AFTERTHOUGHTS (12)

12.1 The nominees for the 59th Annual Emmy Awards have been announced, and here are the noms that have got me jazzed.

79th Annual Academy Awards
Outstanding Art Direction For A Variety, Music Or Nonfiction Programming
Outstanding Picture Editing For A Special (Single or Multi-Camera)
Outstanding Hairstyling For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special
Outstanding Lighting Direction (Electronic, Multi-Camera) For VMC Programming
Outstanding Music Direction
Outstanding Individual Performance In A Variety Or Music Program (Ellen Degeneres)
Outstanding Special Class Program
Outstanding Sound Mixing For A Variety Or Music Series Or Special
Outstanding Technical Direction, Camerawork, Video For A Miniseries, Movie, Or A Special

Battlestar Galactica
Outstanding Directing For A Drama Series (Felix Alcala for “Exodus, Part 2”)
Outstanding Sound Editing For A Series (“Exodus, Part 2”)
Outstanding Special Visual Effects For A Series (“Exodus, Part 2”)
Outstanding Writing For A Drama Series (Ronald D. Moore for “Occupation/Precipice”)

Dexter
Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing For A Drama Series (Elena Maganini for “Dexter”)
Outstanding Main Title Design
Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music (Rolfe Kent”)

Entourage
Outstanding Casting For A Comedy Series
Outstanding Directing For A Comedy Series (Julian Farino for “One Day In The Valley”)
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Comedy Series (Kevin Dillon)
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Comedy Series (Jeremy Piven)
Outstanding Guest Actor In A Comedy Series (Martin Landau)
Outstanding Comedy Series
Outstanding Sound Mixing For A Comedy Or Drama Series (half-hour) And Animation (“One Day In The Valley”)

Family Guy
Outstanding Original Music And Lyrics (Walter Murphy and Danny Smith, for “My Drunken Irish Dad,” from “Peter’s Two Dads”)

Hellboy Animated: Sword of Storms
Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming One Hour Or More)

Heroes
Outstanding Art Direction For A Single-Camera Series (“Genesis”)
Outstanding Directing For A Drama Series (David Semel for “Genesis”)
Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing For A Drama Series (Michael Murphy, Donn Aron, and Louise A. Innes for “Genesis”)
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series (Masi Oka)
Outstanding Drama Series
Outstanding Sound Mixing For A Comedy Or Drama Series (one hour) (“Genesis”)
Outstanding Special Visual Effects For A Series (“Five Years Gone”)
Outstanding Stunt Coordination (Ian Quinn for “Genesis”)

Lost
Outstanding Directing For A Drama Series (Jack Bender for “Through the Looking Glass”)
Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing For A Drama Series (Stephen Semel, Mark J. Goldman, Henk Van Eeghen, and Christopher Nelson, A.C.E. for “Through the Looking Glass”)
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series (Michael Emerson)
Outstanding Supporting Actor In A Drama Series (Terry O’Quinn)
Outstanding Sound Editing For A Series (“A Tale Of Two Cities”)
Outstanding Writing For A Drama Series (Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse for “Through the Looking Glass”)

Nip/Tuck
Outstanding Prosthetic Makeup For A Series, Miniseries, Movie Or A Special (“Conor McNamara”)

On The Lot
Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music (Mark T. Williams and Jeff Lippencott)

Project Runway
Outstanding Cinematography For Reality Programming (Tony Sacco for “Iconic Statement”)
Outstanding Picture Editing For Reality Programming (“Iconic Statement”)
Outstanding Reality-Competition Program

South Park
Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour) (“Make Love, Not Warcraft”)

To one and all, congratulations and the best of luck. You can check out the entire list of nominees here (downloadable in three formats).
The Creative Arts Emmys will be given out on September 8, while the Primetime Emmys will be presented on September 16.

(Image courtesy of visualterrain.net.)

PARIS, JE T’AIME
(Review)

An impressive array of directors are assembled for Paris, Je T’Aime, a collection of 18 five minute shorts set in and around certain sections of modern-day Paris. Ably assisted by an equally impressive ensemble, the 21 directors (3 shorts are co-directed) bring their visions of the City of Lights to the screen, and collectively produce this heartfelt cinematic portrait of life, love, and loss.
A shortlist of stand-outs would be pointless, as this film comes tantalizingly close to a clean sweep: these shorts are bittersweet and poignant, lives telescoped into a handful of minutes, sections of time that serve to illuminate entire existences.

If there are any entries that compromise that clean sweep however, they’re Vincenzo (Cube) Natali’s “Quartier de la Madeleine“ and Bruno Podalydes‘ “Montmartre.“
While Podalydes‘ entry—which opens the film—suffers in my eyes merely due to a personal pet peeve I have (characters talking to themselves), Natali’s effort is quite possibly the single misfire in this entire endeavour.
Though it is still pretty to look at (as are a vast majority of the film’s shorts), “Quartier de la Madeleine,“ which features Elijah Wood, just seems to be off-key, tonally all wrong. And it’s not because this is one of the more fanciful entries; Sylvain (Les Triplettes de Belleville) Chomet‘s whimsical tale of mimes and love, “Tour Eiffel,“ manages to be funny, moving, and magickal all at the same time. “Quartier de la Madeleine” just seems to be a misstep in an otherwise excellent selection of shorts. (I can live with Podalydes’ talking out loud in “Montmartre.”)

There are also a number of pleasant surprises, particularly cinematographer extraordinaire Christopher Doyle’s quirky entry, “Porte de Choisy.” Appropriately enough, like a Chinese puzzle box, “Porte de Choisy“ has another surprise within: director Barbet Schroeder as Monsieur Henny.

Without a doubt, there are some excellent shorts herein. But as art is ultimately a very subjective thing, whether or not the 18 shorts cohere into a single film rests entirely on the audience’s willingness to surrender themselves to the wizardry of the directors and their performers, and the vivid portrait they paint of a contemporary metropolis that quite possibly is not the common perception of “Paris.”

Paris, Je T’Aime is a genuinely moving collection of stories, snapshots of yearning and melancholy, of hope and regret, of loves lost, and found, tiny dramas played out under the shimmering lights of Paris in just under two hours, two hours that fly past quickly, as only the magick of love and cinema can make them.

Parting shot 1: Paris, Je T’Aime was originally intended to be made up of 20 short films, each set in a Paris arrondissement, but contributions from Christoffer Boe (“15th Arrondissement”) and Raphael Nadjari (“11th Arrondissement”) were dropped by producer Claudie Ossard; purportedly, they did not fit in with the rest of the entries.
Given my problems with “Quartier de la Madeleine,” I have to wonder what Boe and Nadjari had to say about Paris: did they have aliens blowing up the Arc de Triomphe? Or did they decide to pick up where 28 Weeks Later left off?

Parting shot 2: For the record, here’s an alphabetical list of the directors and their respective contributions:

Olivier Assayas: “Quartier des Enfants Rouges” (with Maggie Gyllenhaal)
Frederic Auburtin and Gerard Depardieu: “Quartier Latin” (with Ben Gazzara and Gena Rowlands; Rowlands also wrote the short’s script)
Gurinder Chadha: “Quais de Seine”
Sylvain Chomet: “Tour Eiffel”
Joel and Ethan Coen: “Tuileries” (with Steve Buscemi)
Isabel Coixet: “Bastille” (with Miranda Richardson)
Wes Craven: “Pere-Lachaise” (with Emily Mortimer, Rufus Sewell, and Alexander Payne)
Alfonso Cuaron: “Parc Monceau” (with Nick Nolte)
Christopher Doyle: “Porte de Choisy”
Richard LaGravenese: “Pigalle” (with Bob Hoskins and Fanny Ardant)
Vincenzo Natali: “Quartier de la Madeleine”
Alexander Payne: “14th Arrondissement”
Bruno Podalydes: “Montmartre”
Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas: “Loin du 16eme”
Oliver Schmitz: “Place des Fetes”
Nobuhiro Suwa: “Place des Victoires” (with Juliette Binoche and Willem Dafoe)
Tom Tykwer: “Faubourg Saint-Denis” (with Natalie Portman)
Gus Van Sant: “Le Marais” (with Marianne Faithfull and Gaspard Ulliel)

Parting shot 3: Interestingly enough, while Payne appears in Craven’s contribution, Craven appears in an uncredited role in Natali’s short.

Parting shot 4: Co-producer Emmanuel Benhiby is currently developing a film brand, “Cities of Love,” with the next project being New York, Je T’Aime.

(Paris, Je T’Aime OS’s courtesy of impawards.com.)

ON THE LOT
Episode 11
Action Night

So in one fell swoop, we’re suddenly down to an All Boys Club-- nothing new for Hollywood-- as Shalini and Hilary are sent home.
I’ve never been Hilary’s biggest fan, but she actually got better in her final weeks on the show. Shalini meanwhile, has got a good eye, but last week’s “First Sight” wasn’t her strongest work, and at this point in the show, no one can afford a misstep. (I already said that, didn’t I? Last week. Sorry, no new material.)
First double elimination down, one more to go.
And on that note…

MY FAVORITE: Andrew Hunt’s “Zero2Sixty”
A car salesman makes a pitch under really stressful circumstances.
Though I wasn’t overly impressed by the car chase, and the actor playing the car salesman got a tad grating in some scenes, this one has Andrew’s humour running through it, making for an entertaining two-and-a-half minutes.

Jason Epperson’s “Sweet”
Clearly the crowd-pleaser, this one has a man remembering his anniversary at almost the last minute, and doing his best to compensate.
Nice, clean fun (and look, he even paid for the lemonade!), but where did the wife suddenly have to get to at the tag?

Mateen Kemet’s “Catch”
A man chases down a thief, with some unexpected results.
Of the five, the only straight-forward “action” short without any comedic strains running through it. Also the one that arguably, was the most exciting, helped by its pounding score.

Sam Friedlander’s “Key Witness”
The eponymous key witness is run down by a bounty hunter, getting them both into some hot water.
It alarms me that this week, Sam ends up in my bottom two, but this one was definitely not Sam’s best. I loved the swallow the key/”I used to do magic” bit (word play in the title!), but the shoot-out wasn’t all that, and the dumpster diving wasn’t either. (But getting the goon to go splat on the dumpster lid was smart.)
And dude, you’re smiling more! Excellent! Get those extra votes! (Though you might want to have shaved a bit…)

MY LEAST FAVORITE: Kenny Luby’s “The Losers”
A Physics geek Dad proves he’s a freak his son can look up to by competing in a skateboarding race.
As with Hilary’s effort last week, it’s ironic that Kenny’s best work to date still ends up as my Least Favorite of the night.
For the record, this one was still a good short, with a warm, fuzzy “even losers can be winners” ending. The skateboarding stuff wasn’t really that exciting though. (And the behind-the-scenes stuff showed Kenny’s tendency to be an enfant terrible, so he could be on shaky ground.)
And on a final note, I loved the Physics geek writing on air, but what was with the toy lizard?!

Tonight’s guest judge: Antoine Fuqua.
I’ve only ever watched one Fuqua film, The Replacement Killers, and wasn’t terribly impressed by it. I’ve seen stretches of King Arthur on cable, but haven’t seen it in its entirety, so I can’t form a proper opinion on it.
Don’t worry. Next week’s guest judge is Brad Silberling, and I’ve at least seen two of his films!
And speaking of next week, it’s another Comedy Night (with a little Romance, according to Adrianna), with the remaining six contestants all going head-to-head.

(Contestant image courtesy of thelot.com; Antoine Fuqua image on the set of Training Day courtesy of movies.yahoo.com.)

ENTOURAGE
Season 4 Episode 2
“The First Cut is the Deepest ”

The boys finally get back from a break in Italy, since Billy claims Medellin is finally ready to be screened (for Vince’s and E’s eyes only). At the offices, Ari makes it clear that because of the bad word on the street regarding Medellin’s “troubled shoot,” no one wants to dangle an offer in front of Vince till it’s established that Medellin isn’t the next Gigli.
Meanwhile, Turtle and Drama prep the welcome back party, to be held at Drama’s condo (as Vince is currently staying at a hotel, much to Marvin’s very vocal dismay).
And meanwhile still, Ari and Mrs. Ari go on red alert as it looks like their boy may not get into the school they’ve poured so much effort into.

So while Vince and E meet Billy, only to have him flee the scene with the only completely-edited print of Medellin, Drama orders Porta-potties and padlocks his bathroom (among other drastic steps to ensure his place isn’t trashed). And in Ari’s quest to get his son into school, he finds out his son isn’t the problem; it’s Ari the foul-mouthed, cell-phone wielding maniac the school doesn’t want any more of.

At the party (where Drama insists on the use of coasters and has everyone take off their shoes), E finally gets a message through to Billy, stressing that Vince’s career—and bank account—are on the line with Medellin. So a nervous and insecure Billy finally agrees to a screening, asking only that Vince “Be gentle.”

As Vince and E finally see Medellin, the party moves to Vince’s hotel room, where Anthony Michael Hall pisses over the balcony, getting them all thrown out.
Exiting the screening room, Vince and E congratulate Billy on a great film. In the car though, E reveals he was only being nice to Billy, and while Vince apparently thought the film was great, E thought it sucked.

(Image courtesy of hbo.com.)

reVIEW (9)
HIDE AND SEEK

Hide and Seek is the story of psychologist David Callaway (Robert De Niro), whose wife (Amy Irving) loses her life suddenly and tragically, forcing him to not only cope with the loss, but care for their little girl Emily (Dakota Fanning). One move to upstate New York later, and Emily is having visitations from her new friend Charlie, and the expected strange goings-on begin.

The central riddle of Hide and Seek, of course, involves Charlie and his true nature. Is it supernatural, natural, or psychological? The big problem with the film is, the answer is painfully transparent, and the underlying reason for it, ultimately prosaic. To the credit of director John Polson (Swimf@n) and scriptwriter Ari Schlossberg, the clues are present, but there really isn’t much of a mystery here. A senile Angela Lansbury could solve this one without breaking a sweat.
And the red herrings are, at best, negligible. Admittedly, I’ve seen worse: the awkward and obvious herrings of Jane Campion’s In The Cut and Robert Zemeckis’ What Lies Beneath readily come to mind. And though a mystery’s red herring is supposed to distract you from the real solution, the herrings in Hide and Seek are instantly dismissable, as not only do they cross into the too-obvious zone, but the true answer is just so evident, that once you’ve latched onto it, you’ll be like a dog reluctant to give up its bone.

One of the other tragedies of Hide and Seek is that not only is talent of the caliber of a De Niro wasted here, but that of Oscar nominee Elizabeth Shue (for Leaving Las Vegas) and Famke Janssen (who did more as Michael Douglas’ injured wife in Don’t Say A Word than she ends up doing here) as well. Shue and Janssen don’t really play characters; they play plot necessities, the possible romantic interest, and the younger colleague/former student. We don’t really know much about them beyond the barest skeleton of a thumbnail sketch, and their on-screen time is limited, at best, visible only when the story’s events require their presence.
The lion’s share of Hide and Seek is handed over to De Niro and Fanning, which wouldn’t have been such a bad thing, if only De Niro had submitted more than the passably serviceable performance he gives here, and Fanning had done more than just steal a page from Christina Ricci’s Wednesday Addams, looking all gloomy and morose, like a pre-teen believer in heroin chic. One never really gets the sense of the presumably tremendous psychological weight these characters must be toiling under. In the end, everything is terribly mediocre and not very thrilling.

Interestingly enough, the space in which Hide and Seek operates is the same territory masterfully staked out by a certain kind of film from the recent Asian horror cinema boom. However, there is far more style and flair in Kim Ji-woon’s Janghwa, Hongryeon (A Tale of Two Sisters) or Park Ki-hyung’s Acacia, than in this piece of assembly-line Hollywood masquerading as a thriller.
Polson’s direction is casual when it should be taut. There is never any sense of something extraordinary taking place here. Instead, due to the throw-away manner in which the material is approached, it’s almost as if the filmmakers are saying, Nothing to worry about, this happens every day.

Any film should be involving, a mystery perhaps even more so. It should have the ability to suck you into its world, to subsume the audience into its twists and tangles, making you wonder, all the way until the final frame. It should be able to get you to participate in its game, get you to try and solve its riddle, to look as hard as you can for the hidden solution.
In Hide and Seek, with its answer plain to see, Polson and company don’t seem to care, one way or the other, if you choose to play their game. Well, all I can say to that is four simple words: sit this one out.

(The above review was previously published under the title “Sit This One Out.”)

(Hide and Seek OS courtesy of impawards.com.)

reVIEW (8)
EL MAQUINISTA
(THE MACHINIST)

Brad Anderson’s El Maquinista (The Machinist) is the most bewildering film I managed to see from 2004.
It’s the story of Trevor Reznik (a horrifyingly emaciated Christian Bale), who hasn’t slept for a year, and the gradual unraveling of his so-called life, when strange incidents begin to take place. It’s the kind of film that makes no effort to give the audience any idea about where it’s going; the kind of film where you keep on waiting for the other shoe to drop, unaware if the shoe’s going to be a high-heeled stiletto, black-leather dress, or steel-toed motorcycle.
There is an enigma at the heart of The Machinist, to be certain. The question is, if, by film’s end, the viewer will find the answer worth having waited for.

Edited by Luis De La Madrid and shot by Xavi Gimenez (the excellent editor and cinematographer tandem of Jaume Balaguero’s chilling Los Sin Nombre and Darkness), The Machinist has a bleak air about it, bordering on the oppressive without actually crossing over into the why-is-it-always-dark-and-raining territory of Se7en. But as visually interesting as the film is, it is in its script (by Scott Kosar, who also penned the scripts for the remakes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Amityville Horror) where The Machinist breaks down.

The central mystery, of course, is why exactly has Trevor not gotten any sleep for the past year? Why is it that outside of his job, the only regular socializing he does is with Stevie, a prostitute played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Marie (Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, who starred opposite Keanu Reeves in A Walk in the Clouds), an airport waitress he’s visited every single night for the past year?
The beauty of a mystery is when there are enough clues that the attentive and analytical audience member can actually solve it just before the final reveal. Just take a look at The Sixth Sense. All the clues are right there, if only we interpret them properly. The problem with The Machinist is that, though there are clues handed out to the viewer, they’re rather general and ambiguous, so much so that actually solving the puzzle before the climax is a slim, nearly non-existent possibility. And because the clues are not very precise, the audience could be left annoyed and irritated as the end credits begin to roll.

Ultimately, the most disturbing aspect of The Machinist is the physical transformation Bale underwent to play the insomniac Reznik, losing 63 pounds—a third of his body weight—making the Oscar-winning thinning-down Adrien Brody did for Roman Polanski’s The Pianist look positively little league by comparison.
Having debuted on the silver screen in 1987, appearing in Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun, and the lesser-known Mio, moj Mio (Mio in the Land of Faraway) from Vladimir Grammatikov, Bale has gained a reputation for the intensity and dedication he brings to his craft.
When he bulked up and honed his body to a stunningly high-definition for Mary Harron’s American Psycho, then maintained that build for Kurt Wimmer’s Equilibrium, I was suitably impressed by Bale’s ability to take on the physical transformation a specific role entailed. And though this latest feat is no less impressive, it is also a shocking thing to see.
You just know there is some deep, dark secret at The Machinist’s core, something so disturbing it can turn a man into the wasted husk we see on-screen. It is, I believe, this added pressure on the final answer to The Machinist’s dark question that results in its collapse.
Not that the answer is light-weight by any means, but somehow, it doesn’t seem enough, not for a feature-length film, where drama is heightened and magnified from its real-life proportions. In the end, the movie does not successfully convey the weight, the magnitude, of what we learn is the truth. Like John Polson’s Hide and Seek, the final reveal of The Machinist just seems too prosaic given all we’ve seen leading up to it.

Anderson’s previous psychological thriller Session 9 (with David Caruso, who managed to move from New York to Miami without seemingly becoming a different character) was also a slick little package that sadly lacked substance and cohesion once the wrapping had come off.
Maybe, if Anderson eventually manages to hold a solid script in his evidently capable directorial hands, we’ll all see the great film he so clearly wants to show us.
Until then, we’ll have to make do with the tantalizing possibilities already visible in his near-misses.

Parting shot: A Spanish production, The Machinist was filmed before Batman Begins, and Bale had to quickly gain back all the pounds he’d shed to bulk up to play Gotham’s Dark Knight.

Parting shot 2: I’m eagerly awaiting Anderson’s next film, Transsiberian, hoping this is the one that’s gonna kick my a$$.
Aside from that, Luis De La Madrid is also helming the upcoming The End of the Summer.

(The above review began life under the name, “Out Of Order.”)

(The Machinist OS’s courtesy of impawards.com.)

ON THE LOT
Episode 10
“When Two Worlds Collide”

Shira-Lee goes home, and that’s too bad, as I did like the nursery scene from “Open House.”
And that’s not the only bit of bad news Adrianna brings to the contestants. It seems that from this batch of five directors, the two with the least number of votes get eliminated. Suddenly, the odds are ramped up against the contestants, and no one can afford a misfire at this stage of the game.
So, without further ado…

MY FAVORITE: Adam Stein’s “Worldly Possession”
Though the idea of a top secret military weapon getting mistakenly sent to suburbia was one of the loglines from the very first OTL episode, Adam makes the most of the idea, as a materialistic couple get their just desserts. (The punchline however, does wipe out the entire neighborhood as well…)

Will Bigham’s “Spaghetti”
A couple get lost on the road and end up in the middle of a spaghetti Western.
Will finally breaks out whole sentences of dialogue and makes this a fun little homage to the genre.

Zach Lipovsky’s “Time Upon A Once”
The new neighbours move in, but there’s something decidedly odd about them…
Again, the logistics and technical aspects of his short are impressive, but just as Carrie Fisher pointed out, Zach’s set his own bar so high, that even a good entry like this one suffers in comparison to his past work.
And I wouldn’t have minded subtitles, ala Twin Peaks.

Shalini Kantayya’s “First Sight”
A shallow and self-involved young woman has a shocking epiphany at a street fair.
Though I didn’t have as much of a problem with this one as Carrie Fisher and guest judge Luke Greenfield did, it did still lack some “Oooomphh.”
And the visual effects that turn Baba (I believe his name was) into a ball of light were so Charmed, it hurt…

MY LEAST FAVORITE: Hilary Graham’s “The Legend of Donkey-Tail Willie”
An interesting fable set in the Wild West, where true love can be found, no matter the particular circumstance of one’s physicality.
It’s ironic that this is definitely Hilary’s best work to date, and this week, it’s my Least Favorite.
I just really didn’t feel Willie’s predicament as much as I should’ve. And there wasn’t any sense of genuine conflict on our way to that happy ending.

This week’s guest judge was Luke Greenfield, who directed The Animal and The Girl Next Door, neither of which I’ve actually seen, so I don’t have anything really to say about the guy.
So I won’t.

Next week’s gonna be interesting (it’s Action Night) and tough, as two directors are going home… And the week after that, two more go home…
Things are getting down to the wire.

(Contestant image courtesy of thelot.com; Luke Greenfield image courtesy of ryanpinkston.com.)