True Grit (1969)

Film: True Grit
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on laptop.

I had hoped to put up a review of Driving Miss Daisy today, since it’s the only Best Picture winner I haven’t reviewed. Alas, the vagaries of NetFlix delivery and the USPS have prevented me from getting a copy until later this week. Ah, well. But there’s still time for a last review before the year turns.

When you talk about John Wayne films, eventually someone will get around to True Grit. It certainly ranks in the pantheon of Wayne’s performances, but for my money, it’s not anywhere close to his best film. The Searchers is one of the two or three greatest Westerns ever made, and it would be hard to discount Stagecoach and The Shootist. And yet, True Grit is the film for which Wayne won an Oscar.

Take the High Ground!

Film: Take the High Ground!
Format: Turner Classic Movies on rockin’ flatscreen.

For most people, the best part of a film like Full Metal Jacket is the first half, the part concerning basic training. I’m not sure what it is about training sequences that we find so fascinating, but there is no doubt that we do. Take the High Ground! is that sort of film; we start with a collection of misfit, ragtag recruits and a little more than 90 minute later, we leave with a platoon of well-trained men thanks to the efforts of our tough-as-nails drill sergeant.

The drill sergeant in question is the awesomely named Thorne Ryan (Richard Widmark), who is almost a caricature of what a drill sergeant is. Ryan wants nothing more than a transfer to the shooting war in Korea but is stuck training raw recruits with the assistance of Sergeant Laverne Holt (Karl Malden). While the traditional drill sergeant puts on an act of hating the men under his command, Ryan seems to genuinely hate them while Holt is far more willing to give the men a little leeway when they need it.

The Last Emperor

Film: The Last Emperor
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on The Nook.

One of the things I love about historical dramas is that I frequently learn about something I’d have otherwise never known. The Last Emperor is a case in point. I know a very tiny bit of Chinese history, mostly connected to World War II. Even so, I knew very little of the history of the Chinese monarchy before seeing this (and I remembered very little before this rewatch). The problem with historical dramas is that any deviation from actual history becomes canon.

Pu Yi (played as a toddler by Richard Vuu, as a child by Tsou Tijger, and as an adult by John Lone) is named as the Emperor of China at the tender age of three. He is moved into the Forbidden City and is forever unable to leave it. While is power is complete and supreme, he is a prisoner of his own position. Additionally, unknown to him because such things are kept from him, China has become a republic, and the position of emperor is nothing more than an elaborate figurehead.

Frances Ha

Film: Frances Ha
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on The Nook.

The goal of a movie review is, at least in part, to define the movie in question. With something like Frances Ha, that’s a difficult proposition, because Frances Ha is at least in part indefinable. This is a film that needs to be felt more than understood consciously. It takes on the entirety of the hipster generation, and the fact that the hopes and dreams of that generation are already fading, leaving yet again a collection of 20-somethings in exactly the same position of the previous generations—we’re all convinced that we’re important and going to change the world, and we’re going to do this by essentially standing still.

All of this takes place through the lens of Frances (Greta Gerwig, who co-wrote the script with director Noah Baumbach). Frances wants to be a professional modern dancer, and is in the way that most people who want that profession are—she’s an understudy/trainee for a dance company and she teaches ballet to children. Her world is wrapped tightly with her friend and roommate Sophie (Mickey Sumner). Frances even breaks up with her boyfriend Dan (Michael Esper) when he asks her to move in with him, opting instead to stay with Sophie.

The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Film: The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on The Nook.

I would love to know how Charlie Kaufman’s mind works. He creates the strangest and most compelling worlds in his scripts and fortunately manages to get equally visionary people to then film them. The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a case in point. In this case, though, I have a strange indicator of where the idea may have come from: cartoonist Carol Lay. It’s possible that this was an entirely independent idea, of course, but Lay created a comic called “Repeat Performance” in which couples repeatedly go to a service to have their memories wiped only to get back together afterward.

And that is the story here. Joel (Jim Carrey) has had a relationship with a woman named Clementine (Kate Winslet). After a few years and a bitter break-up, Joel discovers that Clem has gone to a company called Lacuna which eliminates him completely from her memory. For Clementine, her relationship with Joel no longer exists. In pain, Joel decides to do the same thing to her. He meets with Dr. Howard Mierzwiak (Tom Wilkenson), the creator of the process, and arranges for the erasing to happen that night.

A Beautiful Mind

Film: A Beautiful Mind
Format: DVD from NetFlix on laptop.

It’s been some time since I’ve seen A Beautiful Mind. Depending on how you look at it, I’ve either been saving in for close to the end of watching/rewatching all of the Best Picture winners or I’ve been avoiding it. Avoiding it might be closer to the truth. I don’t dislike this film, but I don’t love it, either. I know the license it takes with the actual history of John Nash. More to the point, I know where the different beats come in the story. This is one of those films that works once. It doesn’t carry over nearly as well to a second viewing. This is a film that requires spoiling to really discuss, so consider the rest of this review under a spoiler tab.

We’re shown the life of John Nash (Russell Crowe), who won a Nobel Prize for his work on game theory. The film shows his triumphs and his personal tragedies, namely his struggle with schizophrenia. The real John Nash suffered from auditory hallucinations. This version of Nash has visual ones as well. I imagine this is because giving us visual hallucinations gives us something to look at.

Gifts for Everyone!

Every year since this blog has been around, I’ve posted a list of films that I think should be added. Except for the first year, before I actually posted reviews, it’s become a Christmas tradition.

This year, though, the Listmakers opted for a major overhaul, going back to the beginnings of film and adding a ton. Technically, they re-added three, switched out another 47, and stuffed two more Toy Story films into a single entry and called it 50 new films. In that spirit, I’m going to suggest a bunch.