Monday, December 5, 2011

MYSTERIOUS SKIN (2004)

Sadly, I've never read the novel this film is based on, but I can't see how it can be anything short of a masterpiece because this film is a masterpiece.

Opening with the slow-motion shot of Fruit Loops falling on the face of a smiling boy, we're next introduced to Brian, a teenager who recounts how as a small boy he lost several hours of his life due to being kidnapped by aliens at a baseball game and was then found later bleeding in a closet of his house. Now as a teenager he's fascinated by aliens. Next is Neil, he's the same age as Brian but a world apart as far as personalities go. He tells us how, at age 8, he used to jack off watching his mother with her various boyfriends and lust over the men in her Playboy magazines. Then he met Coach. Coach was the handsome coach of the boy's baseball team and he had a mustache that was so manly and awesome that it could tame an army of a thousand purring kittens. At first sight, Neil was in love with him. Soon after he allowed himself to be seduced by Coach. Then came Brian.

From the very beginning of the film you know what happened, but the script and the acting by everybody (especially by Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Chase Ellison) is so strong that even after multiple viewings I still find myself almost hypnotized by the screen. Neil is now a male prostitute and secure in his homosexuality and molestation as a child. He even has pictures and recordings of the events. Brian though is living in a complete dream world and he's broken. He cannot function in reality. Obsessing endlessly over aliens, he thinks more and more about the events leading up to the abduction when he suddenly remembers there was another boy there, but he can't remember who he was. He decides to find out this boy was.

MYSTERIOUS SKIN isn't for everybody's tastes. It's vile at moments and perverse, but how can it not be with such a sickening subject matter? In fact, I wish it had gone even further. That aside, everything about this film is fantastic. The script, the acting, the tone, pace, cinematography, direction. Even days after my latest viewing I still find myself thinking about it and how brilliantly the story was told. MYSTERIOUS SKIN could almost be compared to RASHOMON in it's differing accounts of a shared event. Honestly, I cannot recommend it enough.

Double feature it with SHAME.

Friday, December 2, 2011

SUPER 8 (2011)

SUPER 8 is the story about some small town kids back in 1979 who are out one night filming a zombie movie. During the middle of shooting a scene near a train station, some maniac rams his truck head on into into a fast-moving military freight train. The truck explodes into a fireball and the train derails all over the joint. Somehow, all of the kids survive the disaster without any injuries. Afterwards, they're stumbling around the wreckage when they find the driver of the truck alive! He tells them to get out of here and to never talk about what they saw or else them and their parents will be killed. That scares the shit out of the kids, so they skedaddle and keep the fact they were there a secret.

Almost instantly, the military arrives and locks the town down and starts an intense investigation into the wreck and the now missing cargo. At the same time, all of the dogs in town run away and random people start disappearing. What's going on?! Something cool I hope and not something extremely simple and boring that we've already seen a million times before...well, you're out of luck. It's exactly what you think it is and nothing new or clever happens at all. In fact, it's kinda lame.

Technically the film was fine. Even with the rampant lens flare bullshit, the film looks good and the actors where all impressive. Going into the movie I was hoping for an engaging story built around strong characters, instead I got a watered down story build around predictable characters.

Worth watching, it is a good time waster, but I was really hoping for something...more. If you need me, I'll be in my room reading Robert McCammon's "Boy's Life" while watching Stranger Things.