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Double
Trouble BAD EDUCATION: Written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar. Produced by Augustín Almodóvar. Cinematography, José Luis Alcaine. Edited by José Salcedo. Music, Alberto Inglesias. Art director, Antxón Gómez. Starring Gael García Bernal and Fele Martínez, with Javier Cámara, Daniel Giménez-Cacho, Lluis Homar, Francisco Boira, Francisco Maestre, Juan Fernández, Ignacio Pérez, Raúl García Forneiro, Alberto Ferreiro and Petra Martínez. Sony Pictures Classics, 2004. 110 minutes. NR.
Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar consistently creates interesting, layered, character-driven, richly cinematic works that require the audience to participate in uncovering the film's meaning. He is a master storyteller, satisfying my need for complexity while not abandoning narrative structure. Almodóvar works on an emotional level that resonates. He forgives his characters their bad behavior but gives each room to express a range of feelings. He incorporates fantasy elements into realistic stories, such as last year's stunning Talk to Her, which I feel sure I saw way more times than you did. Already I know twice is not enough to fully understand Bad Education. So if you like being spoon-fed, skip this movie. Otherwise, plan to see it at least a couple of times. One of the most challenging aspects of the film is time. It opens in 1980, in Madrid, at the home of a film director, Enrique Goded (Fele Martínez). A man who claims to be an old school friend from childhood, Ignacio Rodriguez (Gael García Bernal), interrupts Enrique's work. Enrique doesn't recognize Ignacio, who says he is now an actor using the stage name of Angel Andrade. Identity joins time in flexibility. Enrique is looking for material for his next film, and he is touched when Angel offers him a story called "The Visit." The film moves back in time to 1964, when Enrique (Raúl García Forneiro) first met and fell in love with Ignacio (Francisco Boira). The situation was charged, because the boarding school principal, Father Manolo (Daniel Giménez-Cacho), was helplessly in love with one boy and had the other expelled. But reading Ignacio/Angel's story, Enrique begins to see it as a movie script. Now the film slides deeper into the movie-within-the-movie, and identities go through further transformations. As an adult, Ignacio has become a transvestite prostitute and cabaret performer named Zahara (Gael García Bernal). In the script, Zahara goes to the old school, where Fr. Manolo still holds mass, with her lover and criminal partner, Paquito (Javier Cámara, Benigno in Talk to Her). As the story deepens, and the movie is being filmed, still more identities melt and run together, such as Juan (Gael García Bernal), Mr. Berenguer (Lluis Homar), junkie drag queen (Francisco Boira), and Ignacio's mother (Petra Martínez). It takes a couple of viewings just to begin seeing how all the various personae interact. Are they all characters from the mind of the filmmaker? Which filmmaker: Enrique Goded or Pedro Almodóvar? Of course, Almodóvar has been asked countless times about whether the film is autobiographical. He says no, these things did not happen to him. But yes, as a youth he did attend a Catholic boarding school, where he heard similar stories from friends. One aspect of Enrique's character that seems to come from Almodóvar's actual life was his discovery at age 10 of the word "hedonist," which he decided fit him perfectly. But Almodóvar steadfastly denies targeting the church. "'Bad Education' is not a settling of scores with the priests who 'bad-educated' me or with the clergy in general," Almodóvar writes in the production notes. "If I had needed to take revenge I wouldn't have waited 40 years to do so. The church doesn't interest me, not even as an adversary." An Almodóvar film wouldn't be complete without homage to films that opened the world to an imaginative boy who grew up in a small Spanish village during Franco's long stranglehold on cultural life and cinema. We see three movie posters on a wall, but I can identify only the first: Double Indemnity, an influential film noir from 1944 directed by Billy Wilder. Late in Bad Education, two characters sit through a double bill, which the production notes identify as Renoir's La Bête Humaine and Marcel Carné's Thérèse Raquin. Almodóvar deconstructs the noir genre in his own brilliant manner. This one is a jewel. Explicit sex may be problematic for some viewers, but try to get past it. Bad Education isn't about sex; it's about stories and how we can't live without them. A great film by my favorite filmmaker, Bad Education opens at the Bijou on Friday, Feb. 17, with the very highest recommendations.
Deceiving
John Q. Public WMD: WEAPONS OF MASS DECEPTION: Documentary directed and produced by Danny Schechter. Producer, Anna Pizzaro. Editors, Kozo Okumura, David Chai. Music, Nenad Bach. Cinema Libre Studio, 2004. NR. 98 minutes.
News is big business, and media critic Danny Schechter makes it his business to analyze what gets covered in print and electronically. In choosing to document coverage of the war in Iraq, Schechter shows there are essentially three different wars: the war we see and read about in the US, a commercial war; the war as it appears in Europe; and the war the rest of the world sees. His latest book is Embedded: Weapons of Mass Deception: How the Media Failed to Cover the War on Iraq. Schechter's conclusions don't come from the haphazard network crawling I did during the so-called war but rather from "embedding" himself in front of the television and watching wall-to-wall coverage. I did some of that during the first Gulf War, in part because a family member was in Saudi at the time, and I was worried about her. Although I was a graduate student in the journalism school at UO, I had trouble detaching emotionally from images and words spoken on the screen. Unlike my experience, Schechter's viewing of this war was methodological. He earned the authority to call the media's lopsided coverage of the war Weapons of Mass Deception. "There were two wars going on in Iraq," he wrote. "One was fought with armies of soldiers, bombs and a fearsome military force. The other was fought alongside it with cameras, satellites, armies of journalists and propaganda techniques." If you've been to Schechter's web site — Mediachannel.org — you may have read some of the gazillion words he's written to show a staggering similarity of coverage across media outlets. In WMD the film, reporters outside the mainstream media such as Peter Arnett add their voices to Schechter's. Once an MSNBC correspondent, Ashleigh Banfield was chastised by her bosses at NBC and dropped by the network the following year. Her crime: She told the audience during a speech at Kansas State University the war coverage was "sanitized." Ooops! Language control is a subtle but efficient way to limit an argument, a device by which to define the terms and claim the high ground. Using words calculated to put U.S. actions in the best light, the mainstream media knowingly or inadvertently helps the Bush administration get away with murder every day. Maybe Schechter can wake up people who take literally words written thousands of years ago, but I doubt it. It takes an open mind to see how the public is manipulated by what Schechter calls the "militainment" of the post-journalism era. This film tracks the media war through the summer of 2004. It opens at the Bijou on Friday, Feb. 18 and deserves your support and attendance. Highly recommended.
A Stacked Deck TARNATION: Documentary film by Jonathan Caouette. Produced by Stephen Winter. Executive producers, Gus Van Sant, John Cameron Mitchell. Wellspring Release, 2004. NR. 88 minutes. Opens UO Cultural Forum's 13th Annual Queer Film Festival. Plays at 7 pm on Feb. 25 in 180 PLC, UO campus. One of the most difficult-to-watch films I've ever forced myself to sit through, Tarnation drags its raggedy-ass, pulp beauty through the bare dirt yards of Texas trailer parks to sing a song of sadness, madness and determination. Filmmaker Jonathan Caoutte (pronounced co-ETTE) has taken a lifetime of home movies and cobbled together a jittery, wholly original montage of moving and still images, photo-booth pictures, drag impersonations and pure psychotic ravings. I'm not sure it's a movie, but whatever it is, it's riveting, terrifying yet impossible to stop watching. This is not entertainment. Caoutte's mother, Renée LeBlanc had a miserable childhood. She was a beautiful child, but one day she jumped off the roof of her house and landed on her feet without flexing her knees. We aren't given a medical explanation for the resulting paralysis, but Renée's parents allowed doctors to give their child repeated electroshock treatments. She recovered — she could walk and talk —but her mind was never right. Because ignorance is a dangerous condition, the grandparents set up the same pattern for little Jon. He, too, ended up with a scrambled brain, thanks to eager doctors willing to shoot electricity through it. Set up to self-destruct, Jonathan found a lot of ways to burn out. Home movies of him in drag at age 11 and later are terrifying. Renée never lost her love for the camera, either, although her beauty faded quickly, leaving her desperate and manic. A lot of people, including filmmaker Gus Van Sant, believe Caouette finds redemption through this psychedelic, pop purge. I'm not so sure. Besides electroshock, he endured years of abuse in foster homes as well as brain damage and dissociation from doing bad drugs. That's a lot for anyone to overcome. Maybe he'll find grace with an ordinary life. Not fame. No glitter, just everyday feelings, without the presence of a camera. Love. The Queer Film Festival kicks off Friday, Feb. 18 with a free showing of Brother to Brother, a 90-minute film directed by Rodney Evans starring Anthony Mackie at 8 pm in 180 PLC, UO campus. Go to darkwing.uoregon.edu/~qff for all the details on the Queer Film Festival. — Lois Wadsworth
OPENING
OR RETURNING: Bad Education: Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar (Talk to Her) consistently makes some of the most interesting films in world cinema. This film travels from 1980 back to 1964, with stops between, and the characters' identities meld and twist Child molestation in a Catholic boy's school is the original situation, but the stories we tell ourselves and others is at the heart of the film. Very highest recommendations. NR. Bijou. See review this issue. Because of Winn-Dixie: A lonely child adopts an orphaned dog she names Winn-Dixie, who helps her make friends in a small town in Florida. Directed by Wayne Wang, film stars Jeff Daniels, Dave Matthews, Cicely Tyson, Eva Marie Saint and AnnaSophia Robb. PG. Cinema World. Cinemark. Brother to Brother: Rodney Evans' 90 minute feature stars actor Anthony Mackie as a NYC art student kicked out by his family for a homosexual encounter. A chance meeting with a legendary Harlem poet of the 1920s changes his life. Queen Film Festival. Plays at 8 pm on 2/24 in 180 PLC. Free. Constantine: Stars Keanu Reeves, Rachel Weisz, Shia LeBeouf, Tilda Swinton, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Djimon Hounsou and Peter Stormare. An epic set in a world of demons and angels. Hmmm. Based on comic, Hellblazer. R. Cinemark. Cinema World. Constructing Public Opinion and How Democrats and Progressives Can Win: Prof. George Lakoff leads discussion after the films, which start at 7:15 on 2/21 in Cozmic Pizza. Free. Crossing the Abyss: Miriam's Journey: Shows with three other Oregon Documentary Project short films at 7 pm on 2/17 in 182 Lillis, UO campus. Free. Hijacking Catastrophe: 2004 documentary covers two decades of neo-conservative Republicans such as Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney setting the stage for the so-called Bush Doctrine (of American imperialism). Must-see viewing, it's an excellent, cogent political film. Unconstitutional (2004): The effect of the Patriot Act is shown in this documentary, which looks at claims of government surveillance and censorship. At 7 pm on 2/23 in 180 PLC, UO campus. Free. Ivan the Terrible (1946): Sergei Eisenstein uses this biography of the Russian dictator who declared himself czar and brutally consolidated centralized power to shed light on the taboo subjects of Boshevisim and Stalin. At 7 pm on 2/22 in 115 Pacific. Free. Kinsey: Bill Condon's excellent film about human sexual researcher Alfred Kinsey stars Liam Neeson, Laura Linney and Peter Sarsgaard. Frank, open-hearted and genuinely humorous, it's an entertaining, enlightening antidote to the bedroom politics of the religious right and one of 2004's best. Highest recommendations. 2004 Academy Award nomination for Linney. R. Movies 12. Online archives. Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events: The misadventures of three orphans who fall into the hands of an evil count are popular with children and adults. Jim Carrey stars, with many co-stars. Directed by Brad Silberling. PG. Movies 12. Lonesome Cowboy (1969): Andy Warhol directed this "borderline surrealist spoof on the Western and was placed on the FBI watch list as a result. Part of both the Warhol Film Festival and the Queer Film Festival, it plays at 8 pm on 2/24 in 180 PLC.. Free. Lou Harrison: A World of Music: A work in progress discussed by filmmaker Eva Stoles. At 8 pm on 2/17 at DIVA. $5. Also, Stoles presents a workshop from 10 am- 2 pm on 2/19 at DIVA. $40. Preregistration required; programs@divanow or 954-8373. Mission Against Terror: Documentary on the Cuban Five, with filmmaker Bernie Dwyer at 7 pm on 2/21 in 100 Willamette, UO campus. Free. Ocean's Twelve: Director Steven Soderbergh returns with the gang: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, Bernie Mac, Andy Garcia, Julia Roberts and newby Catherine Zeta-Jones. Highly recommended for its unabashedly confident entertainment value. PG-13. Movies 12. Online archives. Son of the Mask: Family comedy stars Jamie Kennedy as father of a new son, Lavey, who is born with the supernatural powers of The Mask. Throw in a jealous family dog, and the mischievous Nrose god Loki, and you've got trouble. Crude and suggestive humor and language. PG. Cinemark. Suspira (1977): Dario Argento's horror fllick had good-for-the-era special effects and what Videohound calls "a chilling opening sequence." At 6 pm on 2/20 at DIVA. Free. Vera Drake: Mike Leigh's gritty portrait of a good neighbor who helps girls in trouble in mid-1950s England. Staunton gives an understated dignity to her role, which infuses the film with warmth and humanity. 2004 Academy Award nominations for director Mike Leigh, also nominated for original screenplay; actress Imelda Staunton. R. Bijou. WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception: Media analyst Danny Schechter's documentary studies the US coverage of the war in Iraq and finds it seriously jingoistic. 2/18 -2/20 at Bijou. See review this issue. Films open the Friday following EW publication date unless otherwise noted. See archived reviews at www.eugeneweekly.com
CONTINUING: Are We There Yet?: In Brian Levant's new movie, Ice Cube takes his recently divorced girlfriend Nia Long's two kids on a road trip from Portland to Vancouver, BC, on New Year's Eve. Jay Mohr plays his best friend. PG. Cinemark. Aviator, The: Martin Scorsese's 169-minute film about lover, aviation pioneer and eccentric billionaire industrialist Howard Hughes stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Hughes, with Cate Blanchett, Kate Beckinsale, John C. Reilly, Alec Baldwin, Jude Law, Alan Alda, Frances Conroy and Ian Holm. DiCaprio is brilliant in the role, and Scorsese makes the film his own. One of the best films of the year. Very highest recommendations. 11 Academy Åward noms for picture, director, Di Caprio actor, Alan Alda supporting actor, Cate Blanchett supporting actress, John Logan original screenplay, Dante Ferretti art direction, Robert Richardson cinematography, Sandy Powell costumes, sound mixing, Thelma Schoonmaker film editing. PG-13. Cinemark. Cinema World. Online archives. Boogeyman: Horror, terror and violence await you as Barry Watson, Emily Deschanel and others confront the boogeyman. PG-13. Cinemark. Elektra: Jennifer Garner plays Elektra, a killing machine, based on the Marvel comic book character. Co-stars Goran Visnjic ("ER"), Terence Stamp, Abby Miller. PG-13. Movies 12. Fat Albert: Bill Cosby character debuts in a live-action and animated film based on Cosby's stand-up routines about growing up in Philly. Directed by Joel Zwick. PG. Movies 12. Finding Neverland: Johnny Depp stars as British playwright J.M. Barrie, based on Allan Knee's play, The Man Who Was Peter Pan. Directed by Marc Foster, it co-stars Kate Winslet, Julie Christie, Radha Mitchell, Dustin Hoffman. Winslet and Depp's performances are radiant, but the real star is 12 year-old Freddie Highmore, playing the boy who inspired Barrie's play. Heartbreaking, gorgeous and probably too complicated for young children. 7 Academy Award noms for best picture, Depp actor, David Magee adapted screenplay, original score, Gemma Jackson art direction, Alexandra Byrne costumes, Matt Chesse film editing. PG. Cinema World. Online archives. Flight of the Phoenix: Using Robert Aldrich's 1965 adventure film as his base, John Moore updates the main story, in which crash survivors in the vast, remote Gobi Desert attempt to put their fractured plane together and fly out. Stars include Giovanni Ribisi, Dennis Quaid and Jacob Vargas. PG-13. Movies 12. Hide and Seek: Robert DeNiro plays a recently widowed father desperate to break through to his daughter (Dakota Fanning), who has an imaginary friend with a terrifying agenda. Directed by John Polson. Co-stars Famke Janssen, Elisabeth Shue, Amy Irving, Dylan Baker. R. Cinemark. Hitch: Will Smith stars in this romantic comedy as a New York "date doctor" who helps hapless men woo the women of the their dreams. Costars Kevin James, Amber Valletta, Eva Mendes, Michael Rappaport and Adam Arkin. Directed by Andy Tennant. PG-13. Cinema World. Cinemark. Hotel Rwanda: During the Rwandan massacres of 1994, a hotel manager named Paul Rusesabagina offered refuge to more than 1,000 Tutsis fleeing rampaging Hutus. Directed by Terry George, film stars Don Cheadle, with co-stars Sophie Okonedo, Joaquin Phoenix, Nick Nolte. 3 Academy Award nominations: Cheadle, best actor; Okenedo, supporting actress; original screenplay. Very highest recommendations.PG-13. Cinema World. Cinemark. Online archives. Just Hustle: West Coast filmmaker Sage Bannick's homage to the French New Wave is about a private detective who gets involved with a college gambling ring. Stars Samia Doumit, Efrin Ramirez, Marissa Tait, Benji Olson. LateNite Bijou. Meet the Fockers: Jay Roach directs Ben Stiller, Teri Polo, Robert De Niro, Blythe Danner, Dustin Hoffman, Barbara Streisand. Culture clash. Surprisingly funny and heart-warming, with a lovable performance by Hoffman. PG-13. Cinemark. Online archives. Million Dollar Baby: Clint Eastwood, who directed, produced and composed the music for this film, co-stars with Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman in this story of a spunky fighter, a reluctant trainer and an ex-boxer who looks after the gym. One of 2004's best films. Very highest recommendations. 7 Academy Award nominations for best picture, Eastwood director, Eastwood actor, Hilary Swank actress, Morgan Freeman supporting actor, Paul Haggis adapted screenplay and Joel Cox film editing. PG-13. Cinemark. Cinema World. Online archives. Phantom of the Opera, The: The Andrew Lloyd Webber musical is brought to the screen by Joel Schumacher, starring Emmy Rossum, Gerard Butler and Patrick Wilson. Under Schumacher's insipid direction, kitsch dominates. If you already love the work, you may enjoy the film, but its way too-sweet for me. 3 Academy Award nominations for original song, art direction and John Mathieson cinematography. PG-13. Cinemark. Online archives. Polar Express, The: Robert Zemeckis (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?) directs a wholly CG animation adventure, starring Tom Hanks in multiple roles in this adaptation of children's book by Chris Van Allsburg. Called "performance capture," the technique uses actors' live-action performances to drive the emotions and movements of the digital characters. G. Movies 12. Pooh's Heffalump Movie: Pooh, Piglet and Tigger set out to capture a Heffalump in the Hundred Acre Wood. Voices by Jim Cummings and Brenda Blethyn. G. Cinemark. Racing Stripes: A farmer (Bruce Greenwood) and his daughter (Hayden Panettiere raise a baby zebra to become a champion racer. Live action, computer animation. Voices by Frankie Muniz, Dustin Hoffman, Whoopi Goldberg, Snoop Dogg. PG. Cinemark. Ray: Jamie Foxx plays late, great Ray Charles in this musical, biographical drama directed by Taylor Hackford. Co-stars Kerry Washington, Regina King. Outstanding performance by Foxx. One of the year's finest films. 6 Academy Award nominations for best picture, Taylor Hackford director, Jamie Foxx actor, Sharen Davis costumes, sound mixing and Paul Hirsch film editing. PG-13. Movies 12. Online archives. Shall We Dance: American remake of the sublime Japanese film of the same title. Jennifer Lopez plays the dance teacher; Richard Gere is the shy man who learns to dance. See the original. PG-13. Movies 12. Shark Tale: Computer-animated feature. Lovable tropical fish (Will Smith) takes on the underwater Mafia when he assumes responsibility for killing the godfather of the Great White Sharks. Voices include Jack Black, Robert De Niro, Renée Zellweger, Angelina Jolie, Martin Scorsese; Eric Bergeron. 2 Academy Award nomination for animated feature, original song. PG. Movies 12. Sideways: Alexander Payne's social comedy follows two guys on a bachelor week in California wine country. Great performances by Paul Giamatti (American Splendor) and Thomas Haden Church ("Wings") sweetens the tale, as do Virginia Madsen and Sandra Oh. One of the best films of the year. Don't miss. Academy Award nominations for best picture, director, Church supporting actor, Madsen supporting actress, Payne and Jim Taylor adapted screenplay. R. Cinemark. Online archives. SpongeBob SquarePants: Animated feature starring one of Nickelodeon's most absorbing characters. Voices: Alec Baldwin, Scarlett Johansson. PG. Movies 12. Wedding Date: Debra Messing, Dermot Mulroney and Jeremy Sheffield star in a romantic comedy direted by Clare Kilner. PG-13. Cinemark. Cinema World. Online archives. White Noise: Stars Michael Keaton as an architect who thinks his dead wife (Chandra West) is talking to him through electronic devices in their home. Geoffrey Sax directs; Deborah Kara Unger, Ian McNeice co-star. PG-13. Movies 12.
MOVIE
THEATERS Bijou
Art Cinemas Regal
Cinemas Cinemark
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