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davisprof
Reviews
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Sorry gang. We all want to like this movie, but it really stinks.
Evidently the producers thought that the shocking idea of homosexuality on the range was itself so powerful that it didn't need any of the other trappings of narrative film-making -- plot, character development, motivation. The time scheme is so poorly delineated -- and the age makeup for the two hunkettes so timid -- that the only way to tell what's going on is by figuring out how old their kids are. The two actors try their best, with Ledger putting in the funniest mumble performance this side of Benecio del Toro. But pretty much the rest is cliché, especially Michelle Williams' noble anger a la Jennifer Connelly. How did Ang Lee, so deft and comic in WEDDING BANQUET, become pompous so quickly? In Frank Oz's messy but still insightful IN & OUT, Matt Dillon plays a good-hearted narcissist who wins an Oscar for playing a gay solider. The film clips that we see at the film's Oscar Awards (brilliantly introduced by an uproariously fatuous Glenn Close) are suitably self-congratulatory (and hilarious). Give Brokeback Mountain a few years, and Larry McMurtry's script will seem as unintentionally idiotic as Paul Rudnick's was intentionally so.
A Raisin in the Sun (1961)
Splendid film of groundbreaking play
A Raisin in the Sun is a wonderful play, set in the 1950s but so current that the 2004 Broadway revival starred Sean "Puffy" "P Diddy" Combs. This movie is a heartwarming, and at the time groundbreaking, account of a black family's attempt to rise out of the South Chicago ghetto and move to a previously all-white suburb. It is enormously moving and entertaining. It is also something of a who's who of '50s and '60s African American actors, all the way from Sidney Poitier (in his career-making role), through Claudia McNeil, Ruby Dee, and Diana Sands all the way down to the small role played by Ivan Dixon, a fine actor in his own right, and later Hogan's Heroes regular. This film was not readily available for years, so welcome its reappearance on VHS and DVD. Treat yourself. And for an extra pleasure, also check out the later version with Danny Glover and Esther Rolle -- not quite the miracle that this production was, but splendid in its own way.
The Waste Land (1996)
Filming of great theater
I have to say that I have not seen this film. But I did see the stage production on which it is based. A single actress reciting Eliot's "The Waste Land" may not strike you as very interesting. But Fiona Shaw and director Deborah Warner are so brilliant that their collaboration remains one of the most memorable theatrical experiences in my life. In New York, this short performance cost more than $2 a minute. But it was sold out, and no one felt short changed. Fiona Shaw rarely appears in films or even on stage in America. And while she is always amazing in her short roles -- as the paralyzed professor in Doctor Sleep or mean Aunt Petunia in the Harry Potter series -- this performance allows her to show her full power and range. If the film catches even part of the magic of the stage production, it is certainly worth checking out.
The Spoils of Poynton (1970)
LOVELY LOST VERSION OF UNFAMILIAR JAMES
The Spoils of Poynton is one of the short novels James wrote before turning to the three large novels that ended his career -- The Ambassadors, The Wings of the Dove, and The Golden Bowl. As such Spoils is a wonderful introduction to the subtleties of late James. Since it is the complicated story of a fight over who inherits the family furniture, and how that may influence whom the son marries, the plot is like most James very subtle and complex. This screening makes the characters' motives clearer without in any way simplifying the Jamesian turns of the story. I haven't see this production in over thirty years, but I remember it as charming, and fairly truthful to James. It came the year before Masterpiece Theater's famous GOLDEN BOWL, and is in every sense its equal. A special bonus is a very young Gemma Jones as the wretchedly named heroine Fleda Vetch. Hard to find, but see it if it comes you way.
Ten Cents a Dance: Parallax (1985)
Graceful experimental film that examines the range of love
Ten Cents a Dance (from a Rogers & Hart song sung by a dancer/prostitute) explores three sexual interactions in three ten-minute segments. In the first a lesbian and bisexual woman discuss the possibility of sex over dinner at a Japanese restaurant. In the second two gay men have (simulated, PG-rated) sex in a public toilet. In the final segment a man calls a sex phone line and gets off. His female phone partner talks dirty but actually ignores him, painting her nails and lying about her appearance. These somewhat cynical accounts are very funny in presenting the ranges of failed love. They are also photographed spectacularly. The subtitle Parallax refers to the shift in image when cameras look from two slight different directions. Each of the three segments is a single take without cuts, filmed by two cameras, not quite on the same sight line. These slightly off images are then projected together on a split screen. The chaste image contrasts beautifully with the varying degrees of lust portrayed in the scenes. A beautiful, hilarious, and finally thought-provoking film.