The FilmNerds Blog

A film about a silent film actor would, of course, have to be silent.  George is an A-list actor in the late 1920’s, the silent era, and has a face that is made for the silver screen.  The film, The Artist is about this acclaimed actor’s descent into obscurity brought on by the film industry’s transition from Silent to Sound.  George disappears from the lime light just as Peppy, a doe-eyed fan of George’s, is bolstered into stardom by the actor himself just prior to his downfall.  Peppy’s star rises just as George’s plummets.

The Artist is a silent film, yet doesn’t wander into the realm of a “novelty”.  I wasn’t sitting in my seat thinking, “This film is silent.”, and I think that in and of itself is an accomplishment, especially this day in age.  It’s a silent film about a silent film star not willing to do films with sound.  It’s Meta in that the film itself is a representation of the subject.  The transition from silent to sound is somewhat comparable to the transition from 2D to 3D.  Though the movement to sound was quicker and more widespread than the 3D move, critics and actors alike wrote it off as a non-threat.  They scoffed at it as though it were a ridiculous idea and that it would take away from the film experience.  In order to make a successful film about a silent film actor not willing to concede to the sound movement, it’s obvious to me now that the film itself had to be silent.

In George’s refusal to act in a film with sound he, in a way, refuses to live in a world with sound as well.  There’s a great dream sequence where we, the audience, actually hear the sounds in the dream along with George.  In his dream, George lives in a world with only music and no sound effects or dialogue and he is just as surprised to hear these sounds in his dream as an audience would be in the late 20’s having never seen a film with sound.

The Artist makes up for its lack of dialogue with incredible style and, though it’s a simple film, tons of imagery.  The cinematography is a beautifully crisp black and white with some wonderful well-framed shots.

The Artist has all of the feel and charm of a real old timey silent film.  From the mannerisms, movements and reactions of the actors to the scene transitions, The Artist is a true silent film and in no way a gimmick.  But what it represents and the story it tells without dialogue is the real achievement here.  To create such an in depth character study while at the same time telling a delightful love story with no dialogue is a fantastic achievement, indeed.

NOTE: FilmNerds has been fortunate enough to receive an early review of the upcoming film The Muppets from one our readers, Benjamin Self. We are extremely grateful for Benjamin’s contribution and proudly present his advance screening review below:  

There have been a lot of reboots of popular children’s franchises in the past few years, but none as sincere as the new Muppets movie. Jason Segel stars as Gary, big brother to Walter, a new muppet character voiced by Peter Linz. Younger audience members will recognize the voice of Tutter the mouse from Bear in the Big Blue House. Amy Adams plays Mary, a school teacher and Gary’s longtime girlfriend.

As Gary and Walter grow up together in the film’s opening sequence, we see Walter realizing that he’s different from everyone else. He doesn’t grow taller like his older brother, and feels like an outsider among the other children. Then Walter discovers The Muppet Show (1976-1981) and immediately connects.  Walter obsesses over the old Henson characters, watching taped re-runs again and again. When Gary and Mary decide to take a trip to LA to celebrate their 10^th anniversary of going steady, Gary invites Walter to come along and tour the original Muppet Studios.  On a tour of the now derelict studios, a crestfallen Walter decides to sneak into Kermit’s old office to get a closer look. As he’s admiring all the memorabilia from the old show, he’s interrupted and has to hide from cut-throat oilman Tex Richman (Chris Cooper). Richman lays out a plan to buy up the old Muppet Studios and demolish them in order to drill for oil. However, Kermit’s old “Rich and Famous” contract states that if the Muppets can raise ten million dollars before the contract expires, they can buy back the studio. Armed with this revelation, Walter and the gang set out to reunite the Muppets and raise the money to save the studios.

Make no mistake, this film was made with older audience members in mind. The movie is loaded with cameos from the original Muppet movies and nods to bits from the old shows; even Andy Rooney gets into the act in the opening musical number. And the musical numbers are fantastic. They’re hugely energetic and have no problem holding the attention of younger viewers. Fans of the original show will appreciate the verve and wit they remember from the older films (think A Muppet Christmas Carol).  There’s really nothing original about this Muppets movie, and that’s just fine. Director James Bobin understands all the things that made us fall in love with these characters when we were young, and he’s distilled it down into 100 minutes of nostalgic euphoria. Segel and Adams are earnest and sincere for every minute of screen time, and do a great job of engaging the young children who might not be able to appreciate the tribute.  Chris Cooper is over-the-top and genuinely funny; he even got to ham it up with his own song. This movie has something for everyone but the cynic. It’s just too sweet.

Matt and Francesca Scalici are back with another Cinematriomony podcast! This week, the married FilmNerds take on indie thriller Martha Marcy May Marlene and discuss Elizabeth Olsen’s spectacular performance, the film’s controversial ending (SPOILER ALERT, as always) and whether it is too dark for a normal human to enjoy watching. Download at the link below or find it on iTunes by searching “FilmNerds”.

DOWNLOAD: Cinematrimony – Martha Marcy May Marlene

As someone who was born in the state of Alabama, it’s impossible for me to watch Roll Tide/War Eagle, the latest production from ESPN Films, without feeling some pretty intense emotions. As you’ll see in the film, which airs Tuesday night at 8 pm Eastern on ESPN, being a part of this rivalry means that true objectivity and impartiality is not something you can ever realistically have when looking at the other side, no matter what any journalist covering either of the two teams may tell you. It’s hard to describe to an outsider how all-encompassing, how mind-blowingly intense, and at times how truly miserable it is to be a part of this rivalry – but this movie comes as close as it gets. If I ever need to choose one document to explain what it’s like to live in the state of Alabama, this movie would be it.

That sounds like extremely high praise but it’s really more of an indication of how completely misunderstood this rivalry has been for the length of its existence until very recently. The nation was shocked by the bizarre incident of an Alabama fan poisoning a group of landmark trees on Auburn’s campus last year and while it was certainly an abnormal occurrence, people who live in this state have heard of stranger and more violent happenings resulting from the Iron Bowl rivalry. To the rest of the nation, sports rivalries are something worth getting excited about for a few days a year, the days that the games are occurring. In Alabama, without exception, it’s something that is a part of every single day of your life. That includes Christmas (Auburn or Alabama ornaments on every tree), Thanksgiving (families mentioning Iron Bowl victories among things they are thankful for), and even your own wedding day (so help you God if you planned your wedding on a fall Saturday).

It’s a strange and unique phenomenon that has badly needed exploring by a talented filmmaker and director Martin Khodabakhshian handles it with delicacy by giving both sides equal time to explain their greatest moments and their perspective of the other side. He also chooses both some the most beloved figures from each side (Greg McElroy and Mark Ingram from Alabama, Pat Dye and Bo Jackson from Auburn) as well as some of the most controversial figures from each side (Harvey Updyke, the aforementioned tree-poisoner from Alabama, scandal-plagued Heisman-winner Cam Newton from Auburn) for interviews and manages to get some real insight from every person involved, which is no easy feat considering they are talking about one of the most sensitive subjects they’ve ever been a part of.

ESPN Films in its short life has already produced some of the most fascinating and deeply moving sports documentaries of all time, particularly during its 30 for 30 series that ran on ESPN last year. It has explored much darker and more serious subjects than the Iron Bowl in films like June 17th, 1994 and The Two Escobars (their two finest works so far, in my opinion) but when it comes to getting to the heart of a unique American sports phenomenon, I don’t know that ESPN or anyone else has done a better job than what we see in Roll Tide/War Eagle.

The segment of the film focusing on the strange and sad story of Harvey Updyke was probably the most effective part of the film for me, even though it is the least representative of the normal state of affairs here in Alabama. Updyke is a man who feels both ashamed and astonished at what he did but also deep down has some satisfaction and justification and even pride about what he did. He serves as a parable of what can happen when one lets this rivalry burrow too deeply into the mind and heart. At the end of the day, letting the rivalry get your emotions flowing is part of what makes it fun but you have to learn to turn it off or you could end up like poor Harvey.

Perhaps the most impressive feat of the film is the filmmakers’ resistance to draw some sort of narrative conclusion involving the April tornados that ravaged Tuscaloosa. Many of the less nuanced in-state journalists lept at the opportunity to decide that Alabama and Auburn fans had somehow had their perspectives changed by the tragedy, that it had brought them together and made them forget their silly, petty quarrels. The problem with that viewpoint is that it assumes there is something inherently wrong or petty about the Iron Bowl rivalry. There are freaks out there who take things too far but for the majority of us fans, it’s the source of some of our greatest joys in life. The truth is, people in Alabama love this rivalry and wouldn’t know what to do without it. That’s why the rivalry didn’t diminish one bit after the tornadoes and why it never will as long as both teams continue to care deeply about football.

The 23rd James Bond film has been announced. Titled Skyfall, the film will see Daniel Craig return, will be directed by Sam Mendes, and will not continue the Vesper/QUANTUM arc from the first two Craig 007 films.

Of course, rumors of this type have been flying around for months. Javier Bardem will, in fact, play a villain, and the script will be written by Bond vets Purvis & Wade, in addition to star screenwriter John Logan (Any Given Sunday, The Aviator, Rango). I’ve only been burned by Bond films twice. Die Another Day was an experience I did not enjoy, but Quantum of Solace really stung. I loved Casino Royale for its sure-handedness, twisting narrative, and cinematic flair. I was optimistic about Quantum bringing on a German director, and its first trailer was impressive. Fellow Film Nerd Ben Flanagan spied hints of the Bourne Supremacy influence early on, but I maintained that if the series stuck with the style established in Casino Royale, the hand-held frenetic action that worked for Bourne would not be shoe-horned into this franchise. Of course, I was wrong. In addition to a rushed script and a bored, License to Kill -flavored tone, the film was, in fact, very dependent on the 2nd Unit action choreography and photography of Dan Bradley.

So, here we are, and I’m honestly trying very hard to be optimistic, and that’s a big problem. The problem with today’s James Bond series is that these movies cannot afford to be bad anymore. The great thing about the grand history of this series is that it always survived bad or under-performing films. In fact, the ability for a Bond film to be critically or financially disappointing gave us some of the character’s gems – the low-grossing masterpiece On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, for example. When I walked out of The World Is Not Enough, which has a thrilling first act that quickly loses steam, I wasn’t hopeless that Bond would disappear forever. In fact, there was another film already in the works. What I didn’t know was that this film would be financed, packaged, and released in a fashion similar to a Lord of the Rings or Spider-Man movie. Die Another Day had to be one of the biggest films of the year, or it would be considered a failure. Consider this: GoldenEye was produced for $58 million. It was a huge success, so Tomorrow Never Dies (an underrated entry, in my opinion) was rushed into production, finally breaching the $100 million budget mark. James Bond movies are no longer kitschy, escapist adventures. Now, they have to be full-on event movies with budgets usually reserved for Roland Emmerich pictures.

Here’s what I’d like to see from the franchise, which has been mostly well-protected from the Hollywood economic system from producers Barbara Brocolli and Michael G. Wilson.

There is Safety in Numbers.

Tone down the budget, crank down the risk. I’d much rather see a fun, creative Bond film every two years than a big, bloated “event” Bond movie every five. Treat it like a TV show, hire a writing staff, and crank some of these out. I should credit The Hollywood Saloon’s John Jansen with opening my eyes to this Bond philosophy. Again, so much of the strength of EON Productions is their insular nature. The only thing these guys need the studios for is distribution, so why even let Hollywood in the door to begin with?

Stay Away from the Auteurs.

Can you really blame kitchen-sink directors like Marc Forster and Sam Mendes if they flub a James Bond movie? The appeal of these movies are not the directorial vision or thematic strength they show off, rather their suspense and character moments. Both of these directors do care about character, but they usually prioritize character under theme (Revolutionary Road, American Beauty, Stay, Finding Neverland). When the series excels, it is under the guidance of a scrappy, skilled craftsman with an ear for dialogue and a mind for visual strategy (Peter Hunt, John Glenn, Martin Campbell). I’d prefer the producers hired a team of young British directors in the vein of Attack the Block‘s Joe Cornish to trade between smaller films, rather than putting such a big task on one man’s shoulders.

Make it British.

I understand that Bond’s adventures were always on a global scale, but I think it’s important to continually show us his regional centrality. In the 60′s, Bond represented a meddling empire. In the 90′s he represented a progressive, humanist “fixer”. It’s important for us to see the “Britishness” of James Bond, as well as his contrast with the government (which has been handled nicely in the newest films). This is why it’s important for a Bond actor to have roots in the Commonwealth, as well as Bond directors. Again, this shouldn’t be a global property just because of its global implications.

Make it Fun.

Contrary to popular belief, Casino Royale was an extremely fun motion picture. Its Bond was brash, rude, and funny, unlike the icy Bond of Quantum of Solace. The action scenes in Casino Royale are among the most playful and imaginative of recent years. In fact, the two biggest action scenes in that film – the opening foot chase and airport car chase – end with quite an ironic punchline. I hope that in Skyfall, as well as in future Bond productions, this wry sense of mischief isn’t traded for icy brutality. On the whole, I could certainly use more Brosnan “smugness” and less Craig “thugness”. I do think Craig has it in him to crack some jokes, but it’s up to the writers, producers, and directors to give him that playground.

Again, I’m forcing my optimism for Skyfall, and I really wouldn’t have to if I knew there was a 24th Bond film that could potentially redeem it. I’m troubled by the scale and risk of these productions. However, I’m also encouraged that, at the very least, the producers are attempting to put some sort of polish on their films. I guess I’ll see everyone at the theater next year, listening to Tom Petty’s newest 007 single, “Skyfallin”.

*In Wonder Mill Films news, we’ve announced our third major project, as well some updates on our newly released feature film, The Nocturnal Third. Check out all the details at www.facebook.com/wondermillfilms and www.thenocturnalthird.com!