Melina Sue Gordon Billy Bob Thornton (back)
stars in the film "The Man Who Wasn’t There."
“The Man Who Wasn’t There” Starring:
Billy Bob Thornton, Frances McDormand Directed by: Joel and Ethan
Coen
“The Man Who Wasn’t There” is a existentialist
movie in the vein of film noir with a delicious and frightening
depth. Billy Bob Thornton’s outsider allure and the plethora
of smoke and shadows may make the movie at first seem like a simple
remake of a 1940s cinema formula. Yet as the film goes on, it
becomes apparent that it is combines some classic qualities in a
strikingly original finished project. Though the plot steals a lot
from former Coen movies like “Blood Simple” and
“Fargo” and though Tony Shaloub’s character is
basically a reprisal of his role in “Barton Fink,”
“The Man Who Wasn’t There” is so well
orchestrated that it doesn’t have to be all new to be great.
The gee-golly flavor of the characters Birdy, Frank and, to a
lesser extent, Thornton’s Ed makes the movie swing as a
period piece without ever being too much. The role literally
written for Francis McDormand gives her a great vehicle to showcase
her varied acting abilities. She is sexy, decisive and crazy. But
she, like the rest of the characters, plays her role with a
precision and restraint that makes her character realistic, if not
likable. Even with McDormand’s great performance, it is still
a very masculine movie. Though Ed is quiet, he is never soft.
Female characters are full but sparse ““ Doris and Birdy both
have to leave the screen ““ which gives the remaining
male-driven screen time a feeling of innate brutality appropriate
to existentialism and interesting to watch. The film’s pacing
is unusual but deliberate. Whereas most movies have a single,
transitory conflict, “Man” stumbles across so many
complications that the audience finds itself unfettered by
demanding plot and begins to look into other aspects of the movie.
But the film isn’t obvious enough to keep reminding the
audience that it can only exist on a screen; “The Man Who
Wasn’t There” feels like an alternate vision of what
might be going on in the next room. The strong use of shadows never
takes over enough to feel like another character, but it is
influential. What the shadows ultimately accomplish are to act as a
cue to the audience of where and how to look within the action and
the characters. This subtle tutorial of light is unique when most
of today’s movies use light only to draw attention to a
pretty face. With the solid base of the Coen brothers’
screenwriting, the actors and the photography heaps well done onto
well done, making “The Man Who Wasn’t There” a
fascinating and almost flawlessly crafted movie.
Kelsey McConnell
“Monsters, Inc.” Starring: John Goodman,
Billy Crystal Directed by: Pete Doctor
An imaginary world where monsters love to drive their cars to
work, power shortages alarm a city, and a monster’s plush
coat seems so soft to the touch, comes alive in “Monsters,
Inc.” Starring John Goodman as James P. Sullivan, aka Sulley,
a frightfully large monster with blue and purple fur, and Billy
Crystal as his best friend, Mike Wazowski, a fast talking,
lime-green, one-eyed monster, “Monsters, Inc.” presents
a world analogous to our own in the city of Monstropolis. Monsters,
Inc. is the leading energy producer and powers the city with human
children’s screams. It is the job of Scarers, led by top
Scarer Sulley and his Scare Assistant Mike, to frighten the
children behind myriad closet doors at Monsters, Inc. In a twist of
events, Sulley comes to care for a little girl, whom he names Boo
(Mary Gibbs), accidentally let in from the human world. The
residents of Monstropolis know that one touch from a human child
can kill them, leaving Sulley and Mike with many obstacles to
overcome in order to return Boo to her world. Not only do the
parallel scenarios in the monster world make the movie real, but
the relationships developed between the characters tap into our
emotions, especially the affinity that forms between Sulley and
Boo. Boo is completely believable as a little girl, from her
reddening cheeks when she cries to her spontaneous gibberish. The
relationship between Sulley and Boo is made tangible,
Sulley’s facial expressions so clearly revealing love and
care.
BVPublicity.com Billy Crystal and John Goodman voice Mike and
Sulley in "Monsters, Inc." Analogies to our own world bring us to
question how things came to be and maybe if they can change. The
mysterious Central Decontamination Agency appears at the mere
mention of the words “R3-19″, a code for the
“contamination” created by objects from the human world
that pass into Monstropolis. The monsters’ method of
acquiring power ““ scaring children to death ““ is not
much different from our extraction of resources from the earth.
These situations create a question as to whether our ways and
policies are appropriate and make us wonder how we came to accept
these almost arbitrary ideas.
A heartwarming film, “Monsters, Inc.” not only
addresses everyone’s fear, present and past, of monsters that
come out at night, but presents characters we fall in love with
while questioning big-brother-like agencies. With even suspenseful
scenes, college students can get more stimulation from this G-rated
animation than in a R-rated movie.
Taylor Kim
“Annihilation of Fish” Starring: James Earl
Jones, Lynn Redgrave Directed by: Charles Burnett
Everybody needs a fantasy to live with, and it is not good to
shoot down people’s dreams. In “Annihilation of
Fish,” three eccentric people come together and participate
in each other’s dreams. Fish (James Earl Jones) is the
Jamaican immigrant whose deep sense of purpose in life is
intertwined with wrestling with a returning Demon. Poinsettia (Lynn
Redgrave), longing to marry her imagined lover, composer Giacomo
Puccini, lodges in the same Los Angeles building in which Fish has
just rented a unit. Mrs. Muldroone (Margot Kidder) is their
landlord who cares for her weeds and is obsessed by how her last
name is spelled. Poinsettia gradually finds in her neighbor a sexy
man to replace her hopeless imaginary lover. Confronted with
Fish’s sincere response to Poinsettia’s marriage
proposal that a Jamaican cannot marry a white American, Poinsettia
insists, “But we are both old.” And they kiss. Yet
her participation as referee in his fantasy world creates a serious
problem:Â The Demon does not come back and the saddened Fish
realizes that the problem rests in the wrestler sleeping with the
referee. The film is a heart-warming mix of comedy, romance, and a
touch of surrealism that creates an eccentric film with an
existentialist undertone. It is hilarious to watch the serious
and noble James Earl Jones rolling with his big belly on the floor,
and then to watch him turn into a romantic lover. Lynn Redgrave is
fascinating in her transformation into a Madame Butterfly, as she
leans her hand on her imagined lover’s shoulders. The film
itself turns witty as the camera takes on the Demon’s view
during the wrestling fights, and as the tree shakes when the
defeated Demon is thrown out of the window. This film is an
original mix product of such talents as the UCLA graduate indie
director Charles Burnett, whose MFA thesis “Killer of
Ship” (1977) was declared a national treasure by the Library
of Congress, co-producer Paul Heller, whose impressive credits
include the 1990 Oscar-winning “My Left Foot,” and the
Jamaican/Lebanese screenwriter Anthony Winkler. “The
Annihilation of Fish” opens on today at Laemmle Music
Hall.
Azadeh Farahmand