Audio to the Visual: Garden State's Music

          Films are known around the world and in definition as moving pictures, as imagery. Everything revolves around the scene, that thing you see as an audience. Equally important though, yet far more subtle than the images on the screen, are the use of song and music. Music is usually taken for granted. Most songs will not astound you in their ability to enhance the movie experience. More often than not a score while run alongside the moving pictures, subtly setting the tone like a deep, steady baseline. But when a song crawls out from under the skin of the movie and stands as a centerpiece, emotions and character developments can become that much more relevant and impactful. Songs are great at harnessing the abstraction of our undefined feelings and allow character's to silently express things that can't be conveyed through speech or conversation. Important events and themes of a movie stick with a viewer that much more when linked to a note or song.

          This may be common knowledge to most, that songs are moving. Yet 2004's Garden State expanded the boundaries of musical integration in films. Using songs released in the last decade, director Zach Braff is able to immerse scenes in a song, letting the music drive the story, letting images compliment the melodies, as opposed to their usual roles. In the final scene of the movie, Adam (Braff) leaves Sam (Portman) stranded in an airport, and prepares to leave behind her along with his recently united childhood friends and his father. In a sap-less montage, life continues as Adam prepares to embark. Commanded by the deep synth tones of Frou Frou's "Let Go" the scene epitomizes a message and a conflict that has been building the whole film.

Little Miss Sunshine's Wannabe Cousin: Juno

          “A fresh, quirky, unusually intelligent comedy about a 16-year-old girl who wins our hearts in the first scene.” Says Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times. False. “A movie already reputed to be hipper than tomorrow night.” Raves Newsday’s John Anderson. More Lies. Right off the bat I’m going to say that Juno is a good movie; it is worth the ticket stub price and perhaps even a DVD purchase if you missed it in theatres, but while Juno is a decent movie, it is not a lot of other things. Juno is not a) the best movie of the year. b) even close. c) hilarious or hip. I’m sorry sports fans, but Juno is not the second coming of Jesus Christ (If you’re into that kind of thing). While I fully support the viewing and enjoyment of this movie, there are a lot of things to think about before dubbing it the greatest screenplay of all time and even seeing it.          The story of Juno is told from the point of view of a young girl, named Juno, played by the budding Ellen Page. The general plot is pretty straight-forward, Juno gets impregnated by Superbad’s Michael Cera, from there the movie follows her pregnancy as she attempts to give away her baby, deal with her relationship problems and still live a normal life. The parts for the puzzle were there, but director Jason Reitman and writer Diablo cody are those kids who have to have those two pieces go together that obviously don’t fit. Juno had all the ingredients, but fell short of greatness, due to some glaring issues.
          First off Juno is not “hip”. Juno’s claim to fame is its bleeding edge lingo that will rock the “hizzouse”. This is in no way true. Any child, any adolescent will tell you that this movie is not “hip”. Partly because of the fact that no one says hip anymore, but mostly because Juno tries too hard. Juno desperately wants to be indie. Juno is the rich kid who really, really, really wants to live in the hood. Sorry, it’s just how the cookie crumbled. Not only is Roger Ebert’s quote wrong about the first scene, but it is in fact the exact opposite. Lines in the first fifteen minutes physically made me cringe. Such timeless phrases as, “Honest to blog” should be banned from existence. It is a scar on the teenage demographic. In what twisted universe does someone say that, and what has the world done wrong to convince the middle aged men who are Hollywood’s critics to believe that such phrases are the epitome of “cool” let alone said in real life.          Developing a character with quirks and flaws is one thing, but being alternative for the sake of being obscure and indie is another. Sometimes it feels as if the writers are bragging. Ok buddy, I get that you listen to weird music, but see the thing is, I don’t, therefore I’m not getting much out of this ten minute rant about Sonic Youth’s early works.
          Since hearing someone tell me this I can’t stop seeing Juno through this lens. Juno the movie, the script and its whole being is very self-aware. It knows it’s being too cool for school and different. Which makes it pale in comparison to truly genuine movies like “Little Miss Sunshine” and “Napoleon Dynamite”.
           After ripping apart the movie like that, I can’t trust that you, the reader, will take my endorsement, but in the end Juno will win you over. The hype isn’t for nothing, the movie really starts to flow well by the second or third act, as the humor and the emotions find its way, but between excluding Juno’s dry humor king of a boyfriend from most of the movie and creating this forced hip environment, Juno fails to evoke the same sense humanity and authenticity that other great films can boast. Once you watch it I know you’ll like it, but c’mon, it’s not that good.

Plastic (Sexual) Inspiration: Lars and the Real Girl

          Inanimate objects make for great toys. Inanimate objects can also be used during sex, which is why there are sex toys. Love, true compassion and commitment are three of the last qualities a person would link to a non-living thing, let alone a life like sex doll named ‘Bianca’. Even in the most twisted convoluted settings this idea of a relationship with a sex doll doesn’t seem to be the key to most recent movie hits. Yet Lars and the Real Girl commits so fully to this concept that the movie actually works and better yet, succeeds.
          The film opens and we view Lars. He’s alone, which the audience will soon find out is a very common habit for Lars. He not only spends most of his time in seclusion, but also actually prefers the confines of his home to most other activities. Besides going to Sunday mass and his office job, he rarely spends time with other people.          Lars lives in the garage (by choice of course) of him and his brother’s house, which they inherited from their late father. Lars’ brother, played by Paul Schneider, who lives just across the road, is husband to, Karin, who constantly worries about the health and well being of Lars. Whether prompted by Karin’s concern or the nosey lady at church or even his perverted cubicle mate, Lars orders a life-like sex doll while under the effects of what is medically called a ‘delusion’. This means that people are able to convince themselves of a certain idea and really believe in it. Which is exactly what Lars does as he deludes himself into believing that Bianca the sex doll is a real living person. Themovie jumps off from this point, following the relationship between Lars and Bianca and the community as they try and support Lars in his manic, soul searching endeavors.          While bizarre and perhaps even unappealing this movie’s commitment should be applauded. Because of this fact, the film is able to truly explore these unusual settings and rules within the storyline and relate it all back to the controlling idea of the movie. These factors alone make the movie satisfying and completely fulfilling without holding your hand and saying, “Hey everyone, here’s the big reveal!” This genius story could only be flagshipped by one man, and Ryan Gossling was it, giving one of the best performances of 2007. Better yet in my opinion is the supporting roles’ performances as they try to deal with Lars’ new found obsession and love.        

          The sheer originality of the movie will draw you in while the intricacies and depth of the story and character will make you for the first time ask, “More sex dolls please.”

Bad Blokes II: Hot Fuzz

          The L.A. heat blazes, barely blurring the wide slow-mo shot of two mean looking cops that have a gangsta’ swagger and desert eagles to prove it. You know them from capping drug dealers and tearing up the streets with lead, it’s the Bad Boys. At the same time though, two pasty white English chaps, a portly one with scruff from lazy hygiene habits and an organized, straightforward and by-the-book officer, make their way past the hedges of a well tended to back yard in their own cinematic slow-mo walk attempt, because, while Martin Lawrence and Will Smith may be on their way to bagging an itlian mob boss, this afternoon, these Englishmen have got a bone to pick with an elderly grocer. The question here is, how come the English guys are more badass?
          
          There’s no easy answer to this. The movie truly accomplishes a lot. It’s not often that a movie about a Police Force officer, let alone a high ranking one demoted to suburbia, becomes so intense and yet full of belly-laugh moments. Evidence of that can be found first and foremost in the acting performances of Simon Pegg, a clinical ex-London police sergeant named Nicholas Angel and Nick Frost, his bumbling, cop-movie buff, and drunkard of a friend named Danny Butterman. The term dynamic duo is thrown around a bunch, often times too much, but the acting relationship between Nick and Simon are truly dynamic, the partnership feels real and it’s evident that they feed off each other when you hear the comedic timing and the delivery the two have with each other.
          The parodic nature of “Hot Fuzz” and it’s UK style, really give it a humorous edge, and that’s why most people will go see it, but much like Frost and Pegg’s previous box office outing, “Shaun of the Dead”, humor is only one layer of a movie that touches on so many aspects. So while the wide cast net will haul in tons of laughs, with its perfected slap-stick and witty cop dialogue, the movie comes up strong on other fronts, like action and storytelling. Most will agree when I say London’s finest may not have the chiseled abs of wife-beater sporting Will Smith, but England’s crack team bought tickets to the gun show, in mass surplus. It should be noted though that although there's lots of action, lots of really quality action, it sometimes teeters and the verge of excessive to say the least, but most will warm up to the ridiculous combat.
          But of course while the slugs are flying there’s still a tale to be told, and in terms of plot, sophistication may not be the word that comes to mind when watching Butterman and Angel scuttle after a fugitive swan, but the story still has merit and proves oddly engaging in a ‘British’ sort of way. It will be overlooked for being whacky, much like most of mainstream comedy found today, but it does the movie a great service, that’s for sure. Because I don’t know anyone, or want to meet anyone who doesn’t think the idea of senior citizens wielding illegal firearms is worth their time.          The story of course, like in any comedy as of late, is the first to take a hit and Hot Fuzz is no exception. This two-hour roller coaster ride of a movie definitely has its turbulence. The most blatant bump being that fact that it’s two hours. While “Hot Fuzz” may not have the same unprecedented amount of unneeded flack as The Lord of the Rings series, (Oh wow, Frodo’s crying again?) “Hot Fuzz” could’ve karate chopped anywhere from 20-30 minutes off without taking a hit to the story. Sadly this is not the case, so while the film finds itself slowing down to baby crawl in its rising action, like any good sprinter it finishes with all its got.
          Because of this, sexed up California life and high speed cars makes Martin Lawrence and Will Smith look like some cops that don’t play by the rules by putting dress code last and semi-automatic weapons first, but across the pond, slick aviators straight off the convenience store rack hide the suburban warfare hardened faces of true law enforcement legends. Prim, proper and always packing heat.