The World is not enough 1999

Though it was the most profitable James Bond film to date, Tomorrow Never Dies was widely considered a disappointment. Blasted by critics for its leaden action scenes, poor character development, and dearth of Bondian tongue-in-cheekery, it left most 007 lovers neither shaken nor stirred. Producer Barbara Broccoli heard the fans' cries and hired respected British director Michael Apted (Thunderheart, Gorillas in the Mist) to make a "new kind of Bond movie."
Did Apted succeed? Well, he got it half right. Sporting a refreshingly different story and an Aston Martin-ful of racy innuendoes, The World Is Not Enough is a good — but not great — addition to the Bond pantheon. It delivers excitement at moments, but Pierce Bronsan's third outing fails to live up to its own promise, joining Octopussy and Diamonds Are Forever in the second rank of 007 adventures.

World starts off with the biggest bang since Roger Moore's hair-raising ski-skydive in The Spy Who Loved Me, following an explosive attack on MI6's London HQ and a high-octane motorboat chase up the Thames. Killed in the assault is oil baron Robert King, a personal friend of Bond's boss M (Dame Judi Dench) and father of the alluring ingenue Elektra King (Sophie Marceau).

Intrigued by the stunning heiress, Bond soon learns she was kidnapped and tortured years ago by Renard (Robert Carlyle), a ruthless terrorist who, thanks to a bullet lodged in his cerebrum, happens to be impervious to pain. Believing Elektra to be in danger, 007 jaunts off to her company's exploratory pipeline project in Azerbaijan. Of course, it isn't long before the pair is doing some deep surveying of their own.

To tell any more would be to spoil what is one of the more original Bond plots since Goldfinger. Suffice it to say, the story soon involves Renard, some loose nukes, and the nubile — and very improbable — scientist Dr. Christmas Jones (Denise Richards). It also features an unusually large number of dramatic interludes, which, though intriguing at first, become grating as we itch for 007 to take his gadget-packed BMW for a spin. World also serves up many comic one-liners, most of which are risqué howlers (Brosnan's final quip is priceless) but some of which are clunky groaners (like when a plutonium rod-waving Renard growls, "Welcome to my nuclear family").

World is blessed with a uniformly talented cast (with one BIG exception) but the story doesn't always measure up to its characters' potential. Brosnan gives Bond an effortless charm not seen since Connery's heyday, and shows off some impressive emoting when confronted with a dilemma not seen since On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Marceau is easily the most dangerously sexy Bondgirl since Barbara Bach, flashing ample flesh and exuding the predatory sensuality of a jungle cat. Carlyle's quietly menacing Renard is a welcome change from the usual hammy megalomaniacs (for once his motive isn't to rule the world). However, you can't help wishing Apted had done more with his villain's pain-resisting abilities a la Rutger Hauer's near-invincible replicant in Blade Runner.

Ah, the exception. Though she has the silhouette of a pneumatic Barbie doll, Denise Richards sports a screen presence reminiscent of unflavored Jell-O. Atrocious even for a Bondgirl, her monotone delivery makes Tanya Roberts seem like Honor Blackman. Her stilted speeches on nuclear physics are laughable, and the wardrobe person who decided to costume her in jazzercise-like workout wear should undergo body hair removal with Auric Goldfinger's laser.

When he landed the World gig, surprised director Apted said "I'm not an action director." Though he proves himself wrong in the bravura opening sequence, which is among the best ever filmed, three of the remaining four action scenes disappoint. A picturesque alpine chase seems stilted, a missile-silo shoot-out is adequate, and a chainsaw-helicopter attack is inventive, but not impressive. Though thankfully free of exploding villains' headquarters, the underwater finale simply doesn't satisfy. The rest of Hollywood should follow The Matrix's lead and start importing action choreographers from where they make shoot-'em-ups best: Hong Kong. I'm not proposing a Bond-Fu movie, but a little John Woo-style gunplay would go a long way in keeping the series fresh. Car chases and slowly advancing fireballs are not enough.

American Movie 1999

The funniest movie at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival was not Happy, Texas or Trick or any other high-profile comedy. In fact, in a year when the non-fiction entries were stronger than their fictional counterparts, the film that garnered the biggest guffaws was a documentary. American Movie, the side-splitting story of a determined Wisconsin filmmaker, had audiences rolling in the aisles with its colorful characters and wonderfully eccentric take on the American Dream.

If Edward D. Wood, Jr. had grown up in a Fargo-like setting, he probably would have turned out like Mark Borchardt. A 30-year-old father of three living in the Milwaukee suburb of Menominee Falls, Mark has been obsessively making movies since his early teens. With titles like The More the Scarier and I Blow Up, his oeuvre consists of ultra-low-budget horror shorts, filmed with the help of friends and family.

American Movie, a collaborative effort between director/cinematographer Chris Smith and producer/sound recordist Sarah Price, covers just over two troubled years in Borchardt's life. During that time, Mark attempts to film his magnum opus, a semi-autobiographical drama entitled Northwestern. Lacking funds, Mark decides the solution is to finish his uncompleted horror featurette Coven (which he pronounces like "woven"), sell 3,000 video copies, and use the money to shoot his feature. That Coven is an amateurish oddity of dubious merit doesn't seem to occur to the aspiring auteur.

The many characters we meet are truly memorable. Mark himself is a wired dynamo, a fast-talking obsessive who is blessed with an ability to rope others into his projects — whether on a manic high or a depressed low, he remains steadfastly focused on his films. Inspired not only by horror flicks like Dawn of the Dead and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but also by classics like The Seventh Seal, he is a beer-drinking, good-timing Midwesterner whose ambitions are as fierce as the Wisconsin winter, yet whose talents have more in common with that state's other claim to fame: cheese.

His best friend, Mike, is a long-haired stoner type who sports tie-dyed Led Zeppelin T-shirts and plays neo-classical heavy metal on his acoustic guitar. A slow-talking acid casualty, he would be a completely sad figure were it not for his good-natured personality. Mike spouts some of the most amusing dialogue of the film. When told by Mark that the "original" song he's singing is, in fact, a Black Sabbath tune with just one word changed, Mike replies that he had to get inspiration from somewhere, insisting that it's impossible to simply "make ideas up."

And then there's Uncle Bob. Though he supposedly has almost $300,000 in the bank, Mark's withered uncle lives like a miser in a run-down trailer. Reluctantly coming on board the Northwestern project as an executive producer, he lends Mark a few thousand dollars while constantly offering his negative opinion of the undertaking. For all his complaining, though, it's clear that he is truly fond of Mark and appreciates his company, even as he seems fairly dubious about his prospects as a filmmaker.

Smith and Price do an excellent job of bringing us into Mark's world, providing a never-less-than-fascinating look at a truly independent filmmaker. It is to their credit that the film never mocks Mark or the community of kooky characters that surround and support him. To be sure, these characters' misadventures are frequently hilarious, resulting in a documentary as mirthfully entertaining and heartfelt as Roger & Me or Sherman's March. But it's impossible not to be moved by this story of a driven man and the people who, because of their love of and belief in him, try to help make his dreams come true.

X Men 2000

Based on the wildly popular Marvel comic book series, X-Men is easily the most anticipated film of the summer, sparking heated Internet debate among legions of fans about its numerous script revisions and controversial casting. Meanwhile, uninitiated viewers wonder whether this ubiquitous flick is worth all of the fuss. The answer? Largely, yes. Though X-Men lacks the mind-blowing visuals and complexity of last summer's sci-fi/action spectacle The Matrix, this thoughtful, imaginative adventure is one of the better live-action comic-book adaptations on film. Director Bryan Singer (Usual Suspects) meets the challenge of distilling 37 years of epic adventure for newcomers while remaining true to the series' themes, tone, and characters.
Set during the "not too distant future" X-Men unfolds in a world where humans are beginning to evolve into uniquely and powerfully enabled beings. The widespread persecution of these "mutants" drives a pointed parable about racism and genocide, with direct references to Nazi-era Germany. Stemming from this broader sociological conflict is the ideological clash between two mutant factions: those who wish to peacefully co-exist with humans, led by Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart, Star Trek: The Next Generation's Captain Picard), and those who wish to destroy mankind for its ignorance and inferiority, led by Erik Lehnsherr, aka Magneto (Sir Ian McKellen, Gods and Monsters). Xavier and Lehnsherr are directly comparable to Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, down to Magneto's oath to effect change "by any means necessary." Pretty heavy stuff for a comic-book film. Although the questions posed about intolerance and the definition of "humanity" are similar to those in Blade Runner, they're not as eloquently presented or affecting.

Singer and executive producer Tom DeSanto, who, after numerous rewrites, wisely focused the final version of the script on Logan (Aussie newcomer Hugh Jackman) aka Wolverine. Easily the series' most popular character, Logan is a wanderer, an outsider that acts as the viewer's introduction into Xavier's "School for Gifted Youngsters," a secret academy to train mutants. Unlike the team's squeaky-clean field leader, Scott "Cyclops" Summers (played with winking, self-referential humor by Gossip's James Marsden), Logan is a smokin', drinkin', cantankerous misanthrope who kicks butt with retractable, razor-sharp metal claws. The script playfully tweaks the two allies' oil-and-water relationship and their mutual feelings for Xavier's right-hand mutant, the telekinetic Dr. Jean Grey (Famke Janssen, GoldenEye).

But X-Men is Wolverine's film, and Jackman offers its most complex performance, melding feral instinct, sarcastic irreverence, and heart-of-gold sensitivity. Logan's blade-flashing yields X-Men's exhilarating moments, and his quips about the unusual situations he encounters add levity to the film's otherwise ominous tone.

The rest of the X-cast comfortably fill their superhuman boots, with Stewart a perfect fit as the Picard-like leader and McKellen equally sterling as his magnetism-wielding adversary. Anna Paquin (Oscar-winner for The Piano) offers a tremulous performance as the teenage Rogue, frightened and overwhelmed by her own deadly energy-stealing power. But despite leading-lady-level press, Halle Berry is no more than gorgeous window-dressing as the weather-controlling Storm, with few lines and clumsy screen presence.

The "non-actors" fare well as Magneto's Brotherhood of Evil Mutants: pro-wrestler Tyler Mane as the animalistic Sabretooth, supermodel Rebecca Romijn-Stamos as the gymnastic shape-shifter Mystique, and martial-arts master Ray Park (The Phantom Menace's Darth Maul) as the impish, twelve-foot-tongue-flicking Toad. These are more otherworldly mutants than the X-Men, and the trio brings a fantastical quality to the Brotherhood that's lacking in Xavier's more "human" team.

X-Men's story is sparse and economic, giving just enough plot information to move things along but without bogging down in excessive historical detail. Singer and cinematographer Tom Sigel (Three Kings) match the film's somber themes with their dark elegance, and the set design is clinical in its minimalism. Even the "score" is limited to humming, heartbeats, atmospheric sounds, and silence, which emphasize the prevailing sense of isolation and claustrophobia.

X-Men is about ideas and people, and makes no effort to establish a high-speed pace; its combat arises organically within the unfolding story, making the flow atypically varied for an actioner. Fight scenes define characters, advance the plot, and showcasie the mutants' abilities — and appendages — for humor. Special effects depict the mutants' super-powers and add to the fun factor, but few scenes actually inspire awe, and the team is largely landbound, lacking the over-the-top exuberance for combat one might expect of the über-abled. Other sequences — dream depictions, telepathic encounters, and Magneto's defining Holocaust experience — aren't effects-heavy, but they have a haunting, visionary beauty and lasting impact. Unfortunately, Singer doesn't sustain this level of wonder throughout the film.

Die-hard X-devotees may quibble over character interpretations and timeline violations, but with so many unbearable comic-book films — remember Tank Girl? — why nit-pick a creative, intelligent, and cohesive near-miss for condensing an operatic saga? X-Men isn't as dynamic as it could be, but it has style, substance, and soul. Trying finding that in the next Batman movie. and more than a touch of genuine sentiment.

Pie's plot, such as it is, involves four high school lads — desperate to lose their virginity — who make a pact to get laid by their senior prom. There's Jim, (newcomer Jason Biggs), the nice guy who just can't talk to girls; Oz (Election's Chris Klein), the jock whose buff bod conceals a sensitive soul; Finch (Eddie Kaye Thomas), the would-be sophisticate who makes jokes in Latin and drinks mochachino; and Kevin (Thomas Ian Nicholas) who, though he has a girlfriend, can't bring himself to utter the three little words that would get him past third base.

Their separate strategies to score take each member of the hapless quartet in different directions, and often to hilarious conclusions. In a scene destined to be rewound endlessly by hormone-wracked teen boys across the country, Jim inadvertently sends a live Internet feed of his painfully inept encounter with a hot-to-trot exchange student (nicely nubile newcomer Shannon Elizabeth) to his school's entire student body. It's probably the funniest scene in the film, and the only one that actually features nudity.

In fact, though the language is consistently vulgar, and there are sight gags involving masturbation, semen, and, yes, sex with baked goods, American Pie is not nearly as leeringly sexist as many of its '80s predecessors. The film's female characters are given personalities as developed as their figures. Though underused, Slums of Beverly Hills' Natasha Lyonne captures the perfect tone as the experienced girl who doles out advice on matters of sex. And Alyson Hannigan (Willow on TV's Buffy the Vampire Slayer) almost steals the movie as the geeky band nerd who's not quite the stereotype that she seems.

First-time director Paul Weitz, working from a script by first-time screenwriter Adam Herz, has crafted a breezy ode to adolescent sexuality. Granted, there's plenty of toilet humor and dirty talk, but the film's underlying humanism prevents this from being just another dumb teen flick. The young, mostly unknown actors acquit themselves well, fleshing out the characters so that American Pie never descends to the level of moronic caricature. Alternately outrageous and sweet, it may not be quite as filling as a nice piece of pie, but it's certainly as tasty.

Almost Famous 2000

In his first film since Jerry Maguire, director Cameron Crowe takes us on a rollicking, episodic, and autobiographical journey behind the curtain of 1970s rock-'n'-roll. One of this generation's premier screenwriters, Crowe proves once again that he has an unflappable knack for injecting big-studio projects with an intimacy and warmth usually reserved for smaller indie fare. And at a time when both Hollywood and independent flicks seem to be suffering from a dire case of the blahs, Almost Famous doesn't disappoint, soaring as a thoroughly entertaining hybrid of the two.
The film is based on Crowe's real-life experiences as a young reporter for Rolling Stone magazine back in 1973, covering the backstage antics of such super groups as Led Zeppelin and the Allman Brothers. In Famous, Crowe's 15-year-old alter ego William Miller (Patrick Fugit) accepts a writing assignment for Stone to profile the touring, up-and-coming, and fictional rock band Stillwater, fronted by lead singer Jeff Bebe (Jason Lee) and enigmatic lead guitarist Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup).

Though initially perceived as "the enemy" by the band, William successfully befriends the members of Stillwater, over the objections of his protective mother (Frances McDormand) — who calls incessantly to harass both her son and those around him ("Your mom kind of freaked me out," says one). Of course, finding himself caring about this extended rock-'n'-roll family won't make it any easier for William to tell their story impartially. Helping the young writer find his way in these dizzying surroundings are terminally "uncool" rock critic Lester Bangs (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and, more significantly, alluring "band aide" Penny Lane (Kate Hudson), to whom both William and Russell eventually take more than just a liking.

Though the story itself is routine in many ways, and the ending is somewhat soft, there are two attributes that make Almost Famous great. First are the uniformly terrific performances from the entire cast, particularly by Hudson, who is sexy, elusive, and thoroughly enchanting in a star-making role. McDormand also stands out, managing to be both hilarious ("Rock stars have kidnapped my son!") and moving despite the handicap of delivering most of her lines into a telephone.

The second, and probably most important factor behind Almost Famous' genius is the wealth of magical movie moments with which Cameron dots his labor of love. In many ways, the difference between a good film and a great one is in the number of classic scenes and memorable lines that a movie delivers, and, like the director/writer's previous efforts (Fast Times at Ridgemont High's script, Say Anything, Jerry Maguire), Almost Famous is full of them. In fact, every character (with the exception of the underused Anna Paquin) owns at least one glorious moment, from Jason Lee as the self-absorbed lead singer ("I'm the front man! You're the lead guitarist with mystique!") to Zooey Deschanel as William's rebellious sister Anita, who inspires the young writer by leaving her record collection to him with a note attached: "It will set you free."

If for no other reason, Almost Famous delights because it refreshingly captures the essence of a less inhibited, pre-MTV rock-'n'-roll generation — complete with a smashing soundtrack of '70s-era classics punctuated by a sequence featuring Elton John's "Tiny Dancer." The film examines, in a very human way, the peculiar conflict that those who frequent this musical netherworld inevitably encounter between "keeping it real" and being eternally "cool." Far from the safety of his simple beginnings back in San Diego, William will find a way to merge the two — ultimately discovering that there's a big, exciting world out there where "It's all happening!"

All about my mother 1999

All About My Mother (1999)

Though nearly every scene feels as if it could break into camp at any moment, Pedro Almodóvar's All About My Mother instead stays firmly rooted in masterful melodrama. Sure, there are drag queens, fake breasts, heroin addicts, and nuns who stray from the convent's calling, but Almodóvar somehow brings these elements together like a latter day Joseph Mankiewicz — delivering a film that finds remarkable poignancy in the most unsuspecting ways. Forget Steel Magnolias and Hope Floats; Mother represents a level of intelligent, female-centered storytelling that hasn't been seen since John Cassavetes' time.

Mother follows the story of Manuela (Cecilia Roth from What Have I Done to Deserve This?), a transplant unit nurse in a Madrid hospital. Almodóvar introduces her on the 17th birthday of her son, Esteban (Eloy Azorín), who wants nothing more than for her to reveal his father's identity to him. Manuela resists … until Esteban's life is tragically cut short. Even with him gone, Manuela decides to fulfill Esteban's wish — she will find his father and tell him of the son he never knew he had. But in her return to Barcelona (from which she made an exodus many years before), she becomes more than just a messenger — she turns into something of a missionary, mending the souls of the women she meets (the organ-donor analogy is made quite clear here). She first finds her old friend Agrado (Antonia San Juan), a transgender prostitute whose thoughts on the sexual authenticity that plastic surgery brings are hilarious. And there's Sister Rosa (Penélope Cruz of the brilliant Open Your Eyes), a nun whose break from convent tradition sets her life down a difficult track. There's Huma Rojo (Flower of My Secret's Marisa Paredes), an actress that Esteban once revered, as well as her drug addict lover Nina (Candela Peña).

Each of these women is given vibrant life by these marvelous actresses (Roth, especially, is amazing) and Almodóvar's screenplay and direction. There's a mad glee to scenes like the one in which the women briefly talk about the word "cock," and Sister Rosa, with delight, exclaims that she also loves the word "prick." Almodóvar's balanced, three-dimensional portraits of women bursting with vitality cleanse the viewer's mind of the patriarchal themes of Runaway Bride and the histrionic caricatures of The Story of Us.

In the States, at least, audiences favor the stereotype-dependent "chick flicks" of Nora Ephron and her ilk over challenging, authentic looks at the female sex. Almodóvar is the anti-Ephron, a man whose understanding of women is far deeper and vastly more intelligent than any female director in Hollywood.

Notting Hill 1999

Notting Hill is a likable but flawed romance about a world-famous actress who falls in love with the proprietor of a travel bookshop. Not seeking much of an acting stretch, Julia Roberts plays actress Anna Scott, and Hugh Grant, as the shy bookseller William Thacker, plays the same bookish but debonair role he's played many times before.
The standard romantic cliches are also intact. The pair meet cute (he spills orange juice on her after she visits his bookshop), they have a cute "getting to know you" date at a birthday party, and they engage in cute post-prandial hijinks after dinner. These scenes would have been perfectly pleasant if the film did not insist on blasting viewers' ears with movie "mood music" designed to warm the cockles of our hearts. Music for films should supplement the dialogue and action, not supplant them. In Notting Hill, viewers are subjected to two songs twice in the course of the film.

However, Notting Hill has more fundamental problems. Not a spark of passion flies between the overly chummy Anna and William, who are more buddies than lovers. Whereas Four Weddings and a Funeral had Andie MacDowell's delightfully naughty revelations (as in Hugh was lover number 32), sex is barely hinted at here.

There are also moments that ring extremely false, as when a tabloid-dogged Anna answers the door to William's flat, only to be suddenly confronted by hundreds of paparazzi (surprise!). Furthermore, the audience is never given a compelling reason why William should be so smitten with the actress, save for the fact that she's famous and looks uncannily like Julia Roberts.

Despite these flaws, Notting Hill manages to satisfy. The acting is solid, and Roberts in particular brings a refreshing weariness to her role as a woman trapped by the exigencies of celebrity. However, it leaves Julia Roberts in the same predicament as her character: If she ever wants to be thought of as anything other than a Pretty Woman, she's going to have to find something edgier than this rolling Hill.

After life 1998

After Life 

Hollywood films about death (e.g. Ghost, Stepmom, and What Dreams May Come) might have one think that there exists a rule that any movie concerning the hereafter must be cloying, melodramatic, or just plain silly. Thankfully, Kore-eda Hirokazu's After Life is nothing of the sort. Instead, it's a poignant, humorous, minimalistic meditation on the importance of memories.

One Memory 

Filmed in an understated, documentary style, After Life follows a group of 22 newly deceased souls as they stay at a way station — between earth and the afterlife — for one week. At the beginning of the week, the station's caseworkers explain to each person that they have died, and that within a few days they must pick a memory that was precious to them. The staff will then re-enact and film the remembrance, and the person will move on, taking only that memory with them.

Prompted by the caseworkers, the subjects begin reminiscing. One man discusses his pleasurable experiences with prostitutes. A young woman remembers eating pancakes at Disneyland and riding Splash Mountain. Another man recalls being a child, and feeling the warm sunlight on his naked body. An elderly man, Watanabe (Naito Takashi) can't come up with anything, so he watches tapes of his life, one for each of his 71 years.

The staff works diligently to re-create the moments, and as they do so, the subjects' faces glow with pleasure as they think back on their joyous moment. On the final day, there is a screening, and the souls vanish one by one, taking their one memory with them.

Elegant Extras 

The extras on After Life are perfectly suited to this elegant, delicate film. The production notes describe the cinematography and the casting of the film (the key actors' biographies). Theatrical trailers (one in English, one in Japanese) showcase some of the film's moments, asking the question, "What is the one memory you will take with you?" The section dedicated to Kore-eda Hirokazu contains his profile and filmography (consisting mostly of documentaries) and also a director's statement, which explains the inspiration behind After Life: the director had watched his grandfather suffer with Alzheimer's and become senile, gradually losing all memories and his sense of self. Hirokazu interviewed approximately 500 people, asking them which one memory they would take with them. These interviews were the basis of the film, and some of the interviewees are featured in the film, speaking about actual events. Hirokazu sought to show people coming to terms with the past, and affirming and accepting their lives. It's a remarkable achievement that he did just that, with this exceptional and affecting film.

After Life is presented in a widescreen letterbox format. Language is in Japanese only, with English subtitles. Though lacking the sharpness usually associated with DVDs, the transfer is visually pleasing, showcasing the film's muted grays, browns, and greens.

Affliction - 1988

Affliction (1998)

Paul Schrader has written such famed films as Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, and he has directed a dozen others, including American Gigolo and his latest, Affliction, now available in an impressive 1.85:1 widescreen DVD transfer.

A Psychological Study of a Man on the Edge

The director once maintained that his tortured heroes are "crushed, bruised romantics." Nick Nolte's haunting portrayal of Wade Whitehouse in Affliction certainly fits that description. The film, based on Russell Banks' 1989 novel, is a powerfully economical psychological study of a man on the edge.

Wade, a divorced, small-town New Hampshire "one man police force" — as Banks described him — is a sympathetic guy struggling to do the right thing with his daughter, but he's pursued by the furies of family violence. Glenn (James Coburn), his gloomily alcoholic and belligerent father, has crippled Wade's ability to return love as an adult. Though girlfriend Marge tries to connect with Wade, he just can't seem to outrun his demons. After Wade's called to the scene of a hunting accident, he starts to suspect murder. But is the mystery all in Wade's confused mind?

We don't meet Coburn's Glenn until nearly a half-hour into the film. Pop's presence, however, uncannily lives in Nolte's performance. "You! I know you," Glenn growls at Wade late in the picture. "You're my blood." It's a chilling moment. No wonder Coburn won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar®. He seems to loom and tower over his burly adult boy. This is a father-son relationship made in hell.

The other supporting roles are also memorable. Sissy Spacek's heartbreakingly tender and understanding Marge is matched by Mary Beth Hurt's wary and protective portrayal of Wade's ex-wife, Lillian. As Rolfe, Wade's sensitive younger brother, Willem Dafoe has few scenes, but proves to be an effective narrator.

Yet Affliction is Nolte's movie from start to finish. He gradually reveals Wade's buried emotional world of powerlessness and paranoia. It's a devastating multi-layered performance that yields more upon repeat viewing.

No Extras, but a Skillful Transfer

It's too bad that the DVD doesn't include an audio commentary from Nolte, Coburn, and Schrader. On the other hand, the transfer has been managed skillfully. Paul Sarossy's chilly, atmospheric cinematography lends another dimension to the inner landscape of Affliction's characters. The crisp Dolby Digital soundtrack is also crucial to the film's impact, as Schrader uses it to seamlessly move in and out of Wade's troubled past.

An affair of love - 1999

An Affair of Love (1999)

Due to the fact that human beings have this capacity called intelligence, sexual desire amongst our species is an immensely complicated matter — it can't just be boiled down to reproductive instincts. When American movies attempt to handle this subject — especially when it concerns female lust — they almost always come up short. Too often, the women in these unpersuasive and uninvolving films are too pretty, too neurotic, too idealistic, or too dull to engage our attentions. Luckily, we have Le Cinema Français and films like An Affair of Love to remedy the problem. French filmmakers have consistently been responsible for bringing more mature fare about the complications of love and lust to these shores.

Affair is a brief, but pithy drama about an unnamed woman (Return of Martin Guerre's radiant Nathalie Baye) who has a fantasy she wants to enact with a stranger. Her offer is taken up by a handsome, middle-aged man (Sergi Lopez from Western) of Spanish descent. Their story is told mostly in flashback as an unseen man asks each of them separately about the relationship. When speaking to this interviewer, the pair often differ on certain details — she thinks they met online while he believes she placed an ad in a pornographic magazine; he believes they exchanged photos, but she comments that she didn't know what he looked like until they met face-to-face. In this way, the film touches on the faultiness of human memory in the same way as Alain Resnais' Last Year at Marienbad, but with far less pretentiousness.

Although the nature of the woman's fantasy is never revealed, it's not important. As she tells the interviewer, "It was an act of love. It could have been anything." What is central is the film's ability to convey the whimsical and powerful nature of desire and the increasing level of connection between the two.

After the first encounter, they agree to meet weekly. The film fascinatingly delineates how the power dynamic between them continually shifts. One thought-provoking suggestion posed in An Affair of Love is that by getting the sex part over with early, a couple has a greater opportunity to be completely honest with one another. Each of the protagonists may not know the other person's name or where he or she works, but they do know about each other's fears and fantasies — and ultimately, which of these things is more important?

There is, of course, a moment when the characters have to decide if they want to pursue a more traditional romantic relationship, but since such a path requires a different kind of commitment and a form of emotional sharing that diverges from how they currently communicate, there are barriers they must overcome in order to walk it successfully. Affair limns these difficulties concisely and wisely, especially in a segment featuring an elderly couple whose marriage has soured. Because these are the only two people that the trysting pair meet over the course of their affair, this couple's romantic malaise is seen as a symbol of the abyss that can await people who marry the wrong person.

It's no big secret that our hearts and heads rarely agree with our loins, but Philippe Blasband's script explores this dichotomy carefully. Affair shows that there are advantages to beginning a relationship with sex, but that a couple has to be compatible out of bed as well. While day-to-day mundanities may be of little importance on a larger scale, they are an integral part of our lives and must play a part of any long-term romantic endeavor.

In a remarkably brief 80 minutes, the cast, screenwriter Blasband, and director Frédéric Fonteyne manage to depict the intensity and complexity of a single relationship with much more acuity than most of the interminable romantic pap that Hollywood constantly churns out. As Baye's character tells her interlocutor, "In movies, sex is always Heaven or Hell, never in between the two. In life, it's almost always in between." An Affair of Love captures this middle state perfectly.

Adams Family - 1991

They're creepy, they're kooky, they're mysterious and spooky — and now they're on DVD. The Addams clan, those wacky, offbeat psychopaths who made their debut on TV in the '60s and first graced the big screen in 1991, have never been in better form. In The Addams Family and its 1993 follow-up, Addams Family Values, director Barry Sonnenfeld (Men in Black, Get Shorty) combines stellar casting, witty scripts, and top-notch cinematography and special effects in his cauldron and bubbles up a pair of darkly funny, stylish classics.

Beneath the Cobwebs Lurks a Loving Family

The first movie introduces the viewer to the core Addams family — passionate patriarch Gomez (the late, lamented Raul Julia); statuesque matriarch Morticia (Anjelica Huston); and their children, stoic Pugsley (Jimmy Workman) and grim, pale Wednesday (a very young Christina Ricci). All of the actors are spot-on perfect in their roles, particularly Ricci, whose performance as Wednesday helped cement her status as the queen of dark, offbeat films.

The plot kicks in when Gomez's long-lost brother Fester (Christopher Lloyd), missing for 25 years, suddenly returns (or does he?). But the story is really secondary here — what drives the movie are its stunning visuals and pitch-black humor. (Morticia to her husband: "Don't torture yourself, Gomez. That's my job.") That, and the fact that beneath the cobwebs, the Addamses are a close, loving family that values the bonds of blood above all else.

Those bonds are put to the test in Addams Family Values, which is just as hilariously macabre as its predecessor and has more plot to boot. The movie opens with the birth of the Addams' third child, Pubert, to whom Pugsley and Wednesday take an immediate, violent (as in guillotines and guns) dislike. To spare a serenely stressed-out Morticia — "I wish I had more time to seek out the dark forces and join their hellish crusade," she says — Gomez hires a nanny, Debbie (played by a voluptuous, delightfully cracked Joan Cusack), who turns out to be a serial killer known as the Black Widow. Debbie makes a play for rich bachelor Fester, clearing her way by packing the kids off to perky Camp Chippewa, where some of the film's funniest scenes take place. Will Wednesday save her uncle from disaster? If you don't know (or can't guess), you'll have to watch the movie to find out.

Flawless DVDs with Few Features

Both films look and sound terrific on DVD; their transfers are flawless (impressive, considering that the first one is now almost 10 years old) and the high quality means that every detail of the elaborate sets and special effects is crystal clear. Both are presented in widescreen (1.85:1) only and have been enhanced for 16x9 televisions. Unfortunately, neither disc offers much in the way of features (would it have killed them to include the music video for M.C. Hammer's "Addams Groove"?). The short list includes theatrical trailers (two apiece), scene selection, and English subtitles for the deaf and hearing impaired, as well as English Dolby Surround and 5.1 Surround sound options.

The Abyss

... When you look long into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you.
— Frederich Nietzche

With these words begins an undersea journey that now goes deeper than ever before. Twentieth Century Fox has outdone itself with the special edition release of The Abyss on DVD. The equivalent of an encyclopedia devoted entirely to the making of one spectacular, technologically innovative, and commercially unsuccessful film, The Abyss Special Edition might just be the new standard by which all DVDs are measured. This two-disc set includes both the theatrical release version and writer/director James Cameron's Special Edition, which adds 28 minutes that redefine the film in both scope and structure. It is to the studio's credit that they have layered this film with so many extras for its much-anticipated release on disc. From a reviewer's perspective, however, the resulting task is not unlike the challenges the film's characters must face: This DVD set goes so deep into the making of The Abyss that it might just be possible to drown.

What is The Abyss? Well, it's an underwater action thriller. It's a love story. It's a cautionary tale about nuclear proliferation and the insidious paranoia that fuels it. It's an alien encounter story. It's a science-fiction epic that unfolds on a human scale. And, it's a very, very deep trench at the bottom of the ocean. With all these factors combined, The Abyss is one hell of a movie.

The Approach

The coolness of these discs is evident from the first moment they load in your player. Designed by the same studio behind Fox's outstanding Alien Legacy collection, the menu interface on these discs is second-to-none in terms of sheer DVD-induced exhilaration. Swooping up from the titular undersea crevasse, you approach DeepCore, the underwater drilling rig that is the setting for most of the film, and emerge in the sub bay that plays so prominently throughout the film. Once there, the various menus navigate you through hatches, portholes, and computer terminals as you select from the myriad of features contained on the discs. The shimmering interface is almost worth the price of the set itself.

The Film(s)

Both the theatrical and special editions of the film are presented in the original 2.35:1 widescreen format, accompanied by audio in either Dolby 5.1 or Surround 2.0 options. Remastered in THX, the film looks outstanding, with the dominant blue of the palette combining with the ambient noise of the ocean deep, resulting in an otherworldly aquatic atmosphere supplanting your living room. The lack of support for HDTVs is the set's only major failing, and will certainly raise the ire of high-end home theater enthusiasts; but for most of us, the pristine transfer to DVD is more than adequate. In addition to optional subtitles in English or Spanish, one of the most beguiling features of the film itself is the scene-specific text commentary. More effective than any audio commentary I have ever heard, this option efficiently (and entertainingly) conveys technical and anecdotal information without divorcing the viewer from the experience of actually enjoying the film, as audio commentaries by their very nature do. Since we are able to read faster than we talk, it makes sense to convey information in this manner for a film with so much detail and technological prestidigitation behind the scenes.

Under Pressure

In addition to three theatrical trailers and a 10-minute promotional featurette, the set includes Under Pressure, an hour-long documentary on the making of the film. Made in 1993 to accompany the special edition re-release of the film, this revealing feature is matched only by Fear of God, the BBC-produced documentary on The Exorcist: Special Edition DVD, in terms of depth of information and apparent journalistic integrity. Under Pressure details the innumerable hardships endured by cast and crew alike, resulting in The Abyss being dubbed the "toughest film shoot in history." What's most refreshing about the documentary is its candor — it does not shy away from James Cameron's draconian methodologies and the tensions between director and cast that developed, including the incident that prompted actress Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio to storm off the set. The documentary also frankly addresses the film's weaknesses, and allows those involved to respond. It's a refreshing change of pace from the standard "extended commercial" approach most "making-of" featurettes inevitably become.

The Abyss In-Depth

In addition to the film (films, really) and the documentary, the majority of the extras are integrated in the "Abyss In-Depth" section, which guides viewers through the well of features contained on the second disc. Viewers are taken through all 28 chapters of material, starting with Cameron's original treatment through excerpts of various drafts of the screenplay to the complete shooting script. That's right — the entire screenplay is available, and not just for DVD-ROM users (who can also read the screenplay and play three included games). Whether anyone would actually sit and click through the entire screenplay for a three-hour film is totally beside the point — the point is that everything I have just mentioned comprises only the first three chapters (chapter one being the table of contents, chapter two the overview). There are also options to view only the information pertaining to the production itself or the various "mission components," including the DeepCore set, various submersibles, and the alien creatures.

Much of this material is presented textually (but legibly), interspersed with hundreds of photos and multimedia clips of the cast, crew, and production. The cumulative result is the most detailed assemblage of production information ever included on a DVD. The information underscores the enormous technological innovations necessary in order for the film to succeed, from the custom design of the dive gear itself (the helmets were fitted with communications devices that allowed for the first recording of undersea dialogue) to the most complicated effects shots in the film. Equal parts scrapbook and production journal, the "Abyss In-Depth" may explain the techno-wizardry that went into the film, but it does not strip away the mystique.

The Imaging Station

While the "In-Depth" navigation options are helpful and fun to play with, they probably won't appease those jonesing for the quick-fix multimedia orgy that DVDs have come to promise. Those addicts need look no further than the "Imaging Station," which collects the bulk of the A/V material seeded throughout the "In-Depth" sections. This collection of features dissects many of the film's most technologically daunting elements, including a multi-angle look at the creation of the "pseudopod sequence," which is generally regarded as the first truly refined use of CGI effects, as well as glimpses of the more traditional special effects employed. Of these segments, perhaps none is more impressive than the time-lapse footage that compresses the months-long construction of the DeepCore set (in an uncompleted nuclear tank in Gaffney, South Carolina) into seven minutes. Set to Alan Silvestri's stirring score, this montage showcases like no other feature the sheer scope of the production, particularly when you witness all those months of handiwork drown in the 7.5 million gallons of water necessary to fill the tank.

Other highlights from this section include footage from the surface photography, demonstrations of the rear projection used to incorporate live action with miniatures, and the actual real-time footage of the crane-crash sequence, which was shot on miniature at 120 frames per second to enhance the dramatic effect. Suffice to say, the effect paid off — contrasting the "real" footage with its presentation in the film is as close to a definition of "movie magic" as I can conceive. "The Imaging Station" is capped off by the inclusion of the 20-minute special effects reel that was sent to the Academy, and that gives a cue-by-cue breakdown of how most of the film's effects were created.

Dive In

As The Abyss plumbed new depths of technical filmmaking, so too does the special edition DVD release of the film strike new ground for its medium. While the whole package may flirt with excess (lack of enhancement for widescreen TVs notwithstanding), its respect for the details that go into the making of a monumental film result in this set being a wet dream-come-true for cinephiles, technogeeks, and DVD freaks alike. While one can certainly critique the movie's narrative overindulgence, the production itself remains an awe-inspiring and unforgettable cinematic experience. Once one has looked into this Abyss, the film will never be the same again.

Ben-Hur - 1959

By patterning his pod race in Star Wars: Episode I after the chariot race from William Wyler's 1959 production of Ben-Hur, George Lucas all but confirmed that the climactic scene has become a part of film lore. Choreographed by legendary stuntman Yakima Canutt, the 15-minute race anchored this grand 212-minute epic that's one of the best ever to come out of Hollywood. Ben-Hur won a record 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Director (Wyler), Actor (Charlton Heston as Judah Ben-Hur), Supporting Actor (Hugh Griffith as Sheik Ilderim), Cinematography, Music Score, Costume Design, Film Editing, and Special Effects. Now, freed from the cramped distortion of TV-formatted versions that expanded to widescreen only for the chariot race, it emerges as powerful as ever on DVD. And the special effects are still surprisingly effective.

A More Secular Tale of the Christ

Based on a novel by Gen. Lew Wallace, subtitled "A Tale of the Christ" and shot in Rome, Wyler's adaptation manages to walk a steady line between religious spectacle and secular epic. Even Heston isn't as hammy as usual in his role as a wealthy Judean unjustly sentenced to the galleys by his childhood friend, Messala (Stephen Boyd) — who has returned to command the Roman garrison. But character wins out, and Ben-Hur's heroics in saving the fleet commander (Jack Hawkins) earn him his freedom and a chance for vengeance against Messala in the Jerusalem circus. Though the film begins with the wise men paying tribute to baby Jesus in Bethlehem and ends with the Crucifixion, the entire middle focuses on the Roman world and Ben-Hur's quest to find himself and his imprisoned mother and sister. We learn from the "making of" feature that Wyler, a Jew, wanted to make a film that would appeal to people of all religious faiths, and he seems to have done just that.

Epic Extras

Warner Bros. has put together a fantastic full-frame documentary on "Ben-Hur: The Making of an Epic," which, itself, has an epic feel to it. The production staff seems to have left no research stone unturned; and the documentary includes scenes from the 1925 black and white version of Ben-Hur (which, surprisingly, featured frontal nudity), early studio and stage stills, photographs of documents and scripts, and even footage of Heston accepting his Oscar for Best Actor. It's wonderfully edited and tells the complete story of Ben-Hur — from the birth of the novel by the former New Mexico Territory governor, to visuals of early playbills for the first staged production and all of Hollywood's attempts to capture the grandeur of Wallace's novel on film.

Twice, we learn, Ben-Hur saved the studio from bankruptcy, and there was a lot riding on the 1959 version. The film used literally a cast of thousands and more than 300 sets — including a 10-square-block set which depicted a Jerusalem that experts said was historically accurate. It was the most expensive motion picture filmed to date, and nervous studio execs flew to Rome to check on the progress almost weekly. Wyler, who was an assistant on the 1925 film, was a stickler for realism and accuracy, and so even the leper colony scenes were shot in an old marble quarry that actually could have been used for the same purpose in 26 AD. Even studio shots were elaborate. For the epic naval battle, Wyler ordered a man-made lake dug so that larger-than-usual miniatures could be used. Years of research preceded the set design, and actors like Heston went to Rome early to learn how to drive chariots. Christopher Plummer handles the narration of this documentary that is so good it will bear frequent rewatching.

Nielsen Ratings

One unexpected, hilarious extra features screen tests from actors seriously considered for the parts of Ben-Hur and Messala. But Leslie Nielsen as the granite-chinned Messala? It's hard not to laugh watching Nielsen try to throw a spear and act like a Roman after seeing him stumble through The Naked Gun and sequels as the bumbling Lt. Frank Drebin. Heston does a fair job on his running commentary, which has a nice "advance" feature so that viewers can cut to the next voiceover. There are also cast/director highlights, theatrical trailers, and an art gallery of still images.

Before Night Falls - 2000

Before Night Falls (2000)

Before Night Falls continues artist-turned-director Julian Schnabel's fascination with creative visionaries who reside outside society's normal parameters. While the woefully underdeveloped subsidiary characters make it less successful than his earlier film Basquiat, Schnabel's new work does succeed in creating a compelling portrait of the film's central figure, homosexual Cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas.
The author (played by Jamon Jamon's Javier Bardem) is born in 1943, and spends much of his younger days in an impoverished rural province of Cuba with his mother and her parents. After his grandfather chops down a tree on which Reinaldo has carved a poem, the boy runs away from home to (as he puts it) "join the rebels." A brief newsreel segment about the Cuban Revolution of 1959 is the bridge to Havana 1964, when we see Arenas as an adult, attending university classes and discovering his sexuality. Though Bardem is in his 30s, he conveys the exuberance and slight awkwardness of a revolution-minded 21-year-old with an artistic bent, and this sequence is one of the finest in the film.

Arenas' social life revolves around a group of other gay men, one of whom is his off-again, on-again boyfriend Pepe (Andrea Di Stefano, in one of many underwritten roles), and though the friends are circumspect about their behavior, they are also fairly uncloseted. This relative openness causes problems for them when Castro makes a pronouncement in the late-'60s that homosexuals are counter-revolutionary, and it's not long before Arenas is arrested and his books are banned. He supports himself in prison (and saves himself from physical assault) by writing letters for the mostly illiterate prisoners. The scribe then uses the payment from these endeavors to get a drag queen inmate named Bon Bon (Johnny Depp, in the first of two very distinct roles) to smuggle out the manuscripts he writes in jail.

After Arenas is released from jail, the film takes a Fellini-esque turn as he goes to live with a group of prostitutes and other outcasts in an abandoned hotel. Escape from Cuba is on everyone's mind and the discovery of a bunch of parachute material leads to the construction of a hot-air balloon in the film's most surreal sequence.

Although this mode of escape fails, Arenas eventually gets to New York by virtue of a 1980 Castro edict which allowed people who were homosexual, mentally ill, or had a criminal record to leave Cuba. A decade later, categorized by the U.S. government as "stateless," the writer dies of AIDS.

With a life this full and complex, Schnabel has a lot of material to get through, and Before Night Falls should really have been longer. At its current length, the movie is dramatically unsatisfying, more a "Greatest Hits" collection from Arenas' life than a presentation of his full catalogue. The director has a terrific visual sense, and an aptitude for erotically representing his central character without a prurient leer, but he should have been more confident that the audience wanted to see his subject in greater detail.

Bardem is astonishingly good in the best role of his career. His early parts typecast him as the macho heterosexual stud, but he's recently been veering away from this (he also played a gay man in 1999's Segunda piel, which has not yet been released in the U.S.), and Before Night Falls takes him to another level entirely. Like Tom Cruise in Born on the Fourth of July, the actor is given the opportunity to create a character who goes through numerous iterations, and is utterly believable at every stage.

Other actors don't fare so well. They either suffer from under-representation in the script or from Schnabel's penchant for stunt casting (Sean Penn comes off the worst as a campesino who gives young Reinaldo a ride after the lad leaves home). Di Stefano exudes scads of charisma as Pepe, but this clearly significant relationship in Arenas' life is given short shrift. A similar fate befalls Olivier Martinez as Lázaro Carriles, who befriends the writer after his prison release and sees him through his illness in New York.

Portraying the life of an artist whose method is the written word is very difficult. Other modes of expression are far easier to represent visually and can allow the filmmaker to more successfully connect the audience with the main character's internal life. Bardem and the director work very well together to overcome this substantial obstacle, and Before Night Falls is successful because of their skill at composing and portraying the film's primary focus. It's just a shame that Schnabel neglects to fill in the rest of the portrait.

Kiss of the Dragon - 2001

Kiss of the Dragon (2001)

Forget Romeo Must Die. Please forget Lethal Weapon 4. Kiss of the Dragon is the crossover film Jet Li fans have been waiting for. Combining a cool, Ronin-like European setting with the Asian action star's top-notch kung fu, it's a first-rate adventure on par with many of his Hong Kong films. Thankfully, it also doesn't feature the mid-air wire-fu fighting that's quickly starting to become overused. Here, Li street-brawls with a brutality not seen since Fist of Legend, his remake of/tribute to Bruce Lee's Fists of Fury.
Kiss of the Dragon is much like another Bruce Lee movie, Return of the Dragon. Both films follow a Chinese martial arts expert to Europe where he hunts down a group of ruthless criminals. But whereas Bruce did it for revenge, Jet's doing it for justice. He plays Liu Jian, a crack Beijing cop seconded to the Parisian police to help bust a Chinese heroin dealer. However, the detective supervising the operation, Jean-Pierre Richard (Tcheky Karyo), turns out to also be said smack-peddler's French distributor — a murderous Bad Lieutenant who kills the Eastern drug dealer with Liu's gun, framing the Chinese lawman and forcing him to go on the run.

Revealing these details might be considered spoilerism. However, they all are shown in the film's first major scene, an action-packed 15-minute showstopper culminating in a laundry-room brawl where Jet takes on all comers with laundry baskets, mops, and steaming-hot irons.

Many filmmakers would merely jump to the gunplay, but freshman helmer Chris Nahon shows the same flair for stylish action that marked the early work of Kiss of the Dragon's producer/screenwriter Luc Besson, the fallen dauphin of French cinema. He builds tension by keeping the opening exposition to a minimum: Liu enters a swanky hotel, only to be rerouted to various rooms by secret notes and lurking bodyguards. Complications ensue with the appearance of a dazed prostitute named Jessica (Bridget Fonda), but Nahon lets the suspense mount, letting several nail-biting minutes pass before the guns start blazing.

While an action director with a sense of restraint is rare these days, Besson's script (based on a story by Li) has well-worn tropes aplenty. Blandly played by Fonda, Jessica is a hooker with a heart of platinum, turning tricks only because Richard is holding her young daughter hostage. As if that wasn't coincidence enough, Jessica also just happens to street-walk the same sordid alley that Liu's safe house is on. (You'd think the moneymen at Fox might've sprung for a second location, the cheapskates.) Richard is also straight out of the bad-guy playbook. You never believe for a millisecond that he could be anything but pure evil — the first glimpse viewers catch of him, he's beating a suspect to death with his bare hands.

Karyo, however, deserves credit for making his ridiculous character more palatable than written; most other actors would have pulled a Gary Busey and simply started cackling, hollering, and baring their teeth. However, like Tommy Lee Jones in Under Siege, Karyo gives his dirty cop a bit of shading and delivers some hilarious bon mots; when Jessica's daughter asks the part-time pimp if he has any Barbie dolls, he cheerfully replies "All my Barbies are working."

The real surprise performance, though, is Li. Given only a half-dozen lines in Romeo Must Die, he has more dialogue in Dragon than Jean-Claude Van Damme did in his last three films combined. Despite being saddled with a thick accent — which is appropriate, considering his character is from Beijing — Li carries himself with determination and grace. When Jessica's pimp starts roughing her up in front of Liu, the agent's outrage is convincing, as is his all-but-inevitable fury.

But no one's going to plunk down $8 to see Li emote — they're there to see him kick ass, which he does — en masse. Editor Marco Cavé's quick cutting may irk those used to watching Li deliver fisticuffs for minutes on end, but martial arts choreographer Corey Yuen smoothes over the rough patches. Using tricks honed directing such Li classics as New Legend of Shaolin and Fong Sai Yuk, he showcases Jet's ability to simultaneously pummel dozens of opponents. Nowhere does this skill shine more than during the finale, where Li batters an entire Paris police station into paté. After watching this dizzying orgy of hand-to-hand combat, there's no denying this Dragon has got some serious fire.