Volume 04, Number 20
Movies
Movie News
By Bill Hersey
It was very Hollywood—and Las Vegas—on the 51st floor in the Roppongi Hills Club when Warner Brothers hosted a colorful party to celebrate the opening of their film Oceans 13. The people there were an interesting international mix of film and TV stars, prominent sports personalities, fashion designers, theme park owners, top hoteliers, and leaders in both the Japanese and foreign communities. Many spent much of the evening in the casino trying their luck at the game tables. When they needed a break they joined those in the main reception room where there was a superb buffet.
Showtime was dynamic and special. The show by the chic, glamorous pole dancers (one was world champion) was beautifully choreographed, and for the lack of a better word—hot. Everyone also enjoyed Matthew Ireton’s piano playing and singing. He’s a talented young man. It was a super evening in every way.
Movie Review - The Brave One
by Marie Teather
To say this film is simply a gun-wielding female avenger seeking vengeance against her lover's killers would be to miss the point. Director Neil Jordan's The Brave One goes beyond the boundaries of standard revenge flicks, investigating what happens when deeply hidden human impulses take over your socially normal self, and of a society so anxious it manifests its own terrors.
Jodie Foster stars as Erica Bains, a middle-of-the-road, non-controversial radio DJ known throughout New York City as ‘The Street Walker.' Strolling the streets of the home she romanticizes over, Bains records and adds commentary to the quirky sights and sounds reminiscent of a city grandeur—in short she's the kind of afternoon DJ your mother would enjoy.
But when she and soon-to-be husband David (Naveen Andrews), are violently attacked by three gang members, David is beaten to death and Erica barely survives through horrific injuries. Erica is left dealing with the psychological trauma caused by the attack and her life becomes an existence with fear for the city she once loved. Acquiring a gun illegally, Erica's street-walks take on a sinister edge; walking at night, in neighborhoods previously ignored, she discovers a darker city to the one she once knew. Drawn into a world of vigilantism by killing random criminals, Bains' world is now consumed by the fear of herself and the stranger she has become.
The characters are deep and the relationship between Bains and Detective Mercer (who is investigating the series of murders) an admiration of partners who should be on opposing sides of the law. Jodie Foster's performance is, in addition, menacingly astounding; emotional enough to want to reach out in empathy for her pain, but detached enough to comprehend the shell shock of the situation she finds herself in.
With similarities to Taxi Driver both in content and the backdrop of an America caught up in an unpopular war, The Brave One evokes and then questions your sympathies towards a woman on a killing spree.
East/West Double Bill
by M. Halliday
Set around the middle of the 19th century, Red Beard is perhaps not the first film that springs to mind when contemplating Akira Kurasawa's magnificent body of work and while never quite reaching the heights of The Seven Samurai and Ikura (what could?), Red Beard is an excellent piece of work and well worth viewing. Released in 1965 the film tells the story of an arrogant young doctor, Noburo Yasumoto, (Yuzo Kayama) sent to finish his medical apprenticeship at a free public clinic under the stewardship of Dr Kyojio Niide (the ever excellent Toshiro Mifune) also known as Red Beard. Believing the clinic to be beneath him, the young doctor rejects the patients and his coworkers, and, having knowledge of the latest Western medicine, he also rejects Red Beard's out dated methods. Slowly but surely the older doctor, by example and by exposing Yasumoto to the lives of the patients the two doctors treat, the younger man discovers his humanity and becomes the doctor, and man, Red Beard believed he would. Beautifully shot; well acted by a large cast of characters; this was the last film (of 16) Kurasawa and Mifune made together. It was also Kurasawa's last film in black and white.
Whether you like him or loathe him, as the cliché goes, it's hard to ignore Michael Moore. With his latest film Sicko there is plenty for both likers and loathers to fuel up on. Following GM, Gun Control and George Bush, Moore now tackles health care coverage in the USA. Made in Moore's usual style, narrated with his usual wit, Sicko is as infuriating as it is enlightening. Sections on the French, British and Cuban healthcare systems are so ludicrously one-sided it is hard to know what to really believe, likewise his ‘Canada good / US bad' spiel is wearing very thin and stands no real scrutiny. On the other hand, an interview with a medical insurance actuary is fascinating (that's a sentence I never thought I'd write) as the ugly bottom line truth of health coverage (healthcare companies will do anything to avoid paying out) is clearly laid out. A sequence showing a clearly mentally ill lady being dumped outside a public hospital having been ‘discharged' from a private one (her insurance ran out) is an example of documentary making of the highest order. A new Michael Moore film is, for even his harshest critics, an almost must-see proposition, and with this power he is able to move uncomfortable questions about modern American life to what passes as the centre stage now; whether he has any answers is another matter altogether.