Ahhhhhhhhhh why is it Monday? The weather's getting warmer, the college kids are preparing for Spring Break, and I want a looong vacation. Well, I guess the next few weeks will be eventful enough that it will kind of be like vacation. But, not really. My parents and brother come to LA for a visit this coming Friday, which is nice, but I'll probably need a vacation to recover from that. And the parents coming means that I must designate at least one day this week to clean my apartment. I also need to make sure my apartment is well stocked with many necessities as my brother will be staying with me. I also need to figure out how many, if any, days I'm taking off from work so I can spend even more quality time with the fam.
This past weekend though was a lot of fun - I tried to keep busy knowing that next weekend will be filled with day-trips and inspections of my apartment, car, wardrobe, finances, health, and so on (sigh ...). Friday I met up with some current and former NBC pages at The Roxy to see a concert by a band fronted by, you guessed it, an NBC page. Saturday I met up with my great aunt and uncle in Brentwood for some dinner, and then was joined by L-Squared for a showing of one of my most anticipated movies of the last few months - Black Snake Moan, which I'll get to in a minute. Finally, Sunday me and the G-Man braved the uncharted waters of a Purim party put on a by a group called J-Connect, having little idea what we'd be getting ourselves into. Luckily, the party was a lot of fun, and I ran into some familiar faces and met some new people as well, and even ate a humentashen or two.
- Anyways, apparently Black Snake Moan kind of bombed at the box office, which I was somewhat surprised about. I didn't think it'd do huge numbers or anything, but at least to me, everything about this movie screamed COOL. Samuel L Jackson - one bad mutha. Christina Ricci - hello, Wednesday Addams? Craig Brewer, the mastermind of Hustle and Flow. I mean, come on. I guess most Americans are too lame to see the greatness right there, and too busy seeing WILD HOGS. God help us all. I think I need to watch IDIOCRACY again ...
BLACK SNAKE MOAN Review:
Let me start with this: this is by no means a perfect movie, and it undoubtedly has its share of flaws. But even so, and even though for that reason I can't give it a flat-out "A," I can still feel confident in calling it one of my personal favorite movies so far of 2007. This is a movie that dares to be different, that doesn't care if it offends or confuses, and for that reason, come next year, it will likely not be on anyone's radar come Oscar Awards 2008. This is one of those movies, however, that will undoubtedly go down in a different sort of Hall of Fame, the one that consists of REAL movies, the kind that make young guys want to go out and make movies, the kind that bred people like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez who have that innate appreciation for the taboo, the bizarre, the provocative. Yep, we have Grindhouse on its way to theaters soon, but for a small taste of downhome and dirty grindhouse cinema, look no further than Black Snake Moan. Some will hate it, many will avoid it, but for that percentage of the movie-going population that appreciates the oddball sensibilities of a movie like this, well, Black Snake Moan is a must-see cult-favorite in the making.
To try to sum up the movie's over-the-top trappings - Black Snake Moan tells the tale of a past-his-prime Bluesman named Lazarus (Jackson), who is left by his wife for his younger brother, and finds himself alone on an isolated farm, going into town only occasionally to sell his crops. Meanwhile, Rae (Ricci) is a girl with issues, finding solace only in her oddball relationship with a naive young guy plagued by panic attacks. When her boyfriend ships out to the army, Rae loses her one touchpoint to sanity, and goes on a wild bender of sex and drugs, falling in with all manner of abusive characters. Finally, one particularly shady guy beats her up and leaves her bloodied body on a deserted road, where she is found by Lazarus. Lazarus takes her in and tries to look after her, but Rae is like a feral animal, clawing, scraping, and repeatedly offering up her body to anyone who falls within earshot. Baffled to his wit's end by this girl, Lazarus see's no other option but to chain her up to his radiator, and through the power of prayer, music, and preaching, force some sense into her. And this begins this lurid story of southern justice ... Black Snake Moan, named for a throbbing, moaning blues song - as blues is the movie and the movie is the blues.
First of all, you have Craig Brewer. With Hustle & Flow, Brewer created a movie that set a new standard for the hip-hop rags to riches genre because the entire movie pulsated with the spirit of the music. Here, Brewer accomplishes a similar feat, creating a movie that is in many ways an ode to The Blues as much as Hustle was an ode to Hip Hop music. From the opening ruminaitons on the nature of The Blues, Brewer creates a hot, sweaty, dirty atmosphere for his film that completely envelops you. This isn't our reality, let's be clear on that - this is the stylized world of Blues, built on tall tales and curses and sad, screwed-up characters. And what characters we have here ...
This is, probably, Samuel L. Jackson's best role since Pulp Fiction. It's the first starring role he's had in a long time where I was completely absorbed in THE CHARACTER, and didn't simply feel like I was watching Sam Jackson playing a version of himself. Sure, there is plenty of the trademark Jackson badassness, and few actors are able to utter a curse word with the same flippant relish of Samuel L, and we get some classic moments of that here. But this isn't a one-dimensional character, this is a far cry from Snakes on a Plane. This is a complex, tortured, bluesman - a guy who you're still trying to figure out as the movie wraps up, who you spend the entire movie trying to decipher and who constantly surprises you. This is Samuel L. Jackson with his working boots on - the polar opposite of his occasional cash-the-check-and-run roles. At the same time, this is him at his badass best. Even the scenes of Jackson playing the blues thunder with an intensity that I wasn't expecting. Great stuff from Jackson - a reminder that he really can be The Man when the role is right.
And man, Christina Ricci. Probably one of the more underrated actresses of the last several years, you have to admire her for sticking to roles that fall under the radar, away from the mainstream, and are always, always provocative. But man, you ain't seen nothing yet. This is Christina Ricci redefining the term "fearless acting." I mean, how many other actresses could pull off playing a crazed, tortured nymphomaniac who writhes like the girl in The Excorcist whenever her anxiety manifests as rabid sexuality? Ricci owns this movie. She goes toe to toe with Jackson to the point where we're actually scared for HIM even though she's the one chained to the radiator. Christina Ricci goes balls to the wall in this movie, somehow creating a character who is a psycho-nympho, a redneck pinup, and a sympathetic tortured soul all rolled into one.
The rest of the supporting cast does a great job as well. Justin Timberlake is good here for what his role is - he is supposed to be a kind of meek, in-over-his-head guy, and he pulls that off well. Everyone else does a good job and adds to Craig Brewer's down-home vision of southern gothic exploitation. The funny thing about this movie, however, is that some may be surprised at how it mixes quasi-exploitation with genuine pathos and emotion. It's like ... you know how the real versions of the Grimm Fairy Tales are in actuality very dark, violent, and disturbing? Well this is like the Grimm version of some "tall tale" you heard as a kid, Johnny Appleseed or Paul Bunyan or whatever. A distinctly American tale, Black Snake Moan reminded me a lot of Garth Ennis' PREACHER in how it mixed the profane and grotesque with a real sentimentality to create a timeless American story. Even the movie's comic-book like poster seems to pay homage to those old, forbidden EC stories that were simultaneously whacked-out exploitation and all-American morality plays.
Now, my one complaint here is that I couldn't help but feel at movie's end that SOMETHING was missing. Something about this movie just feels unexplored, incomplete, and it's hard to put my finger on what, exactly, that something is. I guess that, as far as this movie goes into the realm of lurid and provocative, it seems to stop a bit short of following its strange story to its logical extremities, instead settling for a sanitized version of events that, in the end, doesn't quite add up. I mean, one of the essential conflicts here is with Lazarus - on one hand, he's a chaste presence in the movie, acting as both a foil and a father figure to Christina Ricci's Rae. And yet, here is the guy whose wife has left him, acting as a mentor and father figure, never REALLY succumbing to Rae's come-ons or crazed sexuality ... and YET ... there he is, giving her a full-body naked spongebath. A chaste spongebath, sure, (I think?), but still - despite how clearly screwed-up and complex these characters are, I still didn't quite feel like the movie went all the way in explaining the essential contradiction of Lazarus as both a wild bluesman and a bible-thumping reformer.
Nonetheless, Black Snake Moan is filled with so many great scenes, quotable lines, and evocative imagery that it quickly won me over and never let up. As soon as the title sequence ended on a shot of waifish, devil-may-care Rae walking in traffic down a dirty road, giving the finger to the mac truck honking at her from behind, I knew that this was going to be a movie to remember. This was a movie with a unique artistic vision, an awesome, style, and two great performances from two actors who you can't help but admire. Please, go see this movie, and prove that there is room today for director's like Craig Brewer, actors like Christina Ricci, and movies like Black Snake Moan that dare to give the finger to convention and not hold back.
My Grade: A-
- I cannot wait for THE 300 this weekend! If my brother is up for it after flying in from CT, this Friday shall be an epic night of CGI-enhanced, Frank Miller-inspired brutality!
- TMNT looks kinda badass as well. I can't wait to spend a day filled with old cartoons and nostalgia, then hop down to the theater and scream Cowabunga!
- Finally, it warms my grizzled heart to see The Simpsons Movie put out a trailer that actually looks great, is funny, and legit gets me pumped for the film. Seeing the trailer in a packed theater last weekend before Reno 9-11, and hearing people thrill, laugh, cheer for The Simpsons like it was 1995 seriously gave me chills. Please let this be good!
TV STUFF:
- Speaking of THE SIMPSONS, last night's ep was a pretty good installment, especially relative to others this season. I give the show credit for doing some really cool stuff with its animation in the last several weeks, and man, this weeks' stylized, cross-hatched art as Bart told his friend's a ghost story was pretty awesome. And, there were a few decent jokes as well (lots of vintage Skinner - Chalmers humor for one thing), and a pretty well-written script that evoked some of the classic, Bart-centric episodes of the show's heyday. The musical numbers were not too bad either. Not much was done with the Cletus storyline though, and it didn't really add anything to the character as other supporting-charcter-centric episodes have done.
My Grade: B
- FAMILY GUY had a few laughs last night, but overall was just all over the place with a lot of really out-there randomness that didn't add much to the episode. It's just really sad to see the show's flash-cuts done so haphazardly, where it feels like every cutaway is just mining some leftover joke that the writer's threw into a pot to be retrieved as needed. Most of the cutaways now rarely feel clever, and either make a pop culture reference sans joke or just try to be as random as humanly possible for no good reason (last night's Moose Hitchhiker joke - wtf!). Also, the show seems to never tire of having a "Peter decides to adopt the ways of (insert cultural stereotype here)" plot. Enough already! This was yet another weak installment of what's been, by and large, and week season of a once-great show.
My Grade: C -
- How about FOX's latest attempt to preempt King of the Hill - THE WINNER. Man, I really wanted to like this show. The cast is pretty good, Rob Cordrry is funny ... but the obnoxious laugh track in this show is just HORRIBLE. EVERY other line of dialogue elicits belly-laughs and guffaws like you've never heard. I almost turned this show off in its first minute when the dad made some lame OJ Simpson joke, and the laugh tracke went ape$#@* (you see, the show is set in the 90's, so the dad is watching the White Bronco chase and yet, despite what we now know, he insists that OJ must be innocent! Even though he's not! Get it! GET IT?!?! Isn't that HILARIOUS?!?!). I somehow kept watching though and actually kind of grew to like the main character, a 32 year old loser and his 14 year old sidekick. It's just frustrating, since there's some talent here and it COULD have been a clever comedy, but the crappy writing and painful laughtrack reek of mediocrity.
My Grade: C
- Alright, back later with more, of course some 24, and that's for sho'. PEACE.
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