Culture Blues

November Movie Primer

Welcome to Culture Blues’ monthly cinema primer! Every month, Jeff studies the next month’s slate of releases and ignorantly pre-judges them. His opinions are solely based on 15 minutes of IMDB research and trailers. Jeff has not seen any of these movies. You’re welcome.

November offers a slate packed with the destruction of the world and deconstruction of humanity. It’s always nice when movies start holding the mirror up to our shaky, scared society, right before Thanksgiving. Of course, it’s no surprise that a month of challenging flicks should be the most exciting in recent memory, way back to when that Transformers movie dropped.

THE END IS NIGH!
In a recent interview with some other pop culture site, Chuck Klosterman said this about 2012mania: 

“It would be weird if that comes true, obviously, but especially so because however long it took for the world to end—20 minutes or four days, whatever the window is—it would be interesting to walk up to people and say, “Fuckin-A, man, the Mayans! Who would’ve guessed? That was the apex of society! I never would have guessed it was the Mayans!”

Klosterman didn’t realize that he was cribbing actual lines of dialogue from Roland Emmerich’s upcoming explosionanza 2012. In between John Cusack escaping from disasters (via truck, limo, helicopter, jet, hot air balloon, and saddled sea horse), there is time for some of that trademark Emmerich wit, with “snarky guy,” probably played by Woody Harrelson, quipping about how he never saw the end of the world coming. Later, he'll say something random about giving the Mayans a virus or something, and that will give Cusack the big idea he needs to save the world (it will likely involve riding a meteor into the eye of a hurricane).

Ok, so it's a bit unfair to paint 2012 as Independence Day redux. Unfair to Independence Day, that is. The aliens blowing our shit up was a lot cheerier in 94. Now, it seems Emmerich has lapsed from joyfully destructive escapism to CGI explosions that play on our worst fears.  First global warming, now the nutso 2012 thing. Emmerich is just not fun any more - we've seen the wide scale destruction often enough, and some of it hasn't been in theaters.

Of course, 2012 looks like a bubblegum blow-em-up next to The Road. Destined to be anything but a feel good holiday movie, The Road details what happens to a father and son after an Emmerich level snowglobe shaking. It's based on the acclaimed Cormac McCarthy novel and stars Viggo Mortensen, but it's also suffered numerous delays and some lukewarm advance press. I'm still looking forward to it. Hopefully they keep in the cannibalism and rape threats that make the book so engrossing. I like my apocalypse served raw, thanks.

ANOTHER SURE SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE
Who wants to be the first in line to tell me that Zac Efron is now a serious actor? The career makeover begins in Richard Linklater’s Me & Orson Welles, the long delayed festival darling is finally getting a wide release this month. Forget about Efron though, the real buzz is around newcomer Christian McKay’s portrayal of Welles. He’s looking like a darkhorse for best supporting actor, one that I missed in last month’s premature predictions. 

THE WACHOWSKI SIBLINGS

The "we're sorry for the last two Matrix movies" tour continues this month with the Wachowskis bringing us a god damn ninja movie! Packed with stylized violence and hopefully completely devoid of any philosophy 101 bullshit or flying Christ figures. I'm willing to give Ninja Assassin a chance.

GOOD DIRECTORS, STRANGE CHOICES
I’m a big Wes Anderson fan, but I can’t work up any desire to check out his stop motion pseudo children’s film The Fantastic Mr. Fox. My antipathy for kid’s movies, even those helmed by directors I respect, has been well-documented in this column (I never did get out to see Where the Wild Things Are, figuring a lone man at a matinee might disturb the Park Slope Parents). Unlike Wild Things and Up, movies that I look forward to watching the next time I’m randomly asked to babysit (this has never happened), I haven’t even a passing desire to see Mr. Fox. Although, after reading this NY Times article about the contentious production process, I’m a little more intrigued.

In a similar vein is Richard Kelly’s follow-up to the absolutely fucking brilliant Southland Tales, an apparently more mainstream effort called The Box. Sort of feels like a movie that Kelly was forced to take in order not to be kicked out of Hollywood after Southland. The Box is based on a short story by the wackadoo that wrote I Am Legend (the book that inspired the Will Smith movie, and actually features a ton more necrophilia than the movie) and Kelly is certain to transcend classic thriller tropes to bring the weirdness. Still, it’s hard to get too excited about Cameron Diaz and Cyclops playing morally ambiguous yuppies. Kelly should’ve cast this one with Cheri Oteri and Jon Lovitz. Also, I’m not a fan of what they did to Richard Nixon’s face. It looks fake. Like, Avatar fake.

Spoiler:  They press the button.

OMG VAMPIREZ
Twilight the Deuce hits big screens this month, destined to inspire the next generation of erotic fan fiction. I don't have much to say about this treacle. Maybe you should read our own Giovanny Caquias' in-depth analysis of what that Stephanie Myers lady has done to vampires. It about says it all.

MOVIE TO TAKE MOM TO SEE
Tough month for this as everything is so gloomy and depressing, just like the Thanksgiving after Uncle Harry's suicide. After a few glasses of wine, you might as well take your love-starved mother to Women In Trouble. She likes sexually liberated women and Carla Gugino's boobs, right? Anyway, with lines like "If we don’t tell people how we feel, then what are we doing here?" in the trailer, I'm sure your mom will probably cry.

LET’S HELP SOME BLACK PEOPLE!
Watch the trailer for Precious, the Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry produced drama, based on a national bestseller about an overweight, illiterate, twice pregnant Harlem teen that tries to turn her life around. Precious, already garnering steady Oscar buzz, looks gritty and real. After watching that trailer, don’t you find yourself thinking; if only Precious had some nice white people to teach her how to live? That’s the plot of The Blind Side, Sandra Bullock’s (reprising her role from Crash) flick about a big-hearted conservative that learns to love a fat black boy that’s really good at football. Talk about a double feature! Oh, and does anyone else watch the dinner scene in The Blind Side commercials and immediately think of this?

GAZE INTO THE EMPTINESS OF ROBERT ZEMECKIS’ VISION
I don’t get the fuss over Robert Zemeckis. Yes, the Back to the Future series is beyond awesome. And I’m told some people like that one movie about the tough-as-nails soldier that loses his legs in Vietnam and then has to babysit a retard on a houseboat for the rest of his sad life. But what has Zemeckis done in the last decade to warrant his vaunted directorial status? He’s created a bunch of the creepiest, coldest looking CGI monstrosities known to man, that’s what. That Tom Hanks conductor creature from Polar Express? Holy shit, terrifying. And Beowolf totally sucks, but at least he didn’t inflict it upon our children. Zemeckis is back to ruin another holiday classic with this month’s A Christmas Carol. Keep in mind Zemeckis is also the guy that directed the Tales From the Crypt where an escaped psycho killer dresses up as Santa to terrorize a single Mom and her son. Speaking of criminally insane, Jim Carrey lends his incomparable powers of kabala to the mix, voicing Scrooge and all the Ghosts. Please, I’m begging you, don’t take your kids to this. It will scar them forever. There’s a nice movie out called Planet 51 with some friendly looking aliens and that pleasant The Rock fellow (and also the best use of a Killers song in a trailer, ever). Take your spawn to that instead.

TWO TO STRONGLY CONSIDER SEEING
Two that I'm looking forward to seeing this month are The Men Who Stare at Goats and The Messenger. Goats is an adaptation of a fine little book by woefully under-read political writer/satirist Jon Ronson. I'm not sure where I read it, or heard it, but someone said about Clooney's performance that it's the first time in a comedic role that Clooney doesn't seem like he's in on the jokes. He's the butt. That's meant as a compliment, but also a sort of criticism on those smug  fucks from the Oceans gang. Anyway, it has me interested in Clooney's performance. Also, the phrase "american jedi" will, for me, always sell a movie.

I think I've demonstrated over this site's 3 month lifespan that I'm a sucker for a good Iraq War movie. Unfortunately, there's only one really worth a damn (The Hurt Locker), the rest are either unbelievably preachy (Rendition) or dispiritingly vapid (MTV's music video Stop-Loss). The Messenger looks to counter that trend with a star turn from the coiled ball of violence that is Ben Foster. It also stars Woody Harrelson (having a helluva a year) and has the kind of strong indy pedigree that makes me think it could actually challenge The Hurt Locker. Or at least be better than Lions For Lambs.

THE ONE MOVIE YOU ABSOLUTELY MUST SEE IN NOVEMBER
Sure, a lot of things look good in November. But nothing quite reaches the level of life imitating art imitating batshit craziness that Bad Lieutenant:  Port of Call New Orleans does. Maybe you haven’t heard about Nic Cage’s recent financial troubles. In Bad Lieutenant he’s basically playing himself, with the manic laughter and psycho googly eyes amped all the way up to 10. This all goes without mentioning the presence of crazy German director Werner Herzog, whose reimagining of Abel Ferrara’s cult classic Bad Lieutenant promises all the harrowing over-the-top pathos but without Harvey Keitel’s ding-a-ling. I hope. Anyway, go see this movie! It’s going to be a unique cultural experience.

That’s all for this month. Join me in December for all the major Oscar contenders (except the weird foreign one nobody will see coming), Guy Ritchie’s badass take on Sherlock Holmes , and this little James Cameron movie a few people are excited about (not me).

Tagged as: 2012, john cusack, nic cage, orson welles, Precious, richard kelly, the messenger, the road, woody harrelson renaissance, zac efron vs twilight