Nazi Murderer in Repose.

Szpilman’s Liszt.

THE PIANIST follows Jewish concert pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman as he hides out from Nazis during the invasion of Poland. It’s not a story about heroes, rather, the story of a Polish man who avoided being one. And lived to play another day.

1939. Wladyslaw “Wladek” Szpilman (Adrien Brody), whom many contend was “the most accomplished pianist in Poland, if not all of Europe” during the 1930s, is thrust into WWII fingers first when a German bomb blows up the radio station where he is broadcasting a piano performance.

When he arrives home, his large family, who were just desperately packing to flee, hears Britain on the radio declaring war on Germany, and promising Poland she “is not alone.” However, like every political promise made in the history of politics, it will mean less than the airwaves it was broadcast on. Even whilst they enjoy dinner and drinks to celebrate the end of a war which is actually just beginning, German troops are goose-stepping into their town. There is an authenticity to this ambivalence that is lacking in many war movies: In hindsight, we know what a scourge Hitler’s regime was, but in those more innocent times, when only one “World War” had ravaged humanity, Poland (and the world at large) did not take Hitler’s extremist policies of relocation and extermination seriously.

We see the slow undermining of Poland’s freedoms: “Jews Only” cafés, Star of David armbands forced on Jews to identify them like cattle, laws prohibiting Jews to sit on park benches… it gets real when Wladek’s father is stopped by Nazis and beaten for not bowing to them in the street.

November 1940: 360,000 Jews – Wladek and his family among them – are herded into the Warsaw Ghetto.

During the evacuation of the bombed radio station, Wladek met a blonde fan enamored with his playing, Dorota (Emilia Fox). While the station crumbled around him, Wladek’s mind was not on German raids but on raiding panty. Even during a bombing – men be pigs! He took Dorota on a date, where he lamented, “What’s the use of fighting back?” – which, we presume, caused him to miss out on some fine blond tail that night…

Now, while Wladek drudges alongside a cart with his family, he sees Dorota by the roadside, watching the exodus. Oh, Humiliation, thy snide mistress! And Dorota, tears edging her eyes in disbelief, says what must have been in everyone’s minds as it was happening back then, “It’s too absurd.”

You should see this place on a Friday!

From this point THE PIANIST starts resembling that other great WWII drama, SCHINDLER’S LIST, in its depiction of German soldiers’ brutality and sadism. Scenes of unthinkable misery: a man in a wheelchair thrown off a balcony; a father dead in the street, his head cradled by his crying son; a woman asks a soldier, “Where are you taking us?” – a nonchalant bullet to the head. Like SCHINDLER, the violence is sudden, glaring and shocking; the misery and poverty of the downtrodden Jews almost too much for us to bear even as viewers.

A chance separation; a critical turning point – a friend from the Jewish Ghetto police recognizes Wladek and pulls him deliberately from the line, while his family are being herded into windowless cattle cars. To their knowledge, they were being taken “somewhere” as an enslaved labor force – at the least, they were a commodity, none could conceive of the trip being a journey to their deaths. There was truly no rational reason to simply wipe out people. But there was no reason or logic to the fanatic racism of the Nazis (which they have carried down to their most recent capos like Dumbo Donald, Closet Mike Pence, Ku Jeff Sessions and the whole foreign-bought enslaved American republiKKKan administration).

In a labor camp, Wladek meets an old friend, Marjorek (Daniel Caltagirone, the Andy Garcia of Poland), who helps Wladek escape into the Jewish Underground. And so begins the hiding. From deserted apartments to bombed districts, forever moving and being aided by free, rich Jews sympathetic to the cause. At one point Wladek encamps in the lion’s den – across the road from German Police. With a piano in the room, which he couldn’t play, because the apartment he was hiding in was regarded as empty! Only a musician will know the pain.

When ventriloquial dummies won’t cooperate.

There are two themes at play in THE PIANIST – the first message is simply about the inartful, ungodly luck that separated life from death during the war. In his flight from the Nazis, Wladek would encounter so many chances and coincidences and near-death experiences that the overarching message of the movie is not one of heroism or canniness, but of randomness. Though we may regard Wladek as intrinsically worthy of saving (because he is an artist? the star? a sexyboy?), he did not do anything heroic in his quest to survive; it was not as a “reward” for saving a school of children from bombs, or trying to sacrifice himself for another, no, his existence was what most would regard as “cowardly” – fleeing from hideout to hideout, noiseless, like a mouse, the merest hint of discovery causing him not to take up arms against his aggressors but to flee again and again. He did this until his country was liberated by other people, negating his need to flee. At one point, Wladek helps a young boy crawl under a wall, but the boy dies in his arms – this is not so much a heroic act as another demonstration of randomness, as when Wladek was pulled from the line and saved unintentionally from death.

This randomness would have a part in the second theme of THE PIANIST, which illustrates the true sense of being humane. Wladek is discovered by Wehrmacht officer Wilm Hosenfeld (Thomas Kretschmann – no matter how Aryan this guy looks, he’ll always bring our tears to the surface in his touching roles!). Coincidentally looking like Liam Neeson (cough-Schindler!), Hosenfeld is a music lover, and after discovering Wladek is a pianist, starts supplying him with food! In a heart-rending turnaround, Hosenfeld finds himself a Soviet prisoner when the war is over, and beseeches a passing Polish musician, “Do you know Szpilman? I helped him while he was in hiding! Tell him I’m here!” But Hosenfeld would die an unheralded death in that camp in 1952, unapplauded, unforgiven. Yet wasn’t his fate a treatise on Christianity in its purest form? How God entreats Christians not to seek plaudits or reward for their good deeds, nor to shout them from the rooftops, but to perform them in earnest, away from prying eyes? Truly, this is Hosenfeld, who returned a creature of art to the world. And when he asked for reward (in the film at least), none was given. Yet, he never looks regretful of his humane actions…

The Pianist and The Captain – Wladyslaw Szpilman and Wilm Hosenfeld.

BEST DIRECTOR: Ronald Harwood screenplays from Szpilman’s book, The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story Of One Man’s Survival In Warsaw, 1939-1945 (Picador, 2000), a story which resonated with director Roman Polanski, who was also a fugitive from Hitler’s regime at a young age. There were many who felt Polanski redeemed himself of his statutory rape crimes with his creation of this touching film– (oooh, don’t say ‘touching’). THE PIANIST also won BAFTAs (including Best Film 2003), and a host of other awards.

BEST ACTOR: There were the “big” aspects of Adrien Brody’s Method: he dropped down to 130 pounds, moved to Europe, got rid of his car and phone, to experience isolation and loss, and wasn’t sure he would make it through the experience entirely sane. Then there were the little things: after he realizes his whole family has been taken from him in one fell swoop, Wladek meets a fellow fugitive and is in such a state of despair he cannot speak coherently (we think he’s going to give the customary exposition about the train taking the Jews to the ovens, for historical context blah blah, but Brody brilliantly, gutturally tries to squeeze out a few words and says nothing; or the amazing visual when Wladek speaks to Germans, where he adopts a cowed manner, and we are taken aback when we see Brody (the obvious star) murmuring with head bowed, until we recall this was the manner of all Jews toward occupying Nazis; or Brody’s pretty convincing piano miming, most of which is Chopin – challenging stuff, even to mime. (Actual closeups show the hands of pianist Janusz Olejniczak – which may also be the last remaining letters in any given Scrabble game.) And one thing Brody didn’t need to work on – that honker! Whatever nationality/religion Adrien Brody is, that nose of his is strictly Jewish. Adrien won the Oscar for Best Actor. His nose won at Cannes.

The one thing that gives us pause and robs the film of a little authenticity is – ironically – the sound of the piano in the bombed house where Wladek is discovered by Hosenfeld. It is beautiful, magnificent, in perfect tune and conditioning, not one key sticking, not one key broken, not one string even slightly flat, its feel and touch perfect. In Holocaust Poland. I’ve played pianos in modern music studios that are in worse condition than this instrument in Holocaust Poland.

Closing titles: “Wladyslaw Szpilman continued to live in Warsaw until his death on 6^th July 2000. He was 88 years old.”

His nose continues to tour with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra.

END

Okay you guys, bring it in for that group shot– oh, Hulk, didn’t expect to see you here, babe; how did you even read the call-sheet? Liz honey, less ass, more side-boob, okay? Oh, and Quickie, babe, don’t look so dangerous. You can run fast, honey – not dangerous. Thor, more tricep. Will Iron Man and Captain America PLEASE GET YOUR MASKS ON? You’re superheroes – not astronauts! Vision? Where’s Vision? Someone go get his interdimensional ass out of bed, will you? Cap, lose the shield, you’re covering the pearbottom responsible for the funding. Uh, Hawkeye, face the camera son, there’s only so much introspection we’re gonna buy from Marvel’s least lucrative property.
And will someone tell those robots to clear the shot?!…

Blammo Brigade finds Intelligence. Artificially.

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON is not just your same ole blammo-fest with sugarbottom; merely the second movie in the AVENGERS franchise, ULTRON has moved leaps and bounds beyond its predecessor. Yes, there is blammo, but interspersed liberally with morally ambiguous characterization, tentative romance, quiet introspection, self-effacing humor and – that trend in modern plot devices – Artificial Intelligence. Oh, and there’s Vision – but we’ll get to that magnificence in a moment… Dare we call this movie a dark symphony? Ooooh, dare, dare!

The Avengers, once again consisting of a god, a titanium-armored physicist, a serum-enhanced soldier, a gamma-irradiated indestructible geneticist, a thigh-kwon-do espionage agent, and a guy who can aim real good. They will soon be joined by a hex-wielding empath and a guy who can run real fast.

Behold… The Poffy!

Like X-MEN developed into The Continuing Story of Wolverine, AVENGERS is merely The Continuing Story of Iron Man aka Tony Stark aka Robert Downey Jr. (They’re all the same person, right?) All the other Avengers’ roles may as well be extras who punch real good. There’s Thor (Chris Hemsworth; someone wake me when this thunder god decides to use his full powers), Captain America (Chris Evans; throw shield, flash dreamy eyes, punch, repeat), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson; just back dat pearbottom up, darlin,’ don’t say a word), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo, the old dog, enters the cast and steals Widow away from Cap), and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner, who is fleshed out here with mature backstory… TMI, Marvel Studios, T-M-I!). They will be joined by Russian twins, Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen, adding schoolgirl skirt to the pearbottom quotient; aka Wanda Maximoff, not really known as “Scarlet Witch” except through our a priori comics knowledge), and Quicksilver (Aaron Taylor-Johnson, also never called by his “superhero” name, but Pietro Maximoff).

There are also fun cameos by Idris Elba (as Heimdall, THOR), Stellan Skarsgård (as scientist Selvig, THOR), Andy Serkis (as a weather-beaten underground arms dealer), Anthony Mackie (as Falcon, CAPTAIN AMERICA: WINTER SOLDIER) and Don Cheadle (as War Machine, IRON MAN 2). Samuel L. Jackson is Nick Fury, Cobie Smulders picks up a pearbottom paycheck, Thomas Kretschmann is a HYDRA villain and Stan Lee is – Stan Lee.

But Stark is the one to watch, as he tips into megalomania, and creates the Artificial Intelligence “peace-keeping program” called Ultron, the supposed villain of the piece. (Wait! Didn’t Hank Pym create Ultron? –Get thee behind me, Comics Dweeb!) But if Stark is responsible for the creation of this “villain” then rightfully, ethically and technically, he is the villain. (Don’t blame the children – blame the parents.) He admits this himself in a soul-searching moment, “I’m the man who killed the Avengers.” But audiences will never grasp this nuance – not least because of the way Western moviemaking has conditioned us to regard any ambiguously moral “hero” as a “tortured genius” rather than an actual villain. Movie villains were easy to identify when they were mad scientists using blue bzzz things to make monsters, or Bond nemeses with designs on bettering the world through their fascism… It seems like a billion dollars, cars, chicks, quips, and hi-tech titanium armor will mitigate that “mad scientist” or “evil leader” tag to “playboy billionaire.” When all Tony really is – is an update of that age-old Dr. Frankenstein/Ernst Blofeld trope.

“By Odin’s blood, my knackers are sweaty! I need to change my skirt.”

Like any good leader who wants “peace in our time” Tony has turned fascist, with his ranting that he has “no time for a town hall meeting with the Avengers! I don’t want to hear the ‘man-was-not-meant-to-meddle’ medley; I see a suit of armor around the world.” At film’s opening – besides the cheesy/stock action sequence that would pull all the Avengers into a dynamic/wanky single frame – we see Tony’s cool Iron Men drones policing the skies. Even if it’s for peace, well, that’s one man’s version of peace.

Tony unilaterally unleashes Ultron (voiced by James Spader like Vincent Price reborn), who is a computer program, and represented physically by an 8-foot tall golden robot. Being an app, he can travel amongst the web and into innumerable other robots – cue Tony’s Iron Men drogues – so his ideology can be in multiple beings at once. The story is written and directed (by Joss Whedon) in such a way that Ultron becomes conscious by himself after number-crunching J.A.R.V.I.S., Tony’s supercomputer, but again, don’t let Western filmmaking fool you into giving Tony a pass.

A naked Iron Man shares a romantic moment with Ultron.

Being a “peacekeeping program,” Ultron comes at us with the line, “I’m here to help,” like the thoughtpolice in Orwell’s 1984, or like Republicans shilling for the Koch brothers while cutting your benefits and telling you it’s an improvement. Ultron takes “peacekeeping” to its logical end, using his A.I. reductive reasoning to discern that Mankind has to go. He means, like, totally. Poffy concurs. Mankind is now the Earth’s problem, not the solution. With the propensity for birthing more offspring than are being allowed to die, it’s not even Man’s miniscule augmentation to “climate change” that is destroying the Earth; nor his wars or reality shows; rather simply, overpopulation and its attendant logistical survival problems (which is why there is widespread poverty), which include raping Earth’s resources, making it unpeaceful for all life. That, and his CONFOUNDING STUPIDITY.

Tony’s mission statement is later repeated by Ultron – “peace in our time.” If Ultron was intentionally “evil” then it would be a sarcastic jab at Tony, but if Ultron sincerely believes that eradicating humanity will bring peace, then it is just a courtesy reminder.

Every synopsis you read will claim Ultron is the “villain” but he is NOT. He is an A.I. that runs a scenario to its logical conclusion and determines organic life is pointless because it ends in death. (Life is a means to an end – merely serving to propagate genetic material across lifespans). Humans are organic and they actively destroy all life as well. In the name of peace on Earth, they deserve extermination. Sagan and DeGrasse Tyson might remind us we are the same molecular material circulating as starstuff in a closed loop of unending beginnings. All nihilism aside, we’re still pointless. Self-awareness makes us erroneously believe in “purpose” but that’s debatable if the ultimate denouement is death. And reality shows.

When Computer Graphics fight, we ALL lose.

Though AGE OF ULTRON raises A.I. issues (to its credit), it merely scrapes the surface, rather than dive into intricacies (like EX MACHINA, THE MACHINE, or even CHAPPIE), to make way for blammo. And pray tell, the punching stylings of our supers need to be revisited from time to time to keep the Attention-Deficits in order. (That whole Iron Man/Hulkbuster sequence has got to be the most superfluous piece of eye-jiggering diabetes-candy since the last TRANSFORMERS debacle disguised as a movie. A friend suggested a title for this review: “Age Of Dulltron,” and Lord knows, I’m tryin’ Ringo, I’m tryin’ real hard to be the shepherd and make you the righteous movie, but with this collateral damage-fest, maybe it means that you’re the weak, and that CGI is the tyranny of evil men…)

So to the movie’s discredit, the A.I. element is simplistic. The Avengers tell Stark, “Ultron can’t tell the difference between saving the world and destroying it. Where do you think he gets that?” implying that A.I. is “bad” “evil” “contra humans.” (Almost like the JURASSIC PARK series misrepresents carnivorous dinosaurs – a natural cog in any ecosystem – as “evil” villains.) But how can any kind of “Intelligence” – artificial or otherwise – be villainous? Well, here it is, personified by the mechanical man with the faux-British accent, quoting the bible and Pinocchio in equal jest. (He loves his fantasy books, that Ultron!)

To be or not to be: that is the Vision.

Then, riding a bucking steed of electric lightning, comes… VISION!

Oh Captain my captain. Oh Vision my vision! J.A.R.V.I.S. and an Infinity Stone had a baby and his name was – Vision. (Wait! Wasn’t Vision created using the brain patterns of Wonder Man? –Get thee to a nunnery, Comics Dweeb!) Vision is Paul Bettany, eternally the voice of J.A.R.V.I.S., at last joining his actor cohorts in outlandishly colorful tights.

And he is uber cool. He is Mr. Ice. He is The Breeze.

With powers beyond imagining, wisdom beyond comprehension, and hued in deep purple like Jon Lord – so he must be a god… Martin Luther King should have said, “I have a Vision.” Survivor should have serenaded Rocky with “Vision Of The Tiger.” That guy cured by Jesus should’ve shouted from the mountaintops, “I was blind but now I have Vision!” He’s aloof, soft-spoken, incorruptible, inscrutable, all-knowing, all-powerful, the zero-Kelvin coolest Marvel cat of all. That scene of Thor, Iron Man and Vision in a line, like a rock band at a row of mics, all beaming power rays at Ultron – now that’s what superhero movies were made for!

I need to put my pants back on.

The key to Marvel’s and DC’s success in bringing “childish” superhero tales to modern masses is not so much the fantastic production values (although that doesn’t hurt), but moral ambiguity; less delineation between good and bad, right and wrong, evil intent and good intent gone awry. Rather than portraying outlandishly-garbed two-dimensional do-gooders foiling bank robbers (remember Kirk Alyn’s 1948 SUPERMAN and George Reeves’ 1952 series, foiling “crooks” in hats?), these are adult adventures with some blammo thrown in for the kids who can’t spell moral ambiguity yet (that would be everyone in America up to age 35).

Though Marvel has left DC in its dust with this “Marvel Universe” cross-pollination of movies (as opposed to DC’s oft-promised/ill-fated/off-grid JUSTICE LEAGUE projects) it’s time to go the whole hog and renounce this constricting PG-13 rating (I know it’s for box office reasons, but box office desperation can be mitigated with less outlandish salaries, less intrusive advertising/tie-ins and less unnecessary CGI), and move these summer tentpoles to a heavier grit with R-rated conundrums. These protagonists are already dealing with moral ambiguity, searching for the best way to be right in a world that is always wrong. Extend that to casual swearing and innocent deaths, and we’ll have real emotional powerhouses on our hands – movies that can probably win some of those hedonistic, hubristic, suckhole awards you people are always giving to the wrong recipients.

Many bystanders die in this movie, but it’s not graphic and it’s implied; disguised by the colorful action and quips and cutaways. You think not one solitary soul was killed or maimed in that Iron Man/Hulk battle? You think not one citizen just fell to their death when a whole city was levitated by Ultron and people were trying to evacuate in a panic? A car with a family in it goes over the edge and Captain America tries to hold it, triceps thrumming, dreamy eyes fluttering in anguish – but he loses it!… In slomo it falls – but no worries, little kiddies, suddenly raising it from below is Thor… everyone happy and gay. Goddamit! Show them lose a few people now and then, for the emotional impact. It would highlight the toll these heroes have to bear every time their vaunted powers do not necessarily fail, but are simply inadequate to deal with the enormity of the problem.

Sensing danger, Scarlet Witch
quickly pushes out her breasts.

Hawkeye says to Scarlet Witch: “If you go out there, you fight, and you fight to kill.” Let’s break it down: Wanda Witch has truly super powers – she can warp minds and shoot frickin’ laser beams out of her hands. (Her hex powers are represented very dramatically with her “Dracula hands,” ramped film and vermilion contrails. That schoolgirl skirt is just gravy. And that sugarbottom is dessert.) First of all, why would she be hesitant in killing things that are trying to kill her? I guess Hawkeye’s warning illustrates it’s not just the power – it’s the WILL to use it judiciously. The movie is hinting at that heavy emotional burden spoken of above, but it doesn’t follow through – because these robots she eventually burns down are just electronic drones; they’re not organic beings, or unwitting followers of a duplicitous leader. She might as well be hitting Ctrl+Alt+Delete.

Prime ass (as in assassin) Natasha flirts with Hulk. It’s official: bigger is better. But the movie will surprise us with its tragic denouements and unresolved throughlines. Marvel Universe offers us a myriad of upcoming films where fates will be decided (not to mention contracts merged, agents baffled, and Spider-Man traded like a baseball player).

In any media where humans are on the verge of being wiped out for their CONFOUNDED STUPIDITY, there is always always ALWAYS that Cringeworthy Speech No.5 that mitigates our idiocy. Unfortunately, it is Cool McCool Vision delegated to deliver that numbnut speech here: “Humans are odd. They think order and chaos are somehow opposites and try to control what won’t be. But there is grace in their failings.”  By definition, there is NO grace in failing – that’s why it’s called failing. And failing so calamitously so often means we are NOT worthy of being alive, much less presuming ourselves “rulers” of this planet, for which we are not even “stewards” or “butlers” rather a virus that is wiping out other life forms to the detriment of the ecosystem. Kill us. Kill us NOW, Ultron!

By the way, Mr. Ultron, if you really want to kill all humans, there’s no need for this much punching. The Avengers don’t ever need to be hit even once with all your Iron Man clones. They can band together and punch to their heart’s content (and there’s a very cool group sculpture of them doing just that during the end credits) but there’s a much better way to wipe out humanity. (I’ve advised Mr. Terminator and Mr. Decepticon on this exact same method – none of you dopes will take my advice.) You’ve got access to every computer system on Earth. Simply… shut everything down… and watch Mankind fall to its knees after five minutes of not being able to access their bank accounts, their launch codes, or a reality show.

If some writer would come up with an intelligent storyline (artificial or otherwise) that doesn’t insult our intelligence, now that would be a… VISION!

END

Next To Nothing.

“Here’s the thing about the future,” Nic Cage tells us at the beginning of NEXT, “every time you look at it, it changes – because you looked at it. And that changes everything else.”

Oh, so it’s Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Only dumber.

Cage is Cris Johnson, a Las Vegas mentalist who can see two minutes into his future. (Did anyone see another Las Vegas movie in Nic Cage’s future? What are the odds?! And did anyone foresee that his hairstyle would be a cross between Hanks’s Vitruvian Man in THE DA VINCI CODE and Gene Simmons Without Makeup?) He can see the future, but he couldn’t see he was going to make an assface of himself by doing this movie.

Julianne Moore is FBI Agent Ferris, trying to forcefully enlist Cris in an FBI case involving international espionage and nukes. Annoying how she unequivocally believes in his foresight power, which he has parlayed into his magician act to stay undercover in plain sight. No matter that Moore plays Tough Guy as badly as she did when pursuing Hannibal Lecter, whenever there’s a woman in charge, there is always Always ALWAYS a man sidekick for her to bitchslap (Moore’s slappable bitch is Troy Kittles).

NEXT is from a Phillip K. Dick novel, The Golden Man, so it is a compelling, intriguing premise, but an uninvolving movie. Trouble with any time-bending film is that you pull one little thread and the cardigan unravels. There are so many dangling threads in NEXT that we’re soon entangled like a playful kitty in a ball of yarn.

When Cris stops a potential thief in a casino, the police think he was the thief and chase him; he then “sees” his way through a complex cat-and-mouse evasion of the police through the casino labyrinth – yet he couldn’t “see” how to avoid the police mistaking him for the thief in the first place?

To meet his “destined love” Liz (Jessica Biel, who displays not one whit of chemistry with Cage), he foresees all the options on how to best approach her. Which means he can’t see into “the” future, but into “possible” futures. And while he’s thinking of all these two-minute-into-the-future-scenarios, ten minutes have gone by.

Hrmmm…

Every time we see an establishing aerial shot of Vegas, could we please please puh-leeze stop with the source music, A Little Less Conversation (A Little More Action)? Please. We get it. It’s Elvis’s town.

Don’t let me spoil it for you by revealing Patrick Duffy in the shower.

END

Plight of the Valkyries.

When I heard Tom Cruise was to play a World War II Nazi, I laughed my LMAO off. Tough sell for a non-actor. And by non-actor, I mean movie star. And by movie star, I mean he can’t act.But then it all comes clear. The role was Colonel von Stauffenberg, who was involved in one of the more famous assassination plots against Hitler – so Cruise was not really being asked to extend his acting bone; he was a disenfranchised Nazi, a veritable “liberal” in America’s eyes. He was a traitor to the Germans, but you know what they say: One man’s traitor is another man’s Cruise.

Colonel Cuken von Poffenberg

And, ludicrous as it may sound, Cruise and director Bryan Singer (X-MEN) actually boast of the “risk” for Cruise in taking such a role. What risk? His character is the Hero, with a beautiful wife (Carice van Houten) and four loving, blond kids (cos he’s German, see); he’s principled, a born leader, and hates the Nazis so much he’s practically American. He doesn’t even speak German in the film! Associated Press actually published this stupid article: Tom Cruise taking risk with Nazi film `Valkyrie’.

In VALKYRIE, it is 1944 and Chancellor Adolf Hitler, whom many on both sides regard as an “insane genius,” is not only losing the war that he started, he is committing atrocities and driving Germany’s credibility with the rest of the world straight into the toilet. Kinda like George W. Bush – without the “genius” bit. We meet Colonel Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (Mr. Cruise, proudly pretending he is “taking a risk”) as a young rebel, displeased with Hitler’s management of the war, his mission impossible: “to serve Germany – or the Fuehrer – not both.”

Then the Allies bomb him. Stauffenberg loses his right hand, half his left hand, and his left eye. If that doesn’t make you wanna blow up your Chancellor, well…

Stauffenberg is recruited by a cast of “Chermans,” so upper-crust British they make your butler feel like an illegal Latino: Kenneth Branagh (as Major-General Tresckow), Bill Nighy (as General Olbricht), Tom Wilkinson (as General Fromm), Terence Stamp (as Ludwig Beck), Eddie Izzard (as General Fellgiebel), Kevin McNally (as Dr. Goerdeler). The German names won’t mean a thing unless you know the story – the joke is in the casting. It is why VALKYRIE stumbles conceptually, because it is always in the back of our minds, “No wonder they’re trying to assassinate Hitler – they’re BRITISH!”

Bad Guys are British, right? Staple of Hollywood. So casting them as Germans was no stretch, but director Singer ensures that the “good” Bad Guys (i.e. traitors) are all British actors and the “bad” Bad Guys (i.e. Nazis) are actual German actors.

Then there’s Tom. Fruiting about the authentic-looking WWII backdrop, in no way trying to inhabit the role of a one-handed, eye-patched, high-ranking German Chief of Staff. Just Being Cruise. The American accent is bad enough. (We give the filmmakers credit here for the artful way they suspended our disbelief in everyone speaking English: the opening titles are written in German, and morph into English, then we hear Cruise speaking German with English subtitles, cross-faded into him speaking English.) We get the point of the translation for our lazy Western ears, but there is more to a role than an accent; Cruise gives it nothing more than Cruise. We do not lose ourselves in this “German’s” conflict – committing the highest crimes known to man since Judas Iscariot. It’s Tom Cruise, eat your popcorn.

The two things foremost in my mind were Cruise’s ingenious bluescreen glove he’s obviously wearing, and how hard the Shakespearean vets on set must be laughing at his babyboy acting chops over lunch.

As a political thriller, VALKYRIE succeeds, though. Even with Tom just Being Cruise. Writers Christopher McQuarrie (THE USUAL SUSPECTS) and Nathan Alexander compress events and often just falsify events to keep it popcorn-friendly – this is not a historical document – but they do not lose too much in their streamlining because the story itself is just so entertaining. (To understand the extent of the operation, and its many complications that are not shown in VALKYRIE for brevity, one of the most authoritative sources is still William L. Shirer’s The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.)

“Valkyrie” was the code-name for a plan that called for Germany’s Home Army (led by Thomas Kretschmann – he was the Euro boat captain in KONG 2005) to hold major German cities in case of a revolt from the millions of foreign laborers. Stauffenberg says, “I’ve rewritten Valkyrie” (which is ironic, considering the filmmakers re-wrote the events of Hitler’s assassination in VALKYRIE as well) – an idea which comes to Stauffenberg while listening to Wagner’s Flight of the Valkyries (somehow Singer squeezed it in).

The plan: to kill Hitler – with a good old-fashioned time-bomb (with no Roger Ebert Red Digital Readout!) – then report that SS radicals were trying to take over the cities, which would allow the conspirators to mobilize the Home Army to arrest all SS officials. This would nullify Hitler’s main Gestapo bulldog, Himmler.

It is a pleasure to see a modern movie that doesn’t use holo-computers, laser fields, cell phones or cockamamy technology so outlandish it might as well be magic. (I refrain from dropping the classic Arthur C. Clarke aphorism on you. Congratulate me. It’s harder than you think.)

Stauffenberg plants the bomb in a briefcase near Hitler during a staff meeting. It detonates, seemingly killing everyone in the room. The Home Army started its takeover of major cities, but just as Germany was about to become the United States of Tom Cruise – Hitler was discovered alive and made a public radio announcement to proclaim his survival was divine.

The conspirators failed by not controlling the flow of information. This was in a time when mass communications were in the form of telegrams sent to a central communications switchboard, then forwarded on. Though the conspirators had hundreds of high-ranking officers onboard Valkyrie, they failed to recruit the low-ranking message personnel. The telegram of Hitler’s death stunned these indoctrinated Nazis, but the following one about his survival made them smell that rotten something in Denmark (on accounta it’s so close to Germany…)

Just as the conspirators were saying, “I love it when a plan comes together,” the Home Army is re-claimed by the Nazis. As Stauffenberg’s orders go out over the wire to arrest SS officers, orders issue from the Wolf’s Lair (Hitler’s HQ) to arrest Stauffenberg. The wire operators chose to send on The Fuehrer’s orders and ignore Stauffenberg’s.

Stauffenberg’s plan had to work, so he made no effort to hide his tracks. He was discovered and executed within the 24-hour period when Valkyrie was launched on 20 July 1944. He was executed 21 July 1944.

Somewhere in Germany, there is a monument to Tom Cruise for his brave sacrifice. Or is it in Britain in the Risky Business Untrained Actor’s museum?…

END

Yes! We Have No Bananas!

Pure entertainment. Twenty-five hairy-bottomed, big-dumb-galoot feet of it. And nothing else. Despite the ubiquitous refrain of beauty and beast subtexts and alienation metaphors and caveats against taming nature, searching for deeper meaning within this wholly implausible tale will only lead to senseless cavil and being considered the big ponce for taking it so seriously in the first place.

If there is any message we can glean from this fanciful ape tale, haunting our sensibilities since before there was rock and roll, it is that Women Will Kill You – One Way Or Another. But we already knew that.

Cucumber Kong

Director Peter Jackson actually fixed what wasn’t broke! How he did it is a wonder to behold. The sheer spectacle of KING KONG 2005 over-rides any shortcomings it may possess – trouble is: there are no shortcomings…

Comparison with Merian C. Cooper’s and Ernest B. Schoedsack’s 1933 KING KONG is not only inevitable – it should be compulsory, to fully appreciate Jackson’s phenomenal achievement. Purists may want to leave the room, as it is going to get quite – er, hairy for King Kong aficionados, even Fay Wray reportedly remarking to Naomi Watts, “Ann Darrow is mine!” For an actor to succumb to such petulancy over a figment, one shudders to imagine what the action-figure fanbase may be plotting against us.

Into that cauldron of knotted knickers we dive…

Upon re-watching 1933’s static KONG – after viewing Jackson’s kinetic 2005 remake – we realize, to our shock, that the reasons we considered that film a “classic” have all been rendered moot, at the very least, academic. Released during the Great Depression (when “talkies” had been existent a scant five years), it was pioneering for a simpler time and a much simpler audience; filmic sophistication was at an all-time low and suspension of disbelief was at a premium. As dambusting and magical as it was – saving RKO Pictures from bankruptcy – it reads now as riotously unsophisticated and virtually unwatchable, with its token white-supremacist racism, its sophomoric “love affair” between Darrow and Driscoll; the merely-sad look of the then-pioneering rear-projection and stop-motion techniques; and – most heinously – the primitive, community theatre acting styles of all the principals.

Before blindly dismissing Jackson’s vision for the sole reason that it is a “remake,” I challenge you to re-watch your deteriorating VHS copy of that plasticine ape movie. Note the storyline – juvenile, at best (the two major “breathtaking” sequences – Kong versus tyrannosaur and Kong climbing the Empire State – merely “set-pieces,” to elicit the “wow-factor,” with no plot import or reasoning, respectively); note the motivation of the principals – apart from Denham, no one else has any (Kong especially has no compelling reason for any of the anthropomorphized caretaker duties he undertakes for his puling charge); note the unfolding of the interspecies “love story” – there is none (Darrow is ferried around by an inexpressive Kong, at every opportunity attempting escape – when she isn’t playing the helpless coquette with no leg muscles). And every two minutes we must endure the mind-scratching screaming of Fay Wray, like some kind of Tourette’s victim (perfectly corroborating the 1930’s perception of “Woman with the scientifically-proven smaller brain,” who couldn’t possibly have climbed down that log herself when the tyrannosaur approached to eat her).

In KONG 2005, all these inadequacies have been addressed. Our newest incarnation of Ann Darrow (golden child Naomi Watts) is a vaudeville performer so down on her luck in Depression-era New York that she has reached the stage of, “To get work in this town, which Big Ape do I have to screw?” As luck would have it, director Carl Denham (Jack Black, in a role which will rocketsauce his career), desperate to find a heroine for his adventure movie, “discovers” her in a sequence which not only pays homage to the original film, but which supplies Darrow with suitable backstory and motivation enough to voyage with Denham into the unknown.

To an island merely a scrawl on a sea-dog’s map, Denham’s hired tramp steamer runs aground. The island natives are more than restless; face-pierced, alien and lethal, they kidnap Darrow as sacrifice to their simian god – Kong.

Director Jackson and co-writers Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens have taken an unmolded lump of clay (all puns intended) and added all the bells and whistles which the original film strived for and alluded to, but did not quite achieve due to budget, its place in history and lack of film-making experience. KONG 2005 has not only improved on its progenitor’s technical icing one-hundredfold (which goes without saying, and which is NOT the reason this film is better than the original), it also boasts character development, motivation, Method acting, and actually possesses the “love story” foretold, but never realized, in that far, far away galaxy of 1933. (Jackson opted to run with the plot-holed broad strokes of the original story, so criticizing him for merely sticking to the asinine and implausible plot is moot. His bravura re-rendering of that storyline is his gift to us.)

Other improvements on the original include Denham absconding with his movie reels when his funders get cold feet, writing rubber checks to all and sundry to retain the impetus of his outlaw campaign; the boat captain played more believably (than 1933’s calm, unquestioning senior) by a skeptical Thomas Kretschmann (suitably grizzled and indeterminately Euro) and a veritable kidnapping of writer Jack Driscoll (Adrien Brody, oozing leading-man cool), who tries to alight the boat as it is about to sail, even while police rush to board it, to arrest Denham. Even seemingly benign and obvious developments, like Darrow and Driscoll engaging in spanky-spanky en route to their destination, gives Driscoll the much-needed motivation later in the film, to leg it over carnivore-infested territory to find her.

KONG 1933 had no such delving into characterization, and KONG 2005’s non-efx exposition might be construed as unnecessary in a “blockbuster spectacle” film – but diving into special effects flummery immediately would serve to diminish the “story” which Jackson takes the time to reverently improve upon. For those who snidely question why KONG 2005 takes 187 minutes to spool a tale originally only 104, we must surely question their apprehension of “plausible backstory.” We see how far they are willing to stretch their suspension of disbelief in the original – with specious backstory and performances so camp you could hold a three-ring circus under it – and surmise that they only support its primacy out of misplaced loyalty. KONG 2005 suffers from “length” only in the minds of those short-attention-span critics whose idea of proper film length is denoted by Big Studio Decree pertaining to crowd attendance, shorter films meaning more screenings, meaning more income; but more so denoted by their spongy posteriors jonesing for a Raisinets-and-plastic-pizza fix after two hours of thankful existence sans junk food. Absolutely zero connection with inherent quality or visceral, wet-panted enjoyment of a film.

Were the original, naïve storyline remade note for note, the same critics would bury Jackson for those reasons. As forewarned, you just can’t please the Purists – or the spongy posteriors…

KONG 2005 is not overlong. It is under-appreciated.

Once upon Skull Island, the movie ratchets into the stratosphere, in sequences where Jackson has no equal, as his creative cameraplay swoops through time-blasted village constructs and lush landscapes tantalizing with vestiges of ancient ruins. Bringing his masterful LORD OF THE RINGS wizardry to bear on these stunning tableaus and ancient designs, we realize that, due to his pedigree, Jackson is the only person who could have remade KING KONG with any semblance of majestic authenticity.

And then – the sauropod stampede… where Lord Peter Jackson illustrates quite definitively that Bigger is, in fact, Better.

Reality. It’s gonna kick your CGI ass.

Taking his cue from the original’s biologically-incorrect carnivorous sauropod chasing sailors while roaring like an ocelot, Jackson gives us a herd of stampeding sauropods in an astounding pursuit that sees raptors attacking and humans dodging the elephantine legs of the beasts during the stampede – a sequence that needs to be seen to be believed, even if just to view the level of unbridled insanity that the state of computer graphic technology has attained.

In fact, the whole Skull Island interlude is so rife with arterially-bursting CGI that “breathtaking” or “awe-inspiring” are not only understatements, they are sins against humanity. There are words yet to be invented for this bombalicious middle section of KONG 2005 – and our children will be speaking them, wearing their underpants over their heads – or whatever passes for fashion in those far-forward days.

Peter Jackson is George Lucas with a soul. Not having to rely on Lucas’ ILM studios, helming his own company of effects madmen (WETA Digital), Jackson shows George how to do “More is More” without losing sight of the human protagonists at the heart of his tale. A perfect example being the tyrannosaur attack…

…Where everything gets ten times trickier for Jackson and Co. – for in the original movie, the battle between Kong and the t-rex was an effects stunt for the sake of effects (oooh! like no one in the black and white era ever made that lowbrow call), but now, not only is the tyrannosaur battle chair-clutchingly mind-careening, this event is the seal on Darrow and Kong’s “relationship.” The major thematic element of KONG 1933 – the vaunted Beauty and Beast entanglement – was seemingly written in the press junkets, rather than into the movie itself; at the tyrannosaur attack of 1933, Kong had not yet displayed any particular proclivity towards his captive, except for ferrying her about like the spoiled brat she was. Why then, did he risk his life battling a t-rex for her? With 1930s anthropocentrism prevailing, it was assumed that simply because Darrow is Human, she should unquestionably be defended – but to Kong, she was nothing more than a plush toy with an annoying squeal. By 2005’s t-rex battle, Kong has at least invested some emotion in Darrow (albeit as an intriguing and amusing plaything), thereby justifying some smidgeon of motivation to risk his life for her. Still, it’s a stretch that anyone would go the distance with three tyrannosaurs over a pet hamster…

“Ah, a woman wearing a pink nightie. My luck is changing…”

On the boat, Darrow broached the concept with Driscoll that the best way for a man to get the attention of a woman is to ignore her. After the t-rex battle, Kong actually plays this card with Darrow, who realizes that the only way she will survive is to ally herself with the King of this jungle, running after him in supplication. And for the first time in any Kong movie, a palpable connection is made between Darrow and the ape, as he whisks her onto his shoulder, Toomai style. (Film buffs, watch for the homage to the original battle, where Kong breaks the t-rex’s jaw and then toys with it.)

Wray never found any pity for the beast at all, opting to scream like a loon anytime it was near. In the 1976 remake, Jessica Lange (glazing through her role as if on the verge of full-throated orgasm), went a small way towards “loving” the ape with her entreaties to, “Pick me up so they won’t shoot you!” It has taken the talent of Jackson to give bodyheat to the “Beauty and the Beast” catchcry, with Watts volunteering herself to Kong. But don’t touch yourself just yet. This is not a love story – never has been, unless you take into account that “pet hamster” thingy. For what other kind of “love” could exist between a Homo sapiens and a Gorilla giganticus – not counting those types only found on illegal internet sites?

Nonetheless, Kong’s and Darrow’s attachment is so pronounced by the time Driscoll appears to “save” her – as she sleeps in Kong’s palm, having curled there of her own volition, after sharing the beauty of the sunset together – that it actually seems implausible that she would desert her ape captor, as her human savior seems oh-so-impotent compared to the masculinity of the beast; the first KONG movie where this doubt even crosses our minds, all other heroines tripping over their diaphanous gowns rushing into the arms of their man-heroes.

Now if only we could ignore the fact that Kong’s grasp should realistically crush over half her bones, or that her neck should have snapped a long time ago with him manhandling her like a doll, we’d be in that delusional pink that the original’s supporters seemingly wallow in.

“This is what happens when you have two working arms, Rexy!”

In the movie’s only weak sequence, Kong is captured by Denham and the boat crew (- after battling three tyrannosaurs? I don’t think so!). At this point in the original film, Denham (Robert Armstrong) melodramatically bellows, “We’re millionaires, boys! I’ll share it with all of you!” in a ludicrous stentorian swish. Jackson’s team have re-defined Denham – the fanatic movie director so bent on giving the public something they’ve never seen that he will go to any lengths to achieve it – by making Jack Black repeatedly promise hollowly, whenever a crew member gets killed, “We’ll finish the movie – and we’ll donate the proceeds to his wife and kids!” so that when Kong is captured and Black mimics Armstrong’s stagey effeteness, it is now played for what it really should have been – a running gag on his insincerity. Black is playing a heartless man who doesn’t know he’s heartless. Armstrong was playing a carnival barker – with a swish to die for.

If Jackson gave Kong limbs, Andy Serkis breathed life into them. Doing double-duty in this film – as the eponymous ape, and as Lumpy, the cook, Serkis’ effectiveness as Kong – with over 100 sensors attached to his face for motion capture of the subtlest expressions – is wondrously demonstrated when Kong faces off against the last t-rex standing, with Darrow at his feet protectively. Glancing down from Darrow, up to the t-rex alternatively, Kong’s eyes actually register caring to threat, caring to threat, as he looks back and forth! So how to capture that “cute” aspect of the 1933 Kong – whose innocence seemed to grow with his onscreen time – with Jackson’s realistic, battle-scarred silverback? Marvel at the poignant scene on Central Park’s frozen lake, where the displaced Kong finds himself with Darrow in a brief interlude, sliding over the ice with her, ecstatic that he has reunited with his pet hamster.

The reverie lasts no longer than it takes to wipe away a lone tear, as the tragic finale looms atop the Empire State Building, which Kong climbs, with Darrow as willing accomplice, in a misguided attempt to escape the madding crowd. By now, Jackson has stacked his deck with the message that the original film found so hard to convey – that Kong is not the most dangerous beast – humans are. As Darrow sorrowfully watches a final sunrise with her wild and crazy pal, she repeats once more, “Beautiful!” now referring not only to the pastel-palette horizon, but also to Kong, as a part of that natural world – inevitably cut down by a “civilized” world which could find no place for twenty-five hairy-bottomed, big-dumb-galoot feet of nature within its concrete heart.

The Arabian proverb that opened KONG 1933 is barely applicable to that flawed masterpiece, after witnessing the depth of emotion that infuses KONG 2005’s heart-breaking skyscraper flourish. The telling scene atop the Empire State is one of aching perfection: Kong and Darrow, in profile, with the cityscape in pastel dawn behind them, she sitting in his palm, gazing into each other’s eyes. All is silent. A clutch of biplanes suddenly drone from behind the building, across the background sky. Kong huffs. Darrow knows it is the end. “And lo, the Beast looked upon the face of beauty. And it stayed its hand from killing. And from that day, it was as one dead.”

Peter Jackson’s KING KONG incarnation has breathed life into the legend for at least another 70 years – until someone with as much vision, economic and technological clout as he, can re-vamp it to blow a future generation’s bollocks to the Cretaceous. Hopefully (new words having been invented), my grandson will be able to describe that new version with greater aplomb, with his Webster’s New Malafrabjous English Dictionary by his side, a copy of KONG 2075 in his holo-DVD, and his underpants over his head.

END