Another Movie Review This Week: Frost/Nixon - Boring/Lies

Anyone can become Richard Milhous Nixon. They mass-produce the little masks and sell them during Halloween. In 2008’s Frost/Nixon, Frank Langella becomes the notorious ex-president almost as well as Nixon himself, complete with a prosthetic nose and several pounds of Hollywood makeup. But it wasn’t just a mask – Langella captured the core of Nixon, a broken-down old man who feels remorse for the Watergate scandal. Only, what actually happened is much different.
The fallen president has recently resigned from office. He’s old, fat and discouraged about retiring until David Frost (Michael Sheen) baits Nixon with a surplus of cash in return for an unscripted interview. Nixon takes the money like a greedy child.
Frost, with his sculpted hair, plastic smile and oblivious attitude can’t get anyone to take him seriously, not even the audience in some cases. Because Frost had just been canned from his popular talk show, the Nixon interview was just a way for the unemployed man to make himself famous and meaningful again, but even Frost doesn’t seem incredibly concerned with the outcome.
For months, Frost’s team of investigators prepared hard-hitting questions to “take Nixon down,” implying that this vendetta is what America needed to move on. Frost picked some intelligent companions who uncover some damning evidence, but Frost also chose boring and two-dimensional people. Sam Rockwell plays the underdeveloped James Reston Jr. who’s only personality trait is getting angry about the former president. Executive editor Bob Zelnick (Oliver Platt) sits in the back, quietly sulking, occasionally angry about Nixon. Even John Birt (Matthew Macfayden) only defends Frost’s every boneheaded move and again, gets angry about Nixon.
The rest of the cast are forgettable, including whatever chick Frost was boning and Nixon’s uptight aides. Director Ron Howard truly only invested in Frost and Nixon, pitting them against each other to make the interview seem of extreme importance.
Historically, the interviews were insignificant in the sense that they didn’t change anything and were mostly forgotten. And watching the original tapes is little more than two boring people talking candidly. Unlike the drama on screen, Nixon almost never raised his voice and Frost’s stoic face never cracked.
The movie doesn’t mention that Frost interviewed Nixon almost ten years prior to the big one. In 1968, Frost visited the White House with his mother, celebrating Christmas with the Nixons for a campy fluff piece on how great America is. The interview was bland and lifeless, and that attitude didn’t change much by 1977.
Even what the interviews were supposed to signify was lackluster. Ford had already pardoned Nixon, so admitting guilt in Watergate would have done nothing. Besides, Nixon never did admit guilt, unlike what the melodrama in the film suggested.
All the interview did was line the pockets of an old, retired thief. All the movie did was make an unimportant debate seem like a justice was finally brought forth. It wasn’t.
But Ron Howard’s creation came out just after Obama was sworn into office, which wasn’t mere coincidence. In interviews and DVD featurettes, Howard compared Nixon’s abuse of power to President Bush’s similar administration. Howard was hoping to encourage a repeat in history, perhaps with a different ending.
So far this hasn’t happened, but if it does, one can expect the same results. Why would anybody expect a president, let alone anyone, admit to felonies and treason on national television? The Frost/Nixon interviews weren’t exactly Judge Judy. Bush would make the same excuses for his civilian-bombing wars, wiretapping and abuses of power that Nixon did. And Bush would also get away with it, several million dollars richer.
Broadcast journalism employs a lot of theatrics, but the leaps and bounds Frost/Nixon makes in the fact department are absurd. First of all, what’s with all the pseudo-documentary interviews with characters in-between scenes? It’s as if the drama couldn’t speak for itself, so Howard gave his spiritless supporting actors a couple more lines to explain the plot, all while inaccurately representing the real people they were based on.
The tension-building phone call between Nixon and Frost never happened, but from the screenwriter’s point of view, it makes sense to include it. It made the final interview seem like a bloodthirsty fight to the finish, pumping up the action so the climax was more rewarding. But one question remains: if they original story didn’t have enough action to begin with, so much that you have to falsify history to include excitement, why make a movie about it at all?

Entre Les Murs (from NAU's French Film Festival)

Entre Les Murs (Between The Walls and known as The Class in America) is a 2008 French docu-drama based on the real-life experiences of an inner-city school teacher named François Bégaudeau (played by himself under the name Mr. Marin.)

So you write this autobiographical account of problem kids in your (presumably) underfunded public school and then play yourself in the movie adaptation with a different name? Already this movie seems a little bizarre.

And it is. Hundreds of movies have been made about classroom settings, where screwed up kids are somehow made normal and educated by some random teacher. In fact, most adult movies about high schools make them out to be prisons (an accurate description if I say so myself) and every example from Sister Act 2 to Notes On A Scandal to the more recent release Precious just seem to up the ante. Make the kids as dark and troubled as possible.

Give a fat black girl an AIDS baby with Down syndrome and another on the way, impregnated by her rapist father. Make the girl stupid as hell and make her mother abusive and make it seem hopeless. Bam! Send in a lesbian teacher named Blu Rain and then, everything is better.

Which is why The Class is so out of it’s own league. None of the “problem” kids have any serious issues with drugs, sex, violence or even rock and roll. Their main issue is they’re a bunch of lazy teenagers. It’s a little more realistic and easier to relate to when the story isn’t bogged down with melodrama that most people don’t see in their high school experience. Drugs, death, etc, happens, but it’s not omnipresent.

As far as I can remember in high school, it blew as bad as being incarcerated. You couldn’t leave when you wanted, there were cops everywhere and the teachers didn’t care what you learned, so long as you passed the AIMS test (a type of educational parole) and didn’t complain. There were plenty of kids killing themselves with guns, razors or needles, but otherwise it was mostly boring. It wasn’t some kind of twisted soap opera. School is prison, sure, but it’s not exactly Oz.

In the end, the teacher in The Class really doesn’t change much in the attitude of the kids. He does a helluva good job compared to American school teachers, but he still can’t influence them deeply. So if even awful French education systems are better than American’s and can’t push this boulder uphill, maybe public school isn’t the answer.

No Understanding for Old Men

I rewatched No Country For Old Men and remembered all the confusion the movie caused two years ago. I wanted to write an explanation for those who "don't get it", but I've completely forgotten what I had to say. So I'm going on a tangent and maybe I’ll hit something.

Expect spoilers.

The Coen Brothers aren't inclined to explain the symbolism in their movies, which is why sometimes they confuse an audience. By the end of Barton Fink, Burn After Reading, Fargo and especially No Country, a lot of folks asked, what was the point of watching that?

You're not gonna find an explanation from the directors, but luckily No Country was their first adaption, so we can look to the book.

Wait, Cormac McCarthy is nearly as reclusive and ambiguous as the late J.D. Salinger. Oh well, you can read the book anyway and have a much closer guess.

It helps to note that the main character is Sheriff Bell, not Llewellyn Moss (played by Josh Brolin, the guy who dies in the middle). Here is a man caught in a vast wasteland overflowing with unspeakable violence and according to him, it didn't use to be this way. Now everything he ever understood is in chaos.

Still, the story centers around Moss, who stole $2 million dollars and let greed ruin his life. Everyone he knows or cares about is dead by the end of the film. It’s kind of a metaphor, so don’t look at it straight on.

Moss has the ultimate showdown with Anton Chigurh, more than once. This is because, really, Anton Chigurh represents the Grim Reaper. Anton, dressed in all black, carries an unusual weapon made for killing cattle instead of a scythe because in 1980 Americans reaped a much different crop. With few exceptions, anyone who meets or "sees" Anton meets a violent and untimely demise. One minor character asks, "Are you gonna shoot me?"

"That depends," Anton replies. "Do you see me?"

He says this with a wide, sadistic grin. He enjoys killing because he has nothing to lose. And undoubtedly, few people have met the Grim Reaper and lived to tell the tale (except for Bill and Ted).

Then there's his weird coin flipping habit, made to prove that death is all chance, but in every way it's inevitable. Everyone, from Moss to Sheriff Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) to Carson Wells (Woody Harrelson) deeply fears Anton (or should). He's the ultimate, formidable enemy and no one can stop him. They can only accept his existence.

Bell deals with Anton differently than everyone else, who get their heads blown off. He quits his job, finally “outmatched” by his environment. On his first day, Bell has nothing to do but sit quietly, muse over depressing dreams and wait for death to come anyway.

Somehow the ending is the most hated part of the film, but Bell's dream is the whole point of the movie. He describes it as his father traveling far ahead, starting a fire and keeping the cold, surrounding darkness warm. That's what death means to Bell -- being taken out of disastrous circumstances and into warmth with long lost relatives.

Only Carla Jean, Moss's wife, understands and doesn't completely fear Anton (Death). When she is confronted by Anton in the end, she calls him out on his insane nature. But arguing with Death doesn't get her far. It is only implied that she dies, but that implication is best. Here, she accepted her fate and fought for her life, if only using words. Out of all the characters in the film/book, she made her life the most meaningful.

But it all ends. Blah blah blah. The point of watching No Country for Old Men is to remind yourself that the world is violent, cold and dark and one day, it'll catch up to you. So it asks you, how do you face the callous cattle killing of Anton?

If you look at No Country for Old Men (even the title is directed at Sheriff Bell) this way, maybe you’ll appreciate the film a lot more. I suggest you rent it again and see if the message rings a little more true.

FAREWELL RIDE (Free book download)

I wrote a short story over the weekend to accompany some weird images I found once. You can download it for free. It's seven pages including images. The story is only about two paragraphs long.
It's just a little something I made that's supposed to be pretty.

You can download it at:
http://filthfiller.weebly.com/words.html

or

http://rapidshare.com/files/352178773/FAREWELL_RIDE.pdf.html


Thanks.

How to improve your life in three weeks or less!

dye your hair random colors!

In order to make your life exponentially better you must first add in shit. If you do something shitty, say you go to the world's cheapest, ugliest, worst bowling alley and your game could never be actively worse. So from there, every bowling event will be better. The tip is to plan beforehand to have your personal worst bowling game ever, drink a ton and revel in the joy of failure.

You can make your life exponentially better just by adding shitty elements to it!

So go to a seedy Chinatown restaurant that gives you colon cancer, quit your job and work in a shoelace factory and cut off your fingers in the garbage disposal. Soon you will realize how precious life can be!

Spike and Mike's Sick and Twisted Animation Festival

When you hear the title, Spike and Mike's Sick and Twisted Animation Festival, you may think it's just a gaudy, violent and crude occasion for low-lifes who laugh at poo poo jokes to come out in public and scare the normals. I was hoping for that more than anything when Spike and Mike came to Flagstaff's Orpheum theater and it more than delivered.

But more than just inappropriate humor, Spike and Mike have aimed to showcase short animation that is foreign or independent, the type of artistic sweat that you may never see otherwise. The aim of the hosts may just be to act indecent, but they also warm the artistic heart.

It's also a throwback to a forgotten culture. I remember growing up that there used to be short animations before feature films. Now what do you get? Bradford fucking Howe, the Screenvision guy trying to sell you a damn cellphone or shell your soul over to the Navy. Unless it's Pixar, you don't get an appetizer before the main event. You get commercials and that's disgusting, not to mention soulless.

The 70's and 80's were full of independence: independent theaters, film fests, underground comics and animated shorts. These days, everything is a cookie-cutter chain store selling you shit from China. Things like Avatar and Wall*E should have big stickers that say MADE IN TAIWAIN all over it. Our entertainment is fake and boring and it's always been this way, but at least thirty years ago we had other options.

Spike and Mike (and little theaters like the Orpheum) are keeping ideas of independence alive. Their festival is brilliant, inspired and above all, controversial. It's not some bullshit, wiped-up and glossed over film about how we all need to be nice or save the environment. It's a feeding frenzy for those feverish primal urges everyone gets and a damn good excuse to get drunk while enjoying "the simple pleasures" in life.

It began with the eerie "Who's Hungry?" by David Oochs, which luckily I have found on YouTube. It's an eerie, dark retelling of Hansel and Gretel, perhaps the way it should have been told, but with some strong imagery invoking Hostel, a hand reaching from a blender, grabbing at a little girl's skull.

There were a lot of zombie flicks, such as Chainsaw Nurse and Touchdawn of the Dead. Zombies are just so easy to film, yet (as Shaun of the Dead proved) so good for humor. There were also rambunctious owls, dogs with electric collars and all the things you can dream of.

There were the occasional penis cartoons, satisfying the most primal desires, and maybe it's mindless entertainment. It's still beautiful and funny and important. Animation is an art that modern audiences are losing, Pixar nonwithstanding. Spike and Mike's Sick and Twisted Animation Festival is a celebration of an unappreciated, underground culture. We need more things like this in the world.