Formally LOST: “The Other 48 Days”

Funerals aren't so special for the tailies.

In this series of features, we’ll take a look at six episodes of LOST – one episode from each season. These are not recaps or reviews to the episodes. Instead we will be mostly be discussing the formal construction and storytelling modes of each episode and what that form reveals about a particular season or the series as a whole. Needless to say I will be freely discussing SPOILERS; if you haven’t seen the show yet…what are you waiting for? This week, we continue with episode 2.07, “The Other 48 Days.”

Formally LOST: “Walkabout”

In this series of features, we’ll take a look at six episodes of LOST – one episode from each season. These are not recaps or reviews. Instead we will be mostly be discussing the formal construction and storytelling modes of each episode and what that form reveals about a particular season or the series as a whole. Needless to say I will be freely discussing SPOILERS; if you haven’t seen the show yet…what are you waiting for? This week, we start with episode 1.04, “Walkabout.”

Review: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)

Story: It’s a beautiful spring day – and North Shore high schooler Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick) wants to make the most of it by constructing an elaborate sick day ruse and romping around downtown Chicago. Only it’s his ninth – and Principal Rooney (Jeffrey Jones) ain’t buying it as he ruthlessly hunts down his most hated truant.
Judgment: My favorite John Hughes film – at once his most universally accessible and his least traditional. The looser narrative suits a film whose main character simply ignores the rules (including that of breaking the fourth wall and addressing the audience). Broderick may never find a role as perfect as Ferris, and his chemistry with Ruck’s Cameron creates the ultimate pathos that holds the story together. Jeffrey Jones (sadly, now a registered sex offender) also gets to star in his own great little screwball comedy trying to break into the Bueller house. It’s unnecessary to pigeonhole this film as a Hughes teen comedy or contextualize it with Reagan-era bromides – just watch it and feel the joy of being alive.
What’s it all mean: Ferris is an unusual protagonist – he really faces no crisis and undergoes no change, he simply flits from one place to another, directly or indirectly letting people briefly forget their strictures and routines and live in the moment. Most importantly, he yanks his best friend out of what could have become a suicidal lethargy. Hughes drops in some intimations that Ferris might be screwed after high school – but what does that matter in a movie all about the eternal present?
Essential scene: Ferris seemingly gets the whole Loop area population to sing along to The Beatles’ “Twist and Shout.” Sorry, lads. It belongs to Ferris now.

Review: Funny People (2009)

Story: George Simmons (Adam Sandler) is Hollywood’s biggest comedy star, but when he is diagnosed with leukemia, he must contemplate his solitary existence. He ends up hiring aspiring comedian Ira (Seth Rogen) as a protege – and essentially buys him as a friend.
Judgment: The first two-thirds of Funny People would easily stand as Judd Apatow’s best movie and could have earned major awards recognition. Sandler in particular is fearless as a bitterer version of himself (at least I assume he’s not this mean in real life). But the third act swerve into a tangential romantic plot saps the momentum from the film and takes the story out of the stand-up world it portrays so well prior. And Apatow is still too in love with his characters to end the movie in darkness.
What’s it all mean: The comedy circuit is starkly portrayed – full of camaraderie, cutthroat competition, and performance as therapy. Of course the comedy industry is huge now, and Apatow richly renders all its aspects– including laugh-track ridden sitcoms and, yes, cravenly commercial Sandler films. (Sandler must have trusted Apatow a lot to let him tacitly condemn most of his oeuvre.) Otherwise, its typical “dark side of fame” stuff.
Essential scene: Sandler’s Thanksgiving toast never fails to choke me up – he must be thinking of Chris Farley, right?

http://movieclips.com/e/hD3q/

George's Toast



Funny People

— MOVIECLIPS.com

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, the newest installment of Jerry Bruckheimer’s tentpole franchise based on Disneyland’s animatronics attraction, underwhelms like a sunken soufflé. All the ingredients are in place for a fairly elegant and lighthearted summer entertainment, but an undercooked story stretched to 140 minutes can’t be saved, no matter how charmingly aloof Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow gets or how many CGI creatures Bruckheimer and new director Rob Marshall throw our way.

Review: Singin’ in the Rain

Story: Don Lockwood and Lina Lamont, Hollywood’s most glamorous on-screen couple, must cope with the transition from silent to sound film – which would be great if he could act or if she had a tolerable speaking voice.
Judgment: The greatest movie musical of all time – and one of the great movies period. The enthusiasm bursting from the screen may embarrass some modern viewers at first but damn if this doesn’t put a smile on your face. The snappy comedic dialogue and the innovative choreography of Gene Kelly elevate the admittedly recycled songbook.
What’s it all mean: One of the most self-reflexive films ever, without being showy about it. Kelly pioneered a character-based style of dancing for film, and several scenes touch on the improbable alchemy by which the artifice of Hollywood can create great art. “Make ‘Em Laugh” is a full-throated defense of populist entertainment over moribund solemnity, a stance validated by the lasting legacy of this film vis-a-vis its more prestigious contemporary An American in Paris.
Essential scene: The title number performed by Gene Kelly.

Review: The Room (2003)

Story: Johnny (Tommy Wiseau) has a seemingly great life but when his fiancé Lisa begins an affair with his best friend Mark, it all goes tragically downhill.
Judgment: Poor in conception, execution and presentation, this independent drama has become the cult movie of the millennial generation. Venerated by comedy heroes Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim, David Cross, and Alec Baldwin, it’s essential viewing for anyone interested in the basics of filmmaking. Best viewed with a group of friends with a slant toward the ironic.
What’s it all mean: Director-writer-star Wiseau remains strangely endearing and charismatic despite the cinematic travesty he’s wrought. The story is so clearly personal that one wonders what kind of relationships he was in – all the women are portrayed as callow, manipulative, irrational narcissists.
Essential scene: The highlights (lowlights?) are too scattershot, but the flower shop stands out for its poorly recorded dialogue and overall inelegance.

Review: A Few Good Men (1992)

Story: Hotshot JAG lawyer Cruise must defend two Marines, accused of murdering a member of their unit under the guise of off-the-books discipline.
Judgment: My favorite sort of movie – a great mainstream Hollywood collaboration with a heart and a brain. This one lurches more to the old-fashioned side of things, as the legal plot is essentially a cinematic version of a Perry Mason episode; but screenwriter Sorkin and director Reiner imbue the subject matter with simultaneous reverence and briskness.
What’s it all mean: The thematic complexity is impressive, never taking a side on thorny issues as due process, chain of command and the messiness we tolerate when we think life itself is at stake and try to protect it. And when one of the Marines reflects on the trial, it’s really a moving and artless articulation of America’s role in the world.
Essential scene: The rightly iconic deposition between Cruise and Nicholson.