Modern Classic of the Week: American Beauty

Sam Mendes' searing portrait of suburbia is a study in filmmaking. Every aspect of this film fires on all cylinders and comes together as a brave, heartbreaking saga of the lost connections between human beings. Alan Ball's superbly written screenplay truly gets at the heart of what it is to be a person in a sea of nothingness and to try to swim to shore in an attempt to regain some long lost humanity.

The person at sea in this film is Lester Burnham, played in a career performance by Kevin Spacey. Simply with the look on his face, he can speak volumes where words do not seem apt. He is a despicable character whom the audience can not help but like because, innately, we understand him. For all of his faults and insecurities, he is us, and we are with him on his search for a soul that has long since drifted away.

Matching Spacey point for point and blow for blow is Annette Bening, as Lester's workaholic wife, Carolyn, who tries so hard to keep up appearances that she herself can no longer see what is real and what is a facade. There is a magnificent scene a quarter of the way through the film where she repeats her mantra "I will sell this house today" while prepping the home for showings. She is earnest and strong until the final moments when she realizes that she has failed, and she completely falls apart. The mania and desperation she expresses is both frightening and devastating.

There are strong performances from every actor in the film, a fine supporting cast including Chris Cooper, Mena Suvari, Wes Bentley, and Thora Birch; however, the show is stolen by cinematographer Conrad Hall's beautiful tableaux. His use of light and shadow, of depth and color make the film a visual masterpiece, comparable with anything in a Peter Jackson sci-fi epic. Meticulously crafted and expertly shot, each image is a painting and each painting is a revelation.

On par with the likes of Schindler's List and Pulp Fiction, American Beauty stands as one of the finest films of the nineties. It is a bold statement on humanity and life, on beauty and truth, and on all of the things that we take for granted. The film's tag line, "look closer", is a summation of theme, but it is most assuredly a profoundly ardent suggestion on how we should live our lives and interact with those around us.

Music in the Movies Part One: Score

Yesterday, I purchased the soundtrack to a very, very good film, Once. I saw it several weeks ago. Its recent success has convinced the studio to push more money behind it. I could not be more pleased with that. I would call it the year's essential movie to see so far (David Fincher's Zodiac being a close second). More generally, however, the soundtrack got me to thinking about the use of music in film. It does essentially boil down to two things: original scores of music written for the film or a compilation of pop hits from any of various appropriate decades. Since these are two very different concepts, we will discuss them independently of one another. Today, I will talk about original scores.

I am of the opinion that a film's music should blend into the film and assist in creating an overall atmosphere. In tandem with the photography and art direction, the music is essential in determining the mood of a piece. These aspects should all work together to produce a singular work of art. Basically, what I mean, more than anything else, is that the music should not draw attention to itself. It should not be unnecessarily grandiose and self-important.

We will take a case study of two of the most highly regarded films of all time: Gone with the Wind and Casablanca. Both scores were written by music legend Max Steiner; however, they are as different as night and day. The score from Gone with the Wind is arguably the more memorable, ranking number two on the American Film Institute's list of greatest film scores. And, it is an admittedly fine piece of musical composition, but it stands alone, apart from the film, as a separate artistic achievement. On the other hand, Steiner's score for Casablanca is an essential part of the film and can not stand alone. The whole of the music is based on the most prominent song in the feature, "As Time Goes By".

While Steiner's work on Gone with the Wind is masterful writing, it augments the film rather than enhancing it and is used as simple shortcut for arrousing the proper and appropriate emotion in the viewer. The music in Casablanca is, however, perfect in exemplifying the mood and tone of the film. It does not distract the audience but instead subtly flows in and out of the movie as necessary.

One could easily spend all day considering the history and evolution of the film score. I have chosen two examples that may seem dated but, for my purposes, will suffice. Countless pages could be spent examining the validity of John Williams' artistic contributions to just Steven Spielberg's filims, let alone Williams' other notable works. Modern film scores are less revered than classics, but we will see where they stand thirty years from now. In three decades, will Howard Shore and Phillip Glass be held in the same regard as Franz Waxman and the aforementioned Max Steiner. Time will tell.

Classic Movie of the Week: Viskningar och Rop

Everyone else is doing it, but that does not make it any less valid for me to do so as well. Last week, the film world lost both Michelangelo Antonioni and Ingmar Bergman. Both were master craftsmen. Though I find Bergman to be the better of the two, it is like choosing between a filet mignon and a fine champagne, wildly different things but fantastic in their own right. I choose Bergman for many reasons. Not the least of which is the fact that I happened to share a birthday with the man.

Therefore, the classic movie of the week is Bergman's 1973 masterwork Viskningar och Rop (Cries and Whispers), one of the select few foreign films ever to be nominated for best picture at the Academy Awards. Starring Harriet Andersson, Ingrid Thulin, Liv Ullmann, and Kari Sylwan, the film is a devastating exploration of the human soul and of Bergman's favorite subject, god's silence.

Sven Nykvist (an Oscar winner for this film) uses his camera masterfully and draws the most out of every frame. However, the real star of the show is Marik Vos-Lundh's wonderful set pieces. The house, in which almost all of the action takes place, is the perfect evocation of the human soul, which Bergman is oft quoted as imagining as "a damp membrane in varying shades of red". It is all at once claustrophobic and suffocating but also cold and distant.

The performances all around are fabulous, but Harreit Andersson is amazing as the matriarch of the family who suffers from cancer while her daughters surround and wait for her to die. Using almost no words at all, she is able to convey every feeling of pain and sadness and regret that she experiences.

As is almost always true with Bergman, the symbolism of the story trumps the literal plot, but this is one of his very few uniquely cinematic films. The style and substance of Visningar och Rop could only be done in the film medium and only by an artist like Bergman.

New Movie Review: The Bourne Ultimatum

This is supposedly the final film in the series, and if so, it wraps up the trilogy nicely. Fresh off the success of his tremendous, if controversial, film United 93, for which he received an Oscar nomination, Paul Greengrass is back for his second Bourne-film. In what may come to be known as the year of the three-qual, after seeing the release of the third Pirates movie, the third Spiderman and the third Shrek, The Bourne Ultimatum stands head and shoulders above the rest of the crowd.

It is an intense, spy thriller filled with the same intrigue and action that drew audiences to the first two installments. Greengrass' trademark handheld camera is the perfect fit for this kinetic film that hardly slows down to explain itself and, yet somehow, never leaves the audience questioning the motives of anyone, least of all Jason Bourne.

Reprising his role as the earnest, amnesiac CIA operative is Matt Damon who gives a fine performance, managing to look comfortable but never boring in the skin of what some are calling the "American Bond". He is at once icy cool and frantically desparate as he seeks to outwit his nemises at the CIA, here played by David Strathairn in a wonderfully understated supporting performance.

In the end, The Bourne Ultimatum delivers on every promise that it makes: it is a gripping thriller, an intriguing spy game mystery, and contains some wonderful chase scenes through streets of major world metropolises. It is a popcorn flick with a magnificent pedigree and is a worthy addition to the genre.

See it?

Yes.

Things to come...

Alright, so here's the deal: this is my first post in almost a month. There are reasons for this, but those reasons matter very little. What is important is what is to come in future posts. Please allow me to tell you. I am a movie person. It is what I do. I eat, drink, and breathe movies, figuratively. So, my blog will be about movies. One every couple of days specifically. Each week there will be at least one review of a movie new in theatres. There will also be a choice for classic film of the week. In addition, there will be the "modern classic" of the week, which will be defined as a movie released in the last twenty-five years that, in another twenty-five years, should or will be considered classic. I will begin Sunday night, so tune in then for our show.

"Happy birthday, welcome home, and we who are about to die salute you."

Name that quote.