Control (2007)

Shadowplay: Sam Riley is Ian Curtis in Anton Corbijn's Control

Photographer Anton Corbijn's debut film Control manages to escape the conventions of biopics documenting the life and death of troubled rock stars. Possibly it is the fact that Corbijn is foremost not a filmmaker but a figure deeply established in the story he is narrating, having photographed Joy Division and directed one of their videos before Ian Curtis's death, that makes the film so moving and raw in its account.

Sam Riley's Curtis is persuasive and utterly heartbreaking. Troubled by emotional fragility and bouts of epilepsy, he is tortured by uncertainty, indecision, and the fact that life and its decisions are not defined by one clear right. He cannot bring himself to leave Debbie, the woman he fell in love with and married too young (Samantha Morton), nor can he resist the beautiful Belgian woman he loves yet hardly knows (Alexandra Maria Lara, Riley's real-life companion).

Aside from love tearing him apart, he is disillusioned by the pressure of the band's swelling fame. He longs for the simplicity of life before Joy Division's rise, a time when he could love without distortion - music, literature, his family.

Shot in black-and-white and with the aesthetic elegance that comes only from a photographer's eye, the film simply captures the heart and soul of Ian Curtis. It does not loiter around creating background or making clear the progression of the band's success or the events of Curtis's life. With these details disregarded, Corbijn has ample room to explore the human tragedy of the singer's life, resulting in a film heartbreaking and profound in its narrative.

The film closes at the cemetery with a lovely shot as the camera slowly pans up until it lies just above the rooftops and gazes lingeringly into a blank, grey sky. Joy Division's 'Atmosphere' continues throughout as we float above this worldly conception of death to something beyond, something as of yet undefined, and, most of all, something that holds great hope, creating a sense that the music Ian Curtis created with Joy Division transcends all the tragedy and pain, all the absurdity and gravity of mortal existence, both Curtis's and ours.

A Surrealist Fantasy about Reality

After trekking through a portal into John Malkovich’s brain, challenging the boundaries of self-reflexivity in Adaptation, and ultimately undergoing memory erasure in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, we end up in Charlie Kaufman’s latest cerebral romp, Synecdoche, New York.

Inspecting miniscule art or human existence?

Marking his directorial debut, Synecdoche offers Kaufman at his “Kaufman”-est, with no filters installed by Michel Gondry or Spike Jonze. The result is a film unrelenting in its complexity, persistently confusing, absurd, surreal, heartbreaking, and, above all, beautiful.

The film’s protagonist, playwright Caden Cotard (played brilliantly by Philip Seymour Hoffman), suffers fears regarding his mortality and the pressure of achieving something meaningful before dying. Earning a prestigious MacArthur theater grant, he finally gets his chance to create a massive play that will cement his legacy to the world.

Upon embarking on this task, however, his vision grows larger and larger until he abandons his old reality to live in the reality he created. He is living in a play about his life creating a play, and new characters are brought in to play old characters, leading to uncertainty over what is reality and what is his creation.

Rather than try to understand the physical complexities of the film, we should appreciate that Kaufman has crafted a reality that is simultaneously absurd and deeply poignant. He offers plentiful humor, usually in the form of nonchalant acceptances of painful truths many of us don’t like to acknowledge. However, even in the midst of such pessimistic realism, he presents beautifully understated moments of life’s simple grandeur.

Kaufman offers a philosophical view of reality, the world, and our human existence within both. Using his films as texts, one can delve into his view of human experience: that there simply are no solutions or explanations, no matter what we try to do to create one. Though this appears to be the track to despair or nihilism, within Kaufman’s narratives also lies an unbounded optimism in finding profundity in the everyday existence that connects us as a human race. His stories tend to end with a twist that lands the protagonists far from conventional happiness, yet manages to be oddly uplifting in its depiction of life’s many ironies – and this film is no exception.

All in a week's work.

Things I've done in the past week:
1. Interviewed Stifler.
2. Received the gospel from Charlie Kaufman.
3. Been plunged into the deepest depths of the human condition.

Austin Film Festival took place this past week, and though I was out of town for a quarter of it and busy for the rest of it, I did happen to catch a special screening and perform an interview, which amounted to a more than sufficient amount of excitement for one week.

On Monday morning, I traveled to the Four Seasons downtown for a chat with writer-director David Wain and actors Seann William Scott and Jane Lynch of the new comedy 'Role Models,' which premiered at AFF on Sunday.



I'd caught an earlier screening before the AFF premiere - I enjoyed the film, but maybe not as much as I enjoyed my specially reserved press seat next to Ain't it Cool News. All pretentiousness aside, I did like the movie - nothing too memorable, but enough healthy laughs to keep me entertained for 99 minutes.

Director David Wain

Seann William Scott, Paul Rudd, and Jane Lynch

David Wain, Seann William Scott, and Jane Lynch were endlessly gracious and hilarious. You can find our conversation here.
Only when I began transcribing the interview did I realize that more than half the conversation I had recorded would not fit in a print interview, so what you see is probably a quarter of the banter. A few highlights:

David, this film is quite different from some of the work you’re most well known for (“Wet Hot American Summer”, “Stella”). How was the experience doing this type of big-budget comedy?

DW: I had caviar. I had gold-plated cameras. I had “fluffers.”

SWS: I was one of them.

DW: It’s just different type of material, definitely a different machine behind it, but the actual process of making the movie itself was exactly the same. It’s still just figuring out the best actors, figuring out the best way to tell the story. The tools you have to tell the story no matter what the budget are the same. It was a great experience learning the other side of it.

The film had a great cast. And there were many actors that had worked with David Wain and with each other before. What was the dynamic like on set – did you all get along great?

SWS: It was funny – I hadn’t had a chance to work with any of the cast before. But it was really great for me; I’m a huge movie buff and I’d been a fan of the “alternative comedy.” “Wet Hot American Summer” is one of my favorite comedies, so it was a big opportunity to work with all the guys. But it did seem like all these people knew each other, so at times I kind of felt like the new kid at school.

DW: We beat him up sometimes.

SWS: They raped me.

DW: Then we realized that he was a lot bigger than us.

All of you have played some memorable comedic characters. How similar are you to these characters? Any disclaimers you’d like to present about roles you’ve played?

JL: I don’t think I could do something if it wasn’t in me somewhere. You know, I choose not to lead with the type of narcissism that [her “Role Models” character] Sweeney has, but it’s right under the surface.

DW: How similar are you to your character in “40 Year Old Virgin”?

JL: I don’t have any of the sexual entitlement. But I do have power issues.

DW: Do you ever just count up your IMDB number?

JL: On a daily basis.

DW: I read about myself on the Internet every day. I get Google alerts.

[Side note: It looks like we've neglected him, but Paul Rudd is in this movie. I was originally scheduled to interview him last week, but he pulled out due to a family emergency.]

Now #2 and 3 on my list of things I've done this week all pertain to the Tuesday night AFF premiere of Charlie Kaufman's directorial debut, 'Synecdoche, New York' at the Paramount. Coincidentally, Tuesday's word of the day on dictionary.com was none other than synecdoche! Fate? Yes.

I can't decide which poster I like more.

Kaufman himself was present at the screening, performing a Q&A session following the film. The prospect of having him there to sort of elucidate the film was inevitably a futile endeavor - that man is simply on another plane of thought. At times he could hardly comprehend the simple questions the audience presented, and other times he was purposefully enigmatic, believing the power of the film lies in its subjectivity and ability to transform over time. Kaufman is undoubtedly the most cerebral and intellectual screenwriter working in the industry today, and though he gave little or no answers, he was a pleasure to be in the presence of.

As for the film itself, a review is in the works, and an overall very positive one. Conflicting reviews have been surfacing, from those blindly applauding its merits to those dismissing it as pretentious dribble. Personally, I see absolutely nothing pretentious about Kaufman's films - he merely strives to portray the deepest, most basic truths about the human condition.

'Synecdoche, New York' opens today in New York and Los Angeles; 'Role Models' opens November 7

The Olympics of advertising

I'm a sucker for the Olympics, and this year's games have been far more epic than I could have imagined. Even though it's taking place in a city that arguably doesn't deserve the Olympics, the games and performances themselves have not disappointed.

There have been so many moments, ups and downs, that will live on. Phelps' record-breaking eight golds, including phenomenal individual races that just showcase his physical refusal to lose a race, even if it means a win by .01 seconds that is incomprehensible even when watched in slow motion. Lezak's remarkable turn that won U.S. the 4x100 freestyle against France. The Greek gods of swimmers we had at this year's games: Phelps, Lochte, Peirsol, etc. Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson's 1-2 win in all-around gymnastics, especially Nastia's tearful smile as she stood atop the podium - pure Olympic glory right there. Sasha Artemev's rousing pommel horse routine that ensured U.S. men's team bronze, followed by his upsetting fall in individual competition that took away a medal he had clear potential to win. Liu Xiang, a hero in China and an inspiration as first Asian to win gold in a track event, pulling out of this year's competition, in devastating pain as a hurt Achilles heel tore him away from his dream of defending his title in his home country among a packed stadium of expectant fans.

Along with the Olympics always comes a bevy of memorable ad campaigns. The winner this year is Visa's 'GO WORLD', boosted by beautiful, inspiring images of the Olympics and Morgan Freeman's God-voiced narration.

My favorite by far:




Brilliant advertising right there. Such simple, eloquent truths that remind us why we need and love the Olympics.

Visa's always been consistently impressive in their ads. One of my favorite commercials was the 'Life takes Visa' campaign that came out during the 2006 Winter Olympics. Unfortunately, I can't find it anywhere in large or embeddable form, but there is a small video available on the website portfolio of Mophonics, who composed its music.

Riding on the current love for Nastia Liukin, gymnastics all-around champion whose aesthetic grace has been unsurpassed this year, here is a lovely 'Impossible is Nothing' Adidas ad from 2004 featuring a 13-year-old Nastia and Nadia Comaneci, which has greater impact now following Nastia's gold medal win:



Another highlight from this Olympic season's batch of advertisements is Nike's 'Courage', featuring The Killers' 'All These Things I've Done.' I'm not a big fan of the band, but I am a fan of the song and it is used perfectly in this one:



This one's not Olympics related aside from coming out during the games, but United Airlines has been producing beautiful ads for their new business class that stand out due to their lovely, dreamlike aesthetic and wonderful use of Gershwin's 'Rhapsody in Blue':



GE's been doing a series of Olympics/China related commercials and this charming 'Healthcare Re-imagined' advert is currently everywhere:



The Olympics, along with its advertising, is always the highlight of the season, almost becoming a drug as its conclusion always results in a sense of great loss, for nothing ever seems worth watching without the inspiring unity of the Olympic games. Together we witness the creation of sublime moments that will last a lifetime, see lives defined in an instant, whether it is experiencing the elation of years of hard work paying off and ambitions being fulfilled or feeling the painful defeat of dreams shattered in a split second. The entire spectrum of the human experience is displayed magnificently in the Olympics, and for those two weeks, all the world is united in common admiration for the pure achievement of humanity.

This year's withdrawal will definitely be a difficult one.

Radiohead

Here is my obligatory post on seeing Radiohead live. Twice, in fact. I realize this is coming more than a week after the fact, which is ridiculous considering my ridiculous love for Radiohead. Anyway, I went to the Houston show on May 17th and then the Dallas show the following day, which sounds a bit crazy, but was entirely worth it! Here are some photos:

These are from the Houston show:

radiohead heads


a hardcore fan


noel fielding, is that you?!

RADIOHEAD


jonny on 'pyramid song'




thom and jonny on 'faust arp'


videotape




'there there', ridiculously amazing live




the following four pictures are 'planet telex', amazing lights








thom's eye during 'you and whose army?' just hilarious


this is idioteque




still idioteque...




take a bow, dear lovable genius mr. thom yorke



Wow. Definitely the most perfect band I will ever see live. As you can see from the photos, the show was visually stunning. In a respectable effort to reduce carbon emissions on their tour, Radiohead created an energy-saving, LED-lit stage, which provided for one hell of a visual experience. The lights and visual elements gave greater life to the music and elevated the whole concert experience, making this tour possibly their best series of shows ever. Leave it to Radiohead to create a groundbreaking concert that's both the most environmentally innovative and overall brilliant show I've ever been to.

Between the two setlists, I had a near perfect Radiohead experience. I was pleasantly surprised with how much they changed it up within just two nights. Houston saw some untraditional choices from albums like OK Computer ('Lucky' and 'Climbing Up The Walls'), but they were fantastic to see and hear live. 'Planet Telex' was an absolute thrill; the lights were most incredible on this track, the energy was enlivening. Played toward the end of the concert when I had given up hope of hearing anything from The Bends, this live performance truly gave new life to the song and to the show.

Dallas saw more classics as well as a few personal favorites not played in Houston, which were amazing to see in concert. Notable were 'Bangers & Mash', on which Thom played drums, and 'A Wolf at the Door', on which I nearly exploded. They opened their first encore with 'Fake Plastic Trees', the most beautiful concert experience I've ever had. The entire audience was alit in a sea of lighters, everyone peacefully united in love of the music. With 'Exit Music' and 'The Bends' finishing off the 1st encore, it was almost overwhelming. Their closer, 'Paranoid Android', fulfilled everything and sent me home in a state of euphoria.

There were great songs played both nights as well. Much of In Rainbows (all of it was played in Dallas). 'There There' - probably one of the greatest songs to see live, with Ed and Jonny both taking up drums. 'Idioteque' (Thom dancing), 'The National Anthem', 'Pyramid Song' (Jonny playing his guitar with a bow), 'You and Whose Army?' (hilarious comic relief as the camera zoomed in on Thom's eyes + great great song).

Aside from how amazing this tour is, I really feel lucky to have been able to see them at this point of their career. Through their setlist, spanning all their albums with the expected exception of Pablo Honey, you can really witness the fluid evolution of their music throughout the years and marvel at the consistent brilliance of it despite its intensely varied nature. You also get to see the band revisit all these creative moments in their past, with the same passion and emotional intensity, from their present state, one that seems much more at peace with themselves, freed from the tensions that plagued previous parts of their career and genuinely enjoying themselves. It's a beautiful thing to see.

And with that I've fulfilled one of my life goals: to see Radiohead at least once in my life. It has also given rise to another life goal: to see Radiohead as many times as possible within my lifetime. I can't wait till the next show.

Grand Finale

As the academic year's ending, I'm constantly trying to find a satisfying conclusion, some sense of resolution or at least acknowledgment that it's the end. It hasn't come for the most part. Everyone's always so eagerly looking forward to new beginnings instead of realizing that something quite significant, no matter good or bad, is always coming to an end right before us.

And when I was least expecting it, Professor Jensen (Critical Issues in Journalism) hit me with the conclusion I'd been looking for. He himself was seeking a way to close his course for the year, bringing up the question of what it means to be a human in terms of the world in which we live today and which we humans created. He concluded in a beautifully understated anticlimax, resigned to the fact that there is no great finale, only infinite questions. And it seems that there is never a great finale in life, only ends that lead to new beginnings and new ideas and new questions. After all, when it comes to the end, what will your life have amounted to? Yet another question. And maybe it is the constant birth of new questions that is the driving force and goal of life.