The Grouchy Editor

I don’t know about you, but when I contemplate the SOBs on Wall Street responsible for our financial meltdown, I want blood.  And when I learn that Hollywood has made a movie about the corporate “masters of the universe” who played hell with my 401(k), I want the film rated R — so that the filmmakers are free to dispense some well-deserved carnage and gore on the guilty parties.  In short, I want Gordon Gekko’s head on a stick.

After all, wasn’t it Michael Douglas’s memorable turn as glamorous, villainous Gekko in Oliver Stone’s Wall Street that attracted so many sharks to firms like Lehman Brothers in the first place?

Alas, there is no gore to be found in Margin Call, director J.C. Chandor’s incisive take on financial panic at an investment bank reportedly based on Lehman Brothers.  There is, however, a great deal of emotional carnage in the film.

Chandor’s script depicts one day in 2008 when an entry-level analyst (Zachary Quinto) raises red flags about his company’s shaky business practices.  Faster than you can say “mortgage fraud,” the firm’s honchos are convening in the wee hours of the night to see what they can do to avert disaster.  Their choice is simple:  submit to the consequences of their own negligence, or screw business partners by selling off toxic assets, pronto.  Favored employees will grab whatever can be salvaged — and to hell with everyone else.

Margin Call is an actor’s dream job, and the cast doesn’t disappoint.  Kevin Spacey, especially, is riveting as a sales manager caught in a moral dilemma.  Does he do what’s right and retain the respect of his traders, or does he succumb to the demands of unethical superiors?  The suspense in this film derives not from what is going to happen (we know that), but from how it will happen.

Most of us don’t personally know any hedge-fund managers or Wall Street bankers.  We wonder, justifiably, what kind of monsters some of them might be.  Margin Call wants to show us the humans behind the crisis, and it does so effectively.  Turns out these guys aren’t really monsters — but you wouldn’t mistake them for angels, either.     Grade:  B+

Director:  J.C. Chandor  Cast:  Kevin Spacey, Paul Bettany, Jeremy Irons, Zachary Quinto, Penn Badgley, Simon Baker, Demi Moore, Mary McDonnell, Stanley Tucci, Aasif Mandvi  Release:  2011

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My dictionary defines melancholia as “a condition characterized by extreme depression, bodily complaints, and often hallucinations and delusions.”  The definition says nothing about frighteningly big, rogue planets on collision courses with Earth — I’m thinking “hysteria” might be a better word for that scenario.  But Melancholia is the name of the planet doing a “dance of death” with Earth in director Lars von Trier’s new movie, a strikingly original piece of work with images and themes that are haunting.

Von Trier sets up his doomsday drama at a leisurely pace, examining another type of melancholy in the debilitating depression that grips Justine (Kirsten Dunst), a new bride with the eerie ability to “know things.”  Justine’s instincts tell her that marriage to the son of her wealthy employer was a bad idea, and they also tell her things like the exact number of beans in the lottery-jar at her wedding reception … and that the star in the sky that brother-in-law John (Kiefer Sutherland) insists is Antares is no such thing — and that the glowing orb seems to get bigger every day.

If Melancholia has a weakness, it’s that Part One (“Justine”) verges on overkill; we understand that Justine is depressed, now can we please move on with things?  In Part Two (“Claire”), von Trier finally turns the screw, with disaster approaching in the sky and everyone’s world turned upside down.  This is no Deep Impact, with cardboard characters servicing the special effects.  Instead, von Trier exercises restraint, creating a creeping dread that culminates with some unforgettable scenes.

Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), Justine’s sister and a true believer in the power of ritual, begins to fall apart.  Her husband John sees his faith in science and material resources unravel.  As the ominous ball in the sky grows larger, Claire asks, “It won’t hit us?”  “Not a chance,” John replies.  Claire persists:  “But what if your scientists have miscalculated?”

Ironically, it is only Justine, the impulsive, runaway bride, who remains calm.  But her take on the pending end of the world (presumably von Trier’s take, as well) is less than reassuring.  “The Earth is evil,” she says, “We don’t need to grieve for it.  Nobody will miss it.”  Even more unsettling is her reply to a question posed by Claire.  “Life is only on Earth,” she says, adding, “and not for long.”

All of the actors are first rate in Melancholia, but this is von Trier’s triumph.  The images are dreamlike, and his use of Wagner’s prelude to Tristan und Isolde on the soundtrack is stirring.  The themes are downbeat, yet absorbing.  Melancholia is no battle between religion and science, because they both take it on the chin.        Grade:  A-

Director:  Lars von Trier  Cast:  Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Kiefer Sutherland, Charlotte Rampling, John Hurt, Alexander Skarsgard, Stellan Skarsgard, Brady Corbet, Udo Kier  Release:  2011

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When The Human Centipede (First Sequence) crawled onto the scene last year, I was — sort of — among the much-maligned movie’s defenders.  Sure, it was a low-budget horror flick, but director Tom Six’s little creep-fest was as original as the dickens.  Yes, its central set-up — a mad doctor wants to surgically connect three people, anus to mouth — was off-putting, but Six wasn’t overly graphic and his approach was more creepy than clinical.

Mostly, the first Human Centipede was a hoot.  Dieter Laser, as crazed Dr. Heiter, was a modern-day Vincent Price, and his delusions of grandeur were ripe for satire.  By the time South Park delivered a hilarious send-up of the “centipede,” Six’s small European horror movie had gone from underground cult favorite to campy cultural phenomenon.  How could a sequel top that?  Six makes an attempt by dispensing with most of the original film’s black humor and replacing it with explicitness — which doesn’t really work; what we are left with is a whole lot of unpleasantness.

Dr. Heiter is missing from the sequel, replaced by Martin (Laurence R. Harvey), a Norman Batesian endomorph who lives with his mother, works at an underground parking garage, and fantasizes endlessly about the first Centipede movie.  The first half of Centipede 2 is padded with all-too-familiar psycho-boy staples:  Martin’s childhood sexual abuse, his domineering mother, his stunted sexuality, and his preoccupation with bizarre hobbies.  This is all just filler to get us to the main event.

What you think of the last part of Centipede 2 depends on what kind of filmgoer you are.  If you are jaded and/or detached, the type of viewer who analyzes special effects rather than cringe at the sight of fake blood, you might appreciate the graphic depiction of Martin’s “surgery,” which he accomplishes with duct tape, a crowbar, and a staple gun.  If, on the other hand, you blanch at the sight of violence in the movies, then this is decidedly not the film for you.      Grade:  C

Director:  Tom Six   Cast:  Laurence R. Harvey, Ashlynn Yennie, Maddi Black, Kandace Caine, Dominic Borrelli, Georgia Goodrick, Emma Lock, Katherine Templar, Bill Hutchens, Vivien Bridson   Release:  2011

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These are a few things that Drive has going for it:  1) the hottest actor of the year, Ryan Gosling; 2) arguably the most promising actress of 2010, Carey Mulligan; 3) a director, Nicolas Winding Refn, who brings a distinctive European flavor to the project; 4) handsome production design and striking visuals.

None of that matters, because Drive goes nowhere thanks to a lackluster story and characters who are thinner than windshield-wiper fluid.  It’s all very frustrating, because the film would seem to have so much potential.  Yet once again, Hollywood puts polish and shine on a movie and neglects the most important element, good storytelling.

Gosling plays “the driver,” an enigmatic Steve McQueen type, a soft-spoken loner who is on the wrong side of the law but who harbors — you guessed it — a kinder, gentler side.  Just in case we overlook this aspect of his personality, we are treated to scenes of Gosling watching cartoons with a kid.  Somehow, I can’t picture McQueen taking time out in The Getaway to watch an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants.

The driver decides to bless a girl next door with his niceness, which leads to big problems.  Mulligan, so good in An Education and in Never Let Me Go, has the thankless role of “the girl” in another example of lousy parts for women in Hollywood “A” movies.  Mulligan plays a single mother (dad is in prison) whose main purpose in Drive is to cast sad looks at the men in her life:  expressions of longing for Gosling, and looks of despair for her no-good husband, an ex-con called “Standard.”  (I checked, but I could find no character in the film named “Automatic.”)

The supporting cast is also wasted.  Bryan Cranston is the foolish sidekick whom any graduate of Movies 101 will tell you is expendable in a movie like this.  Christina Hendricks looks fetching but comes and goes in no time at all.  Albert Brooks, as a foul-tempered money man, is one of the film’s few bright spots.  The undernourished plot is a heist-gone-wrong story that you’ve seen many times before.

Refn, who inexplicably took home a Best Director award from the Cannes Film Festival for this mediocrity, wants his film to be like Shane with car chases.  Shane was cool and had lots of soul.  Drive looks cool, but has no soul.      Grade:  C+

Director:  Nicolas Winding Refn  Cast:  Ryan Gosling, Carey Mulligan, Bryan Cranston, Albert Brooks, Oscar Isaac, Christina Hendricks, Ron Perlman, Kaden Leos, Jeff Wolfe, James Biberi, Russ Tamblyn  Release:  2011

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I wanted to like Julia’s Eyes, really I did.  It’s been a long time since we’ve had a good blind-damsel-in-distress movie, maybe since Audrey Hepburn turned off the lights in 1967’s Wait Until Dark.  Alas, despite a handsome production, nifty direction, and some good acting, Julia’s Eyes is … dumb.

The thriller begins promisingly with the death of Julia’s twin sister Sara (both played by Belen Rueda), apparently by suicide.  Both women suffer from a degenerative eye disease.  Sara had gone completely blind, and it’s just a matter of time before Julia does, as well.  But was Sara’s death really a suicide?  Julia doesn’t believe so, but can she convince anyone else?  Have we seen this plot before?

Director Guillem Morales’s film goes wrong where nearly all films of this type do:  far-fetched storytelling.  The first half of the movie is basically a whodunit, but Who Did It becomes obvious early on.  Once we have that information, the movie turns into a routine killer-chasing-heroine exercise, with stale elements borrowed from The Silence of the Lambs, Rear Window, and yes, Wait Until Dark.

Unlike its esteemed predecessors, Julia’s Eyes lacks originality.  Instead, it has an abundance of clichés:  When Julia has an opportunity to stab the killer with a knife, she jabs him in the leg — that way, he won’t die and can continue to chase her.  We are asked to believe that the bad guy, played by an actor blessed with movie-star looks, is angry at the world because he feels “invisible” in day-to-day life.  And then there are the scary scenes that turn out to be — you guessed it — nightmares.

Some people will be drawn to this movie because one of its producers is Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth).  But as we’ve learned from Steven Spielberg, attaching a big name to a film project is no guarantee of quality.  Julia’s Eyes is frustratingly stupid.      Grade:  C+

Director:  Guillem Morales  Cast:  Belen Rueda, Lluis Homar, Pablo Derqui, Francesc Orella, Joan Dalmau, Boris Ruiz, Daniel Grao, Clara Segura, Catalina Munar  Release:  2010

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