TREME: SEASON 1

It's all about the music.

Sure, you have your usual David Simon (The Wire, Generation Kill) elements:  A diverse cast of colorful characters; an exploration of social injustices being perpetrated on the "lower classes"; and a city that serves not only as setting, but as a protagonist/antagonist in its own right.  But what you'll find yourself doing after watching any individual episode will be singing the chorus to "Ghost of a Chance". . . or perhaps "My Indian Red".  This is the portrait of a city bonded by music.  Despite the divisions between people in Post-Katrina New Orleans - Black or White; Rich or Poor; Indian or Cop - everyone, but EVERYONE, knows the lyrics to all of the local standards.

The story arcs of the diverse characters share one common bond: it's about people learning to deal with the cards that fate hands you.  About being able to cope with loss.  Sometimes that's as trivial as losing a DJ job that you could care less about, and other times it's about the search for a brother who was lost in the system.  As David Simon once said, "There's no room for hope on The Wire.", but in Treme it's all about hope, despite the odds.

Everything about this show is as excellent as anticipated.  I leave it feeling informed, entertained, and moved (Yes, you will be crying!).  A slight caveat is that it might do more for big fans of New Orleans Jazz than it did for me;  While the "real people" cameos in The Wire were smoothly integrated into the narrative, here they're about as subtle as Vincent Price showing up on the Muppet Show (with a slightly different Kermit).

LOVED

DEATH TO GENRE

I'm an American male of Irish ancestry.

Knowing only that, what could you tell about me?

Grasping at straws in the dark, you might guess that I'm a drinker, a fighter, and a person prone to melancholy (Socially; Occasionally; and who isn't?).  What you wouldn't be able to guess from just knowing my tribal heritage is that I'm a film nerd, I hate coleslaw, and that I possess a bright yellow bag with the words "Let's Be Eco-Friendly!" printed on the side.

In other words:  Ancestry tells you a lot, but not much that's important and unique.  Genre - being the classification of film and literature into categories like Horror, Action, Romance, etc - functions in a similar fashion:  It's a helpful shorthand for knowing the broad strokes about a film - but who cares about the broad strokes?  The devil, and the fun, is all in the details.

Am I advocating the expulsion of Genre categories from Netflix Instant?  Nah.  If people are looking to get scared, it makes sense to look in the Horror section first and foremost.  This is a plea for filmmakers and film connoisseurs to think outside the pre-packaged boxes.

What's the harm in Genre?  Well, staying on Horror for a moment, let me ask you this:  Why is the acting in Horror films so often terrible?  Give up?  The answer is, mainly, that we, as a culture, EXPECT the acting in Horror films to be terrible.  Once, long ago, people were trying to make so-called Horror Films that were actually, genuinely good - but they were made fast, cheap, and often by first-time directors.  As such, a template was formed - "Horror Films will henceforth be shitty because that's what we're used to now".  Occasionally, a director will make a good film that's designed to scare the pants off of people - such as The Exorcist or Silence Of The Lambs - but these efforts are so few and far between that they're either referred to as "transcending" the genre, or labeled as a different genre altogether (Lambs was referred to as a "Thriller", very pointedly).

So, in the creation of a film, the writer/director/studio labels it as "Horror", and either subconsciously or intentionally gives it a set of parameters in which to play.  Conversely, the viewer comes to the finished product with certain expectations.  Horror has become a ghettoized genre, and films attempting to frighten an audience aren't often given a fair shake on either end of the creative process.

Let me tell you something else about myself - I'm also of English and German heritage.  Probably a lot of other stuff, too.  Whether through crossbreeding or just influence, there aren't a lot of "pure" cultures left anymore - everyone has influenced everyone else.  Likewise, movies aren't often just one thing.  Evil Dead 2 is classified as a Horror film - but it's also really funny.  Is it more of a Horror Film than a Comedy?  Does Rock beat Scissors, so to speak?

Maybe people can see past their pre-conceptions, but I've recently realized that I have difficulty with it.  Despite my experience, or perhaps because of it, I EXPECT a Horror film to be a certain way, and I EXPECT a Romantic Comedy to be another way.

Maybe it's completely naive, but I'd like to believe that films, like people, can define themselves.  I'm not simply Irish-American, English-American or German-American. . .  I am Phil Dean, the Alpha and Omega of myself.  I, like all people. . .  like all movies. . .  take bits and pieces of influence from everything that I've seen, touched, heard and experienced.  To say that I'm a Man is true.  To say that I'm American is true.  Even to be as specific as to call me a Movie Nerd would be true, but it doesn't define everything about me.

To contradict the words of Tyler Durden - I am a unique snowflake, and so is everyone else.  It stands to reason that our works should be equally varied.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS

If you had told me that there was a new film directed by Woody Allen, starring Owen Wilson, that was actually really good, I would've said you were crazy.  Yet. . .  here we are, the roles reversed, with myself as the crier and you, dear reader, as the disbelieving consumer.

It's not a movie for everyone, to be certain - I would hope, at this point, you wouldn't be expecting anthropomorphic robots and explosions from the Woodster - but it's charming, evenly paced, and the kind of straight-forward feel-good movie that leaves me floating.

Owen plays a successful screenwriter who aspires to be a novelist, traveling in Paris with his bride to be (Rachel McAdams), and her disapproving parents.  While McAdams and family galumph through the city as the traditional Ugly Americans (led, in part, by McAdam's old friend, and onetime love interest Michael Sheen, in a hilariously douchey role), Wilson finds an intimate connection with all the beauty and history surrounding him.  Quite literally, in fact. . .  One night, while wandering through the city's street, he ends up at a party hosted by the Lost Generation.  Before he even knows what's happening, he's drinking champagne with the Fitzgeralds, being threatened by Hemingway, and having his rough draft reviewed by Gertrude Stein.  Caught between two worlds - the modern at daytime, and the roaring twenties at night - he finds inspiration and a renewed sense of purpose.

You're not going to find anything new here - you've seen this type of story before, and you know exactly where it's going.  And, to be frank, the "cameos" play out like porn for lit nerds.  But the cast is extremely game; the city, and photography, are gorgeous (thanks to master DP Darius Khondji); and there's a sense of romance and joie de vivre seeping out of every frame.  Its not a groundbreaking work of life-altering art - but who cares?  It's fun, and I love it more every time I think about it.

LOVED

THE TREE OF LIFE

The enigmatic Terrence Malick strikes again.  I watched this last weekend at the Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor, amidst a decently populated house.  The majority of the audience came to see a new Brad Pitt and/or Sean Penn film, and were wholly unprepared for what was in store.  Well, really, we all were.  Even with my knowledge and experience of Malick's previous works, I sheltered myself from the hype enough that I wasn't sure where he was taking me on this particular trip.

It turns out that he was making the film that his entire career has been building up to - the summation of all of his works, spanning from the dawn of time to the land beyond death.  I'm fascinated to see where he goes from here, because I would be shocked if he were able to go bigger.  But hey. . .  Kubrick followed up 2001 with A Clockwork Orange, so. . .  Is it time for Malick to do his Richard III?  We'll just have to wait and see. (He's already been filming a new movie, starring Ben Affleck, but as per usual no one knows what it's really about.)

A lot of directors use fast-paced editing, and I usually hate it.  I like my films to be fairly "neat" in construction, and a film moving at the speed of a freight train is often jarring to me, and lacking emotional heft.  Some few, great directors pull it off nicely - the aforementioned Kubrick with Clockwork; Scorsese with The Departed - and Malick uses his editing in a similarly unique way.  He shows us snippets of scenes, traces of intimate moments; and besides the plot of this film, it's that element I believe people find the hardest to wrap their heads around.  The point is this. . .  Each moment in the characters lives are like pieces of a puzzle; pieces which, when placed end to end, are revealed as parts of a greater truth.  In Tree, we're watching a man's life flash before his eyes.  But not only his life - also everything that led to his creation, and every consequence of his decisions thereafter.

As I've said before - you don't watch Malick for the narrative.  He's a poet, using the cinema in its purest possible form.  Not only is this my favorite film of the year so far, but its my favorite that I've seen since Where The Wild Things Are.

ECSTATIC ABOUT

CHANGES

Longtime readers (all twelve of you, minus the ones who refuse to think of a year as "long") may be wondering why my output has decreased so significantly in the past month or so.  The simple answer to that question is this:  I was getting bored with it.  Now, on to the more complex answer. . .

You may notice a couple of changes that I've made to the site.  First off, I'm no longer going as Frederick Frog, but as my actual name, Phil Dean.  Seeing as how the vast majority of my regular readership comes via my Facebook page, this animalistic ruse seemed particularly ridiculous.  It was really the remnant of an earlier design for the site, and I've made the necessary correction.

Secondly, my review system - if you'll but take a gander at the right side of the page, I'll save myself the redundancy of explaining it twice.  The short version is that I was getting sick of the perceived elitism and condescension inherent in my previous judgmental wordings.

Thirdly, I've made a huge, HUGE, HUUUGGGEEE, change in my life. . .

Huge.

I've decided to no longer seek out movie news.  In fact, I've decided to intentionally shelter myself from it.

I'm doing this for a number of reasons.  One has to do with the negativity of the online film nerd community.  Much vitriol has been spent towards maintaining the hegemony of the nerd film dynamic - i.e., a film involving wizards or superheroes either "Sux" or "Rox".  I'm interested in a reasoned, open discussion, not a shouting match.

I also just miss the ignorance that I used to have.  While I stay clear of spoiler material, I still absorb information about casting, basic plot synopsis, and "buzz" on scripts, ofttimes several years before the movie in question is to be released.  How fun would it have been to see X-Men: First Class and not know ahead of time that Jennifer Lawrence was in it, thus being pleasantly surprised by her appearance as Mystique?  Would it be possible to make myself isolated enough so that immediately before release, I could say "Holy shit!  They made a Green Lantern movie?!".  Only time will tell.  Either way, I think that the less I know going into a film, the less likely I am to subconsciously pre-judge it before I see it.

And most importantly?  I often go on little "diets", taking away elements of my personality that I consider vices.  That's how I quit smoking.  How I cut down significantly on drinking alcohol.  Movie News is, when I came to think about it, how I waste a great deal of my time.  Time which I could be spending on other pursuits.  I'm getting back into my screenwriting in a big way, and closely following who the frontrunners are to direct Jurassic Park 4 is simply another distraction that prevents me from realizing my actualization.

So where do I go from here?  I'd like to continue doing Blunderbuss, but I don't know what form it will take.  Reviews will continue, but perhaps in a more laid back style.  Ideally, I'd like this site to be more of a conversation piece than a polemic, so let me start by asking this:  What would you like to see?  What would you be interested in me writing about?  What's been working for you so far?

Thanks for reading my erratic posts this past year!  I hope to continue the madness into 2012 (and the end times).

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS
Director - Matthew Vaughn
Stars - Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence

This is the fifth film in the X-Men movie franchise, and the second prequel (The previous film in the series, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, was set before the first three but after this.  Stay with me here!).  In case you're unfamiliar with the premise of the series, its this:  Mankind is evolving, and the newly discovered "Mutants", who have abilities such as teleportation and telepathy, find themselves the targets of ordinary humans who hate and fear them.  The X-Men are advocates of peace, and a lasting co-existence between their fellow mutantkind, and mankind.  In First Class, we see the origins of the X-Men, gathered together in the early 1960's.

Do you have to be a fan of the series to enjoy this, or even know what's going on?  Not per-se, but it sure would help.  Most of the best moments in the film are "fan bait" - little cameos or character references that X-Heads are sure to love.  But the film can't quite decide whether its a prequel or a reboot, and thats where I'm a bit stumped.  Its efforts to connect the dots with the other films is noble, but seriously - why bother?  The continuity has been fucked for some time now.  Or did no one else notice that Sabretooth transformed from a mute wrestler into Liev Schrieber?  That the continuity seems to be fluid doesn't bother me, and doesn't appear to bother anyone else.

I will say this - you have to be a hardcore fan of superheroes to enjoy this.  While something like The Dark Knight, soaked to the bone in gritty realism, acts as a good gateway drug for the non-converted, this film is flashy, goofy, and balls-out earnest.  Fair-weather friends of the spandex set need not apply.

Director Matthew Vaughn, having just come off the meta (and brilliant) superhero film Kick-Ass, brings his indie sensibilities and energy to this WAY underfunded affair.  The fx scenes won't blow your mind, but he makes them work well.  Vaughn understands the rhythm of an action scene better than most of the big name directors out there, so what he lacks in budget, he makes up for in actual skill.

The performances here, particularly by lead actors Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, and Jennifer Lawrence, are very strong.  That's where one of my main complaints lies - I like these characters so much, I wanted to see much more of their interplay, but the movie is rushing through exposition like a freight train.  I know this might initially sound ridiculous, but I would've preferred if they'd stretched this story out over the course of three films.  Its solid, but there are just too many things going on, and too many characters to touch on, for them to really focus on the development of the group.

I've said in the past that the X-Men series is one of the best half-assed franchises of all time, and the tradition continues.  For every exuberant action set-piece, or perfectly delivered line of dialogue, there are moments that rival the unintentional goofiness of the Star Wars Prequels.  However, for the most part, this film sheds quite a bit of the bloat that made the last two films kind of a chore, streamlining the narrative in a satisfying way.  I'm hoping this does well, because I'd like to see the further adventures of the swinging sixties X-Men.

In short - for the average moviegoer, I would rate this as "Good".  I loved it, but acknowledge that it has some serious fucking problems.  But for myself, and fellow X-Men fanatics. . .

FREDERICK OPINES - GREAT