True Grit

Watching the Coen Brothers' remake of True Grit brings to mind a question I think a lot of filmgoers have been wrestling with lately: what is the point of a remake? The remake is becoming a major part of cinema, and it could be argued it is the laziest form of film making - even moreso than sequels. There seems to be two kinds of remakes: one is the retelling of a story for an audience that may not have seen the original. The other is a reinterpretation of a film, filtering it completely through a new director's point of view. There is probably more nuance than those two options, but largely most remakes fall into one of the two camps. The Coen Brothers would seem like the ideal candidates for the second category, but True Grit never seems to have much in common with their darkly ironic worldview to begin with (The Searchers always felt like it would make more sense for them). And indeed, True Grit lacks a lot of what one might expect from the Coens, ultimately feeling more like a retelling of the original John Wayne version than anything else.

So then, I ask, why? Why spend a year of your life remaking a fairly well known, Oscar winning Western, and not update the story in any real way? What is this film meant to offer us? The answer seems to lay with two things: the acting and the technical components. If nothing else, the Coens have so finely tuned their craft, that they make some of the most fully realized films each year. From sound to visuals to editing, they seem incapable of making a technically deficient movie, and True Grit is no exception. With each gunshot that rings out, you will jump in your seat. Every set looks so real you would assume they found authentic locations to shoot in. The costumes run circles around those in the original. The score, inspired by hymns from the era, is enchanting and memorable. In pretty much every technical aspect, this is the superior film to the 1969 original. But is that enough?

The acting, with apologies to Mr. Wayne, is unanimously better here. Rooster Cogburn, as portrayed by John Wayne, was little more than an extension of the Duke's persona. He played a type, and this character was that type to a T. Jeff Bridges, on the other hand, has created a wholly original character. Mumbling, foolish, aggressive, bitter - Bridges fills what could have been a stock hero with so much nuance and energy that you can't help but be entertained by him. And while he is very good, even better is newcomer Hailee Steinfeld as young Mattie Ross, the girl who hires Cogburn to avenge her father's murder. She takes the delightfully archaic and wordy dialog and runs with it effortlessly, making you forget she is acting at all. As head strong as Mattie is, Steinfeld never lets you forget than you are watching a young grieving girl, and she lets that aspect shine through at just the right moments. It is one of the best performances of the year.

And yet, for all this, the film still suffers from its inability to shake the original, to be something new. The pacing often feels very off, dragging right when it should be speeding up. There is a long sequence early on in which Cogbrun is on trial for murder. While this is meant to serve as our introduction to just who Cogburn is, it ends up stopping the momentum of the movie and tells us little that we wouldn't know just from watching how this man behaves around others. And the climax of the movie seems far more rushed than in the original. While we are never meant to really know Tom Chaney, Ned Pepper, or the other villains of the film, it feels like they get even less screentime here than in the original, making the climax feel more perfunctory than it should. And speaking of endings, they seem to be the most divisive aspect of any Coen Brothers movie. Here will be no exception, but for the opposite reason of A Simple Man or No Country: it doesn't know when to end. We get a flash forward on top of another flash forward, telling us every last detail we could ever want to know, when a little more ambiguity might have served the story better.

If you have never seen the original True Grit, this may well be a very good movie. I have seen the 1969 version, so it becomes more difficult for me to appreciate this version. The things that stand out here really stand out, but the things that fail are pretty glaring. In the end, I cannot judge this movie as if I hadn't seen the Wayne version, any more than a newcomer could judge this in the context of the original. Which again begs the question, why remake this film? As much as I liked the aspects I liked, I probably would have enjoyed them even more in the context of an original story. It often felt like the Coens were spinning their wheels instead of trying to be innovative. This movie can be fun at times, but it never really rises above that, and occasionally dips below it.

Milk

A long time ago, the screenwriter got as much play in advertising as the above the line talent. Take a look at the trailers for Network and you'll notice that it's credited as a Paddy Chayefsky film, not a Sydney Lumet film. That's not something you see these days, so when the advertisements for Milk made writer Dustin Lance Black's name so prominent, it made me expect something exceptionally well written. This isn't a guy with a lot of previous writing experience (his only big credit is the TV show Big Love), so clearly something must have been special about his writing here if producers felt using his name in the trailers would be worthwhile. So color me surprised to discover that Milk's single greatest failing is that it follows a very by-the-numbers screenplay that has almost no interest in any of its supporting characters. No amount of great acting can overcome what amounts to a been there, done that writing approach. What a shame.

For those who aren't familiar with him, Harvey Milk was an openly gay politician in San Francisco who fought to protect the rights of homosexuals in the late 70's, before he was gunned down by a fellow city supervisor. This is certainly an interesting story to be told, especially in light of the recent passing of Prop 8 in California. Yet the script does not do the man's plight justice. From the very get-go, I could tell the writer was not confident with his story. The whole movie is framed as Harvey recording his story on tape because he fears he might be assassinated. This tells us two things quickly: 1) Black is worried we won't connect with the film unless he states right off the bat that something tragic will happen, and 2) Black isn't sure of how to string together the events of Milk's life without some sort of narration. This framing device is made all the more irrelevant in retrospect because we never see any point where Harvey might feel like his death is imminent, nor do we see any reason for him to reiterate to anyone his life's story.

The acting is strong across the board (with one major exception), but if a character's name isn't Harvey Milk, apparently they don't warrant anything more than a surface examination. Each character seems to have one facet to them that separates them from other characters: Emile Hirsch plays the rebellious kid, James Franco is the supportive guy, and Josh Brolin is the opposition. Hirsch does surprisingly well considering how stock his character feels most of the time. Franco really has nothing to do here, but he does create a warm presence and plays well off of Penn. And Brolin deserved so much more examination than he got. His Dan White murdered two people, yet we really don't understand why. Perhaps the film subscribes to the Twinkies Defense? Brolin does a great job of making White seem uncertain of himself, like an animal cornered in his own den by trespassers. Yet it's not enough to make us see why he would do what he did. The one actor who feels totally out of place is Diego Luna. His character is tacked on, almost as if his existence in real life demanded he be shoehorned into the film. While the character isn't necessarily supposed to be liked, Luna does a horrible job of making us care about him in any way, grating on the nerves whenever he appears. When he does something very important late in the film, it feels completely pointless to the overall film, almost as if the film had to stop and deal with this other character for a few minutes. Luna's character is actually less likable than a man who murders two people - Black could not have intended that when he wrote the film.

Finally, there's Sean Penn. Clearly the best performance of the film, and probably award worthy. Penn really goes for it here, embracing Harvey in a way I feel a lot of other actors might have shied away from. Particularly interesting is the way he shapes Milk into both an immensely likable guy, but also one with an undeniable conniving undercurrent to him. The way he manipulates some people around him makes Milk a far more interesting character than he would have been if he was just a tragic hero. Penn is front and center for most of the run time, and he carries the film well.

Director Gus Van Sant is known for his more artsy films, often taking less of a narrative approach than an atmospheric one. Here he is back in mainstream territory, but with the occasional artistic flourishes. The way he would frame certain shots so that some characters were out of frame, or other shots where the camera is zoomed out to an almost unnatural level help to create a feeling of alienation that Milk and others certainly must have felt at times. But those flourishes aren't enough to mask the fact that the film hits all the beats you might expect from a biopic. While I've had some serious problems with Van Sant's atmospheric pictures, I would have preferred him to take some sort of risks with the narrative here so that I didn't feel like I've seen it all before.

Good performances and a timely story are not enough to overcome the poor writing here, and I can't really recommend Milk because of that. An interesting side note, we almost got a repeat of the Capote/Infamous showdown from a couple of years back. Bryan Singer was planning to have his next film be about Harvey Milk as well, but felt that it was futile since he was beaten to the punch. That's a shame, as I feel like there's so much more that could have been explored about this story. A film about the relationship between Milk and White could have made for a far more unique take on this story.

A Look Back at 2007: The Breakout Stars

I wanted to give out an award for the actor who had the best year in 2007, but in trying to narrow it down to one I realized it was nigh impossible. Too many people had too great of a year. So I decided instead to focus on the five actors who had the biggest breakout this year. These are people who were either largely unknown or generally disregarded before 2007 rolled around. Thanks to their work this year, each is now a household name, and we can certainly expect a lot from each in the coming years. In alphabetical order:

Casey Affleck

The films: Ocean's Thirteen, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Gone Baby Gone

The less famous Affleck finally became the bigger of the two in 2007. Casey has largely been on the fringes of film, most notable for his supporting role in the Ocean's trilogy. He started his year off as the best part of Ocean's Thirteen before heading into serious fare with Assassination and Gone Baby Gone. These films demonstrated that he could hold a film on his own. No longer hidden in his brother Ben's shadow, he seems to be on his way to getting an Oscar nomination this year for his portrayal of Robert Ford.

Coming Next: Not yet announced.


Josh Brolin

The films: Grindhouse, In the Valley of Elah, American Gangster, No Country for Old Men

The former Goonie has been languishing for years in middling fare like Hollow Man and Into the Blue. But somehow he completely reinvented his image in 2007 with four major films. He has excelled this year at playing the creepy guy, be it as a villain (Grindhouse, American Gangster), or as the hero (No Country for Old Men). I can see his career taking on a similar trajectory to that of another former child star, Christian Bale. Bale seemed to be gravitating to these sorts of roles a few years back before he hit it big with Batman Begins. So long as he doesn't waste all this new found attention, he could be huge.

Coming Next: Milk, the true story of the murder of San Fran politician Harvey Milk. He plays the murderer.


Michael Cera

The films: Superbad, Juno

No actor's breakout this year makes me happier than Michael Cera. To those who knew him from Arrested Development, it felt like we had this little secret we wanted to share with the world. Well now the secret is out, and Cera seems poised to be the next big comedic actor. Impressive for a 19 year old. I realized just how much of a chord he'd struck with audiences after Superbad hit when I saw the Juno trailer for the first time. When asked who fathered her child, Juno says "Paulie Bleeker" and the trailer cuts to Cera's mug. The whole audience burst into laughter. To elicit that kind of laughter in a trailer by simply being on the screen for a split second is huge, especially for someone still so new to film. If he does prove to be a bankable comedic star, perhaps they'll finally be able to convince Fox that an Arrested Development film is viable.

Coming Next: Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist

Emile Hirsch

The Films: Alpha Dog, Into the Wild

Hirsch is a guy I just never expected much from, career-wise. I figured he'd languish in teen exploitation films like The Girl Next Door or Alpha Dog before disappearing. But with Into the Wild he popped in a big way. Suddenly he is gaining respect as one of the best new actors of his generation. Oscar glory seems to be in the cards as well if all goes well next January. How did this happen? Well, Sean Penn certainly deserves some credit, as he was the one who discovered that Hirsch could do something big given the chance. The best comparison I can think of is Leonardo DiCaprio, who also didn't seem to get much respect as a young actor and had to work that much harder at gaining the respect he deserved. I honestly hope people continue to doubt Hirch in the future, because that kind of doubt will only push him to try more and more challenging work, something that has proved to elevate DiCaprio above the peers he was once seen as inferior to.

Coming Next: The ultra trippy looking Speed Racer.


Shia LaBeouf

The Films: Disturbia, Surf's Up, Transformers

Every decade seems to have one or two big stars. There was Jack Nicholson in the 70's, Harrison Ford in the 80's, Tom Cruise and Hanks in the 90's, and Johnny Depp and Will Smith now. Come next decade, we will be talking about Shia LaBeouf in that same manner - assuming he doesn't achieve that status in the next two years, which is entirely possible. Before you accuse me of being some Shia fanboy, a little history: I had almost no idea who he was before this year, and I wouldn't consider any of his movies this year to be among the year's best. But there is no denying that he has that star quality that so few seem to have. He was able to make the otherwise mediocre Disturbia fun, and his work in Transformers made me believe in giant transforming robots more than any special effects ever could. He has such charm and charisma that I get sucked into his films inspite of whatever misgivings I might otherwise have. It also helps that he has Spielberg in his corner. So long as his life doesn't fall apart like so many other former child actors' do, he's already on his way to superstardom.

Coming Next: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Seriously, do you really want to bet against this kid?