Directed by Lars von Trier. (Unrated. 133 minutes. At Bay Area
theaters.)
Lars von Trier’s “Dogville” was one of the best films of 2004, an
incisive fable that seized on and elucidated certain peculiarly American
varieties of human pathology. It was a film of subtlety and power and brilliant
control, a massive mechanism that landed on a dime, sure of its meaning, sure
of its method and galvanized by what seemed like genuine anger.
“Manderlay” is von Trier’s sequel to “Dogville,” the second of a trilogy,
we’re told, and in every way it’s a betrayal of the earlier masterpiece. The
film is obvious, weak and scattered and seems more like a practical joke than a
work of genuine passion. It is without exaggeration one of the most blindingly
boring films I’ve seen in years. No longer angry, von Trier is trying to incite
anger, but “Manderlay” can’t do that because its creator has no idea of what
he’s talking about and doesn’t much care.
Grace, the gangster’s daughter played by Nicole Kidman in “Dogville” is
now played by Bryce Dallas Howard. She’s a smart actress with an impatient,
no-nonsense air — one that’s refreshing in a movie that tries patience and
is all nonsense. While traveling through the Deep South with her father (Willem
Dafoe), in 1933, she comes across Manderlay, a plantation in which slavery is
still, somehow, in effect, 70 years after the Emancipation Proclamation. Grace
is outraged, and when the matriarch (Lauren Bacall) dies, she decides to stay
at Manderlay, along with a small posse of guards. She wants to help the slaves
become self-sufficient, productive citizens.
As in “Dogville,” von Trier films “Manderlay” without much in the way of
sets, in what looks like an empty airplane hangar, and he tells the story
through a series of episodes, each introduced by John Hurt in a sneering
voiceover narration. But in “Manderlay,” von Trier leans on the narration
slavishly, often at a loss as to how to convey information. And unlike in
“Dogville,” the story doesn’t build from one episode to the next. Instead, the
episodes are discrete and uninvolving.
Von Trier, who has never visited the United States, has no insight into
the issue of race in America, and the point of his fable is difficult to
discern. The closing credits show scenes of racial injustice, but frankly, from
the evidence at hand, von Trier seems as contemptuous of black Americans as he
is of white Americans. He presents the former slaves as helpless and pathetic,
and then on several occasions has someone suggest that white people made them
that way. It’s hard to say whether von Trier is trying to be condescending, is
satirizing condescension or is trying to do a little of both. It’s hard to
care. It’s hard enough to stay awake.
This is a wretched piece of work, and all the more to be regretted for the
bad light it casts on “Dogville.” If he has this little to say next time out,
von Trier should really forget the trilogy and cut his losses.
– Advisory: Nudity, strong language, a graphic sexual interlude and
violence.
– Mick LaSalle
‘Why We Fight’
Documentary. With
John McCain, William Kristol, Gore Vidal.
Directed by Eugene Jarecki. Running time: 98 minutes. (Rated PG-13. At Bay
Area theaters.)
Eugene Jarecki’s documentary about the corporatization of war opens
with a potent touch of irony: footage of President Dwight Eisenhower, in his
1961 farewell address, warning the nation against the encroaching
“military-industrial complex.” Today, the former general’s words would brand
him an anti-American radical. This, Jarecki suggests, demonstrates just how far
the United States has come, or rather sunk, since the days of the Cold War.
“Why We Fight” — which, in another bit of irony, borrows its title from
Frank Capra’s series of World-War-II propaganda shorts — indicts the
marriage between arms and profit by painstakingly chronicling the growth of a
military economy under both Democratic and Republican administrations. Views
are culled from both sides of the red-blue divide, with neoconservatives like
Richard Perle and William Kristol voicing support for international policing
and Gore Vidal and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., serving up more critical
assessments.
Like Michael Moore in “Fahrenheit 9/11,” Jarecki takes his cameras to the
streets to canvass the common folk, who dish out patriotism, gullibility and
suspicion in equal amounts. He also invests his rhetoric with several
human-interest angles, from a young volunteer who joins the Army as respite
from a dead-end life to a retired New York police officer who supported the war
in Iraq because he was seeking justice for a son killed in the Sept. 11, 2001,
attacks. He never got it, and his expressions of betrayal offer a more
effective damnation of political deceit than all the other punditry in the film
combined.
“Why We Fight” is a somber polemic that presents a convincing case against
using war as an economic booster — although, Jarecki argues, that is
precisely what the United States has been doing under every president since
Truman. The military-industrial complex has become the American way. Somewhere
Ike, that pinko peacenik, is surely rolling over in his grave.
– Advisory: Rated PG-13 for graphic war footage.
– Neva Chonin
‘Neil Young: Heart of Gold’
Starring Neil Young, Emmylou Harris, Pegi Young, others.
Directed by Jonathan Demme. Rated PG. 105 minutes
Facing brain surgery for an aneurism, Neil Young went to Nashville and
recorded an album while he waited for his operation the following week.
“Prairie Wind,” the resulting work, easily ranks among the 10 best albums in
the prolific career of the bard of La Honda.
If the album had been a big hit, the “Prairie Wind” concert movie — now
titled “Neil Young: Heart of Gold,” after Young’s biggest hit — would have
been an acclaimed triumph. But because the album made its appearance and
quietly slipped away before the movie could be released, the filmed concert,
with the first half devoted exclusively to songs from the new album, joins the
ranks of similar Young concert film ventures over the years — another
snapshot of his fabled career that’s of little interest to anyone outside his
many fans.
Perhaps not surprisingly, mortality looms over songs such as “Painter,”
“Falling Off the Face of the Earth,” “No Wonder.” He dedicates “Prairie Wind”
to his father, who died shortly before the sessions, and “Here for You” to his
young adult daughter.
Academy Award-winning director Jonathan Demme (”The Silence of the
Lambs”), who made one of the greatest rock concert movies ever with the Talking
Heads’ “Stop Making Sense,” keeps the action focused on the stage of
Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium, spiritual home of country music where the Grand
Ol Opry was broadcast every week for the first 60 years or so.
Young is backed in a largely acoustic performance by a large ensemble
that, at times, includes a full string section and the Memphis Horns of
Stax/Volt soul music fame. Emmylou Harris joins his wife, Pegi Young, on
harmony vocals and Young, for his part, plays a guitar that once belonged to
Hank Williams.
Outside of a couple of yellow painted backdrops on the Ryman stage that
give the film a golden glow and a set of cowboy stage outfits made especially
for the shoot, “Heart of Gold” is an unvarnished, no-frills concert documentary
that captures Young giving the warmhearted songs from the album — plus a
handful of his well-known pieces in the film’s second half — his typically
soulful performance.
– Joel Selvin
‘Far Side of the Moon’
Comedy-drama. Directed by Robert Lepage. With Robert Lepage, Anne-Marie
Cadieux. (In French with English subtitles. Not rated. 105 minutes. At the
Castro.)
This film began as a one-man performance piece by Quebecois playwright
and filmmaker Robert Lepage (Cal Performances presented it in Berkeley in
2001). It was highly acclaimed, and perhaps Lepage should have left it at that.
This screen version is well made, but it’s a talkfest that wears its
stage origins on its sleeve.
The story mingles the history of the space race with the efforts of two
alienated brothers to come to terms with the death of their mother (Anne-Marie
Cadieux). One is a drippy grad student whose thesis links narcissism to space
travel, the other a slick TV weather announcer who is gay.
Lepage’s talent is unquestionable. He not only directed and edited the
film, he portrays both siblings, and manages to make them individuals. The film
is visually impressive (it was shot in high-definition video) and it is
intermittently funny.
However, Lepage indulges himself in metaphor mongering and throws in
incidents that are individually absorbing but don’t seem to go anywhere —
let alone to the far side of the moon.
The film may be best appreciated by those who’ve seen the stage version.
– Advisory: This film contains adult language.
– Walter Addiego
‘Breaking News’
Hong Kong
action. Starring Richie Ren, Kelly Chen, Nick Cheung. Directed by Johnnie To.
(Not Rated. 90 minutes. At the Balboa.)
It takes just the first shot to get sucked into “Breaking News,” the
latest bit of destruction from mayhem master Johnnie To, and it’s a doozy: A
seven-minute take with To’s camera sweeping in and out of upstairs rooms, cars
and shops, climaxing in a shootout on a Hong Kong street.
When the dust has settled, the crooks have gotten away and the police are
embarrassed; especially when a patrolman puts his hands up in defeat when
confronted by the main crook, Yuan (Richie Ren), and a local TV news crew gets
it on tape.
So the police not only have a dangerous band of thieves on the loose, but
a PR problem as well.
Enter Rebecca Fong (Kelly Chen of “Infernal Affairs”), an ambitious
inspector who lobbies the police chief (Simon Yam) to take control of the case.
Her plan: Once the criminals are cornered — and they quickly are, in a
high-rise apartment building — she will invite the media and feed them
stories with a pro-police slant. She even sets up a media trailer outside the
apartment building to personally direct the PR strategy as well as negotiate
with the criminals.
Trouble is, the criminals, who have three hostages (a father, played by To
regular Lam Suet, and his two children), also have cell phones and Web cams,
and they create their own media access.
So what we have is “Dog Day Afternoon,” Johnnie To style. To, Hong Kong’s
best action auteur since John Woo left for Hollywood, doesn’t disappoint. Apart
from the bravado opening take, he inventively stages shootouts in the apartment
building — in cramped hallways, in stairwells, hanging outside windows and
even in elevator shafts.
To is also excellent at little touches that humanize his characters —
as in the fabulous scene when two of the crooks fix dinner (because Dad, the
hostage, can’t cook) and find they both had wanted to be chefs and own their
own restaurants. Also noteworthy is Cheung as an inspector who has little
patience for Rebecca’s plan.
However, as solid as “Breaking News” is, it doesn’t quite reach the level
of To’s best work — specifically “The Mission” (his masterpiece), “PTU,”
“Where a Good Man Goes,” the romantic comedies “Love on a Diet” and “Needing
You” and his most recent film, the gangster drama “Election,” which was just
voted the best Hong Kong film of 2005 by the Hong Kong Film Critics Association
(and just came out on DVD in Asian video stores in the Bay Area).
Perhaps that’s because To’s skewering of both media and government
responsibility needs more bite. He’s working with a great idea, one that should
have been as well thought out as his elegantly staged action sequences.
– Advisory: This film contains PG-level violence.
– G. Allen Johnson
