Good Night, and Good Luck.
dir. George Clooney
2005

[watched with Sam, James, Régis and Donna]

Chicken Little
dir. Mark Dindal
2005

[watched a free sneak with Sam and Matt Flynn at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood]

Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
dir. Nick Park & Steve Box
2005

[watched at the AMC Century City with Matt Flynn]

Corpse Bride
dir. Tim Burton & Mike Johnson
2005

Corpse Bride is clearly the product of Tim Burton's twisted imagination, but many other equally talented artists made unmistakable contributions to this well written, beautifully animated and designed, musical/horror/comedy.

First and foremost, the credit for the film's genesis goes to the late great Joe Ranft. A master storyteller himself, Ranft initially introduced Burton to the original 19th Century Russian folktale about a man who unwittingly weds a corpse over 10 years ago.

Though Tim Burton is listed as a co-director, the man truly responsible for the eye-popping stop-motion animation is Mike Johnson, who created the award-winning stop-motion video for Les Claypool's cover of The Devil Went Down to Georgia.

Long-time Burton collaborator Danny Elfman makes his usual (extraordinary) musical contribution and even lends his voice to the skeletal character Bonejangles.

Spanish artist Carlos Grangel took Tim Burton's rough sketches and turned them into stylized character designs.

It probably won't be quite the merchandise cash-cow like it's predecessor The Nightmare Before Christmas (a film often misattributed to Burton even though it was actually directed by Henry Selick ), but Tim Burton's Corpse Bride is destined to become a classic.

[watched with Sam, James, Ashley, Rob and Michelle]

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Current Mood:
Current Music: Yanqui U.X.O. by Godspeed You! Black Emperor

Worst Kidnapper Ever:

[from toothpaste for dinner]

Even though I'd already seen it (recently ), I convinced Kurt and Sam to join me to see Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance at the NuArt.

The film has been getting some really bad reviews as critics (wrongly) attack the film for being violent merely for shock value. Entertainment Weekly rants that "the hideousness serves no dramatic purpose" but I totally disagree.

First off, most of the violent acts in Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance appear OFF-SCREEN, ala the ear-severing torture scene in Reservoir Dogs, or are obscured from the audience's view. By cutting away from the violent act itself, director Park Chan-wook forces his audience to face the consequences of that violent action head on. We don't actually see Ryu stick a screwdriver in a black-marketeer's neck, but we do indeed see it in all its blood-spurting glory when the badguy pulls the screwdriver out of his throat, but only after we see the terror in his eyes as he realizes that he's going to die.

Whereas most kidnapping / revenge films build their tension upon the action-packed drama of solving a mystery, Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance is all about the motivations and consequences of the characters' actions, rather than actions themselves. Park Chan-wook doesn't even show us the pivotal kidnapping itself. He provides his characters with strong motivations for kidnapping a little girl and he portrays the inner emotional turmoil the characters face as they weigh the potential consequences of such a violent act. Any Hollywood film would have milked a kidnapping scene for all it's worth but Park doesn't even show it. Park simply cuts to the next scene where the kidnapping has already taken place and then proceeds to demostrate the horribly unexpected consequences of the act.

Park also withholds many of the facts about how the father unravels the mystery and finds his daughter's kidnappers. All that matters is that the father has more than enough reason to hunt them down, and that he is willing to face the consequences of his own equally horrible actions once he finds them. The "hideousness" that the EW critic claims "serves no dramatic purpose" is not about shock value at all, but rather, it serves as motivation for the father's own subsequent actions. While I concede that the act depicted is indeed hideous, it is oozing with emotional import. Park immediately cuts away from the bloody scalpel to gaze upon the father's face where he fixes his camera for the entire duration of the autopsy, because the autopsy itself is not nearly as important as the father's emotional reaction to it. This hideous autopsy is the launchpad for his quest for vengeance. It hardens his heart and makes him capable of doing evil things. He quickly becomes so desensitized to blood and guts that he actually yawns while watching another autopsy, because this time it's the rotting corpse a kidnapper.

Clearly there is nothing "flamboyant" about Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance (as the EW review suggests). There is no hero of the film. Every character has sympathetic movitations for committing evil acts, but sympathy does not justify vengeance, and Park Chan-wook punishes his characters severely for their misdeeds.

Onion AV club review:
http://avclub.com/content/node/25634
(this is the best review I've read so far)

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Current Mood: )-o Tired
Currently listening to: Avalon Original Soundtrack
by Kenji Kawai

After months of waiting and several failed attempts, I finally got to see 2046 on the big screen.

Sam and I had already seen it on video, but we convinced Shahab, Kurt and Tripp to join us at the NuArt.

Tripp fell asleep (like he did during Steamboy), and Kurt and Shahab weren't very enthused either.

I, however, love the film even more the second time around. I feel like now I've got a better understanding of how Tony Leung's character could've turned so cold and cynical since the events depicted in In the Mood for Love. However bitter he is though, the man is insane for jilting a woman as mind-boggling sexy as Zhang Ziyi 8|

Tripp had to meet Rachel after the movie, but Shahab, Kurt, Sam and I went to California Vegan, where we coincidentally ran into Navid (Negin's brother and Greg's new in-law) and his girlfriend, Sarah. They had just ordered so they joined us for dinner, which was excellent.

All in all, a cool night out with friends, which I don't get to do as much I'd like.

The Aristocrats
dir. Paul Provenza
2005

My favorite comedians being raunchy as fuck... it doesn't get much funnier than this.

Wen and I saw it on opening night in a packed theater which turned out to be distracting because everyone was laughing so hard that we couldn't hear many of the rapid-fire jokes.

I guess I'll just have to watch it again and again when it comes out on DVD, which will probably be loaded with tons of extra scenes. Speaking of "loaded", Eddie Izzard and Chris Rock were drunk as fuck during their interviews.

UPDATE 09/12/05:
I was wrong about Eddie and Chris being drunk... see the COMMENT from the director himself, Paul Provenza ( OMFG, how crazy is that!?!).

[watched at the Loews Cineplex Odeon at 3rd St in Santa Monica with Wen]

Wedding Crashers
dir. David Dobkin
2005

I had no plans to see Wedding Crashers in the theaters, but Lisa DelVillar had already seen Charlie and The Chocolate Factory and the AMC in Century City wasn't playing March of the Penguins.

I had very low expectations going in considering how disappointed I was with the last comedy starring Vince Vaughn and a Wilson brother, and while Wedding Crashers wasn't great, it at least made me laugh a lot (something that Old School failed to do at all).

I think the main reason the movie is so funny is that the really hilarious lines are totally random. Most other recent comedies like this rely on jokes that are so completely set-up and obvious, but I don't think there was a single person in the audience who expected Vince Vaughn to shout "She was my first Asian girl!!!" If only the romantic part of the plot wasn't so clichéd, the film could have been more than a bunch of really really big laughs.

[watched at the AMC in Century City with Sam and Lisa DelVillar]

The Beat That My Heart Skipped
dir. Jacques Audiard
2005

Onion AV review:
http://www.theonionavclub.com/cinema/index.php?issue=4126&r=2

Sam, Pheap and I had planned on meeting up with Jon Morley and his coworker friend (crap, I forgot his name) to see Wong Kar Wai's 2046 at the Laemmle Sunset 5 for the LA Film Festival but Sam and Pheap were late picking me up so we ended up trading our tickets for the French film The Beat That My Heart Skipped instead.

I met Jon as he was coming out from 2046. We had talked about Wong Kar Wai films when I visited Rhythm & Hues a few weeks ago so I was curious to hear what he thought.

The Beat That My Heart Skipped was pretty good, but I had to leave right before the end because I had to run (literally) down the street to the DGA for the rerun of the UCLA Directors Spotlight, where my Self-Portrait was screening.

I felt bad about leaving early, especially considering the director, Jacques Audiard, was there, but I'm glad I went to the Spotlight screening because there was a Q&A afterwards and I got to be funny answering questions about my film.

The day didn't go at all as planned (we missed 2046, the Spotlight program order was totally mixed up, and I didn't know there was going to be a Q&A) but it turned out to be a great day. After the Spotlight screening, I noticed Jodie Foster had been in the audience. Pretty cool

Batman Begins
dir. Christopher Nolan
2005

Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins is definitely the best of the Batman movies, and one of the best films based on a comic book character I've ever seen (Sin City is still probably the best direct comic book adaptation).

Onion AV review:
http://www.theonionavclub.com/cinema/index.php?issue=4124&r=1

(watched at the Grauman's Chinese Theater with Regis, Donna, James, Matt Flynn, Katie, Liz and Phien)