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Last week, I watched one of the most gripping movies I’ve seen in years. Der Tunnel, known as The Tunnel in English is a taut, dark thriller that does an exemplary job of conveying the primal emotions that often drive people.The Tunnel is a German film and is available with English subtitles. At just short of three hours it requires an investment of time, but that investment is repayed several times over.

East Germany’s construction of the Berlin Wall and its effect on the lives of common people forms the backdrop against which the movie plays out. The lever on which the plot tilts in the determination of those same common people to overcome the obstacles placed in their way by an uncaring and totalitarian regime.

The emotions that drive people are communicated to the audience amazingly well the movie’s cast. Not once do you get the impression that a particular actor is on the set simply because they want or need the paycheck. In addition, the cinematography is well done as the claustrophobic nature of tunnel building is well conveyed by the dark, constricted photography.

The film is inspired by historical events, but it does not claim to be non-fiction itself. Many have decried some of the films’ plot points and seemingly convenient last-minute rescues. However, there are times in life when we are rescued by coincidence or happenstance. We don’t then turnaround and start squawking about unbelievable it was that we were just rescued. Sometimes, those things just happen. In addition, the movie is fiction. Fictional works get to manipulate their reality to better the drama. That’s one of the advantages of writing fiction.

In short, I would recommend this movie to anyone who is looking for a smart, tightly-wound thriller. It’s been days since I watched it and I am still thinking about it.

Last night, Sarah and I took in Chicago: The Musical at a local theatre.Given the quality of Chicago the movie, we both had high expectations for the stage production.

After the show ended last night, both Sarah and I felt the movie was much better.

The movie did a great job cutting the fat from the play. There were numerous musical numbers that little to nothing to advance the story or develop characters. Mary Sunshine’s number, for instance, was a complete waste of time and talent. In addition, the musical number, “Class” seemed designed to bulk up the second act a bit. You know a musical number is extraneous when I lean over to Sarah during a long dance scene and mutter, “gratuitious music video,” a catch phrase we usually use when discussing music video filler sandwiched into a feature film.

While the play was laden with low-quality filler, the movie improved the source material by cutting all the fat and leaving the muscle and bone. The musical numbers left in the film are all high quality numbers that help to advance the story of develop characters. The medium of film, where running times are generally shorter than that of musical theatre, actually helped to improve the source material.

<SPOILER> In addition, the play’s goofy gimmick that Mary Sunshine is actually a man in disguise is ridiculous. Maybe that shocked people in the Twenties, but it is a tired contrivance these days.</SPOILER>

In addition, many of the musical numbers in the movie had more pop. The number “Cell Block Tango” was greatly improved in the movie version. The addition of the red and white scarves, while simple, was a fantastic visual addition to the otherwise sparse staging. There is no reason that the play couldn’t adopt something similar for that number.

That’s not to say that play has nothing on the movie. It’s clear from watching the movie that the director and producers went out of their way to protect Catherine Zeta-Jones’ limited singing and dancing ability wherever possible. By comparison, the woman playing Velma Kelly last night clearly was a superior singer and dancer.

Ultimately, we were disappointed that we shelled out nearly fifty bucks a seat for a show that seemed off in nearly every respect. It would not be inaccurate to say that we enjoy the DVD of the movie more than we enjoyed watching the show last night.

There are very few things I enjoy more than reading the reviews of truly awful movies. Sure, I’ll most likely never see the movies in questions, but I sure get a kick out of reading the reviews.The beauty of bad movie reviews is that the critics don’t feel bound by the traditional movie review framework. After all, if a movie is among the worst ever, does each part of its awfulness require in-depth examination? Instead, they let fly with all sorts of cutting commentary liberally dotted with words obviously dredged from the depths of the thesaurus.

So, without further ado, allow me to present just a few of the reviews The Dukes of Hazzard.

There are routine movies and others that blaze a trail. There are routine bad movies and others so horrendous that they redefine bad, that make us look up synonyms for agonizing and abysmal and then gnash our teeth because the language has not kept pace with the decline of film.

…

Three back-to-back chases form the climax. They’re excruciating. The comedy is nonexistent. The filmmakers couldn’t buy a laugh in a burning poppy field. The movie is only 97 minutes long, but it makes time stretch, so that it’s impossible to feel comfortable in one sitting position for more than five minutes.

– Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle Movie Critic

At one point, the film’s narrator says, “If you have to go to the bathroom, now would be the wrong time.” I beg to differ. There is no wrong time to flush this turd.

– Peter Travers, Rolling Stone Movie Critic

Since it is not possible to endure The Dukes of Hazzard without finding some other task to occupy one’s mind (straight viewing could result in brain damage), I passed the time by re-constructing what might have been the pitch meeting in which Warner Brothers executives green-lighted this project. This is reproduced here in lieu of a review (which would amount to a lot of negative adjectives strung together with phrases like “one of the worst movies of the year” and “makes The Devil’s Rejects look a lot more appealing”).

– James Berardinelli, ReelViews Movie Critic

Now moving to the head of the line is The Dukes of Hazzard, a redo of a hit show that was already so awful the filmmakers really had to try hard to do it one worse; that they succeeded, perhaps, is how they justify their paychecks, because one really must put substantial effort into making movies this willfully and unbearably awful.

– Robert Wilonsky, Dallas Observer Movie Critic

Since Sarah and I signed up with Netflix several months ago, we’ve certainly seen our fair share of movies. Rather than rate the 26 movies and five television series discs that we’ve seen, I want to write about one in particular.Regardless of your opinion on the Iraq war, I strongly encourage you to see the documentary Gunner Palace. It is an incredibly interesting, gripping film about the daily life of average, ordinary soldiers in Baghdad.

What makes Gunner Palace such an interesting movie is that it does not try to act as a vehicle for a particular political agenda. Rather, it simply wants to show what life is like for the soldiers on the ground in Iraq. Whether or not you truly believe that the US Army is fighting terrorism in Iraq; regardless of whether you believe that our soldiers should be in Iraq; you should see this movie.

The 2 Battalion of the 3rd Field Artillery of the 1st Armored Division spends their days and nights holed up in one of Uday Hussein’s palaces when they aren’t out patrolling, raiding, and gathering intelligence. They have a pool party. There is a command center in the palace. They have checkpoints. They visit orphanages. They eat food heated up in a microwave. They play video games and electric guitar. They send e-mails back home. They are constantly alert for IEDs. Their Humvees run out of gas on the freeway. In short, they do all the dirty work that we don’t see on television.

This film was a really intimate portrait of the 19-30 year olds who are the face of America in Iraq.

Tuesday night, Sarah and I attended a show by the touring production of the Broadway show, “The Producers“.The show was given at Madison’s new, and generally revered, Overture Center. The Overture Center is a new arts center in the heart of Downtown that was 100% funded by private donations, all from one local couple.

The building itself has clean lines, plenty of glass, airy spaces, and is a generally nice facility. Certainly it is a vast improvement on what it replaced.

We saw “The Producers” in Overture Hall, which is the centerpiece of the Overture Center. The hall seats just over 2200 people and is really an impressive facility for a city the size of Madison.

The show itself was really quite a contrast. The first act, and the first half of the second act, are frenetic, riotous, and funny. It is really Mel Brooks at his best. The staging and scenery are superb. The actors and acrtresses seemed well rehearsed, and enthusiastic.

Where the show really drags is in the second half of the second act. Both Sarah and I felt that it was as if Mel Brooks simply ran out steam, and spent a good half-hour writing a dull and untidy end to the show. In fact, the ending is so awful, that it really casts quite a shadow across the first three quarters of the play. It made me wonder just how awful many of the other plays on Broadway were that this show won as many awards as it did.

In addition to a clunker of an ending, the seats in Overture Hall are just as painful. The geometry on the (sparkling new) seats is just enough out of whack as to make sitting in them for the better part of three hours an endurance event.

There is absolutely no way to sit comfortably in those seats. I’m not the tallest person I know, but I am taller than average, so I’m used to sitting in confined areas while taking in cultural events. It’s just the price I pay for being able to reach items on the top shelf. And, it isn’t as though I’m too wide for the seats. In fact, there were several inches of seat on either side of me that I wasn’t using.

At intermission, the gentleman seated next to me (who I didn’t know), started a conversation with me about how uncomfortable the seats were and how his knees were aching. I expressed similar sentiments as I had spent all of the first act trying to find a comfortable position in which to sit. Sarah, who isn’t as tall as myself or the gentleman next to me, expressed the same frustration.

So, there were the three of us, having paid a non-trivial amount of money to see a show, sitting in a brand-new building, with sparkling new seats, complaining how the seats were actually less comfortable than many aluminum bleachers we’ve used over time at various sporting events. Clearly, there is something wrong with the seating at Overture Hall.

Some movies we’ve seen of late:

• The Station Agent – See it.
• Zatoichi – See it.
• Before Sunset – Girls: See it. Guys: Slack it.
• De-Lovely – Skip it. As much as I like Cole Porter’s music, I could never get past my “Oh, look. There’s Kevin Kline and Ashley Judd” stage. Neither Sarah or I was able to suspend our disbelief and enter the movie’s world. And the artifice the movie employs to tie the plot together is amateurish.
• Walking Tall – You find The Rock entertaining: Slack it. Otherwise: Skip it.
• Collateral – See it. See it twice. Jamie Foxx was robbed with merely a best supporting actor nomination. He was clearly a starring actor in this film.
• Shaun of the Dead – See it. It features zombies, after all.

Explanation of my capsule movie reviews

There are very few things more entertaining to read than a sharp, biting review of a really bad movie. As Exhibit A, I offer the San Francisco Chronicle’s review of the movie “Alone in the Dark.”

Here’s a teaser of what you’ll find in the review:

“Alone in the Dark” is the best Ed Wood movie never made. It fails so miserably as both an action and horror picture that it succeeds as a comedy. It’s a film so mind-blowingly horrible that it teeters on the edge of cinematic immortality….

Every casting decision, camera angle, special effect and sound seems created as a dare to leave the theater.

Last night, we went out to a movie for the first time in a long time. I had been dying to see the The Incredibles and was amenable to that choice so off we went.Of late, I’ve taken to writing one-line reviews of movies we see. Generally, I believe that people are not interested in reading long-winded reviews of movies. Most people have a reasonably strong opinion about what kinds of movies they like to see. To overcome that opinion is not easy and, in some cases, no amount of positive word-of-mouth or critical reviews is going to convince someone to see a particular flick.

That’s fair. I’m not terribly crazy about seeing any movie that has Sissy Spacek in it and no amount of positive word-of-mouth or cajoling on Sarah’s part is likely to change my mind.

Having said that, I strongly encourage anyone who can get over the fact that the Incredibles is animated to see the movie.

Beyond the funny “life as a superhero” sight gags and jokes, the movie contains some real thought about personal and social issues. It would not be reading too much into the movie to see clear signs of an exploration of the separation of work and family life. Nor would I feel out-of-bounds writing that the movie displays how it can be difficult to balance personal desires with the needs of close family members.

In addition, there are some very clear and deep homages made to preceding films. Even casual moviegoers should see reverence displayed for the forest speeder chase through the Ewok forest in Return of the Jedi as well as the sand speeder race in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. “The Incredibles” just drips with obvious James Bond references, including one scene where the soundtrack is nearly a note-for-note copy of the signature James Bond theme.

I could go on and one about the movie, but inevitably I would likely write a spoiler or two and that would ruin the movie for those who have not yet seen it.

If you have seen “The Incredibles” already, you know that you want to see it again. If you have not been so blessed as to sit in a darkened theater with this film showing on the big screen in front of you, I cannot encourage you enough to hie to the nearest theater and avail yourself of two hours of film majesty.

Some of the movies we’ve seen of late:

• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban – See it. Really good.
• Mystic River – See it, even though it has Kevin Bacon in it.
• Under the Tuscan Sun – Slack it. Sarah liked it much more than I did.
• Starsky & Hutch – Slack it.
• Sweet Home Alabama – Skip it. Predictable dreck.

Explanation of my movie reviews

Sarah made the (faulty) assumption last night that I had seen the movie Pretty Woman. As we were discussing what movies I hadn’t seen growing up, I realized that my movie selection criteria at the time were actually somewhat simplistic.

So, I made up a flowchart that allows anyone to predict, with a reasonably high degree of accuracy, if I saw any given movie that was released before I started college.

Short and sweet reviews of movies we’ve seen recently.

• Mean Girls – See It
• Hellboy – Slack It
• Barcelona – Skip It
• City of God – See It

Explanation of my movie reviews

We saw The Terminal last week and both of us liked it. If you find yourself seeking a refuge from the summer heat, and if that refuge is the movieplex, check out the latest offering from Spielberg and Hanks. You won’t be disappointed.

We’ve seen several movies of late and while some of them were quite good, others were far less so.By far the best movie we’ve seen of late was Shrek 2. While we were waiting in line to get into the theater, Sarah and I were trying to decide the last time we’d actually been to a movie theater to see a movie. After some back and forth we agreed upon sometime last fall. Anyway, we probably would have just waited for Shrek 2 to come out on video (like we do with everything else), except that some of our friends wanted to see the movie in the theater and they invited us to go along.

Sure, the movie is somewhat predictable, but it does have its fair share of truly funny moments. I found myself laughing quite hard at times, which is an unfortunately rare event when it comes to movies these days.

Last night, we saw 21 Grams. There is an art-house movie theater just a few blocks from our house, and 21 Grams played there for months. So, when I saw it in the video store I decided to give it a try. What, exactly, was all the hype about?

The movie was, quite frankly, boring. Characters had incredibly difficult to understand motivations. Sure, I can understand Naomi Watts’ character’s motives. I can even partially understand Benicio Del Toro’s character’s motives. But the motives of Sean Penn’s character? Just too far out there. Half way through the movie I was keeping myself entertained by playing with the dog.

Big Fish was a surprisingly good movie. I little to nothing about it, other than Tim Burton directed it. The movie itself was very entertaining, and even heartfelt. It could have been really corny and dumb, but Burton really pulled it off and made a very entertaining movie.

This year’s award for overly-hyped, “I Can’t Believe It Won A Best Picture Oscar” goes to The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. If there was a more boring movie released last year, I didn’t see it. This movie carried with the burden that nearly everyone knows how it ends. How do you build up drama to a foregone conclusion? You don’t. While the visuals were interesting, the storyline (once the writer and director got done mangling it beyond recognition) wasn’t very compelling. This was another movie where I spent a fair amount of time playing with the dog while it ran on the television.

We watched the much-heralded Disney movie Miracle the other night.

What a snoozer. The movie is perhaps only interesting to those who don’t already know the outcome of the game. For those who know how the game ends, all the drama seems highly artificial and hardly worth the price of admission.

If you wanted to see real hockey drama, you’d do better to visit your local ice rink during hockey season and watch a game live.

Some good, some bad, some truly awful. Read on if you want to hear more about “Hulk”, “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen”, “Matchstick Men”, “School of Rock”, and “Band of Brothers.”

• Hulk: The fact that this movie was based on a comic book was my primary motivation for seeing this one. Fortunately, I did not pay to see it in a theatre, nor did I pay the slightly higher price to see it when it was a “New Release” at the video store. Ang Lee came up with some nifty camera effects to simulate comic book illustration, but beyond that, there isn’t much to recommend this film. The action is predictable. The characters are extremely shallow. The plot…uh…the plot… There was something like a plot, but I wouldn’t call it a plot. The special effects were nothing special. If the folks at ILM didn’t have the Star Wars films on their resume, and if Hulk was all I knew of their work, I would not feel uneasy or unfair describing their special effects work as second rate.

• The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: When a movie that initially looks like it has some interesting qualities is panned, and hard, by everyone who sees it, I’m always a bit curious about when, where, and how such a great idea went so horribly wrong. Such is the case with this movie. A great book turned into a complete trainwreck of a movie. There is a character that was so obviously added just to satisfy shallow American audience members that I experienced profound disappointment everytime that character was on the screen. The special effects were remarkably pedestrian (how do you skimp on special effects when adapting a comic book to the big screen?!?). The characters weren’t even shallow; they were completely two dimensional. The plot…uhh…The plot of this movie made Hulk appear complex and compelling by comparison.
• Matchstick Men: The plot here is interesting and has several twists. Overall, the characters have some depth and we can understand what drives them. Nicholas Cage, who I generally feel cannot act, does a decent job in this film. The film didn’t leave me feeling like I had just wasted a good portion of my life, so I would recommend it.
• Band of Brothers: Not a movie, per se, but a mini-series originally aired on HBO. It can be rented or purchased on DVD. I just happened to watch it on the History Channel. This series was incredibly compelling and interesting. The characters have depth and actually seem to be real people. The plot of each episode is different, but all fit within the Allied march towards Berlin in WWII. Even Sarah, who isn’t much for war movies, found herself drawn in to the series and compelled to watch. If you see only ten hours of movie/video this year, seeing all ten episodes of Band of Brothers would be a worthy use of those hours.
• School of Rock: This film was entertaining, but not very compelling. If you want to see Jack Black at his finest, and a more compelling storyline to boot see High Fidelity.

Sarah and I haven’t seen many movies of late because we’ve been busy with other things. However, we have seen a few.

• Desperado: A fun, fun movie. If you just want to kick back, suspend disbelief, and have a good time, this movie will keep you entertained. If you’re going to analyze the action and motives of the characters, rent something else.
• Once Upon a time in Mexico: Written, directed, edited, shot, produced, and scored by Robert Rodriguez, who also directed and wrote Desperado, above. Another fun, suspend disbelief movie. If you rent the DVD, make sure to watch the fascinating bit on making puerco pibil in the DVD extras.
• The Italian Job: An average movie. Not good, not bad. If I was stuck on an airplane with a limited amount of reading material, and this movie was free in the cabin, I would watch it. Otherwise, I probably wouldn’t bother.

Bob Keeshan, the man who played Captain Kangaroo on television, died today.

Ironically enough, Sarah and I were talking about Captain Kangaroo a couple of days ago. For all that we watched the show, neither one of us ever remembers seeing Captain Kangaroo hop, jump, or otherwise move like his namesake.

Sarah and I watched the movie NorthFork over the weekend.

It was sold to audiences as a story of a town about to be innundated by the lake created behind a new dam. A group of state workers were charged with getting the people out of the town and on to higher ground, even if the residents did not want to leave of their own accord.

The movie’s actual plot can be found by reading on.

The actual plot of Northfork is very different. Rather than portray a relatively conventional series of cause and effect actions, the movie veers sharply into religious and surrealistic territory, almost from the opening credits.

Angels, devils, and government agents somewhere in between dominate the list of characters. Surrealistic images and beasts dominate the visual landscape. Rather than occuring serially, events happen at random. Even when events do happen, they happen at such a slow pace that reading the newspaper while watching the movie is not only possible, it is advisable.

The opening of the dam is almost completely irrelevant to the story. Tearing down an apartment building or tearing down houses to build a freeway would have provided the same framework to the movie.

All of this makes “Northfork” a movie that is best experienced while asleep or while under general anestheia.

If you missed Baxter Black’s commentary on the 31 Dec 2003 version of Morning Edition, you missed some truly funny moments. The segment is titled ‘I Can Fix Your Cow’