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Reviews
The Man from Elysian Fields (2001)
Nonsense
I'm genuinely quite shocked to see the amount of positive comment about this movie. I was also quite genuinely shocked at the movie itself, witless, absurd and ineptly directed and paced as it was.
The entire movie screams "vanity project" from high heaven. Andy Garcia gets to play a penniless struggling author (Andy Garcia, plus goatee beard and thick rimmed glasses, natch) who loves his family *so* much he becomes a prostitute. Uh-huh. and Mick Jagger, well, Mick gets to be on screen and adopt an absolutely ridiculous accent. As if his normal voice isn't bad enough.
(Spoilers, though I feel no shame giving away this "plot")
The plot is frankly beyond incredible. The Pulitzer-prize winning author husband of Garcia's *very first* client (wow! think of the chances!) hands over the authorship of his final novel to the complete stranger who is sleeping with his wife. Seemingly without having read a word of his writing. When the resulting novel is released without Garcia's name, readers around the world fail to detect that the "genius"'s work has been replaced by that of a rank amateur. Well, one guy in glasses is much the same as any other, right?
Partly, it's another ample demonstration of Hollywood's absolute inability to portray the creative process of an artist on the screen without reaching for appalling cliches. Relatively few films ever avoid this trap - Ed Harris's "Pollock" being one of the few noteworthy exceptions. Generally, it's just a bad film, full of glib cliches and groan-inducing plot "twists".
The final scene, (which I'll not "spoil") was so awfully predictable and terribly scripted I saw three people in the theater doubled up with laughter, despite the attempt at an emotional climax.
There are bright points - James Coburn play his part with charisma and dignity, despite his shallowly-written character. And, on behalf of the besotted women I saw this film with, it does, at least, have Andy Garcia. A lot of Andy Garcia.
Possession (2002)
gutted...
-yup, a gutted, or more accurately, lobotomised version of the book. So many compromises have been made to get this richly textured novel onto the screen that where the book interwove the stories in a fascinating counterpoint, convincing in voice and detail, the film is simply a bog-standard romance between good-looking actors with some pretty victorian stuff tacked on.
You have wonder about the wisdom of even attempting to convert a book which is powerful tribute to the power of words and language and turning into a would-be powerful tribute to Gwyneth Paltrow. To paraphrase the famous quote, making a movie about words and language is something like a dancing about architecture.
The second largest flaw is that Aaron Eckhart is woefully miscast, leaving a character floundering in a story where he no longer makes any sense. I'm not sure if he normally delivers his lines in such a clunkingly flat way, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. I'm not against adding American elements to a story to make it work commercial - it worked very well in High Fidelity, for example, but Roland's transatlantic transposition leaves all the other characters constantly having to react to his incongruous American-ness - he simply doesn't fit into the character in the novel.
In addition, several *important* characters have been removed, leaving gaps in the narrative - obvious ones - Roland's previous girlfriend for example. Roland explains his singledom as he is simply "off relationships", but never gives any kind of convincing back story to the motivation for this. Strange gaps like this make the main characters seem one-dimensional and adrift in a plot that has to rattle through events which are barely explained by what we see on the screen.
I have to admit, I was bored rigid and couldn't wait for the film to finish. I can't see how anyone could take much out of such an obviously compromised film, unless they're a Merchant-Ivory fanatic and love any old nonsense with Victorian frills.
Monster from Green Hell (1957)
aw, ain't he sweet?
I'll be quick and then out of here. I've got a real affection for this one - the quintessential bad monster movie, totally and utterly unpretentious. Yeah, analyse it for the goofs, sneer at the scale-changing monster, the plot flaws, but there's something really rather charming about the scaley foam-rubber dude.