Finally! Film Babble Blog’s 2020 In Review

I know, I know – it’s April and I am only now getting around to look back at some of the most notable films of last year. Honestly, as 2020 was so compromised by the pandemic, and films were a lot fewer (many were delayed until this year); I decided against doing a ‘best of’ this time around. So I am going to do it differently as I’m not going to give the movies numbers in order to rank them. I’m going to just babble about a handful of titles, five to be exact, that stood out to me over this weird, sad year.

The last movie I saw on the big screen before the pandemic hit was Leigh Wannell’s THE INVISIBLE MAN, starring Elizabeth Moss. Sadly the theater I attended the film at, Six Forks Cinema, permanently closed not long ago. 

The film, which was originally supposed to be part of Universal’s Monsters Cinematic Universe (not to be confused with Legendary’s MonsterVerse or is it?), but after THE MUMMY flopped that franchise appears to be dead in the water. No matter, the film stands on its own largely due to the performance by Moss as a woman who is being stalked by an abusive ex (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) - a scientist who has discovered the formula for invisibility. This loose adaptation of H.G. Wells classic 1897 novel is a stylishly suspenseful treat that comes equipped with a number of genuine scares, and fiercely clever moments.

While under quarantine, I mostly caught up with TV series which I wrote about here, and watched older films, but I did catch some new releases like Christopher Nolan’s TENET. A new release Blu ray I should say. I almost braved the Covid 19 scare to see it at one of the few open theaters, but I chickened out and waited for home video. 

Nolan’s latest attempt at visionary filmmaking is certainly entertaining but I had difficulty understanding what I was watching. A great, gripping John David Washington, and Robert Pattinson, whose work keeps getting better, star as undercover CIA operatives travel backwards and forwards in time in order to prevent World War III. Got it? It’s hard to outright recommend as it’s so baffling, and purposely convoluted, but Nolan fans should dig it. I’ll give TENET this – it totally deserves its Oscar nomination for Best Production Design.

If I was posting a list with numbers, I probably would pick Aaron Sorkin’s THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7 for #1. This great historical drama features a well-chosen ensemble including Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Black Panther Bobby Seale, Sacha Baron Cohen as hippy (or yippie) activist Abbie Hoffman, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as prosecutor Richard Schultz, Frank Langella as Judge Julius Hoffman, Eddie Redmayne as Tom Hayden, Mark Rylance as defense attorney William Kunstler, and Michael Keaton as U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark. That barely scratches the surface of the actors involved as it’s a big-ass cast, and I don’t want it to take up the bulk of this paragraph. Sorkin’s screenplay may be his best yet. The dialogue is devoid of his weakness for cutesy wordplay, and each character is more compellingly drawn than some of his past endeavors, and I say that as a fan. If you don’t know anything about the Chicago 7, this is a recommended place to begin. I’ll be pulling for it to get some Oscar gold, which it should since it got six nominations including Best Picture.

Another fine film I enjoyed was Darius Marder’s SOUND OF METAL, which concerns a heavy metal drummer who has to cope with losing his hearing. The rightly Oscar-nominated Riz Ahmed portrays the deaf musician, who you really feel for as his life is emotionally upended, and he suffers through a stint at a rehab for the deaf run by a Vietnam vet (Paul Raci). Ahmed does warm up to his fellow residents, but his girlfriend (Olivia Cooke) disappears from his life. The authentic feeling movie is outfitted with a stirring sound mix that effectively depicts the sounds of deafness, which may seem impossible, but Marder and crew pull it off and received an Oscar nomination for their efforts (like TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7, SOUND OF METAL scored six well-deserved noms). The last bit and the ending may be rushed, but this film’s gritty realness, and lack of pretension make it a major must see.

Paul Greengrass’ NEWS OF THE WORLD is maybe the most stone-cold entertaining of the five films in this round-up. Based on the 2016 novel by Paulette Jiles, this western, set in 1870 follows Tom Hanks as Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd, an ex-Civil War confederate soldier who makes his money by reading select newspapers to captive audiences as he travels through Texas. One day on a road through the woods, he comes across a 10-year old girl (Helena Zengell) who either goes by Johanna or Cicada hiding out in an overturned wagon. Before long the duo are saddled together as Hanks takes the girl, who identifies as a Kiowa Indian, on the long trek to her supposed home in Castroville, Texas.

They get into a rocky mountainside gun fight, encounter a massive dust storm, endure a devastating wagon accident, and have to figure out how to get away from a rag-tag army of renegades ruled by evil land baron Farley (Thomas Francis Murphy). Now these elements may sound like frontier clichés, but Director Greengrass handles the material confidently, never needing to reach into his catalogue of BOURNE-isms. Hanks’ Kidd is a familiar persona – the everyman that he’s honed for decades – but he inhabits the character with the likability we expect from the two-time Oscar winner. As Hanks’ travelling companion, Zengall is the real stand-out with her driven, naturalistic performance. I’m betting we’ll be seeing a lot of her in years to come. NEWS OF THE WORLD received four Oscar noms, but with its competition I’m thinking it might not win any of the categories. If it does score at least one Academy Award, I would bet on Dariusz Wolski for Best Cinematography as his landscape imagery is ginormously gorgeous.

As I usually have spillover on these Best of entries, Here’s some other films I enjoyed in 2020: Lee Isaac Chung’s MINARI, Regina King’s ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI…, Thomas Vinterberg’s ANOTHER ROUND, Kelly Reichardt’s FIRST COW, Kitty Green’s THE ASSISTANT (excellent Julia Garner performance), George C. Wolfe’s MA RAINEY’S BLACK BOTTOM, Chloé Zhao’s NOMADLAND, and Charlie Kaufman’s weird, unwieldy I’M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS.

Also these documentaries: Alexander Nanau’s COLLECTIVE, Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk’s ATHELETE A, Jeff Orlowski’s THE SOCIAL DILEMMA, Garrett Bradley’s TIME, Bryan Fogel’s THE DISSIDENT, Seth Porges and Chris Charles Scott III’s CLASS ACTION PARK, and the Spike Lee Joint, DAVID BYRNE’S AMERICAN UTOPIA, which is more of a concert film than a doc but they often reside in the same category.

Alright, so I finally tackled 2020 in review. With hope, I'll be back on my game next year.

More later...

THE DICTATOR: The Film Babble Blog Review

THE DICTATOR (Dir. Larry Charles, 2012)

In their newest film, Sacha Baron Cohen and director Larry Charles don’t push the envelope; they poop all over it.

Discarding the mockumentary format of their previous films, BORAT and BRÜNO, THE DICTATOR tells the story of Supreme Leader Aladeen, the rude crude ruler of the fictional North African nation of Wadiya.

We’ve seen the likes of this kind of character before - a power-mad tyrant who has anybody who disagrees with him killed - so many of the punch-lines are predictable, but Baron Cohen energetically milks every possible comic possibility available, and succeeds about half the time with getting laughs.

The other half of the time is extremely cringe-worthy. Disgusting bodily humor, gratuitous nudity (do we always have to see Baron Cohen’s junk?), and cheap smarmy dialogue (Baron Cohen calls co-star Anna Faris “Justin Bieber's chubby double” among other monikers), dominate THE DICTATOR, suggesting that its target audience is still in grade school.

After its setup in which Baron Cohen gets kidnapped and shaved (by a hitman played by John C. Reilly of all people) upon arriving in New York City, the movie largely becomes a fish-out-of-water premise. The dictator’s scheming uncle (Ben Kingsley!) replaces him with a dumb double (also Baron Cohen), so he bides his time working in Faris’s vegan food store, waiting for his chance to reclaim his title. So we get a lot of crass gags that the film makers really over sell. Especially when the movie riffs on rape jokes.

As Baron Cohen’s ally, Jason Mantzoukas has one of the most grounded roles, and some of the funniest parts are the bickering exchanges between the 2 characters.

With its mericifully brief 83 minute running time, THE DICTATOR moves fast from laugh to cringe, is cluttered with cameos (look for Megan Fox, Garry Shandling, various Saturday Night Live folks, etc.), and it has the right comedic spirit.

If only those appealing factors weren't overridden by the film's high quotient of gross-out groaners.

Baron Cohen's climatic U.N. speech would've had so much more satirical power had it not been surrounded by such juvenille scatalogical shenanigans. But then, these guys are, of course, more into poop jokes than making a pointed political parody - something THE DICTATOR would never be confused with.

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BRÜNO: The Film Babble Blog Review

BRÜNO (Dir. Larry Charles, 2009)

Approaching the theater (Mission Valley in Raleigh) minutes before midnight, my wife and I heard many complaints coming from the crowds of college aged kids (many younger than that) mulling about in and around the line for BRÜNO. Apparently no beer was to be sold at the concession stand for the showing.

There was a sign in the window of the box office booth confirming this. My wife said "it must be because of nudity" and she was, of course, right - NC Statue 18B-1005.1 forbids the sale of alcohol on premises providing "entertainment by any person whose genitals are exposed". When a particularly jolting close-up of full-frontal (and full screen) male nudity hit the screen (accompanied by pounding rave music of course), she leaned towards me and remarked "that's why we're not able to drink."

BRÜNO is Sacha Baron Cohen's new feature length vehicle for a character from his infamous albeit brief running D Ali G Show (2000) now presented because, as the ads state, "BORAT is so 2006."

The character Brüno (there is even an umlaut over the "U" in the Universal logo at the beginning) is a flaming homosexual Austrian TV fashion reporter whose sole purpose is to get up in the face of uptight straight people and make a scene. A series of these scenes, in mockumentary format, makes up a movie as it did with BORAT. It seems that here, Cohen and director Charles intend to offend everybody that BORAT didn't get to.

While Borat came to America in order to document "cultural learnings"; Brüno comes here to become famous. He goes through every conceivable celebrity trend to achieve this goal including adopting an African baby (actually trading for him with an iPod) deciding upon a charity to lend his name to. Darfur, he accesses is taken, so he wants to know what's going to be "Dar-five."

There are many laughs throughout BRÜNO, even if you can see them coming a mile away. Baron Cohen's intense commitment to the character and quick comic timing make just about every obvious set-up tick, and there's such a strongly silly drive behind it all that's impossible to deny. But if you thought BORAT was a bit much in the crude provocative department, this is likely to be way in the red zone for your sensibilities.

The rest of us may feel guilty about laughing at such base (I may be inclined to say "brilliantly base") material but we'll still laugh. As for the intended audience, the 18-24 year old crowd which mostly made up the packed theater I attended for example, laughed in loud rawdy rapture. Imagine if there had been alcohol involved.


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Full Frame Documentary Film Fest 2009: Day Three

This will be another brief rundown because with all these documentaries coming at me I've had little time for blogging. Like I said before I will write more about select films after the festival is over and the dust settles. This is what I attended on Day Three: (Titles in red don't have IMDb listings yet) BETWEEN DREAMS (Dir. Iris Olsson, 2009) A 10 minute film about passengers' dreams on a 7 day Trans-Siberian train ride. Very affecting although dark and blurry at times. Olsson did a brief Q & A after in which she revealed that every aspect of the film including editing and scoring had been done on the train. It really could've stood to be longer but it's pretty striking as is. CARMEN MEETS BORAT (Dir. Mercedes Stalenhoef, 2008) When Sasha Baron Cohen picked Glod, Romania to stand in for his homeplace of Kazakhstan for his audience pleasing alter ego Borat Sagdiyev, he left behind a lot of resentful residents. For some probably misguidingly romantic reason the film centers on the daughter of a local businessmen (one of the few well-off members of the community) who felt highly offended by Borat's ruse. Ionela Carmen Ciorobea, who at 17 is consdered an old maid by her fellow townsfolk, dreams of leaving the poverty of the village and the clutches of unsuitable suitors. The title is misleading; Carmen never meets Borat (Cohen is only seen in recycled footage from the original movie; the photo above is Carmen hugging her father - see what I mean about being misleading?) which is reflected in the different more accurate title on IMDb: WHEN BORAT CAME TO TOWN. Ciorobea's plight does have its touching moments and the tale of her father and other townsfolks' ill-fated attempt at a lawsuit prompts some mild chuckles but overall the film doesn't feel necessary. THE MEMORIES OF ANGELS (Dir. Luc Bourdon, 2008) I feared this might be a dull travelogue but found it to be a mezmerising extended montage of many different film stocks from 50's and 60's Montreal, Canada. An example of the genre "The City Symphony", which I was unaware of before this weekend, the well timed scene shifting along with the carefully chosen music accompaniment was engrossing from the first to last shot. THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE (Dir. R.J. Cutler, 2008)

As one of the most talked about offerings at the festival, this examination of the pain staking process of finalizing the September Issue of Vogue Magazine more than lived up to the buzz. Editor-in-chief Anna Wintour is the real life Devil who wears Prada and her intimidating demeanor levels staffers left and right but not long-time creative director Grace Coddington. Wintour and Coddington never come to confrontation but a palace of passive aggression is built as the labored over layout comes together. As funny as it is fascinating, even if you know nothing of the world of fashion (like me), THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE surely will make a documentary dent when it gets a full release. An insightful Q & A (mostly about whether Wintour is really that mean) followed with guests director Cutler, editor-at-large, André Leon Talley, and Coddington followed the feature.

MIROIR NOIR (Dir. Vincent Morisset, 2009)

As it was nearing midnight on a Saturday it was a perfect time for the US premiere of a rock doc. Actually less a documentary than a hodgepodge of musical segments, both live and studio, featuring Arcade Fire - the cult Canadian band who are one of Merge Records' (based in Durham) biggest sellers. Despite the lack of context with no venues identified, dates given, or interviews, the film is as artsy, abstract, and absorbing as their music. Most likely a late night favorite in years to come. Whew! I have got to get some rest for the last day of the festival which will include an award BBQ and re-screenings of the winners. I voted on a number of movies so I'm anxious as Hell to see what wins and maybe view a film I missed. I'll let you know how it goes. More later...

I Think I Smell A BORAT...

"We support your war of terror!" - BORAT (Sacha Baron Cohen)  


The #1 movie-film in America right now with an approval rating of 96% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (you know, the site that tallies up all the major reviews) BORAT: CULTURAL LEARNINGS OF AMERICA FOR MAKE BENEFIT GLORIOUS NATION OF KAZAKHSTAN is really burning it up this season.

It does has a lot of funny moments though I personally feel much of the material would be better seen in individual YouTube clips, because even at just 84 minutes the guys routine wears a bit.

Peering in on the sold out shows at my local hometown theater where I work part-time, a drop-off in riotous laughter is strongly evident in the last third of the movie. One sequence in particular I could have done without, a nude wrestling match between BORAT (Sacha Baron Cohen) and his morbidly obese manager (Ken Davitian) that starts over a squabble in a fancy-pants hotel room and spills out into the lobby, so that the shocked public can witness of course. 

Thankfully black bars were inserted to cover the naughty bits. That's definitely he scene where my laughter dropped off. 

Being the second most hyped movie of the year (the first being SNAKES ON A PLANE) I was surprised at the critical reaction.

It's getting a lot of incredibly favorable notices remarking on the supposed sharpness of the satire and the telling socio-political statements it makes. Some examples:

"The brilliance of BORAT is that its comedy is as pitiless as its social satire and just as brainy" - Manohla Dargis (New York Times) 

"He makes us squirm until we laugh and laugh until we squirm, holding a mirror to our darkest fears and prejudices." - Bob Townsend (Alanta Journal-Constitution) 

"Evil comedy, a new genre, has arrived. The bar has been raised and is flying over everyone's head." - Victoria Alexander (FILMSINREVIEW.COM) 

This is a bit much. 

I mean, it does live up to the hype much more than SNAKES and it does have plenty of genuine laughs, but come on! It says more about how lame comedies have become in the last several years if this is being lauded so highly. As for all the variations on the labeling of BORAT as an "equal opportunity offender" that critics have been tirelessly making, I was offended like Jerry Seinfeld would be "as a comedian" at how easy cheap and obvious some of the lines were - for example:

Borat Sagdiyev: This is Natalya. (He Kisses her passionately) She is my sister. She is number-four prostitute in whole of Kazakhstan. (Natalya holds up a trophy and smiles) Niiice!

Yep, now that's top-line-state-of-the-art-grade-A comedy!

More later...