Django Unchained (2012)

Star Rating: ****
There's one thing that is essential to understand about "Django Unchained" before you see it: it's purely fiction, a fantasy. It is violent, it is profane, it is disturbing... but it doesn't mean any harm. It is a creation from a filmmaker who loves movies and preserving and embodying certain passages of film history in his own films. With that in mind, it is not a societal drama and it is certainly not a history lesson. It is a thrill ride, with historical context. With all that understood, you may proceed. If you don't get this, there's a much higher chance that you will be shocked and offended by it.

That's not to say it won't smack you in the face with its content--because it will! In fact, a more appropriate title for the film would have been "Tarantino Unchained". For in "Django", Tarantino is more violent, more bloody, and more profane than he's ever been. The bloodshed here may not be in such frequent quantities as in "Kill Bill", but it looks more realistic, which makes it worse. There are several shootouts, and one incredibly rough scene where a slave is savagely ripped apart by dogs. Just when I thought onscreen violence couldn't get any worse, there's always Tarantino.

The profanity: Tarantino goes a little ape with the "n" word. True, this may have been appropriate because of the time period, but it does get bothersome. I have to wonder if he was having fun and got carried away while writing the script.

Now for those of you who are not familiar with the premise (but why would you be reading this if you weren't) "Django Unchained" is a homage to spaghetti westerns, which specialized in action, thrills and violence. The setting is the deep south in 1858, three years before the Civil War, not two as the title card suggests. A German dentist turned bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) recruits a slave named Django (Jamie Foxx) to help him find a group of murderous outlaws who only he (Django) could indentify, in exchange for his freedom.

After the outlaws have been seen too, Django sticks on with Dr. Shultz to search for his wife who had been sold off years earlier. Django and Dr. Shultz search every plantation they come to for Django's wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington). They eventually learn that she's on the most horrible and brutal slave plantation in the United States, Candyland, owned by Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio). Shultz and Django masquerade as potential customers, and go to Candyland in search of slave to purchase: Broomhilda.

Leonardo DiCaprio has certainly blossomed as an actor. He's no longer the street-smart love struck Jack from "Titanic". That ship has sailed. After several movies with Martin Scorsese and Christopher Nolan, DiCaprio has become a very serious leading man. Calvin Candie is a charming, seemingly level headed individual. And yet it is Candie who orders the execution of the slave who is, in a word, destroyed by vicious dogs in a scene as jarring and disturbing as the ear cutting scene in "Reservoir Dogs" twenty years earlier. Here is when we are convinced of Candie's cruelty and malevolence. It's not enough knowing he owns the most brutal slave plantation in the country, we have to see it for ourselves.

Tarantino is known for writing quirky characters with fascinating interests, such as the religious Jules from "Pulp Fiction", and the "detective" SS Colonel Hans Landa (also played by Christoph Waltz), from "Inglourious Basterds". In "Django Unchained", bounty hunter King Shultz used to be a dentist, and he uses his dentistry credentials as a cover. He drives around in a carriage with a large tooth attached to a spring on the top. There's a small "cavity" in the tooth where he stores wanted posters. Calvin Candie is a "Francophile", and has a good deal of interest in French culture, but doesn't speak a word of French. I really like the way Tarantino writes his characters. They are who they are, and aren't sorry for it. And neither is he.

"Django Unchained" is a very well made movie, with good characters, an eclectic soundtrack, and a great script, though not as talky as Tarantino's others. It has incredibly funny moments and incredibly disturbing moments. Sometimes the disturbing moments are funny. It strongly resembles "Inglourious Basterds", which may not surprise you. Both movies are period pieces, and deal with difficult times in history.

In both movies, Tarantino is having fun with subjects that are really touchy, even today. He claims that he wanted to make a film about slavery, but he wanted to do it like a spaghetti western, rather than a social issues movie. He calls it a "southern", rather than a western. I can see he does care about slavery, but it's his style to do entertainment movies (Hiscock). It was the same case with "Inglourious Basterds". He has the same message about slavery that he had about Nazism, and it's right there: it's bad. It's no deeper than that. What you see is what you get. And he makes that point, as if he needed too.

Revenge is a theme that both films have in common, and has been prominent in Tarantino's work as far back as "Kill Bill". In "Inglourious Basterds", Shoshanna wanted revenge against the Nazis for the slaughter of her family. Now Django wants to get revenge on white slave owners, specifically the ones who harmed him and took his wife. Let's just say that the body count at the end of both movies are enormous.

I hear one more revenge drama is the cards for Tarantino. The project, still in development, called "Killer Crow" about three black soldiers during World War II who go AWOL, and shoot their white superiors. This should conclude Tarantino's "American History/Revenge Trilogy" (Gates, Jr.). That should make one heck of a box set.

Tarantino makes excellent movies that you almost feel guilty for liking because of how violent and controversial they are. But there is no denying his talent, or the quality of his work. With "Django", he has made what is possibly his most controversial work. This film is not for everybody. Only the selected few who can appreciate this is for what it is: an art-house film that knows what it is, isn't sorry for it, and doesn't even pretend to be.

Hiscock, John (April 27, 2007). "Quentin Tarantino: I'm proud of my flop". Telegraph.co.uk.
Retrieved 8 February, 2013.

"Django Unchained Trilogy and More: Tarantino Talks to Gates". theroot.com. December 23, 2012.
8 February, 2013.

Moonrise Kingdom (2012)

Star Rating: **** (4/4 stars)
I remember thinking to myself, "I hope 'Moonrise Kingdom' is at least nominated for Best Original Screenplay, if for nothing else." Sure enough, the one and only nomination the film received from the Academy was for its screenplay. I hope it wins too--it's the best screenplay in any movie I've this year, even outdoing dialogue master Quentin Tarantino's outrageous "Django Unchained".

Wes Anderson's talent lies in crafting idiosyncratic and often very flawed characters and putting them in even stranger situations. "Moonrise Kingdom" is no exception, and may even be a perfect example of his style. The story, set in a fictional town in Rhode Island in 1965, is about two very troubled children who fall in love, and run away together. This arouses considerable agitation amongst the locals, and a search party is formed to find them.

The children are orphaned Khaki-Scout Sam (Jared Gilman), and school girl Suzy (Kara Hayward). Both are very troubled children, and form a strong bond with each other. In one scene, Suzy's parents discover a collection of letters they'd written to each other. Sam tells Suzy she's pretty, and how he's recently been in trouble for lighting a shed on fire while sleep walking. Suzy tells Sam how she's recently been suspended from school for talking back to a teacher, and that she likes him a lot. Sam also sends Suzy a picture he drew of a girl (presumably Suzy) totally naked. "You're a great artist," Suzy writes to him.

The dialogue between the children is wonderful. Another of Wes Anderson's strengths is writing the most bizarre dialogue, and having his actors deliver it in an incredibly deadpan manner. They do seem a tad somber and don't smile a lot, but it's what they say and how they act with each other that makes the performances so good.

While a search party frantically scours Rhode Island for them, Sam and Suzy set out through open fields, over rivers, and through forests and beaches. The scenery is visually pleasing. My good friend Matt Hedges was actually the primary camera intern on the project, and told me it was one of the best experiences of his life. The music composed for the exploration scenes by Alexandre Desplat is so lyrical and adds so much to these parts. It grounds these moments in emotional reality--on the line between seriousness and utter bliss.

In addition to the lucid soundtrack by Desplat, Anderson also uses music from composer Benjamin Britten. Suzy is a part of a choir that performs Britten's Noah's Fludde, which is how she and Sam meet. Britten's pieces used throughout the film are mostly for children's voices, and also add a lot of feeling to the scenes.

"Moonrise Kingdom" also features performances from so many prominent actors including Wes Anderson regulars Bill Murray as Suzy's father, and Jason Schwartzman as one of Sam's fellow scouts' cousins. There's also Frances McDormand as Suzy's mother, who is secretly seeing Police Captain Sharp (Bruce Willis), adding to Suzy's dismay at home. Edward Norton is Scoutmaster Randy Ward, head of Sam's scouts. Harvey Keitel puts in an appearance as a commander, and Tilda Swinton appears towards the end as a Social Services representative. It's wonderful to see all these faces and everyone delivers so well, but the main spectacle are the two children.

Such fine acting from newcomers Kara Hayward and Jared Gilman. While complimenting the writing of their scenes together, I may have neglected to mention their performances. They're so real, that you simultaneously want to hug them and keep as far away from them as possible. I'd be scared out of my wits of these two if I ever encountered them. They do get violent with people who try to oppose them, and even go so far as killing a dog, which was very unpleasant to watch. But these are extensions of their distressed personalities, which also make them seem real, though I could have gone without seeing the dog go. If you can suspend that and look at everything else, that's when the touching love story really bites you.

"Moonrise Kingdom" is a good companion piece with Wes Anderson's breakthrough film "Rushmore" (1998), featuring Jason Schwartzman as the idiosyncratic idol of trendy Rushmore prep-school. "Rushmore" focuses on Schartzman's coming of age, and the same could be said for Suzy and Sam in "Moonrise Kingdom". They do sort of come of age, even though they're still quite young, and things remain more or less the same with Suzy, if not for Sam.

That's another nice thing about the story in "Moonrise": that it doesn't end with "happily ever after". Yes, it is a happy ending. We see what we want to see--that Sam and Suzy continue seeing each other after the ordeals that follow them running away. On the other hand, they're seeing each other in secret, indicating things are more or less back to normality as we saw it at the start of the movie, with some definite improvements. And the music in that last scene doesn't hurt a bit, unless you enjoy getting sort of misty eyed. I dunno, maybe it's just me.

I feel like the music and art design should have received nods from the Academy, but they did nominate the right thing. In "Moonrise Kingdom" all the sprockets are going like made to create an excellent movie. Man, that screenplay...

Frankenweenie (2012)

Star Rating: ***1/2 (3.5/4 Stars)
When I watch either version of Tim Burton's "Frankenweenie"--whether it's his original 1984 short or the remake--the one thing I think of is how far the "Frankenstein" story has come over the years. More specifically how the movies have shaped how we view the story. If you look at Mary Shelley's original novel published in 1818, you will find it is totally different from the film traditions. Many of the iconic attributes we associate with "Frankenstein"--the hunchbacked lab assistant, the bride with the outrageous hairdo, the blind man in the woods, the policeman with the mechanical arm, the climax at the burning windmill--have all come from the movies and not the novel.

Producers and directors, even comedians, have been "re-animating" the story at every turn. And as if that wasn't enough, now we're bringing dogs back to life. Dogs! I wonder what Mary Shelley would say if she saw what has happened with her creation. It's certainly taken on a life of its own. Dare I say she's created a monster?

"Frankenweenie" (2012) is a few things: it's Tim Burton remaking his own short film of the same name. It's also a homage to the original Universal films from the 1930s. Mostly the "Frankenstein" movies, but all the monsters are in here. This time Victor Frankenstein is a young boy who has knack of filmmaking and science. His only friend is his dog Sparky. When Sparky is hit by as car and killed, Victor gets the radical idea of bringing him back to life. Needless to say, things get out of hand.

When the other kids learn that Victor brought his dog back to life, they're all afraid he'll win first place in the science project, so they all plagiarize and reanimate their pets. One kid brings back a fish who becomes invisible. Another one reanimates a rat who grows into a horrific wolf-like being, and another who brings back a gerbil wrapped in bandages, resembling a mummy. There was a boy who created sea-monkeys resembling The Creature of the Black Lagoon, and an Asian boy who reanimated a turtle who grew five times it's natural size, forming a Godzilla like creature. There was also a girl who tried reanimating a bat, but the electricity struck her cat, and the bat and cat became blended into a vampire-cat.

All these creatures run amok and wreak havoc, sending the film to its familiar climax at an old windmill on the outskirts of town. I sat watching these creatures, wondering exactly what point they served in the narrative. The answer is actually quite simple: to create conflict and add flavor to the story, but most of all this is Tim Burton having fun with his source material. Why not mix it all up? All the monster movie references may generate some eye rolls, but even so, it's too much fun not to like!

"Frankenweenie" does feature some Tim Burton regulars, only this time no Johnny Depp. No Helena Bonham Carter. Instead we have Winona Ryder, ("Beetlejuice", "Edward Scissorhands"), voicing Victor's next door neighbor, who becomes one of his allies as the film progresses. Victor's mother is voiced by Catherine O'Hara ("The Nightmare Before Christmas"). Victor's science teacher is voiced by Martin Landau, who played Bela Lugosi in "Ed Wood" (1994), another affectionate nod to classic horror films. It's nice to see Burton reuniting with some old talent who appeared in, and really made, his earlier and better movies.

One of these being Burton's original "Frankenweenie" short. It's easy to dismiss it without watching it because of the title and the premise. But shorts can be goofy and experimental and get away with it. What's so nice about "Frankenweenie" (1984) is that it turns out to be a really entertaining, ambitious film despite appearances. Burton made a bit of a risky move expanding it into a feature. At least he had the sense to make it an animated film. Animated films can also get away with almost anything plot wise. It turned out to be well worth it though. The remake is well done and just as fun and endearing as the original, even if it does drag in bits. This is definitely Tim Burton's finest work in years.

It's been nominated for an Oscar for Best Animated Film, alongside "Brave", "ParaNorman", "Wreck-It Ralph", and "Hotel Transylvania". I think "Frankenweenie" has a good chance of winning, and personally hope that it does.