Cinematical

With Fall Festival season about to kick off, this week The Rocchi Review features James chatting with Cinematical's Film Festivals Editor Kim Voynar about the strange splendor of the Telluride Film Festival, what the most-anticipated movies will be at this year's Toronto Film Festival and much, much more. Will Zack and Miri Make a Porno make a splash? Will Rachel Getting Married get Anne Hathaway some respect? And does one of the most-anticipated films for Toronto really star Jean-Claude Van Damme? Cinematical's podcast is now available through iTunes; you can subscribe at this link. Also, you can listen directly here at Cinematical by clicking below:



As ever, you can download the entire podcast right here -- and those of you with RSS Podcast readers can find all of Cinematical's podcast content at this link.

Gathered to talk about Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Pénelope Cruz, Rebecca Hall, Chris Messina and Scarlett Johansson all had similar praise for their director and writer -- even if they took different paths to get to the film. Cruz's agent actually reached out to Allen when Vicky Cristina Barcelona was in development, on the off chance Allen might have a role for her: "My agent said ... 'We found out you're doing a movie in Spain, do you want to meet Pénelope?' We met in New York, a very short meeting, which took less than one minute, and he told me 'I saw Volver, and I'm writing this story, it's not finished yet, but if it keeps going in this direction, the script, I think you could be right for this part. ...' He didn't tell me anything more about the story, or the characters, but I felt like we connected; we were laughing, and when I left, the people who work with him told me 'You've been there for such a long time.' ..."

Even after being asked, though, Cruz found the prospect of working with one of film's best-known directors daunting: "You can trust the director -- you're working with Woody Allen, you're working with a genius -- but that doesn't mean you're not going to be doubting yourself. ..."

I felt, after seeing Woody Allen's latest, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the way I do after I've been to an excellent tapas restaurant; I'd been presented with a series of small moments of flavor and texture and presentation, some more pleasant than others, and while the overall experience didn't add up to a full meal, it was still a sincere pleasure. Allen's been globetrotting lately -- although you can suggest that's been motivated less by some muse of artistic inspiration than by the equally beguiling, if less dignified, seductress of international financing. After several films set in London, Allen's now in Barcelona, Spain, as recently-graduated friends Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) are taking some time to see the world before going back to America and futures as bright and unfixed as a sunlit fogbank.

Staying with family friends Mark and Judy Nash (Kevin Dunn and Patricia Clarkson), Vicky and Cristina take in the sights and experiences of Barcelona. Cristina's able to lose herself in the moment; for Vicky, each summer day's tempered by the certainty that summer will soon end. But one night after an art gallery showing, at an appropriately bohemian venue, Vicky and Cristina are approached by the painter whose work they've just seen, Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem), who proposes they join him as he flies to a small town so they might spend the weekend making love. Vicky's appalled; Cristina's intrigued; Juan Antonio is a laid-back seducer with a ready counter-argument to every objection: "Life is long; life is dull; life is full of pain." Why not have a little fun? It's not enough to talk the girls into agreeing to go to bed with him, but it is enough to get them on-board the plane. ...

Tropic Thunder, starring Ben Stiller as one of a group of runaway actors whose work on a big-budget Vietnam epic goes horribly awry, is a funny, far-fetched mockery of modern Hollywood; the laughs don't maintain anything like a coherent intensity, but when they come, they're big enough to get you through the spaces between them. Some will mistakenly call Tropic Thunder a satire, but Tropic Thunder is in fact an example of satire's boisterous, bumbling sibling, the spoof. A satire's held with a light but precise grip, so the point can slice and the blade can cut; a spoof's more of a club, landing with blunt force and broad impact.

Star and director Stiller attacked the celebrity-industrial complex before, in 2001's Zoolander, and Tropic Thunder has more in common with that film than you might think; Stiller manages to mock action and thrills while also delivering them, and he's got a fine grasp of coarse celebrity behavior. Stiller seems drawn to characters whose self-centered arrogance is mixed in equal measure with self-loathing insecurity. We see an interview clip where Stiller's character, box office star Tugg Speedman, is informed by an interviewer how "Someone close to you said 'One more flop and it's over for him.'" Speedman pauses, and then asks his follow-up: "Somebody said they were close to me?"

Hell Ride is a deliberate, calculated throwback, referencing and recycling the cheapie bike-sploitation flicks of the '60s and early '70s as a band of burly brothers roar, rage and ride their way through the American Southwest on a rampage of revenge. Written by, directed by and starring Larry Bishop, Hell Ride thrums and roars with attitude; problem is, the drive shaft components of plot and character and logic just aren't there, meaning that even when Bishop hits the throttle, the roar and rattle can't hide the fact nothing's really happening.

Hell Ride revolves around a cycle gang known as The Victors, led by Pistolero (Bishop), with the tuxedo-shirt clad The Gent (Michael Madsen) riding on his right and recent inductee Comanche (Eric Balfour) an up-and-coming lieutenant in the organization, on his left. The Victors are trying to take care of business -- although what business it is they're in is never quite explained -- and the only thing interfering with that is Pistolero's obsession with righting the wrong done decades ago to Cherokee Kisum (Julia Jones), slain on the 4th of July in 1976. The Gent and Comanche are rubbed the wrong way by Pistolero's campaign of retribution, especially with the Six-Six-Six'ers and their kill-crazy leader Billy Wings (Vinnie Jones) edging in on Victors turf. ...

Things get a little lively on The Rocchi Review this week, as we look at Comic-Con's biggest surprises and let-downs with Alex BIlington of First Showing. But there's plenty else going on, too -- from all the reasons James and Alex are dreading The Spirit to the question of if Comic-Con is selling sexiness or sexism, as well as what recent films in development are earning enthusiasm or scorn, and a brief argument about entertainment journalism vs. 'entertaining' journalism. ... Cinematical's podcast is now available through iTunes; you can subscribe at this link. Also, you can listen directly here at Cinematical by clicking below:



As ever, you can download the entire podcast right here -- and those of you with RSS Podcast readers can find all of Cinematical's podcast content at this link.

It must be a horrible, wonderful thing to be a movie star in this modern age -- rewarded and yet tightly caged by the public's perception of you. Stay within the expectations of the ticket-buying public, and you're likely (or, more accurately, more likely) to not fall off the public's radar; at the same time, that gilded cage must, at some point, feel more and more like a prison. I mention this in talking about Swing Vote because Kevin Costner manages a somewhat nifty trick in his performance as Bud Johnston, a New Mexico ne'er-do-well who, thanks to a close-fought election and a voting machine error, gets to pick the next president. Oh, sure, we all do that on voting day -- but, due to a electoral college tie and a tie in New Mexico, it turns out Bud's vote will be the deciding one. For, well, everyone. Before this is established by Jason Richman and Joshua Michael Stern's screenplay, though, we get a sense of Bud -- and, at first, Bud seems like another in a long line of Kevin Costner likable rascals from Bull Durham's Crash Davis to Tin Cup's Roy MacAvoy. But Bud is something more interesting -- a man whose charm can't quite cover up the holes in his soul. Bud's a drunkard. Bud's lazy. And if it weren't for his daughter Molly (Madeline Carroll), Bud would be even more adrift and frayed. Early, Bud tells his civic-minded daughter that " ... voting doesn't count for a goddamn thing." Bud's the kind of guy who's wrong a lot -- and he knows it -- but, thanks to the gentle contortions of Swing Vote's plot, never more so than now.

There's good news and bad news, Soderbergh fans: The bad news is that the director's two-part, Benicio Del Toro-starring Che Guevara biopic Che, as noted in a recent piece in The Hollywood Reporter, still doesn't have a U.S. distributor. Gregg Goldstein's piece (which also looks at the similar challenges faced by Cannes '08 films Synedoche, New York and Two Lovers) notes that there are four offers on the table from independent distributors, but no deal has yet been signed.

For many who saw Che at Cannes (including myself), this is vexing news. Goldstein also relates that one distributor's hopes to purchase Che as a single film with a three-hour running time has been roundly rebuffed. However, in case anyone would like to see what all the fuss is about -- albeit in blurry, bootleg fashion -- a grainy, blurry bootleg of the trailer (in all Spanish with no subtitles) for the first half of Che, The Argentine, has hit YouTube (see above) -- and while the bootlegged trailer may lack clarity and definition, it also gives a great sense of the look and the feel of the film.

Does The Argentine's trailer make you hunger for all of Soderbergh's Che? Or does it just make you appreciate how hard it's going to be to get a distributor to back a four-hour long historical drama in Spanish?

It's been called one of the greatest documentaries ever made. It's a 170-minute-long juggernaut of a film. The fact it was snubbed by the Oscars created such a public outcry that the Academy was compelled to change the very voting process for the documentary field. And, like finding a piece of filet mignon at the local fast-food joint, Hoop Dreams is now nestled in alongside old Buffy re-runs, Simpsons clips and other offerings at Hulu.com.

Directed by Steve James, Hoop Dreams follows two young men from Chicago and their struggles and triumphs on and off the basketball court as they aspire to go from grade school promise to high school stardom and hope make it to the NBA. Shot over a period of years, Hoop Dreams has been called one of the finest documentaries of all time, and the indie-consultancy group Cinetic has made it available on-line at Hulu.com. And, of course, part of me is looking for the cloud around this silver-lined opportunity: What's Cinetic hoping to get out of this? What's Hulu hoping to prove? And if you're hoping to prove the viability of Hulu as a distribution model for documentaries, why would you pick a 14-year-old film that already has a great Criterion DVD? And finally, as much as I admire Hoop Dreams and the idea of it being available on-line, I have to wonder if anyone is going to sit in front of their computer screen for the full 171-minute running time of the film. ...

(With American Teen opening in theaters today, we at Cinematical are re-running our review from Sundance.)

Nanette Burstein's documentary American Teen opens not far from John Hughes country, both geographically and artistically: we're introduced, in quick order, to four students at the high school in Warsaw, Indiana, on the first day of class. But while the camera work and voice-over has the glossy fizz of fiction, it's nonetheless a real school, and while the kids we meet all correlate roughly to the archetypal teens of fiction, they're real too. We meet Hannah, the plucky, artsy outsider; Colin, the star athlete with a heart of gold; Megan, the prom queen whose school-spirit high-fives hide an iron fist; and smart, insecure, dorky Jake, all in quick succession. And while part of your mind reels at the clichés -- we're just one Judd Nelson-type away from a straight flush, for heaven's sake -- as Burstein's film unfolds, we realize that if there ever was a place cliché's were true, it's high school.