11.18.07
Posted in Film analysis at 4:15 pm by Administrator
You’re going to hear a lot of crazy stories about Southland Tales. People are going to call it convoluted, confusing, and a down right orgy of misplaced ideas. Depending on who you are , you may or may not agree with them. This film divides audience’s right down the middle and even those who enjoy it won’t feel too inclined to defend the film against its enemies. Richard Kelly joins the ranks of Darren Aronofsky and shoots for the stars on his second time out. The problem with being this ambitious is that sometimes your ideas are bigger than yourself, bigger than your audience, and bigger than the movie itself. Southland Tales isn’t going to spoon feed you its entertainment value. It requires reading of the prequel saga available in one collection of three graphic novels detailing the events leading up to the film. I would even suggest that you watch Donnie Darko as this film shares a lot of similarities with that film’s theme and subject matter.
If the film were connected to a heart monitor the sound of its pulse would go from a slow thump to a heart attack in just a matter of minutes and then back to mimicking the pattern of a nervous man during a lie detector test. The film is abnormal but always enthralling. The performances are all but consistent but this is no fault on the actor’s parts. Every scene requires a different tone depending on whether or not Dwayne Johnson is playing Boxer Santaros or Jericho Cane. Sarah Michelle Gellar feels underused as porn star Krysta Now, this is especially disappointing since in the graphic novel her character is given a lot more to work with then in the film. She ultimately amounts to a song and dance number that pales in comparison to Timberlake’s own musical scene.
Anyone who tells you this movie is confusing has either never read the prequel saga or has never watched an abstract film in their lives. Critics want you to think this film is incomprehensible and difficult to understand but honestly its not that hard especially when you realize Kelly is repeating many of the same ideas he had in Donnie Darko. Go ahead email me any question you may have about the film and I’ll answer it to the best of my ability. (Stephen@stephenalix.com). If you’ve ever watched Jodorowsky’s Holy Mountain you’ll see that their is such a thing as a critic proof film. To criticize Southland Tales is to show a certain degree of ignorance. A film like this is so intentionally designed to provoke a very specific reaction you may unknowingly be tangled in its web. Experiencing the very thing the film wants you to feel but your rejection of that feeling can lead to a negative reaction to the film.
My only qualm with the film is a blatant “homage” to Mulholland Drive that borders on theft but I’ll forgive Kelly because Rebekah Del Rio has never looked so good. I really don’t want to give this film a star rating so you’ll have to just decide for yourself if this movie is for you. If the idea of laughing your way to the apocalypse sounds good then you may just enjoy these sordid tales of how it all came crashing down. The end of the world never felt so good.
Permalink
11.12.07
Posted in Film Review at 6:27 pm by Administrator
Video games are a business so first and foremost what you must realize is that they only want to make games they feel are going to sell. This makes it very difficult to find the real art being created by the smaller game studios who work hard to make unique experiences that express very specific ideas. Its rare but sometimes these projects are spearheaded by one individual. Thats one vision guiding the entire team who work tirelessly to bring it to life. Not unlike how a director of a film guides his team but must also rely on everyone doing their part to make the film the best it can be.
If your knee deep into gaming you should recognize the names, Tim Shaffer, David Jaffee, and Shigeru Miyamoto. The great minds that helped bring to life Mario, God of War, and the lesser known Psychonauts. Sometimes particular game studios are reknowned for always releasing creative thought provoking projects. One such team is a studio ownedby Sony Computer Entertainment, Studio 1. Most recently they released Shadow of the Colossus for the Playstation 2 home entertainment console. Warning spoilers ahead.
The game is unique first and foremost because it doesn’t require much from the person playing. Theirs no items to collect and the only enemies you will be facing are 16 giant Collosi who exist on a vast landscape but skillfully hidden from plain sight. The game opens up in widescreen with a simple introduction to yourself, your horse, and the woman you love. A young warrior places a woman on an altar in an ancient temple. You request she be brought back to life but a voice from above demands that you kill 16 of the colossus who roam the land before you can return her to life. Sounds simple enough eh? Except these creatures are giants who towers hundreds of feet above your head. Each battle will take about 30 to 40 minutes and will require you to discover hidden weaknesses and different strategies.
Now this may not seem very artistic until you experience the nature of these epic battles. Each monster has their own set pattern of behaviours. Many of them will not fight you until you strike the first blow. Some even seem to be very gentle creatures who are reluctantly placed into battle due to your actions. As you journey across the land with your trusty horse taking down each one something strange begins to occur. You realize that what you are doing doesn’t feel right. These beautiful creatures have done nothing to deserve death and yet you instigate them into battle and end each one feeling a little sorry for the beasts who now lay dead before you.
This is where the game becomes art. You are making a moral choice as the character, one that is highly questionable to the individual playing, and with each kill you are slowly being poisoned by a strange black cloud of dust that eminates from the dead colossus. The mystery surrounding all these events is a truly gripping aspect of the game. Something very few games ever cause you to experience. Since when did a game make you question your own actions? This doesn’t include games like Grand Theft Auto which never give you a guilt trip for killing a hooker. This game wants you to feel something. Something truly powerful, a sadness for these creatures, a sense of wonder for this land that time has forgotten. What fruit will your actions reep? What will become of yourself and your love once all 16 are dead? Who is the mysterious voice that gave you this horrible task?
All of these brilliant ideas are wrapped up in a beautiful cinematic style that doesn’t seek to look realistic. The style of the game is very specific and gives the tone of the game a gloomy feel all through out. Theirs no bright colors or any sign of life in this cursed land. The colossus are beautiful creatures designed to make them feel aged but filled with a wisdom of the land. I won’t spoil the end result but needless to say its as gloomy as the rest of the game and your gut instinct about your actions may not be too far off from the truth.
What is art if not a method of questioning the world around us. Reflecting back at us our actions, both morally and socially. What is the price to pay for our greedy selfish intentions? That is the core theme behind Shadow of the Colossus. How is that not art?
Next up I take a look inside the mind of Tim Schaffer and his game Psychonauts.
Permalink
Posted in Random Accidents at 5:26 pm by Administrator
What did it take for films to be considered an art form? What about music? The first thing most of us think of when we see the word Art is a painting hung in a museum and from this starting point art has taken many shapes, forms, and meanings. Art style can simply be an asthetic form created to be pleasing to the eyes but soon this visual is given an underlying nature of meaning, this is probably where the term art truly starts to take the definition that many have struggled to grasp as they create what they consider to be art. You can sit back and watch a mindlessly entertaining action film and feel like you received a certain amount of stimulation that you were expecting from watching explosions. The alternative is watching a film that doesn’t instantly give itself away to the viewer, instead its hiding something underneath its seemingly simple narrative, and that is an idea. This idea is what seperates an art film from your average movie.
I firmly believe that one can inject artistic elements into almost anything that requires creative input. That doesn’t automatically make something art but its certainly artistic and requires such talent to implement ideas in inventive ways. Art isn’t simply what you see its also about the reaction that it causes you to experience as you view, listen, or play it. If a video game can cause you to think about what you are doing, other then simply asking you to just shoot bullets or jump platforms, if you take a moment to consider that something truly important is occuring between your character and the others in this virtual world, that indeed, in my opinion, can make a video game art.
Keep in mind I am not talking about the look of the game I am focusing on the complicated interelationships of the characters and how it relates to you as the game player. In my next two blogs I will briefly explore two games I feel match this criteria and manage to go from being simple entertainment to becoming a work of art.
Permalink
11.08.07
Posted in Film analysis at 5:16 pm by Administrator
Once upon a time, dear reader, a small indie film was released in theaters, due to poor advertising nobody knew it existed and thus no one went to see it. Then it was sent straight to DVD limbo. A couple of folks watched it on home video, loved it, and started to tell all their friends about it. Word began to spread throughout the Internet. “Theirs this crazy movie called Donnie Darko, its trippy, and you have to see it.” I remember purchasing this film just in the midst of the small buzz surrounding it. It was a blind purchase and frankly I went out on a limb to watch this film by an unknown director with this giant horrific looking bunny bossing around this kid named Donnie, at the time played by an unknown Jake Gyllenhaul.
The rest is history. I loved it. Others loved it and soon Richard Kelly and Donnie Darko became a secret password for film lovers all through out the Internet. Now unfortunately the next phase in this cult process is that once word gets out more people start to see it and then begins the “lets shit on something people love” phase that normally follows anything with a cult following. I think at long last the hype on Donnie Darko has leveled itself out so that its known to be great, a little over hyped, but good nonetheless. And rightfully so, its a perfect melt of some great theoretical ideas on time travel, horror, and just the right amount of humor to create an enjoyable experience that takes you through a variety of moods in its near two hour running time.
Richard Kelly tapped into the spirit of Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, and The Matrix. He mixed in a little bit of horror and Donnie Darko was born. While the title might suggest a super hero film, Kelly once again takes your expectations and turns its on its head. What you also thought was going to be horror is in fact a science fiction story about time travel. The films best-kept secrets were mostly speculated amongst fans. What exactly is going on this movie? It wasn’t until the director’s cut was released that the film explained itself fully and the answers were indeed pretty unusual.Spoilers ahead!Apparently a paradox has occurred in the space-time continuum, which has caused time to fold in on itself. God isn’t too thrilled with all of his creation suddenly dissapearing due to the laws of science being completely broken, so he uses a vessel (Frank the Bunny) to save Donnie’s life so that he can set events into motion that will recreate the paradox, and allow him to transcend time to save the world. Donnie was always meant to die in his room but the first time around he would’ve died and the world would have ended. Instead he creates a second paradox that cancels out the first, he still dies but now his death has meaning. End Spoilers! Are ya still with me? Funny enough the director’s cut takes a great film and over explains it to death. I watched it once but now I just go back to the original film I loved so much. Donnie Darko has stood the test of time and everything that was so great about it in 2001 is still great today.
So next week Richard Kelly dares to once again challenge what a film should be and he’s peppered it with a surprisingly large cast of Hollywood stars. Dwayne “The Rock”Johnson, Sean William Scott, and Sarah Michelle Gellar star in Southland Tales. His choices have been baffling to say the least but until I see the final product I really can’t say if it was mad genius or just a classic sophomore mistake. Southland Tales opens in limited release in NY and LA and I urge you to check it out. I don’t know if it’s going to be great but I know it’s going to be different.
The mistake most often made when criticizing complex films is the audience thinks certain filmmakers are just intentionally trying to baffle them. That some directors take glee in watching filmgoers scratch their heads in confusion. This is entirely untrue, they don’t want you to be confused. They want you to actively pursue the answers yourself. They want you to be an active participant in the film. Don’t just sit there! Think dammit! Think! It’s really not too much to ask now, is it?
Permalink
