Casablanca

Directed by: Michael Curtiz

Written by: Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch (screenplay); Murray Burnett, Joan Allison (play)









Roger Ebert's Great Movies #1

There's not a whole lot I can say about Casablanca that I haven't already said to most of the people who would be reading this.

I love this movie. Everything about it is great. Everything.

I can't remember how many times I've seen this movie, but it's easily one of my favorites

I first saw it and immediately fell in love with it in my Senior year of high school. My dad and I were wandering around the hometown Blockbuster (back when there actually were Blockbuster video stores around), and they had a display up of the most recent "AFI Top 100 Movies" with most of them underneath. Citizen Kane was already out, so we grabbed #2 - Casablanca - and headed home. At that time and at that age, I shouldn't have been interested in this film. But from the introduction after the opening credits, I was hooked. The next day, I watched it again before we returned it.

Not long after, dying to form my own unique identity in a college world filled with "unique identities," I bought my own copy of the film on DVD. I then proceeded to watch it and all the special features included. Whenever people tried to talk about movies to show off their intellectual and artistic personalities, my go-to reference was Casablanca. I knew it backwards and forwards and everything I could about it's history. (Sadly, most of what I once knew is now reduced to a few bits of trivia - I need to watch those special features again.) It was old. It was cool. And, always to my dismay, it was mostly unwatched by people I knew. Of course, to resolve that issue, I forced all my friends (and many people who were not my friends) to watch it.

Now, Casablanca has been a part of my life for longer than it wasn't. I've watched it with my friends. I've watched it with students. I've watched it with my family. I've watched it with my wife (though she might add "too many times"). I'm not afraid to admit, I've watched it by myself.

Each time I watch it, I catch something new. Or I understand a new nuance that I didn't catch before. Or I just have a new insight.

For example, when watching it with my students, it finally came to me exactly how complex Rick's plan at the end had to be. It involved him lying to everyone. It even involved lying and saying that Elsa was lying when she said she was in love with him. At the end, he manages to be a step ahead of everyone else in understanding what was at stake and what needed to be done. He has planned for every possible contingency, and everything he's said and done in the past few scenes - both the casual encounters and the big moments - have been to carefully calculated to make sure his plan is executed flawlessly.

The next time I watched it, I realized the complexity of Rick's plan should have been evident from the start. The moment we first see him, he's playing chess - a notoriously complex game of maneuvering and counter-maneuvering, in which the most successful players are able to see and plan several moves ahead of their opponents. Its a

One Fast Move or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur

Directed by: Curt Worden











Curt Worden's documentary creatively explores the period of Jack Kerouac's life leading up to and during his writing of Big Sur.

The film has a nice mix of narration (drawn from Kerouac's original novel), first-person accounts from those who knew Kerouac at the time, and commentary from artists and musicians inspired by the novelist.

One thing I appreciated was that, although there is a bit of hero-worship, the film itself didn't feel like it was forcing anything. It felt casual, relaxed. It felt like a bunch of friends chatting about the good ol' days.

I was especially impressed with the use of vintage photos and film from the time period mixed with contemporary footage of the same places (and, in some cases, people). It was neat to see the exact locations visited and described in the novel.

Familiarity with the book is highly recommended before watching this, but it can be enjoyed without a total line-by-line memory of the book. (I haven't read it in nearly fifteen years, so I only had a vague sketch of the text in my mind.)

Interstellar

Directed by: Christopher Nolan

Written by: Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan









A lot of digital ink has already been spilled over this movie, so I'll keep my review fairly short.

I didn't want to like it, and I'll probably spend most of my time here pulling apart the things I didn't like. That being said, I actually liked this movie despite myself.

Things I didn't like.
-- It was too long. It was too short. Either way, it wasn't the right length. At nearly three hours, it definitely tested my patience. But there was so much in the movie that didn't feel developed enough (such as when Topher Grace's character showed up out of nowhere). Each of the three acts - Earth, Travel, Tesseract - could have been a separate movie in-and-of-itself.
--It took itself so darn seriously. I could feel the science-y pretentiousness oozing out of several scenes. For a science-fiction movie, it didn't have enough fun. (Exception: the robots - see below.) I'm not saying it needed to be "campy," but it might have benefited from someone telling the Nolan brothers to get over themselves.

Things I liked.
--The robots were the most unique and original element of the film. Fascinating design and execution. Just when you think there's no new ideas about robots in science fiction, along comes CASE and TARS.
--The imagery and cinematography were top of the line. Each shot was gorgeous.
--Matt Damon was an genuine surprise to me. I'd managed to avoid all spoilers, so I was shocked when he showed up. I was even more shocked when his character started to develop, but I'll save that for another time.

Jonathan and Christopher Nolan deserve credit for developing an original science fiction movie (aside from a few nods to "2001" here and a wink at "Alien" there). Without trying to sound like a cranky old man, I feel that sci-fi movies tend to be sequels, rip-offs, re-boots, or just plain copy-cats of prior work. In most cases, the prior work was better, and only in rare cases - the recent "Planet of the Apes" films jump to mind - are the newer works anywhere in the same league as the originals. "Interstellar" manages to be new while maintaining the feel of a classic.

Another sign of quality in "Interstellar's" favor is that I keep coming back to it in my thoughts and conversation. I keep wanting to discuss it and dissect it (both the good and the bad) and, who knows - maybe I'll watch it again.

Take Shelter

Written and Directed by Jeff Nichols











This movie has a lot of what I look for in a movie. Strong cast. Strong script. Strong cinematography. It's subtle and beautiful and manages to excel without needing to go over-the-top.

The movie has a beautiful, unclear ending - not necessarily ambiguous, but certainly unresolved. I appreciate that that writer/director Nichols didn't bother to spell it all out. We're left with something to talk about. The ending alone makes the movie worth watching, but the rest of it is so well executed that it doesn't feel like a "twist" or a "gimmick." It's just left there to be considered.

Most of what I've read about "Take Shelter" online focuses on Michael Shannon's performance. And he, indeed, shines. He is haunting and powerful and real at a level rarely achieved in acting. He steals the show, no doubt about it.

But I also believe Jessica Chastain deserves significant credit as well. Her stability serves as a counterpoint to Shannon's instability. Like Shannon, she manages to be "real" without resorting to "gritty." You feel for her.

I'd love to have a discussion on what the movie means, if anything. And I love the fact that the movie allows so much to be discussed. I think that too often writers and directors are afraid to leave anything ambiguous or open ended. Jeff Nichols does not have that problem, and I think him for it.

Much Ado About Nothing

Directed by: Joss Whedon

Written by: William Shakespeare (play); Joss Whedon (screenplay)










It's tough to do a modernized version of Shakespeare. Really tough. Most fall flat (see Ethan Hawke's "Hamlet") while those that don't totally fail are forced to rely on stylistic gimmicks (Baz Lurhrmann). Most don't even try to really modernize, but try exotic time periods and locations (Sir Kenneth Branagh).

Joss Whedon's "Much Ado About Nothing" succeeds. It's good.

I'm not sure what else to say except that Whedon's adaptation feels natural and organic. It doesn't go over-the-top. The choice to shoot in black-and-white film is a bit of a stretch at first, but quickly is forgotten and helps with the simple, straight-forward feel of the movie.

What surprised me most was the way the actors, especially character actors such as Nathan Fillion, manage to take total control of the Shakespearean language and make it sound totally natural. None of the conversations felt forced or over-wrought.

To be honest, it's been a long time (ten years or more) since I've read the original Shakespeare, so it's tough for me to judge the how much of the source material was scratched and molded to fit Whedon's vision. In any case, it worked.

They Came Together

Directed by: David Wain

Written by: David Wain and Michael Showalter










I tried to enjoy this movie. I really tried. The movie had a lot of things that I, theoretically, should have enjoyed. And yet, it was almost physically painful to watch this movie from beginning to end.

At multiple points, my wife and I simply looked at each other and said some variation of, "This is stupid."

I'll boil it down: the biggest problem is that the film doesn't know what it wants to be. It tries to spoof the cliche romantic comedy genre, but doesn't have enough bite or satire. It seems like it tries (maybe?) to make the characters likable, but they also exist as caricatures and, as such, lack any real humanity. Some jokes are parody, some are slapstick, and some seem like they were ripped from "Family Guy." In any case, none of these features belong together.

It felt, very simply, like a bunch of funny people got together and decided that it would be really funny to make a movie on this topic. And then they did, with complete impunity from editing or criticism. "They Came Together" would have been much better if boiled down to an extended SNL sketch, but didn't have enough substance to fill an entire movie.

His Girl Friday

Directed by: Howard Hawks

Written by: Charles Lederer, Ben Hecht, Charles MacArthur, and Morrie Ryskind









I'll try to keep my review here brief. For years, I'd had this movie on my radar for a long time, mainly due to the presence of Cary Grant, but had never gotten around to sitting and watching it.

As the script was based on a play, most of the film focuses on the dialogue between characters to develop the plot, with few moments of action and few changes of scene. Without this information up front, I struggled with the film's pace while I was watching it. It's a little long, and some scenes felt unnecessarily long.

That being said, the movie is quite enjoyable. The quick dialogue between Grant and Russell is top-of-the-line. The movie possesses an excellent balance of comedy (usually in the form of irony) and simple action/drama to keep things moving forward.

I didn't really know what I was getting into with this film, but I'm glad I finally got around to seeing it.