“Summer of Film #14 of 100”:http://www.devanshanu.com/things/2005/06/12/2005-summer-of-film/
Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins teaches an important lesson in screenwriting. You can rescue a so-so film with a spectacular climax.

For all practical purposes, this is the first Batman movie. It tells the classical superhero origin story in its own reimagined way. While this may not be the best Batman movie ever, this is by far the best Batman of all time. As a character, Batman as played by Christian Bale, is one of the most well developed and well acted superheroes. The problem with previous incarnations was that you did not know about (or care about) Bruce Wayne. For the first time, with Batman Begins, you actually do. More than you do about Batman. Continue reading →

“Summer of Film #13 of 100”:http://www.devanshanu.com/things/2005/06/12/2005-summer-of-film/
The only way I can talk about Love Liza is to talk about Philip Seymour Hoffman. In his films he seems to operate in one of two modes- there is the Hoffman (of say Owning Mahoney or Magnolia) that shrinks while on screen, that is so subtle, understated that you would not notice him if he wasn’t a character in the film. Then there is the larger than life Hoffman (of Punch-Drunk Love or Almost Famous that demands your attention every frame of every scene). This movie has him operating in the first of these two modes. The movie stars Hoffman as Wilson Joel failing to deal with the suicide of his wife. Continue reading →

“Summer of Film #12 of 100”:http://www.devanshanu.com/things/2005/06/12/2005-summer-of-film/
Before I get into anything else- what is the connection between ‘The Sopranos’ and 1995’s ‘Basketball Diaries’? Three actors from ‘The Sopranos’ are in this film- Lorraine Bracco (Dr. Melfi from ‘The Sopranos’), Michael Imperioli (Christopher Moltisanti on ‘The Sopranos’) and Vincent Pastore (Big Pussy on ‘The Sopranos’). Then I’m reading a bit more about these people and come to the realization that all three of them were in Scorsese’s ‘The Goodfellas’ as well! No explanations yet after a little time researching and googling.

Basketball Diaries is a story of a kid- Leonardo DiCaprio playing real-life writer Jim Carroll- who nearly loses everything he has when drugs threaten to take over his life. This has the potential to be a spectacular story- and it is, since it actually happened. The problem is in execution. The movie doesn’t take it’s subject matter seriously enough. It pulls its punches- keeping most of the violence, suffering and consequences off screen, to the effect that to a youngster the worst effect drugs would have on you was that you felt like you had a bad case of the ‘flu. And you couldn’t play basketball. Continue reading →

“Summer of Film #11 of 100”:http://www.devanshanu.com/things/2005/06/12/2005-summer-of-film/
Robert Altman (MASH, Gosfod Park) is the master of fly-on-the-wall cinema; the brilliant ability to make films about ensembles rather than follow individual characters. The opening scene of The Player has the camera drift on a movie studio lot for 8 minutes without a cut, catching glimpses of inside deals and snippets of only-in-hollywood conversations. This sets the stage for a film that draws us behind the closed doors of doublecrossing Hollywood players. Continue reading →

“Summer of Film #10 of 100”:http://www.devanshanu.com/things/2005/06/12/2005-summer-of-film/
Easy Rider is more about a generation, a time, a place. A lifestyle.

Easy Rider is a film that creates a mood and builds on it for its duration with the sole purpose of giving people everywhere an understanding of a lifestyle that existed for a few years and then vanished to only become part of the American mythology. This was the time when “peace, love and music brought people to the town of Woodstock”:http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050522/REVIEWS08/505220302/1004 , when “riots brokeout at the cinenmatheque in Paris”:http://www.devanshanu.com/things/2004/04/25/the-dreamers-2004/ and when a guy named Captain America (Peter Fonda) with his friend Billy (Dennis Hopper, also the director) rode across America’s south in search of a way out of the system. Continue reading →