Anvil! The Story of Anvil (2008, USA)

Perhaps the best description I can think of for Anvil! is that it’s a cross between This is Spinal Tap and American Movie. But while there are plenty of laughs in Anvil! - some of which the subjects are probably unaware of – the movie is more about struggle and dedication, and less about laughing at talentless, self-deluded hacks. Steve “Lips” Kudlow and Robb Reiner, the heart and soul of the metal band Anvil, have been at it for 30 years, with one big flashpoint in the early 80’s and a lot of playing at sports bars and in European dungeons for ten or twelve people a show. Though they occasionally show signs of giving up the rock n’ roll dream, they remain committed to staying together, making music, and hoping for that big break.

Perhaps even more central to Anvil! than the usual documentary dream-chasing is the relationship between Lips and Reiner, two guys in their 50’s who have been playing metal together since they were fifteen. There’s an incredible sequence in the middle of the film, while the band is recording their thirteenth album, where Lips loses his shit (not an uncommon occurrence), blows up at Reiner, and “fires” him from the band. The album’s producer then has to sit them both down and essentially play marriage counselor – a scene that ends in tears, remarkable not in the least because it’s quite obvious that the two men have been here dozens, if not hundreds, of times before. In the end, Anvil’s minor triumphs and their love of playing music keep them together, and keeps Lips and Reiner closer than brothers, chasing the dream of fame for who knows how long. Good for them.

(Re-reading this review, I don’t think I made it clear how much I really enjoyed Anvil!. It’s one of the best documentaries I’ve seen in a long time, and certainly one of my favorite films of 2009, thus far. It doesn’t matter if you’re a metal fan or not – I’m not – it’s a terrific film, and though it will mostly be ignored or passed over theatrically, I think it’s going to enjoy a long life on DVD.)

Hamlet 2 (2008, USA)

The first two-thirds of Hamlet 2 really cross that line between funny and uncomfortable. But it’s generally worth sitting through for the staging of the play itself, which is an absurdly Dadaist spectacle. Why is Laertes a cowboy? And why is he onstage with Albert Einstein, singing a song called “Raped In the Face”? It’s a pretty catchy tune, actually, though not quite so hummable as “Rock Me Sexy Jesus”.

I think now I get why Steve Coogan hasn’t really caught on Stateside. With the exception of some of his straighter roles in films like 24 Hour Party People, he can be really, really disturbing. Imagine Will Ferrell at his weirdest, but with a suicide wish. Coogan’s Dana Marschz cries a lot, screams a lot more, physically abuses his students, and writes a high school musical featuring a gang bang that involves Dick Cheney and Jesus. Even I was a little bit freaked out. But it could be worse. I could be in Tuscon.

The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008, USA)

Wow, so that was a big ol’ waste of time. Not that I expected greatness, but I thought it might be good to help while away a sick-day afternoon. Not so much. It’s incredibly dull, and not even the presence of some of my favorite television actors – Jon Hamm, Kyle Chandler and Robert Knepper – really made this worth the hour forty-five. And that Jaden Smith kid? Makes Keanu look like a master emoter, even when he's playing an emotionless alien. That's BAD.

Adventureland (2009, USA)

A funny, often bittersweet, coming-of-age romance, Adventureland is nearly pitch-perfect, especially in its sharp script and satirical, though affectionate, take on 80’s teen culture. James Brennan (Jesse Eisenberg) is a newbie Oberlin grad, more interested in showing off his academic chops in poetry and philosophy than seriously considering his future. Too bad for him, his alcoholic father has just been demoted, and instead of traveling Europe and smoking weed all summer, James is forced to take a crap job at the local amusement park, Adventureland, and . . . smoke weed all summer. As it happens, Adventureland harbors some kindred spirits, such as the awesomely nerdy and dryly hilarious Joel (Martin Starr), and the aloof fatalist Em (Kristen Stewart, worlds away from her dead-eyed performance in Twilight. Perhaps the weed helps her act?). Where James’s story goes from there is generally predictable, but also genuinely felt, well-acted, with more than its share of laugh-out-loud moments – though it’s nowhere near as crude or laugh-oriented as writer/director Greg Mottola’s Superbad. Adventureland has a more somber tone, but it’s part of what pushes the movie beyond just a popcorn laugher about “Rock Me Amadeus”, ball-punching, and giant-ass pandas.

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains (1981, Canada)

I don’t know if this is a review so much as a collection of somewhat isolated reactions.

1) So now I know where The White Stripes got their name (and theme!).
2) Wow. Ray Winstone was pretty cute in his youth. Who knew?
3) Speaking of youth, was Laura Dern seriously THIRTEEN when she made this movie?
4) Who can I get to be the Stains with me next Halloween?

Anyway, it’s kind of a mess of a movie from any technical standpoint – the sound, in particular, is crap, which is unfortunate in a movie about music – but it’s cheeky and entertaining as hell. And who doesn’t like seeing a fifteen-year-old Diane Lane run around in a leotard for the better part of an hour and a half?

Twilight (2008, USA)

Admittedly, I have read all four of the Twilight books. They’re like book crack – terrible, but hard to quit once you’ve gotten started. In a perfect world, the movie version of the first book would either be entirely forgotten in the space of a few weeks, or destined for midnight screenings along the lines of Rocky Horror. It’s terrible. All of the weirdness of the book – why is Edward such a patronizing dick, questioning everything that Bella says or does? And what’s with the obscene stalking? Or the complete lack of vampire-lore rules? – is multiplied tenfold by Robert Pattinson and Kristin Stewart’s complete lack of chemistry. Without any real sense of a growing connection between the two actors, the whole thing becomes a hilarious charade, a paint-by-numbers adaptation of a book that doesn’t have a whole lot of plot strength or acceptable dialog to begin with. Seriously, I’d love to see someone take Twilight to the next level – can’t you just see the baseball game enacted by audience members throughout the theater, or catcalls during Edward and Bella’s terribly contrived and uncomfortable “conversations”? Comedy gold.

On a related note, I know that New Moon and Eclipse are being filmed back-to-back, but I cannot imagine how anyone will be able to film Breaking Dawn. First off, it’s about 800 pages long. Then there’s the teenage (marital!) sex, the most horrifying pregnancy I’ve seen committed to paper, and the entirely bizarre and happy-making second half of the book. On one hand, I don’t know how a studio would be able to pass up such an obvious cash cow, but on the other hand – I know from unfilmable, and Breaking Dawn is totally unfilmable. Unless, as my friends and I discussed, John Waters were to attempt it. Or maybe David Lynch.

Timecrimes (2007, Spain)

I’ve been looking forward to Timecrimes for at least a year, maybe longer, because I kept missing it in theaters and I love time-travel fiction. Perhaps I anticipated it for too long, because I found it slight, less creative than I was hoping. It fits together rather well, but some things certainly feel contrived – why does Hector pause on the path the first time he heads up to the silo? Why does he go back home at the most inopportune moment? Some of these things are certainly attributable to the difficulties inherent in time-travel fiction (just look at last week’s Lost (“Whatever Happened, Happened”) as a good example), and some is probably due to writer/director Nacho Vigalondo’s inexperience – he was only thirty when he made this, after all. It’s rather impressive for a debut feature, with generally strong camerawork and a plot with fewer holes than many time-travel narratives, so if the whole thing feels a bit light, it doesn’t diminish much in the way of entertainment.