Category: Film

I often ponder how much meaning a single moment can have; a related question is whether it matters if this single moment is connected to many years of complementary life experiences.  Meditations on the nature of marriage and also identity remain favorite topics of mine.  The morally complex Canadian drama Away From Her concerns the evolution of Alzheimer’s in a woman and her husband’s reactions.  It is one of the best movies I have seen, ever, though it is hard to say more without spoiling the surprises.  It is guaranteed to make you cry, and I’m not referring to the ending.  For the wonks it even has some bits on health care policy.

Here is more information.  And if you are interested in Alzheimer’s, John Bayley’s Elegy for Iris is one of my favorite books.

This humorous and philosophical film — strongly recommended — also offers an implicit market failure argument: raising children is the main thing that goes on in a marriage, yet few of us choose life partners on that basis.  The film suggests that a random allocation might be better than selecting a partner on the grounds of smarts, common interests, attractiveness, how good he or she makes us feel, and so on.

I can think of a few hypotheses:

1. Common interests in life are correlated with common philosophies of child-rearing, so all is well in the marriage market.

2. High-status men and attractive women are also best at raising children, so seek those sorts of partners in any case.

3. Forget what your utility function seems to be telling you, seek a partner who is willing to do all the dirty work when it comes to kids.  Seek submission.  This is worth way more than you at first think.

4. Common interests hinder effective child-rearing, since it means the partners have more to lose when children take over their lives.  Opt for a low expectations marriage.

5. We should require prospective marriage partners to play sophisticated computer games, mimicking the familial struggles they will later face.  In the limiting case, dating should be replaced by joint kid-raising sessions, using small and unruly robots if necessary (the film in fact portrays this).

6. Judith Harris was right, genes matter but not how you raise your kids.  Marry whomever you want, following nature’s dictates, and neglect the little buggers that result, it doesn’t matter.

None of these hypotheses, in my view, replace the default option of simple market failure.  And yes this is one of the biggest institutional failures in the entire world.

For every dollar received in global (non-Austrian) box office by Austrian films, 28 dollars are spent on film subsidies. 

Scroll through this document to page four for comprehensive — and scary — EU figures.  Only the Czech Republic and Poland, both of which have very low subsidies, have ratios under one.  France and Denmark, two of the more successful European film-producing countries, have ratios between three and four, meaning that four dollars are spent to produce one dollar of overseas revenue.

It is remarkably difficult to make movies that people in other countries wish to see, and it is not obvious that film subsidies are helping matters.

I bet that if the Sandman and Spiderman could have just gotten away
from their positional stances (“I need to take money” and “I need to
catch crooks” respectively), to their underlying interests (“I need to
help my little girl” and “Dude, I’m all about helping the people”),
they could have found some common ground.  There was opportunity there,
and it could have saved a lot of expensive plate glass and I-beams and
cars being thrown about.

I do think the Sandman didn’t open
his mind to lot of options that became available to him when he got
particle-ized.  I understand that you do what you know, and he had
conceptualized himself as a thief and a fugitive.  Maybe those were his
most lucrative options when he was a man, but as Sandman, I don’t think
he had to be an outlaw to make a ton of money.  Considering his
strength and versatility, I bet any construction firm would have hired
him in a flash.

Here is more.  Here is my earlier post, The Macroeconomics of Superman.

Lucas will make two more live-action films set in everyone’s favorite galaxy far, far away.  These films will likely be an hour each, and will air on television, though he doesn’t know on what channel (The Sci-Fi network?).  Says Lucas of the films, "they won’t have members of the Skywalker family as characters.  They will be other people of that milieu."

Here is one report.  The episodes are supposed to be set between installments III and IV and they are scheduled for 2009.

Incubus is a 1965 horror film that was filmed in Esperanto and starred William Shatner.

Via Jason Kottke.  The first link includes a pretty amazing trailer for the film.

Mix a South Korean Erlkonig into Godzilla, with a good dash of comic relief and anti-authoritarian satire.  This is not a movie for everyone, but if you are even thinking of going you must.  Here is Wikipedia.  Here are reviews.  Here is the trailer.  It’s the biggest grossing movie in Korea, ever.

The audience is too supportive, and we perform better in front of strangers or even a hostile crowd.  Here is further explanation.

That’s the new German movie with the rave reviews and the foreign language film Oscar, but don’t be fooled.  The movie is technically excellent, but not thoughtful.  It is part of a more general, and disturbing, trend in contemporary German culture to whitewash the past.  The film shows many small acts of defiance against the Stasi, as if to redeem an otherwise sorry East German record.  Last year — fortunately I cannot remember the title — we were shown the German martyrs against the Nazis. 

Don’t economists emphasize the marginal unit?  Can’t we have at least one movie about small acts of defiance?  In principle yes, but characters implausibly discover the brotherhood of man and viewers are fed uplifting final homilies, a’la Schindler.  Natasha, who lived with her equivalent of the Stasi for many years, had a similar reaction of partial disgust and incredulity.

My friends consider me a cultural Germanophile (I could do "My Favorite Things German" for weeks), but I tend to be a cynic about the blacker historical episodes in the German past.  I used to hate the slow, tortuous, and pretentious Nazi-Angst movies of Fassbinder and his ilk, but they’ve aged surprisingly well, and they came much closer to striking the appropriate tone.

Addendum: Here is one good review (spoilers); by the way if you know the Hong Kong original, Infernal Affairs, you’ll find The Departed almost impossible to watch.  I walked out.

A loyal MR reader mailed me a copy of his movie, Burning Annie.  A depressed college guy fails in love and lust because he obsesses over the pessimistic Woody Allen movie Annie Hall.  (You can put it in your Netflix queue, and it plays in NYC 2/7, here are reviews).  He refuses to tell bed-ready, nubile young women that he loves them, or even likes them, because he is unwilling to make himself vulnerable and open to rejection.  I wonder how much truth-telling stems from this motive. 

I liked the special effects, of course, but on the whole
the film [a Schwarznegger movie] bored me.  Like many of these American
films, it had one good idea and clung to it so hard that it seemed poor
in emotion and range.  The scenes seemed flat because even in the most
dramatic moments the American actors spoke quietly to each other, as if
they were discussing the price of onions.  And there were no songs.
Finally, ultimately, most American films were sparse and unrealistic,
and didn’t interest me very much.

That is from one character in Vikram Chandra’s Sacred Games, my early pick for novel of the year.

Otherwise I am learning just how good a writer Roberto Bolaño
can be, I see Bogota women run into the men’s room to avoid even a
slight line at the ladies room, and I’ve figured out how to eat well
here, it is fundamentally a baking culture.

Made by the director of
Office Space, this politically incorrect dystopian comedy portrays a future where dysgenics
have made everyone a moron.  It should appeal to those who enjoy
watching stupid people behave stupidly, not to those who demand
legitimate filmmaking.  In other words, it’s pretty damn funny.  There
are some classic lines, like "Welcome to Costco, I love you."  DVD only.

The Stations themselves are usually a series of 14 pictures or sculptures depicting the following scenes:

    1. Jesus is condemned to death

Apoc: Jaguar Paw captured by cultists.

    2. Jesus receives the cross

Apoc: JP tied to slave line.

    3. The first fall

Apoc: First fall (guy forced to rise without help)

    4. Jesus meets His Mother

Apoc: Testicle-eater sees his mother-in-law?

    5. Simon of Cyrene carries the cross

Group saves wounded guy at end of slave line.

    6. Veronica wipes Jesus’ face with her veil

???

    7. The second fall

???

    8. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem

Mayan women laugh at the guys getting painted blue.

    9. The third fall

???

   10. Jesus is stripped of His garments

???

   11. Crucifixion: Jesus is nailed to the cross

Brought up to top of pyramid.

   12. Jesus dies on the cross

Eclipse saves JP.

   13. Jesus’ body removed from the cross (Pieta)

JP sent back down the pyramid.

   14. Jesus is laid in the tomb

???

Overall, amazing parallelism.

And then in a later email:

…Jaguar Paw definitely returns to save his wife and sons on the third
day.

Right on.  But for the last few Stations, I see a deliberate non-parallel with the Christian story.  I view the film as concerned with Islam as much as the Mayans.  It replays the (supposed) Islamic "myth" that Jesus climbed down off the cross, saved by a miracle, and joined his wife and kid to live in India (to complicate matters, only a minority of Muslims believe this, but many quasi-informed Christians think this is a very common Muslim view).  Gibson’s movie is saying "OK, let’s say that happened.  Jaguar Paw makes a miraculous escape.  But earthly triumph is still no means of salvation and it cannot replace the Christian notion of sacrifice; you can run but you can’t hide.  The plague is coming.  The Spanish ships are coming.  God is coming.  We must throw ourselves on God’s mercy.  Islam is no good, salvation lies only in Christ."

I also wonder if all that throat-slitting was not a reference to Daniel Pearl and various jihad-based webcam assassinations.

Pretty intense vision.  Gibson is repugnant, and his approach is distant from my own worldview, but I am still thinking about his splendid movie.

Apocalypto, yes storage costs for goods are positive in the movie.  The film is about theology; virtually frame-by-frame it is commentary on Passion of the Christ, the Bible, or both.  Call it mishnah, if you wish; the reviews I read didn’t get this at all.  The movie’s central question is what the idea of a miracle, or salvation, can mean in a non-Christian world.  I found it remarkable, but I can’t imagine it drawing many viewers beyond the curious, the omnivorous, the Mayan, and the deeply committed.

Here is my previous post on negative rates of return.  Comments are open, but if you wish to simply complain about Mel Gibson, please use this old space.

Addendum: Here are reviews.