Yes, No, Maybe So: 127 Hours & Fair Game

It's a true story double feature for this installment of Yes, No, Maybe So, in which we break down personal reaction to movie trailers.

We'll start with Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire follow up -- and boy does this trailer not let you forget that this is the follow up -- which is called 127 Hours. In the movie, James Franco plays Aron Ralston who gets pinned under a rock and the rest is, well, his arm is history.



Yes James Franco is on the rise and this could be the movie where he finally proves the extent of his talents. He does have to hold the screen for virtually the full running time. If I've understood the prerelease mumblings correctly, what we're seeing in the trailer is only clips from the first half hour ish of the movie. I'd actually love to have that be the rule for Hollywood. You may not use anything past the 30 minute mark in your trailers. Begone Spoilers! (Not that people don't know what happened in this particular story since it's so easy to sum up and everyone has already been summing online for months.)

Also Moab, Utah is ridiculously beautiful even when shot by cinematographers far less gifted than Oscar winner Anthony Dod Mantle or Enrique Chediak. I know because I once lived in Utah and every photographer, good or un, has a million photographs capturing the rocky beauty of southern half of the state.

No For lost in the desert existential survivalist drama, I'll take something more contemplative like Gus Van Sant's Gerry. Will this be too tricked up to combat those nerves filmmakers so often have about how long they can hold the audiences attention? (Hence the current ridiculous average shot length being under 2 seconds problem.)

Maybe So Even though I wasn't crazy about Slumdog Millionaire -- it's actually my least favorite of his filmography (that I've seen) -- I do think Boyle is an energetic and often interesting filmmaker. My Boyle heirarchy would break down like so.

1. Trainspotting ...choose life
   
2. 28 Days Later ...choose the future
   
3. Shallow Grave ...choose a starter home
   
4. Sunshine ...choose a fucking big television
   
5. The Beach ...choose a family
   
6. Slumdog Millionaire ...but why would i want to do a thing like that?
   

Love the top three and admire the fourth quite a lot. Slumdog and The Beach are like weird twins of the B-/C+ overrated & underrated fraternal variety. So I'm curious about this movie. Where will it fit in?

Verdict: I'm a yes all told. I'll see it opening weekend in early November if I somehow miss the critic's screenings.

*
In Fair Game, Naomi Watts plays CIA Operative Valerie Plame and Sean Penn her husband the journalist in this true story that's already been covered at the cinema in a movie with Kate Beckinsale and Vera Farmiga that nobody went to see called Nothing But the Truth. (It's on that annually expanding list of December Glut Plague victims)



Yes We need to be reminded of stories like this. Particularly since the sins of the past administration are still haunting us. It's definitely a compelling and resonant story about a nation that chucks their integrity and bedrock values for political point scoring (sound familiar? see also: current events).

No On the other hand, do we need to be reminded of it again this quickly? And doesn't the casting of Sean Penn in a liberal political type movie feel a bit too preaching to the choir, a bit too on the nose?

Maybe So I'm intrigued that they choose to end the trailer with Naomi Watt's defiant line reading...

They push you until they find the point at which you break. You can't break me. I don't have a breaking point.

(even though the underscore is laughably OTT) because I feel the exact opposite about her as an actress. She often seems so broken before a movie even begins. I think she's Oscar worthy in Mulholland Dr and nomination worthy in The Painted Veil (easily her two best performances) but my principal problem with her intensely pitched work is that she always seems ahead of the character arc, rather than developing it organically towards narrative peaks. I'm hoping she's calm and nuanced her at least before they threaten to break her.

Verdict: I'm a no in terms of desire, but I try to see everything if Oscar buzz becomes involved. So if awards seasons starts calling on Naomi, I'll definitely catch it.

How do these trailers breakdown for you in the yes no maybe so sense? Have at it in the comments. Whether you're pinned under a rock or your dangerous secret has just been outed, nothing is more urgent than blog commenting!
*

Madonna & Sean

The definitive couple of the 80s?


It was 25 years ago today that Madonna and Sean Penn were married in Malibu. It was Madonna's birthday (she was turning 27). Sean's birthday was the following day (he was turning 25). She was the new queen of pop ("Dress You Up", the final hit single from Like a Virgin was hitting the charts) and he was the critics darling of young actors, consistently winning praise for both his comedy work (Fast Times at Ridgemont High) and drama (The Falcon and the Snowman)... Oscar voters, often slow on the draw, waited another 10 years to nominate him.

Paparazzi helicopters descending on their wedding like an invading army. The following year their movie collaboration Shanghai Surprise was released. Critics swarmed like an angry hive. Whenever paparazzi bugged Madonna, Sean raged like a...

Well you get the point. What a ruckus they always caused.

Their marriage didn't last but their solo fame sure did. Sean Penn won his second Oscar just 18 months ago and Madonna is, well, Madonna. They'll still be talking about her in the 2085. She's currently in London filming W.E. (see previous post).

Madonna arrives at her 52nd birthday party a couple of days ago

Each decade gets a few defining celebrity pairs, don't you think? Who would you say the definitive couples are now? Obviously Brad & Angie, but who else. Which celebrity couple takes up too much of your mental real estate?
*

Great Hope Springs Tailspin

Wasn't it just yesterday in a comment thread when someone mentioned Meryl Streep & Jeff Bridges not having worked together. To which I was all "hey, they're the same age but they never let actresses play romantically opposite actors the same age!" Funny how these things pop up in the internet ether and the next thing you know, we all seem like prophets.

The Bridges & The Gummers
Jeff & Meryl know a little something about longterm coupling

But I'm burying the lead... or at least muddying it. Okay. As you may have heard Streep & Bridges are close to signing for a marital drama called Great Hope Springs about a couple who've been together for decades having an intense weekend therapy session that will decide the fate of their marriage.

I always argue with myself about movies in development. To wit:

Meryl Streep and Jeff Bridges working together = Probably gah!some and reason enough to be very excited.

But...

Another marital drama for Jeff with a blonde lovely (see also: The Door in the Floor) and it's not Michelle Pfeiffer again??? Only La Pfeiffer would make me sad about a Streep/Bridges pairing. I just don't get what the problem is with getting The Fabulous Baker Boys onscreen together again?

<-- Jeff @ Michelle's star ceremony in 2007

From all reports ever shared orally, written on paper, or otherwise recorded in the history of the existence of the world and its movies, Jeff and 'chelle are as super fond of each other offscreen as they are amazing together onscreen, which is to say: very very very fond of each other. How did Pfeiffer tagging along on his Oscar campaign (It wasn't just Oscar night. There was also Palm Springs) go unnoticed by everyone in world who might be involved in movie industry dealings that might lead to them reuniting, fictionally speaking.

But, okay. What's that?

Oh yes, the Great Hope Springs director is Jessie Nelson, the woman who made I Am Sam, and we don't care for that movie so much.We thank it for bringing us wee Dakota Fanning (nice to meet'cha!) but otherwise we have very little time for it even though we thought Pfeiffer was sort of quite good in a weird/thankless/unlikeable way. So maybe it's best that she not repeat that situation.


If that movie is indication, which it might not be since it was a first film, Great Hope won't be subtle and that might be bad for the material since marital dramas that are too histrionic are really hard to sit through and often titled We Don't Live Here Anymore or Revolutionary Road.

Plus, if we're being honest we all know that Streep is a big ham -- a big ham we love, don't forget. (More soon on the Streep series. I'm just a few days behind.) So if a director WANTS big attention grabbing acting and doesn't want her to save some for the next movie, you'll get it all. But therein lies the rub. You can't say that you weren't getting it all with Sean Penn in I Am Sam even as you wanted to give at least half of it back.

[UPDATE: It might be Mike Nichols instead of Nelson in the director's chair, instead.]

Finally, if Streep is doing a marital drama, the movie has a big old cloud hanging over its head and that cloud's last name is Kramer. As in Kramer Vs. Kramer. Because, how you gonna measure up Great Hope Springs? Tread carefully.

The third crucial role of the psychiatrist is not yet cast. Philip Seymour Hoffman had to pull out of the project to ruin P.T. Anderson's next masterpiece (argh and also: calm down if that sentence made you angry) so maybe somebody less ubiquitous but able to keep up with Jeff & Meryl is in order. Might I suggest David Strathairn? Doesn't he deserve better after Good Night, and Good Luck.? Couldn't he have a go?

I'm trying to stop jabbering away.

I'm in a tailspin... HELP. Talk to me.
*

Viggo, Posterized

With the Cormac McCarthy adaptation The Road coming out on DVD on Tuesday (I'm eager to give it another look) I thought we should focus on one of the best actors working: Viggo Mortensen also known as "Aragorn"

<--- Viggo at twenty-two

Aragon's filmography is super odd. Or maybe not. In many professions if you do good work, your career very gradually swells but there's plenty of detours and error along the way as you feel your way up the ladder. I guess it just feels odd in the context of the movies. When we think of leading players in Hollywood don't we tend to think of them in terms of overnight sensations, has beens, or stars that have always been and will always be with us and seem to have arrived fully formed (Streep, Pacino. That type)?

Viggo fits none of those categories but he's very much a leading actor. I remember reading a magazine article about him around 1998 or so -- I think it was in conjunction with the release of A Perfect Murder -- calling him "the hot new 39 year old" as if he were a) new and b) way too old to find stardom. As it turned out he wasn't. He was too young.

Here's the posters... albeit missing a few.
Scroll carefully as there's an intermission this time!

Witness (85) -debut | Prison (88) 1st leading role | Fresh Horses (88)

Leatherface TCM III (90) Young Guns 2 (90) The Indian Runner (91)
Viggo's first solo poster! (Thanks, Sean Penn)

Boiling Point (93) | Deception (93) | Young Americans (93)

Carlito's Way (93) | The Prophecy (95) | Crimson Tide (95)

Portrait of a Lady (96) Albino Alligator (96) Daylight (96)

INTERMISSION: At a casual glance it seems like his career is just one solid upward slope of increasingly large parts in fairly successful films (he's third billed in the Sylvester Stallone action flick) but it's actually messier than that. In the mid 90s he's also doing straight to DVD movies plus he's dipping his toe into Spanish cinema - he speaks fluently - and even taking roles where he plays characters like "homeless guy" despite already having Hollywood's attention to some degree. Did he ever say no? Perhaps he slept just 3 hours a night the whole decade.

At any rate the career heated up once Demi Moore demanded he suck her dick. This unusual career move also worked wonders for Ashton Kutcher. (I kid. I kid. I couldn't resist)

GI Jane (97) | A Perfect Murder (98) | Psycho (98)

A Walk on the Moon (99) | 28 Days (00) | The Fellowship of the Ring (01)

The Two Towers (02) | The Return of the King (03) | Hidalgo (04)

A History of Violence (05) | Alatriste (06) | Eastern Promises (07)
we never got Alatriste in the US. (sigh)

Appaloosa (09) | Good (09) | The Road (09)

Viggo Mortensen quite obviously improves with age. One could say he's like a fine wine but he's more of a whiskey, don't you think? I do worry about all three of his 2009 efforts flopping. Will the lead roles keep on coming? Next up is his third go at being David Cronenberg's muse. Actors are always better off once an auteur suddenly can't live without them.

How many of these 27 movies have you seen? I've only seen half of them. Oops.
What do you first think of when you hear the name Viggo? Tell all in the comments.
*