STRAWBERRY KILLING FIELDS FOREVER: Max (Joe Anderson) sees red after he's sent to Vietnam in Across the Universe
Page 3 of 5
A WOMAN I VAGUELY know -- for lack of a better term, we'll call her a "professional moviegoer" -- once informed me that, out of the countless free screenings she's attended over the years, the only one from which she's ever walked out was Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou. This statement blew my mind. As I reflected on the dozens of truly grotesque movies she's doubtless seen in the past decade alone -- a brain-rotting list that includes Bad Boys II, Christmas With the Kranks and Garfield: The Movie -- I could scarcely believe that this was the only feature deserving of her unadulterated contempt.
Then again, Wes Anderson is that type of filmmaker, the sort of auteur who stirs love-him-or-leave-him vibes in audience members. Which makes my own ambivalence toward him slightly perplexing: I've mildly enjoyed all of his films to date (others include Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums), yet I've never detected that spark of genius that his fans (and many critics) insist he possesses. Anderson's movies are too slight to earn such hefty acclaim, and were they not peopled with strong actors who can punch across his sweet-and-sour declarations (most memorably Gene Hackman in Tenenbaums), they would blow off the screen with the ease of a dandelion caught in a summer breeze.
The Darjeeling Limited is Anderson's most wispish work to date, a road movie in which the road is made of railroad tracks. Carrying over the thematic baggage of most of his previous efforts, this one also concerns itself with familiar discord -- here, Francis (Owen Wilson) invites his younger brothers Peter (Adrien Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman) to India to join him on a spiritual quest. They travel mainly aboard the train The Darjeeling Limited, attempting to communicate (but often just miscommunicating) with each other as they reflect on their relationships with loved ones as well as with each other.
Anderson regular Bill Murray pops up at the very beginning, and his shaggy-dog appearance sets the tone for the remainder of the picture. Working from a script he co-wrote with Schwartzman and Roman Coppola, Anderson places the bros in various situations that, despite all the lip service given to spiritual journeys and moments of epiphany, never markedly change them. Their quest feels more like a jest, and even when they encounter death along the way, the three men remain too self-absorbed to fully respond to it. The Darjeeling Limited is a mixed bag of a movie, with some exquisite camera shots and a few clever exchanges not quite enough to overtake the tale's slenderness or the limitations of the three leading characters. But it offers enough modest charms to earn it a mild recommendation -- walking out of it would simply be criminal.
HOW NECESSARY ARE sex scenes to a film's very identity? In some instances, such as Last Tango In Paris and Shortbus, they're integral to our understanding of the characters' psyches. In most cases, they're merely movie decorations, there to entertain us and arouse us and not do much more.
The carnal encounters in Ang Lee's Lust, Caution, intimate couplings that earned the film a rare NC-17 rating, are open to debate. Certainly, part of the director's intent is to employ the sex as a means of charting the complex relationship between Wong Chia Chi, a drama student who becomes a spy, and Mr. Yee, a Chinese official who's also a key Japanese collaborator during World War II. At the same time, there's a nagging sense that, having stirred up plenty of controversy with Brokeback Mountain, he's hoping to keep the fires burning by going even further in his exploration of sexuality. The trouble is, Brokeback Mountain truly gave us something unique (at least in American cinema), while the soft-core romps in Lust, Caution can be caught on late-night cable any given weekend.
Expanding a short story by Eileen Chang, Lust, Caution moves back and forth between the war years 1938-1942, with the naive Wong Chia Chi (Tang Wei) joining a patriotic drama club whose leader (Wang Leehom) decides that in order to truly serve China, its members must get their hands dirty. The outfit sets its sights on Mr. Yee (Tony Leung), who's deemed a traitor by aiding the Japanese during their occupation of Shanghai. It's decided that Wong will pass herself off as a bored wife named Mrs. Mak, gain access into Mr. Yee's inner circle, and engage in an adulterous tryst that will result in him letting his guard down long enough to be assassinated. Mr. Yee is attracted to Wong, but because he trusts no one, it takes a while for him to feel fully comfortable with his mistress. For her part, Wong earns his love but finds herself conflicted when she starts to develop similar feelings toward him.
ACROSS THE UNIVERSE
***1/2
DIRECTED BY Julie Taymor
STARS Evan Rachel Wood, Jim Sturgess
THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD
***1/2
DIRECTED BY Andrew Dominik
STARS Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck
THINGS WE LOST IN THE FIRE
***
DIRECTED BY Susanne Bier
STARS Halle Berry, Benicio Del Toro
THE DARJEELING LIMITED
**1/2
DIRECTED BY Wes Anderson
STARS Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody
LUST, CAUTION
**1/2
DIRECTED BY Ang Lee
STARS Tony Leung, Tang Wei.
DAN IN REAL LIFE
**1/2
DIRECTED BY Peter Hedges
STARS Steve Carell, Juliette Binoche
RANDY AND THE MOB
*1/2
DIRECTED BY Ray McKinnon
STARS Ray McKinnon, Lisa Blount
ON THE WEB
TRAILER/PHOTOS: For trailers of the reviewed movies, as well as additional photos, go to www.theclogblog.com.
Mobile
