On DVD: Shinjuku Incident

Shinjuku Incident is a surprising find: a solid, gritty crime thriller from Hong Kong starring Jackie Chan. Eschewing his cuddlier American image, Chan plays a quiet, single-minded Chinese immigrant who comes to Japan in search of a woman and instead finds power and influence. The film is both old fashioned and refreshing, skillfully directed by Tung-Shing "Derek" Yee, and consistently engrossing.

Among a boatload of raggedy, poor Chinese refugees, "Nick" (Jackie Chan) comes ashore at a Japanese beach and finds his way into Tokyo's Shinjuku district, one of the city's busiest business centers. After joining with his brother "Joe" (Daniel Wu) and a larger group of illegal Chinese immigrants, Nick sets out to fulfill the reason he left China: to find his long lost fiancée Xiu Xiu (Xu Jinglei). It doesn't take long for him to discover that she has since married a local crime lord, Eguchi (Masaya Kato). Eguchi leads one of several Yakuza gangs that have joined to form a larger syndicate; however, internal strife continues to pit the gangs against each other. When Nick tracks down a rival gang leader who has wounded Joe, he winds up saving Eguchi's life in the process. Eguchi allots Nick significant power and control over criminal enterprise in a Shinjuku neighborhood. Thus begins Nick's rise to power.

Shinjuku Incident weaves several other plot threads into what is ultimately a convincing character study and gripping thriller. Chan's performance as "Nick" (his character is called "Steelhead" in Chinese, and was inexplicably changed in the subtitles) is marked by a quiet, controlled sense of purpose. Nick only wants legal status and something resembling a regular life; it is only when circumstances call for it that he turns to crime in his search for peace and stability. After losing his fiancée, Nick's vision of the future is drastically altered, and all bets are off.

The script guides us through Nick's story while maintaining a potent, challenging contemporary perspective. The plight of Chinese immigrants and the state of Japan's criminal gangs are approached with a forthright confidence that suggests a real engagement with these issues on the part of the filmmakers. The brutal violence in the film seems a lot more like an outgrowth of a commitment to realism than a sensationalistic attempt to court controversy. (Shinjuku Incident was banned in mainland China for this reason.)

Swift direction from Derek Yee keeps things moving very quickly, with character moments interspersed with bursts of action. The widescreen photography by Nobuyasu Kita is particularly noteworthy; it utilizes creative lighting effects and is stylishly economical. There's nary an instance of visual overkill; the crew keeps the film at ground level. Even the blood that is spilled, copious though it is, doesn't spray in the firehose arcs used by other filmmakers working in similar modes. Shinjuku Incident is an accomplished film that reflects a highly-engaged production grappling with issues both personal and political in a seamless, confident manner. 

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On DVD: Green Zone

Director Paul Greengrass applies his consummate technical skill and capacity to crank tension to untold levels to a new story about the Iraq War in Green Zone. A competent thriller, the film moves quickly, never pausing for breath, but in the process it does some odd things with the film's nonfiction source material. "Inspired by" the book Imperial Life in the Emerald City by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Green Zone jettisons the book's impressive research and engagingly sardonic tone, and adopts the narrative trappings of the three Bourne films. Indeed, the source material may as well have not even been mentioned - this is, through and through, a fictional story without any basis in real incidents whatsoever, and its supposed connection to a nonfiction book is just a sleazy misdirect that artificially inflates the film's relevance. In a way, this attempt to "legitimize" the film by tying it to the work of a reporter eerily echoes the prewar justification for the war itself.

This issue is obviously irritating to me, but when I set it aside, Green Zone is a competently-made thriller that is consistently entertaining and well-acted by a diverse and talented cast.

Matt Damon plays CWO Miller, the leader of a squad assigned to locate hidden caches of WMDs in post-invasion Baghdad. Stymied repeatedly by bad intelligence, Miller begins to question the military's source, a highly-placed Iraqi code-named Magellan. A CIA operative working in Baghdad (Brendan Gleeson) perks up at Miller's questions and begins working with him to covertly identify Magellan and, perhaps, learn the truth about whether or not WMDs exist in Iraq. Along the way, Miller runs up against an inquisitive reporter (Amy Ryan) who was the first to legitimize Magellan by printing his assertions in a major US paper - thereby giving credibility to the government's case for war. Meanwhile, Pentagon representative Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear) is working furiously to locate Magellan for other, more sinister reasons.

Damon is earnest, direct, and serious as Miller; he lends real weight to the role. Miller came to Iraq with a straightforward mission: to locate WMDs. Unable to find them using the military's intel, he wants to know where they are and what the flaws are in the intel. So he sets out in an equally straightforward manner to find out.

The supporting cast is excellent. Although their roles are a bit under-written, Gleeson and Ryan are, as always, a lot of fun to watch, as is Kinnear. Jason Isaacs appears, briefly and effectively, as a thuggish Special Forces operative.

Greengrass channels his considerable skills and turns a solid procedural script by Brian Helgeland into a propulsive thriller. And yet Greengrass can't completely solve the major gaping story issue, which is the conspiratorial nature of the "secret" of the WMDs. As we all know, there were no WMDs. The lies that were told about them were always plain and obvious. Therefore, it seems strange that a film would opt to create a shadowy conspiracy story to explain something that was always right out in the open, in the light of day. There's a disconnect here between what we all know actually happened and the way the movie chooses to portray it. Why create a fictional explanation for something that has been so well documented?

To the credit of the filmmakers, this question was not obvious until after the film ended. It moves so quickly and is so effective in generating suspense that there was hardly time to register confusion or criticism. 

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Essay: Eastwood, California

This weekend I spent a night in Carmel.  It was my fourth or fifth visit in three years - this time, the occasion was my third wedding anniversary.

Carmel is two things: 1) a cozy, pre-Kinkade seaside village that is infused with an odd but authentic charm, and 2) an embodiment of insistent delusion.  It has much in common with Disneyland, except that Walt Disney's concept involved paying a fee to experience a specifically-constructed mythworld.  Carmel, on the other hand, is a real town, where human beings live and play.  Like a lot of places in California, Carmel was designed to resemble something it is not - in this case, an English village, complete with stone cottages, sweet shops, and a population that tends toward the spirited elderly (Clint Eastwood and Joan Fontaine, to name two).  But unlike most other places in California, Carmel actually feels like the thing it wants to evoke - it is cozy; the buildings are charming; the local businesses are well-run; and the whole place has a certain unique character, despite its derivative origins.  Is this simply time at work, adding natural wear and tear ("personality") to the mock-everything buildings?  Or is it the diligent product of necessity, i.e., Carmel's dependence on tourism?

It really doesn't matter, although it's an interesting question for those who, like me, tend to be preoccupied with California's inability to generate, absorb, and process authenticity.  Because there's something simultaneously phony and genuine going on there, whatever it is.

We walked down Ocean Avenue toward the beach, and down the dunes and across the sand, remarking on the unusually large breakers.  Nobody surfs in Carmel, but it was ideal day for beginners.  We walked south, toward the Pebble Beach golf course, both of us in a pleasant haze over the good weather, the foreign tourists (many of them hilarious), the cute shops, and the amusing dogs playing on the beach.  Close to Pebble Beach, we spied groups of asinine golfers moving across the fairways, throwing away hundreds of dollars just to be a tool in a little cart for an afternoon.  

As we turned to backtrack to the hotel, I noticed that a blonde lump I'd mistaken for a boulder was actually a sea lion.  It was conspicuously alone, and I immediately assumed it was the latest victim of the unusually large die-off that continues to plague central coast beaches.  I phoned 311, but Monterey County has no such service.  Trudging back up the beach, we scanned for anything like a lifeguard or ranger station, but there were none.  Then it hit me: Carmel could not possibly accommodate any symbol of life's inherent danger.  I don't ever remember seeing a police car in town, or a meter maid, or an ambulance.  Who knows how long the sea lion had been lying there; when we left it, it was still heaving occasional breaths and struggling to move.  It felt impossible that, of the hundreds who had surely passed it by before us, no one had alerted the authorities.  

Only in Carmel, a seaside town nestled in a pine forest, could this stricken ambassador from the natural world appear so alien and alarming.

On DVD: The Official Inaugural Celebration

A year and a half into the Obama presidency, watching this two-disc set of inauguration day celebrations feels odd, distant, and inappropriate. Of course, these events originally took place at an appointed time and place for the express purpose of marking an historic moment of great significance. At the time, it seemed to some that no ceremony could be too large to recognize the passage of the Bush era and the beginning of a new and potentially radical one. It now seems as though the anticipation outpaced the reality. Viewed in retrospect, the inaugural celebrations seem far more dated than they should - a record of something that we now take for granted. The Obama presidency has not met with anyone's expectations - his most fervent supporters have been alternately cheered and stymied by his mixture of calculated risk-taking, legislative shyness, and centrist populism; his most venomous opponents have made fools of themselves painting him as a messianic radical, while traditional conservatives have found grist for their punditry in Obama's liberal spending policies.

Whatever one's views, the inaugural ceremony and concerts seem like weird relics from a time long past - much longer than the seventeen months since that January day. This two-disc set from HBO compiles the major events broadcast that day, although they are arranged oddly.

The first disc begins with an Invocation by Reverend V. Gene Robinson, a prayer for good things to come, which leads into We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration. This concert combines speechifying and musical performances, all carried out quite tastefully on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in front of the new First Family and an enormous crowd of thousands. The two-hour concert includes musical performances by Bruce Springsteen, U2, Mary J. Blige (looking downright awesome in all cream, plus snakeskin boots), Stevie Wonder, James Taylor, John Mellencamp, Bettye LaVette and Jon Bon Jovi, and Pete Seeger. There are also special presentations by everyone from Denzel Washington and Martin Luther King III, to Marisa Tomei and Jack Black. It's a stately, dignified show. The musical performances are all rather strong. The emotional highlight comes near the end, when 90-year-old Pete Seeger takes the stage to lead the company and the audience in a rendition of "This Land is Your Land."

The second disc begins with President Obama's Inaugural Address - which surprised me at the time by not being his finest piece of work, paling beside a number of his other, much more inspired orations. The other program on the second disc is The Neighborhood Ball, the evening concert that was more of a party than We Are One. The Neighborhood Ball features performances by Mariah Carey, Beyonce, Mary J. Blige, Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, and an alarmingly bearded Sting. It's mostly good stuff, but not as consistent as We Are One. The atmosphere is loose and club-like, which make Vice President Biden's appearance unintentionally hilarious (although that might just be me).

Since the value of this two-disc set mainly lies in its' role as an historical document, I wish HBO had gone all the way. Had they included the entire inaugural ceremony (dull as that may have been) and arranged the content in chronological order, those most likely to purchase this set would have had a record of the whole day, rather than these disordered bits and pieces. Still, We Are One features a number of memorable performances, and the set as a whole will appeal to those who want to remember this historic occasion in years to come. 

Read the full review here 

On DVD: Not the Messiah

There's growing old with grace and dignity, and then there's Not the Messiah. Whereas four of the five surviving Pythons have found second careers separate from their membership in one of the most influential comedy troupes of all time, Eric Idle has persistently, and independently, recycled the group's old material into new and less-engaging forms. Some of Idle's ventures, such as the musical Spamalot, have been hugely successful. Others, such as his exploitative concert tours, in which he performs Python material solo, have been purely indulgent. Not the Messiah, an oratorio based on Monty Python's Life of Brian, arrives on the lower end of this spectrum, smelling as it does like a warmed-over slab of opportunism (in this case, Python's fortieth anniversary), even while it bears at least salutary traces of invention.

There are times when it is wise to rest on one's laurels. Since 1983, the Pythons have done so in a generally elegant way, briefly revisiting their glory days when anniversaries and such roll around. The tributes and special events are mostly modest, however, and limited in scope. I don't believe there have been any official Python performances, per se, since Monty Python's The Meaning of Life was released. The book The Pythons, a group autobiography published in 2004, may have been the only official troupe "product" since that feature. (Aficionados more thorough than I should feel free to correct me on this point.)

That hasn't stopped the flow of feature films and Flying Circus on DVD, reissues of the Python record catalog on CD, and other ancillary products such as Idle's cannibalized projects. Not the Messiah is the latest of all of these, and it's not the worst. Still, it's far from the best. What keeps Not the Messiah from being a noteworthy entry in the quasi-Python canon is its unavoidable staleness; its chief effect will be to drive its viewers to watch Life of Brian again - a veritable work of genius beside which this derivative "oratorio" pales.

Co-composed with frequent Python collaborator John Du Prez, Not the Messiah is staged with a full orchestra and chorus, and fronted by four soloists. Songs range from those based directly on material in Life of Brian (such as "Mandy's Song" and "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life"), as well as others like "O God You Are So Big," which comes from a scene in The Meaning of Life, and the bizarre one-off "Individuals," in which Idle, performing solo, does a decent if perplexing Bob Dylan impersonation. The feel of the oratorio therefore feels ad hoc - a big jumble of jokes that Idle has compiled more out of his own need to rehash, than out of any sense of artistic or comedic integrity. (It's worth pointing out that Spamalot, despite its success, relies on the same rather thoughtless approach. It includes material from Flying Circus, plus its own version of "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life.")

Musically, the oratorio is a moderate success. Du Prez' orchestral arrangements are appropriately bombastic and occasionally inspired. However, this is overshadowed by the silly one-note joke of the libretto, which is based on the assumption that it's hilarious to have classically-trained singers perform frivolous, comic, and off-color material. In fact, Not the Messiah almost uniformly fails to evoke laughter, with perhaps the solitary exception of a very brief, well-timed appearance by Terry Gilliam. The closing crowd-pleaser is a jaw-dropping non sequitur, with Michael Palin appearing with a chorus of Mounties for a performance of "The Lumberjack Song." Never has great comedy ever appeared so pathetic; Palin's more recent career as a wonderful travel writer and documentary presenter has been unwisely jettisoned for this stunningly inappropriate insertion of a greatest hit. It's as if Bruce Springsteen wrote a longform instrumental work and then ran out onstage to sing "Born in the U.S.A." 

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