THIS WEEKEND - Critics are pretty well split on Robert De Niro's new movie City by the Sea (see yesterday's post for more details). Rotten Tomatoes currently shows 28 negative reviews and 24 positive, though none of those are particularly glowing. The consensus seems to be that this cop drama is formulaic and really nothing better than your average TV movie of the week except for its heavyweight cast -- Deniro, Frances McDormand, and up-and-comer James Franco. Here's how Roger Ebert sums up his 3-star review: "City by the Sea" is not an extraordinary movie. In its workmanship it aspires not to be remarkable but to be well made, dependable, moving us because of the hurt in the hero's eyes." Ebert's next line is the most interesting, having recently read the sharply-crafted Esquire article that inspired the movie: "A better movie might have abandoned the crime paraphernalia and focused on the pain between the generations... Obviously, I can't say Ebert is right or wrong since I haven't seen the film yet. But Mike McAlary's story focuses on just that -- "the pain between the generations" of the LaMarca family -- and not so much on the crime end of it. Leave it to Hollywood to take what could have been a fascinating character study and turn it into more or less just another conventional crime melodrama. Slate's David Edelstein does a nice job summarizing the real-life back story, and how its been altered for the screen. Overall, his praise for the film is faint : "That City by the Sea isn't laughed off the screen is testament to Caton-Jones' attention to actors and to some tightly written scenes...[De Niro] gets his mugging under control and gives a decent performance -- the plainest and maybe the best he has given in a decade or more." I'll see for myself this weekend.
Also opening today is Swimfan -- or as I like to call it, "Erika Christensen's Career Suicide Watch 2002." Is it that hard for a young actress to find work these days that you have to follow-up a strong performance in Traffic by vamping around in this "teen psychodrama" about a stud high school swimmer (Jesse Bradford) who gets in too deep (sorry) with the new girl in town (Christensen)? It's Fatal Attraction meets The Crush, and if Christensen isn't careful, she could soon end up in the "no longer relevant file" along with that movie's young star, Alicia Silverstone. Reviews are exactly what you'd expect -- out of 18 so far, only 2 are positive. Reel's Tor Thorsen is even brave enough to throw out a Hitchcock reference: "On the surface, the film is played straight, with sustained tension and effective frights. But the director has done his research, and fills every scene with a subversive humor that's 100% pure imitation Hitchcock." I suppose watching what amounts to a parody of Hitchcock might be entertaining, though I'm not sure I buy Thorsen's implication that director John Polson had this in mind all along. I'll probably avoid this one, especially since I am heading back to Chicago this weekend. Check back Monday for a review of City by the Sea. Also next week, I'll have reviews of two arthouse flicks available soon on video and DVD -- Y Tu Mama Tambien and The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys, both finally playing in Iowa City at the Bijou, the University of Iowa's student-run theater.

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WHICH GODFATHER NEEDS A NEW AGENT? - In a review of the recent movie Simone, a local movie critic quite incorrectly stated that Al Pacino "has had a string of forgettable roles over the last 10 years." Everybody knows the 80s were a tough decade for Pacino -- Author! Author!, Sea of Love, Revolution -- but the past 10 years? Something about this comment seemed dubious, so I went to IMDb to check it out. Sure enough, take a look at Pacino's body of work over the past decade: Insomnia (2002), Any Given Sunday (1999), Insider, The (1999), Devil's Advocate, The (1997), Donnie Brasco (1997), Looking for Richard (1996), City Hall (1996), Heat (1995), Carlito's Way (1993), Scent of a Woman (1992), and Glengarry Glen Ross (1992). Of these 11 movies, only 2 could be described as "forgettable" (i.e. bad): The Devil's Advocate and City Hall. More importantly, there are at least five movies on this list that are decidedly unforgettable -- Glengarry, Scent of a Woman, Heat, Donnie Brasco, and The Insider. Simone is a step back, but Pacino's next three movies, all set for 2003 releases, look promising -- The Recruit with Colin Farrell, Gigli, and the movie version of Tony Kushner's acclaimed Broadway play Angels In America. The 70s icon who really needs to reevaluate his choices is Robert De Niro, who stars as a (shock!) New York City homicide detective in City by the Sea (opens tomorrow). De Niro's been much busier than Pacino over the past 10 years -- so much so that I'll simply provide the link rather than list all of the titles -- but to what end? Showtime, Men of Honor, Flawless, 15 Minutes, The Fan -- now those are some truly forgettable movies. Based on the real-life story of Vincent LaMarca, a distinguished cop whose father famously murdered a baby in 1956 and was put to death in the electric chair, City by the Sea at least should be watchable. The story centers around LaMarca's attempts to protect his estranged son (Spider-Man's James Franco), who is on the run after being pegged for murder. It's the kind of role De Niro can sleepwalk through -- haunted, distant, cop, New York -- and, unfortunately, he just might. I'm somewhat optimistic, however, because Franco is a talented, charismatic young actor; let's just hope the movie gives him something to do other than run fast, hide in shadows, and talk on pay phones. If the movie is even half as good as Mike McAlary's riveting 1997 Esquire article that inspired it -- somewhat loosely, from what I gather -- it will be worthwhile. Frances McDormand, George Dzunda, and Eliza Dushku co-star. Michael Caton-Jones (The Jackal, Rob Roy) directs. Click here for the official site.

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BAKER ON BOURNE - CS contributor Eric Baker takes issue with me and the esteemed critic Stanley Kauffman with regard to the realism of The Bourne Identity. I'll post a response after his comments.

* I'm the biggest Stanley Kauffmann fan in the world, especially since reading a collections of his reviews and essays, Regarding Film. In fact, other than M. F. K. Fisher, I think he might be one of the most compelling writers of the last century. But sometimes, like with the quotation below, my BS sensors go off. Kauffmann's prose can flow like honey, but it can also get gummed up. I liked The Bourne Identity as well, but the only thing that's ineluctable about the photography is that it is gimmicky during the action sequences. It doesn't certify anything, except that MTV-style jump-cut editing is necessary when your action star (Matt Damon) is trying to beat up baddies bigger than he is. I'm all for realism -- I find those movies to be consistently the best because they are the easiest to relate to. And in end, I think Kauffmann agrees; here's an excerpt of his review of Pulp Fiction (newly released on DVD):

"Some of the action strains belief in a picture that dwells mostly in the naturalistic realm. On her night out, Thurman takes a life-threatening overdose of heroin, is revived at someone's house with a jolt of adrenaline straight to the heart, then is taken home by Travolta and dropped off as if it had been an ordinary date. I suppose there's meant to be some burlesque edge to this sequence, but even so, it's pretty farfetched. More matter-of-fact glitches: guns are fired in residential areas, and no neighbors seem to hear them. Willis kills a man, wipes the gun free of his fingerprints, and then puts his prints on a doorknob. etc."

To be clear, if I was rating The Bourne Identity on the Tomatometer, it would be "fresh." But I don't think Kauffmann is being completely truthful about one of the major downfalls with the movie. People were laughing during the action scenes when I saw it. *

CS response: Eric and I have had this debate before and I'd be curious to know what readers think. There were laughs during some of the first few Matt Damon fight scenes when I saw the movie too. But Eric was and is still wrong to construe these laughs as having anything to do with a lack of realism. When Damon quickly unarms two officers in a park, for example -- the first time we see any hand-to-hand combat -- the humor stems from the fact that he is just as startled as we are at how skilled he is as a fighter. (Remember, he has amnesia and at this point doesn't have any idea who he is or why he has this ability.) Liman deliberately pauses on Damon's reaction so we can see the surprise on his face. To repeat a phrase, we're not laughing at him -- we're laughing with him. Eric seems to think it's unintentional comedy, whereas I say Liman got exactly the reaction he wanted from the audience. I also wouldn't describe any of the cutting in The Bourne Identity as "MTV-style jump-cut editing." Liman does, I think, speed up the action during some of the fight scenes. But jump cuts? I'd have to watch it again, but I don't think so. In fact, and maybe someone can help me out here, doesn't the fight scene in question occur in one take? As Kauffman said, "When Bourne disposes handily of three armed opponents, we see it, don't we?" We do. And the beauty of it is that Liman doesn't try to disguise it with a flurry of cuts.

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MUSINGS ON BOURNE AND BLOGS - Last week when I announced the results of the CinemaScoped Critics & Readers Poll (8/26, scroll down), I omitted one of my favorite films of the year so far -- in addition to About a Boy, Signs, and Thirteen Conversations About One Thing -- The Bourne Identity. It's XXX minus the lobotomy and James Bond without the paint-by-numbers story and characters. Doug Liman's (Swingers, Go) direction is stylish without being flashy and he proves that you can make an engrossing, action-packed spy thriller that isn't just explosions and special effects. The quiet, tense confrontation scene in a field between Matt Damon and Clive Owen near the end is the antithesis of the modern Hollywood fight/chase scene -- and 100 times more effective. As usual, The New Republic's Stanley Kauffman (7/3) articulated better than anyone else what makes the film so successful:

"The tenuous moments in The Bourne Identity -- such as Bourne's karate disposal of multiple armed enemies, or a man bursting into a room through the window of a fourth-floor apartment -- soar on that innate power, because the essence of film is realism. Even trick photography photographs the tricks, sweeps them into the real. Digital maneuverings, special effects, are all embraced in the camera's ineluctable realism. The camera certifies the existence of what it looks at: the bedrock of film is factuality. When the Lumière brothers showed a train arriving at a station in 1895, there could be little question in the audience that this was a real train. They saw it. When Bourne disposes handily of three armed opponents, we see it, don't we? We may know in a corner of our brains that this action would be unlikely in life; but we accept it here because the camera's currency is fact. In a way we are grateful to the film medium for giving such moments their being."

And I'm grateful to CS Chicago correspondent Sam Hallgren for reminding me how good this movie was. One online source says The Bourne Identity will be released on DVD December 3. No word yet on extra features.

For readers who might be more interested in blogs than movies -- or, at least, my ramblings about movies -- there's a pretty great e-mail discussion about weblogging going on over at Slate between uber-media pundits Andrew Sullivan -- a senior editor at The New Republic and A-list blogger -- and Kurt Andersen, the author of Turn of the Century and the host of the public radio program "Studio 360." Sullivan started the exchange yesterday and Andersen responded. Sullivan's next post should be up this afternoon and the discussion will continue throughout the week. This feature on Slate -- take two intellectuals/pundits/writers/whatever and have a colloquium of sorts over e-mail -- has always been one of the zine's most endearing features, I think. The end of the year "Movie Club" between David Edelstein, Roger Ebert, A.O. Scott, and Sarah Kerr (and sometimes Jonathan Rosenbaum) is always provocative and entertaining. (Click here for last year's Movie Club). Slate asked Andersen and Sullivan to discuss the Weblog phenomenon in relation to two new books, We've Got Blog: How Weblogs Are Changing Our Culture and The Weblog Handbook. Fortunately, they spend more time dishing their opinions on weblogging and how it has affected our culture than they do discussing the above-mentioned texts. Call me a geek, but is there anything more fun than reading really smart, arrogant individuals speak their mind while also taking pointed snipes at one another? For example, Andersen had this to say in yesterday's exchange:

"Too many bloggers remind me of Dennis Millers manqué or the comic-book store owner on The Simpsons ... combined, in the Rebecca Bloods of the world, with Mr. Van Driessen, Beavis and Butt-head's hippie teacher. In other words, passionate and smart but also irritating and smug and faintly, inescapably sad. (andrewsullivan.com is not a bit sad, of course, although as salutary as ad hoc, post-publication fact-checking by bloggers may be, your harping on Howell Raines—e.g., eight mentions in the last week—and the New York Times does seem unnecessarily predictable and self-congratulatory.)"

Of course, now that I read that passage again, I wonder how much of Andersen's blog assessment -- "passionate and smart but also irritating and smug and faintly, inescapably sad" -- could be used to describe CinemaScoped. Too much is my guess.

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REVIEW: MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING - I realize that probably 95% of you have already seen this big fat Greek hit, but its jaw-dropping success compels me to post a few comments. My Big Fat Greek Wedding had its highest showing at the box office last weekend -- its 20th week of release -- finishing #2 behind Signs with $14.5 million. With a budget of under $5 million and a box office take of $82 million (and rising!) to date, it has to be one of the most profitable movies of all-time. I finally saw the surprise hit about a week ago and I can say that while it by no means blew me away, I certainly understand why it has generated so much positive word-of-mouth. It's cute, funny, and it touches on subjects almost everyone over the age of 20 can relate to: falling in love, figuring out your purpose in life, and, of course, the torture of trying to stage a wedding these days -- whether your family is Greek or otherwise. Based on her one-woman play, Greek Wedding stars Nia Vardalos as Toula, a frumpy, unmarried thirty-something who hates working at her family's Greek restaurant and dreams of changing her life. Her family wants her to find a nice Greek boy and start pumping out kids, but Toula decides to enroll in college classes and use her computer skills to work at her aunt's travel agency. In the meantime, she pulls one of those 80s movie geek-to-hottie routines -- dumps the glasses, gets her hair done, buys some new clothes -- and suddenly, the self-conscious ugly duckling blossoms into a confident swan. Toula's transformation attracts the attention of a high school English teacher named Ian (John Corbett); the problem is, he's not Greek, which her fanatically patriotic father has some trouble accepting. A few weeks ago somebody wrote in to Roger Ebert's Movie Answer Man complaining that they couldn't swallow the fact that a "hunk" like Corbett (Northern Exposure, Sex and the City) would fall in love with Vardalos' character -- that she isn't attractive enough. Ebert rightfully rebuked the reader, though not for the same reasons I would. In my opinion, Corbett just isn't all that "hunky," while Vardalos is definitely attractive enough to garner the affections of a good-looking guy. (Click here to see Corbett and here to see Vardalos.) My complaint would be that Ian isn't too good-looking -- he's just too good. He's one of these dream guys that's cute but sensitive, smart but not pedantic, confident but unassuming, and he always says the right thing and supports Toula even when he has good reason to show a hint of anger or impatience. (Quick digression: Is it just me, or is every high school English teacher portrayed as the "perfect guy" in movies?) I hate to disrespect my gender, but as most women will probably tell you, guys like this simply do not exist. It's a total fantasy, and yet the relationship works because of the chemistry between Corbett and Vardalos. I actually enjoyed and laughed more at their courtship scenes than I did the over-the-top scenes with Toula's loud, abrasive family. Admittedly, a lot of the jokes in these scenes are pretty funny, but there are many others that scream "one woman show." The film is also too earnest at times and relies on a few too many cliches. The scene where Toula's boneheaded brother, a cook in the family restaurant who has a knack for drawing, tells Toula that she has inspired him to go to school and take art classes, oozes greeting card sappiness. Even worse is his parting bit of advice not to let her family run her life, but to never forget where she came from. I would have written the actual quote down but I think I was too much in awe of her brother's Confucious-like wisdom to grab my pen. I'm ripping on this movie now and I don't really mean to. If you haven't seen it yet, check it out, I doubt you'll be disappointed. The love story is charming enough and most of the jokes work, especially if you've ever had the misfortune of having to plan a wedding.

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