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It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of Wes Anderson’s films.  I’ve talked about most of them upon their releases on NP1, and I tended to go on and on about Rushmore years back.  Very recently, things have gone rather well for my favorite living auteur.  His 1996 debut got the Criterion treatment last fall, and his first animated feature proved to have just as much going for it as the rest of his work.

Let’s start with the new DVD for Bottle Rocket.  The closest the original DVD release could come to “special features” was the fact that one side of the disc was in widescreen and the other was fullscreen.  His next three films would all be handled by Criterion, which says a lot about what they think of his work.  Almost as soon as Rushmore was re-released, starting the partnership with Criterion, fans were calling for a new version of Bottle Rocket.  Slowly but surely, a two-disc set was compiled and released.  I remember reading an interview with Wes in which he said that they didn’t want to put anything out until they had “everything.”  The fruit of their labor is a lovingly crafted set, complete with interviews, a documentary, deleted scenes, the original black and white short film, and plenty more.  I have watched most of this stuff, as well as the gorgeous new transfer, which puts the old DVD to shame.

The Wilson Boys get their start

The best thing about watching this movie again is discovering the fact that the Wes Anderson style has been almost unchanged from the beginning.  He’s just gotten better and better at doing what he does.  There’s a prototypical feel to Bottle Rocket the whole way through, in which you see all of the Anderson trademarks at work, but in a subdued manner.  Framing, costuming, music selection, and that same dry sense of humor are all accounted for, but not quite as fleshed out as his later films.  This doesn’t make it a bad movie, of course.  Although the film meanders through genres from ‘crime movie’ to ‘romantic road movie’  to ‘heist movie,’ there are plenty of things worth keeping an eye out for along the way.  Owen Wilson’s character Dignan is one such reason to watch.  Fast-talking and easily distracted, this ‘criminal mastermind’ just wants to carry out a life of crime with his friend Anthony (played by brother Luke) and join James Caan’s gang of landscapers/thieves.  Just about every line out of his mouth is comedy gold.

So let’s fast forward about fifteen years or so, and we get to Anderson’s latest, an adaptation of Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr. Fox.  I remember first hearing about the project and not knowing exactly what to make of it.  Was this going to be a kids’ movie or something?  Did that mean that Wes would have to compromise his style in order to make this film?  Was it, in fact, just some sort of cash grab?

I wasn’t really scared of that possibility.  In fact, I was sort of optimistic.  I was a fan of Dahl’s writing not only in grade school (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, etc.), but it stayed with me to high school and college when I discovered his twisted sense of humor in his short stories.  Sure enough, when the trailer first debuted, I knew Wes had another winner on his hands.  I just didn’t know how big a winner.

Here, put these bandit hats on.

It makes sense for this movie to be a kind of heist movie, like Bottle Rocket.  Mr. Fox is a reformed chicken-thief who moves into a new neighborhood, only to find that across the valley are the three farms owned by Boggis, Bunce, and Bean.  He decides to do one last big job on the sly with help from his opossum friend, Kiley, son Ash, and nephew Kristofferson.  It also makes sense that George “Danny Ocean” Clooney gets to play the titular character.

I have to say that I was shocked to find that this was, quite possibly, Anderson’s best film to date.  I’m not even sure where to begin.  For one, it’s light.  Most of Anderson’s films deal with issues like death and dysfunctional families.  If you saw The Darjeeling Limited, you got that in spades.  No such distractions from the comedy this time around.  Second, it’s a movie that kids and adults will both appreciate.  The kids will love the cute characters and the story, but the grown-ups are going to love all that and more.  There’s jokes about real estate and credit cards, and they make sense, even when delivered by anthropomorphic animals.  They’re also rather modest.  Anderson’s propensity to use profanity in his movies makes the cut, but instead of what you’d expect, they just use the word “cuss” in its place.  This makes for some of the best lines in the film (”Are you cussing with me?”).  And the little dream world that it all takes place in is detailed and charming in a way that only Wes could create.  The animals all have different jobs in their community, and they even play their own sports, such as the smartly conceived game of “Whack-Bat,” which I now want to learn and play on weekends.

Also, Ash (on the left in the above picture there) reminds me of my cat, Peanut.

Most importantly, though, is the fact that this is an animated movie without computers.  Whatever happened to cell animation or stop-motion?  The latter is the medium used here, and it gives this movie a whole lot of extra heart.  Now, I really have no problem with Pixar.  I think that they’ve put out some very good movies since Toy Story first debuted.  I still love The Incredibles.  Dreamworks, not so much.  But it just seems to me that the concept of “animated films” has become dominated by CGI, and that the old-school approach is still worth investing in.  This movie is a prime example of that.

Hot Box!

The new motto of NP1 is “Playing catch-up since 2001,” and a couple of weeks ago I took another step towards seeming relevant when it comes to technology:  I bought an HD TV.  Now, I know that there’s plenty of folks out there who don’t have HD (and quite frankly, it’s not essential), but it’s getting to the point now that if you don’t have HD, you’re missing out.  It’s like my mother says about when Star Trek was first on TV and not everybody had color TVs.  It was getting to the point where if you didn’t have the newest, nicest TV, you were missing out.

But without a color TV, how will you know?

I knew I was starting to miss out over the past year.  Little by little, I could tell that the widescreen aspect ratio of HD was becoming the new standard of videography for television.  I remember watching House a couple of months ago and watching as House and Foreman sat at opposite sides of the table, arguing over a lupus diagnosis.  At least, I had to infer this, because I heard their voices, but they were both cut off by my standard screen.  I only had Chase in the frame, looking listless and wan.  There’s plenty of other offenders (Verizon ads make no effort to take 4:3 into effect), and it gets on my nerves.  Try watching a David Lean movie that’s been “formatted to fit your TV.”  Try watching a David Lean movie in general, for that matter, you need a little culture in your life.

And so I went on the hunt for just the right TV to fit my needs.  Big, but not too big.  Capable of displaying 1080p resolution at a decent refresh rate.  And all for a price that won’t kill me.  When it came down to it, I went with a 32″ Insignia set that I’m quite pleased with.  I have a CRT made by Insignia (Best Buy’s store brand) which is quite good for standard def, so I felt pretty safe with the purchase.

The arrival of HD has caused a recent surge in hot-air balloon programming.

There was, of course, a bit of a learning curve.  I thought I’d done all of my homework, but there were a couple of issues I needed to come to grips with.  For one, I knew that I’d likely need an HD box if I wanted all HD, all the time.  Still, I had a feeling that I could get something out of the direct cable line into the TV.  Sure enough, the local affiliates are available in HD, but that’s pretty much it.  Another thing I thought was weird was that there are something to the effect of “sub channels” in some cases:  WBZ is on channel 4, but then the HD version of the station is on channel 4-1.  I don’t quite get it, but it works, so I’m not complaining.  Now I can see the final episodes of LOST or the weekly NBC Sunday hockey game in HD as they are intended.  I’ve always felt that hockey is the best sport for HD viewing as the detail and speed are easier to follow in higher resolutions.  Anybody who complained about not being able to see the puck shouldn’t have any trouble now.

Another issue that I had to contend with was playing video games on an LCD screen.  As it turns out, there’s some settings to mess around with in order to get your games playable.  As far as my Wii is concerned, everything is easy to do.  Just a change of the Wii settings and a utilization of the TV’s “Game Mode” feature, and I’m stompin’ goombas and whatnot in no time.  HOWEVER, I found that the Playstation 2 has its own set of problems.  Long story short, the picture that the PS2 puts out is just fine for a standard TV, but LCD sets need to “process” the interlaced image before it hits the screen.  The result is a split second of lag between your button press and the corresponding command being onscreen.  Hence, my PS2 is now just a noisy DVD player… but a DVD player nonetheless, and with more screen settings, all of my movies look great now.  Am I saving up for a PS3 now?  You could say that.

I’ve never been one to jump on new technology the second it comes out.  Sometimes, it’s buggy and needs to be tested by the general public before I’ll bother to spend my money on it.  Other times, it’s bound to be upgraded by the time I think I’ll get the latest cool thing.  When it comes to HD, I think that I timed it just right.

I love bad movies.  In order to enjoy a good movie, you have to know how to enjoy a bad one.  In fact, I think that any film appreciation class you take in college should not focus so much on Eisenstein and Welles as they should on Wood and Corman.  It doesn’t hurt to have had Mystery Science Theater 3000 on television when you’re a teenager, either.  But tonight, on the eve of my 27th birthday, I do believe that I have now seen the best bad movie ever.

Thrill at the empty stare of Tommy Wiseau!

If you know a thing or two about bad movies and the Internet, then you may have heard about The Room.  If you haven’t, then it honors me to inform you.  Long story short, the film was released in Los Angeles in 2003 and quickly became one of those LA inside jokes that fascinate me.  I just don’t understand what makes Los Angelenos tick.  Anyway, it was written, produced, directed, and starred in by a strange, foreign man named Tommy Wiseau.  Wiseau is most likely French, but like all great eccentrics, his true origin is unknown.  And that’s just the beginning.  There are plenty of mysteries to be found in The Room.

The story is like something Tennessee Williams would have written in junior high.  Wiseau plays Johnny, a San Francisco resident who seemingly has it all: a fiance, some kind of a bank job, a parade of friends who may or may not have names, an apartment with a rooftop to hang out on, and a lot of hair.  Things seem to be going very well for Johnny, until one day his fiance, Lisa, decides she no longer loves him and decides to start an affair with his best friend, Mark.  All of this while lying to everyone she knows, saying that Johnny hit her.  Mark seems to constantly want to call off the affair, but he is written badly enough that he goes ahead with it anyway.  The story essentially follows Johnny’s downward spiral as Lisa’s antics continue.

This of course, is only the main storyline, and is really the only one that is followed through to its completion.  Several subplots are created and then never revisited, such as Johnny’s “adopted” “son” Denny, who lives in the building and owes a drug dealer some money.  After an encounter on the roof with this dealer, we never hear about it again.  Or Lisa’s mother’s breast cancer.  And in a later house party scene, we are left scratching our heads as to why an as-yet-unseen (and unnamed) character should have the moral compass to tell Lisa to come clean to Johnny about her infidelities.

The best part of it is, The Room takes itself entirely seriously about 90% of the time.  Wiseau has gone on to say that the film was always intended to be a “black comedy” as it took on cult status as a midnight favorite in LA and New York.  The cast and crew said otherwise, but you have to wonder if indeed, Wiseau was pulling a fast one on everyone involved.  There are moments in which the film switches gear from super-serious to improvised hilarity in seconds flat.  Watch it and you’ll probably agree.  Sometimes true genius can be unassuming.

So why do I love The Room so much?  There’s plenty of reasons.  For one, it suffers from an identity crisis: is it a melodrama or a so-called comedy?  Or maybe it’s a San Francisco travelogue, thanks to all of the lingering shots of the skyline and the Golden Gate Bridge.  Another key to success is quotability.  Any movie that has a line like “You can keep your stupid comments in your pocket,” or an impassioned “YOU’RE TEARING ME APART” is a surefire classic.  And don’t forget to watch it with someone you love, because you’re in for not one, not two, but FOUR of the creepiest, most awkward, and unsexiest love scenes ever committed to film (or HD video, whichever Wiseau felt better about).

If midnight showings of The Room do not make their way to Boston, I’m going to have to raise the funds to bring it to Worcester myself.  I have to see this with a roomful of people.  You probably should, too.

I know that it was only a few days ago that I listed James Cameron as a finalist for the Golden Troll Award, but the jury was still out.  Well, I’ve seen Avatar now, and I have to admit that it’s something special.  I’m not saying that it’s the best movie of the year, and I’m not saying that it does anything that we haven’t seen before in science fiction.  What I am going to say is that Avatar is a film that will probably have a very big impact on special effects, just as Cameron’s films usually are.

This poster is way cooler than the other one.

The Terminator was a landmark in makeup effects and also in minatures, just like Aliens.  The Abyss was one of the very first movies to feature CGI, and that technique was taken much further in Terminator 2 (effects that still look great to this day).  Titanic made big-budget effects movies legitimate when it won 237 Oscars (except Kate Winslet).  The impact that Avatar will have won’t be felt for a while, but in a few years we’re sure to see new strides taken in effects, and I’m very excited to see what’s up next on the big screen.

The story isn’t anything new.  If you’ve read and seen plenty of sci-fi, then you’ve gone down this road before.  In fact, my favorite Ain’t It Cool writer, Massawyrm, drew the comparison to Dune, and it is pretty much note for note the way the story goes.  You’ve got a far off planet being mined for a super-rare resource, a hero who comes from off-planet and becomes the savior of the indigenous people, and a climactic battle in which the natives ride on huge animals to fight the aggressors.  Good stuff in my book.

The point of it is the execution.  For one, I saw it in 3D, and I was both impressed and annoyed.  As neat as it was to see things as if they were right in front of me (the movie was shot on special stereoscopic cameras), wearing those glasses over my own glasses felt awkward at times, and I think it messed with how I saw some of the effects.  Call me old fashioned, but I like when my movies stay on the wall.  But everything just looked so cool that after a while you get used to it and I’m sure that when I get it on DVD, I’ll feel underwhelmed by how “flat” everything looks.

As for all of the performance-capture that we heard about, it was probably the one thing that thoroughly exceeded my expectations.  The performances of Sam Worthington and Sigourney Weaver as their Na’vi avatars were great, but dare I say, Zoe “New Uhura” Saldana was outstanding as Neytiri.  She was funny, exciting, and heartbreaking to watch throughout the picture.  Kudos go both to her and the effects masters at Weta Digital for bringing that performance to life.  My hunger for cool-looking sci-fi design was also sated.  Great vehicles, weapons, and computers were all on display, and as usual in a Cameron movie, everything looks like it would work if you got your hands on it.

I could go on, but in all honesty, I’d just be going on about the same things you’ve read in other reviews by more competent people who saw it before me.  Just go check it out, in 3D if you can.  It’s three hours long, but Jim did his very best to make sure that not a second drags on.  I shouldn’t have doubted him after all.