Blood Diamond

It's the beginning of March, and you all know what that means: I'm going to start posting like a madman. This review is actually going to be fairly lengthy, but I'm pretty sure I'm not going to keep that streak going for very long this month.

Before I get started on the actual movie itself, I must preface it with a couple of things.
1. When I first saw the trailer for Blood Diamond, I swore to myself that I wouldn't see it because of DiCaprio's accent. (I'll get to my thoughts on that in the actual review section.)
2. I'm not usually a fan of exploitation films (unless it's blatantly so, as is the case for the upcoming Grindhouse, directed by Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino), but the other guys were going to see David Fincher's Zodiac and I had absolutely no interest in seeing that. Plus, I found out that this movie wasn't necessarily an exploitation film per se: it had a lot more plot to it than I predicted.

Director Edward Zwick has a couple of good films in his repertoire; the most notable of these are Glory and The Last Samurai. His complete filmography is here, if you're interested. I'm not going to talk too much about him, since I know little to nothing about the guy and I've only seen four of his films. I will say that I thought he did a really good job with Blood Diamond, although in hindsight nearly anyone with any kind of directorial competence could have churned out just as fine a product. Zwick doesn't have any sort of stand-out style that I noticed, which I guess is good because you aren't always looking for the little nuances of the director's films (cameos, flashbacks, doves, etc) while you are watching the film. He let the script and, more importantly, the cast, do the talking for him.


The movie takes place in Sierra Leone in 1999, where civil war has broken out and the illegal diamond trade is in full swing. When Solomon Vandy's (played by Djimon Hounsou - yes, the guy from Amistad and Beauty Shop) family is taken from him and his village burned to the ground by rebels, he must rely on diamond smuggler Danny Archer (DiCaprio) to get them back. Also thrown into the mix is a reporter (Jennifer Connelly) searching for a story that will finally shed light on the injustices being done to the people of Africa merely to keep the market price of diamonds high.

I can't go any further without saying it: Leonardo DiCaprio is dangerously close to becoming my favorite actor. If he keeps taking roles like this one, which he played excellently, and characters like the ones he depicted in The Departed and Catch Me If You Can, he'll be at the top of my list before you can say "Gangs of New York." Without a doubt, he 100% deserved the nomination for Best Actor for his performance in this film. OK - man love for DiCaprio aside, there were other actors in this thing also. Djimon Hounsou did a good job, although I'd like to see him in some more versatile roles than just the crying, angry black man (he was cool as the mercenary in The Island). Jen Connelly was nowhere near her hotness-peak that she hit in 1991's The Rocketeer (see below for gratuitous picture), but she was pretty smokin' nonetheless and actually pulled off playing a character other than a victim for once. Arnold Vosloo, who you would know as the titular character from The Mummy franchise, played a small part as well. I'm not going to lie, he wasn't fantastic - I just wanted to type "Arnold Vosloo."

(Connelly, circa '91. What a hottie.)

Ideologically speaking, Blood Diamond had a lot to say. The film posed a lot of questions to the audience, but the most prominent was undoubtedly "How caught up in consumerism are you willing to get before you stop and think about the consequences?" It was one of those films that kind of made you ashamed to be wearing your bling when you walked out of the theater. Granted, I'm sure the filmmakers sensationalized the situation to some degree, but with the current crisis in Darfur and other African countries today, we know that some of it has to be accurate. There were a couple of lines specifically intended for the purpose of letting us think about what's going on in the world, such as when Connelly's character walked up to a refugee camp and said "This is what a million people looks like. This is the second largest refugee camp in Africa. You might see a clip or two of it on the news, in between sports and weather." There were a lot of family themed tie-ins as well, due to the story paralleling DiCaprio going after a huge 100 carat diamond and Hounsou trying to get his family back.

(Warning: Spoilers ahoy, mateys. If you haven't seen the film, skip down to the next paragraph.)

Something that particularly stood out to me was the dichotomy of the bird and the airplane. Hounsou's character, a native African and therefore a simpler man than the slick, monetarily concerned DiCaprio, looked up at one point and noticed a hawk flying overhead. This symbolized the strength and tradition of family for him, and served as a beacon to help him press on towards his family. DiCaprio, at a different time, saw an airplane in the sky. This served as a mechanical, materialistic reminder of why he was going after the diamond in the first place: to escape the war-torn land of Africa and get rich from other people's suffering. When the two men reached the top of the cliff after procuring Hounsou's son from the rebel side (which was very reminiscent of Hook and Peter Pan regaining his son's trust from the pirates), the plane returned to pick up the three and take them to their destination. Unfortunately, DiCaprio doesn't make it on the plane, but he makes a conscious decision to give up the diamond, help Connelly bring the truth to the world, and hold off the rebel forces while Hounsou and his son make it aboard the plane. All this you could see coming from a mile away, but it was still a cool image to have DiCaprio's character make his uplifting, morally conscious, "right" decision literally at the top of a mountain. Sweat and Campbell would be proud.

(End of spoilers.)

Blood Diamond was a pretty stellar flick. I'm sure it won't be in theaters for much longer, but if you can get out there and check it out, it's worth it. There are a bunch of really gorgeous sweeping shots of the jungle, the mountains, and the desert in it, so even if you don't care for the film, it's aesthetically pleasing. The only other potential downer is that the movie is about 2 and 1/2 hours long, but it did a fantastic job with suspension of disbelief, so it wasn't as bad as many of the other 2 and 1/2 hour films I've seen recently. Give it a shot. If nothing else, see it for DiCaprio's performance. Until next time...

The Future is Looking Good

This is a small apology to anyone who has checked out this blog and hoped for more than just the two reviews that I've had up for the past month or so. I've seen so many films since I've last updated, and I've ALMOST written a couple posts about a few of them. But I just couldn't seem to pull the trigger. I didn't think that I had enough to work with. But someone close to me told me something to the effect that I don't need to write a dissertation about every movie I want to write about, and you know something? She's right.

So I'm thinking of doing something innovative (well, innovative for ME, anyway). In the month of March, I'm going to try to post something on every film that I see for the whole month. That way we can get some meat to this site and have some stuff to look back on. This will also mean that there will probably be updates like twice a week, which will be good for those of you who use this as just another reason to procrastinate. This includes myself. Mainly, I'm doing it to crack down on myself for being lazy about posting recently, and more importantly, I think it'll be fun. So follow along if you're up for the challenge, friends. Until next time...

Memento

For my Deja Vu review, I said it was necessary to see the film before you could read the review, mainly because I gave away some plot points and things of that sort. This time, those of you who haven't seen Memento won't be disappointed, since I'll do my best not to ruin the movie for you. So read on...

Christopher Nolan = the man. His filmography (provided, as always, by the gracious folks at IMDB) is short but really impressive so far. Insomnia was a great flick, with both Pacino and Robin Williams giving good performances, but the main thing that stuck out in that film was the cinematography. It's been a while since I've seen it, but I recall almost the entire movie taking place in Alaska and since it hardly ever gets dark there, the lighting in the movie took on a character of its own. Pretty cool stuff. Batman Begins is considered by many (myself included) the greatest comic book-to-movie adaptation of all time. It took a lot to remove the ridiculousness that the previous Batman films had instilled into the viewer when that franchise came to mind (seriously: built-in ice skates in the bottom of Batman and Robin's boots?), but Nolan did a fantastic job with the movie. Plus, as an added bonus, I always have more respect for directors who write their own stories and screenplays and then direct their own movies (some prominent examples being M. Night Shyamalan and occasionally Hitchcock). The screenwriters really get shafted when its all said and done. The general public has no clue that it is actually the screenwriters who dictate most of the camera angles, etc. and the director is more of an overseer who just tweaks things here and there to establish the overall "feel" of the film. But Christopher Nolan has written (or co-written with his brother Jonathan) and directed the most famous of his films so far, so that garners much more of my respect.


Memento is the story of Leonard Shelby, a man who (get this) has lost the ability to make new memories. He remembers basic things about his life before an incident that caused his condition, but he can't remember what happened to him 5 minutes ago. Or 10 minutes before that. Seemingly at random, he just fails to recognize where he is, who he is talking to, or what he has just done. So he lives his life snapping and reviewing Polaroids, which he labels with important information about the subject of the photos. Also, his body is covered with tattoos telling him his one reason for living: that his wife was raped and murdered and there are clues to who is responsible. The film follows Leonard on his journey as he inches closer to the truth in his search for revenge.

What makes Memento such a great film is the completely unique style in which the story progresses. Because of Leonard's condition, the film is chronologically reversed in order, with the beginning of the film actually taking place at the end of the storyline. What makes it even more interesting is that between cuts of this reverse-order chronology (filmed in color, by the way, to indicate the temporal shift is backwards), there are scenes filmed in black and white that are moving forward in time. If you're confused by now, go watch the movie. It'll confuse you even more.

Even with the potentially confusing structure of the movie, Nolan does a good job setting the pace for the film in the first three scenes. He shows a color scene, then cuts to the forward-moving black and white one, and then reverts back to a color scene that happened immediately before the first shown colored scene. There is a slight overlap in these color scenes just to give the viewer SOME sort of sense of where they are in the time line. If you are one of those people that doesn't really like to think too much when you're watching a movie, then Memento is probably not for you.

After the initial shock from the unconventional storyline and structure wears off, the viewer can actually pay attention to the technical aspects of the film. The music never really plays a big part in the movie, but is effective in its haunting tones when divulging particularly important information. Otherwise, it is almost like there isn't even a musical soundtrack at all. This isn't really a bad thing; if this movie had any more information for the audience to process, I think people would go on overload mode. So its good that the soundtrack isn't overbearing in any way.

The camera work in this movie is really exceptional. The camera constantly concentrates on Leonard's character and follows him in an over-the-shoulder manner whenever he goes anywhere. There is also a numerous amount of direct close-up cuts to items that Leonard examines, which serves to give us almost a first person interaction with his character - we are seeing what he sees, when he sees it. This is the style in the color (aka reverse time) scenes. In the standard linear black and white scenes, the camera is much more detached from the character and takes a more objective look at his situation. Since most of the black and white camera work takes place in a hotel room, the camera is placed in an upper corner of the room, giving the feel of a security camera looking down on Leonard's situation.

The mise-en-scene of this film is deliberately spartan and non-recognizable. This is most likely done to mirror Leonard's condition with his memory in a much larger way; in this case, the city he is currently located in. The colors are mostly pastels and not too harsh, also serving as an indicator of nondescript backgrounds and locations - there isn't anything that is blantatly recognizable by color. This aids in lending a sense of helplessness to Leonard's situation. Memento has a gritty noir feel to it, due mostly to the camera work, the use of inter-cut narrations, and the convoluted nature of the plot (see The Big Lebowski for another modern example of the plot getting out of control).

Last but not least, the casting in Memento was thoroughly enjoyable. Guy Pearce (who was excellent in The Count of Monte Cristo), Carrie-Anne Moss (Trinity from The Matrix series), and Joey Pants (more professionally known as Joe Pantoliano, also of Matrix fame, along with The Fugitive and U.S. Marshals) all did a superior job in their respective roles as Leonard, Natalie, and Teddy. Their versatility as actors was certainly put to the test in a film like this.

If you haven't seen Memento, get ready for a mind-bending of mystery and intrigue that will surely leave you scratching your head and wanting to come back for another look. Until next time...

Deja Vu

(Warning: This has nothing to do with the film until the next paragraph.)
What better way to start things off than some good old fashioned complaining? AMC Orange Park 24 has kicked its prices to an outrageous $8.00...for STUDENTS. I didn't even look to see what the regular price was. Hey, movie industry: it's starting to get ridiculous. There has been talk ever since 9/11 about how the entire movie industry has taken a shot and with the new Blu-Ray technology and HD DVD's out there, I can see why some people would think that. However, what those folks fail to consider is that there are always going to be people out there like myself who will see movies in the theater for the sole reason that we love the experience. There's just something about actually being in a theater that makes it worth it. That being said, $8.00 for student tickets is absolutely preposterous. So for the love of Mike, check the prices online before you go out to the theater, because this time you might not have enough for your usual Steak 'N Shake run afterwards.

Now that THAT'S out of the way, let's get into the real reason I've started this blog: reviews. I hate people that do what I'm about to do, but for this film, I kind of feel the need to do it, and for that I apologize. If you haven't seen Deja Vu, there will be spoilers that will ruin it for you. That's just the nature of the beast, at least for this film. In the future I might be able to work in some reviews that don't completely ruin the movie, but that's just not the case this time. Sorry. However, I would highly recommend that you DO get out and see this film, since I thought it was really well done. So once again for all you people who just skim over paragraphs searching for important words, DO NOT CONTINUE READING THIS IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN DEJA VU.


Tony Scott (brother of the more-famous Ridley) directed this film, and honestly, the man's got a pretty good track record in my book. Check out his filmography at IMDB here. Anyway, I was slightly worried (due to what I'd seen in the trailer) that Deja Vu would be full of shaky camera work ala Bourne Supremacy, but thankfully this is not the case. Actually, the camera work stands out as one of the more outstanding features of the film. There are a lot of tracking shots that serve to move the story along at a reasonable pace and give a certain resonance behind Doug's (played, obviously if you've seen the film, by Denzel) actions. He NEEDS to prevent Claire's (played by a woman I've never heard of, Paula Patton, but she turned in a fine performance) death, and the camera work plays a huge part in relaying that to the audience.
Denzel, as usual, was really phenomenal. Personally, I'm a big fan of character development in films. I have to really know the characters before I can feel sorry for them when their partners get killed in gruesome ways (OK, maybe I'd feel sorry for just about anyone if their partner was brutally murdered before their eyes, but you get my point). Deja Vu kind of cops out in this aspect. There's the few scenes of Doug and his partner arguing, but we don't know what they were arguing about. Doug seemingly has absolutely no life outside of his job, which would be fine if he was portrayed as a workaholic-type character. Unfortunately for believability's sake, this is not the case. Denzel is almost TOO charismatic, and the audience is more likely to believe that he'll go out on the town after work than sit at his house (which we never see) without the companionship of some ridiculously attractive female (the writers also never bother to address this fact in Doug's past). The only reasoning offered by the film is the exchange between Val Kilmer and Denzel on the boat that goes something like:

Denzel: Everything gets taken away from us. No matter how hard we try to hold on, it always slips through our hands.
Val: Oh, come on. It's not that bad.
Denzel: Yes, it is. Moms and Dads die, and every person we ever love, ever, will die.
Val: Man, Denzel, go listen to some Eddie Money and loosen up a little bit.
Denzel: (Solemn look on face)

Yeah, that's pretty much word for word what was said in the film. Exaggeration aside, there wasn't TOO much in the way of character development in this movie. There was no back story on any of the computer geek squad members working with Doug and Val Kilmer's character. I mean, I LIKED those characters. They served their purpose as supporting roles and they did it pretty well. They cried when horrible things happened to Doug's partner and they laughed at their own stupid jokes. They helped Denzel at the end do what we all knew he was going to do: break the orders from the bureaucratic bigwigs and go back in time himself. What I'm getting at here is that even though there wasn't a particular character in the film where I was like, "Man, I really liked everyone's performance EXCEPT for (insert name here)'s," they still could have done a much better job of delving a little deeper into (at least) the main characters' backgrounds.

One of the main points that I'd like to make about this movie is the multitude of themes that were presented. Predestination vs. Free Will, the true meaning of patriotism ("one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter"), the standard "love conquers all," and more. More importantly though are the political stances taken in the film. With the government funding this new technology where cameras can go literally everywhere (albeit in a certain grid) and the hero using what he has learned from this technology to eventually take down the bad guy, the movie takes the stance that maybe the Patriot Act isn't as terrible as people make it out to be. While the ending arguably undercuts this point with Denzel's explosive death, it also serves to reinforce it by showing us that the sacrifice of one person is good for the many, obviously drawing parallels to the recent political upheaval about the Patriot Act and privacy issues in America. The movie basically says "Hey, if we have to give up a little here and there, but 543 people survive this boat explosion because of it...I guess we can deal with that." You don't see too many films with those kind of undercurrents coming out of Hollywood these days, and I admire the writers for working in that point of view in such an unobtrusive way. Plus, Denzel lives on (in the present form, anyway), so all is right with the world.

Did anyone else think of how weird that car conversation must have been between Claire and Doug at the very end? I mean, she had to explain to him all the things that his OTHER self did for her. CrAzY.

In conclusion, Val Kilmer is the man, and Deja Vu was a really good movie. Until next time...