Film Review: "The Big Year" is for the Birds

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Saturday, 15 October 2011 10:46

Written by Lloyd Carroll

The Big Year
directed by David Frankel
starring Steve Martin, Jack Black, Owen Wilson

You have to give the filmmakers behind The Big Year credit for this much: at a time when Hollywood is criticized for few original thoughts, it's safe to say there's never been a film about competitive birdwatching. “Big year” is a term birders (they abhor being called “bird watchers”) use for the most passionate -- and generally wealthiest -- fanatics who take a full calendar year off to traipse across North America and compete for the honor of observing the most members of the aviary species.

If you think that sounds like a topic for cable’s National Geographic Channel and not a big screen movie, well you’re right. The film centers around three individuals, Stu Preissler (Steve Martin), Brad Harris (Jack Black) and Kenny Bostick (Owen Wilson), who play friendly at times and not so friendly at others in their joust to become top birder of 2010. The backstories of all three men involve some sort of life crisis. Stu is the CEO of a multi-billion dollar corporation and he wants nothing more at this point in life than to retire and run around the continent with his binoculars. Brad is a 35-year-old with a bad case of arrested development. He works as a computer programmer in the DC area and lives with his parents, played by the always welcome Brian Dennehy and Dianne Weist. He has saved up his money so that he too can run around following birds. Dad thinks he’s cuckoo while mom gives him encouragement and some needed funding.

The most troubled character, though, is Kenny. Bostick, as he's dismissively called, is so preoccupied that someone will break his record of observing 732 different bird species back in 2003 that he embarks on another “big year” much to the chagrin of his wife, Jessica (Rosamund Pike), who hears her biological clock ticking and wants to start a family in her oversized Bergen County home. Kenny is more obsessed with birding than he is with making his wife happy, even though it's clear that he loves her dearly.

While everyone's background stories are interesting, there's very little else to hold your intrigue once things get underway. Rashida Jones, in a prototypical role, plays a shy, sweet birder with whom Brad becomes understandably infatuated. Two wonderfully comic actors, Kevin Pollak and Joel McHale (star of NBC’s terrific Community), are wasted in straightlaced roles as executives in Stu’s company who keep badgering their old boss to return to headquarters and put out ongoing business fires.

Anjelica Huston shines through as a weary tugboat captain with a passionate dislike for Bostick. At a Manhattan press conference sponsored by the film’s distributor, 20th Century-Fox, Steve Martin claimed that the lead characters are “passionate” and not “obsessed.” Just as the Persuaders once sang that it’s a thin line between love and hate, apparently it’s an even thinner one between passion and obsession. I surely won’t be the only critic to use this line but it must be said: The Big Year is for the birds.

Dance Review: Mostly Balanchine at New York City Ballet

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Wednesday, 12 October 2011 16:00

Written by Jack Angstreich

New York City Ballet's program on October 1st, 2010 opened with George Balanchine's excellent Concerto Barocco, set to J.S. Bach's glorious Double Violin Concerto in D Minor. The modernity of Balanchine's choreography here, even as he employs a classical language, is the basis for an exhilarating symbiosis with Bach's expression of the spirit of an aristocratic age -- Bach's music has never sounded more modern than in this ballet. Given the enormous ambition -- in terms of the number of works presented -- of every City Ballet season, it's not surprising that there should be infelicities with regard to timing, synchronization, etc. At this performance, some in the corps could have been more rigorously rehearsed -- indeed, there were such weaknesses in all the ballets in this program in which the corps appeared -- but, overall, these dancers were not lacking in energy, which made for an exciting experience. The featured performers were not especially distinguished in commanding attention nor did they always avoid some clunkiness in execution. But, as a whole, Concerto Barocco was a success: Balanchine's vision here is so strong that the formalism of this dance -- its abstract poetry -- proved enchanting and, in the slow movement pas de deux, oddly moving.

Concerto Barocco repeats in the spring; I look forward to revisiting it.

Equally impressive as choreography -- although conceived in a different register -- and performed with a greater confidence and precision was Balanchine's Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux, set to the original music for the pas de deux in Act III of Swan Lake. Although there were some imperfections, both of the dancers here danced thrillingly: Joaquin De Luz, with breathtaking athleticism, and Megan Fairchild more graceful and assured here than elsewhere, of late.

After an intermission, the company presented Benjamin Millepied's Why am I not where you are, choreographed to a surprisingly effective and memorable score by Thierry Escaich and featuring a set designed by renowned architect, Santiago Calatrava, who served as an artist-in-residence for City Ballet last season, when this piece received its premiere. The presiding genius influencing this work appears to be Jerome Robbins but I find the choreography here compelling, not derivative, even if there is a certain, easily disregarded, banality in its theme. The dancers brought the requisite enthusiasm to this ballet although lead dancer, Sean Suozzi, was outshone by Janie Taylor and -- here, unexpectedly strong -- Amar Ramessar. However, the greatest performance was certainly that of Sara Mearns, who can be an astonishing dancer.

The program closed with the Balanchine masterpiece, Chaconne, set to Christoph Willibald Gluck's glorious ballet music for the opera, Orfeo ed Euridice. The two principal dancers, Wendy Whelan and Sébastien Marcovici were effective in the second "Pas de Deux" but I was also very impressed with Erica Pereira in the first "Pas de Deux" and with Stephanie Zungre in the "Pas de Cinq".

I was pleased to see Chaconne repeated on the October 3rd program with the same cast. It was followed by Balanchine's Momentum Pro Gesualdo, choreographed to Igor Stravinsky's hommage to the great 16th century composer -- and murderer! -- Don Carlo Gesualdo, himself the subject of a classic novel written by the great Giovanni Verga (and translated into English by D. H. Lawrence). Stravinsky's music modernizes the late Renaissance structures appropriated from Gesualdo and Balanchine here found a correlative style suspended austerely between an antique classicism and a bold modernism. The excellent principal dancer, Teresa Reichlen, was memorable here.

More modernist, both musically and choreographically, is Balanchine's Movements for Piano and Orchestra, which followed, also scored to Stravinsky, here in the serialist mode which he embraced, under the influence of Robert Craft, in the last phase of his career. The outstanding soloist, Rebecca Krohn, was the highlight at this performance.

Both Stravinsky ballets repeat in the spring.

Also repeated on this program was Tschaikovsky Pas de Deux, although this time featuring Ashley Bouder and Andrew Veyette, with the accomplished Bouder a standout here.

The program closed with an expanded version of the long-unseen and delightful, The Magic Flute, a classic story-ballet winningly choreographed by Peter Martins -- indeed, it is one of his most satisfying achievements -- to a charming, tuneful score by the 19th-century ballet composer, Riccardo Drigo. The lead role was beautifully performed by one of the best male dancers in the company, the energetic and athletic Joaquin de Luz, but he was outshone in every duet by his partner, the exquisite Tiler Peck. One episode featured an outstanding quartet of dancers in the corps: Stephanie Zungre, Alina Dronova, Maya Collins, and Lauren King.

The Magic Flute will be reprised in February and I greatly look forward to revisiting it.

New York City Ballet Program

Concerto Barocco                                                                                                                Concerto in D minor for Two Violins, B.W.V. 1043 composed by Johann Sebastian Bach        Choreographed by George Balanchine

Tschaikovsky's Pas de Deux Excerpt from Swan Lake, Op. 20, Act III

composed by Peter Ilyitch Tschaikovsky                                                             

Choreographed by George Balanchine

Why am I not where you are                                                                                       

The Lost Dancer composed by Thierry Escaich                                                       

Choreographed by Benjamin Millepied

Chaconne                                                                                                                                            Ballet music from the opera Orfeo ed Euridice composed by Christoph Willibald Gluck Choreographed by George Balanchine

New York City Ballet                                                                                                          

David H. Koch Theater                                                                                                        

New York, NY 10023

Call: 212-870-5570

http://www.nycballet.com

Kevin's October '11 Digital Week II

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Reviews

Published on Monday, 10 October 2011 20:00

Written by Kevin Filipski

Blu-rays of the Week
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure (Warners)
Two of Tim Burton’s most impressive visual feasts finally get their long-overdue hi-def upgrades: his colorful debut, 1988’s Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, and his 2005 “remake” of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, with a weirdly off-putting turn by Johnny Depp as Willy Wonka.

Of course, Blu-ray is the perfect format for Burton’s surreal extravaganzas, since his singular directorial eye and arresting color palette are simply breathtaking transferred to hi-definition. Extras include Burton commentaries and on-set featurettes.

Go West and Battling Butler (Kino)
A pair of lesser-known silent gems continues Kino’s Buster Keaton Hi-Def Upgrade. 1925’s Go West finds Keaton heading west on a train to find his calling as a rancher, with a spellbinding comic climax of a cattle stampede through L.A.; 1926’s Battling Butler shows Keaton hoping to impress his girlfriend’s tough-guy brothers by entering the ring--needless to say, his climactic bout is a doozy.

These films are in slightly rougher shape than earlier issues, but they’ve been cleaned up nicely; extras include a Keaton audio recording, a Hal Roach short also titled Go West, and excerpts from Keaton’s screenplay for a 1947 Battling Butler remake.

Harakiri (Criterion)
Masaki Kobayashi’s classic 1962 samurai film is structured brilliantly: a talky, intentionally static first half gives way to kinetic blood-letting in some of the most elegantly staged fight sequences ever filmed. Kobayashi’s stellar photography and razor-sharp editing are the big draws here, along with Tatsuya Nakadai’s sublimely controlled performance.

The Criterion Collection’s Blu-ray transfer of this seminal Japanese film may be the most exquisite-looking black-and-white film in their collection; extras comprise scholar Donald Richie‘s introduction and Kobayashi, Nakadai and screenwriter Shinobu Hashimoto interviews.

The Lion King and African Cats (Disney)
It’s no coincidence that Disney released its “lion” movies on Blu-ray at the same time, since everyone who loves The Lion King will also love watching, in their native habitat, real African Cats, a family-oriented nature documentary in the vein of Disney’s own Earth and Oceans. 1994’s The Lion King, one of Disney’s most beloved animated features, looks absolutely terrific on Blu (even without 3-D), while African Cats records Simba’s real-life counterparts with excellent hi-definition cameras.

Extras on Cats include behind-the-scenes featurettes, a music video and interactive featurettes that explain filmmakers’ intentions; Lion King extras include never-seen deleted scenes and bloopers, a deleted song, extended scene and making-of featurettes.

Planet Earth (BBC Earth)

The classic 2006 BBC series set the standard for televised nature documentaries when it first aired, then set the standard for Blu-ray when it was first released. Now, with technology moving forward even faster, this new, upgraded Blu-ray release is even more astonishing to watch.

The six-disc set is packed with hours of bonus features, including a quartet of new programs (Great Planet Earth Moments, Snow Leopard: Beyond the Myth, Secrets of the Maya Underworld, Elephant Nomads of the Namib Desert) that nicely complement the original nine-hour series, audio commentary, video diaries, a music-only option and a sneak peek of the upcoming Frozen Planet.

Le Quattro Volte (Kino Lorber)
Michelangelo Frammartino’s astonishing documentary, shot in southern Italy’s Calabrian hills, is a nearly wordless exploration of man and nature’s life cycle. With perfect  control, the director shows the daily life of an elderly shepherd, his goats, herding dog and surrounding countryside (including a magnificent fir tree): life and death casually—and causally—interconnected.

A jaw-dropping sequence of the old man’s dog is so intricately structured that it seems staged: that it’s real life makes it more incredible. The final sequence, which seems aimless, climaxes with forceful images of recycling in the truest sense. The exquisite cinematography gets its due on this first-rate Blu-ray; no extras.

Scream 4 (Dimension)
The fourth go-round for this self-referential, winking horror franchise is three too many. Even if it never takes itself seriously, the constant references to other horror movies get old-hat fast; and, stretched to nearly two hours, it’s obvious director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson couldn’t let their beloved in-jokes go.

David Arquette, Courtney Cox and Neve Campbell are awful, but the “kids” make it watchable: Hayden Panetierre shows a knack for self-parody and Emma Roberts has a blast as a foul-mouthed, not-quite-what-she-seems teen. The hi-def image is impeccable; extras include a commentary track, gag reel, deleted and extended scenes, and alternate opening and ending.

The Showgirl Must Go On (Image)
This entertaining chronicle of Bette Midler’s return to Las Vegas in 2008 showcases a star with perfect comic timing, flamboyant theatrical flair and a solid song list (which includes her ‘70s novelty, “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” and beloved standards like “The Rose” and “Wind Beneath My Wings”).

Even though she’s in her 60s, the Divine Miss M still has the energy of performers half her age, and far more talent than most of them. The Blu-ray image is much sharper than the DVD version, and the audio has a lot more clarity and punch. Unfortunately, there are no extras: since the show is barely 70 minutes, it’s too bad that no backstage featurette or Midler interview is included.

Submarine (Anchor Bay)
Writer-director Richard Ayoade’s coming-of-age comedy balances preciousness and insightfulness in an easily digestible stew. With a minimum of visual flourishes,  Ayoade tells a teenager’s story of dealing with his own fantasies, girls at school and his parents’ troubles in a clever, original way, and the acting by Craig Roberts, Yasmin Paige, Sally Hawkins and Noah Taylor is superb.

This touching tale contains enough quirkiness to satisfy its “cool” quotient without overdoing the eccentricity. The Blu-ray transfer is excellent; extras include deleted scenes and a making-of featurette.

DVDs of the Week
Buck (MPI)
This compassionate portrait of a real-life horse whisperer who was technical advisor on Robert Redford’s 1998 film based on the famous novel is a straightforward look at an ordinary but eccentric character with a compelling back story.

Buck is an authentic slab of Americana, a man whose special talent (handling the wildest of horses) is related to a deep, dark secret he candidly discusses. This beautiful-looking film, which lovingly studies marvelous equines and landscapes, details an engaging true story. Deleted scenes are the lone extra.

Death of the Virgin (Indican Pictures)
Joseph Tito’s middling, muddled thriller has a trendy storyline, a la The Da Vinci Code: in the Italian town of Caravaggio (the famed artist’s hometown), a shocking series of murders based on his paintings are occurring. Or are they just one woman‘s dreams?

Despite an attractive cast led by gorgeous Maria Grazia Cucinotta (best known as the love interest in the Oscar nominated Il Postino) and equally attractive locales, the movie is nothing more than a series of grisly killings with occasional sparks of visual or dramatic invention courtesy of the long-dead painter.

Moby Dick (Vivendi)
Herman Melville’s unfilmable novel (even John Huston came a cropper in 1956) is barely dented in director Mike Barker’s three-hour adaptation. Despite stirring sea sequences shot off Nova Scotia‘s coast, the movie is a mere collection of plot highlights, beginning with a not-so-clever scene where we hear the novel’s famous opening, “Call me Ishmael.”

William Hurt woefully lacks gravitas as Captain Ahab, Charlie Cox makes a handsome but blank Ishmael, and Donald Sutherland a crazed Father Mapple (Orson Welles also hammed it up in Huston’s version). Even the appearance of the infamous white whale is anti-climactic, especially since it’s reminiscent of the mechanic shark in Jaws.

To Be Twenty (Raro Video)
Fernando Di Leo, an Italian cult director getting his due on video after decades of neglect, made this bizarre and bloody sexploitation flick in 1978. Nubile actresses Gloria Guida and Lilli Carati are memorable as carefree, sexually liberated small-town girls who hitchhike to Rome to look for the “sweet life” and find more than they bargained for, culminating in a truly chilling finale that apparently was too much for censors even in the late 70s.

Two versions of the film are included: the shredded 85-minute cut and Di Leo’s 98-minute director’s cut, with lots more skin and mayhem. The lone extra is a half-hour featurette about the film, including a Di Leo interview.