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Dogtown and the Z Boys
Dogtown and the Z Boys
Title Note: The title refers to the Dogtown area of Santa Monica, CA, and the surfing and skating team, the Zephyr Team,
AKA the Z-Boys.
Awards: Audience Award for Best Documentary (tie), Director's Award - Documentary, 2001 Sundance Film Festival); Best
Documentary, 2002 Independent Spirit Awards
Running Time: 89 minutes (packed with history and footage of how modern skateboarding was born, I was surprised to find
out it was this short... it easily felt like 2 hours; in a good way)
Cast: Sean Penn (narrator), Jay Adams, Tony Alva, Bob Biniak, Paul Constantineau, Shogo Kubo, Jim Muir, Peggy Oki, Stacy
Peralta, Nathan Pratt, Wentzle Ruml
Director: Stacy Peralta (debut; he also directed the recent ABC telefilm, The '70's: The Decade That Changed Television)
Music: This film has one of the best rock and roll soundtracks in years, including prime tracks by Led Zeppellin, Pink
Floyd, Black Sabbath, and Alice Cooper.
Screenwriters: Stacy Peralta, Craig Stecyk (debuts)
Premise: This documentary tells the true story of how kids living in Santa Monica, CA in the 1970's brought their surfing
styles into skateboarding, revolutionizing the sport, and becoming stars along the way. Including interview footage with the
Z-Boys and others today, Stacy Peralta also built his film around the original 8mm footage he and others shot back then, along
with magazine articles, news footage, great rock music, and Sean Penn's narration.
In addition to establishing how they rocketed to fame and influence, we also are entertained by great stories of how the
kids raided massive empty swimming pools for skateboarding, and how many of the tricks and styles of the sport came to be
so exuberant.
Genres: Documentary, 1970's, Skateboarding, Teen
Z-Boys.com (the site claims to be unofficial, but it's so crammed with archival photos, articles, and information, that
it easily outperforms many official sites I've seen for other films)
It's easy to take it for granted today that there are skateboarders across the country, wherever there's pavement and
bored teenagers. It wasn't that long ago, however, that the skateboard was considered a failed fad, the unwanted hybrid son
of the rollerskate and the surfboard. Dogtown and Z-Boys tells the true story of a group of rowdy Santa Monica youths in the
1970's who brought their love of dangerous surfing to the pavement, adapting skateboards to their unique surfing styles, and
in effect, revolutionizing the way they would be used forever. From the ragged ruins of an amusement park that has fallen
into the sea, where the Z-Boys could surf and not have to worry about intruders (and if there were any... they were more than
capable of making them leave) to the heights of fame, the Z-Boys represent a series of great stories of street kids rising
up through a love of a sport, and an attitude of rebellion. This might seem trivial and barely something that a wide audience
would be interested in, if Stacy Peralta, one of those original kids, didn't infuse this documentary with such a sense of
energy, exuberance and rocking joy.
There are plenty of sports documentaries out there (mostly direct-to-video), but few are compiled and edited with such
ferocity and speed. Like Requiem for a Dream, this film is an ode to editing (by Paul Crowder, who I was surprised to discover
is making his debut here), as just about every trick in the book is used to make the use of magazine articles, stills, and
archival footage seem fresh and revolutionary.
Sean Penn's narration was perfect for this, including a "blooper" that wasn't edited out, but it's the original
Z-Boys themselves that make this film so much fun to take in. I will admit right away that I know nothing of skateboarding,
having grown up in the woods where it's not convenient. That, however, didn't decrease my interest one iota in their story,
because their scrappy underdog success stories transcend whether or not you actually know what they're talking about at first.
Peralta's accomplishment is that he makes you love skateboarding because the Z-Boys do.
When they compete in a skating competition not used to their long hair and wild ways, we root for them to succeed (although,
paraphrasing what one of them says, they're like a hockey team showing up at a figure skating competition).
At first glance, you might think that this documentary is going to only appeal to young kids into skateboarding, but I
think Sony might be able to pull off the trick of getting the message out that this is a superb documentary, regardless of
your background. The rebellion, the rock music, and the frenetic introduction to skating culture all combine to make Dogtown
and Z-Boys one of the most entertaining movies of the year.
Eight Legged Freaks
You can't blame the truck-size spiders of Eight Legged Freaks for chasing and chomping humans. Our biped surrogates are so
infuriatingly dull that they beg to be squashed. In this era of overused computer-generated effects, Freaks is yet another
case of plot and characters playing second fiddle to an orchestra of visuals.
If you like monster movies, you'll love its hordes of skittering, leaping, hairy-legged spiders, which busily fill the
screen like armies of Star Wars clones. But the story is numbingly clichéd, and its setup is long and leaden, as our old friend
Toxic Waste triggers growth spurts among spiders in a sleepy Arizona town.
Residents must deal with an unexpected houseguest after chemically altered spiders begin growing to gigantic proportions
in Eight Legged Freaks. Once the spiders attack in full fury, Freaks nicely careers to its finish as an action-adventure laced
with lunatic humour. But its main characters are as uninvolving as the cannon-fodder extras whose bloodless slaughter is minimised
to keep the PG/12 rating intact.
Chief among them is Chris (David Arquette), the town's prodigal son. As fate and plot contrivance would have it, he returns
home after 10 years, aiming to reopen his dad's failed gold mine and to rekindle sparks with Sam (Kari Wuhrer), the town's
model-worthy sheriff.
Director and co-writer Ellory Elkayem intercuts this listless exposition with glimpses of big spiders starting to misbehave.
But that's not enough to lift the film's first half, which is only partly redeemed by the charm of Scott Terra as a bookish
kid who looks like Tim Robbins at 14. Wuhrer also shows spirited conviction, and Doug E. Doug lends comic relief as a DJ riddled
with conspiracy theories.
But apart from brief gonzo screaming, Arquette submerges his clowning talents in a straight heroic role. Bad move. Granted,
his part is underwritten, but surely he could try to range beyond pained earnestness. Yet the spiders are great...munching
and crunching in spindly spectacle. They look real enough, and the CG insects are ably integrated with live action.
Some dart from below ground to grab their prey. Others jump the length of a street. A few spin some live punters into
sticky cocoons as take-away items for dining on later. The best action sequence involves dirt bikes, a fuel truck and the
ravenous, skittering critters. But mostly our heroes simply fend off the fiends with pathetic wee guns, or simply run away!
Some will blame the film's faults on producers Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin, the artistically discredited men behind
Independence Day and 1998's Godzilla. But after 1990's Tremors and Arachnophobia, this genre has little place else to go.
It certainly can't return to the seriousness of the '50s, when Cold War paranoia gave meaning to big-bug movies, from Tarantula
and Them! to The Black Scorpion and The Deadly Mantis, not to mention the finale of The Incredible Shrinking Man.
As they all show, insects are bad enough at normal size. When they pass us on the food chain, that's a war worth waging
- but not always a movie worth watching.
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Austin Powers
in Goldmember
Running Length: 1:30
Theatrical Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Cast: Mike Myers, Michael Caine, Beyoncé Knowles, Fred Savage, Michael York, Robert Wagner, Seth Green, Mindy Sterling,
Verne J. Troyer
Director: Jay Roach
Producers: Mike Myers, John Lyons, Suzanne Todd, Jennifer Todd, Demi Moore, Eric McLeod
Screenplay: Mike Myers and Michael McCullers
Cinematography: Peter Deming
Music: George S. Clinton
When Mike Myers and Jay Roach introduced the world to Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery in 1997, their intention
was to make a one-off spoof of James Bond movies and '60s culture. The movie did extremely well at the box office, and exploded
in popularity when it hit home video. The result was 1999's Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, which achieved blockbuster
status. Thus was born another franchise with deeper roots in money and popularity than in creativity.
In all fairness to this third in the series, it is vastly superior to the comparatively disappointing second movie. The
comedy is about as low-brow as it can get - there are characters named "Fook Mi" and "Fook Yu" and the
obligatory sexual innuendo. Gross-out humour abounds, from the flatulence of Fat Bastard to the truly disgusting behavior
of the newest villain, Goldmember (who peels off bits of dried skin and eats them). And the movie isn't hard-up for penis
jokes, which comprise about 1/3 of the film's laugh-inducing material.
Subtle witticisms, multiple irony and incisive satire abound, and it's refreshing not to see Myers compromising this for
the majority "duh?" USA audience, and the avalanche of crude humour isn't all bad. When it works, it can be really
hilarious (as is the case on several occasions). But when it fails, it does come across as badly conceived and juvenile.
For Goldmember, the versatile Mike Myers adds a fourth character. In addition to playing Austin, his nemesis Dr. Evil,
and the unbelievably obese Scotsman Fat Bastard (who's only in a few scenes), Myers essays Goldmember, a twisted associate
of Dr. Evil who lost his genitals in a smelting accident. Goldmember, who looks like a Star Trek reject, wants to destroy
the world using a tractor beam (codenamed "Preparation H") aimed at a solid gold asteroid. For some reason, he has
also kidnapped Austin's dad, Nigel. As the International Man of Mystery's father, Michael Caine has an opportunity to put
his mimicry skills to the test (Nigel evidences many of the same mannerisms as Austin). Caine, who was Harry Palmer in the
'60s series of spy movies based on Len Deighton's novels, gets a chance to try out the lighter side of the kind of character
he once played seriously. Beyoncé Knowles is Blaxsploitation-inspired Foxxy Cleopatra, Austin's latest love interest. While
the "Destiny's Child" performer shows better comic timing than Heather Graham, she displays minimal screen presence
and fades into the background whenever possible. Fred Savage, all grown up, is Number Three, a man with an obvious facial
disfigurement. The "regulars" - Basil Exposition (Michael York), Number Two (Robert Wagner), Scott Evil (Seth Green),
Frau Farbissina (Mindy Sterling), and Mini-Me (Verne J. Troyer) - are all back.
As was true of the previous Austin Powers films, this one uses the saturation approach to comedy - throw so many jokes
at the audience that, even if only a fraction of them stick, the final product will be deemed funny. When Goldmember is delivering
its best material, it's a highly entertaining experience. The first ten minutes represent the movie's pinnacle - a cameo-rich
sequence that starts out as a parody of a spoof before turning into a surreal musical production number. Later, there are
naughty subtitles and a vulgar-but-clever bit featuring some unusual "shadow puppetry". There's also a gratuitous
trip back to the '70s that features new lyrics to some K.C. and the Sunshine Band tunes and a brief lip-synching appearance
by the brilliant Nathan Lane. In between all of this, however, we are treated to a lot of grotesque comedy that's more likely
to turn stomachs than provoke laughter, re-treads of jokes from the other Austin Powers outings, and new stuff that lacks
inspiration or dilutes its source material. (The "Fook Mi/Fook Yu" routine echoes Abbott and Costello's "Who's
on First?" and the Mole-on-the-Face-Avoidance recalls a skit from "The Germans" episode of "Fawlty Towers".)
One of the blessings of Goldmember is that it's only 90 minutes long, but, after three Austin Powers instalments, that's
4 1/2 hours spent in the company of this goofy band of characters. Qualities that were once amusing are in danger of becoming
irritating. But ultimately it's a tribute to the popularity of the International Man of Mystery that he's still going strong,
even if the comedic aptitude of his adventures is losing steam. (Austin Powers is no Inspector Closeau, but he could end up
becoming as long-running a character as the Blake Edwards/Peter Sellers creation.) If Mike Myers and Jay Roach want to get
out of the rut they have fallen into, they're going to have to do a little innovation next time Austin Powers reaches the
screens.
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Insomnia
Starring Al Pacino, Robin Williams, Hilary Swank, Maura Tierney, Martin Donovan, Nicky Katt and Paul Dooley. Directed by Christopher
Nolan. Written by Hillary Seitz. Produced by Paul Junger Witt, Edward L. McDonnell, Broderick Johnson and Andrew A. Kosove.
A Warner Bros. release. Thriller.
Running time: 117 min.
A remake of the 1997 Norwegian film by Erik Skjoldbjaerg, "Insomnia" is both remarkably similar and fundamentally
different from the original. While some settings and dialogue are exactly the same, the plot and relationships between characters
are more developed. While the protagonist takes almost exactly the same course of action, he is both more likeable and more
complex with the result being a superior version of an already excellent film.
Insomnia sees the action transplanted from the Arctic Circle in northern Norway to the Land of the Midnight Sun in Alaska.
Will Dormer (Al Pacino) is a seasoned Los Angeles police detective who has been asked to travel north with his partner Hap
Eckhart (Martin Donovan) to solve an unspeakable crime - the homicide of a local high school girl. Their business trip also
allows them to avoid an Internal Affairs investigation that is ravaging their department.
In the course of their investigation, the detectives lure their suspect to a remote cabin with the victim's discarded
backpack. The sting goes awry, and the cops are forced to pursue him in the dense Arctic fog. Unable to distinguish between
his partner and his prey, Dormer accidentally shoots Eckhart, who accuses him trying to kill him because he had intended to
cut a deal with Internal Affairs. Eckahrt dies, and, recognizing that he has a legitimate motive, Dormer covers up his crime,
claiming their suspect did it.
But Dormer was not alone in the mist. Unable to sleep in the 24-hour daylight, he soon starts getting phone calls in the
middle of the night from the killer (Robin Williams), who saw him shoot his partner and proposes they work together to frame
the murdered student's abusive boyfriend.
Meanwhile, ambitious yet inexperienced local detective Ellie Burr (Hilary Swank) is assigned to the Eckhart shooting.
She's an ardent admirer of Dormer's, and, recognizing this, he encourages her to investigate further - at his own peril -
when she presents a sanitized version of the events for him to sign off on. Dormer is essentially a good cop, but he turned
a corner a long time ago wherein he'd collar a criminal at any cost, just to get a result -"The end justifies the means,
right?"
Supported by an outstanding cast - Pacino is reliably rousing, and Williams, in the midst of a string of departures ("Death
to Smoochy," the upcoming "One Hour Photo"), while he has little to do, demonstrates why he won an Oscar for
a dramatic role (in "Good Will Hunting") - helmer Christopher Nolan, coming off his critically acclaimed indie hit
"Memento," doesn't bank on his actors to get him through his first major studio flick. Rather, he infuses the film
with his signature style, using extreme close-ups and exaggerated sounds to communicate his protagonist's stress, guilt and
sleep deprivation; spectacular overhead cinematography of vast blue-grey fields of ice, rolling hills blanketed with evergreen
trees and dense fog to convey the setting; and a recurring image of blood seeping through the threads of a shirt cuff, depicting
Dormer's defining moment.
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