Rogerebert.com review

Rogerebert.com is the former website of the late Roger Ebert (1942-2013). It is no longer used by Roger Ebert for obvious reasons but is now frequently operated by several other staff members and Mr. Ebert's wife Chaz Ebert.

The site reviews a variety of movies that come out, including mainstream blockbusters and indie films that few have heard of. Movies are both critiqued by their overall quality and have their style analyzed. In the review for Spike Jonze's "Her", Glenn Kenny discusses the positive effect that the film's cinematography has on the quality of the film, rather than simply praising the acting and script (though he does that too). A similar example is Christy Lemire's discussion of black and white used in Alexander Payne's Nebraska. She praises the way that the black and white gives notice to a sense of decay and melancholy in the story, unlike many films where it's meant to be nostalgic.

There is another section on the site dedicated entirely to the blogs of several contributors to the site, including Ebert himself. Ebert's blog is obviously no longer active but one of the most notable posts, "Movies that are made forever", doesn't analyze any particular film, but rather film in general. He discusses how certain movies are like sausages ("Grind up everything that's usable, stuff it into the casing of a marketing campaign, package them six to the weekend, pull them off sale after they begin to spoil") and how other films have a fervent passion and a need to be seen on the big screen, giving a careful examination of movies that are made for profit vs. movies that are made for more complex reasons.

Jim Emerson's blog, Scanners (titled after the David Cronenberg film) has both movie and non-movie discussions. The movie discussions include analysis on how multiple people make the movie. For example, Emerson praises Christoph Waltz in Django Unchained for not simply being a mouth piece for director Quentin Tarantino, which he feels is all too common for Tarantino films. He explains how a great actors can make cliche dialogue sound good and strong direction can create strong performances.

The site even features a question simply titled "Great Movies" which attempts to break down films that are held in high regard. David Lynch's Mulholland Dr. is dissected in an unusual way by Roger Ebert. Ebert not only discusses what  the film could mean, but also the effect that the film has on people. He discusses how nobody has a common consensus on the complex film, how perhaps the creature lurking outside of the diner isn't supposed to be anything but a visual strategy, and how David Lynch's love of archetypes, genres, and obligatory shots shape the film. It's an unusually thoughtful analysis.

Rogerebert.com is a fairly effective site for both hardcore movie buffs and casual viewers. The casual movie fans can enjoy the reviews discussing the quality of the movie while the film buffs can find great appreciation in the inquiries of various motion pictures. 

Rope of Silicon review

Rope of Silicon is a site which explores a variety of films and their quality. These films include hollywood films, independent films, and foreign films. The head of the site is Brad Brevet, a Seattle native. Brevet has several features on his site. One of the features is reviews.

Brevet's reviews are thoroughly written and go beyond simply whether a film is good or bad. For example, when reviewing 12 Years a Slave, Brevet analyzed the sound in the film, saying "Sound, in fact, weighs heavily on this film. Following Northup's abduction he's chained and tossed into a room with a concrete floor and wooden slats for walls. Every move he makes the chains strike and scrape against the floor at a nearly intolerable level. And when the ambient noise isn't setting the mood, Hans Zimmer's cello-driven score threatens and taunts us with the promise of more to come." He is also not afraid to go against the status quo, giving American Hustle (94% on Rotten Tomatoes) a C+ rating while giving Spike Lee's Oldboy (44% on Rotten Tomatoes). Brevet is noted for finding entertainment in unusual ways. He enjoyed Oldboy because  he found "the cultural differences between the Korean original and this American remake result in a fascinating game of compare and contrast for those that have seen both, though it's not even necessarily the actual culture [he's] referring to as much as it's the difference in cinematic culture. Your willingness to expand your cinematic horizons, whether you're a seasoned film geek or simply a mainstream moviegoer, will serve as the true test." 

Brevet also discusses movie news. For example, he discusses recently released trailers and posters as well as his box office predictions. He thoroughly analyzes his box office predictions by taking many things into account, including the film's plot, the director and their relative box office success, and the actors and their relative box office success.

Arguably the most popular feature is the "Awards" section. Brad Brevet uses several factors to predict who will be nominated at the Academy Awards each year. He avoids bringing his own opinions into account and instead focuses on the common consensus, as well as the sentimentality that often times attracts the Academy. He thoroughly examines each individual or film that he considers to be a contender in the Oscar race. Brevet also looks at the other award shows that precede the Oscars to make his predictions. He has a high success rate with his predictions. However, the notable thing is his commentary on the Oscars itself. He likes them in the way that they are a celebration of film, but he dislikes the politics involved in the award show.

Overall, Rope of Silicon is an intelligent site that I would recommend any movie buff to visit. From the well written reviews to the engaging look at Oscar season, it should have something for everyone.

Early blog post #2

Jarhead

Jarhead is one of those outstanding films that nobody really watched. It's also one of those films that's not really regarded as outstanding scoring a mere 61% on Rotten Tomatoes. However, Jarhead tackles military life in a way rarely seen. War is hell as seen in most movies, but not for the reasons we are used to.


Jarhead is an examination of the effect war have on aimless use, especially in regards to their masculinity. The main character, Anthony Swofford (Jake Gyllenhaal) is ferociously yelled at by his drill instructor in a scene reminiscent of the first half of Full Metal Jacket. Swofford admits that he only joined the Marine Corps because he got "lost on the way to college". Drill Instructor Fitch is not impressed

Swofford finds his training at Camp Pendleton rather uninteresting and even pretends to be sick to avoid having to do any work. However, he is eventually invited to join a Scout Sniper course which he accepts. Swofford and a fellow soldier Troy are made shooter and spotter respectively. Troy and Swofford have a mostly friendly relationship. Troy's first words to Swofford are "welcome to the suck". The suck is a slang used by Marines which refers to the Marines, but it also ultimately foreshadows how all of the Marines will be feeling later in the film.


After Kuwait is invaded by Iraq, Swofford and several other marines are sent to the Persian Gulf as part of Operation Desert Shield. Lt. Colonel Kazinski (Chris Cooper) gives the Marines a charismatic pro-war speech. One of the Marines, Fowler, shouts "I can't wait to kick some Iraqi ass, sir!" Soon enough, all of the Marines start saying it, and Kazinski is happy to see the enthusiasm of men ready to murder others.

The only marine who doesn't seem to fall for the propaganda is LCpl. Chris Kruger (Lucas Black in an excellent performance). Kruger is different from the other Marines because he only joined to avoid going to prison (it's never explained what he did). Kruger is a young Texan, the type of person who is usually stereotyped as being pro-war and bloodthirsty. Instead, Kruger seems to be the only man who sees what's going on. He believes the only reasons the troops are there is to protect the profits of the oil tycoons. When a television crew arrives to interview the Marines, Ssgt. Sykes (Jamie Foxx) demands that they don't say anything that could be interpreted as anti-war. Kruger accuses it as censorship. Swofford starts to see more clearly at this point as well asking about freedom of speech and the constitution.

"No, you signed a contact. You don't have any rights. You got any complaints, you complain to Saddam Insane and see if he gives a fuck."

Kruger accuses Sykes of treating the Marines just like Saddam treats his own people.  Sykes responds "you are a marine. There is no such thing as speech that is free. You must pay for everything you say."

These marines, who are supposed to be fighting for freedom and democracy, don't even have freedom themselves. When the interviews happen, most of the interviews are typical. Troy talks about how he loves being a marine because he finally counts for something.  Cuban immigrant Ramon Escobar talks about how he's proud to serve America because it has given freedom to him. Naive Fergus O'donnell discusses how he misses his parents. Swofford is arguably the most honest after being asked if he's scared. "Look, I'm twenty years old and I was dumb enough to sign a contract. I can hear their fucking bombs already. I can hear their bombs and I'm fucking scared, yeah." 
Kruger is interviewed as well but ultimately has nothing to say because he wants to speak his true opinions and he's not allowed to do that.

Nobody seems to be lacking more in empathy than PFC Dave Fowler. Fowler is reckless, loudmouthed, and is bigoted towards Middle Eastern people including making obscene gestures to a woman in a Hijab. All of this goes unpunished. Swofford finally decides Fowler has gone to far when he sees him defiling a burnt Iraqi corpse. Sykes assures Swofford that Fowler will face consequences for his actions when they go back home, but the last scene we see of Fowler is him back in America making out with a woman in a bar with a big smile on his face. Fowler's lack of humanity was irrelevant to the U.S.M.C. The gung-ho marine is exactly what they're looking for so he gets off without even a slap on the wrist.
Swofford's behavior constantly teeters a line between sympathetic and gullible. Pure boredom often times gets the best of him. This isn't call of duty. The marines don't have to worry about shootouts or bombings. The only bombing incident is from a friendly fire incident caused by the gung ho PFC Dave Fowler dissented from the formation. Swofford has family waiting for him at home and a girlfriend, but his big concern is to be involved in the action. He wants to fire his rifle. He wants to kill someone. The USMC has taught him the importance of kicking Iraqi ass and if you leave the war without killing someone, then you're nothing. Only killers matter. This has a horrible effect on Swofford's mental state to the point that he almost shoots Ferguson in the face and then tries to shoot himself. Troy berates him for his reckless and dangerous actions.


At the end of the film, Swofford and Troy are finally sent on their first combat mission. Their mission is to kill two Iraqi officers in a control tower. They are given permission to take the shot but a team of Marines who outrank them appear and call in an airstrike instead. Troy wants a kill, he NEEDS a kill so he pleads with the commanding officer to let them take the shot anyways. When his requests are denied, Troy breaks down into a violent fit and eventually tears up. The commanding officer observes with a smirk. He doesn't care about his fellow marines. He just wants credit for everything. It's at this point that Swofford realizes what he has become and how Troy's mental break mirrors his own from earlier in the movie.

Troy and Swofford head back to base disappointed. They get lost but here noises in a distance (it's late at night). They think it's their chance so they get their guns ready only to discover that it's their own base and the noises are their fellow marines partying. The war is over and the Marines couldn't be happier. Swofford tells Troy that he never fired his rifle. Troy recommends that he does it now, so he fires a round in the air. The other marines fire their weapons into the sky as well, the only time any of them got to experience anything that even resembles action.

The marines head home and are celebrated as heroes, despite their presence having no real effect on the war. The situation becomes worse when a Vietnam war veteran jumps onto their bus and it's immediately clear that he's still suffering from effects of the Vietnam war. Swofford moves on with his life, though he discovers that his girlfriend has moved on with somebody else. Everyone else moves on with Kruger arguably ending up the most successful. His final scene shows him talking in a corporate boardroom, apparently doing quite well. Swofford discovers that Troy has died and attends his funeral (the cause of death is not specified in the film, but in real life it was a car accident). This causes Swofford to truly examine his life. The film ends with one final monologue:
A story. A man fires a rifle for many years. and he goes to war. And afterwards he comes home, and he sees that whatever else he may do with his life - build a house, love a woman, change his son's diaper - he will always remain a jarhead. And all the jarheads killing and dying, they will always be me. We are still in the desert.

This is going to be hanging over Swofford for the rest of his life. He spent a year doing absolutely nothing and he'll never forget it. His biggest accomplishment was almost killing someone and he now realizes the absolute pointlessness. He fell for the propaganda, for the pro-war movies, and now he has no choice but to continue. However, this will always remain a piece of him. Once a marine, always a marine. Swofford made the choices he made, thanks to his own naivety, and now must live with the psychological consequences.

Early blog post #1

Practice blog post #1

A mix of a review/analysis of a film intended to practice making blog posts.


Somewhere (2011)

I wasn't quite sure what to expect from Somewhere. Few films are quite as divisive. Critics like Roger Ebert, Richard Roeper, and A.O. Scott absolutely loved the film, praising nearly every aspect. Many reviews show absolute hatred of the film, using lines such as  "'Somewhere' goes nowhere", calling it boring and pointless. That said, I loved Sofia Coppola's previous effort, Lost in Translation, and I consider Stephen Dorff to be a very underrated actor (who is best known for his roles in indie films like Backbeat, I shot Andy Warhol, and Felon, but has also had mainstream roles such as playing the main villain in Blade) so I gave it a shot.

Stephen Dorff in Somewhere

Somewhere tells the story of Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff), an actor who's finally achieved the stardom he's been searching for but is now suffering from an existential crisis and is now staying at a celebrity hotel. He's also recovering from a minor injury on his arm (the cause of the injury is never explained). His ex-wife suffers an unexplained breakdown and goes away, leaving him to care for his 11 year old daughter, Cleo (Elle Fanning).

At least that's what I thought the film was about. Cleo is actually barely seen in the first half of the film, which mainly focuses on scene after scene of Marco's loneliness. He promotes his new film, watches twin sisters pole dance, has sex with strangers, attends a party, and gets a massage among other things.


The first half has some entertaining moments, the best being the few moments with Cleo and the funny massage scene. The insight into show business life and Johnny's general behavior is at times well shot and meaningful. It was great to see Johnny's lack of purpose, after all, he's achieved the fame he's been looking for and he's not sure if it's quite what he expected and he's unsure as to what to do next. That said, things are ultimately more boring than interesting, with many scenes dragging on way too long. For example, we have TWO scenes where Johnny brings pole dancing strippers into the hotel where he's staying and we see their entire dance. Both dances are about 2 minutes but the film could have easily just shown the last 20 seconds of the dances and still made the point they were going for with Johnny's unusual reactions. And don't get me started on the unbelievably tedious makeup scene. We see a group of makeup artists cover Johnny's face in latex (for reasons never explained), then they leave and we see THIS for over a minute. Just the camera zooming in...

However, while the first half of the film film teeters the line between being a tedious film about nothing happening and an interesting film about ennui, everything comes together once Cleo enters the picture. I don't know how much (if any) of the dialogue was improvised, but Elle Fanning and Stephen Dorff have such natural chemistry that they feel like a real life father and daughter. Seeing the way Marco develops as a character from his time as Cleo is done in a very believable manner.

There's virtually nothing known about the film that Johnny is starring in. All that we see is a poster of him giving a brooding stare while standing next to his female co-star played by Michelle Monaghan.
The film appears to be about Italian-Americans (Marco is probably Italian, considering his last name) and may or may not be a reflection of "post modern globalism". The film is never named by any of the characters but from what I could make out from the poster, it was "______ Agenda".

But the lack of the details in some ways actually help the film because it shows how Johnny just does not care at all. His relationship with his co-star is shown to be less than stellar as we see them smile together while promoting their movie and it makes you wonder how genuine any of those photos are of actors together promoting a movie in real life. Are they just smiling for the camera?

The film is quite similar to Sofia Coppola's universally acclaimed Lost in Translation. Both are about lonely actors who try to get out of their shells with the help of a younger female and have a few language barrier issues when in a foreign country (a portion of Somewhere is set in Italy while Lost In Translation is set in Japan). Lost in Translation is definitely the better film, as Somewhere often times lacks focus. You can't expect too much focus in a "Slice of life" film, but Lost in translation still had enough to keep the viewers interested for the entire running time. Another similar thing to Lost in Translation is the ambiguous ending and you can feel free to interpret that in any way you like. I have an idea of what it means, which I will discuss below. Coppola is a fine director, though as mentioned before, she does let some scenes go on too long. Despite this, it'd be nice to see her start exploring some new themes (I have not seen her most recent film, The Bling ring, but it doesn't seem to be about loneliness which is refreshing).

All this said, Somewhere is still an entertaining film thanks largely to the performances and chemistry between Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning, and the engaging themes of Hollywood's celebrity culture, ennui, and parenthood. As mentioned before, the first half lacks the focus that made Lost in Translation so interesting to watch, but there are still enough emotional and lifelike scenes to make it an enjoyable experience. While, I'm not sure that I loved it as much as a handful of critics did, I definitely don't understand some people calling it one of the worst films of all time either. Johnny Marco, despite his subdued personality and celebrity status, felt like a real human being and one I could really relate to and because of that, this is a hard film just to forget. Even the first half is starting to grow on me, the more I think about it. It's somewhat a difficult film to recommend, due to some VERY negative reviews, especially on IMDB, but its a film that I certainly enjoyed. During some moments in the first half, I was wondering when the film would be over, but in the 2nd half, I was almost sad as it was ending, because a film like this wouldn't have a Johnny Marco sequel, so we'll never explore this fascinating character again.

7.5/10

SPOILERS: Ok, let's discuss the ending. The spoiler sign might not even mean anything because what really happened anyways? The ending is a "Book Ends" ending. That means that the ending scene matches the beginning scene, usually meant to show how things have greatly changed or how they haven't changed at all. The film begins with a black ferrari driving in the desert at a fast pace. It eventually stops and Johnny Marco steps out of the car and just stands there. The film ends with Johnny Marco once again driving his Ferrari in the desert. He once again stops, but this time he doesn't just stand there. He walks away from his car, leaving the keys in the ignition, with a smile on his face, heading to places unknown. 

My interpretation of the ending is this: the beginning shows Johnny's aimlessness. He's driving around the desert because he doesn't know what he's doing with his life. He steps out, hoping to find purpose beyond simply driving in the desert. However, he doesn't know what to do so he just stands there. At the end of the film, he's driving again, but this time he walks away from the car. The Ferrari represented Johnny's aimless life. He doesn't need the Ferrari anymore because now he has a purpose, a purpose bigger than an acting career. He has a daughter, a daughter who he greatly cares about and who cares about him. Johnny's life is no longer driving in circles. It's not clear where he's walking to because Johnny doesn't know. Life is unpredictable, but he knows what he wants now. He wants to spend time with his daughter, the key to his happiness.