Friday Five - Best Movies (and worst)
1. American Beauty. I can't put into words how much this movie moves me every time I watch it. It's not a spectacle. It's not over the top. There are no real special effects. But the true meat and bone of American Beauty is the concept that no matter how hard we try in life, attaining perfection is a near impossibility.
For Lester Burnham, perfection was going back to his teenage years, driving the cherry hot rod, dating the cheerleader. Now in his 40's, his life had become estranged from everything he wanted it to be. For his wife, Carolyn, perfection was success. For their daughter, it was simply love and attention.
The last five minutes of this movie are spellbinding...
2. La Vita รจ Bella (Life is Beautiful)
I caught this gem on DVD a few years back. Roberto Benigni put on the performance of his life in this story of a Jewish Italian bookstore owner who finds the love of his life only to be forced into the Nazi prison camps with his son. I love this movie because despite the horrible things that are happening around Benigni and his son in the death camps, he never stops smiling and creates an elaborate 'game' with his son to shield him from the horrors of what may happen to them. The film is a throwback to the classics of the 40's and 50's and the cinematography is breathtaking.
And in the end, his son wins his tank!
3. Donnie Darko
(from a blog in 05) I watched Donnie Darko again the other night. I had seen the movie about a year ago (a library rental) and had a hard time grasping the concepts and plotlines of the film. This time, it seemed to make more since.
The story is somewhat like Back to the Future, although there are no DeLoreans, mad professors, Calvin Kleins in this tale. The plot is centered around the life of a teenage boy named Donnie Darko (a name, not so accidentally, reminiscent of a super hero). He lives in the typical nuclear family. His mom is authoritive and his father throws discipline to the wind. They've put Donnie in pyschotherapy and on medication to cure him of his problems, however, his problems take on a life of their own. He begins to be visited at night by a strange guy in a macabre bunny suit, looking something akin to Bugs from Hell. The Bunny, Frank, leads Donnie off one night, leaving him asleep on a golf course. Donnie returns home the next morning to find a stray jet engine had demolished part of his house, more specifically, his room. By some strange twist of fate, or maybe the hand of the unknown, he had avoided death.
Okay, so this is where the story gets weird... although some people may think that following a six-foot tall bunny around in the middle of the night is pretty strange as it is. Frank gives Donnie a prophecy of sorts. He's told that the world will end in 28 days (Frank actually breaks it down into minutes and seconds). Somehow, a tangent universe was created when the jet engine landed in the Darko House. The Government couldn't figure out where it came from as there was no record of any jets losing engines... so our Donnie becomes the chosen one, much like Neo from the Matrix. His job, his purpose, is to save the world from utter destruction by somehow closing the tangent universe putting the world back into it's normal timeline. Frank, along with others around him, become unconcious guides to help him complete his mission. A mission that very well may spell the end of Donnie's existance.
*spoilers ahead.... red alert!*
There are a few things that make the story confusing. When is Donnie in the real world and when is he in the tangent universe... or has the tangent universe become reality at the point of the engine (or artifact) appearing? Does the real world reappear during the span of time between the halloween party and the whole cellar door incident with Frank and the bullies? Who is the short mexican chick and why is she in the movie? Is Smurfette really a who-ah?
Anyhoo... I'll have to ponder these thoughts...
4. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
Peter Jackson's final bookend to Tolkien's masterpiece is to say the least, breathtaking. Of the three movies, Return of the King remains the bedrock of the trilogy, and I don't think that a better finale could have ever been put on celluloid (or digital film, these days). When it comes down to it, the central theme of LOTR is how the smallest of all can change the world with the heart of a hero.
5. Jacob's Ladder
This movie has been in my top five since the first time I saw it in 1991. At the time it wasn't a blockbuster and the film's reviews were lukewarm for the most part. What I love about the movie though is the nightmarish quality that director Adrian Lynn brought to an already bizarre script. Jacob Singer (played masterfully by Tim Robbins) is a Vietnam vet who has his ability to distinguish between the real world and the demon filled hallucanagenic reality of his sub concious. In one life he lives as a post man, with spicy Elizabeth Pena. For some unknown reason, he begins seeing demonic manifistations in his everyday life, such as a bum on a subway with a tail, or an old nurse at the V.A who seems to have the stumps of horns underneath her hat. He soon sinks into a pit of fear and paranoia which drives him to search out the source of his visions. As confusing as that may seem, he also finds himself flashing to another existance, where he is happily married to a beautiful wife and has two loving children. The youngest, Gabe, is his little angel, in more ways than one. He also finds himself back in Vietnam, strapped to a gurney, his intestines seeping out of a hole in his abdomen.
What Lynn does so well in this movie is that he weaves the three alternate realities into one cohesive story, and while the movie does stray off topic a few times (about government conspiracies and secret military drug tests), the characters are well defined and at times extremely frightening. The special effects, apparently produced with hand held cameras on the cheap, are particularly well done - and are placed sporatically through the film like easter eggs that you stumble upon when least expected. I found the faceless vibrating man especially creepy.
The creators of Silent Hill used Jacob's Ladder for inspiration in creating their video game as well. This hospital scene is a good example. This is probably our future under socialized medicine.
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