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FILM AUGUST 12-18, 2009 M E T R O S I L I C O N VA L L E Y
M E T R O S I L I C O N VA L L E Y AUGUST 12-18, 2009 FILM
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Peter Travers
AWESOME.
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‘DISTRICT 9’ SOARS ON THE IMAGINATION OF ITS CREATORS.�
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Reviews by Michael S. Gant and Richard von Busack.
New Adam (PG-13; 99 min.) Max Mayer’s comedy/ drama stars Hugh Dancy as a man with Asperger’s Syndrome who tries to ďŹ nd love with a new girl in his life (Rose Byrne). (Opens Aug 14 at the Guild in Menlo Park and the CinĂŠArts Santana Row.) Bandslam (PG; 111 min.) Todd Graff (Camp) directs an alterna-kids movie about a group of misďŹ ts getting a rock band together. Vanessa Hudgens and Lisa Kudrow co-star. (Opens Aug 14.) Cold Souls (PG-13; 101 min.) Paul Giamatti stars in a tale of an actor wrestling with his part in a Chekhov play. (Opens Aug 14 at CinĂŠArts Santana Row and CinĂŠArts Palo Alto.) District 9 (R; 112 min.) See review on page 43. The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard (R; 90 min.) A comedy about a used-car salesman, starring Jeremy Piven, Ed Helms and Ving Rhames. (Opens Aug 14.) La Rondine The Puccini opera recorded at Teatro la Fenice in Venice. (Screens Aug 12 at 7pm at Camera 7 in Campbell.) Ponyo (G; 100 min.) See review on page 47.
Spread (R; 97 min.) Ashton Kutcher plays a gigolo. Who knew? (Opens Aug 14.) The Time Traveler’s Wife (PG-13; 107 min.) Eric Bana plays a man who can’t keep to the present; things don’t go well for those around him when he keeps zooming off chronologically. Also stars Rachel McAdams. (Opens Aug 14.) Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg (Unrated; 92 min.) Aviva Kempner’ s excellent documentary on a tremendously popular multi-media phenomena. She was Gertrude Berg, once described as “the ďŹ rst lady of television.â€? For more than 30 years, she starred in radio, TV and movies as Jewish housewife Molly Goldberg of the Bronx. It’s probably apocryphal, but it’s quoted here that FDR said Molly Goldberg ended the Depression, not him. More certainly, The Goldbergs pioneered the type of family-centered comedy/drama still running on network TV this very night. Using a harmonious and cleverly chosen blend of vintage footage and interviews, Kempner re-creates Berg’s triumphs. But the underside of the story is here, too—the blacklisting of Berg’s co-star Philip Loeb, ďŹ ctionalized in Martin Ritt’s The Front. Interviewees include everyone from passionate fans to Berg’s family and the show’s surviving co-stars. Norman Lear credits the show for his survival as a young boy; another fan who testiďŹ es for it is Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The more muted praise by Ed Asner provides a useful counterpoint: Molly Goldberg’s Old World warmth and New World energy disarmed anti-Semites. Yet she accelerated assimilation, and assimilation eventually outpaced Molly
Goldberg. (Opens Aug 14 at Camera 3 in San Jose.) (RvB)
Revivals Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) King Arthur is played by Graham Chapman as soft and rather dumb, a constitutional monarch in the bloody Middle Ages. Even God, animated by co-director Terry Gilliam, isn’t that keen on him. John Cleese is impressively gruff as a bellicose knight who doesn’t let quadruple amputation dull his ďŹ ghting spirit; he is also an extravagantly ridiculous French knight. Eric Idle is brave, brave Sir Robin, his shield bearing the emblem of the ferocious Chicken of Bristol. And Michael Palin and Terry Jones (in drag) are the moral centers of the ďŹ lm, the razzing voices of the working class. The ruling class in England derives some of its power from the myths wrapped around it. The Pythons never forgot that power when it came time to roast the tales of Arthur. The screening includes contests and free ticket giveaway to the upcoming local run of Spamalot. (Plays Aug 12 at sundown in San Jose at San Pedro Square; bring blankets or lawn chairs; free.) (RvB) A Night at the Opera/The Merry Widow (1935/1934) The ineffable Marx brothers take on the world of classical music. However, they’re saddled with a squarepleasing “love interestâ€? of Allan Jones and Kitty Carlisle, which makes for popcorn breaks, anyway. Home of the famous and endlessly imitated “stateroom sceneâ€? and the symphony orchestra chumped into playing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.â€? BILLED WITH The Merry Widow. The
spicy story retold in post-Code times, heavy on the MGM gingerbread. The confectionary plot is mostly familiar in its parody form (in the Marx Brothers’ Duck Soup). Prince Danilo (Maurice Chevalier) is required by patriotism to marry the country’s richest widow, but Danilo hexes the job by mistaking one of the oozies at Maxim’s for said heiress. Not director Ernst Lubitsch’s ďŹ nest hour, despite some pleasant touches throughout. (Plays Aug 12-13 in Palo Alto at the Stanford Theatre.) (RvB) Niles Film Museum Four two-reelers from 1921; in the new decade, comedy was changing from an emphasis on action to an emphasis on reaction. The Boat, with Buster Keaton, recounts the fatal and short cruise of the DamďŹ no, complete with the captain going down with the ship. Also: I Do with Harold Lloyd and Be Reasonable with Billy Bevan; here the Australian comic with slapstick’s largest mustache plays “A Rolling Stoneâ€? pursued by a legion of cops. I think Bevan’s ďŹ nest hour was devising the “fresh oyster stewâ€? routine, stolen and made unforgettable by Curly Stooge. Also: Charlie Chaplin in a dual role in The Idle Class, as both a rich wastrel and a goodhearted tramp. Judy Rosenberg at the piano. (Plays Aug 15 at 7:30pm in Fremont at the Edison Theatre, 37417 Niles Blvd.) (RvB) The Notebook (2004) James Garner plays Noah, the visitor of an aged woman, Allie (Gena Rowlands) at a convalescence home; his task is to read to her from a book that contains a boy-meets-girl, boy-loses-girl, boy-gets-girl tale. Rachel McAdams is often accidentally funny in the story-
within-the-story as the ďŹ ery rich girl drawn to young Southern working-class Whitman quoter Noah (Ryan Gosling), a coupling opposed by frustrated rich mom Joan Allen. (Plays Aug 13 at sundown in Redwood City at Old Courthouse Square; free; bring blankets or lawn chairs.) (RvB) A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) There is post-Elvis music; there is post-Picasso art. There is no such thing as post-Brando acting. Here Brando plays a brute who outwits a poor cracked buttery (Vivien Leigh). Tennessee Williams’ view of this drama was that it concerned “the ravishment of the tender, the sensitive, the delicate . . .â€?; Stanley Kowalski’s gusto for life turns this into a drama in which we sympathize with the cruel, the callous and the strong. A Marlon Brando impersonation contest begins the evening. (Plays Aug 19 in downtown San Jose at sundown at Post Street between Market and First streets; bring lawn chairs or blankets; free.) (RvB) Swing Time/Bachelor Mother (1936/1939) Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers were poetry in motion. Unfortunately, the plots of their ďŹ lms were prose. Lucky (Astaire) is a hoofer by trade, but a gambler by vocation. He and his equally penniless partner, Pop (Victor Moore), head to New York to raise the dowry for Lucky’s ďŹ ancee, but the dancer has his heart stolen by Penny (Ginger Rogers), who works at a dance school. From that point on, it’s his persistence vs. her reluctance as they work their way up to penthouse-level nightclubs. Astaire is so graceful that even when he’s running for a train, it looks syncopated. Although The Gay Divorcee is Astaire and Rogers’ best
comedy, Swing Time is their most romantic ďŹ lm, mirroring as it does the lives of lovers with the lives of gamblers. BILLED WITH Bachelor Mother. One can supply the recipe for this, but one can’t describe its speciďŹ c deliciousness: a Garson Kanin–written comedy of errors in which a shop girl (Ginger Rogers) is mistaken for a single mother; and the son of the department store owner (David Niven) is presumed to be the father. (Plays Aug 14-17 in Palo Alto at the Stanford Theater.) (RvB) West Side Story (1961) The jazzed-up urban version of Romeo and Juliet has indifferent juvenile acting. Natalie Wood is a ravishing blank, but Rita Moreno, in a secondary part as Anita, is the real star of the show, and she knows it. When Moreno spits out “A Boy Like Thatâ€? you see what the movie could have been if they’d used more of the proverbial wise Latina. The much-honored ďŹ lm is a different animal in 70 mm than it is on a TV; on the bigger screen, one gets not only a vanished NYC, entombed under the Lincoln Center; one also gets a look at the amazing art direction. The sets are like a compendium of 1950s modern art styles from Clyfford Still shadows to Robert Rauschenberg walls to the Ed Kienholz– like cafe where the juvenile delinquents learn their social lessons from Doc (Ned Glass). The songbook is impossible to resist. (Plays Aug 14-15 at 7pm in San Jose at the California Theatre.) (RvB) The Women/Humoresque (1939/1946) The mother of all bitch fests: Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Joan Fontaine and the tedious Norma Shearer (as the good wife, naturally) in an all-female freeform battle over men. You couldn’t dream of calling it
feminist—except in the Cosmopolitan sense—but it’s as unique as it is long. The Technicolor fashion show is a psychedelic delight. BILLED WITH Humoresque. Jean Negulesco’s fraught drama about a classy but alcoholic older woman (Joan Crawford) and the ďŹ ery young classical violinist she “sponsorsâ€?: John GarďŹ eld, the sultry but doomed pre-Method actor, here given a script co-written by Clifford Odets to sink his teeth into. The authentic-looking violin scenes were done by stufďŹ ng two separate classical violinists under GarďŹ eld’s coat: one with his hand up his sleeve, the other to do the fretting. (Plays Aug 18-20 in Palo Alto at the Stanford Theatre.) (RvB)
two years. She was called Summer (Zooey Deschanel). As Tom recalls this tale in random-accessed moments, we begin to see the bigger picture. (500) Days of Summer is allegedly an anti-romantic ďŹ lm, but the result is yet another alterna-date movie—a little brighter, a little more referential, than usual. The scenes don’t go on so long that they wear out their welcome. And yet it’s so full of negative space—places where jokes could have been planted, places where the characters could have been deepened. If only director Marc Webb had spent as much time thinking how to ďŹ ll in the blanks as he spent murmuring, “It’s going to be Annie Hall for our generation.â€? (RvB)
Reviews
Funny People (R; 146 min.) As Jonathan Schell described the late Robert McNamara, “emotional without being introspective.â€? Judd Apatow’s op doesn’t range far from below the belt: it’s his most serious ďŹ lm and yet his worst. Seth Rogen plays Ira, a budding L.A. comedian who hooks up with George (Adam Sandler), an A-list comedian with a string of proďŹ table high-concept ďŹ lms— and a case of Hollywood Movie Disease. George mentors Ira; Ira mensches George. The title is a misnomer; in Apatow’s world, it’s only men who are funny. Which is strange, since 45 hilarious seconds of Sarah Silverman talking about her junk beats the more than two hours of cock humor here. To those who have always felt that Sandler was an aggressive, cold ďŹ gure, it’s hard to celebrate his showing an uglier side than usual. The visuals aren’t worth mentioning; Apatow’s still essentially a TV director in love with the easy setup and the interior shot. (RvB)
Aliens in the Attic (PG; 86 min.) A family comedy about kids and visitors from beyond. The Cove (PG-13; 92 min.) Top 10 material. Louie Psihoyos’ documentary uncovers a continuing scandal—the wanton slaughter of dolphins off the coast of Japan. The outrage happens annually at a Wakayama Prefecture site hidden from the public view by security guards and concertina wire. The investigator is dolphinologist/ activist Richard O’Barry. He assembles an Impossible Mission Force–like team to inďŹ ltrate the site by land and water, despite intimidation by police and security guards. This outraging, thrilling ďŹ lm is guaranteed to stir indignation. (RvB) (500) Days of Summer (PG-13; 95 min.) Tom (Joseph GordonLevitt), a greeting-card writer, has his heart broken by a girl he knew for about
G-Force (PG; 88 min.) Guinea pig humor dressed up in military fatigues. G.I. Joe: Rise of the Cobra (PG-13; 120 min.) Behind-the-scenes moments to look for when this DVD comes out: Sean Penn is passed over for a role on the G.I. Joe team after he fails to demonstrate proper “kung-fu gripâ€? and “eagle-eye visionâ€? in audition; producers screen Todd Haynes’ 1987 underground ďŹ lm Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, which was acted out with Barbies, and briey consider casting actual G.I. Joe dolls; writers somehow remain blissfully ignorant to the fact that their plot point about the bad guys trying to destroy the Eiffel Tower was used in Team America: World Police, as a parody of how bad the plots for movies like this are; project stalls when everyone involved realizes a live-action movie based on plastic action ďŹ gures is a really stupid idea, revived when Transformers becomes one of the most successful movie franchises in history. (SP) The Hangover (R; 100 min.) A satisfyingly low comedy with a sturdy plot and the wit to realize that the Three Stooges format is solid gold. Stick with it, since the ďŹ rst third is hit and miss; later, director Todd Phillips solidly builds the situations, thinking up strategies to bolster the risky comedy. (RvB) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (PG; 153 min.) Hogwarts’ decay is showing, against lowering weather that looks like January in Iceland. The new potions professor, Horace Slughorn (Jim Broadbent), holds in his memory a key conversation with the young Tom
Riddle, later to become the Hitler of the world of magic. Dumbledore (Michael Gambon), the magic-world’s Churchill, needs to know what Slughorn knows, but the world’s greatest wizard is starting to decay. Young Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) is now comfy enough with being called the Chosen One that he can joke about it (even if Emma Watson’s Hermione gives him an whack on the head when he does). Rupert Grint is show-stealing in his perennial role as ginger-nut comedy relief. (RvB) The Hurt Locker (R; 131 min.) The soldiers of Bravo Company are stationed in Baghdad for the 2004 ďŹ ghting. Central to the ďŹ lm is the mystery of Staff Sgt. James (Jeremy Renner) who comes in to replace a slaughtered demolition expert. James’ risk-taking amazes and angers his subordinate, Sgt. Sanborn (Anthony Mackie). Director Kathryn Bigelow does what Howard Hawks would do: she ďŹ nds the cooperation between men of great competence in a killing trade, rather than pumping up rivalry. (RvB) In the Loop (Unrated; 106 min.) Armando Iannucci, a well-known ďŹ gure in British television comedy, does a scathing sort-of version of the dawn of the Iraq invasion. James GandolďŹ ni’s Lt. Gen. George Miller is a more wrathful version of Colin Powell. Mimi Kennedy plays Miller’s best ally, Karen Clarke, a career State Department diplomat with dandruffy hair and teeth that seem to be disintegrating during the middle of a crisis. GandolďŹ ni and Kennedy’s characters are the ďŹ lm’s moral
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