Born to Be Wild

Review: The Hurt Locker

Thirty-eight days left in Bravo Company, and the explosives men are cracking wise. But when the bomb they set off takes out one of their own, in steps Sergeant First Class William James (Jeremy Renner), a renegade with 873 diffused bombs to his credit. He stores parts from memorable explosives under his bed, one from the U.N., another that almost killed him. Right away, his recklessness gets on Sergeant JT Sanborn (Anthony Mackie), who plays by the book.

Nerves run high enough in Iraq after the 2004 invasion; director Kathryn Bigelow wisely does not turn The Hurt Locker into a maverick-versus-status quo narrative. She and screenwriter Mark Boal realize that a great war film targets no enemies beyond that inevitable, any-day-now feeling. For Sgt. James, war is adrenaline, the only way to experience life. Diffusing an explosive-laden car, he removes his safety gear ("If I die, I want to die comfortable."), striking with the bomb an intimacy he knows nowhere else.

A few cameos, some foreshortened, keep the stakes high. For James, the journey is less about endurance than addiction; he can't love his family back home in the same way. Despite the day-to-day responsibility as an insurgent, Sanborn envies his partner's risk-taking. Mackie offers strong support in the film, notably in his quiet desperation at the end: "I'm done. I want a son. I want a little boy, Will."

The Hurt Locker rides on Renner's shoulders, and he swings between wild and sedate with ease. As James ebbs in and out of paranoia, his inner turmoil flares up and recedes quickly, like bits of shrapnel piercing his surface cool. Lest I make this sound too serious, it's really a knuckle-biting action movie. Bigelow captures the electricity of each new bomb, within the grim streets of invaded Baghdad. The film can be a disjointed series of episodes; rather than building to one singular climax, it takes a near-documentary approach to the humor and anxiety with which these men pass each hour. The threat of death looms, but never as heavily as the fear of survival.

We Know That There's Always Tomorrow

Review: Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire

All the hype, the Sundance cred, the Oprah-Tyler Perry stigma. Precious may be based on a novel, as noted by the insistent subtitle, but it’s a visceral movie experience. Ten minutes in, during the first of many eviscerating verbal beat-downs by Precious’s mother Mary (a devastating performance by Mo'Nique), I worried I wouldn't be able to watch more.

Lee Daniels deserves credit for imbuing the grimmest of urban tragedies with occasional flashes of an exterior world. Precious, sixteen and pregnant again by her father, steps away—or maybe toward—into a fantasy world: swashes of parties, red carpets, autograph signings, the latest couture. The film charts a course of transformation via Precious's imagination. When more and more weighs her down (and believe me, the heaviness never lets up): through writing, her teacher and nurse (Paula Patton and Lenny Kravitz, both on their game), the birth of her son.

I don't know if Gabourey Sidibe will sustain a career in acting, but she's very affecting here. Her taciturn face and mumbled speech form a blank slate on which she registers every hardship with tenacity. In the final scene, a tremulous showdown between Mo'Nique and Sidibe, each actress holds her own without lapsing into sentimentality.

Precious invokes many emotions, but is never maudlin. Some musical cues (gospel ballads at the end of a fight, for example) feel shoe-horned in, as if Daniels needed all the levity he could muster. It's amazing how this film has taken off since its Sundance premiere; though it's easy to blister at the horrors within, there's more than urban welfare critique. Precious, like the title character, feeds off a strain of possibility, just below the surface, that almost proves redemptive for character and audience.

"Better get rid of your accent."

The Guardian recently railed against bad accents on film and on stage. Why not dispense with the whole messy business of accents, the paper suggested? Now I am not one to hate on actors who aren't gifted at accents. Many factors go into casting, and accent proficiency should not be the prime one, or even in the top five.

"The constabile's responstable."

But compared to analyzing scripts and motivations, as well as physical appearance, chemistry with costars, the accent's bottom-drawer. Films about historical events or celebrities require the accent: Cate Blanchett as the inimitable Katherine Hepburn (The Aviator), Philip Seymour Hoffman as Truman Capote. But sometimes actors use them as a crutch. Meryl Streep couldn't have pulled off Julia Child without her distinctive chirp, but did she need such a heavy cloud of Bronx dialect hovering over Doubt?

If your characters are Europeans speaking, presumably, in German, don't have them pull out the bier-und-bratwurst. Amadeus is a wonderful example of Austrian/German/Italian characters all speaking in their natural Standard American--because why should they do otherwise?

All I ask is that actors be consistent. Devise whatever Scandinavian dialect you like, but don't slip in and out of it. Or going halfway then giving up (like Kevin Costner's in-out British Robin Hood). It's easy to cite Sean Connery for his Scottish brogue no matter what role he plays; but I don't want to spend the film cringing as he butchers other dialects needlessly. Did Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart, or Bette Davis let it get them down? Their own peculiar speech patterns were good enough.

Some general trends: Brits tend to think Americans hail from North Carolina. Australians are accent pros. Every movie set in Boston seems to require the whole cast to chomp through each scene like it were chowdah from the hahbah.

Memorable accents attempted gone askew:

Dick van Dyke, Mary Poppins (Cockney).
Michael Caine, The Cider House Rules (New England).
Keanu Reeves, Bram Stoker's Dracula (British). Prime example of someone who should have just gone American.
Eddie Izzard, The Riches (Southern).
Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond (South African).
Julianne Moore, 30 Rock (Boston).

Some actors are more adept, from Vivien Leigh to Kate Winslet. Toni Collette, Cate Blanchett, Heath Ledger, all from Down Under. Meryl Streep by sheer volume.

What So Proudly We Hailed

What could be more American than the much-envied Snow Day? How about a snow day spent listening to various versions of our national anthem? Yes, "The Star-Spangled Banner," Francis Scott Key. This is what happens when class is cancelled.

It's somehow Super Bowl Week here at my blog. Here are my thoughts on Super Bowl highs and lows of that singer strangler, "The Star-Spangled Banner." It's a hard song to tackle, especially "the land of the free," which places the highest note on an "ee" vowel. (Rough for women if they don't have a good head voice.)*

1. Whitney Houston. 1991. Lauded all around; Rolling Stone suspects it was "the best Super Bowl ever." Her performance plays in the Smithsonian in the restored flag's exhibition. The second verse gets a bit mellow, but once those rockets start glaring, there's no turning back.

2. Jennifer Hudson. 2009. Her first public gig after family tragedy. Full-throttle the whole time. Normally I dislike the song at funeral speed, laden with vocal melisma, but she's a powerhouse and knows it. Despite her Idol start, she's really come into her own.

3. Cher. 1999. Better "Believe" it. Who knew she could pull this off?

4. Carrie Underwood. 2010. This country girl goes a cappella, with an authentic, slightly strained sound. More interesting than Jordin Sparks, Christina Aguilera, Beyonce's versions. I worried, though, she wouldn't make it to "free."

5. Billy Joel. 2007. YouTube commenters debate over if he used AutoTune or not, but it's doubtful considering how many notes he missed.

6. Mariah Carey. 2002. Before she went all padded-walls on us. She opts for hushed Sprechstimme and uncomfortable riffs ("bursting in air" just sounds bad in her voice). And that two-octave jump on "free"? B above high C whatever**--cheap gimmick, and out of place.

Enough with the female belters, dear Super Bowl. Can we shake it up*** next year? Placido Domingo could sing the hell out of it.

*From Tony Kushner's Angels in America: "He set the word 'free' to a note so high nobody could reach it. That was deliberate."

**Few women can hit a B6, so applause for that. But "four octave range"? It's not like half those notes Sound Good. And she sure can't use those four octaves to pull off the Queen of the Night.

***Within limits. No Roseanne fiascos!

I Watched the Game and I Liked It

I actively watch football once a year. Until high school, I did it for the commercials. Until college, I did it for the chili con queso. Recently I've noticed that I watch the Super Bowl for, well, the game itself. When did this happen?

Because my parents watched games every Sunday afternoon of my upbringing, while I would read Animorphs in the other room, I rebelled by disliking sports. Not a good enough reason? Let's time travel further back.

Most artsy people I know were raised on piano lessons, but my Virginia home has never in 21 years entertained that instrument. I was signed up (involuntarily, I'm pretty sure) for gymnastics and tee-ball. To review my qualifications: I was inflexible and afraid of the ball coming toward me. There were few consequences to hardcore sucking: I never went more than halfway up the climbing rope, but got to jump in the foam pit regardless. When I missed the pitcher's ball, the tee was pulled out like a baseball mulligan.

Going to games, I soon learned, was better than watching them on TV. No instant replays, no commercial breaks--and overpriced cotton candy. But I wasn't destined to be a sports person. If I'd known my six-foot stature, I could have tried basketball. Or tennis--a sport without a team.

My mom would ask, when I practiced violin, how I knew the notes. Strange to think that reading music, second-nature by now, isn't a universal skill. But that's how I approached football for years, an alien in a rowdy land: What's an onside kick? Holding? Why did they just run that two-point conversion?

There's something about growing up that whittles away barriers. School pride comes into play; William and Mary had great football and basketball seasons, at last. It's also choosing the Super Bowl winner 5 out of 7 times. (In other words, every game the Colts are not in. Work with me, Peyton!) Or scarfing snacks during commercials, not game play. Though my inner nerd had its day, too--paystobecurious.com misspelled "rhymes" during airtime, and I aurally admonished them. The corrected version from their site:

(Answer: curple (horse hindquarters) and hirple (to limp).

Hope no Colts hirpled off with purple curples.)

Give 'em the old Razzie dazzle

Awards season has reached its apex. Over the inevitable furor of The Blind Side blind-siding more worthy films for Best Picture, you may have missed what's vying for Worst. I bring you faithful readers my Second Annual Razzie Predictions.

THE 30TH ANNUAL RAZZIE AWARDS

WORST PICTURE

All About Steve

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

Land of the Lost

Old Dogs

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Should I go with the mainstream choice (Transformers Dos, which raked in over $800 million) or something more indie? All About Steve has the lowest IMDB rating: 4.9. But bigger is definitely better at the Razzies. The higher you climb, the harder you fall.

WORST ACTOR

All Three Jonas Brothers (Jonas Brothers: The 3-D Concert Experience)

Will Ferrell (Land of the Lost)

Steve Martin (Pink Panther 2)

Eddie Murphy (Imagine That)

John Travolta (Old Dogs)

Lopping the Jonas Brothers in with four comedians who should know better seems unfair. Robin Williams should hold the fifth spot for Old Dogs. Murphy recently won for Norbit; Travolta will get his shot below. I say Ferrell deserves a win: everything else about his film lost (money, respect, their minds).

WORST ACTRESS

Beyonce (Obsessed)

Sandra Bullock (All About Steve)

Miley Cyrus (Hannah Montana: The Movie)

Megan Fox (Jennifer's Body and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen)

Sarah Jessica Parker (Did You Hear about the Morgans?)

You know the Razzies want to award Bullock the year she's front-runner for an Oscar.

The Best of the Worst continues after the jump!

The Music of Last Night... and the Night Before That...

While Elton John launched the Grammys in the U.S., Andrew Lloyd Webber graced Londoners with a new excerpt from Love Never Dies (aka Phantom II. Still not sure if Phantom's part of the official title or not). As it turns out, this extract from the score was extracted from a different score. Yes, Lloyd Webber's hoping yet again our memories have faded (except for the tabby tuner "Memory," naturally; ALW needs his residuals).

What is currently "Love Never Dies" was birthed as "The Heart is Slow to Learn," as I once posted. Quick recap: The sequel stalled, so ALW rewrote the song as "Our Kind of Love" for The Beautiful Game. When that lost money, the show was rejiggered, and "Love" excised. And so the wheel turns. Now we are back at the start, and the lyrics have changed again. But for the better?