I really, really have to stop letting my friends talk me into watching Kevin Smith's movies. Sure, I know it's supposed to be juvenile, stupid humor. It's not that I don't get it. I just don't think it's funny. The movie did at least have a couple of hilarious cameos, namely Will Farrell, Chris Rock, Mark Hamill and the uncredited orangutan. If you actually liked Clerks, I'm sure you'll love this one. But it's going to take some serious convincing for me to watch another Smith film. Hopefully this time I've learned my lesson.

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Carnage. Glory. Death. Violence. Sex. Barrage. Unrelenting. Generated.

A few words come to mind when I think about 300. It's not terribly easy to associate a complete thought with a film like this. A single word is about all you can focus on before something else bashes you upside the head. That said, I actually enjoyed the experience. There is visual beauty here, hidden in the gore. There is no plot to speak of in the original comic book, and unfortunately what little plot director and screenwriter Zack Snyder attempted to add merely detracted from the impact of the film. I will say that I was excited to have a character with my namesake in the film, even if he only existed to further Snyder's contrived plot additions. The character, Theron, is played by Dominic West, who did the best acting in the film (no surprise there, since he's so brilliant as the drunk, workaholic Jimmy McNulty in the brilliant HBO TV show, The Wire).

Even though I enjoyed this adaptation of a comic, I'm scared to death to see that Snyder is slated to direct Watchmen. 300 was a one note throwaway comic by Frank Miller. Watchmen is the best comic book ever made. I am not exaggerating. It will be nearly impossible to translate to film, and while 300 was fun, Watchment will either be great or it will be a disaster (ala The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen). Time will tell, I suppose.

Maybe it's a tad incorrect to say that there's no plot. The historical story of Thermopylae is quite interesting and the film stays true to the main points. That definitely added a level of interest to the film for me.

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This year for the Interruptus, Roger Ebert could not make it due to health reasons. Jim Emerson filled in for him very admirably. It was my 11th year. I've been coming since I was an undergraduate at CU in 1996 for Pulp Fiction and the first year I missed was 2005 when I was living in Boston.

This year Jim chose to show Chinatown, a film I'd never seen before. Jim called it a perfect film in his introduction, and I have to say I agree with him. The first night, I loved it and recognized that it is a brilliant film. It was only over the course of the week, as we dissected it in fine detail that I grew to realize the depth of its brilliance. It really is a film that is meant to be seen many times over and something rich will come from each viewing.

One of the coolest things that I learned during the week was only tangentially in the film. There is a scene that takes place in the fictional Albacore Club. The real location for this scene is Avalon, on Santa Catalina Island off the coast of L.A. It turns out that Robert Towne wrote the screenplay in Two Harbors on Catalina, and this shot was an homage. I spent a week camping in Two Harbors this New Years and you can see some pictures of the trip on my set in Flickr. It's a beautiful place & I'd wish I'd known that little bit of film history while I was there.

I don't really have any thoughts on the film that I feel like sharing. If you actually read this site, you've probably noticed that I have not been updating lately, so there's nothing new in my mood. But my friend Ted encouraged me to not make a post a project. So, since this isn't a project I won't worry about perfection. I'll leave that to Polanski.

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• Cat and Mouse
• High Anxiety - Mel Brooks - 1977
• Corvette Summer Matthew Robbins- 1978-
• Small Change - François Truffaut - 1976
• Fraternity Row - Thomas J. Tobin - 1977
• Every Little Crook and Nanny - Cy Howard - 1972
• Lovers and Other Strangers - Cy Howard - 1970
• Making It - John Erman - 1971
• Escape from the Planet of the Apes - Don Taylor - 1971
• B.S. I Love You - Steven Hilliard Stern- 1971
• Lt. Robin Crusoe, U.S.N. - Byron Paul- 1966
• The Purple Rose of Cairo - Woody Allen - 1985
• The Rescuers - John Lounsbery, Wolfgang Reitherman, Art Stevens - 1977
• Watership Down - Martin Rosen - 1978
• Christian the Lion - Bill Travers - 1971
• Fantastic Planet - René Laloux - 1973
• 101 Dalmations - Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske, Wolfgang Reitherman - 1961
• Murder on the Orient Express - Sidney Lumet - 1974
• The Hot Rock - Peter Yates - 1972
• Walkabout - Nicolas Roeg - 1971
• When the Legends Die - Stuart Millar - 1972
• Junior Bonner - Sam Peckinpah - 1972
• Capain Nemo and the Underwater City - James Hill - 1969
• The Five Man Army - Don Taylor Italo Zingarelli - 1969
• No Blade of Grass - Cornel Wilde - 1970
• Get Carter - Mike Hodges - 1971
• Hell in the Pacific - John Boorman - 1968
• The Sicilian Clan - Henri Verneuil - 1969
• Murphy's War - Peter Yates - 1971
• The Great White Hope - Martin Ritt - 1970
• Tell Me That You Love Me, Junie Moon - Otto Preminger - 1970
• The Touch - Ingmar Bergman - 1971
• True Grit - Henry Hathaway - 1969
• The Godfather: Part II - Francis Ford Coppola - 1974
• W.W. and the Dixie DancekingsJohn G. Avildsen - 1975 -
• Marathon Man - John Schlesinger - 1976
• Mahogany - Berry Gordy, Tony Richardson - 1975
• Magic - Richard Attenborough - 1978
• Shanks - William Castle - 1974
• To Kill a Clown - George Bloomfield - 1972
• The Night Digger - Alastair Reid - 1971
• The Other - Robert Mulligan - 1972
• Let's Scare Jessica to Death - John D. Hancock - 1971
• House of Dark Shadows - Dan Curtis - 1970
• Race with the Devil - Jack Starrett - 1975
• My Bloody Valentine - George Mihalka - 1981
• Humanoids from the Deep - Barbara Peters, Jimmy T. Murakami - 1980
• Rabid - David Cronenberg - 1977
• Steppenwolf - Fred Haines - 1974
• Arousers
• Darktown Strutters - William Witney - 1975
• Mandingo - Richard Fleischer - 1975
• Cool Breeze - Barry Pollack - 1972
• Pretty Maids All in a Row - Roger Vadim - 1971
• Zachariah - George Englund - 1971
• Melinda - Hugh A. Robertson - 1972
• Death Race 2000 - Paul Bartel - 1975
• Hollywood Boulevard - Allan Arkush, Joe Dante - 1976
• Lipstick - Lamont Johnson - 1976
• Skyriders - Sergio Garrone - 1971
• All This and World War II - Susan Winslow - 1976
• Elvis on Tour - Robert Abel Pierre Adidge - 1972

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The second documentary for me today is Deliver Us From Evil, a heart-wrenching, unflinching and fascinating look at Fr. Oliver O'Grady, a priest in the Catholic Church who abused and molested children in the Los Angeles Archdiocese in the '70s and '80s. Amy Berg, the director, was somehow able to gain the trust of this man and get completely honest interviews from him. Like driving past a gruesome car accident, it is impossible to avert your eyes.

O'Grady begins the film by comparing the interview to a Catholic confession and expresses his hope that his victims come to the understanding that he believes that "it shouldn't have happened." Only through the course of the film do we begin to understand the lack of compassion and remorse that this man has. He may claim that he is apologetic, but in his eyes we see there is only selfishness and excuses for his actions. It is a truly scary depiction of an evil man.

Berg also spent many hours with O'Grady's victims. One has to wonder if they knew that she was interviewing their molester, or as they more accurately call him, their rapist. Would they have understood his right to tell his own story, I wonder? If I were in their situation, I'm not certain that I could have been so charitable. Their presence in the film is crucial, however. Without their stories, and the stories of their parents, it would be all too easy to forget how cataclysmic child molestation is to an entire family. The emotional heart of the film comes when two parents share how they discovered that their daughter was abused. It was not until she was an adult and Fr. O'Grady was finally arrested that the parents considered that abuse was a possibility. In fact, these particular parents posted bail for Fr. O'Grady believing that the accusations were completely false and unfounded.

The film also does a magnificent job at highlighting the particularly horrific nature of abuse by a priest of the Catholic Church. This is a man who is considered the earthly representative of God Himself. He not only holds the power of adult authority over children, but the authority of God. It is a literally a breach of a sacred trust.

The film does not stop here, either. In the end, it is a condemnation of an entire system of patriarchal and monarchical politics that can not only allow a pedophiliac priest to survive in the organization, but to thrive in it. The film makes a very good case against Fr. O'Grady's Bishop, now a Cardinal, that he personally covered up the "scandal" for political gain. It even goes so far as to blame the current Pope Benedict XVI, who presided over a group of bishops who had a responsibility to put a stop to this well known and widespread problem.

I have a couple of complaints about the film, but I need to get moving to the next documentary. The complaints are minor, really. Occasionally the film drags. There was a scene where some of the victims attempt to personally take a letter to the Pope in Vatican City. Of course, they are not even let through the door, further victimizing them and alienating them from the Church. I don't see how Berg could have left this out, but it didn't really add much to the story except to further demonize the Church as a large corporation. Also, no one speaking on behalf of the Church was interviewed (they declined). Though not the fault of Berg, it would have been interesting to hear their side of the story.

So far, I believe this is my favorite documentary up for the Oscar, even over the frontrunner, An Inconvenient Truth. Gotta run! I've got a schedule to keep!

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This week, the Starz Film Center in Denver is showing all five Oscar nominees for best documentary feature. It's a real treat, because typically one of the five, at most, is available for viewing in theaters in a given year. So, to take advantage of this, I'm pulling an all dayer and seeing the four films that I've missed back to back to back to back.

First on the list is Iraq In Fragments. Unfortunately the filmmakers decided to take the title to heart a little too aggressively. The film is in three parts: first is a story of a young boy in Baghdad, followed by the story of Sadr's supporters in the south, and finally a story of a Kurdish family. These stories show that there are many different people in the country with many different viewpoints on the war and occupation of the U.S. troops. But if director James Longley was aiming at a coherent whole for his film, the three stories just don't add up to that.

The film is maddeningly fragmented in its storytelling and visual style. There are moments where I was amazed at the intimate details Longley showed about his subjects. For instance, we see first hand the verbal and psychological abuse the boy in Baghdad endured from his boss, whom he considered like a father. But just when the film was about to reach a profound level, it jumped to another topic. There is another scene where the followers of Sadr accost and kidnap group of men who they believe to be selling alcohol, which is against their religious beliefs. Longley was able not only to film the beating of the men at the market, but also to join them in the car ride and show footage of the final destination of the kidnapping. The beating is brutal and horrible to watch, but Longley insists on fast jump cuts, constantly moving backwards and forwards in time by a few seconds. This fragmentation is simply annoying and draws attention to the film style and away from the brutality of the beating. Finally, we never know what happens to the kidnapped men, whether they are innocent as they claim, not even whether they are killed or released. Longley was obviously close to Sadr's men to be able to ride with them in their van during the kidnapping. Why did he choose not to show the final fate of the merchants?

While the film shows an intimate portrayal of life in Iraq during the U.S. invasion from a few different viewpoints, and this has value in and of itself, it does not come together as a successful film. I left the theater confused about the statement Longley was trying to make, or even if there was one. Now, off to the next doc.

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In a somewhat unprecedented move, I've decided to post about a movie I haven't seen yet. Foreign Policy has posted a thoughtful and interesting interview with Ed Zwick, director of Blood Diamond. To be perfectly honest, the previews left me underwhelmed and I wasn't a fan of The Last Samurai, Zwick's last film. But this interview reveals a director who has researched his subject in depth and the film may find a way to include an important message with its Hollywood sheen. Here's a particularly interesting quote:

There’s a temptation to think of [Africa] as a monolith as opposed to all these different countries with different problems. By telling the story of a small place, and suggesting that there are all these problems in it, you realize that all these places have their issues.

In full disclosure, the interview was conducted by a good friend of mine and Senior Editor at FP, Christine Chen.

Link to the interview.

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There is one thing about young children that will never change; they will never hesitate to tell you the truth as they see it. Seven Up! was originally intended to be a view into the state of England in 1964 through the eyes of a group of diverse seven-year-olds. The filmmakers had an agenda and they made no attempt to hide it. The film was meant to be a diatribe against the class system in England, which was extremely prevalent at the time. The children in the lower class could be found fighting, misbehaving in class, and scrounging money to go to the movies on the weekends. The upper class children were singing in Latin and practicing ballet in their classrooms, traveling to the Alps for ski vacations and even enforcing their own rules upon each other. We also hear the children's thoughts on their hopes, dreams, boyfriends and girlfriends, expectations for school, and what they think about children in other tiers of the class system. This is where the brutal honesty comes into play. The children in the lower classes simply don't have the ambition of the children in the upper classes. They don't have anyone expecting great things from them. They don't have the educational system to allow them to achieve good jobs or careers. One child, Paul, when asked if he's going to university, honestly answers "What does university mean?" On the other hand, the children in the most elite schools can name the exact prep school track they will take to university.

What none of the filmmakers knew at the time, though, was that we would actually get a chance to see what happens to these children over time. This was Michael Apted's first job out of film school. He was only a researcher on this project, tasked to find the children to include in the film. While this film was meant to be a stand alone project, Apted had the inspired notion to continue with the children every seven years, creating the mammoth and still ongoing work of The Up Series. In preparation for the release of the latest installment, 49 Up, I decided to watch all of the films in sequence, and I'll be reviewing each of them individually. This first film was one of the best, because the children have nothing to hide. We are able to see their earliest environments and personalities very clearly, with none of the walls that are inevitably built up with life experience. Even if you are tempted to skip the first films and head straight to 49 Up, I would highly recommend starting here to see the kids at their most open and honest time in life and to see first hand the children that will grow into the adults in 49 Up.

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What can I say about this film, except that Helen Mirren steals the show? She embodies Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II with such perfection that it becomes hard to believe we are watching an actress at work. The film shows the Queen and Tony Blair as human beings like anyone else: unsure of themselves, politicking and wrangling to do the right thing both personally and for the country. In comes in stark contrast to Marie Antoinette, another film about royalty in a crucial political crisis, on the edge of losing their crowns, if not their heads. The difference is that this film drops any pretension and tells the story simply and straightforwardly. It serves the subject matter well.

It is almost tragic that Mirren is so good because she overshadows a superb supporting cast with her royal presence. Michael Sheen is a new face playing the young, inexperienced and constantly grinning Prime Minister Tony Blair. James Cromwell is a joyously vitriolic and hateful Prince Philip, Elizabeth's husband. Alex Jennings has a small, but important role as the grieving and sympathetic Prince Charles.

The story itself is almost secondary to the brilliantly subtle acting. In some ways it merely serves to set up a series of conflicts and stresses on the Royal Family and their relationship with Blair. The film starts just before the death of Princess Diana in 1996 and the majority of the film concerns the arrangements of her funeral. As dull as that may sound on the surface, it turns out to be a serious crisis of tradition, culture, politics and ego. This would turn out to be the first difficulty faced by the Blair administration, but watching the film today we need no reminder that it would not be his last. There is a certain thrill in being a fly on the wall during the official meetings between Blair and the Queen, but I preferred to see the Queen in her quiet moments, such as the scene where her Land Rover breaks down in the wilderness. She is forced to sit quietly and wait, pondering the state of her country and her family until a regal stag disturbs her reverie. This is the very stag that she is on her way to hunt, but she simply sits in awe of his beauty even as we sit in awe of the beauty of the scene and Mirren's performance.

The Queen is a simple and lovely film. Stephen Frears does not clutter the story with cinematic flourishes or confusing subplots. The actors give the emotion necessary but nothing more. The only tears shed on Diana's behalf in this film are those of her people, not of her family. The Queen is always dignified, thoughtful and composed, but like David Strathairn's portrayal of Edward R. Murrow from last year's Good Night, and Good Luck, we occasionally see the merest hint of a crack in her armor, proving that she is more than royalty. She is human.

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