Off Script: Shallow Grave

Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on laptop.

So yesterday I watched Marvin’s Room. Because of that, I decided that today I needed something with a bit more…guts. So, despite have recently put up a review of something from my horror lists, I felt like I needed something along those lines today. Thus it is that I watched Shallow Grave, Danny Boyle’s first full-length theatrical release. This is not a horror movie by any legitimate measure. What it is is a very violent neo-noir and one of the first films in the more modern breed of ultraviolent British crime films. Shallow Grave lacks the fun of a film like Snatch, opting instead for intrigue, mistrust, and pure evil.

The plot is ridiculously simple. Three roommates are looking for a fourth to share their apartment. The three are young professionals, all with decent careers and prospects. Alex Law (Ewan McGregor) works for an Edinburgh newspaper as a reporter. Juliet Miller (Kerry Fox) is a doctor. David Stephens (Christopher Eccleston) is a chartered accountant. The search for a new roommate is more of a chance for them to make fun of people and put them through a terrible interview process, but eventually they settle on Hugo (Keith Allen), who claims to be working on a novel.

Marvin's Room

Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on laptop.

Sometimes I don’t get to make the decisions I want to. A case in point is my watching Marvin’s Room today. My reason for watching it, beyond the fact that it is on one of my Oscar lists, is that it vanishes from NetFlix streaming in a couple of days and NetFlix doesn’t have it on DVD. So it was pretty much now or never. I was heartened by the cast, which is top to bottom excellent. I was concerned about the plot based on the short synopsis. But, rather than let this slide into the “can’t find it” pile, I figured it made sense to knock it out.

So let’s talk about that cast for a moment. Diane Keaton was nominated for Best Actress here, making this one of a handful of times someone other than Meryl Streep was nominated. We also get Hume Cronyn, Leonardo DiCaprio the year before he did Titanic, Robert De Niro in a small role and Dan Hedaya in a smaller one. Seriously, this is a cast any first-time director would mortgage his soul to get.

Apollo 13

Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on laptop.

It’s not something that comes up here that often, but I’m a complete space nerd. About a third of the reading I do for pleasure is space science—cosmology, the creation of the solar system, the history of the space program and the like. It’s one of the greatest accomplishments of humankind, and I can’t get enough of it. That creates a problem for me with a film like Apollo 13; I know what’s going to happen here. I’ve read the accounts and I know the history. I know who guys like Deke Slayton and Gene Kranz are without being introduced to them in the film. That being the case, there aren’t a ton of surprises for me here. Of course, that’s also true because I’ve seen this before, but it was true the first time I watched.

What that means in real terms for me as a viewer is that it had better be a damn good film for me to have a good opinion of it. Fortunately, it is. Just as critically, Apollo 13 is accurate except for minor details made for narrative purposes. The main events, and even the things that seem like cinematic foreshadowing are things that actually happened in the real mission. I always appreciate historical accuracy.

The Verdict

Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

Consider Paul Newman for a moment. While Oscar wins and nominations aren’t specifically the best judge of anyone’s career (Hitchcock never won one for directing; Orson Welles only got nominations for Citizen Kane and nothing else), it’s a good place to start. Newman was nominated for nine acting Oscars, eight of which were for Best Actor. This ties him for sixth all time, behind Meryl Streep (18), Jack Nicholson (12), Katharine Hepburn (12), Laurence Olivier (10), and Bette Davis (10, and he’s tied with Spencer Tracy). It puts the man in very good company, and it means that any film for which he was nominated is one to be taken seriously. When his opposite number is James Mason, you sit up straight. And thus we have The Verdict.

Frank Galvin (Newman) is a down-and-out lawyer who has lost his last four cases, the only cases he’s had in the last three years. He’s reduced to attending funerals, lying about his connection with the deceased, and leaving his business card with the bereaved. He’s at the end of his emotional rope when he is reminded of a pending case. A young woman giving birth to her third child was given the wrong anesthetic and has since entered a persistent vegetative state. It’s the sort of case he needs to get back on his feet, because the hospital wants it to go away. They offer $210,000 to settle, which gives Frank an nice check for $70,000, covers the woman’s medical expenses in perpetuity, and gives the grieving sister some compensation. But Frank has spent that day that the hospital and has decided that this is a case that needs to go to trial, and he turns the offer down flat.

Off Script: Possession (1981)

Format: Internet video on laptop.

Is there a way to explain Possession? I think there is, and even a way that’s sort of satisfying, but this is in many ways a film that is more enjoyable if it’s left completely unexplained. It doesn’t start as a horror film, but it gets there pretty quickly, and even before it has anything in it that’s horror movie-ish, there’s a decent amount of blood and violence. Any attempt to analyze this film that takes the film at face value will collapse in on itself. I can’t help but think that writer/director Andrzej Zulawski wasn’t attempting to make a scary film, but one that was exorcising his own demons.

The first chunk of the film is not a horror movie at all, as mentioned above. Instead, it’s a domestic drama. Mark (Sam Neill) returns home to his wife Anna (Isabelle Adjani) and son Bob (Michael Hogben) in Berlin after a secretive business trip. Upon his arrival, he discovers that Anna has not only been unfaithful to him for the last year with a local named Heinrich (Heinz Bennent) but that she wants an end to the marriage.

Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Actress 1950

The Contenders:
Anne Baxter: All About Eve
Bette Davis: All About Eve
Judy Holliday: Born Yesterday (winner)
Eleanor Parker: Caged
Gloria Swanson: Sunset Boulevard

Lilo & Stitch

Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on laptop.

People talk about the Disney renaissance as starting with Tangled or with Frozen. Nobody mentions Lilo & Stitch despite its solid reviews, direct-to-video sequel and television series. This is a Disney film I missed, and if I’m honest about it, it’s one that I didn’t really relish watching tonight. I’ll put this as nicely as I can: I hate the art. I don’t mean that I dislike that it’s different than the traditional Disney style. I mean that I think it’s weird looking and kind of ugly. I find it vaguely disturbing that Lilo apparently doesn’t have teeth. Everyone is oddly blocky and bulbous. It bothers me on an aesthetic level. Regardless of whether I like the story or not, Lilo & Stitch starts with a large strike against it.

We start at a galactic council where a scientist named Jumba Jookiba (voiced by David Ogden Stiers using a thick Russian accent) is on trial for illegal genetic experimentation. He has created something he calls Experiment 626, which we’ll soon be calling Stitch (Chris Sanders). 626 has been designed to be wholly and completely destructive. The experiment is slated for marooning on an asteroid, but naturally escapes, steals a police cruiser and hyperspaces to Earth. He crash lands on Kauai. Jookiba and Earth “expert” Pleakley (Kevin McDonald) are sent to recover 626 so that he doesn’t destroy the planet, which has been labelled a wildlife preserve as a way to protect the galaxy’s endangered mosquito population.