Licorice Pizza (2021) ... and a pingback to 1917

I kept thinking if I should or shouldn't write a blog entry this month, not really knowing what movie to pick for it. "1917" was a good fit for the current times - not that much given its context, but more for what's expressing. But 1. I already wrote about it in another entry, a couple years ago and 2. I doubt anyway that my blog's audience intersects with whom I was saying there that should have it on their mandatory watch list. On the other hand maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea for more people to watch it or re-watch it. Although, again, it's debatable if the movie's not either too deep for some to get the actual sense in it, or too depressing for who relates too closely to an armed conflict context. So, I got to "Licorice Pizza" - or the first hippie alternative I could think of.

I don't intend to write a long review. Actually, I don't intend to write an actual review. "Licorice Pizza" is some sort of weird romance with lots of comic nuances set in the 70's California, and a much betted movie I'd say than "Inherent Vice", which takes place during the same time and was written and directed by the same Paul Thomas Anderson (more known probably for "There Will Be Blood"). There's a perfect chemistry between the actors, the writing is excellent and the story... not so important.

More important is that "Licorice Pizza" is what we could call a "comfort movie" as an analogy to a "comfort food". Something you really need from time to time. If not for something else, at least to find out if you didn't know that in 1973 (and a couple times after) there were periods of "oil crisis". And most probably that's something you can survive ;) - at least as long as the rest doesn't get much more close to "1917".

Rating: 4 out of 5

Drive My Car (2021)

"Drive My Car" is a long slow movie. So long and so slow that the intro credits come after more than half an hour into it. But it's a "slow burn". In different words, I think it's worth getting to the end of it.

The movie's based on a short writing of Haruki Murakami. Also, it's very entangled with "Uncle Vanya" by Checkhov. Unfortunately, my readings never intersected with the two, and that I think made me lose some of the hidden meanings in the action. This is centered on a period from the life of Kafuku, a theater actor from Japan in his 40s, who's losing his wife in the beginning of the movie as a victim of brain hemorrhage. Fast forward two years from the tragic event, we find Kafuku as a director somewhere in a delegation, tasked with staging the mentioned Checkhov play. The rules of the theater company require him to take a professional driver, a young woman. Initially he's displeased with this, on the ground of breaking his habit of rehearsing the play lines while driving, but he's finally compelled to accept. From here on, the movie starts more often to signal the "slow burn" I was mentioning, delivering between periods of calm some scenes that are either thought provoking or their construction is sufficiently strong to keep you hanging on. Probably one of the first such scenes is when the casting of the play takes place, where a former lover of the deceased wife shows up, a character to whom Kafuku surprisingly decides to give the title role. But let's leave the rest of the story for the viewing I'd say. There's not much of a twist in it after all - the whole charm of the movie's set in its construction with all the details, and a summary in this case would not make justice on giving you the same impression as the complete package.

There's a symbolism in this movie from which you can understand more or less, either as you want to perceive it or how the director intended :) What's important is that's there and keeps your mind busy, from the red SAAB with the wheel on the left driven a lot over Japanese roads, only to find it in the end on a Korean highway where the rule is "drives on the right", up to the interference between Checkhov's lines in repetitions and the moments in the lives of the people saying the words, when you're not sure anymore what's part of the play and what's real. In brief, the direction and the script are top notch, although probably the most obvious contribution to the impact of the movie comes from the actors' side, in particular from the lead.

It's hard to qualify "Drive My Car" as a niche movie, because it doesn't move much beyond the usual pattern of a drama. One thing that's certain though is that's not a movie for everyone. I doubt that 10 years ago, maybe even one year ago, I would've had the patience to digest this properly. I'm not sure I did it now, or better said I'm pretty sure there are more meanings in it than I was able to discern. It's a movie that requires some dose of life experience to understand the feelings of some characters, to be able to empathize with them, at least in part. And if that doesn't happen there are good chances the movie will be dreadfully boring for you. Besides that, it's a movie that has a lot of the typical Japanese calm in its action development - which again you might be able to get a taste of if you're in a period when you unconsciously need it. Then, I can say it's relaxing, and you'll feel that stronger as you watch it. Otherwise, I guess I would've slept through it. But I didn't, and the ending, more or less bitter, brings you one of the best acted scenes I've ever seen in a movie, a dialogue from "Uncle Vanya" partly said using the sign language, and which in essence could be summarized in a line from a previous scene - "we must keep on living".

Rating: 4 out of 5

The Milagro Beanfield War (1988)

Three days ago, I was looking again for a cinematic "sleeping pill", and so I ran over "The Milagro Beanfield War". A totally wrong choice for the intended purpose, as I found out after watching it. And when I found out I decided I must write a blog entry about it. So here we are...

The movie is directed by Robert Redford, which "recommended" it for my search. With all respect for his acting skills, I don't think there's any other directing attempt from Redford to impress me in any way. It's true I've never got to watch "Ordinary People", considered probably his best movie, but out of the rest of what I've seen the script or the subject typically saved the movie, and the directing always felt somewhere between bland and absent. That's why here I had a shock, experiencing exactly the opposite.

There's no complicated subject in this movie. We're somewhere close to the US border with Mexico, in Milagro, a small forgotten town, with a predominantly hispanic population, close to its extinction being overshadowed by a residential complex in development. In this setting we find Jose aka Joe Mondragon who dares the unthinkable - to use water spilled from the property of the landlord who bought almost the entire region to irigate his own field of beans. People start talking, panicking and get close to rioting, splitting between the two sides - pro and agains the capitalst opression. And like that, we get a series of events that lead to a mini "revolucion". What's really catchy in the movie is how this series of events is staged...

I'd say that although produced more than thirty years ago, the movie fits quite well with the more recent trends, drawing some clear lines like anti-system and others. I'm more and more bored of overusing stuff like that in a media like movies, where in more than one hundred years propaganda was way too often present (whatever kind of that was), trying to overshadow the artistic or even the entertainment side. However, unlike the increasing accent on such direction in the latter years, here I can appreciate the fact that this comes second, much less obvious than in many recent movies, and that's thanks to the direction. The movie has a character and situation comic that's so present, fortunately raising on top of other nuances and preventing these to become too.. "aggressive" (maybe less in the end). It's an excellent mix between the acting, the symbolism, a bit of romance, a bit of fantasy, and lots of humor. The actors have a merit, the script has its merit, the score has a merit, but on top of everything, it's clearly, by far, the best movie directed by Redford I've seen by now, and I think the direction has the largest merit in the final result.

Rating: 4 out of 5

Winter-Spring 2021-2022 Movie Preview

I didn't want to close the year with the last month's entry, but I'm still not in the mood to restart the usual blog reviews. However, a short preview entry was the usual choice for this period, and that I can do, but I won't split it in two this time. There's not much to choose from anyway...

Now, in December, I won't stop on Matrix Resurrections and neither on the third iteration of the third reincarnation of Spider-Man. By far the most interesting title in the upcoming weeks seems to be "Nightmare Alley". Guillermo del Toro is one of the directors who still has a personal touch, and you can spot it already from the trailer. Besides that, lately I tend to have more confidence in movies based on books than on productions with an original script. Even though that doesn't guarantee for which characters is decided that's more "correct" to be changed, or what action or dialogue to be adjusted to fit the current tendencies. After all, well.. that's more important than what the writer had in mind. But let's not get lost now in examples.. Hopefully this won't join the list.

For January I'll indulge myself to be subjective (nope, I wasn't earlier). Wes Craven might be long gone to other planes of universe, but I still have hope for the fifth "Scream". We have the same directors couple as we did in "Ready or Not", which was refreshing in a horror genre that's haunted for too long by too many ghosts and spirits. Besides that, most important, Sidney (Neve Campbell) is back ;) As I said, I'm subjective on this one.

In February, what got my eye is "The Outfit". I have a vague feeling that it's gonne be built on the same lines with "Bad Times at the El Royale" or with (the less inspired) "The Hateful Eight" of Tarantino, but different from these both. We'll see...

Starting from March the options reduce a lot (at least looking at released trailers), but from everything in the super-here genre there's one I'd rather not ignore completely - "The Batman" - at least for its cinematic experience potential that it had since Tim Burton to this day. Whatever reincarnation number it might have reached...

There's nothing to mentionf for April, at least not now, and in May the only title to catch some attention is another reboot - "Top Gun: Maverick". Honestly... it always seemed a miracle the fact that the '86 "Top Gun" got so popular. The script was at best mediocre. What saved that movie was the director's genius, but Tony Scott is unfortunately gone. We'll see if the army of screenwriters hired by Tom Cruise can compensate for that now.

Well, this was sort of bitter, I guess :).. But that's pretty much how I felt 2021 in general. Maybe it will change next year. Until then, all I can say is: Happy Holidays! :)

14 - Dune (less) & Chasing Rabbits (more)

I took a break from blogging a month or so ago, and the motivation from my last entry is still valid. However... I never left a year from the "origins" of this without an anniversary entry, so I told myself I could force a short one. The problem is that I don't have a movie subject for year 14.

Normally, for this kind of entry, I would've looked for some production that I could recommend with all my heart (not that I could find that every year until now). So, it crossed my mind to write about "Dune" - Villeneuve version 2021, but I'm not in the right mood for that, and I can't really recommend it with all my heart. One phrase is enough: as visual experience (ignoring the 3D) and audio one too is superb and it really deserves watching it, and fortunately that covers well the less positive trends you can sense in Hollywood lately, although these might still be visible to somebody who's not at the first experience with the "Dune" universe, but I'm really not in the mood to talk about that. Done, subject checked. What about the rabbits...

Since my first year of blogging (the Romanian version) I've had a series of entries tagged as "chasing rabbits", where I allowed myself some off-topic writing once per year. And, as a series, I usually had a connection between the current entry and the previous. There's been a while since I wrote one, and I almost forgot about these. But not completely. So, I did something that really dislike, to read my old blog posts, just to see where I left my "chase". In the last one from 2017 (didn't have the patience to move even more back than that) I was rambling about my time machine obsession. Surprisingly, even though I was more naive back than, my thoughts about this didn't fundamentally change. Maybe just that the random stuff in life is not always so random. The idea to fix the issue by moving back still stands, but because we don't have yet a more concrete solution for time travel maybe we can use the "classic" simulation = reset the context now and restart. In other words sometimes you can try to be the rabbit, if you want to catch the rabbit. Eh, cheap philosophy :)...