deadCENTER review: “The Four-Faced Liar”
“The Four-Faced Liar”
Directed by Jacob Chase
Traditional relationships get the run-around in “The Four-Faced Liar”, the product of a bunch of NYU film students’ work, adapted from a play to film.
The premise is simple enough. Prudish Greg (Daniel Carlisle) moves to New York to be with his just-as-prudish girlfriend Molly (Emily Peck) when they meet new friends Trip (Todd Kubrack), his girlfriend Chlose (Liz Osborn) and his lesbian roommate, Bridget (screenwriter Marja Lewis Ryan). The ensemble grows to become friends, crassly discussing the nature of their relationships over video games (the guys), in the kitchen (the girls) and while playing drinking games (all of them).
Molly—a Clare Danes look-alike—reads Wuthering Heights throughout the film, discussing her dull but practical relationship with Bridget, who listens the way she wishes Greg (read: Linton) would. It soon becomes clear that the two works share a central theme, though—in a twist—Bridget proves Molly’s Heathcliff.
It seems Molly’s grown tired of Greg’s turn-the-lights-off and climb in bed ways, and after a dirty bathroom rendezvous at the crew’s favorite bar, The Four-Faced Liar, the Molly and Bridget sneak around town, pawing at each other like teenagers. It’s not long before roommate Trip finds out and blabs to Greg, which forces Molly into the quintessential Wuthering Heights-situation, whether to choose between what’s socially acceptable and practical or what’s truly her identity.
The film’s not funny enough when it means to be and the characters -privileged twentysomethings- don’t do a whole lot to endear themselves to the audience with their crude and sarcastic treatment of one other. By the story’s end, we’re supposed to somehow feel for the seemingly-hapless Molly who’s extremely immature in her relationship with Bridget and woefully unhappy with the uninspired Greg. It’s difficult to care about a film’s conclusion when none of the characters really seem to care about each other.
Grade: 2 out of 4 stars
–Carney
deadCenter Review: ‘The Extra Man’
“The Extra Man”
Directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini
Husband and wife team Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, who directed the wonderful “American Splendor” in 2003, have a knack for combining the ordinary and the strange, and they do so impeccably in “The Extra Man,” an exceedingly smart and hilarious comedy of contradictions. Jonathan Ames joins the duo in adapting his novel for the screen.
Kevin Kline does his best comedic work since “A Fish Called Wanda” as Henry Harrison, a self-styled cultured aristocrat who nevertheless drives a dilapidated deathtrap on wheels and possesses embarrassingly backward opinions about just about everything. Paul Dano stars as Louis Ives, an aspiring writer who thinks of himself as a dapper character in a Fitzgerald novel, but is rather shellshocked by everything around him.
Louis begins renting a room in Henry’s apartment, and the two become friends despite their respective secrets. Henry is an “extra man,” a kind of escort for elderly and wealthy debutantes, while Louis is a budding cross-dresser. Henry lets Louis in on his secret; Louis does not reciprocate voluntarily.
“The Extra Man” is bursting at the seams with eccentricities, both in terms of its characters and its occurrences, but the film avoids ever becoming too precious, self-aware or smug. It owes plenty of genuinely funny moments to both its verbal and physical wit — mostly from Kline, but even when it seems like it’s overdone it (John C. Reilly plays a bearded neighbor with a ridiculous falsetto speaking voice), the humor comes around to make sense in context.
Katie Holmes gets kind of shoehorned in as one of Louis’s coworkers, but the film certainly doesn’t overuse her or her vaguely hippie-ish lifestyle to become icons of quirk. Instead, the film is at turns both solemn and wacky, restrained and unabashedly uninhibited. “The Extra Man” should be full of indie-film contrivances, but Berman and Pulcini know just when to take a left turn.
The film, picked up by Magnolia Pictures and scheduled for a late July theatrical release, is well-worth seeking out in theaters.
Grade: 3 1/2 out of 4 Stars
-Dusty
deadCenter Review: ‘For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism’
“For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism”
Directed by Gerald Peary
It’s not the best time in the world to be a film critic — dozens have been laid-off from their full-time positions and the proliferation of critical voices on the Web — both accomplished and amateur — has made the field ruthlessly egalitarian, for better or worse. Everyone really is a critic these days.
It’s into this tumultuous environment that director Gerald Peary — himself a film critic for the Boston Phoenix — has released this history and analysis of the profession. The film traces film criticism from its earliest days as a novelty and advertising gimmick up through its current state — although the Web is mostly reduced to a few personalities like Harry Knowles of Ain’t It Cool News. This untrained, fanboy side of Web criticism is certainly worth examining, but it doesn’t represent the whole picture.
Former full-time critics such as Glenn Kenny (Premiere) and Jonathan Rosenbaum (Chicago Reader) both offer serious critical thought online. Rosenbaum retired and Kenny lost his job when Premiere folded, but they both continue to reach audiences online. Peary made clear in his post-screening discussion that his film is not anti-Web, but it certainly doesn’t examine Web criticism in any substantial way.
What the film does well though is offer a history primer that most filmgoers and certainly the general public will learn from. Elements of the history are necessarily brief, but it is rather thorough, descending from its cursory viewpoint occasionally to document certain movements in a more in-depth manner, such as the auteur theory and the resulting feud between Andrew Sarris and Pauline Kael.
Despite existing as mostly talking heads (with a good number of film clips interspersed), the film remains lively and engaging throughout. Dozens of critics are interviewed, with great insight and anecdotes from people like Sarris, Molly Haskell, Stanley Kauffmann, J. Hoberman and Elvis Mitchell, who was in attendance to discuss film criticism in a panel after the film. The film certainly gives more time than necessary to the dour Richard Schickel, who actually confessed to a UCLA audience that he never really loved movies after a screening of this very film.
Peary doesn’t exactly possess a sharp filmmaking talent — the film is visually inconsistent and sometimes rather garish looking, making for a film that is more utilitarian than anything — but that certainly doesn’t detract from the film’s usefulness. In a day where anyone can fire off a review of anything online, it’s nice to be reminded that serious critical thought isn’t quite extinct yet.
Grade: 3 out of 4 Stars
-Dusty
Film criticism, Wayman Tisdale and Oklahoma films highlight Saturday at deadCenter
Film critic and radio/TV personality Elvis Mitchell attended the deadCenter Film Festival Friday to participate in a panel discussion on film criticism.
An abridged version of this story appeared Sunday in The Oklahoman.
Film criticism, a local legend and Oklahoma moviemaking were on the agenda Saturday at the deadCenter Film Festival in downtown Oklahoma City. The last full day of the five-day fest played host to more than 40 short films and close to a dozen feature films across seven downtown locations.
Included among those films Saturday was “For the Love of Movies: A Story of American Film Criticism” which traces the profession from its origins to today’s climate, where dozens of film critics have been laid off from their full-time positions.
The director of the film, Gerald Peary, himself a film critic for the Boston Phoenix, was on hand to discuss the state of the industry, and the increasingly democratized state of it thanks to the Internet. While the legions of online critics — mostly young writers — represent a major shift in the way criticism is practiced and perceived, it’s not all bad, Peary said.
“This is not an anti-young person film,” he said. “This is not an anti-web film for sure. I really do feel two ways at once. I feel protective of older critics. At the same time, I agree with critics that say we should look to young people.”
Elvis Mitchell, former New York Times film critic and host of public radio program “The Treatment,” appears in the film and attended the festival to participate in a panel discussion with Peary.
Despite the fact that it’s becoming increasingly difficult to make a living as a film critic — a proposition that was always dicey, he said — the influx of different perspectives is certainly welcome.
“The great thing about now is that criticism isn’t monolithic anymore,” Mitchell said.
Wayman Tisdale
Saturday also saw the world premiere of “The Wayman Tisdale Story” a documentary about the NBA and OU basketball star and jazz musician who battled bone cancer and died suddenly last May.
Directed by Chicago-based filmmaker Brian Schodorf, the film features interviews with Tisdale conducted just months before his death. Tisdale was emphatic that quitting was not an option, Schodorf said.
“All the stories you hear about Wayman Tisdale are true,” he said. “[He] was very grounded and that’s why he could handle what he was going through so well.”
Anita Richardson, Tisdale’s sister-in-law, said the film was immensely rewarding.
“It really showed how much of an impact he made,” Richardson said.
Greg Price, Tisdale’s friend and a board member of the Wayman Tisdale Foundation, was emotionally impacted by what he saw, he said.
“Sitting that close to the screen and seeing him right there a year later — it just kind of got to me,” Price said.
Also showing at the festival Saturday were feature films by Oklahoma filmmakers, including “The Rock ’N’ Roll Dreams of Duncan Christopher” and “1 in 3.”
Tulsa native Jack Roberts wrote and starred in the karaoke superstardom comedy “Rock ’N’ Roll Dreams,” and said his state roots played a major role in the film’s conception.
“We really wanted to make a fun movie that had a broad audience and we wanted to make a movie that was Oklahoma-centric,” Roberts said.
Lagueria Davis, who lives in Norman, directed “1 in 3” which draws on her experiences working for the Women’s Resource Center in Norman for its story of the effects of domestic violence. Despite the touchy subject matter, Davis had plenty of people who wanted to help, she said.
“Kudos to Oklahoma for having people who wanted to get on board this project,” Davis said.
-Dusty
deadCENTER review: “A Good Day To Die”
“A Good Day To Die”
Directed by David Mueller and Lynn Salt
The best documentaries examine the overlooked. For “A Good Day To Die”, filmmakers David Mueller and Lynn Salt opened up a chapter of American history rarely read by anyone, the story of Dennis Banks and the American Indian Movement (A.I.M.) of the late 1960s and 1970s.
The film is beautifully researched, as Mueller and Salt spent two years digging into dozens of archives across the country to find photographs, news reports, video (homemade and from various news outlets) while also procuring just as many interviews with members of A.I.M. and the federal government present at the scenes of protests, trials and marches the country over. Backed by a Native American soundtrack (composed mostly of Banks’ singing), the tense scenes at the Wounded Knee occupation and protest in Custer, South Dakota carry a far more deathly imposition than that of Vietnam protests of the same era accompanied by “For What It’s Worth”.
Co-founder Banks and the the rise of A.I.M. were inextricably linked, and filmmakers follow him from his youth spent at a U.S. government-enforced boarding school in Minnesota to a brief stint in prison before he began a policy of “confrontational politics” against the government that many of the interviewed Native Americans liken to a big bully. Among their complaints were that Minnesota police were pinning unsolved crimes on Native Americans and that unjust mass arrests and harassment were denying them their civil rights.
There’s documentation aplenty of A.I.M.’s occupations of Custer, Washington D.C. and Wounded Knee and the grainy footage of pissed-off automatic weapon-wielding Indians at the latter is pretty awesome. It’s a powerful image that answers the film’s resounding question, “What do people do when they’re abused and oppressed to the point that they’re willing to die for better conditions?” It’s like a real-life “Braveheart” with a real-life William Wallace, told in documentary form.
Unfortunately the film doesn’t ply very deep into the private character of Dennis Banks. We learn a lot about his motivation to help his people but the audience doesn’t see him at his most personal, in his individual relationships with others. Regardless, he’s presented as a determined, motivational character who’s well-loved and appreciated by native people the world over.
Grade: 3.5 stars out of 4
–Carney
deadCENTER review: “Simmons on Vinyl”
“Simmons on Vinyl”
Directed by Mark Potts
deadCENTER executives have stressed the importance of showcasing locally-produced films to promote the growth of arts within the state. University of Oklahoma students Mark Potts, Cole Selix and Brand Rackley are three such filmmakers and (judging by the film quality and logistic constraints) probably operated on the tightest budget of any feature-length shown at the festival.
But that’s not to say the film isn’t any good, quite the opposite, really. Director Potts isn’t trying to direct “Avatar” here. He plays to his strengths, constructing a simple premise that showcases the trio’s slightly raunchy but good-humored ‘dude-versation’ to permeate the film, a refreshing and funny exercise built around the universal truth that guys will go to moronic and senseless lengths for girls.
Zeek (Mark Potts) is your typical lovable loser with goofy friends and a colossus crush on a girl who doesn’t return his 20 or 30 phone calls. When said girl asks him to run an errand for him in exchange for the possibility of a “mid-afternoon get-together”, he immediately enlists the help of womanizer Dwayne (Brand Rackley) and settled-down Dwight (Cole Selix), who has a kid “that’s cooler than an XBox”.
The trio’s exchanges compose the bulk of the movie, which follows them through a night of hijinks including a funeral for a cat (featuring that mystery wrapped in an enigma that is OU Vice President for Student Affairs and sometimes improv actor Clarke Stroud), a kidnapping and the lowest-budgeted dance contest in the history of cinema. Regardless, the exposition of the guys’ friendship -rife with hysterical pop culture metaphors- and the stop-start cadence to Zeek’s quirky delivery make this film one of the best of the fest.
Grade: 3 stars out of 4
–Carney
deadCenter: “Blastula” Review
This blog review recieves 3 1/2 out of 4 stars.
What a fitting title.
“Blastula” sounds like it has origins from another universe, which makes perfect sense for a Flaming Lips documentary. But in actuality, the short film’s name refers to the early stage of embryonic development in animals.
And this movie is full of creative beasts.
Set inside Lips multi-instrumentalist Steven Drozd’s unsold home, a single camera peaks through bedrooms, bathrooms and living rooms to capture the informal jam sessions the Lips made while crafting its latest album “Embryonic.”
The plot is simple. Lips members repeatedly say they have no idea what sort of album they are making, but they are definitely sure they are making something.
And we get a revealing look into the creative process of one of the most interesting bands making music today. The best moments in “Blastula” are the situations you’d rarely see musicians in. Frontman Wayne Coyne discusses how he pretended to know what he was doing while performing a nine-minute guitar solo and Drozd gives some youngsters a parental glare when they make noise during recording.
“Blastula” will stun your ears and eyes. Guaranteed.
-Poppe
deadCENTER to host world premiere Saturday at 5 p.m.
Hollywood filmmakers David Mueller, Bob Hicks and Lynn Salt wisely chose deadCenter Film Festival for the world premiere of “A Good Day To Die,” their documentary examining the rise of the American Indian Movement and its intrepid co-founder, Dennis Banks.
“We feel that (Oklahoma) is a very appropriate place to unveil the film because this is Native American country,” Mueller said.
–photo by Nathan Poppe, The Oklahoman
Appropriate indeed, because the film — which premieres at 5 p.m. today at the Kerr Auditorium — promotes awareness of the little-known movement that eventually secured a better future for American Indians everywhere.
Produced in just over two years, “A Good Day To Die” combines archival footage with interviews documenting both the rise of the American Indian Movement (A.I.M.) and the life of Banks, its co-founder and leader.
“It’s a history that hasn’t been told and desperately needs to be told,” Mueller said.
Now retired and living in Okmulgee, the film’s associate producer, Bob Hicks, is of Creek and Seminole heritage and one such beneficiary of Banks’ hard work.
“I wanted to make a contribution in the sense that everything that I saw on the screen dealing with Native Americans was always being played by non-Indians,” Hicks said.
“I thought rather than griping about it, I should learn how to make the movies and make a movie about it.”
Originally from Okemah, Hicks traveled to Los Angeles in 1979 and received a degree from the American Film Institute.
Mueller said that Hicks’ 25-minute student film “Return of the Country” pushed the envelope in filmmaking.
“Bob’s film was an inspiration to me and Lynn, too, because it really broke ground,” Mueller said. “It was a very progressive perspective at the time. I think it’s a very important film that will be recognized in the future.”
Salt is a 30-year veteran of the movie industry. “A Good Day To Die” is the product of her passions for recording history and championing American Indians in the arts.
She originally wrote the script intending for it to be a feature film, but after meeting with Banks, it was decided to turn it into a documentary.
The trio hopes the film educates the public about a neglected chapter in American history and the figure at the center of it, Banks, whom Salt compares to Martin Luther King Jr.
“He was the most significant figure in starting the American Indian Movement and I don’t think people know that,” Mueller said. “He’s a remarkable human being with a heroic story.”
If you go
Check out a couple of films today that hit home — “The Wayman Tisdale Story” and “The Rock and Roll Dreams of Duncan Christopher”.
Also showing will be feature films “Armless,” “The Extra Man” and “Bran Nue Dae”.
Acclaimed movie critic Elvis Mitchell will be part of a panel on film criticism at 4 p.m., after the showing of the documentary “For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism.”
–Carney
deadCenter Review: ‘Holy Rollers’
“Holy Rollers”
Directed by Kevin Asch
For a film about Hasidic Jews acting as ecstasy drug mules, “Holy Rollers” manages to be pretty monotonous. The premise, which is based on real events that happened in 1998, screams comedy, but director Kevin Asch goes the serious route, opting for a lightly-baked drama that comes off more insubstantial than deft.
Fortunately, the film has Jesse Eisenberg doing solid work as Sam Gold, a young Hasidic Jew who is being pressured to become a rabbi and marry a woman he barely knows. But the marriage falls through thanks to Sam’s perceived inadequacy, and he really isn’t sure if he wants to go down the ministry route.
When a next-door neighbor (Justin Bartha) offers Sam a chance to make some extra money moving medicine from Amsterdam to Brooklyn, he cautiously treads into the world of ecstasy smuggling — a world he’s soon entrenched in.
The film does a nice job with its progression of Sam, who starts out timidly, almost involuntarily, engaging in the process, then throws himself into it for the benefit of his family (the money enables him to buy his mom a new stove to replace her constantly faltering old one) and eventually just gets sucked into it for the pleasure of the lifestyle.
He gets in good with the boss, Jackie (Danny Abeckaser), and flirts with Jackie’s girl Rachel (Ari Graynor), but Sam’s quick transition from structure and devotion to lawbreaking and partying begins to take a toll on him.
“Holy Rollers” mostly stays on the surface level, and though the unfocused and lilting photography do well to communicate the haze Sam finds himself in, the film fails to be very visually or emotionally striking most of the time. There’s really only one way for this story to end, and the inevitability of the conclusion makes it seem a lot more mundane than it actually is.
Grade: 2 out of 4 Stars
-Dusty
deadCenter Review: ‘Metropolis’
“Metropolis” 2010 Restoration
Directed by Fritz Lang
Easily the premier film of this year’s deadCenter Film Festival, “Metropolis” is the kind of film that just has to be seen on the big screen. Now, with 25 minutes of previously lost footage found, restored and added to the film, it takes on an even more epic quality, and finally feels like a film fully realized.
A 16mm dupe negative of this uncut version was discovered in film archives in Buenos Aires in 2008. Extensive restoration was needed for the inferior elements, but they stand up fairly well against the rest of the film despite their still quite-scratched condition. Due to these scenes existing only on the smaller 16mm format, they remain smaller to preserve the aspect ratio.
Lang’s tale of class struggle and technological disillusionment is one of the great cinematic dystopias, with a towering Modernist city brought to life using a whole host of innovative special effects, including the insanely intricate Schüfftan process. Both the operation of the city and mankind itself works like a machine in the film — lower-class workers move stiffly and rhythmically like moving parts of an assembly line, while large masses of people (the film employed nearly 40,000 extras) move in unison like some overwhelming collective mind.
Some of the restored scenes simply insert shots here and there that serve to flesh out small details, like in the bourgeoisie’s lavish eternal gardens, while others heighten the tension considerably, like an extended sequence near the end where a large group of children must be saved from rising flood waters.
Despite a saccharine ending that’s both sickly sweet and utterly naive, “Metropolis” is one of the masterpieces of cinema, and that status should only be reaffirmed by this landmark new restoration.
Grade: 4 out of 4 Stars
-Dusty
