Let the Right One In

This Swedish vampire flick was masterful at using indirection to create imagined horror. Everything about it was muted, from the silent opening titles to the subtle revelations of the vampire mythology. Slow motion falling snow, white-out landscapes lulled you into a quiet haven ripe for blood and horror, lust and love. The depth of field was so shallow, no matter how close or far away the shot, something was always out of focus. It felt claustrophobic, to be always confined within the frame by the focus of the image. People were rarely shown talking, they were either out of focus or off-screen and characters were frequently shown in profile. All these techniques helped us feel as out of place as Oskar (and consequently, the Vampire child).

The 12-year-old boy/girl was mesmerizing in the most disturbing way. You never saw fangs, just blood on the mouth and face, or blood from the eyes when she entered the house without being invited. The attacks took place in long shot and the animal like movements and sound effects were all we had to go on as to the possible power of this child, using its innocence to prey. Half way through the film she flew up the side of a building only to bite and drop out the window her paternal-esque caregiver. She was once a he, but that was hardly the focus of the love story. Disturbing, yet utterly fascinating, it draws you in. So young and so violent, revenge is paralleled with survival, both boy and vampire use murder or thoughts of murder for strength. The end was poetic. Floating underwater we hear muffled sounds, a flash of feet break the surface and skim backward. A severed head and arm plunge into the calm and sink to the bottom. Cut to the biggest, most captivating 12-year-old eyes ever filmed, the smiling, bloody vampire-child to the rescue. Cut to a brief wide shot of the carnage. Our imagination of what happened is so much worse than anything they could have filmed. And now both boy and vampire are on a train and the cycle begins again. This was a perfectly paced, understated vampire film that gives you just enough horror to let your imagination run free.

earth and 17 Again

While Disney's earth turned out to be a disappointing re-edit of the Planet Earth BBC documentary, leaving that did provide the opportunity to see a good chunk of 17 Again. Yeah, I admit, I would direct a tween hit if it got my foot in the door, especially since the highest paid woman director in Hollywood made Twilight, another tween movie that played directly to its MTV dependent audience and nothing more. She didn't have a clue what any of the scenes were about except for the bedroom scene. Anytime it was about to get interesting the camera panned away, but man did those girlies scream for the guy. This movie definitely capitalized on Zac Effron's hotness in similar ways. Although his character was a little off the wall in terms of sometimes getting the reality of how old he was supposed to be and sometimes not, I still found myself laughing at this made up world. It definitely stuck with its absurdest tone and used it to get laughs. Zac Effron having to court someone his mom's age was also hilarious. I think no matter what the genre, a good story, well told can reach just about anyone. I'm not saying this was either, but I don't think tween movies have to be limited to just that audience. Everyone went to high school and universalities can be found anywhere.

Star Trek

After ranting about Wolverine for so long I don't have much let to say about this film that would be any different. It was very pretty and generally an exhilarating space rollercoaster, but I was left with the same feelings I have after riding a rollercoaster, "man, that was a rush," but the feeling fades and you aren't left with anything substantial to hold on to. Having not be very familiar with the original Star Trek series, all the character introductions that took up the majority of the first part of the movie were confusing and fell flat for me. I basically had to start guessing that we were meeting someone important because Kirk was introducing himself for like the 8th time. I didn't really see much of an arc for Kirk because he was always an arrogant asshole, with a little bit of bad-boy charm thrown into the mix. I didn't understand his rebellion and struggle to join Starfleet. That was all resolved too quickly and then he didn't change the rest of the film. Him and Sylar's (aka Spock) relationship didn't have as much of an impact for me because I am not familiar with the original friendship between them so I didn't appreciate their fighting like hardcore fans did (uhumm Dustin). Again for me this film was a lot of action that I wasn't emotionally invested in and the story seemed to be split too much between Spock and Kirk so that I didn't feel that I got a true arc or identification with either of them. Emotions ran shallow for me in this one and arcs looked more like slightly curved lines. So much was on the surface and the world destroying ship was cliche. Winona Ryder as Spock's mom was laugh out loud ridiculous. Otherwise, it was a fun little ride, but I'm not dying to get in line for it again.

I think I'll post some pictures rather than write more because those are fun. Some of the retro 70s throwbacks, like hair and make-up were neat, but women were non-existent in this film unless they were literally giving birth or having sex with the lead male. Boo.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

A perfect example of why women should direct action movies. So much screen time was wasted showing us pointless action sequences that mean nothing at all because we know that both Wolverine and Sabertooth live on to be in the first X-Men movie. So how do you make an action movie interesting when you already know the hero and villain won't be killed? You have to give us some emotional dramatic tension. Give us a freaking reason to care about these people! The opening war montage was ridiculous because we have already seen war footage from all the various wars of the world in tons of other movies. Why do we need to see both these guys run angrily through the battlefield being indestructible? We know they can heal. What we need to see is how they both feel about the fact that they are essentially gods that can't die and have decided to spend their extended lives killing people. Give us these moments of emotional connection when we learn that Sabertooth has let the power of immortality and the ability to take lives make him a crazy killer with a god complex while all the atrocities have made Wolverine completely disgusted with his own power. Let us see how they react to horror and each other. Let us see the love they have for each other so we care when that brotherly love is threatened and finally ripped away.

I was also thinking about the scene when Wolverine gets his adamantium skeleton. All the tension in this scene is based on the fear that he may die from the procedure, but we all know that he won't die so it completely falls flat. What would have really helped this scene was going back to the original origins hinted at in the first movie, that procedure took months and months to complete. That he had to undergo the treatment day in and day out in order to complete it. Let us see Wolverine at his absolute weakest, at his breaking point. He absolutely cannot take anymore pain. The daily procedures are too much for even him to bear and they only thing that keeps him going are his thoughts of Kayla. She comes to him in his dreams and keeps him motivated and bent on revenge. (This could even be questionable, because once we find out she is still alive it could be that she was real, not his imagination, and another construction by Striker to complete the ultimate experiment. Rad.) Also this would have been way more effective if we cared at all about their love story, which also would have been way more effective if we understood more why Wolverine could no longer take the inhumanity of all of his multiple lifetimes of killing. If all he has done is kill for his country than why does he suddenly get a conscious in Africa? I don't get it.

The stunts were neat, but we saw them all in the trailer and I was just as invested in the characters during the trailer as I was during the film, which is not a lot. The high points came when we got to see the other, younger mutants deal with the newness of their powers, like Scott Summers and the Diamond skinned girl, but these moments were far too fleeting. Gambit was also a high point, but his story was a cluster-fuck mess. Why the hell was he fighting Wolverine when Sabertooth, the guy who initially captured him, was right there? Hugh Jackman is usually complicated and captivating as Wolverine, but I only ever saw one note from this guy. Angry and more angry. His angry meter being indicated by how high his eyebrow was arched. I wanted him to be vulnerable and feel and truly fall in love. His memory loss felt very tacked on and Kayla dying when she did was pointless. It would have been waaaaaay better if she had lived. I would have really felt the tragedy of his memory loss if I knew that the love of his life was still out there somewhere and he just didn't remember her. Having her die and he doesn't recognize her was just like meh, whatever. Which pretty much sums up how I felt for the whole movie.

My final conclusion: I think women should direct action films because so many of them lately, Watchmen included, only care about neat action, but I have seen it all before and I am starting to zone out during pretty action scenes lately because I just don't care. Action only works if you are emotionally invested in the consequences of the fight. What will the character lose if they don't win the fight? What will they gain by winning? It all comes back to hopes and fear which can only be expressed if you have those scenes of emotional connection between the characters before the action. Please Hollywood, make me care!

A side note, the comedy completely fell flat and the tone of this movie was all over the place, mostly because Wolverine didn't have a range of emotion. Why not make him charming and quirky and funny so we miss this in the later films when he no longer has a memory? The scene in the bathroom with Wolverine's new claws was really bad CG and completely took me out of it. Yikes, reality and digital effects have not converged this much yet. Give him some real claws.

BSG: Razor

Sweet Jesus, I can't believe it took me so long to watch this film. I never expected some spin-off to be any good, but this movie has completely re-awakened my Battlestar love after that dismal series finally. Yeah, these guys do know what they are doing in this Battlestar world. This film was everything you could want. Centered on strong female characters, it paints them as real people, not just women. They are every bit as interesting, smart, strong and complicated as the men. It really is their story. Admiral Cain as the villain is fantastic. She gets a backstory that explains and justifies her otherwise vile tactics. Her protege, Kendra Shaw, must deal with the consequences of her own terrible acts that she committed while following in Cain's footsteps. Villains aren't just villains, they are people who have histories that drive them to do what they think is best, even if it turns out to be amoral and vicious. Who do you sacrifice for "the greater good?" What is the greater good after all? This is the only way to have a villain and everything I want in my Webseries. Shaw and Starbuck colliding and then reconciling was also great as was the backstory of the tortured 6 being Cain's ex-lover. This spin-off was all about the women and what goes into constructing a believable villain. God they were all just fascinating, fucked up people, where gender wasn't an issue (but it was there), love wasn't an issue (but it was there), and it truly explored where people could go when pushed to the very limits of their humanity. I will be watching this again and soon.

Julie Johnson

I found this odd little film as a trailer on Nina's Heavenly Delights. It was well acted by Courtney Love and Lily Taylor, but for the most part just humdrum. Lily Taylor did rock some ridiculously hideous costumes, ala early 1990s and the computer science aspect also seemed to be early 90s even though the film was released in 2001. Was it a period piece or just behind the times? None of that really mattered though because the film was just about a repressed suburban housewife finally finding the courage to stand up to her dominating husband and go back to school. She was some sort of genius who wanted to finally "make something of herself." The being a lesbian stuff just sort of happened on the side as a result of her close life-long close friendship with Courtney Love. Turns out they were both thinking about being with each other since they were young. This was kind of a nice idea, not to really focus on the lesbian aspect, it just sort of came and went like any sort of heterosexual romance would with the added bonus of some tension built around them having to keep it a secret. They had to imagine affection in public and, although it was sad to have repressed love, I can't say that it wasn't hot. Love's character, of course, runs back to men because it is too hard, but Julie is changed for good. Her love life is never resolved nor his her future college but her desire to know about the world has been awakened and she is driven to learn and this resolution is enough.

In a stock story about a repressed housewife I missed initial impetus that got Julie to finally follow her dreams, but maybe we were just supposed to understand how unbearable it was because we all know being a housewife to a controlling husband sucks. But what, after like 15 years, made her finally leave? In a great parallel, the husband takes the remote away from Julie to watch sports without even seeing her in the opening sequence while later in the film Julie takes the remote away from Love to watch a science program without even seeing her. We know that there looming separation is imminent. This was a particularly effective story telling tool.

Ben X

This Flemish film was great!! A nice surprise. It's about a hypersensitive genius boy who gets teased relentlessly because he can't interact socially. He has some great insight into human nature as he tries to copy their expression of emotion because he can't feel the emotions himself. He thinks that he has to fake being human and you identify with him because he does point out the absurdities of human behavior, their insecurities and fight for power by belittling others, without being a part of it. His bullying scenes go a little far, I mean we get how bad it is pretty quick, we don't need another 20 minute sequence of torture, but at least during that scene we know about the girl coming to visit him the next day so we have that hope to cling to (like Ben does) during this whole scene. Oh, he does interact normally with people online, in his World of Warcraft like game, and he has a girl that is his healer and plans to come meet him in person. The tension of him finally meeting up with her is great and although he never actually speaks to her, you still feel like he has made some sort of personal triumph. Although you want them to be together, the end almost seems better in a way. He always has her in his imagination and she will never hurt him or embarrass him or leave him like the other kids. Because Ben is the way he is and his fantasy in his head is more real for him than the real world, we accept this as his best possible ending. She does end up saving him without ever actually speaking to him, and this is enough.

The best part about this film was the set-up for Ben's death. The whole film was very subtle about how it prepared you for the idea that Ben would die. Occasionally we see interview style shots cut-in with people from his school, his mom, etc. answering questions like they would a news program. From these we get the early idea that they might be coming from a post-suicide interview and we start to feel smart because we think we have figured out where the film is going. When the suicide did happen you felt prepared and I even thought for a second that maybe where he has gone is better for him than this earth, which just wasn't meant for this kid. And then when he re-emerges and we realize that the "suicide" was all a ploy to get the kids to realize the consequences of their bullying, it was just a fantastic twist. I cheered. He still lives in his own head, with his imaginary girlfriend, but like his mom says at the end, it is ok because he is living. This was a charming film that really makes you think about why people do what they do. It also had two unconventional resolutions with the fake suicide and the girl, both of which were set-up but payed-off differently than you expected, in a way that was still a satisfying surprise for the viewer.

Oh, I also really enjoyed how it intercut the beginning of the film together with the game. It highlighted perfectly the reason people escape into worlds like Warcraft, because they can escape who they are and their own physical limits and construct themselves as anyone they want to be.

Fight Night (aka Rigged)

This is a random one I picked out a Blockbuster while trying to find something different on my quest to see what is possible with a super low budget. I picked it for obvious reasons when you see the poster. In a smart marketing decision to remove Dublin, the main character, from the DVD cover, they got the most out of their little boxing underdog genre film, appealing to lesbians and straight men alike. In fact, Dublin is nowhere to be found on the DVD case. Interesting. Maybe because he is no Brad Pitt. His "charm" just comes across as bad acting. I mean he is supposed to be a bad promoter, but it always came across as so fake charming. He was far too one note and didn't have the depth and struggle, even when facing his mom for the first time after 6 years, to become endearing. His faux confidence was just irritating and his delivery was not at all working.

Kat, played by uber newcomer Rebecca Neuenswander, (seriously, she has one credit and her resume is as slim as some of the girls I get in my auditions), had many more genuine moments. She had the badass tough girl, fighting her past part down and she actually played detached in a way that drew you in and left you wanting more. Some of her her moments with Dublin were awkward. Their relationship was hit and miss. Sometimes she nailed a zinger that was dead funny and sometimes it was like whoa, missed that one. Her physicality was generally good and I did believe she was a bad ass boxer, but in the same way that Kagan and Tim said my actress didn't understand completely the depth of her wounds after being tortured, I would say Rebecca didn't understand her wounds either. Especially after her hand was broken. That kind of pain fucks with you. Even if it is something you deal with daily, it fucks with you. Like you need it to feel alive and you are always aware of it. For the discomfort or the rush. More awareness of the wounds and the reality of getting hit by someone twice your size was definitely needed.

Overall the underdog narrative was completely stock, but the part about Kat being a lesbian running from her mormon family and in denial because she wants to go back, didn't wind up being as disappointing as it could have been. From a newbie male director, I completely expected Kat and Dublin to wind up together and every time I saw it leading there, it unexpectedly drew back. That was refreshing. It was also great how it took the "tough ass fighter has to be a lesbian" stereotype and used it, but played with it as well. Dublin's box munching jokes actually worked to the advantage of the film in undermining the stereotype. Shock. Also, it would have completely killed her narrative if she went straight, because she clearly wasn't and that would have wrecked the entire backstory they constructed for her as to why she fights. Obviously if she could just be straight, she wouldn't have to fight, because she could go home. They do kind of leave the end mysterious as to her relationship with Dublin and she definitely looks way girlier here than anywhere else which was a little disappointing, but at least they left it vague.

Of course the end was ridiculous. Yay, she won and now what? Long unnecessary agony and monologues that avoids the real confrontation and drama. A scene between Kat and her family was ripe for tension. Also it was very unfulfilling to not have her stop running and face herself and finally accept her sexuality. This could have been done very economically and been a great little scene to send this movie out with more than just a boxing win, but a personal triumph as well. It could have also infused Dublin and her's relationship with a little more energy at the end. Some quippy exchange where he makes fun of her, but ultimately accepts her for who she is (like her parents wouldn't) as she accepts herself and finds her new familial support in Dublin. Make sure we get some sort of answer to both the characters needs in the final resolution!! And don't go for a one hit surprise when you could have sustained tension and development.

Nina's Heavenly Delights

I have seen this one before, in pieces on veoh or something. It was charming and so I was fine seeing it again and on DVD where I was sure not to miss anything that was accidentally cut out or because it was blurry and small. I guess I was hoping things were cut and I would get more in the DVD, but alas no.

Yes it, is charming and refreshing not to have to deal with a coming out story on top of a story about Indian food and family. She was at least out to herself and her friends. It didn't dwell at all in the beginning on them falling in love and having it be all secretive and wrought with agony over falling in love with a girl.

If it is Nina's story than her superobjective is to win the cooking competition, but her need is to not run away from who she is. Basically to face her family and tell them the truth. In fact her entire family's need is the same. They all have a secret they need to tell. When she does this, than she will be able to "get the chemistry right" to win the competition. So her falling in love with a girl, and then coming out to her family is just her catalyst for honesty, aka fulfilling her need. It is good, because the love story is handled like most heterosexual romances. It is similar to the Sara's role in The Hustler. This, to me, is the future of gay/lesbian cinema and the kind of films I want to make.

That said, it definitely missed a lot of great opportunities for romantic tension between the two girls and Nina's desire for Lisa was totally glossed over which made the ending weaker to me. They kept talking about what you would do for love, but I had a hard time seeing the two girls in love. Yeah there was a little sexual tension that built as we all thought Lisa was with Nina's brother, but this "surprise" when we find out they aren't together somehow lost a bit of steam. I can't figure out why, but I wanted more tension when they both know each other is gay and they are attracted to each other so when they finally do kiss it is like yeah!! Maybe this had to do with how the club scene was handled. The back and forth and missed glaces at each other were good, but that guy showing up was weird. It was still done rather well. The kitchen scene was hot, but we don't know where that leads and what the consequences of it are. We need some sfermath to see how they both feel about what happened. Once we see they are both totally smitten, WHAM that is when we hit them with a clear THREAT. Something concrete that threatens the bliss. And now we see Nina's desire for Lisa as real because she overcomes this threat to be with her. This kinda happens and we get that weak-sauce allusion to a sex scene that ends waaaaaay to soon. If I get to see this than I start to believe that she could actually be in love with Lisa and not just "movie love" that is convenient for the story. Then I understand why she is so afraid. I get that fear of losing either her or her family that defines love. This really amps up the end and makes me much more invested. Of course the director made the choice to make it more about the food than the love story, but food is passion and desire and I really don't think food and sex are too far removed. Why not wrap them more tightly and visually together? This just makes me more driven to not back off, ever. Keep pushing every scene and script and actor to make sure you are getting the most emotional investment out of everything you put on the screen. Justify the emotions!

The actresses were believable regardless, and darn hot. They pulled off the "love" in the context of the fantasy world, even if it wasn't quite as deep as it could have been. Both have been continuing to do TV projects , but nothing big for either of them yet.