Warhorse – stilted acting, cliche ridden in word and image and without a single honest emotion. Some people will love it.
Mission Impossible -Ghost Protocol – proves that Tom Cruise can still deliver the goods and director Brad Bird is bankable for live action even if his animated greats (The Incredibles, Ratatouille) had more plot and humanity. Great scenes on the Burj Khalifa (esp. in IMAX). Drags on in a peculiar effort to connect with story elements from the previous MI that no one cares about or remembers. For plot reasons, the final scene should have been in San Francisco not Seattle.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – Overall, Daniel Craig doesn’t James Bond it, although at times one wonders whether he is just pretending to be scared. Rooney Mara is good although I prefer Noomi Rapace who was both tougher and more beautiful, as the moment required. Fincher is the better director and the supporting cast is excellent. Lisbeth Salander rings strong in my imagination and I would watch more adaptations.
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - excellent performance from Gary Oldman as Smiley. At something like 8 minutes in I realized that the lead character had yet to speak. It was good but I defy anyone to make a great movie from the Le Carre book, too much is interior. How many viewers will know, let alone appreciate, that many people once did prefer communism for aesthetic reasons?
The Descendants – George Clooney has limited emotional range but it suits him in this role where part of the point is that his character is too boring, methodical, and unemotional for his thrill-seeking wife (why did these two ever marry?) and his now needy children. Excellent performances from Robert Forster and supporting cast and a plot that is involved without being contrived. The contrast between external paradise and internal misery was delightfully disconcerting.
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close – started out strong but by the time it ended I hated it. Every element of the movie is manipulative; 9/11 is used as a prop (like using 9/11 to sell life-insurance), the parents are perfect even when the story demands imperfection and the kid is weirdly unlikable. Finally, the movie has a happy ending, which made me sad.
“How many viewers will know, let alone appreciate, that many people once did prefer communism for aesthetic reasons”
Alex, many still do.
+1
That was my first thought when I read that comment. There are many on the Left who genuinely believe that, despite all of the massive empirical evidence that Communism is a complete failure, it’s never been given a ‘fair’ chance.
“How many viewers will know, let alone appreciate, that many people once did prefer communism for aesthetic reasons?”
As someone who had considered himself relatively knowledgeable about left history, I am honestly baffled as to what this remark might possibly refer. The intent is obvious, and the tone is certainly typical of the rather arch “I am so clever” tone adopted by both posters here (somewhat more successfully by Cowan), but what on earth are you talking about?
Since you assert that “many” did this, would it be too much to ask for some examples? I assume these won’t be simply artists or aesthetes who “preferred” Communism. What are examples of some of the aesthetic reasons these effete leftists asserted for this “preference”?
I’ll turn it around and ask what justification is there for anyone not to view Communism as evil as Nazism?
In my quebec high school we spent much of one year studying the 5 year plans of the Soviet Union. Words that should elicit derision.
Most of my teachers — also in Canada — were simply centre-left / moderates of some kind. But I did have a couple of out-and-out Marxist teachers in High School (and certainly at University).
My sense is that a lot of teachers don’t understand the market or economics. They don’t understand exchange and its benefits. They are attracted to Marxism and other far left positions for aesthetic and moral reasons — so they say.
But often they also justify their position on more “practical” grounds. They rail against inefficiency, and argue that the state would allocate resources more efficiently than the market. Again, they don’t understand. Why? Because they are not required to take an econ. course, ever.
Not sure what you believe you are turning around; of course Soviet Communism was as evil as the Nazis, assuming one regards mass murder as evil- what does that have to do with the point under discussion?
I am querying the bizarre assertion that “many” who supported Communism did so on aesthetic, rather than,, say, political or social grounds, however misguided that support may have been.
What other reason would there be to support it?
Evidently you perceive an aesthetic beauty in Soviet Communism that eludes me, and virtually every one of its historical supporters, both East and West, though I am sure that Prof. Tabarrok will chime in any minute with the no doubt numerous contrary examples of which he is apparently aware.
The idea that support for Communism was predicated on aesthetic, rather than political/social grounds, is frankly risible, and finds no support in the historic literature.
It’s directly out of the film. The mole justifies his treason by saying that communism appealed to him aesthetically.
I mean aesthetic broadly: an attraction to the “beauty” of the idea of the utopian perfectibility of human beings. Or the “beauty” of an egalitarian system where all are (allegedly) accorded equal worth. Or the “beauty” of a system that (allegedly) only cares about human beings, as ends, as opposed (allegedly) to a system that favours capital, or profit.
I have had a number of Marxists justify their political beliefs to me in these terms, which are obviously moral (but expressed in terms that evoke metaphysically “queer” properties, like Goodness and Beauty). I’m sure there are also utilitarian Marxists that justify their Marxism by considering (allegedly) the greatest good for the greatest number…
The “aesthetic” line was pulled verbatim from the movie’s dialogue. It reflects on the plot and the Cold War generally.
Your views are welcome but it’s very bad form to spoil endings, no matter how predictable.
Here, Virginia Postrel reviews the new Thatcher movie, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-13/iron-lady-falls-to-anna-quindlen-doctrine-commentary-by-virginia-postrel.html
I had no particular feelings about Thatcher before the movie, and found it amazingly affecting. People who have strong political feelings about the person might not be moved by the movie, but it is nevertheless a brilliantly touching portrait.
And that review completely missed the main thrust of the movie, which was to provide a balanced portrait of Thatcher as energetic and skilled but human both in her leadership and family life.
I doubt that anyone who saw the TTSS movie could possible understand the plot. It’s simply too complex to be crammed into two hours and even if it was vaguely comprehensible (it’s really hard to say when you already know the plot) it’s so incredibly condensed that rich, deep characters become nothing. What’s the point when you don’t get to know a thing about T, T, S or PM and thus can neither guess who is the spy or, really, have any reason whatever to care?
Also, the period detailing that everyone compliments is an absurd cliche. I don’t remember the 70s but I’m pretty confident that people of that class and in that trade did not dress like that back then because movies made at the time did not depict them so. These were neither college students, nor ad men, nor artists nor anyone else who would adopt absurdly groovy hair and clothes. It was distracting, as was the disastrous idea of having the Christmas Party at SIS and the idea of making their HQ a series of open atria, like Hyatt hotels of the period, where everyone could just look at everyone else’s desk (and having Smiley decamp into the hotel with the largest windows in London, which he kept open). Worthless.
See the Alec Guinness mini series, which may be the best spy show ever made for television (Actually, it’s an Agatha Christie whodunit posing as a spy story, but it’s still truly excellent.) The only thing the movie does better is that it gets the main story started before jumping into Prideaux’s failed mission and Ricky Tarr’s discoveries, which basically dominate the first two hours of the mini series.
Thanks for the tip on the mini-series. Didn’t know that existed. This is why I read the comments section so often on this site: the often great recommendations for further reading or watching.
Scoop is right. The mini-series was wonderful.
I’ll second that recommendation. Fabulous series and follows the book very closely.
The two earlier Guinness series are superb. They are perhaps the best spy/mystery series ever done.
I agree that someone who had not read the book or seen the (superb) TV version would not understand the plot.
However, for a data point of one (for what that is worth!), my wife went with me, had not read the book nor seen the TV version, and found it (in her words) “the most enthralling movie I’ve seen in years.” I don’t think a hard-to-comprehend plot makes rich characters into “nothing.” For example (and this is probably a tortured analogy), I always found William Safire’s writing fascinating, even when I did not know the subject matter on which he was writing.
I do think it was a real stretch to try to compress the book into 2 hours. I think of it almost as a tribute to the book, intended for viewing mostly by devotees, for which I am grateful, as a devotee… but it probably has limited commercial appeal due to the “compression” and “interiority.” Though the Oxford Encyclopedia of British Literature says The Spy Who Came in From the Cold had sold over 40,000,000 copies by about 2005, so maybe there are more fans out there than I thought (realizing that TTSS probably has not sold as many copies as the other book, but I could not find sales figures for TTSS).
I was in London in the 70s and beg to differ: I think the attire was spot on. I was always amazed at how many grown men, active in business, still dressed in “absurdly groovy hair and clothes.”
No idea if the Christmas Party or the atrium were accurate or not. If they were accurate, then it could not be “worthless” to show them this way, since you just criticized the film for not showing what you believed to be accurate period clothing.
I used to work for an intelligence agency (nothing as thrilling as in the movie!), and with those old-school insulated “isolation”rooms you pretty much needed to have a big “atrium” space to have clearance all around it.
I agree with your comments on the mini-series, 100%. My personal connection to it (though trivial in the extreme) is that I used to live on Tryon Street in Chelsea, one block over from Bywater Street, whose exterior shots were used for Smiley’s house/flat.
Re: “absurdly groovy hair and clothes.”
As long as Smiley doesn’t say “Shagadelic, baby!”, I’m good.
I never got past the boy’s school in TTSS (which I recall dragging on through the first 40-60 pages of the book) knew of but hadn’t seen the miniseries and had no trouble following the plot of the film. I’m sure there would be considerable richness to the characters missing, but thought the film told it’s story well enough.
I got the plot just fine. The first 15 minutes or so were a bit disorienting but the rest was generally perfectly fine.
“Warhorse … cliche ridden in word and image”
The only scene that impressed me visually was the execution of the German soldiers. If that is cliched, where was the original?
“Ghost Protocol … the final scene should have been in San Francisco not Seattle.”
When I saw it, I assumed that the producers believed they could film in Seattle instead of San Francisco, without the audience recognizing the difference.
“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy … at something like 8 minutes in I realized that the lead character had yet to speak.”
And when he first spoke, I thought they had spliced in audio from Alec Guinness.
They didn’t film in Seattle, they filmed in Vancouver. At one of Vancouver’s biggest tourist attractions (Granville Island), no less. Recent movies are much funnier if you’re familiar with Vancouver’s building styles and general landmarks.
On IMDB, Vancouver is listed as one of the filming locations, Seattle is not.
“Brad Bird is bankable for live action even if his animated greats (The Incredibles, Ratatouille) had more plot and humanity.”
If you like those and haven’t seen The Iron Giant, do that immediately.
“…stilted acting, cliche ridden in word and image and without a single honest emotion. Some people will love it.” Philistines! You crack me up sometimes, man.
Though I agree, it was pretty terrible.
Alex, did you mean to link to a picture of Rooney Mara where you wrote “uglier”? http://www.imdb.com/media/rm4083856128/ch0185006. If so I’m not sure I understand what you mean.
Corrected. Thx.
Interested to hear what you think about Hugo. Saw it last night and fell in love.
Limited in many ways, but within those limitations exists perfection.
Pre-Review: The Great War, I’m supposed to care about a guy who cares about a horse?
Did you see the reaction to the killing of a wolf in “Game of Thrones”? People freaked out. In the same episode, a 9 year old(ish) boy is killed for no particular reason. No reaction.
Seems like a smart move from a ticket-selling perspective.
“Did you see the reaction to the killing of a wolf in “Game of Thrones”? People freaked out” I assume this is referring to the HBO series? Did you see it in a public setting? Or was that just the reaction of the people you knew who had seen the series?
And how good do you think the series is? I’m considering buying HBO to see it and True Blood vs waiting on the DVD’s.
A couple of gratuitous comments:
Warhorse – redundant review, you could have just said “Spielberg”. And therefore many people will love it.
Tinker, Tailor – I also wonder how many young people in the computerized 21st century will realize why the spy headquarters looked so much like a library?
I prefer the newer Dragon Tattoo. The Swedish version was, oddly, more prudish. They completely dropped the relationship between Blomkvist and Berger. If you miss Noomi (not Naomi), look for her in the new Sherlock Holmes.
I can understand that people don’t think Daniel Craig is right for Blomkvist. He’s describe as a bit schlubby in the books…maybe not schlubby, but more “average” than anything. But, the way the author writes Blomkvist, where he’s pretty much banging every woman over 30 except his own sister (plus Salander), they needed someone like Daniel Craig to make that seem believable. (You are completely free to interpret Blomkvist’s conquests and adventures as the wishful projection of the books’ author. I mean, it’s pretty damn obvious.)
Every action movie is trying to be The Bourne Supremacy. Every heist movie is trying to be Heat/Miami Vice. Haven’t seen M.I.iv yet but will report back.
Alex, were you paid to watch Warhorse or did you spend your own money? If the latter, why?
I sacrificed for the benefit of MR readers.
Glad to see Alex posting more, especially on non-econ things.
I might pay money to see “Warhorse”, but in my case I will be seeing it in Brazil, dubbed into Portuguese, so will be avoiding most of the dialogue and plot and just be looking at the visuals, which is where Spielberg excels. My live loves horses and I am interested to see how Spielberg handles the Great War.
I second the recommendation for “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” the miniseries, but there is a problem is that it creates an impossible standard for the movie. I think the best you can do is to shoot a compressed version of the miniseries, and then you don’t have Alec Guinness.
But I think Gary Oldman was miscast and found his portrayal distracting, particularly since he is made up to look like John Major (I wasn’t sure at first if I wasn’t watching the sequel to the Thatcher movie). But they did OK with the hard to portray plot and with the supporting cast. Colin Firth portrayed the mole well, though again certain of his mannerisms prompted me to think of his portrayal of George VI, which though not his fault was a distraction.
In the book, the miniseries, and the movie, the mole attempts to justify his betrayal by claiming that it was for “aesthetic reasons”, this is what Alex was referring to. I think he also argues that it was better for Britain to be a puppet of Russia instead of a puppet of the United States. In the book, Smiley doesn’t think much of his justification.
I’d like to see someone tackle the sort-of sequel, the Honorable Schoolboy, but the plot of that book is even more incomprehensible than the plot of Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy.
Another great Le Carre movie is The Spy who Came in from the Cold. Richard Burton. Very dark, shot in black and white. Captures the feeling of the book and the times.
How could you enjoy the film with those distractions? Actually why should you be distracted by the work of two very good contemporary actors? I’m just asking. You must be very distracted by appalling performances (of which there are too many these days) if good work distracts you…
I saw it and liked it. It was interesting that I went to a Sat. afternoon showing with 3 friends, and we saw precisely no one under 30, though there were many many people lining up to see the next show when we left. I still prefer the Guinness series, but this was gratifyingly solid.
Oldman’s Smiley does not look like John Major; his glasses make him look like a lot of British men in the 70s and 80s. Don’t you remember Smiley’s glasses in both of the series?
Seriously? The Soviets had awesome graphic design and cool architecture. This is simply a fact.
My main problem with Oldman’s performance is that it emphasized Smiley as the middle aged (or older) bureaucrat. In the books Smiley is something of a scholar and Guiness captured that. It makes his victories over Karla more believable.
MIGP is pure fun. Why has Hollywood abandoned the light, fun international action thriller. It’s really the only type of film I’m willing to see in a theater. Hopefully MIGP’s box office success marks a comeback.
“George Clooney has limited emotional range…”
I guess that’s one way to look at it. But I appreciate Clooney’s acting. He has a subtly which many of the supposedly great actors can’t pull off. It has suited him well throughout his career.
Now I see why you and Tyler are friends.
I saw the original (Swedish?) adaptation of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I really liked it. I haven’t seen the newer Daniel Craig version. FYI, the movie is part of a trilogy, and all 3 of the Swedish versions are available now on Netflix streaming. I have only seen the first (TGWTDT), anxious to see the other two.
Is it the whole neatly ordered central planning aspect of communist theory?
I like Everything Is Illuminated (the book, never saw the movie) so was tempted to read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. But every review of both the book and the movie has said the same thing you say here. You were brave (or foolish) to go see it.
Although TTSS was well done, as Alex kind of mentions, it does a really poor job of making the plot suspenseful. SPOILER ALERT. The dialogue was engaging and the acting was solid, but the ending was mostly predictable (with maybe the exception of Colin Firth’s final scene). For example, the close up, slow motion shots were dead giveaways of who the moles were, and were completely unnecessary. I didn’t read the book, went into the movie knowing nothing, had fairly high expectations, and afterwards felt a little let down.
The (Smiley) books are rich and suspenseful — arguably no film can do justice to them — and much of the suspense came from the uncertainty about one’s own side: who could be trusted?
But audiences want dead giveaways. Whether it’s ominous music that plays just before an unfortunate event, the fact that good guys are invariably handsomer than bad guys, or trailers that give away the entire plot — like everything else that movie studios do, it’s ultimately traceable to the fact that it brings in more revenue than doing the opposite.
I guess I’m not as smart as you, but I had no idea who the mole was until the end.
“Boring, methodical, and unemotional” is a good description for the movie itself (The Descendants). It’s flat and contrived throughout and there is not a single character that I cared about for even one moment, perhaps because you never forget for a moment that you’re watching actors rather than supposedly real characters. I can’t put my finger on it, but something about this movie keeps breaking the fourth wall. And these are good actors elsewhere, so they must have been directed that way. All the critical love is utterly baffling. Go rent the excellent Election by the same director and co-writer instead.
Try “A Separation” ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1832382/ ). Long time since I saw a story that well told. I’m used to American crowd-pleasers, so it took me quite some time to recalibrate to the depth and layering of this one.
For me, it’s a movie with a perfect script. Only Casablanca and The Big Lebowski fall in that category for me …
Good luck!
” Every element of the movie is manipulative; 9/11 is used as a prop (like using 9/11 to sell life-insurance), the parents are perfect even when the story demands imperfection and the kid is weirdly unlikable.”
One can gather all of that from the film’s trailer, which sufficiently warned me off. Sorry Alex missed the trailer.
… TTSS was good, but doesn’t displace the Alec Guinness version.
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