Reeling Backward: "Throne of Blood" (1957)

I'd been wanting to see "Throne of Blood" for years, ever since I saw a short clip of a scene from the film where a Japanese lord is killed by his own men with arrows. It's an arresting moment, full of poetry and violence, as only the great Akira Kurosawa could compose.

After finally seeing the movie, I consider it one of the great director's minor works, even though I know it is widely considered one of his best.

The plot is a more or less straight adaptation of Shakespeare's "Macbeth," transposed to feudal Japan. An ambitious general is egged by his wife into assassinating the Great Lord, and usurps his position. But he is brought down by his own foolishness and suspicion.

Toshiro Mifune, in one of his 16 collaborations with Kurosawa, plays the lead role, Washizu. His wife, Asaji, is played by Isuzu Yamada. Washizu's lifelong friend and comrade is Miki (Minoru Chiaki).

On their way Spider Web Castle -- which is the film's Japanese title -- Miki and Washizu encounter a strange spirit. Bathed in white light and spinning a loom, the old ghost woman makes two predictions: That both men will be promoted that very evening, and that both Washizu and Miki's son will eventually become lord of the castle.

The two generals laugh at this, but indeed upon presenting themselves to the Great Lord they are promoted to the positions the spirit predicted.

Thus begins the deceit of Washizu by his wife. Whispering in his ear a la Lady Macbeth, Asaji convinces Washizu that it is only a matter of time before the Great Lord hears about the prophecy and dispatches him. His choices are but two, she claims: Serve loyally and wait for the execution to come, or dare to grasp the reigns of power and become the Great Lord himself.

His chance arrives when the monarch comes to visit at his fort. Asaji drugs the Great Lord's guards, and puts one of their spears into Washizu's hands. He leaves and returns, almost in a trance, with the weapon, and his hands, covered in blood.

War breaks out, with the Great Lord's son supported by his old enemy. Miki, who had been placed in charge of Spider Web Castle, clearly knows that his old friend murdered their sovereign. Still, he acquiesces to Washizu's ascension to Great Lord in order to keep the peace. Washizu, who is childless, agrees to appoint Miki's son his heir.

But still the scheming continues. After inviting Miki and his son to a celebration feast, Washizu secretly dispatches as assassin to slay them before they arrive. He sees the ghost of Miki in the empty seat where his friend should be, and goes into a panic that alienates his other guests.

Washizu seeks out the forest spirit again, who tells him that he will not be defeated in battle before the very trees of the forest rise up against Spider Web Castle. Renewed with confidence against such an impossibility ever happening, he boasts to his soldiers about the prophecy.

But when his enemies cut down the trees and use them as cover, the men turn on their lord and slay him with arrows.

This death scene, coming at the very end, is just a startling sequence. Wild-eyed, Washizu runs back and forth across the parapet of the castle as arrows rain in. Kurosawa's battle scenes are always amazingly authentic in addition to being kinetically precise -- those arrows really look like they're screaming in at full speed, even thunking into Washizu's armor.

Compare this movie with the battle scenes from "Ivanhoe," a Hollywood movie that is a contemporary of "Throne," which featured arrows that looked like they'd been dumped out of a canister.

There's an astonishing amount of smoke and fog throughout the movie. Clearly, Kurosawa is saying something about people's perceptions being obscured by hate, ambition, lust, etc.

I liked "Throne of Blood," but while there are many scenes that just crackle with Kurosawa's distinct energy, there are many more that just ramble on and on. In particular, his obsession with ranks of soldiers maneuvering on the battlefield gets to be very old, very fast.

Fortunately, the film ends with a scene of such power and electricity, it overpowers the movie's tendency to amble.

3 stars

Review: "Date Night"

Tina Fey and Steve Carell are gifted comedians and likable performers. They're the centerpieces on their smartly-written back-to-back TV shows, "30 Rock" and "The Office."

They're so good, in fact, that watching them slum their way through inferior material like this is depressing.

"Date Night" is a lower-middle-brow comedy about an upper-middle-class New Jersey couple who get their marriage spark reignited by a crazy night in Manhattan where they're mistaken for blackmailers and chased by cops and bad guys alike. I don't know about you, but I'm actually getting sleepy just describing it.

Fey and Carell make for a good team, and they invest themselves in every joke, managing to save a few scenes that end up being pretty funny.

Yeah, they're more or less playing variations on their television characters -- Liz Lemon's self-deprecating neurotic charm and Michael Scott's diffident discomfort in his own skin -- but we enjoy those people so much, it's not a big deal that they're repurposing.

When the pair are just inhabiting a scene, riffing and ad-libbing, the effects are pleasurable. But then the movie has to fall back on its idiot plot -- car chases, scary guys with guns, etc.

They do make for a believable couple. Phil Foster is a tax accountant, and Claire is a real estate agent. Harried and worn out, they barely keep the romance on life support with the occasional date night.

There's a great little moment where Claire is fixing herself up for a night out, and Phil barely glances at her when he walks in the door, and we can see she's crushed. But he redeems himself by taking her to Claw, the hottest new Tribeca restaurant. They have $50 soup, a month-long backlog for reservations and snootily answer the phone, "Claw, you're welcome."

When another couple misses their reservation, the Fosters pretend to be them. Unfortunately, a pair of toughs show up and, thinking they're the other couple, to demand a Flash drive with some juicy material on it.

It's all one big lame case of mistaken identity, and the rest of the movie is spent with the Fosters on the lam, trying to track down this mysterious drive while skirting the hoods and the police.

Directed by Shawn Levy ("Night at the Museum") from a script by Josh Klausner, "Date Night" features a lot of cameos by well-known actors who run into the Fosters. Some are pleasing -- I liked James Franco as a skeevy character who dubs himself "Taste" -- while others just lie there.

Their stale adventures take the Fosters through Central Park, breaking into a friend's office, and showing up on the doorstep of an old client of Claire's (Mark Wahlberg) who has a background in security and is apparently incapable of wearing a shirt.

Throwaway jokes are usually the best ones. There's one bit where they have to infiltrate a mobbed-up strip club, and Claire sneaks into the strippers' locker room and emerges in a tart little outfit. "It's the only one long enough to cover my Caesarean scar," she explains.

Chuckle-worthy little moments like this almost -- almost -- save "Date Night" from itself.

2 stars out of four

Review: "The Runaways"

"The Runaways" is a manufactured movie about a manufactured band.

The all-girl rock 'n' roll band was a '70s gimmick designed to peddle teen sex appeal -- and yet the songs they produced ("Cherry Bomb," "Queens of Noise") have a brash energy that's hard to deny.

Similarly, the movie about them wades through every cliché of the rock biopic genre, but is still an entirely watchable and fleetingly engrossing glimpse at Joan Jett, Cherie Currie and the gang.

I say "and the gang" not because I'm trying to minimize the contributions of Lita Ford, Sandy West and Jackie Fox (and several other bassists whose tenures with the band are not depicted). But since it's based on a memoir by Currie, and executive produced by Jett, it's not surprising they're in the spotlight.

Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning make for believable teen rockers who got caught up in the manipulation and excesses of the music biz. Joan (Stewart) is the purist, a tough girl who buys a man's leather jacket, spends her idle days huffing to get high, and refuses to accept a music teacher's admonition, "Girls don't play electric guitar." She was born with rock 'n' roll in her bloodstream.

Cherie is more of a dreamer who has to be coaxed out of her shell into becoming a vicious stage vixen. As adroitly played by Fanning, Cherie is like a million other girls searching for an identity, and using her broken home as a crucible in which to forge a steely persona.

They're brought together by Kim Fowley (a terrific Michael Shannon), a strange but legendary producer who sees in the teen girls a chance to create something new: Hard rock performed by sexy, underage girls. (Upon learning that Cherie is only 15, he raises his fists triumphantly: "Jailbait!")

This is the movie's strongest section, as Fowley sets about forming a band and toughening them up to withstand hecklers and the media glare. With Joan and the rest of the musicians already assembled, Fowley decides they need to inject a little more sex into the mix.

In a great scene, he goes trolling through a local nightclub, picks Cherie out of the crowd because of her brazen stare and Bowie-meets-Bardot look, and offers her a spot in the band.

They rehearse in a run-down trailer, and Fowley composes the song "Cherry Bomb" on the spot for Cherie's audition. (Sounds like a fake Hollywood moment, but various accounts say it really happened.) It's fascinating to watch Cherie, and Fanning herself, transform from innocent little girl to fire-breathing sexpot in a matter of minutes.

Fowley's tactics are a far cry from politically correct, even for 1975 -- he calls the Runaways "kittens" and "little bitches," and even recruits neighborhood boys to hurl tin cans and dog feces at them to make their performance angrier.

The Runaways go on the road, do progressively harder drugs, make the big time, face hordes of fans, and the movie enters the inevitable, dreary decline-and-breakup phase that seems to be genetically embedded into every rock 'n' roll movie.

Writer/director Floria Sigismondi handles the material without a lot of depth, but keeps the film from spiraling into a torpor. She also employs coy camera tricks in tackling the possibility of a lesbian encounter between Cherie and Joan.

Like the band it chronicles, "The Runaways" is mainstream entertainment waving a rebel flag. It still kinda rocks, though.

3 stars out of four

Video review: "The Lord of the Rings" and "LOTR Trilogy"

The Lords are finally going Blu.

The "Lord of the Rings" movies are being issued on Blu-ray today. And I do mean all of them: The trilogy of 2001-03 films directed by Peter Jackson, which is being released as a single set, and the animated version directed by Ralph Bakshi in 1978.

The fates of those disparate attempts to bring J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasyland of hobbits, orcs and elves to cinematic life could not have been more diverse. Jackson's films set box office records and won a slew of Oscars, while Bakshi's version remains a punch line for serious Tolkienites, who dismiss it as a cartoon for kiddies.

Say what you will about Bakshi's much-maligned take, it looks great on a big TV in Blu-ray. The film itself hasn't improved with age; the cutesy depiction of Frodo and the other hobbits as big-haired moppets still grates. And the technique of "rotoscoping" -- filming live action and turning it into animation -- makes for jerky action scenes.

It doesn't help that the story abruptly stops about two-thirds of the way through Tolkien's novel. Bakshi intended the epic tale to be divided into two parts, but the studio refused to fund a sequel.

Jackson had about 70 times more money to play with than Bakshi did, and it shows. The story was split into three parts, just as publishers generally did with Tolkien's book.

But beyond production values, Jackson and his crew hew closer to Tolkien's vision in both plot and tone. They understood that they were translating an entire world into film -- and fans wanted it treated seriously.

The only downside of the LOTR Trilogy's arrival on Blu-ray (which had been delayed repeatedly) is that this set includes only the theatrical version of the films. The longer -- and better -- extended versions are expected to make their hi-def debut eventually, but no date is set.

Extras for the Bakshi version are limited to a single item: A 30-minute documentary covering Bakshi's career. There's some interesting behind-the-scenes photographs and footage from the "Rings" production, and interviews with Bakshi, his children and collaborators. But it mentions nothing about his intention to do a sequel, or the film's dismal reception, or other critical subjects.

The features for the LOTR trilogy closely mirror those of the extended DVD version, although the multiple commentary tracks are missing. It's an exhilarating and exhausting collection of hours' worth of interviews, features and documentaries. The nine-disc set also includes digital copies of each film.

Personally, I'll wait for the Blu-ray extended version.

Movies: Bakshi version: 2 stars; Jackson version: 4 stars
Extras: Bakshi: 1.5 stars; Jackson: 3.5 stars

Reeling Backward: "To Have and Have Not" (1944)

Lauren Bacall was 19 years old and a total acting novice when she appeared in a doorway to ask Bogie for a match. She reportedly was so nervous to be starring next to the screen legend that she tucked her chin into her chest to keep from shaking, tilting her eyes up at Bogart in an alluring way that soon earned a nickname, "The Look."

Later on in the film, standing in that same doorway, Bacall would deliver the lines that would cement her debut as one of the most memorable in cinematic history: "You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow."

Talk about togetherness: Bacall and Bogart would initiate a romance during the shooting of 1944's "To Have and Have Not" that eventually led to their marriage (and the demise of Bogie's).

Directed by Howard Hawks from a script by William Faulkner and Jules Furthman, "To Have and Have Not" was based on a novel by Ernest Hemingway that bears little resemblance to the movie, other than the Caribbean setting and being about a fishing boat captain. Hawks supposedly called it Hemingway's worst novel, and the author dared him to produce a decent movie out of it.

The result is a film whose plot is a mishmash that doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but is so strong on mood and romantic tension that we don't give a fig.

Bogart plays Harry "Steve" Morgan, an itinerant boat skipper in Martinique. Much like the city of Casablanca, Martinique is an exotic locale ostensibly under the control of the French, but with the influence of the Nazis clearly visible. The Vichy thugs are running the show, while the Free French are trying to drum up a rebellion.

As the story opens, Steve has been taking a rich American out for big-game fishing every day for two weeks, without much success. On the last day the client loses the rod and reel, and slaps Steve's friend and first mate Eddie across the face. Played by the great character actor Walter Brennan, Eddie is an old drunk who has to beg for his booze. But he's still Steve's friend, and he can't stand to see Eddie treated that way, even if he is a worthless rummy.

His client tries to skip out on Steve without paying his bill, but dies first in a gunfight between the Vichy and patriotic French. The fat, diabolical police Captain Renard -- played by Dan Seymour, in something like a combination of the Claude Rains and Sydney Greenstreet roles from "Casablanca" -- confiscates Steve's passport and money.

Penniless, he's forced to take a job from the resistance to pick up one of their leaders on a remote island, but the important passenger is shot during an encounter with a patrol boat. Steve spends the rest of the movie nursing the injured man, insisting to the Free French that he's not taking sides, and dodging questions from Renard.

It's funny; as you watch the movie, you can't take your eyes off Bacall. But once it's over and you start thinking about it, her character is almost totally unnecessary to the story. See, I just gave you a pretty complete overview of the plot without ever mentioning Marie Browning -- aka "Slim."

Slim is a young pickpocket whose M.O. is to lure men into buying drinks for her, then making off with their wallets. That's how she and Steve first meet -- she's just duped Steve's fishing client, and when he demands she return the wallet, he finds a ticket for a plane that takes off right before they were supposed to meet at the bank for his payoff.

Slim and Steve spend most of the movie fighting and kissing, often both within the same scene. It's real screen magic, the two of them. Bogart's doing his usual world-weary cynic shtick, but in between we catch little moments where he seems totally amazed by Bacall.

Jazzman/composer Hoagy Carmichael has a small role as Cricket, the saloon piano player, and Bacall even sings a couple of his tunes. Well, perhaps not. Accounts vary about whether the voice is actually Bacall's. According to legend, as a boy Andy Williams was recruited to dub Bacall's singing. It certainly sounds like her famously low (though not yet husky) voice.

I love the film's ending, which is somewhat abrupt but still satisfying. Having shot one of Renard's men, Steve proceeds to beat the captain and his cohort until they agree to release Eddie, who they've taken hostage. Leaving the villainous police in the hands of the resistance, they gather their stuff to hop on the boat, hoping they have enough gas to get them to another island and a new start.

Slim, whispering her goodbye to Cricket, asks him to play a happy song, and Bacall does this gorgeous little jig on their way out of the nightclub. It was the start of a beautiful friendship -- between Slim and Steve, between Bogie and Bacall, and between her and audiences for decades to come.

3.5 stars

Reeling Backward: "Grand Hotel" (1932)

"Grand Hotel" was one of the first conscious attempts to gather an "all-star" cast. The poster blared out the names of the cinematic giants of that era: Garbo! Barrymore! Barrymore!

Joan Crawford, nearly unrecognizable with her trademark eyebrows shorn back, was the baby of the bunch.

Nearly 80 years later, the 1932 film is most notable for its intersecting, interweaving storylines -- similar to "Nashville," "Crash" and a number of other notable films.

Like "Crash," "Grand Hotel" would win the Academy Award for Best Picture. It was the only award for which it was nominated, and still holds the record of least number of nominations for the movie that won Oscar's top prize.

An old, horribly scarred doctor (Lewis Stone) acts as the quasi-narrator and chorus. "Grand Hotel: People come, people go, but nothing ever happens," he intones at the beginning and end of the story. The obvious irony is that a whole lot does happen.

The central story thread revolves around Grusinskaya, the greatest ballet dancer in the world, played by Garbo. At the height of her fame, she's sick of dancing and adoration. "I want to be alone," she insists after a performance -- words that would forever become associated with Garbo, herself a reluctant star.

Little does she know, but Grusinskaya is being stalked by a thief after her priceless pearls: Baron Felix von Geigern, played by John Barrymore. The baron is a ruined noble, a gambler and occasional bandit, when necessity calls. He poses as a rich gentlemen to move about in high society, which he exploits either with card games or outright robbery.

He's being financed by some criminals who are growing impatient with his attempt to wrest away the pearls, and are ready to apply strong-arm tactics to recover their stake money. The baron finally sneaks into Grusinskaya's suite and takes the pearls, but overhears her despair and stops her attempt at suicide. They fall in love, and he resolves to repay his partners in crime rather than hurt her.

The entire story takes place over the course of a couple of days, with lives and loves being changed forever.

Crawford plays Flaemmchen, a poor young stenographer hired by a powerful business magnate named Preysing (Wallace Beery). The baron and Preysing both flirt with the ingenue, which leads to a clash between the two later on.

The other principle character is Kringelein (Barrymore's brother, Lionel), an accountant from Preysing's textile plant. An old, timid man, he's been diagnosed with a fatal illness, and determines to spend all his money living his last few days in luxury.

Preysing, who's pursuing a major merger deal to save his failing business, is the villain of the piece, although he isn't portrayed as evil -- merely imperious. He's the sort of man who treats his perceived equals with genteel manners, and his underlings with dismissive contempt.

At one point Preysing hires Flaemmchen to be his secretary on a trip to England, and both of them understand this to mean she will become his well-compensated mistress. It's a great early role for Crawford, as the smart but fatalistic woman who keeps finding herself under various men's thumbs.

Director Edmund Goulding -- who also helmed "The Dawn Patrol," which was featured in this space some months ago -- uses some interesting storytelling techniques. He shoots the Grand Hotel in Berlin with an opulent eye, lingering particularly over the great checkerboard-tiled lobby and the view down the great circular atrium. William A. Drake adapted his play for the screen, which in turn was based on a novel.

Money, and the pitfalls of the pursuit of it, are the central theme. Other than Grusinskaya, who only wants a little joy in her life, every character is in some way ruled by their wealth, or lack of it.

"Grand Hotel" hasn't aged particularly well, but it's still an engaging and important piece of cinema.

3 stars

Review: "Clash of the Titans"

Has it really been three decades since the original "Clash of the Titans," featuring a mangled mash-up of Greek mythology, herky-jerky stop-motion animated monsters and a really bitchin' Harry Hamlin feathered haircut?

The new "Clash" exists mostly to remind us how much things have changed.

The monsters are now sleek computer-generated beasties, snapping and slithering in all their 3-D glory. The gumbo of Greek legends has been remixed with the addition of wood-skinned sorcerers and some new humanistic themes.

And as Perseus, the half-man half-god hero, Sam Worthington's no-frills buzzcut signals that this is one classical dude with a lot of post-modern 'tude.

This remake is unnecessary but unobjectionable, and generally pretty fun. Fans of the original -- who, like me, regard it with warm nostalgia while chuckling at its hokier aspects -- will find themselves ticking off a checklist of what's been retained, changed or dropped.

I was disappointed that Calibos, the half-demon villain from the original, has been relegated to a walk-on role. Although there's still a nice touch of pathos to him.

And I didn't like the reduced byplay between the Gods of Olympus. I really enjoyed the first film's depiction of scheming, jealous super-beings conniving against each other, with mortals and their own demigod offspring used as chess pieces.

Liam Neeson gets in a few moments of thunder as Zeus, head god and Perseus' father. And Ralph Fiennes shines as crafty Hades, dissolving into mist and turning a human queen into an ancient hag with a touch.

But the rest of the gods are relegated to mere eye candy. Danny Huston, as Poseidon, has about two lines of dialogue. The female gods don't even get that.

At least the earthbound women got meatier roles. Andromeda (Alexa Davalos), the princess of the god-offending city of Argos, is prepared to sacrifice herself if Hades releases the Kraken, a powerful sea titan, as revenge for their arrogance. And Io (Gemma Arterton), an ageless demigod herself, takes on the role of Perseus' protector and companion.

Travis Beacham, Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi deliver a lean, mean script that focuses on the thrill of individual encounters without an ounce of dilly-dally in between. Perseus and a band of Argos' best warriors are sent to find the Stygian Witches -- frightful triplets sharing a single eye -- to learn if the Kraken can be defeated.

Instead of being the anointed, favored son of the gods, in this version Perseus is a poor fisherman resentful of the big boys' meddling in their workaday lives. He even refuses the gift of a magic sword from Zeus because he wants to win as a man, not a god.

(Although I couldn't help noticing he starts accepting these supernatural advantages ... but only after his cadre of comrades has been significantly reduced in headcount, and his own neck is on the line.)

Director Louis Leterrier keeps things moving along at a brisk pace that prevents the audience from dwelling on any incongruent new elements. Like Perseus' djinn companion, who looks like a cross between the "Lord of the Rings" ents and the Tusken Raiders of "Star Wars." Or that the Greek team also includes, for some reason, a pair of Russian hunters. I think someone took a wrong turn at the Caucasus.

One throwaway joke neatly sums up this entire movie. As Perseus and his crew are arming themselves for their journey, he reaches into a pile of equipment and pulls out a certain golden mechanical owl and asks what it is. The gruff captain (Mads Mikkelsen) tells him to leave it behind.

Younger audience members will be bewildered, but fans of the 1981 film will feel their hearts freeze: "Not that frackin' owl!!" Fortunately, the new "Clash of the Titans" has retained enough of the stuff that made the original memorable, and left the goofier ordnance back in the nostalgia bin.

3 stars