Category Archives: Film

Articles analyzing or offering particular responses to cinema.

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Friday Films: Western Double-Feature

"That'll be the day."

We stopped off at Mr. Chicken first, ordering our roasted half-chickens with pommes. We came back and chowed down to the bones, bared the wall and plugged the laptop into the projector. Up went the Duke, with a blaring soundtrack at his back, riding toward us alone across a vast southwestern prairie. We were on the porch with the rest of the Edwards family, waiting for Ethan to climb down from his horse and amble in for his close-up, all stoic and macho and lionhearted.

For all the fun we poked at it, it’s hard to deny that The Searchers is a classic of classics.

We took a bathroom break and then sat back down for a classic Eastwood flick, Unforgiven, choosing arguably one of that icon’s best as well. I’ve already written plenty about that one here.

It was a good time to be men, and to realize how different we “men” are from the men in these films. I’ve always wondered if I could make it in the late 1800′s, with all its stark frontierism, horses and guns – a place and time so devoid of entertainment opportunities that the whole family is abuzz with exhilaration at the arrival of a poorly written letter. Passing the days slogging through mud to separate feverish pigs, digging holes for fence posts and gathering firewood so the family won’t freeze to death is a far cry from my list of chores growing up (mow the yard, skim the pool, recycle the cans, etc.).

One thing that I do recognize as remaining constant is the desire to sit and… be. In Unforgiven, Gene Hackman’s dream is to build his little house with a porch where he can sit out in the evenings and smoke his pipe and watch the sunset. In The Searchers, John Wayne relaxes on the porch steps of his brother’s house and muses upon his travels while the sky turns from yellow and blue to orange and indigo. All the Tivo’s, DVR’s, high-speed Internet connections, and Netflix envelopes in the world don’t hold up in comparison to the desire I have to enjoy the same. To sit out on a porch of my own, smoke my pipe and watch the same sun that set in 1868 set over me… That’ll be the day.

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Film Fridays: Field of Dreams

Today’s Film:

Some of the films I offer up for these Film Fridays are a bit obscure – they haven’t been seen by everybody. Others are quite well-known, if not as appreciated as I wish they were. And still others, like today’s selection, are usually considered classics. So it goes for Field of Dreams. There is plenty to say about this simple little baseball film. It’s been quoted, it’s been mocked, it’s been praised for being one of the only 90s Costner films without the obligatory butt shot. The truth is, somewhere around the turn of the century (that is, 1999 – 2001), sports movies underwent a slight change. The straight inspirational stories morphed into melodramatic accounts of underdogs proving their mettle, and so we got tales like Remember the Titans, The Rookie and Miracle among many others. Now, most of these films remain worthwhile, but they often seem cut from a Disney-fied archetypal mold. Sports became about winning and proving something, not about personal growth. Compare the sports movies of recent years to some of the classics like today’s pick or another classic like Hoosiers. Were these predecessors about winning and showing up the bigger, badder team and/or colliding against some societal stereotype? Or, on the contrary, were they about drawing together as a community, learning about each other, and having faith that what mattered was how one transcends his own circumstances rather than how he sticks it to the other side? Some recent films have kept this idea, but they are few; most are just about winning and losing. This is why I cherish a movie like Field of Dreams – because it is hardly “just a movie about baseball.” Rather, baseball is “just a metaphor for something bigger.”

One of the first films I like to show whenever I lead a Theology and Film night is this simple little story of a man who hears voices and decides to build a baseball field in the middle of his cornfield. I tell those who gather to watch that if this film is about anything, it is about the journey of faith. Ray Kinsella hears a whisper coming from the corn, and though it does not explain or clarify, the words nag him until he acts in faith and sets to work obeying what he can best figure the voice is asking him to do. Later, when his work does not yield the immediate results, he holds fast to the validity of what he has done, despite critics all around him (some in his own family) who believe he’s forgetting about his responsibilities to properly provide for his wife and daughter. And in the midst of the struggle, the voice whispers again, and Ray, acting in blind faith, takes to the road to follow its promptings, though he has no idea what the ultimate goal is. Sure, he questions, he complains, and he struggles to maintain obedience to the voice, but, in the end, after the hard, tangible work of believing in an unseen purpose, Ray encounters… well, those of you who have seen the film will recognize the significance of those final moments.

If the blind faith aspect is not plenty reason to go back and watch this film, here are five others:

 

#1

#2 – James Earl Jones and Burt Lancaster. Just try to tell me these two weren’t some of the most subtle yet inspirational characters in sports film history.

#3 – The wonderful history of baseball woven into the film and accented with references to the 60s. This film is a kind of time capsule.

#4 – The banter of the baseball players who come out of the corn. So much fun to watch.

#5 – The fact that, given the ending (with the line of cars), the story is saying something about how even one man’s journey of faith can affect a multitude.

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Friday Films: Unforgiven

Film Fridays:

If the fact that the first film I chose for this whole Film Friday theme did not make it obvious, I’ve recently become a sucker for good ol’ American Westerns. In my creative writing class this week, one my students submitted a short story written in the Western genre, complete with cowpokes, brothels, town drunks and enigmatic gunslingers, and I was hooked. It is a ballsy thing to write a Western – you have to play to certain conventions without stereotyping, develop characters while leaving plenty of room for mystery and audience interpretation, and establish a sense of order while creating an environment that is defined by its capacity for chaos. I don’t know if I’ll ever attempt it myself – too formidable – but I do agree with those who say that the Western is the true, original creation of America (unless you count the often uncredited inspiration from Japan’s famous samurai tales). It has a pace, a tone and an atmosphere all its own, not to mention characters with so much unspoken emotion boiling under the surface that Hemingway’s “Code Heroes” would blush from their own loquaciousness.

One of the greatest Westerns I have seen in recent years is Clint Eastwood’s 1992 Academy Award-winning Unforgiven. What makes this movie work is that, like all good Westerns, it is primarily character-driven, and allows the tension to build not from some fiendish plot or strange twist of fate, but by way of a smoldering sense of greed and a contagious desire for revenge. Unlike some more famous Western plots (many involving Eastwood), while the main character in Unforgiven is a stranger to some of the other characters, he is not a stranger to the audience – we know William Munny and sympathize with his desire to care for his children despite being unable to shake an impulse to return to the work that once defined him: “killing.”

There are numerous reasons to see this film, even if you are not a fan of the Western genre, but here are five specific reasons:

#1

#2 – The assembled cast is fantastic – a lot of skill being brought to these characters, especially from Gene Hackman (who won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as the violent town sheriff) Richard Harris, Morgan Freeman and Eastwood himself.

#3 – The themes explored – that of atonement, rehabilitation, fallenness, justification, redemption and, most specifically, how our sins and evil nature can follow us for years.

#4 – The simplicity. I could write this about every Western, because it is a key aspect of the genre, but what makes Unforgiven work so well is that while the themes are complex, the story is rather simple. There’s no need for plot twists and complex schemes.

#5 – The scene in the jail, between Hackman, Harris and Saul Rubinek. Fascinating and intense!

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Film Fridays: To Kill a Mockingbird

Today’s Film:

“Sometimes, there are no words that do justice,” said my professor after the lights flickered back on in the auditorium. So, instead of the standard period of discussion budgeted into the first Friday night of the month, we quietly gathered our things, threw away the trash from our snacks, and filed out of the room. He was right, though. You can watch some films and then immediately want to dive into a discussion that can stretch on into the night, but then there are others that require only quiet reverence. Sure, you could discuss it, but doing so feels almost as if you would cheapen its power. I can’t recall exactly what specific theological or social justice issue was listed on the flyer underneath the image of To Kill a Mockingbird‘s poster, but it turned out none of us needed a discussion that night. Most of us, if not all, had read the book, and some of us had already seen the movie several times before, in a high school English classroom or a late night feature on AMC. However, there was something about sitting down to view it again with the intention of watching it not only for its quiet beauty but the compelling and convicting themes around which the story revolves. It is one of the few films that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with its parent novel, and the reason is that nothing of the simplistic power of Harper Lee’s novel was lost in the translation to Horton Foote’s screenplay. For that reason alone, it should be revered.

But here are five more reasons:

#1

#2 – Elmer Bernstein’s extraordinary music. Very few composers know how to write a score that perfectly compliments – rather than over-dramatizes – a film. Elmer Bernstein is one of them, and TKAM is a superb example.

#3 – Robert Duvall. Yes, this was his first appearance in film, and despite his very brief screen time, his sudden materialization behind the bedroom door is almost as iconic as Gregory Peck’s Atticus.

#4 – The courtroom scene. There’s never been a more moving closing argument and verdict in movie history.

#5 – The children. Whether or not you find their voices whiny or their rambunctiousness unsettling, these three kids are their own ensemble, and serve as ideal manifestations of their book counterparts.

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Friday Films: The Village

Today’s film:

Say what you want about M. Night Shyamalan (and almost every well-rounded moviegoer has his or her opinion), but I reject any critical reviews that pan this film. I truly believe that some of Shyamalan’s best work is found in The Village, as well as in the subsequent Lady in the Water. The reason for Shyamalan’s shrinking audience (which began around the time of his third major film, Signs) is that after Best Picture-nominee The Sixth Sense, he tried to take his storytelling in one direction despite having unwittingly defined himself on the basis of suspense and twist endings. That’s what the majority of moviegoers wanted, and to hell with substance. Sadly, it seems he has bowed to such outcry in recent years, sending up terrible specimens such as The Happening (which marked the death of his attempt at merging substance and brainless thrill), The Last Airbender and Devil. But I hold on to the beauty and depth of The Village; it is not for the crowd-pleasing twist or creep-out that I cherish this film, but for its creative examination of themes such as conformity, isolation, blind faith, fear and sacrificial love. What I appreciate most about this film is Shyamalan’s exploration of living in fear vs. embracing the world’s brokenness. The village patriarchs and matriarchs in the film have fled “the towns” because of the violence and evil that caused them pain. However, they find themselves unable to maintain a place free of this darkness, despite even the most drastic efforts. In the end, it takes a blind girl – who, at times, very literally walks by faith rather than by sight – to show them that hiding from the world’s darkness is impossible. The capacity for evil exists within all of us… but so does the capacity for love.

This is one of three films I believe everyone who participates in a community of faith – that is, the Church – should watch and study closely. There are too many churches today that are pulling back from society, building picket fences around their property and their image, frightened about what might happen if they openly associate with the secular world in all its infidelity and unpredictability. The world is a beautiful place, in need of a love that knows no boundaries. As the leader of the community, Edward Walker, tries to explain to the rest of the elders, “The world moves for love. It kneels before it in awe.”

Here are five more reasons to take a look (or a second look) at The Village:

#1

#2 – The entire cast. Shyamalan assembled a wonderful ensemble (including William Hurt, Joaquin Phoenix, Adrien Brody, Brendan Gleeson, Judy Greer, Sigourney Weaver) and each actor does his or her part to add authenticity to the setting, the overall morose atmosphere, and the story itself.

#3 – The atmosphere. The twist might have left some feeling betrayed, but separatism never looked so beautiful.

#4 – The music. James Newton Howard was nominated for his score which featured the most memorable arrangement of stringed instruments since Psycho (but with a completely different feel, of course).

#5 – The suspense. Shyamalan knows how to build tension, and he also knows that the less you see the monster, the scarier it becomes. I’ve watched this film almost a dozen times now, and the creatures still give me the creeps.