damn near perfect films, I think (haven’t seen The Fantastic Mr. Fox yet, so it could be five), and this one is probably my favorite of the bunch.

It’s the story of three brothers, estranged after the death of their father, who reunite for a trip across india by train. When things go awry they find themselves stranded in the desert and at each other’s throats. That’s the gist of it, but the story is about far more than just a wacky misadventure. It deals heavily with sibling rivalry too, which I thnk is part of the reason I love it so much.

My favorite scene in the movie is maybe the most pivotal one for the characters.

After getting kicked off of their train the three brothers begin following a stream and come across three young boys attempting to cross it via a makeshift raft. The three of them just stand there watching, mocking the kids until they see that the stream is too strong for what the kids are attempting. As the raft breaks and the kids become entangled in the mess the three brothers dive in to rescue them. What happens next is at once joyful and devastating, and I won’t ruin that here.

Anyone who has siblings knows what this feels like. Hopefully not to this extent, but you know what it is to be squabbling with them one minute only to find yourselves in the middle of a crisis the next, working together to overcome it. It’s very powerful and moments like that help put life into perspective. The petty fighting and childish behavior fall behind you and you realize that it’s what you do to help those around you, those in need, that’s what really matters.

In life, much like in the movie, those worthless things you do often show right back up, the fighting will begin anew, but you know, no matter what, your siblings will always be right there next to you, ready to follow you into the water should they need to.

I think it was about four months ago when I first saw Rian Johnson’s sophomore effort, The Brothers Bloom, though at this point it may be closer to five months, I’m not exactly sure. In the three weeks that it played in my city I saw it six times. There’s only one film I’ve paid to see more than this one, and that’s Jurassic Park (seven times).

Since then I’ve sat down at my computer several times with the intent to write about the movie, and every time I fail. It’s not because I can’t think of anything good to say; quite the contrary, it’s because I have no idea where the hell to start.

A few weeks ago the DVD dropped, and I was devastated to hear that it was a rental exclusive. And, for awhile I debated on just renting the thing out from the local store (I’m not a Netflix member…I know, I know…) and keeping it until I could buy it, but I didn’t. I bided my time. And, it paid off. Kind of. See, it’s still not available to buy in local stores, but my Movie Gallery has an excellent habit of cutting their new releases down to a few copies after the initial launch, and Monday I walked in and picked it up for an unbelievable price ($8.99) used.

I feel a bit bad about that too. On the one hand, I’m not sure hom much the studio and/or the filmmakers make off the DVD purchases by rental stores, and given it’s an independant, and a movie I love, I want to financially support it the best way I can. On the other, I NEED to see this movie again. I might buy the official release and re-gift this one to a friend down the line to ease my conscience. But, that’s not what I came here to talk about…

So, where to begin? That’s the dilemma here. I should say that this might be considered spoiler-filled post, so if you want to see this movie without any preconceptions (and I’d suggest it) you might want to avoid this post altogether. I’ll just say, to those of you leaving, this is easily my favorite film of the year, and probably, at this point, my favorite film of all time (though I reserve the right to throw Shawshank above it whenever I damn well please). It’s the story of two brothers, con men, pulling off one last heist before they sail off, separately, into the sunset. It’s about family, love, loyalty, danger, friendship and an unlived life. It is perfect in every way, even in its flaws. Like I told Dave Chen at the Slash Filmcast, it’s the Goonies for adults. Odd, maybe, but oh so very true. However, for those staying with me, I will try and save the most spoilery stuff til the end.

So, like I was saying, where to start…

When we’re first introduced to Stephen and Bloom (the brothers…Bloom’s first name is never given) they’re kids, which is fitting, because until the end I don’t think either one of them is ever really an adult.

There is a shot here I want to mention. There are several that stick with me in the opening, but one that characterizes Bloom almost perfectly. As the two boys leave town we see them both carrying suitcases, but while Stephen walks smoothly and stands tall with his, we see Bloom struggle to carry his and keep up with his brother. In that one shot you can essentially learn every single thing you need to know about Bloom and his relationship with Stephen. It’s freaking amazing.

After that the movie jumps 25 years, to the end of another con, and we get reintroduced to the brothers and their partner-in-crime Bang Bang (Charlie Chaplin as a sexy Asian explosives expert). We also get the kick-ass line “Nine months and a thousand years ago.”

Now, I think the re-introduction here is important to note because there’s a voice over in the prologue done by actor/magician Ricky Jay, but when we jump to the present any and all voice over becomes Adriene Brody (who plays Bloom). Now, it happens five minutes into the film, so it’s not as elaborate as Hitchcock’s change in narrative in Psycho, but I think it’s just as effective. There are very few filmmakers that would even attempt a change like that, and even fewer that could pull it off. We go from a third person nursery-rhyme type of story to a first person narration in less than ten minutes. And it works.

Another little side note, the Brothers have what the call a “wrap party” for the con, and director Rian Johnson essentially uses it as a wrap part for his previous (and first) film, Brick (which, if you haven’t seen, stop reading this now and go buy it. SERIOUSLY!). As the camera pans through the crown you can see almost all of the actors from that movie. I thought it was a nice nod to his previous work and a good way to show us how elaborate the Brothers can be.

So, yeah, there’s a 25 year jump, and we get to see the effect of that life in the face and mood of Bloom. While his brother dances and drinks the night away, Bloom sits quietly in another room playing solitaire. It’s here that we get another of the film’s most memorable lines, “He writes his cons the way dead Russians write novels.” There’s also the scene where the Brothers argue because Bloom wants out, and we get maybe MY favorite line from the film. I won’t describe the scene, but “Holy shit, that’s my new favorite camel” is now in my lexicon.

The story really starts when Stephen tracks down Bloom to convince him to do one last con. Eccentric heiress Penelope Stamp, beautiful and rich, Stephen believes she’s the key to their retirement.

Now, this is where the movie could have very easily fallen apart. Any intelligent viewer can begin to see the wheels turning, it’s obvious where the story is going to go from here, so rather than just lead you into it, Johnson tells you EXACTLY what he’s going to do via Bloom. As Stephen explains the con, Bloom lays out all the question marks you’re going to have: “This is your plan, lure me back in with some beautiful intriguing elusive girl?” and “You’ve got something up your sleeve, this is about me, somehow.”

And, even though Bloom KNOWS his brother is up to something, and nothing is kosher, he goes along with it. And so do you. That’s the beauty of this film. You KNOW there’s a con, but you never know where it’s coming from or what exactly it is. Even at the end. But we’ll get to that.

So, here we get introduced to Penelope. And eccentric doesn’t even begin do describe her. She’s off putting at first, but over the course of just a few minutes you completely fall for her. And another good line (or, lines, surprise!), “It’s a lie that tells the truth.” “I don’t about truths, a photograph is a secret about a secret, the more it tells you the less you know.”

The bulk of the rest of the film is the con. But, like I said, you never know what the con is. There’s the obvious one, getting Penelope to follow them on a wild adventure, scamming her out of millions. A scam that almost backfires on them when they realize that she was more invested in the fake story they’ve given her than in the money they just secretly scammed her out of.

There’s the romance between Bloom and Penelope (Bloom says to Stephen at one point “She feels like one of your characters.”), which you definitely root for, but there’s always the underlying threat of destruction and heartbreak, for both of them.

There’s also the introduction of the Brother’s former…let’s call him a guardian for lack of a better word, Diamond Dog. A con man whom the Brothers crossed and who is brought back into their lives by Stephen, despite Bloom’s requests to the contrary. There is very much the feeling that the Dog severely mistreated Bloom in the past, and eventually it feels like Stephen is manipulating events to get Bloom to face his fear.

There are a few scenes that really stand out in this section of the movie. Most of them are Bloom/Penelope related, and the first one is where Bloom is telling her the story of how the Brothers decided to go on the “straight and narrow” (part of the con). I think it’s important because you’re never sure what’s part of the lie and how much of it is truth, especially after he says (another great line!) “Trying to get something real by telling yourself stories is a trap.”

There’s a great moment between the brothers where, again, you can’t tell who’s really being conned or how. And then there’s maybe my favorite scene, at least favorite Penelopescene. Once they’ve sucked her into the con with the lure of excitement and danger (which they pretend not to want, making it more appetizing for her, of course) Bloom says to her “This isn’t an adventure story.” She laughs and turns around saying “What are you talking about? It totally is!”

There’s the hilarious explosion, the “orgasm” scene, the kissing scene, the constant back and forth money exchange between Bloom and Penelope (you’d have to see it to understand), Penelope’s escape from the cops, Dog’s introduction, Bang Bang’s origin (“An inky whisp of personal information.” “When you’re done with something, blow it up.”), “Freaky scary,” “Real sunsets might be beautiful, but the turn into dark, uncertain nights” and my other two favorite scenes…

The first has no dialogue. It’s simply Penelope’s Theme (I haven’t mentioned how FANTASTIC the music is have I?) playing as she and Bloom walk side by side, the camera following them. The pass by a wall, which takes them out of the camera’s eye and when they emerge on the other side they’re holding hands. The music adds so much, and the way it hits this really off-sounding note as Bloom sees his brother watching the two of them and he releases her hand. It’s so bittersweet…

The second is too close to my other favorite that it’s a tough one to call. It would probably change depending on what day you ask me. This one involves music AND an awesome piece of dialogue! As Bloom wanders through a park, right after the gang has amazingly pulled off the con within the con, he sees a man selling fruit. Atop a stack of green apples is one red one. He stares at it for a few minutes as Cat Stevens ‘Miles From Nowhere’ plays. He walks between the camera and the fruit, and when the stack of apples comes back into view the red one is gone. We see it in his hand, and he sees that a boy has watched him steel it. He tilts his head as if to say “Please?” as the kid points it out to the cart owner. He’s chased through the park, smiling, and eventually falls down. Cut to Stephen bailing him out of jail. “An apple? He asks. Bloom’s response: “It was part of an epiphany.”

Everything that happens after this is incredibly spoilery, so I’ll stop here for a second and talk about some of the film’s other aspects.

Johnson’s use of call back in this film is amazing, as good or better than any film I’ve ever seen. It’s so subtle that most of it you don’t see on the first viewing. I’m still catching things I didn’t see after a fifth and sixth viewing. The music, composed by Johnson’s cousin Nathan and his band The cinematic Underground haunts me. It goes down as one of the best scores I’ve ever listened to. Each piece immediately brings to mind the scene, each theme evoke’s the character it was written for. The acting is beyond superb, and given the sated of the Academy, I’d bet good money that when Oscar season rolls around we won’t see a single nomination for the cast. But, if I were handing them out it’s be easy. Brody gets best actor for his portrayal of a man lost inside a life someone else created for him, never in control of his own destiny. Rachel Weisz gets best actress for Penelope. Not only did she learn almost all of Penelope’s “hobbies” (I’m pretty sure the chainsaws weren’t real…but I read that she learned how to do everything else) but she constantly surprises in the role. She’s able to simultaneously convey every emotion, it’s amazing. Mark Ruffalo gets supporting actor as Stephen. You can never tell what angle this guy is working, but you know he is. And still you’re with him. You love him. And Rinko Kikuchi’s Bang Bang might be one of the best characters in cinema in the the last ten years. Kikuchi has three lines of dialogue in the whole film (one of them a verse from The Band’s song ‘Sleeping’) and yet she’s probably the most expressive character in the film. An almost completely silent performance. Add to it best screenplay and a best director award for Johnson. The Brothers Bloom should sweep the Oscars. But it won’t. Remember what they did to Almost Famous?

And sophomore slumps? Forget it. Rian Johnson knocks this one out of the stadium. This might be the best sophomore film since Pulp Fiction fifteen years ago. And possibly the best con movie since The Sting. The guy is unbelievable!

Okay, so, you’ve got PLENT o’ warning, there’s no turning back from here. I am going to spoil the ending of the movie…kind of. If you haven’t seen it, PLEASE do not read past this point.

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So, the end.

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Convinced it’s all a con, Bloom sets out to confront Stephen only to discover that it isn’t. Bloom rescues his brother, who tells him that, yes, it WAS a con, that he’s faced down his fears and he needs to go live out his life with Penelope. But as Bloom walks away we realize that the con is that there IS no con. The bullets were real, Stephen is dead and soon Bloom realizes it too. But is he?

The ending is so ambiguous that you just can’t be certain. Every time I watch the movie I come away with a different answer. There’s a call back to something Stephen says at the very beginning, paraphrasing here, ”The perfect con is one where in the end everyone gets what they want.” Add to that, on the boat Stephen tells Bloom, “The day I con you is the day I die.” Is it all just a con?

There’s another really nice exchange between the brothers here too. “I just wish you had a bigger audience,” Bloom tells Stephen. Stephen responds with, “You’re the only audience I ever needed.” Bloom says “I love you,” and walks away, unknowingly leaving his brother to die. That itself is a nice call back to their first split earlier in the film, where Bloom tells Stephen “I hate you.”

So, yeah, if you only watched the film once, watch it again. You’ll see things differently, you’ll pick up new things. You’ll start to see that the movie itself is the perfect con. In the end we all get what we want out of it. A love story. A movie about sibling rivalry and the bond between brothers. An adventure. A comedy. A drama. Quirky crime caper. Hell, you even get a shot of Penelope’s butt for all you nude seekers out there. It’s a constant manipulation of feelings and theories, and at the end of it all you’re left to decide what you think happened.

So, there, The Brothers Bloom, my favorite film of all time.

No video to go with this one folks, because, well, I can’t find one. And since I’m pretty dumb at the whole youtube thing, and don’t want to get sued, well, I won’t be uploading it. Instead, you’ll get to hear me describe it. Sounds like fun no?

For the last few days I’ve been trying to come up with a Halloween-related post, so I Googled “favorite scary movies” and spent an hour or so looking over various lists. I was a bit surprised by some of the movies that popped up, mostly because I don’t find them to be scary at all. One of those films was Terminator 2: Judgement Day.

There’s a lot to love in that movie. It’s easily one of the best sequels ever made, and one of the rare few that advance the story from the first film rather than try to recapture the magic that made the first one great. No scene illustrates that more than Sarah Conner’s escape from the mental hospital.

When we get reintroduced to Sarah Conner it’s pretty startling. At the end of the first film she was a young beautiful woman, pregnant with the child who’s going to save the world. Riding off into the sunset. But, when we see her in T2 she’s a completely changed person. Obsessed, tired, haggard and desperate.

Like I said, I don’t really think this is a scary movie, it’s more a sci-fi/actioner, but there is definitely an extreme amount of fear that comes in this scene. When she successfully breaks away from the hospital staff and is headed towards the elevators. Right as she reaches the doors, out steps Arnold’s T-800. As she falls to the ground, scrambling backwards and screaming, you REALLY believe this woman is afraid for her life.

The next moments of the film are filled with some of the greatest scenes of bad-assery in existence. But, it’s that moment, Sarah’s fear, that sticks with me most. Linda Hamilton should have won an Oscar for that scene alone.

EDIT: Found the scene at youtube, but I can’t embed, feel free to make with the clickety and watch though: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuiJBeC8mEk