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Review: The Sopranos: Season 5

About a year or so ago, I stopped watching the Sopranos about midway through the 4th season. It was kind of starting to slow down. Now don't get me wrong, it was still prime stuff as far as TV was concerned but from prior seasons it was kind of losing its grip on me. So I popped in the final disc of Season 4 and finished it up. It ended with a cliffhanger of course, and I was immediately stricken with withdrawals. So a friend gave me the season 5 discs and off I went. I watched the entire 5th season in one weekend. That's how glued I was to this thing again. "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."

So with Season 5 a bunch of new mobsters are released from the joint including Robert Loggia and Steve Buscemi. They all try to reintegrate themselves into the gangster lifestyle, some with varying degrees of success. Since this is essentially like reviewing a 13 hour movie, I'm gonna speed through this. The newbies cause Tony all sorts of new issues, and his cousin, Buscemi's issues ultimately play out till the season finale. Tony and his wife separate in this season and sample the single life only to find that because of the family business they can't really do anything but stay together by seasons end. Its all very sad really and I must say that this season is the by far the darkest. Tony's life is fractured to the point of almost disrepair. The series really does not pull many punches this time out. Tough decisions are made and all though Tony tries to be a nicer person about it, he knows that in the end he must resort to his old ways. Change is tough, and especially when your family's life depends on it. The series has become quite an epic tragedy. Watching it all at once, I felt like I had just finished a very satisfying novel.

Creator David Chase got his second wind this season. And from my perspective it was quite a page turner. I was hooked. I know season 6 and 7 are several years away, but I can't wait. I'm having withdrawals already. But I am ready for something a little lighter after that 13 hour marathon. After all is said and done with The Sopranos, creator David Chase will have created one of the most genius and innovative series to ever grace the screen. Its epic in nature and hopefully can continue for many years to come.

REVIEW: Wong Kar Wai's 2046

I am obliterated today. Not completely, but really close. I will admit to have been in a creative funk as of late. But my Jedi master has brought me back. Amy and I went to the Angelika yesterday and saw Wong Kar Wai’s new movie 2046. I first caught the Wong Kar wai train in college, when I would haunt the local Asian video stores in Arlington looking for some inspiration. I found this movie called Chungking Express and was captivated. Next were Days of Being Wild, As Tears Go By, Ashes of Time, and then the Chungking follow-up Fallen Angels. My good friend and fellow filmmaker Shawn Kelly and I were addicts. We studied him like a textbook, aimlessly trying to imitate him in our own short films with little success. Time passed and a few new Kar wai films would come out. In 2001, In the Mood for Love came out and at first it kind of scared me. It was not anything at all like the previous fast paced stuff he had produced in the past. It was more mature and focused. Instead of fast it dripped slowly over you like looking at a painting in a gallery. And after several viewings I grew to appreciate this new style more and more. Amy even had the poster for it framed for me in this awesome brown frame.

Yesterday at 4:45 I was sucked into the universe yet again with his latest opus, 2046. This is a sequel to In the Mood For Love which follows the Tony Leung character 3 or 4 years after his affair with Maggie Cheung. He is a sci-fi writer now writing a novel called 2046 about a train in the future that you board if you are looking for past memories. The movie shifts through time and space beautifully between the reality of the 60’s and Leung’s characters in a fictional 2046. He has become a womanizer, a man of many lovers but no one love. In his heart he still pines for Maggie from In the Mood For Love and cannot commit to anyone he encounters. Zhang Ziyi, Faye Wong are his main interests, while Gong Li and Carina Lau come into play much later. The movie also serves a sequel of sorts to Days of Being Wild too. The character of LuLu that Carina Lau plays is from Days. In watching it you also get the feeling that by pairing Faye Wong and Tony Leung together again, it is also a kind of Chungking Express reunion too. In fact one shot of Fay Wong looking into the glass says volumes about that relationship. This film really serves as a kind of wrapup of all his previous movies. A kind of 'thank you' to his own characters.

I can’t really put into words what this movie does to me. It inspires for sure as a filmmaker. As a lover of photography it moves me. As a storyteller it challenges me. It’s not a three-act structure. It’s a stew of interplay between desperate characters set against a backdrop of dirty yet glorious desperation. Christopher Doyle’s photography here is as exquisite as anything the Aussie has ever put on celluloid. As much as I love the digital revolution in filmmaking, you cannot make this film on HD. I defy Rodriguez or Lucas to make any statement otherwise. This is a film.

I’ve had the DVD for this film for half a year and yet I held out for a theatrical showing because of my respect for Wong Kar wai. I was not disappointed. Is this the greatest story ever told? No absolutely not. But that’s not what this about. This is about losing yourself in a sea of emotion and imagery. I thought it should have ended about 20 minutes earlier, where it could have ended on a touching somber note, but it kept rolling. Other than that about halfway into this movie I was lost in it. Unable to get out. It took me in. This was something I needed inside creatively. It fed me, it owned me for 2 hours. Time is what Wong Kar wai makes movies about. And for those 2 hours time was insignificant to me. I could have stayed on that train for days not knowing when I was coming back or even caring. I liken kar wai to filmmakers like Peter Greenaway. They have evolved film to an art form. Filmmaking as an art form has not evolved much since its inception other than technically. Wong Kar Wai shows you what can be done with this art form, and let us not forget that that is what it is.

DVD Review: Incident at Loch Ness

Well I am on the mend and getting back on my feet. Amy and I went to Ft. Worth's gallery night last night. I guess we went too early, cause the highlight of the trip was hot dog and a custard at Curleys on Camp Bowie. In the meantime, I got up early and popped this DVD in.... This was a lot of fun. Hollywood screenwriter Zak Penn directed this mocumentary about legendary director Werner Herzog making a documentary about the Loch Ness Monster. Zak plays himself along with other crew members in the mocumentary. This is a hilarious take on Herzog and making a documentary. Herzog really makes fun of himself here, much like Larry David does on Curb Your enthusiasm. The documentary is going along fine until Herzog begins to clash with Penn and his Hollywood crew. Penn wants to make one movie while Herzog pines to make another. Things all come to a head (no pun intended) when Nellie actually shows up and eats some members of the crew. Herzog keeps shooting until the boat goes down much like in his own "Fitzcarraldo". A great send up and I would highly recommend this to fans of mocumentaries and fans of Herzog.

Thoughts on Oliver Stone's Alexander

This was really hard to get through. I started it at about 1230pm, and got through with it at 5:30. Not Stone's most focused work. Adventurous ideas and canvas he is working with, but it didn't go far enough in one direction or the other. I'll have to go back and read my history books again but when did Alexander have an Irish accent? Maybe instead of Zeus his father was in fact the Lucky Charms God. This was a tall hill to climb as a viewer and I did listen to Stone's commentary toward the end of the film, and it sounds like he really respected what Alexander accomplished in his short 33 year life, but while watching the film you don't really ever feel any compassion for him or a dislike for that matter. Maybe Stone sees himself in Alexander and somehow thought it would be cool to make a movie about a tyrant who really cares about the people at the end of the day. Guess we will never know. I didn't think it was as bad as people said, just unfocused. I loved the big pageantry scenes though, and loved the score by Vangelis. Good gory battles too.

My Own Private Film Festival

I can't afford to go to the fancy film fests this year or any other for that matter. The last one nearly killed me! However I am able to throw my own. I was a bit under the weather this week, and I am still on the mend. So I decided to start going through "the Stack" which collects dust on my DVD rack. I had a wide assortment of films Mon-Thursday to plug through. So here come the mini reviews...

REVIEW: The Eye 2
Directed by The Pang Brothers


I liked elements of the original film, "The Eye" by Danny and Oxide Pang. It was creepy and right in the middle of the whole Asian Horror fad that is now fading away. So I took a chance on Part 2 knowing that the original directors were back. This is not a sequel so much, but a spin-off. The only returning elements are the Ghosts from part one. This movie has nothing to do with eyes whatsoever. Its about babies. Its about karma and Chinese spirits coming back to haunt a suicidal pregnant woman played by Qi Shu. The movie moves along nicely but slows in the end and then crashes pretty hard when it doesn't know when to end. The effects are very creepy, or I should I say the ghosts are very creepy. I've noticed something about the Pang Bros that fascinates me. They like to see people fall or get hit really hard by cars. Its CGI, but its starting to look more real than not these days. So I would recommend it if you are looking for the ghosts from The Eye or if you like Qi Shu from The Transporter. Otherwise its another day in the Asian horror neighborhood.

REVIEW: The Brown Bunny
Directed by Vincent Gallo


Man, I love Gallo's first movie, Buffalo 66. Love it to death. Will watch it any day any time. I will span time with it. The Brown Bunny comes with much talk. And sorry to say, I hated this movie as much as I loved Buffalo 66. I thought maybe I was losing my indie touch by missing the boat on this one, but no I didn't. I even went as far to as to read some reviews of it on IMDB. I don't get it. I like art films but this was just utterly boring and then all of a sudden at then end of 90 minutes he decides to tell the story in some expository dialog after getting the infamous real blow job from Chloe Sevigny. I love slow moving stream of conscious movies, but this is Gallo getting a big head after Buffalo 66. Sevigny shows up at the very end of the movie folks, she's not even in the first 80 minutes. Gallo has talent, but anyone could have made this in their sleep. He plays the same character as he did in Buffalo 66 more or less. He just talks less. There are endless scenes of just his face, or just shots of the road going on forever. I got it, that he is a character in pain searching for a connection with someone. And I understand that he gets a blowjob from the one person he loves at the end, and that shows us that this emotionless act of sex is the ultimate analogy of this man's state of being. WHOOPIDEEFUCKING DOO. This film sux it. And so does Chloe Sevigny.

REVIEW: Joint Security Area
Directed by Chan-wook Park


Really interesting film from the genius that gave us Old Boy last year. I liked this movie, as hard as tried to not really care about the North/South Korean issues while the effects of Hurricane Katrina looms daily. In the DMZ separating North and South Korea, two North Korean soldiers have been shot to death, by a South Korean soldier. But the 11 bullets found in the bodies, together with the 5 remaining bullets in the assassin's magazine clip, amount to 16 bullets for a gun that should normally hold 15 bullets. The investigating Swiss/Swedish team from the neutral countries overseeing the DMZ suspects that another, unknown party was involved - all of which points to some sort of cover up. The truth is much simpler and much more tragic. There is a real magic about the way this story unfolds. It is very slow and tedious, but the more you get sucked into it, you see how crime scenes can never really give you the ultimate truth about any situation. And it was nice to learn about this outpost on the North/South Korean border. The story acts as a nice analogy for the problems between the two sides. I was more interested in that aspect towards the end, but then things turn to pull you back into the human part of the story.

REVIEW: The Final Cut
Directed by Omar Naim

I popped this disc in with high hopes. The movie was kinda about what I do for a living every day. And as it wore on my hopes were dashed. The futuristic story concerns implants that are put inside you when you are born that records every single second of your life. When you die a "cutter" takes all the footage and edits down to about 10 minutes to show at your funeral called a "rememory". Robin Williams plays Alan Hackman (how original) the best cutter in the biz. His editing system called The Guillotine is his life. He is addicted to living out others peoples lives through there eyes rather than living his own. It starts out very interesting, then the plot turns stale and becomes very generic and predictable. It was a great concept that could have gone so many interesting ways, but instead goes formula. So watch the first 3 minutes and be a good cutter and cut the rest out.

REVIEW: Last Life in the Universe
Directed by Pen-Ek Ratanaruang


Great movie. This is what Brown Bunny was trying to do. Its slow, yet very focused and honest. A mysterious, obsessive-compulsive, suicidal Japanese man living in Bangkok, Thailand, is thrown together with a Thai woman through a tragic chain of events. The woman is everything he is not. He is a neat freak who keeps his dishes washed and his books neatly stacked and categorized. She dresses like a slob, smokes pot and never picks anything up. It's a match that somehow works. It's photographed by uber genius Chris Doyle of Wong Kar-wei world. This movie has a simple beauty to it. Much like say Chungking Express but without the wacky camera angles. Its more Japanese in style I guess. Of all the movies I saw in this batch Last Life is the winner. Oh and watch out for a small part by director Takashi Miike!

New Superman Returns pic!!!

Too busy to rant today, stuck in an all dayer edit session with a client. But check out this sweet new pic from Superman Returns in the Fortress of Solitude. Man can June 30th, 2006 get here any faster. Please!!!!! Director Bryan Singer said the budget is already over 250 million, and they are not even shooting on film, its all shot on HD. That will easily make it the biggest budget HD movie of all time. I'm ready for this one. Here is a new Newsweek article on the production of "Superman Returns". Click here

Finley 4 Spurs

"In the hours after the Mavericks were eliminated by Phoenix, when he was too tired and discouraged to return to his locker, Michael Finley sat in a restricted corner of American Airlines Center and commiserated with owner Mark Cuban. "We're in this together," Cuban assured Finley. "We'll stick it out together." Three months later, Finley shook hands with San Antonio's Gregg Popovich and held up his No. 4 jersey for a photo op as the newest member of the Spurs."- Dallas Morning News