2008. Starring Sean Penn, James Franco, Josh Brolin. Directed by Gus Van Sant. While watching Milk, I felt that I was seeing three stories told by using the same events. There is the biopic story of Harvey Milk, driven by an amazing performance by Sean Penn, telling the story of a 40-year-old New Yorker who realizes that who he is requires a drastic life change. Milk moves with his partner to San Francisco in order to be himself and, once fully becoming himself, finds his calling in city politics, representing the Castro District and, by extension, the gay community. There’s …
Month: March 2009
Movie Review: Band of Outsiders
1964. Directed by Jean-Luc Godard. Starring Anna Karina, Sami Frey, Claude Brasseur. I don’t pretend to fully understand what Godard was trying to say with this enthusiastic exercise in film, but I love watching the results. I think I like this film more than Breathless, his earlier and better-known film also portraying a criminal who seems more-than-usually inspired by American gangsters. Franz (Sami Frey) and Arthur (Claude Brasseur) are small-time crooks on the trail of a big score, with the help of their English-language classmate Odile (Anna Karina, who happens to be Godard’s wife). They case the house where Odile …
Movie Review: Let The Right One In
2008. Directed by Tomas Alfredson. Starring Kare Hedebrant and Lina Leandersson. Oskar is a sad little kid. Living with his mother, separated from his father, taunted and tortured by classmates, a little too smart and too weird to fit in anywhere. Wintertime in Sweden is a bit on the bleak side too — snow drifting across a black sky, sterile apartment buildings, a quietly unsympathetic school. Then, one night, neighbors move in next door. He doesn’t really see the neighbors, only the cardboard and posters that now cover their window. He sits outside, watching his breath in the air, sitting …
Movie Review: Gone in 60 Seconds
1974. Written, directed and starring H.B. Halicki. I’m almost done with my drive-in movie phase. I’m building up to Vanishing Point. Gone in 60 Seconds is essentially two movies. The first half involves an insurance scam/car theft ring that requires the stealing and delivery of 48 cars in two days. H.B. Halicki portrays the lead of a team who steal some of the most beautiful cars (they refer to the different makes and models by women’s names) by deception or opportunism. They complete the theft of all the cars on their list, but one — a yellow Mustang they call …
Passings: Hank Locklin
I made a bad joke to friends a few years ago when Hank Cochran died that he was the fifth best-known Hank, and we were down to just a few contenders left. Well, I consider Hank Locklin the third best-known Hank, and the highest-ranked “living Hank” before his death yesterday. Hank Locklin’s greatest moment may have been “Send Me The Pillow That You Dream On,” a really sweet song, so earnest that it could never be recorded today, when the sentiment would be considered creepy. I believe that “Please Help Me, I’m Falling” was an even-bigger hit, although both songs …
Country Music Reclamation Project: Rank Stranger
A few years ago, I drove through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee. Besides being one of the most beautiful places in America — the trip took place while the leaves were changing through an incalculable range of colors, and the damp cold could be felt on the mountaintops and in the shadier areas — there was an oppressive feeling of isolation, not only because the park is large and the visitors few that week, but because if there had been others in the park, you likely wouldn’t have seen them through the trees and around the endlessly …