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| Ghulam |
 Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 1:16 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 4742
Location: Upstate NY
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Talking of gangster-art films, I liked The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford a lot, although it was panned by the critics. Many complained of nodding off.
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| Marc |
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 5:47 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
Posts: 8424
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| Just saw THE HURT LOCKER. It's a masterpiece. What Kathryn Bigelow manages to do with a small cast and a small budget is amazing. She has created a war film of remarkable intensity and intimacy. It is an action film in which some of the most powerful and exciting moments are when nothing is happening at all. A showdown in the desert with two sets of snipers picking each other off is brilliantly executed (pun intended). The whole scene is tremendously suspenseful and is shot with a zen simplicity in almost total silence. Powerful. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 6:29 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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| So happy you feel that way, Marc. If The Hurt Locker wins awards as Best Picture of 2009, I will be as happy a camper as a movie buff can be. As you know--but why not repeat it?--it's my favorite movie of at least the past five years. Kathryn Bigelow is some kind of genius and deserves every prize in the book, and Jeremy Renner is a fantastic leading man. Everything about the movie, in fact, is perfect in my book--including the element some have criticized, the "superfluous" subplot which I think cements the film's classic status. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 9:11 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
Posts: 8424
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| the subplot being Beckham? |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 10:34 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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Marc wrote: the subplot being Beckham?
Yes. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 11:30 pm |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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I thought the 3-member team was made up of pretty simple character cliches. The reckless macho leader, the by-the-book pro wanting to survive, and the weak-kneed nervous other guy.
Their personalities and conflicts weren't really interesting or more than 2-D.
The sub-plot kind of veered off into a different movie and didn't add the layers of character development it seemingly intended. I thought it might have been interesting if the reckless bomb defuser did sit down in the kitchen and have a chat with the thoughtful elderly Iranian. Especially with a whiff of paranoia, not sure which side the professor was on, and whether to trust him. As it is, all of the Arabs are just props, potentially dangerous spectators to US Army actions. Only "Beckham" is identified, and he's only intended as a plot device.
My main complaint was that we don't learn thing one about bombs/bomb defusing, so all of those scenarios became basically the same. A few times, the lead tugs on bomb wires (the bomb cluster, and the car bomb) and this doesn't seem to be dangerous. Who knows?
The war is a drug message is pretty facile. The return home, perfunctory and cliched.
The Hurt Locker has three pretty awful taglines, which fairly well reflect the level of sophistication of the film:
- You'll know when you're in it.
- Cut the red wire.
- War is a drug. |
_________________
Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 12:52 am |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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Gromit,
All your points are well-taken and in a lesser film they would be problematic but THE HURT LOCKER is so exceptionally well-directed, well-written, and acted that I felt no compulsion to ask questions of the film such as why didn't "the reckless bomb defuser sit down in the kitchen and have a chat with the thoughtful elderly Iranian." The "reckless bomb defuser" was far more complex and interesting than the simplistic description of the character you've offered up. The reason he didn't have a conversation with the "thoughtful elderly Iranian" was because the thoughtful Iranian's wife went ballistic and attacked him. And would a thoughtful Iranian be married to a psycho-bitch?
"Only "Beckham" is identified, and he's only intended as a plot device."
Everything in a story, screenplay, novel is a "plot device". What's wrong with that? If it it works, that's all that matters. I don't think I'm alone in saying the plot device involving Beckham was moving and added a depth of character to "the reckless bomb defuser".
'A plot device is a technique used in a story to advance its plot. The reader or viewer may not notice that the device is a construction of the author as it may seem to emerge naturally from the setting or characters in the story. On the other hand, awkward or contrived plot devices may annoy or confuse the reader, even causing a loss of the suspension of disbelief.' (wikipedia)
The plot device of Beckham seemed to me "to emerge naturally from the setting or characters in the story".
Quote: My main complaint was that we don't learn thing one about bombs/bomb defusing, so all of those scenarios became basically the same. A few times, the lead tugs on bomb wires (the bomb cluster, and the car bomb) and this doesn't seem to be dangerous. Who knows?
I did not go to THE HURT LOCKER to learn about bomb defusing. And, yes, the bomb defusings were basically the same. The bomb defuser had defused 873 bombs. For the defuser it was just another day on the job....a job in which one wrong move could result in instant death for him and dozens of others. The contrast between the simple mechanics of his job and the profound consequences of one simple mistake was what made the ordinary so agonizingly dramatic.
Quote: The return home, perfunctory and cliched.
Not really. It wasn't "perfunctory". It was tightly compressed. In a few carefully chosen words and scenes, the psychological damage that war inflicts on a man was powerfully demonstrated. Here's a soldier who has gone from dealing with death on a daily basis, who himself was on a death trip, suddenly relegated to the dull rituals of picking out breakfast cereals and prepping the family dinner.
Quote: The war is a drug message is pretty facile.
Nothing facile about the truth. War, like drugs, changes a man's psychology, his chemistry. War conditions men to live in a state of hyper vigilance and constant stress, these men are wired to the gills. Returning to the rhythms of the civilian world usually results in mental and physical disorders, a withdrawal of sorts. Our bomb defuser has been re-wired, a bomb himself, and can only survive in a world of bombs or he himself might explode. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 3:07 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
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Location: Shanghai
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First off, I was reading Juan Cole's blog on Iran and just watched an Iranian film entitled Sara, so I accidentally switched in Iran for Iraq.
Of course it should be an Iraqi professor, not an Iranian. I actually typed Iraqi and then changed it. Sorry for the mistake/confusion.
I agree that the film tried to make the bomb defuser a more complex character, shifting mid-way through the film from team/male camaraderie to his individual psychic state. It just didn't work for me, even though I was ready to move on from the unit dynamics.
I was disappointed when the hero was run off from the encounter in the kitchen, as I thought it was a chance for the film to slow down from its action and invite in a wider (Iraqi, civilian, other) perspective. Obviously that's not where the filmmakers wished to tread, preferring instead to keep the tight focus on the protag and his unit. It felt like a missed opportunity to me, and made that late night trek seem pointless.
Quote: For the defuser it was just another day on the job....a job in which one wrong move could result in instant death for him and dozens of others. The contrast between the simple mechanics of his job and the profound consequences of one simple mistake was what made the ordinary so agonizingly dramatic.
I appreciate that that is the perspective the film went for. My problem was that I had no idea what the wrong move was. Yanking up a wire attached to 10 other wires and attendant bombs looked like the wrongest of moves, but wasn't a problem. I felt outside the drama and tension because I had no idea what he was doing, or what mistakes he might make.
Another example of how I was at a remove, was that there were two near-identical blasts sustained by guys wearing bomb suits with very different results. One could theorize about the randomness of death in war, etc., but I felt it was just celluloid manipulation.
Anyway, I thought it was a competent film and those who like war films, and male-buddy pics will undoubtedly be on board. I just don't see where this draws in a wider audience or rises to the level of an art film. However, I have little idea what US audiences like, and box office is a pretty poor indicator of merit anyway.
I'd be interested to hear what any females have think of the film. |
_________________
Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 5:11 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 20618
Location: New York City
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gromit wrote:
Anyway, I thought it was a competent film and those who like war films, and male-buddy pics will undoubtedly be on board.
I dislike war movies intensely and have no particular love for buddy movies. In any case, I don't think The Hurt Locker qualifies as either genre. It's a suspense thriller that just happens to be set during and in the Iraq war. And the guys involved are nothing like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. They simply work together; they are not "buddies."
Thanks, Marc, for your articulate and thoughtful defense of the movie. You are my new hero. I do think, however, that you give gromit too many props by admitting "all his points" are well taken. The characterization of William James is far from "2-D." In fact, he's one of the more complex characters I've seen in movies.
The bombs definitely seemed dangerous, too. Ebert has written a special column about The Hurt Locker (in addition to his regular four-star review) in which he compares Bigelow's technique here to Hitchcock's in Frenzy (a movie I don't particularly like, but Ebert's point is accurate). Early in Frenzy Hitchcock shows a detailed picture of a murder perpetrated by the villain. Later he just shows a door closing on a murder scene and leaves it to us to assume what's going on behind the closed door.
Likewise in THL Bigelow shows a very early death-by-bomb and demonstrates that these suckers are lethal and unpredictable. Therefore every time James wades in, we know he's one misstep away from certain death. The results are an adrenaline factory. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 7:43 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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I used to be reluctant to watch war films. But the past few years I've been watching quite a bit of WWII related films, and many are quite good.
Actually I'm in the middle of The Heroes of Telemark right now. Only problem is my edition has distracting French subtitles which can only be replaced by Chinese subtitles. Basically, by mistake, the Subtitles Off selection is also French subtitles. Haven't decided yet if I'll return it or not.
For The Hurt Locker, I should have written male-bonding, not male-buddy. Though it's more in the realm of the mismatched team of males.
In any case, the film obviously worked for you. It didn't fully engage me, and I've stated the reasons why. |
_________________
Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| Kate |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 11:03 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
Posts: 1397
Location: Pacific Northwest
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| That was an interesting, even-keeled discussion you guys. The Hurt Locker is only playing in 2 theaters in the greater Seattle area - both a 30 minute drive for me, but after reading your comments, I may make the effort this evening. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 11:13 am |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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Location: New York City
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Kate wrote: That was an interesting, even-keeled discussion you guys. The Hurt Locker is only playing in 2 theaters in the greater Seattle area - both a 30 minute drive for me, but after reading your comments, I may make the effort this evening.
The movie will reward the effort, I wager. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 1:37 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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Quote: I'd be interested to hear what any females have think of the film.
My friend Robin who went with me to THE HURT LOCKER loved the film. |
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| Marj |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 2:20 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 10497
Location: Manhattan
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| Your discussions are making me feel the same as Kate. But today I'm off to see Public Enemies. Yay! Now I hope I haven't built up my expectations too much for that. |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Sun Jul 12, 2009 3:22 pm |
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Joined: 19 May 2004
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Quote: The year's best-reviewed film, The Hurt Locker, expanded to 60 theaters in its third weekend and earned $623,000 for a hearty $10,383 per-screen average. The Iraq War thriller will continue expanding into additional theaters over the next few weeks. |
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