Nine Queens
Theft and con movies have always been a prolific genre, but lately little separates them. Flashy posing is the latest trend, with movies like Snatch and Ocean’s 11 featuring characters (or actors) who are far more interested in how cool they look than how clever their movie is. Problem is these movies are not drawing an audience that wants to see slick gangsters doing their thang, the draw of con movies is the con. Introductions to the characters are suppose to be kept to a minimum, the M.O. is springing surprise after surprise as the movie clips along always keeping the audience in the dark about who is doing what to whom and why but feeding them just enough information for them to keep track of the upkeep. David Mamet seems to be one of the few American directors these days who knows where the heart of the con movie lies, and Fabian Bielinsky’s new Argentinean film Nine Queens definitely strives to fall into the category of a real crime film in the vein of Mamet.
Little is known about either of the main characters in Nine Queens, the film starts with Marcos bailing Juan out of a failed minor con, and Marcos (played by Ricardo Darin as dark and sly, obviously smart but with a sleaziness that hints at a lesser intelligence behind his act) invites Juan (Gaston Pauls, who is handsome and soft, handy in the con game, but has too much of a conscience to really stomach his trade) into helping him scam some money for just a day to see if they could work together as partners. As they mess around a little background information is supplied on each character, of course after so many con movies one must wary of all that’s said and take it for a grain of salt, but suffice to say that Juan needs money fast and Marcos cannot seem to hold on to any of the dough he scams. Eventually the two stumble across a deal to sell a counterfeit copy of a very valuable set of old Weimar Republic stamps to a businessman (the nine queens of the title), but not everyone is being entirely truthful, and whether or not Juan and Marcos completes the deal takes backseat to who and what is really working behind the scenes.
Nine Queens takes the Mamet route of being both visually subdued and action dry, and it has to rely on its leads and their cons to keep the film moving. Mr. Bielinsky (who wrote the script) picked a smart pair of con artists as his leads, Darin and Pauls not only look and talk like men in the same game who each handle it their own way, but Bielinsky takes time to show how each man deals with the same situation differently. This gives a nice window into the true souls of these men, who’s talk and actions are usually just covering hidden motives, and Mr. Darin and Mr. Pauls make each character just barely likeable enough to not distrust them, but just barely despicable to know that they are each hiding their own problems. Their con builds up naturally, as the small thefts Juan and Marcos partake in slowly illustrated how under the surface both men are desperate for money and how they are almost forced to cooperate to get it.
It is when the big con is introduced that the movie stumbles. Situations and meetings start becoming too contrived and too coincidental to take seriously. This leads to the prevailing feeling that there is a massive con running in motion behind the whole operation, and soon the movie unintentionally switches gears from being about how Juan and Marcos are going to pull this off to which man is the one conning the other. Mr. Bielinsky certainly gives no helping clues, and as the stakes keep rising so does the desire to find out the big picture, if only to see the reactions of the sucker, for it becomes quite clear that something is amiss but Bielinsky does not let the audience in on any part of the puzzle. The payoff is not even a payoff, there is no big explanation that has to be worked backwards to make sense, the movie dead ends into the realization that one of the two was behind it all and the other got screwed. Despite the original setup (I mean, who steals stamps these days?), Mr. Bielinsky has somehow avoided anything that could remotely resemble cleverness in the payoff of Nine Queens, and not only does one not get to see the conned man’s bewildered frustration at being so utterly beaten, the sucker never actually realizes he was being conned!
Last year’s David Mamet’s witty Heist survived not only because of its considerable acting talent but because its cleverness was spread evenly through the movie, and as one con ends with satisfaction another one starts right up again and keeps the characters flowing in a metaphorical river of deception (and of course it has more golden one liners than all the movies of 2001 combined). Nine Queens takes its clue from Mamet’s previous heister House of Games and tries to build to that one big one, that one con that takes the cake and slips the rug right out from the audience; the trouble here is that we expect it all along, and what begins as patiently waiting through the setup to get to the con eventually turns into barely tolerating the con to get to the payoff, which then promptly falls flat on its face. Nine Queens exists for that delicious realization that nothing was as it seemed and we, as the audience, were just as fooled as the pigeon in the film, but for once ‘what it seemed’ turns out to be nothing of interest. It really is a shame because Juan and Marcos are fun to watch, and their interactions function mainly to send out feelers from one to other, trying to see if they are trust worthy which results in minor verbal fencing duels. Mr. Bielinsky’s film is both smarty and economically shot (no fancy camera work here, just enough close ups to keep the tension and distrust running and a subtly clay red color palette to keep continuity) as well as having a nice minimalist score that pops up occasionally, but a con movie that is not clever is like a John Woo film without double fisted handguns, in the end it just doesn't work.
Since it’s summer rerun season, I went to the video store and rented two films the other day, the Indian, Bollywood film God Is My Witness/Khuda Gawah, and the HK policier, Ringo Lam’s 1997 award winner Full Alert. Some short comments (and this time I mean it) on the two films.
God Is My Witness is a pretty good Hindi masala film, a 193 epic film starring the Indian film star Amitabh Bachchan, a combination of action film, comedy, and musical (but then again, mcbain pointed out on AIM that all Bollywood films were 3+ hour films that combined action, comedy, and musical). The plot virtually defines melodrama, the Pashtan tribesman played by Bachchan falls in love with the daughter of a rival clan, and to win her heart, he must travel to India to avenge the murder of her father; which sets off a chain of events that keep Bachchan away from his family for over 20 years, languishing in an Indian jail for crimes he didn’t commit, driving his wife insane, and causing his daughter, who he never saw, to grow up thinking she was the daughter of another man (Bachchan’s best friend). The wildly coincidental events of the film’s plot is sheer hokum, and I’m not even sure it all really hangs in together (it has three hours of plot you know), but it’s really enjoyable hokum; hell, I didn’t even know the film took place in the 1970s and then the early 1990s until halfway through the film, I thought it was a period piece. What was really interesting were the musical sequences, most of which were weighted to the first half of the film, particularly impressive was the first sequence, where Bachchan and his would-be bride, Benazir, express their feelings with music, dance, and dangerous, phallic weapons like daggers and swords; the dance sequence, during the wedding; another when Bachchan must return to India to fulfill a promise he made to the Rajput, his wife follows him from afar, wailing despondently from the cliffs above to her beloved Bachchan; and there is another dance sequence, where Bachchan, just released from prison, is confronted by his daughter, who is not only spitting image of her mother, but is also engaged to a man, who father Bachchan supposedly killed (actually, the man’s wife killed him, and Bachchan took the blame to protect her). And of course, there is the obligatory musical sequence between Bachchan and Benazir, separated, and another between Mehndi and Raja, where the scenery shifts with every cut. I love how the director and choreographer worked together to craft the film, the strange angles, the shafts of light, the fluttering saris in the wind, the use of the frame, and cuts on action, used to create interesting compositions. And I have to say, Bollywood directors can find new, and interesting ways to film a woman in close-up. It’s no Lagaan, but it’s a pretty entertaining movie all together.
Ringo Lam’s Full Alert is a simply awesome film, starring one of my favorite HK actors Lau Ching Wan, an actor who, despite the chubby, baby-face, cuts an imposing figure, from a tough guy to one cool motherfucker (but not the suave kind like Chow Yun-fat) usually with some intense brooding, in films such as The Big Bullet, The Longest Nite, and Expect the Unexpected. Lau is Inspector Pao of the HKPD Special Crimes Bureau, who is tracking Francis Ng’s Mak Kwan, a former engineer and explosives expert, who after murdering an architect, and escaping from jail, has set out with a bunch of Taiwanese thugs to rob a racetrack. Full Alert meticulously traces the steps in Pao’s investigations; this is the third Lam film I’ve seen, after City on Fire and The Suspect, and he represents, which I call, for the lack of a better term, the more realistic strand of HK genre directors, which he uses to plumb the moral depths of violence, family, and loyalty. Pao, while apparently only in his early 30s, is already a tired man, who takes stomach pills, is tired and somewhat withdrawn, yet still loving, of his young wife and child. Mak Kwan, Pao’s shadowy doppleganger, is a failure, passionately in love with his girlfriend, who is in on the plot. The film really explores the effects of violence; both Pao and Mak Kwan have killed a man, and both feel the gnawing effects of the guilt. There are actually only a few murders in the film, and all are brutal and bloody, and are not easily shrugged off. There are a few twists in the film, which leads to a harrowing ending. The final shot, a close-up of Pao crying, out of relief, exhaustion, grief, and guilt, is superimposed over a long-shot of Mak Kwan and his girlfriends body (Pao killed the girlfriend who was trying to save Mak Kwan when the two were fighting; while Mak Kwan, shot himself in the head while cradling her body in his arms), we then see Pao himself fall to his knees and collapse in the distance of the shot, before the film fades to black. Very powerful, and well worth watching.
Undercover Brother was a very surprising film, when I first heard about it, I was skeptical, but I did think the trailers were funny, and the good reviews on Friday really clinched it for me. It’s a movie in a similar vein to the Austin Powers movies, as both are spoofs that reference the James Bond series, but instead of a campy, loving spoof of the swinging 60s, mod London, we get a loving, sometimes campy, spoof/homage to 70s blaxploitation films. Other parallels, a secret agent seemingly out of another era (though instead of time travel or cryogenics, Undercover Brother’s style is a completely conscious decision to live at the height of black culture, circa 1972), and a plot that is more or less a string of interrelated gags, loosely tied together by a main plot line. In this case, our hero Undercover Brother joins the B.R.O.T.H.E.R.H.O.O.D., a secret organization dedicated to preserving “truth, justice, and the Afro-American Way, since 1972," to combat the nefarious, all-white organization led by the Man, who is dedicated to the continued subjugation of the black race, in this case, mind control against the leaders of black political, intellectual, and entertainment life (turning them into white bred, sell outs), the first being Billy Dee William's war hero general, the first serious African-American presidential candidate. The Man brainwashes the general instead to open a chain of fried chicken restraints to the horror of the B.R.O.T.H.E.R.H.O.O.D. (at one point, he gives away 32oz bottles of Malt Liquor with each purchase, a reference to Williams's former role as a pitchman for Colt 45).
Like, the Austin Powers movies, the film does rely on audience knowledge of both James Bond movies (Undercover Brother’s gold 1970s Cadillac Coup de Ville has been outfitted with a “rocket-launcher” eight track player and an oil slick that utilizes afrosheen) and blaxploitation films, to the point of embracing the low-rent, but lively aesthetics of the original films: deliberately cheesy back-screen projection (another great joke is the few fake rocks that fall behind the main characters as they talk during the denouement); slow motion martial arts; canted angles; zoom-ins; various split screen formats; and freeze-frames; the 1970s funk and R&B soundtrack (the film features an extended cameo by James Brown), not to mention the clothes and hair styles. The whole thing is directed with flair by Malcolm Lee, who may not have the skills of his cousin, but who gets the job done.
But the film is not dependent on the audience’s knowledge of 1970s blaxploitation and kung fu movies, and unlike the Austin Powers films, it doesn’t really rely on spoofing other well known media formats (though it does, Chi McBride, the Chief, in this movie, btw, everyone has a nickname like Smart Brother and White She-Devil, who plays the gruff, angry, constantly yelling black authority figure, like Inspector Todd in the Beverly Hills Cop movies; he even upbraids Undercover Brother before he even works for him, and has pictures of many black characters from film and TV, like Danny Glover and André Braugher, on the wall behind him; at one point, he says “I’m too old for this shit,” the film then rack focuses and Danny Glovers picture comes into focus, and McBride turns slightly to the picture) or contemporary events. Instead, the film utilizes the all pervasive American problem of racism and racial stereotyping. The film is anarchic in it’s targets, the problem spans the ideological spectrum so no one goes untouched, especially well-meaning liberalism, as evidenced by the hilarious karaoke scene with “Ebony and Ivory,” and there are many riffs on both black and white stereotypes.
The humor of the film operates on many different levels. Much of it is hilariously lowbrow or referential (the golf cart chase across the golf course, replaying so many clichés from 1970s cop shows and movies; the the scene from the trailer where they talk to the “brainwashed” sell-out UB about sleeping with white women; the Sapphic cat fight in the shower, where UB and the two evil male henchmen stop to get chairs, eat snacks, and drink beer together while watching the show (not that the film is completely sexist, Sistah Girl is the smartest and strongest character in the film, and basically only Sistah Girl and White She-Devil kick ass in the film, all of the other men in the film, except for UB is pretty ineffectual); or when Neil Patrick Harris’s B.R.O.T.H.E.R.H.O.O.D. intern, a recipient of Affirmative Action, gets called a sissy and absolutely crushes three Man henchmen, ripping the heart out of one’s chest, the spine out of the other, and quashing the last guys head to a pulp, it’s hilarious), but also some is relatively subtle. I saw the film with an audience that was primarily teenaged, and since I was the only one laughing, I guess a lot of it went over some of the people’s heads: the patronizing talk of the white newscasters when they talk about Billy Dee Williams's general (“he’s so well spoken’), the animated commercial for the General’s fried chicken commercial which ends on an image that could come straight out of Bamboozled, or how Denise Richard’s White She-Devil would never pronounce Sistah Girl’s name right “Tonja,” much to the annoyance of Sistah Girl. I’m not saying that the film’s humor is profound, but it is often truthful and pointed, and leads up to the film’s central message, as the white intern Lance and White She-Devil team up with the black B.R.O.T.H.E.R.H.O.O.D in a show of real racial unity to overthrow the Man, whose henchmen’s worst fear is that, gasp, that our one culture will meld into one (or course, the Man’s fey henchmen, Mr. Feather, played by Chris Kattan, can’t help but react to black culture when he hears it; and it is revealed that even the Man can use “African-American” slang). I think the films attitude is succinctly expressed by Chi McBride’s Chief, who says at one point that it is a great day for “black people of all races.”
Cool and breezily fun, I can only wish that I could spin my car around without spilling any of my Orange Gulp, but I can’t even walk and drink at the same time.
Went to the movies today (surprise, surprise) and saw Insomnia and Undercover Brother. SPOILERS
Insomnia is the second remake I saw this weekend, but this time, I can compare the film with the original, which I saw at the Cinematheque a few years ago (of course, while I liked the original, I feel no undue allegiance to it, and consequentially, my memory of it has faded somewhat). Actually, I think that comparing the new, Americanized version with the original Norwegian film can illuminate what the new version is all about, as the two major changes to the plot are directly related to the new version’s theme. In the original, Stellan Skarsgaard played a good, Swedish detective, but a bad human being, sent to investigate the murder of a young girl in a remote Norwegian town above the Arctic Circle. In the new version, Al Pacino plays a dedicated, and save for one exception, honest cop, and more importantly, he’s ultimately a good person, even if he has to first face his own personal demons, which stem from an earlier transgression; he framed a child murder suspect (who he believed to be guilty, based on 30 years of experience and intuition, instead of evidence), and now due to an Internal Affairs corruption probe of his LAPD unit, his partner is willing to give him up to save himself, and Pacino’s Det. Dormer can’t allow that to happen, or all of the criminals he put away will get out of jail. Skarsgaard character, on the other hand, is a rather amoral, grade-A bastard, who goes to the Norwegian fishing village, primarily because his reputation at home is under a dark cloud, since he slept with a witness back in Sweden. You can already see how the set-up would drastically change the movie. The accidental shooting of the partner in the fog, and the subsequent cover-up, as well as the further investigation into the first murder, is pretty consistent, but the movie has changed, instead of watching a physical, psychological, and moral disintegration of a (amoral) person, all under the cold, constant, unblinking light of the Arctic, winter sun; we see the corruption and eventual redemption of Det. Dormer, mostly through his decision at the end, to confront Robert William’s murderer, Finch, and own up to his transgressions to his eager beaver junior partner, Hillary Swank’s local detective Ellie, encouraging her not to follow his path by covering up his crimes (and earlier, he confessed his LAPD frame-up to Maura Tierney’s local innkeeper, trying to justify himself, but she refuses to ultimately judge him; from the original I remember, that the innkeeper was a much less likable character, and was having an affair with Skarsgaard). He then dies. In the original, while everyone may have their doubts, Skarsgaard gets away with everything, but he is a soulless wreck, driving home alone, into the harsh Arctic light, his eyes light up and then the screen fades to black, except for the cold, piercing light of his eyes (much like the unforgiving light of the winter sun).
These are the two most significant changes to the new version, and they completely recast the film, I remember the first film as cold, brutal, and ugly, but the new version has been significantly changed in other respects. The isolated Norwegian town of the original was bleak, depressed, and run down, far from pretty; on the other hand, the isolated Alaskan town looks relatively prosperous, and is surrounded by spectacular wilderness vistas, captured in cinemascope and rich color. Other prominent changes have been made to make Pacino’s character more sympathetic, someone who would actually desire redemption. For instance, there is the much noted change (in the reviews that I’ve read) of Pacino shooting a dead dog instead of a live one to obtain the bullet that will allow him to escape responsibility by changing the ballistics report; another is his relationship with the murder victim’s best friend, which is much, much more sexually orientated in the original film, giving it all a much more creepy bent. Another significant change, is the amount of time spent watching Pacino trying to get some sleep, as he is kept awake both by the never setting sun and his own guilt. These scenes are more protracted in the Norwegian version, to the point where they made me feel uncomfortable, to a point where I could empathize with Skarsgaard’s personal agony (I kept on waiting for the shade to pop up, like it did many times in the Norwegian version).
Many commentators have remarked that this is a much more conventional film for Christopher Nolan, that it doesn’t display the genius of Memento, instead a workman like professionalism, if not conventionalism. That’s not a completely fair charge; the film, in terms of narrative, is relatively linear and conventional, especially when compared with the multiple chronologies of Memento. But it shares a significant feature with the earlier film, it is relentlessly tied to one character's subjectivity, either by recreating Dormer’s POV, with audio and visual hallucinations; rack focus to simulate blurry, tired eyes; and quick shots, snatches of Dormer’s memories and fantasies (the repeated close-up of a smiling Kay, the murder victim, that Dormer becomes somewhat obsessed with). Almost everything is filtered through Dormer’s perspective, either directly, or indirectly in what Edward Branigan calls “focalization.” (If anyone is interested in an expanded discussion of focalization, see Edward Branigan’s Narrative Comprehension and Film, especially pp. 101-102) The camera either presents us with Dormer’s subjective POV or everything is presented as he would experience it. I really liked Nolan’s usage of different formal techniques to represent Dormer’s subjective experience, especially his use of sound: his heightened awareness of the repeated, mundane sounds in the PD office, after shooting his partner; the muffled, underwater thuds of logs colliding with one another during the harrowing sequence where Dormer chases Finch across the log jam and falls in the water; and the persistent, dull screeching of the windshield wipers as the extremely weary Dormer drives to his final confrontation with Finch.
Some quick notes on the acting, Pacino looks tired. Our first glimpse of Dormer is aboard the plane, a close-up and he already looks world-weary and exhausted, and he only gets worse (haggard is a key adjective to describe his performance). It’s a nice, modulated performance, not among his best, IMO, but he does convey a sense of increasing exhaustion, of the confusion of a tired mind, of a mind that is still sharp, but now clicking a few moments slower than usual, allowing both Finch and Ellie to get to him. It’s nice to see Williams in a role where he is trying not to beatify himself; his Finch is portrayed as a smart, yet incredibly smarmy man, and it’s not a stretch to believe him as a sexual predator, or serial killer in the making. To me, his mania could always mask the darkness underneath (especially since his initial mania was fueled by cocaine). He does get the best line in the film however, when he asks Dormer to feed his dogs (a throw-away termite line of dialogue in a white elephant movie, kind of like my appreciaton of Unfaithful)....
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