Zander’s Weblog

Fantastic. A suburban dystopia worthy of comparison with American Beauty. Lots of wonderfully wrought (and overwrought) characters in existential crises of various sorts.

La Misma Luna is a film that portrays the difficulties involved when Mexican parents feel compelled to leave their children to come to the USA in order to provide a future for them. Adrian Alonso gives a great performance as the 9 year old son. The production values are made-for-television so don’t expect a blockbuster here. I enjoyed listening to the Spanish.

Le Hasard Fait Bien Les Choses is a sweet French romantic comedy. It reminded me of La Cage aux Folles, only thankfully with much less stereotypical affectation.

Most are familiar with the grisly details of Matthew Shephard’s  murder. This movie is Moisés Kaufman’s screen adaptation of the off-Broadway play he wrote together with members of his Tectonic Theater Project. It is well done, and hosts a skilled cast. But as a screenplay adapted from a play adapted from interviews concerning the actual events, it seems overproduced and strangely mechanical.

Les Roseaux Sauvages, André Téchiné’s 1994 coming-of-age drama, is a gem. Set in a boarding school, the film follows the struggles of a group of friends as they grapple with the complex issues of that age. What sets this film apart is that one comes away liking all of the characters.

The follow-on film to The Decline of the American Empire (1986), this is a superior effort that won the 2004 Oscar for best foreign film.

Denys Arcand’s quirky and self-conscious film was difficult to warm up to. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t know anyone in the age group portrayed who spends any time at all talking about their sexual conquests. A pity the film was not more engaging because it may keep many from moving on to the subsequent film The Barbarian Invasions (2003), a far more believable and enjoyable production. So I would recommend this film due to the richness it lends to the latter.

Fast-paced, colorful, engaging film with very good special effects–like a, well, animated comic book. On the other hand I thought it took way too long to tie up all the story lines, and ended up conveying a confusing set of messages. Or maybe it was trying hard not to send messages. In any case, the joker and batman survived to protect the franchise.

Lynn V. Foster’s book condenses the centuries-long and amazingly complex history of Mexico into a crisp 256 pages. Very readable and quite interesting, a tribute to both Foster’s style and the inherent appeal of the material. For example, you’ve got to admire Santa Anna for his persistence–he grabbed (by force if necessary) the presidency 11 times between 1833 and 1855. And did you know that remittances home by U.S. immigrants is currently one of the largest sources of foreign revenues (13 billion in 2002), second only to oil exports?

What can I say about this film? Nice try? I really wanted to like it–a kind of real-world High School Musical, unlike the sterile 2006 film. The music was good. The kids were cute and super talented. But the script was confused. Who was the film supposed to be about? Vlad? Bert? Michael? Ellen? How could Bert be such an alcoholic in one scene and such a paragon in the next? And why on earth would Stephen Sondheim ever have agreed to be in such a messy concoction?
But what really turned me off about this film was the gay backdrop (the film’s title, the rainbow flags all over the place, the one or two actual and several implicitly gay characters), all of it trite stereotype dredged up from the ’70s. The film’s message tries to be a good one: celebrate diversity. And for straight kids the film may work somewhat–”tolerate your gay classmates even if they are bizarre freaks like the ones we portray here.” But how can being tragic losers be a good message for gay kids?