JOKER: TIFF 2019 HIGHLIGHT #4

What I’m about to say applies to damn-near any movie but in the specific case of Joker, this is the kind of thing that’ll be whatever you want it be. If you want it to be a simple & entertaining comic book villain origin story with the slight residue of Christopher Nolan’s super-serious & dark DC universe - then that’s what it’ll be. If you paint this movie out as the poster child for toxic, sad, lonely, incel virgins in a time when everything is weirdly & personally politicized, then it’ll be that. There's a case for both...

Bottom line - this is a movie most folks won’t miss outside of a few people who have understandable comic book movie fatigue or are just genuinely not interested (believe it or not they do exist). So my opinion on it almost doesn’t matter. But if you’d like to know, I did enjoy Joker for the most part (there’s some editing & plot choices that I thought were strange) but it’s hardly a masterpiece or anything groundbreaking. Everyone needs to relax with those labels when it comes to this. Joaquin Phoenix’s performance is certainly solid but the movie is just fine.

Todd Phillips’ Joker origin story isn’t that much different from something like Unbreakable as far as I’m concerned. It just has a little more violence and “edginess” to it. While the present-day character we know is an evil mastermind who really shouldn’t be rooted for or cheered on, we still get some sympathetic insight in to why/how they became who they are. But we really have to disassociate & separate the past from the present when it comes to Todd Phillips’ iteration of the Joker (inspired by The Killing Joke graphic novel). Sure life shat all over pre-Joker Arthur Fleck (it truly did) and he is suffering from mental illness, but he’s also fully aware, in control & conscious of all the terrible things he eventually does towards the end of the movie. It could be argued that the tone of the movie is asking for us to quietly cheer for Joker but how is that any different than Stanley Kubrick with Alexander Delarge (A Clockwork Orange) or Martin Scorsese & Travis Bickle (Taxi Driver)? Filmmakers have been getting us to root for terrible people since the beginning of cinema and getting away with it by calling them “anti-heroes” when they’re really just bad people. Joker is no different. I’m not going to get all bent out of shape about the potential toxicity of this movie but at the same time, anyone who claims to relate to this particular Joker or has sympathy for him might want to look in to who they are as a person and maybe get a little help. For folks on the other side of the spectrum worried about the potential harmfulness of Joker - it's perfectly ok for "the bad guy" to be the main character in a movie.

And speaking of Travis Bickle - I can now absolutely confirm that Scorsese (specifically Taxi Driver & King Of Comedy) are single-handedly responsible for the tone of this movie. Influence is an understatement. Most of you reading this probably already know this without having seen the movie but there are actually people out there who question the influence. Now that I’ve seen Joker I can safely say that anyone who debates or questions the Scorsese influence is a fucking idiot or just likes to disagree for the sake of disagreeing because their lives are empty and pointless and they need something to do.

Not only is part of the basic premise of Joker right out of the book of King Of Comedy (an obsessed/dangerous person with dreams of being a famous stand-up comedian goes too far in their quest for fame & notoriety), there are some similar shots...

The King Of Comedy / Joker

As for Taxi Driver, Joker literally has scenes of Joaquin Phoenix pointing finger guns at his head in a pivotal scene...

Taxi Driver

Pointing a gun at his television in his lonely apartment...

Taxi Driver 

Keeping a journal of scary thoughts...

Taxi Driver

any of this sound familiar?

There are also just various random similar shots & scenes between both films...

Taxi Driver / Joker

Lets also not forget both director Todd Phillips and Joker co-star/Scorsese-regular Robert Deniro have flat out fucking said Taxi Driver & King Of Comedy outright influenced the new joker movie (unfortunately even those facts aren’t enough to convince some people).
I find it strange when movies that are considered highly influential by everyone actually show their influence on new movies and then suddenly those same people are like: “WAIT, WHAT??!”


Certain moments where we see Joaquin Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck slowly transform in to the Joker also reminded me of Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now...

Apocalypse Now / Joker

Bottom line, this is probably the most hyped movie of 2019 so I don’t think any review is going to sway folks from seeing this weather they’re happily excited for it or have already judged it and convinced themselves to not like it ahead of time. At the end of the day I thought it was just fine.

WRONG REEL EPISODE 379: LYNNE RAMSAY

I'm back on wrong reel discussing the cinema of Lynne Ramsay on the heels of her latest release; You Were Never Really Here.

Click the image above to go to the episode. Enjoy...

A FEW WORDS ON YOU WERE NEVER REALLY HERE

It’s easy to compare You Were Never Really Here to Taxi Driver. It does make sense. Besides the fact that both films deal with characters saving young girls from prostitution/sex-trafficking, there are some strong visual similarities between the two films...

Taxi Driver / You Were Never Really Here

My good friend/podcast partner Scott Thorough put it perfectly in a recent tweet... 

Lynne Ramsay's latest also shares some of the same DNA as Drive which also comes from the school of Scorsese (the plots to Drive & You Were Never Really Here are similar in that both protagonist use hammers as weapons and they also get caught up in convoluted crimes that are way above their pay grade). 

Drive / You Were Never Really Here

The emphasis on the hammer (along with one scene in particular) also brings Oldboy & Pulp Fiction to mind...

Oldboy / You Were Never Really Here

Pulp Fiction / You Were Never Really Here

If the Taxi Driver/Drive comparison doesn’t do it for you - imagine a gritty episode of Law & Order: SVU where Elliot Stabler's PTSD takes control over him and he goes batshit crazy killing pedophiles with a hammer. 

And before some of you get bent out of shape over some of these comparison (which are valid) Lynne Ramsay’s cinematic universe is full of references that she herself has acknowledged. From using the theme from Terrence Malick’s Badlands in Ratcatcher to her recreation of “The Lovers” at the beginning of the same film - she is an influenced filmmaker (an influenced filmmaker that has a style all her own). 

"The Lovers" / Ratcatcher

A few more visual similarities between older cinema and You Were Never Really Here...

Battleship Potemkin /
You Were Never Really Here

Apocalypse Now / You Were Never Really Here

The Night Of The Hunter / You Were Never Really Here

Now...the trailer for You Were Never Really Here is a bit deceiving. It’s certainly brutal and somewhat grimey but a lot of the brutality & griminess is either implied or takes place just off camera. This is common for Lynne Ramsay. In her sophomore feature; Morvern Callar, we see the aftermath of a suicide instead of the suicide itself (we also see the dismemberment of the dead body just off camera). In Ratcatcher she shows us Ryan Quinn’s dead body right after he drowns rather than seeing the actual drowning itself. In the very beginning of You Were Never Really Here, you see Joaquin Phoenix’s “Joe” cleaning off a bloody hammer that he clearly used to kill someone minutes before. The cinema of Lynne Ramsay’s rests on the idea of hints & implications. 

You Were Never Really Here isn’t as violent as one might expect and it is, my personal opinion, that it has to do with the female direction. And that’s not a criticism. Quite the opposite. Movies with action & violence are often relegated to male directors because film directing is kind of a boys club and we all know boys love their action & violence. I don’t mean to make this about gender but I think there’s a tenderness that some male directors just don’t have. You don’t always have to be tender when directing a film but in the case of this specific film I think you do. Our main character Joe is suffering from multiple forms of PTSD. Through quick flashbacks we’re given pieces of a rather large puzzle that indicates he was raised by violent/abusive father, was traumatized from his time in the military, and was scarred from his time as an FBI agent that presumably worked in sex crimes. 

In the present day - Joe moonlights as a rescuer of young girls caught up in sex trafficking rinks. On his latest assignment, he gets in way over his head and discovers that the child he is supposed to rescue has ties to local New York City government. 

Instead of making Joe out to be this unbelievably badass tough guy (which he kind of is on some level), he’s a broken man barely holding on. This is that tenderness I was speaking of earlier. I know I’m generalizing but it is true that some men have problems showing certain emotions whereas women don’t. I think that’s why this film is a success because Ramsay adds a personal/touching layer to a film that would have been nothing more than a kickass action film in the hands of some run-of-the mill male filmmaker. That’s not to say male directors aren’t good at mixing violence & tenderness (Nicolas Winding Refn’s Pusher 2 comes to mind). But it is my personal opinion that women have a better balance/grasp on mixing the two elements (Claire Denis’ Trouble Every Day & I Can’t Sleep, Lucrecia Martel’s Zama & Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s Evolution are a few more examples of women successfully mixing beauty & violence).

Joe has a soul. Not only does his line of work have to do with saving young girls, but he also takes care of his mother and isn’t afraid to cry when it’s time to cry (it makes perfect sense as to why Phoenix won best actor for his performance at last year's Cannes film festival).

Like I said earlier - the fast-paced hammer wielding trailer might be a little deceiving to some, but if you’re interested in semi-non conventional cinema (the music is strange, the editing is jarring, a couple of hilariously random things occur, and there are long stretches of minimal dialogue) this might just be the film for you. 

It’s always a treat when Lynne Ramsay delivers (in two decades she’s only made four features). Hopefully You Were Never Really Here will be a success making Ramsay more active behind the camera in the near future.

ZEBRAS IN AMERICA EPISODE 49

We're back! This week we get in to the new Lynne Ramsay, Hard Target, hip-hop biopics and much more. 

Enjoy...

THE CINEMA OF GUS VAN SANT TOLD THROUGH IMAGES & STILLS...

Once you're directing, you're kind of in a certain mode, where you're taking whatever is on the page and forming it into the film that you think it might want to be - Gus Van Sant

Although he’s one of the least explored directors on PINNLAND EMPIRE, Gus Van Sant is still a personal favorite of mine (whats strange is that for a GvS fan I can safely say I dislike 40% of his feature filmography and I'm indifferent towards another 20%). From low budget indie maverick (Mala Noche & Drugstore Cowboy), to mainstream academy award nominated director (Good Will Hunting & Milk), to slightly experimental improvisational art-house auteur (Gerry, Elephant & Last Days), Gus Van Sant has gone through quite a few different stages in his three decades of filmmaking.

I chose to explore Van Sant because ever since Milk (sorry, but I think The Times Of Harvey Milk is a far superior film and didn’t need to be revisited or "redone") I’ve been falling more & more out of love with his movies (I thought both Restless & The Promised Land were pretty flat) and I needed to remind myself why I loved his work so much (next to Abel Ferrara & Takeshi Kitano, this is the largest body of work that we’ve looked at so far and EVERY feature film is represented).

Also make sure to read the one & only Gus Van Sant review on PINNLAND EMPIRE which holds a special place in my heart: Gerry


Enjoy…

The Open Road

When you think of the road movie genre, Gus Van Sant isn’t usually the first name that comes to mind (often times we think of folks like Jim Jarmusch & Wim Wenders). But every now & then Gus Van Sant’s cinema takes us across the American landscape (and sometimes beyond) in either a crappy car (Good Will Hunting), a second hand motorbike (My Own Private Idaho) or even on foot (Gerry & Even Cowgirls Get The Blues). At the end of Good Will Hunting, we see Matt Damon driving from Boston to Berkley to win back his lady. In My Own Private Idaho, he takes us from Portland to Italy and back. And hitchhiking is a huge part of the story in Even Cowgirls Get The Blues (the protagonist in the film lives a nomadic lifestyle)

Even Cowgirls Get The Blues

Gerry

Good Will Hunting

My Own Private Idaho

Mala Noche

Various Phases: Indie, Mainstream, Arthouse & Beyond...

Next to Richard Linklater & Steven Soderbergh, I can’t think of too many other modern American filmmakers that have gone through so many different style changes. Van Sant has the kind of filmography that makes you go “oh yeah, he did direct that, huh?” or “really, he directed that?” or “the same guy who made this made that??” As you’ll see in this write-up, GvS obviously has many common themes that run throughout all of his movies no matter how different they may be from each other, but he's proven that he can adapt to almost any style or genre.

Indie: Mala Noche / Drugstore Cowboy / My Own Private Idaho

Mainstream: Good Will Hunting / Psycho / Find Forrester

Arthouse: Gerry / Elephant / Last Days

???: Milk / Restless / The Promised Land

Recurring shots, imagery & themes...

Gerry / Last Days / My Own Private Idaho

My Own Private Idaho / Gerry / Elephant

Gerry / Elephant / Last Days

Cameos from indie & counterculture figures...

William S. Burroughs (Drugstore Cowboy)

David Cronenberg (To Die For)

Harmony Korine (Goodwill Hunting)

Harmony Korine (Last Days)

Kim Gordon (Last Days)

The (usually naked or half naked) human body...

My Own Private Idaho

Mala Noche

To Die For

Elephant

Last Days

Homosexuality in mainstream cinema

Prior to Milk (a film about a gay activist); homosexuality was never really “the issue” or main focus in GvS' films. This is pretty progressive in my opinion and it continues down the path that Rainer Werner Fassbinder kinda pioneered in the early/mid-70’s (Fassbinder was another filmmaker to have homosexuality in his work without making it the main focus or “issue”). A lot of the characters in Van Sant’s films are either openly gay (My Own Private Idaho, Mala Noche, Even Cowgirls Get The Blues, Last Days, Milk) or questioning their sexuality (Elephant, My Own Private Idaho). And what’s more important is that his work has seeped its way in to mainstream cinema (along with the likes of Todd Haynes & Lisa Cholodenko) without having to compromise anything.

Mala Noche

My Own Private Idaho

The Discipline Of D.E. (short)

Even Cowgirls Get The Blues

Milk

Surrogate families, father figures & mentors

Parents (especially fathers) of Van Sant's young characters usually aren't around (Finding Forrester, Goodwill Hunting, My Own Private Idaho, etc). And when they are, they're usually irresponsible (at the beginning of Elephant, one of the few adult characters in the film is seen driving drunk and is eventually reprimanded by his teenage son in a strange kind of role reversal) or they usually go unseen (almost all the adults in Paranoid Park are shown just off camera or out of focus in the background). Most of the his young characters are "on the outs" (Goodwill Hunting) or they live on the fringe of society (My Own Private Idaho & Drugstore Cowboy) and have to rely on each other by making a sort of surrogate family of brothers & sisters.

Goodwill Hunting

My Own Private Idaho

Drugstore Cowboy

Even Cowgirls Get The Blues

Good Will Hunting

Finding Forrester

The Sea Of Trees

The presence of young people

As corny as it sounds, young people are the backbone of GvS’ cinema. Even the films that aren’t represented with images below (Mala Noche, My Own Private Idaho, Restless, Good Will Hunting, Last Days) feature young characters trying to figure out life or are coming of age just like the characters in the films shown below. From the music & clothes to skateboarding & slang, Gus Van Sant’s fascination with children, teenagers & young people is more than evident. 

Elephant

Finding Forrester

Mansion On The Hill (Short)

Paranoid Park

To Die For

Restless

Dream zone achieved

Van Sant’s cinema sometimes features characters that are dreamers (Mala Noche & Even Cowgirls Get The Blues), deep thinkers (Finding Forrester) or are prone to zoning out or drifting off for various reasons ranging from drug use (Drugstore Cowboy) & narcolepsy (My Own Private Idaho) to dehydration from being stranded out in the desert (Gerry).

Drugstore Cowboy

Elephant

Last Days

My Own Private Idaho

Mala Noche

Loneliness, Depression & Despair

There’s an understated sorrow within half of Van Sant’s filmography. There’s usually some type of looming anxiety (Paranoid Park), major depression (Last Days), pressure (Finding Forrester) or despair (Gerry & Last Days) weighing on half of his characters. And often times these characters lose the battle (Last Days, Elephant, Gerry) or things are left ambiguous or open ended on a slightly negative tone (Paranoid Park, Mala Noche)

Elephant

Finding Forrester

Gerry

Last Days

Paranoid Park

The Sea Of Trees

Influences, True Stories, Adaptations & Remakes

Like Stanley Kubrick (GvS’ personal favorite filmmaker), almost all of Van Sant’s films are derived from pre-existing books (Even Cowgirls Get The Blues, Mala Noche, Tulsa), true stories/true events (Milk, To Die For, Last Days, Elephant & Drugstore Cowboy) or older films (Psycho). But no matter what, he puts his own unique stamp on everything he does…

Drugstore Cowboy (some of the events in Drugstore Cowboy were loosely based on Larry Clarke's photography book Tulsa)

The Wizard Of Oz/Drugstore Cowboy/My Own Private Idaho

Even Cowgirls Get The Blues

Columbine (Elephant)

Kurt Cobain (Last Days)

Pamela Smart (To Die For)

Mala Noche

Harvey Milk (Milk)

Psycho

Portland

Like Todd Solondz (New Jersey), Abel Ferrara ( New York City), vintage Michael Mann (Chicago), Terrence Malick (Texas/Oklahoma) and a handful of other modern filmmakers, Van Sant always makes it a point to rep his hometown (8 of his 15 films take place in Portland). From His very first feature (Mala Noche) to his more recent work (Restless), Portland has always remained a consistent backdrop.

Drugstore Cowboy

My Own Private Idaho

My Own Private Idaho

Mala Noche

Paranoid Park