Taking place in the Paris of the very near future, this French cyber thriller, reminiscent of the slightly better Renaissance (2006), tries very hard to be noir, cool and hip but pretty much fails on all levels.

The de rigueur techno bluish-chrome cinematography is of little help in bringing this story about cloning and memory implants to an above average level.
The lead character can’t act even if his life depended on it, making one wonder why some directors seem to think that mediocre actors are a good choice to play unemotional black turtleneck-wearing tough guys.

There are a couple of somewhat interesting scenes where the technology discussed in the film is displayed, such as remote surgery and memory removal and implantation, but, overall, Chrysalis is a bit of a yawner.

And we would like to thank all the corporate sponsors whose brands are shamelessly and promiscuously displayed throughout the film….

As far as convincing kick-ass US presidents go, William Hurt has to rank towards the bottom of the list. I’ll chose Harrison Ford any day over Hurt whose physiognomy seems better suited to Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985) type roles. Yet, Pete Travis, the director of the wasted effort Vantage Point, has no qualms about showing us Hurt, as the US president, getting into some kind of fistfight with the terrorists who kidnapped him.

Vantage Point starts intelligently enough, with the attempted assassination of the US president during a speech in Spain, being shown from different points of view. Every 10 minutes or so, we are offered a new perspective on the events, through the eyes of a new character. And each time, we seem to be getting closer to finding out what really happened. Except that after slowly raising the tension and having us fairly attentive, Travis decides, mysteriously and shamefully, to throw it all away and to turn his film into some kind of ridiculous over the top action flick. And to make things worse, Travis has the audacity to still pretend that it is intelligent by merging all the different stories into a silly denouement that reminded me of the terrible Crash (2004) in its mediocrity and pretentiousness. Rashomon (1950), this film isn’t.
Imagine a scene where for ten minutes we follow a little girl as she runs looking for her mother, and we can feel from the selection of shots and from the editing that the director is leading her towards a busy road with lots of incoming traffic. At that point, the only thought that logically must enter our mind is: no, the director cannot possibly be aiming for such a cliché scene. Something new and unexpected is going to happen, right? Well, no. Travis does indeed lead the little girl to a busy road in the middle of which she suddenly freezes and stays there screaming, waiting for a car to hit her. Didn’t Travis watch Austin Powers (1997)? Didn’t he get Mike Myers’s joke as Austin Power spends several minutes warning some guy that he is about to run him over with a bulldozer?

As I recently did with Jumper (2008), I will still manage to extract something interesting from this film. Aside for the MTV style shooting and editing, and terrorism aside, Vantage Point does capture a very relevant aspect of our lives. In the film, each character seems to be encountering a different reality, not only based on his or her direct sensory experience but also through their use of technology. Mobile phones and video cameras play an important role in the film as they help to assemble the various pieces of the puzzle. Yet, each version of the reality they convey is incomplete and misleading. Technology has the power to show us images that constitute only one type of reality. The question that is increasingly pertinent today is: what makes one’s reality any less significant than that of someone else? We live in a society where everyone now has the ability to be a witness and to create their own reality out of the different pieces they chose to select.

In addition, in Vantage Point, the mobile phone is used by both the terrorists to organize and implement their plan (a smartphone is used, among other things, to remotely control and trigger the riffle that is used against the president) and by the authorities to locate the terrorists and to avert their plot. This seemed particularly significant as several recent headlines have discussed terrorism and the use of mobile phones.
So, if anything else, Vantage Point does at least offer us a little something to think about in terms of how technology is affecting our lives.

How many times have we seen this story brought to the screen before? Man comes across a deal gone wrong, takes the money and tries to get away with it. If it is true that all film scenarios pretty much revolve around 32 plots (which it probably isn’t), then only real talent can make such a cliché story interesting again.

Enter the Cohen Brothers, the entity that might be known one day as one of the best director in the history of cinema. Forget Intolerable Cruelty (2003) and forget The Ladykillers (2004), two mediocre films that do little to tarnish an otherwise spectacular filmography. The Cohen brothers are back on top and while it is difficult, and probably inappropriate, to compare such a hard and dark film with some of their previous work, this latest effort is nonetheless as good a film as they have ever made.
No Country for Old Men has an intensity and rhythm that reminded me of the recent Scorcese, The Departed (2006). No fluff, no silly and excessive music, no unnecessary dialog, no gratuitous scenes, no let down in the strength of the performances, only tight and solid directing, scripting, and acting (and beautiful cinematography as well).
Many have spoken about the performance of Josh Brolin as a career defining role (good enough apparently to convince Oliver Stone to want to cast him as George W. Bush in Stone’s next biopic), or about Tommy Lee Jones’ convincing turn as a laconic and delusioned Sheriff (one can’t help but to try to create a connection between this character and the one he played a couple of years ago in The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada (2005)) but I personally would like to single out Javier Bardem in what i consider to be one of the best villain performance of all time. I can’t remember the last time the character of a madman was so brilliantly and realistically depicted on screen (perhaps Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs, or Ralf Fiennes in Schindler’s List). I still get chills down my spine thinking about some of the killings in the film and about the character’s methods, which involve a mix of principles, sadism and intelligence.

Overall, an intense, dark and disturbing film that ranks as one of the best thrillers ever made.

Almost 10 years after Frankenheimer’s (The Manchurian Candidate 62, Seven Days in May 64, Seconds 66), Pakula directed his own paranoia trilogy (Klute 71, The Parallax View 74, All the President’s Men 76), as if possessed by somewhat similar demons and motivations, many of which drew from the collective spirit prevalent in the US at the time. It is probable that Pakula was also directly influenced by Frankenheimer’s work.

Indeed, The Parallax View reminds us at times of The Manchurian Candidate in its depiction of deception, fear, conspiracy and of an alternate reality in which the lone (in)sane character tries to uncover a conspiracy. But it reminds us also of the more recent Cypher (02) through its depiction of a world so easily constructed and deceived by large corporations and political entities pursuing their selfish aims at any cost.

But The Parallax View fails to live up to its pretensions and aspirations. The film is a bizarre mishmash of serious, dark and intelligent moments, action-driven mindless scenes, forced coincidences, overly convenient scene resolutions, and strange and often too abstract cuts and dialogues. The progression in time is frequently not perceived, resulting in a film that is often hard to follow. Finally, there is a sense of predictability to it all, making us question how truly intelligent this reporter is, when he seems to be the only one who does not know where this will all lead.

There are nonetheless some quality moments in this film, which is often mostly remembered for its five minutes brainwashing scene during which the viewer is exposed through the eyes of the lead character to a multiplicity of images and words, in a way which has a more profound and direct impact on the viewer, at the very least in the form of a headache, than a similar scene in A Clockwork Orange (71).

I grew up watching the films of Brian de Palma.

In those days, he was considered a modern Hitchcock, a master of suspense and an expert at creating worlds full of intrigue and deception. Films such as Blow Out, Obsession, Dressed to Kill, Body Double showed a vast talent for suspense, ambiguity, eroticism, and a masterly control of cinematic technique.

But something happened in the late 80s and in the 90s, and, in a manner reminiscent of John Carpenter, De Palma’s art seems to have vanished during that period (Carlito’s Way being the exception).

It was therefore with some reluctance that I watched Femme Fatale, six years after having almost choked to death in front of Mission to Farce.

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There is very little I can say about The Departed, other than it is pretty much a perfect film directed by one of the true masters of modern cinema.

Scorsese is back and while The Departed may miss the perfection level of Goodfellas by a hair, it still is, I believe, one of the best thrillers ever made with one of the most furious paces and rhythms I have ever experienced in a film.

I wonder if Infernal Affairs, the Hong Kong film on which The Departed is based, is as good as its remake…

Unmissable.

Animation is the ideal tool for Science Fiction cinema since it can help create and display on the screen what does not yet exist. One of the obstacles that Science Fiction cinema has always faced is the tension between the need to stretch reality and the need to keep it believable and real in a way that most audiences can still relate to it. This is the unfortunate reason why most Sci-Fi films tend to be filled with inconsistencies and a disparity between what the story wants to show us and what it actually does show us.
Animation can relieve this tension by creating believable and abstract worlds. It can free the imagination, which is the point of Science Fiction.

Yet, this free rein of the visual creativity often comes at a price. The traditional aspects of filmmaking such as dialogue, storyline, and, when applicable, acting, have usually suffered greatly in animation films. But today, the line between animation and traditional cinema is becoming more and more blurry. With Toy Story in 1995, Pixar were the first to reach out to such a large audience with an animated film that had strong characters and a solid storyline. Finding Nemo and The Incredibles and the films of Hayao Miyazake were worthy additions and helped continue to increase the popularity of the genre.
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Recently, as I walked down a very average street of one of the most average neighbourhoods in my city, a book stood out from the outside display racks of a very average bookstore: Michael Mann, published by Taschen.

I felt that the book somehow shouldn’t have been there. In a specialized bookstore of a more artistic neighbourhood, yes. But not here, in this bourgeois, conservative area that attracts mainly tourists and bankers…Yet, there it was, and it said to me that Michael Mann had now reached a level of notoriety and access that enabled him to be known and appreciated by a very wide range of people. A democratization of the visualization of cinema, or perhaps, rather, a middle-upperclassification of the action film. Have you seen the latest Michael Mann? It is soooo beautiful to look at! Hmm, the dialogs were a bit weak….Who cares, nobody can frame a scene like Michael Mann! The screenplay was a bit dodgy…Who cares, who needs a perfect screenplay when you can bath it all in a sumptuous blanket of moody blues and grays!

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A classic French film noir with the great Jean Gabin. Shot mostly at night on the streets of Paris, Grisbi is not quite as poignant and grabbing as Rififi which would come out a year later, but nevertheless offers a captivating story of rivalry between gangsters trying to steal each other’s money.

This very hollywood-like French thriller could have been directed by Michael Mann. Marchal’s Paris looks like Mann’s Los Angeles in Heat or Collateral, the city bathing in a constant mist of grays and blues, whose beauty is appropriately complimented by a moody, and, at times, overbearing score. Behind this series of sumptuous photographs of a corrupted Paris-by-night, not enough remains in terms of coherence, dialogues or acting (even Depardieu seems out of place in a very underdeveloped role). And what a convenient and artificial ending…

Interesting idea, beautiful cinematography. Yes, Los Angeles has never looked this good. But Collateral is not one of the most plausible and coherent film. The transformation of the Jamie Foxx character especially is not very believable, while Tom Cruise fails to convince as the i-had-a-bad-childhood-somebody-save-me-by-killing-me-assassin.

Denzel Washington plays an ex-assassin who can not make peace with his past. Tormented, alcoholic, he is hired to be the bodyguard of a young girl in Mexico City and must protect her from potential kidnappers. Will she help him regain the dignity he lost long ago? This headache inducing film will leave you spinning from its cheap and predictable melodramatic moments, empty dialogues and from its explosion of non-stop, constantly-in-your-face visual tricks.

Beautiful film noir set first in New York city then in the New York state country side, it tells the story of a violent and lonely (played wonderfully by Robert Ryan) cop’s journey towards self discovery and redemption. The crime story only serves to support the more introspective, psychological, ‘man on a quest’ angle. Stunning cinematography.

Why, why, why? I know why, but why? Why do solid and intelligent science fiction concepts and stories (especially this one by the master Asimov) have to be turned into comic, light hearted and action driven spectacles? Yes, i know, because it sells more. But what a shame. Great story turned into a mediocre one, top notch special effects (the robots are amazing), stereotypical and annoying hero who can’t deal with his past, isn’t afraid of anything, makes silly jokes even at the most dangerous times and has a way with ladies (of course), and you have standard Hollywood fare, another film contributing, sadly, to the reputation of Science Fiction as a non-serious genre.

Dark and negative endings have never been Hollywood’s forte. The fact that The Manchurian Candidate has one does not make it automatically a good film. Despite its reputation, and despite the acting by Lansbury and some very interesting shots, the film is nevertheless fairly standard Hollywood fare with over-the-top characters and little regard for plausibility or realism.