American Beauty

"American Beauty" had me so baffled after my first viewing that I knew I had to watch it a second time in order to begin to grasp what it was saying. However, I did know that it was one of the best films I've seen in my life. Maybe because it concerned life and living and what that means, the most important topic in humanity. Roger Ebert once wrote that "the greatest films are meditations on why we are here." "American Beauty" does exactly that.

I didn't understand the scene of the floating bag until the second viewing. Initially, it was just a piece of trash dancing amidst leaves. But after viewing it again, I realized that is the central point of the film. Beauty is found in places one wouldn't ordinarily look. Most people would just walk by that bag, but for Ricky, it is the elegance, the formless, fluid movement that stops him and makes him film in wonder. If you actually watch the bag, it is beautiful. You do see the leaves following it like "foot soldiers," as Sam Mendes said. The bag is more beautiful when you forget you are watching a piece of plastic and embrace its trance-like movement of rising, falling, swirling, dancing, living.

This film views a typical American family and chronicles its demise. Or liberation, depending on how you look at it. The film begins with the father Lester (Kevin Spacey) existing, but not living. He comments that he "wasn't always this sedated," referring to the condition that I assume most Americans have experienced at least once. I think it is native to America because we have constructed a guarded, formal, relentless lifestyle that rejects intimacy and looks to possessions for happiness. Therefore, we end up feeling like we're already dead, like Lester says at the beginning of the film. He hates his job, he can't stand up to his wife, and he no longer can relate to his daughter, Jane. His life is a disaster. Or, if you're Ricky, who films each of these situations, they are beautiful.

How are they beautiful? They are beautiful because they are the beginning of a change, a step towards life. The family goes through important life situations; Lester lusts over his daughters friend Angela; his wife Carolyn has an ongoing affair with "the King of real estate," Buddy; and Jane falls in love with Ricky. The latter is the only positive situation of the three, because Ricky loves Jane for her unconventional beauty. He loves her because he thinks she is unique and beautiful. And in one truly remarkable scene, this love is seen. Jane has just been slapped by her mother. She goes over to the window and finds Ricky filming her from his house next door. In an act of intimacy, she takes of her clothes for him--not to seduce him, but to show that she trusts and needs him. As her naked body is exposed on the official film of the movie, it cuts to Ricky's camera--he is not filming her breasts, but just her face. It is a touching scene that shows the audience the love Ricky has for Jane. All the while, the audience sees the suspicious father of Ricky, Conrad, in shadow.

Meanwhile, Lester has quit his job and started working at a fast food restaurant, where he discovers Carolyn's affair when she makes out with Buddy in the drive thru. But Lester isn't hurt; he says it's okay, because he wants Carolyn to be happy. He has found his freedom in saying what he wants and going after what he wants. He works out in order to impress Angela, and one stormy night, he gets the chance. Angela had a fight with Jane and Ricky. Towards the end of the argument, Angela intentionally tries to hurt Jane by saying "yeah, well, at least I'm not ugly." And with insight into the theme of the movie, Ricky steps in and says "yes, you are. And you're boring, and you're totally ordinary, and you know it." A girl that has what the world calls beauty is called out by a boy who knows what true beauty is. This line in particular is perfectly delivered by Wes Bentley, who plays Ricky.

Angela storms out and runs downstairs, where Lester finds her. They exchange kisses and he undresses her. Just as he is about to move in on her, she tells him that she is a virgin, which seemingly snaps him back to reality. He was turned on by this girl, not woman. Lester clothes her and consoles her as she cries, and he realizes who she is, and who he is. They go into the kitchen to talk, and for the first time, Lester considers how he is really doing, how his life is going. He says he's great, and really means it. But then, as he reflects over the best moments of his life, he is killed, by one I will not name in hopes of not ruining the ending. But as Ricky and Jane come down to see what has happened, Ricky sees Lester dead on the counter, blood dripping down his face, and Lester seems happy. There is a small smile on his face that communicates that Lester died while he was content. And there is beauty in his death.

This film is exceptional because it comments on life, how beauty is found not in gorgeous women or sports cars or heated affairs, but in the smile on a dead man's face, or a girl who disappears in a crowd, or in a floating bag on the street. There is so much beauty in the world, we just have to learn how to see it.

Brokeback Mountain

"I wish I knew how to quit you."

"Brokeback Mountain" came into the public eye coupled with a monstrous amount of controversy. It's that gay cowboy movie, most said as they wrote it off. And, being in middle school, I encountered the immediate reference that emerged when any two males had any sort of contact-"BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN," my friends would scream. Of course, none of these people saw the film--they weren't gay, and only gay people went to see it, as far as they were concerned. There should be no wonder where there is so much hate in this country.

The film depicts the relationship of Jack and Ennis (Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger), two cowboys who meet while driving sheep on Brokeback Mountain in the fall of 1963. Initially, the two have a casual relationship, talking while eating meals. Ennis finds a confidant in Jack and speaks more to him than he has in his whole life. He discovers someone with whom he is comfortable and happy. So, one night Ennis ends up sleeping in Jack's tent after he realizes he can't make it back to his safely. In the middle of the night, the two engage in a quick sexual act, then fall asleep. They wake up in the morning, both fully aware of what happened, and promise to keep what happened between them. "I'm not a queer," Ennis states. "Well, neither am I," says Jack. Was this sexual exchange driven by Ennis' prolonged hiatus from sexual activity, being on the mountain and away from his fiance for so long? Or was he just attracted to Jack, and the lack of social and moral restrictions that come with being alone in the wild freed him to move in? I think it begins as the former, but as time progresses and the men continue to meet, Ennis develops a love for Jack.

The two men part ways at the end of the job, and they go back to their normal lives: Ennis marries Alma (Michelle Williams) and has two girls, and Jack marries Lureen (Anne Hathaway), the daughter of a wealthy farm equipment seller. But they never forget about one another--one day Ennis receives a post card from Jack, stating he will be up in Wyoming soon. Ennis is overjoyed, and when his friend arrives, they rush into an alleyway to kiss, to be seen by no one except Ennis' wife. She is horrified but doesn't share her knowledge with Ennis, allowing him to go "fishing" with Jack year after year. But the secret won't go away. She files for divorce and marries again, only then telling Ennis that she knew what he was doing all along.

And time and again, the two men meet at a secret rendezvous, where their conversations are free flowing and relaxed, as if they are only truly comfortable with each other. Over the course of the film, it is apparent that Jack needs Ennis the most. He drives from Texas to Wyoming each month, never making Ennis come the other way. And every so often, Jack offers to run away with Ennis, start up a ranch, live together, be happy. But every time, Ennis refuses; once he shares with Jack that when he was little, a gay cowboy in his town was drug by a horse and killed because of his sexuality. Ennis' father made sure his sons saw it, apparently trying to scare any homosexuality out of them. Whether from fear of social ostracism or frightening death, or even familial loyalty, Ennis turns Jack away over and over.

The men grow up, their lives begin to consume them. Ennis meets another girl but is unable to love her, even though she obviously loves him. Heath Ledger creates a character that is aloof, detached from everyone. He is tight lipped and masculine, and unable to connect with others. Could it be his love for Jack that subconsciously alienates him from the rest of the world? Or could he just be a quiet cowboy in an outgoing society, lonely and wanting what only one other has given him?

In the end, Ennis hears that Jack has died. Jack's wife says that he died in a freak tire-changing accident, but the coldness in her voice and flashbacks showing Jack beaten to death by other men suggest otherwise. Ennis is heartbroken. He travels to Jack's parents house and retrieves a shirt, one Jack wore while the two were on the mountain. He weeps for the only person he truly loved, and his life goes on, leaving him only with the memories.

Ang Lee created an intimacy in the setting on the mountain, alongside the already disappearing and foreign occupation of cowboy. Something about minimal technology and the wide open sky protruded by mountains evokes a nostalgia for a life I never had. The film was beautiful.

However, I didn't love the film; I thought going into it I would, but it just didn't do it for me. I don't say this to try and hide some homosexual desire within me or anything like that--with the cast of characters and the reputation of the film, I was disappointed in how little I was moved by it. Nevertheless, I still believe it was a solid film.

Bite Down And Sleep

Getting my wisdom teeth taken out was the strangest experience I've had in quite some time. All I remember is watching the guy put the IV in my arm and BOOM, I wake up in a different room, extremely tired. I think I got into a wheel chair and they wheeled my to my dad's car. After that, nothing. I can't eat solid foods, which sucks because I've never before craved pizza as much as I do right now. But I'm going to watch movies today and review Funeral by Arcade Fire, so it will end up being a successful day.

An Empty Heart

How is it that I don't care about injustice, or kids on the street, or remodeling of a church? Yes, I have an opinion about these things, but there is no place in my heart that burns and cries and breaks for them- for anything. I am uncomfortably numb. How do you start caring about things? Probably living. Because I haven't had to care about anything here, in my rich, white, American life. I could just go to school and church and family functions and only concern myself with trivial and useless activities that I later grew to despise like basketball. I am the culmination of a life of selfishness, in that I have never cared about anything, so I don't care about everything. Is the solution to start caring about someting? I first thought about caring for others, intentionally acting to make others' lives happier or more pleasant or better. Maybe that's the way. But I want my heart to break for something like Cari's heart breaks for injustice. I want to care about something.

Garden State

After my second viewing of "Garden State," I realized a few things about the film.

First off, the whole movie essentially says this--this life is all we have, so we need to be with the ones we love. I know that when Andrew Largeman says this to his father, he dwindles between accepting contentment with where we are now, and doubting any form of afterlife. I'm pretty sure he chooses the latter, which saddens me; because if this life is all there is, and we have to make the most of every moment, because the only thing that matters is having fun and feeling loved; if that's all we have to live for and then we die and it all means nothing after that, then that fucking sucks. Seriously.

That means that everything we do is only for our own pleasure, and we don't mean anything. God. If we are only here to find love and feel accepted and feel good and learn and eat and then die, then the purpose of our lives are the fulfillment of our desires. Hedonism is god. Let us run wild and free, chasing the temptations of our bodies and souls, capturing them and allowing them to please our appetites until our legs twitch again, and another temptation finds our feet sprinting after their empty golden promises of happiness, satisfaction, and peace.

"Garden State" is a film I like when I don't think about it. For some reason, it feels good. It feels smart and sophisticated, and it being a bildungsroman makes me like it, because that is the genre I'm currently captivated with. It's funny, Natalie Portman's Sam is cute and cool, Zach Braff is cool; essentially, it's a movie of cool stuff.

In one scene, Largeman screams into an "infinite" abyss. I found this interesting about which to speculate. Why is he screaming? Is it venting from the built up anger about how he feels about paralyzing his mom? About her death? About the medications he seemingly no longer needs? About his controlling father? About the feelings he has inside of him that he doesn't understand but knows are torturing him? My sister speculated that maybe he was screaming into a place big enough to hold his problems. Maybe he was screaming to God, or what seemed like God. When he can't articulate words, he just makes sounds as loud as he can, and he feels better.

In a nutshell, this is what "Garden State" says: be yourself, love is out there for you and soothes the heartache like nothing else can, forgive others, and have a really cool soundtrack. It tries to say things that have been said before (kind of like what I did in this review). But it's different, cuz Zach Braff is saying it.

Zombieland

Zombieland was just fun. The script was decent, the acting was average (except I felt that Abigail Breslin tried too hard), the special effects were nothing special. But the jokes were funny enough (I laughed out loud twice, which is rare for me to do once), the actors were likable enough (I do like watching Jesse Eisenberg do his thing), and the movie pulled it somehow together so that I found myself enjoying this film.

This was only my second zombie film to date, the first Danny Boyle's zombie masterpiece "28 Days Later" (both films involve fast moving zombies), so I don't claim to be the genre expert. However, this film seemed to revel in mocking itself. Killing zombies becomes a game, something to be enjoyed, complete with a list of humorous rules and guns galore. And what this movie was ultimately trying to say (if we discard the "shoot-stuff-for-fun" allure) is that people need others. In this film, the four main characters needed each other not only to stay alive, but to thrive as humans. Which doesn't seem like a thing one would worry about in a zombie world. If you only exist to survive the zombies and it requires daily slayings of past people, why would you want to live? Is life worth it then? And that's my soap box on the philosophy of zombie movies.

Again, Jesse Eisenberg plays the nerdy twerp that becomes the beloved main character, a role that I have yet to tire of. He has that guy nailed down--but eventually (depending on how he did in "Holy Rollers" and "The Social Network") he will be forever considered the older brother of Michael Cera, but only because "Juno" was way bigger than "The Squid and the Whale."

This film does have some poignant moments, and at least one of these I didn't see coming. The first and most surprising was that Florida (Woody Harrelson) was trying to move on from his son's death, not his dog's. The filmmakers created a very surprising montage of memories Florida had had with his son, which were proceeded by one's of the same nature but with his dog. I didn't expect to be shocked, but I was. Secondly, I found it touching when Wichita tells Columbus her real name, even though that reveal has been vastly overdone. Nevertheless, it was nice here.

Ultimately, this film is about audiences enjoying watching people kill zombies. As that as it's goal, I'd say it does a pretty good job (I mean come on, it's hard to hate a film with a White Stripes song in it. Just sayin').

Gone Baby Gone

Did he make the right choice or not? That is the question I have been asking myself after watching "Gone Baby Gone." If you are reading this, you have probably read my previous reviews (for lack of a better word) and know that I'm not about retelling plot. The little girl named Amanda is abducted, there is a search and no one finds her, Patrick (Casey Affleck) is the only one who still cares, and he eventually finds the girl under the care and protection of a retired cop who organized a heist to extract the girl from her destructive home life with her neglectful mother. Patrick has a choice--does he leave the girl with the cop, who will make sure that she has a proper, healthy childhood and will most likely put her on the road to having a normal life; or does he give the girl back to her mother, a woman addicted to drugs and alcohol who seemingly doesn't care for her daughter at all. He returns the girl to her mother did he make the right choice?

For a directorial debut, I'd say that Ben Affleck did an outstanding job with this piece. For me, it covers over his stale acting performances in sub-par films as an atonement for those sins. His brother Casey equally handles the pressure of the lead role with skill--he communicated anger, confusion, and uncertainty (among other things) in a way that didn't feel forced or overdone. For example, in one scene, Patrick is questioning if he handled the situation with a child-molester correctly, if killing the man was right. He says "murder is a sin." Police officer Remy Bressant (played by Ed Harris) replies that "it depends on who you do it to." But Patrick, unconvinced, responds "it doesn't work that way." Patrick has a strong inner conscience that provokes him to do what is right, even if it means risking his life, his girlfriend, or whatever else.

This is why Patrick has the girl returned to her mother. Yes, Amanda probably would have had a better life with Doyle, but the basic truth is she was stolen. She was taken from her home without consent. To Patrick, that is stealing. And stealing can't be justified, no matter how nice the birthday parties will be, or how fancy the car she is given, or even how much love she will receive. For Patrick, doing what's best does not outweigh doing what's right. That's hard for my brain to differentiate.

So what does this say about social services? What does this say about foster care and child support and all the other ways children are taken care of when their original family falls apart? Every other character in the film believed that returning the girl back to her mother would only put her in a detrimental situation; none of them believed that the mother would (or could, for that matter) change her lifestyle for the sake of Amanda. I wonder if Patrick did. I know he hoped she would. But in the final scene, as Helene rushes out for a date and Patrick is left watching over Amanda, Helene is still drinking, the apartment is still a mess (but looking better), it doesn't seem like Helene has changed her ways. When Patrick first walks in, it does; the apartment looks clean and Helene is dressed in nice clothes with her hair done. But then, piles of clothes are seen and the coffee table is a mess. I don't know if we are supposed to see change or not. I don't think Patrick knows either. So he is left wondering if he made the right decision as Amanda watches TV, and outside, somewhere more children are in the position she was in, and the world spins madly on.