The Commitments

Year Two, Day 1 - 1/1/10 - Movie #366

BEFORE: I could keep the animated films going, but that's too easy. I took some time to re-organize and re-prioritize my list - and I made note of a bunch of films relating to entertainers, or being famous - I'll start with a look at the music industry and then branch out from there.

Besides, right now it's all about commitment to the project, right? I debated whether to change the numbering system or not for the new year - and arrived on the compromise above, resetting the number of the day, but not the cumulative movie total. This way I can reach #400, #500 etc.

THE PLOT: The travails to form the "World's Hardest Working Band," The Commitments, and bring soul music to the people of Dublin, Ireland.

AFTER: Yeah, I'd heard good things about this film over the years, but still wasn't quite sure what exactly to expect. This turned out to be a great, compact example of the quest for fame - practicing to get it, struggling to maintain it, and then trying desperately to hold on to it, all in the course of one movie.

There's the requisite montage of bad and inappropriate auditions, just like one would see in the first part of a season of "American Idol", as Dubliner Jimmy Rabbitte tries to form a soul band in the middle of a very unlikely place. But soul music is working-class music, so the theory is that it should appeal to the working class of Dublin. So it should just be a matter of finding musicians with the right influences, right?

And to a certain degree it is - I liked seeing footage of the band's early rehearsals, because you really get a feel for the way that the performers start to fit together. I've been in a couple of a cappella singing groups, and I really liked making the arrangements work given the singers we had, and then toying with the balance and the voice parts to get it right.

Once the band comes together, though, it's a struggle to keep going with all the personality conflicts - the bass player gets nervous in front of crowds, the saxophonist secretly wants to play jazz instead of soul, and the trumpet player is sleeping his way through the line of back-up singers. Then the drummer starts arguing with the lead singer, and all bets are off.

The lead singer, Deco Cuffe (Andrew Strong) is really the standout performer in the band. He sits out a few numbers, but none of the girl singers are anywhere close to his talent level, so you definitely feel his absence when he's on break. The guy moves like Joe Cocker and looks like ten kilometers of bad road (no thanks to inferior British dentistry) - but man, the guy can wail. I got chills on a couple numbers, and that doesn't happen often for me.

The film was based on a novel, but the mostly-unknown actors were cast for their musical ability, not their acting ability, which is a nice change of pace, though the accents took a little getting used to - I couldn't understand much of what they were saying in the first 10 minutes, then my ear got accustomed to it and I was fine.

And I was reminded of the film "Big Night", where Louis Prima was supposed to show up at the Italian restaurant - here the trumpet player was supposed to get his old friend Wilson Pickett to show up at one of the band's gigs...but there was a possibility that the trumpet player was, in fact, full of shite.

RATING: 7 out of 10 pints

a message from the management...

Happy New Year!

Year One of the movie project has come to a close. 365 movies down, and I started with 437, so there should be only 72 movies left, right? Wait a sec, the math's not adding up right...oh, yeah, well, I did add a quite a few movies to the list along the way, either by direct acquisition (Damn you, $5.99 DVD store!) or by association (finding that perfect movie on the pay channels to complement another on a double-feature homemade DVD) so the list right now has about 397 to go. So I only made about a 40-movie dent in the overall total, which means it will take, let's see, carry the 1, crap, about 10 more years at that rate... I've just got to get tough, and not add just any old movie to the list. This is about watching the classics, the movies I should have watched before, and I've just got to try and stick to that.

Essentially, I've climbed atop a mountain of watched DVDs, only to discover that I've scaled K2, and Everest is looming in the distance. Well, it wouldn't be logical to scale down, just to climb back up that other mountain, so while I'm in the zone, it makes much more sense to pause here at base camp, and then strike out for that higher peak.

So I'm starting up Year Two - and if I watch another 365 movies, great - but I've already proven it's possible, so if I only get to say, 350 or so in 2010, I've just got to plan to be OK with that. Again, it's not that I think I'm accomplishing some laudable goal here, it's one that most pro movie critics reach just in the course of doing their job. But I'm not a pro, just an amateur, and I have to maintain my real jobs, relationships and hobbies, and that's the tricky part.

What's coming up in the New Year? Well, January looks to be all about fame - movies about music, movie and TV stars getting it and losing it. February's always good for romance movies, then I've got a tribute to Jack Nicholson, a bunch of time-traveling films, and hopefully some Stephen King when Halloween rolls around again. I don't like to plan these things out much more than that - oh wait, yes I do.

I made a dedication last Jan. 1 to my grandfather - and the year is over. So I'm dedicating this year's efforts to the memory of Lyn Clerget, who I worked with for 2 years or so back in the late 80's. Lyn taught me how to manage an office, work a spreadsheet, run payroll, and at least a dozen other things that have kept me employed for the last 2 decades. Also, she knew the importance of snacks in motivating employees. She paid it forward and I never got to pay it back, since she left the planet much, much too soon.

Reset the counter, and fire up the DVD player...and please pass me the Mountain Dew and the chocolate-covered espresso beans.

Curious George

Day 365 - 12/31/09 - Movie #365

BEFORE: No TRUE self-respecting New Yorker goes anywhere near Times Square on New Year's Eve, right? RIGHT? Heck, I don't even want to leave the house - same goes for Halloween, July 4 and Valentine's Day, they're just too dangerous. OK, Valentine's Day isn't dangerous, it's just when the restaurants are most crowded, but the other nights are hazardous and problematic, due to drunk drivers, violent pranks, and fireworks, respectively. Fortunately, I'm married to a wonderful woman who feels the same about these holidays. We went out for a fancy dinner LAST night, on New Year's Eve Eve.

This is it, the last movie of 2009. And even if this movie ended after the ball dropped at midnight, I'm counting it. (For all you know, I watched it in mid-afternoon...) I didn't work this hard just to have my tally come in at 364.

THE PLOT: The Man in the Yellow Hat looks after his pet monkey - an inquisitive and wonderful creature whose enthusiasm often gets the best of him.

AFTER: You know, I just picked this one because I've been watching animated animal films all week, and because of the word "Curious" in the title - if any word sums up my motivation for watching all these movies, it would be curiosity... But I really enjoyed this one, it was quite charming. It's a good, heartwarming way to end the year.

Will Ferrell voices The Man in the Yellow Hat, beloved icon of children's books, and here he's given a name, Ted, a backstory, and some motivation as well - he works for a museum that's having financial troubles, and he's sent on a quest to Africa to find a giant, lost monkey statue. Instead, he makes friends with a pint-size curious monkey (hmm, what to name him...) who follows him back to the U.S.

At first, this causes a lot of trouble - Ted's apartment doesn't allow pets, the museum is all ready to display his non-existent monkey statue, and the son of the museum owner is just waiting for him to fail, so he can close the museum and put up a parking lot. (ooh, la la la...) Now, don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone - and once Ted finally gets animal control to ship George back to the jungle, darn if everything doesn't remind him of their exhausting but exhilarating time together...so he sets out to get George back.

Now you know it's a fantasy film, when the NYC Animal Control shows up - we called them once, because we had a raccoon getting comfy on our back porch, and I was told that they couldn't do anything about raccoons, because they're "part of nature". Umm, aren't ALL animals part of nature? So which animals is it that your office, you know, actively controls?

Most of the reviews I've seen for this film, including those on the IMDB, herald the "traditional" animation style. I beg to differ - almost all of the backgrounds looked like CGI to me, but CGI done in a style meant to mimic hand-drawn animation. All of those great overhead shots of the city, plus all the buildings that George and Ted sail over while being carried by balloons - there's just no way that could be hand-drawn! The perspective was constantly changing, and it was just too accurate, so computers had to be involved. But using the CGI to create the look of a hand-drawn cartoon? I don't know how it was done, but it's just ingenious, creating something in-between the two techniques. Now that makes me curious...

Also, it's refreshing to see an animated animal that doesn't talk. It's a small point, but I think it's significant. We've all become accustomed to live-action animals with animated mouths, or just flat-out CG talking animals in "Madagascar" and "Shrek", that we tend to forget how much of a cheat it really is. Here's an animal that manages to entertain and (sort of) communicate with humans, and it's all done with his actions and expressions. It might be a little harder to tell such a story, but the payoff is that much greater, and they got there honestly.

Also starring the voices of Drew Barrymore (as the love interest), Dick Van Dyke, David Cross and Eugene Levy.

RATING: 7 out of 10 keychains

So that's it for 2009 - I brought her in right on schedule. Now I'm going to catch up on some sleep, re-organize my list, and make a decision about whether I want to put myself through another year of this...

Racing Stripes

Day 364 - 12/30/09 - Movie #364

BEFORE: Just two more movies until the end of Year One. Much progress has been made, but I still have miles to go before I sleep (usually in the middle of a bad film...) For now, it's back-to-back zebra films.

THE PLOT: An abandoned zebra grows up believing he is a racehorse, and, with the help of his barnyard friends and a teenage girl, sets out to achieve his dream of racing with thoroughbreds.

AFTER: Someday, this movie will be seen as important for starring Hayden Panettiere in-between her role on "Ally McBeal" and her role in "Heroes". Just as Elizabeth Taylor had "National Velvet", Hayden's got "Racing Stripes". If she goes on to bigger roles, this film could come back to haunt her...

This is an animated film cross-breeded with a sport film, it's only missing the cliche where an official holds a giant rule book and announces that, by gum, there's no rule that says a zebra CAN'T run in a horse race. Umm, yes there is, it's up there in rule 1 which defines the term "horse race". (funny, you never see lawyers involved in these disputes, which would slow the whole film down...)

Yes, Stripes is a zebra, a fact which the film chooses to remind us of about 50,000 times, as it's the main topic of every conversation between any two characters, or even just his internal monologue...just in case you forgot, or your eyes stop functioning halfway through the film. And we all know it's not the breed of animal, or the size of his legs, or the physical impossibility of beating a thoroughbred in a race - it's all about "heart", isn't it. Funny how the main character's opponent never has any "heart", right? I mean, that would make things difficult, if the other fella wanted to win just as much...

There are nods here to "Field of Dreams" - father builds a racetrack in a cornfield, despite working very hard plowing said field earlier in the film - and "Karate Kid" - training montage of doing manual labor as unlikely preparation for sporting event. Heck, throw in "Rocky IV" and any other sports film you care to name.

And I know it's a film for kids, but there's just too much comic relief - too much time devoted to a couple of rapping/singing flies (David Spade and Steve Harvey) and all the fecal jokes that come with them, and a pelican named Goose (Joe "Joey Pants" Pantoliano) whose main role is to dive-bomb people with his guano... A high ratio of comic relief suggests an attempt to distract from the main storyline.

Also starring Bruce Greenwood (JFK from "13 Days"), Wendie Malick, and character actor M. Emmet Walsh in live-action form, and the voices of Frankie Muniz (Stripes), Dustin Hoffman (as a horse), Whoopi Goldberg (goat), Jeff Foxworthy (rooster), Snoop Dogg (dog, ha-ha), Mandy Moore (horse), Michael Clarke Duncan (Clydesdale horse), and Fred Dalton Thompson (horse). All were pretty easy for me to identify, except Moore and Thompson - I admit I had to fast-forward to the end credits to identify him, it was really bugging me.

And my only personal connection to tonight's film was that Michael Rosenbaum (Lex Luthor from "Smallville") had a few lines as a horse named Ruffshod. I spoke with Michael briefly at the premiere of "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith", as we were standing at the popcorn counter together. Not a great story, but I do enjoy speaking to celebs, even when they're incognito.

RATING: 4 out of 10 riding crops

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa

Day 363 - 12/29/09 - Movie #363

BEFORE: Perhaps it wasn't the best plan to watch those long WWII movies during the busy Christmas season, because now that I have some extra time, I'm watching these shorter animated features. Oh, well, I'm going to finish the year on track, and that's all that matters in the end.

THE PLOT: New York Zoo animals Alex the Lion, Marty the Zebra, Melman the Giraffe and Gloria the Hippo, still stranded on Madagascar, start to leave the island - but they land in the wilderness of Africa, where Alex meets the rest of his family.

AFTER: Jeez, has it already been 11 months since I watched "Madagascar"? In some ways, the year has flown by, but in other ways it's also felt very long indeed.

The first movie saw these four zoo animals making their way to the title island, and in the sequel they try to return to New York, but only make it as far as mainland Africa. Wouldn't you know, they crash-land right near the wildlife preserve where Alex (Ben Stiller) was born - hey, it's not like Africa is a giant continent or anything... They meet his father, Zuba (Bernie Mac), and his mom, Mom (Sherri Shepherd) and also his father's rival, Makunga (Alec Baldwin). I wish I knew enough about "The Lion King" to spot any parody references. (yeah, I know, it's on the list...)

The other zoo animals encounter difficulties fitting in as well - Marty the zebra (Chris Rock) finds out what it's like to be part of a herd for the first time, Melman the giraffe (David Schwimmer) becomes a sort of witch doctor to the other giraffes, and Gloria the hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith) explores the perils of dating a chubby chaser.

The other popular characters are back from the first film also, like the lemur king (Sacha Baron Cohen) and the penguins (who also have a spin-off TV show) but it seems like they're just given odd jobs to keep them busy while the main characters have their personal encounters, and also solve the mystery of the disappearing water hole. I will say that the plot is very tight - all of the major actions have repercussions which become important later, and everything that comes around goes around.

I don't know if they're planning another sequel or not (in addition to the Christmas special that aired earlier this month) but the plot's wide open for it. The jury's still out on whether zoos are "good" or "bad", according to this franchise, or whether animals should be left alone on the African plains. Both environments seem to have their pros and cons - basic needs are attended to in the zoo, plus the animals are stars there - but out in the wild, they're with their own kind and seem to "fit in" in a more social way. Instead of tackling these issues, this film would rather show a long slugfest between a Yiddish grandma on safari and a lion - not really sure what the take-away message is there...

But thank God these animated movies finally stopped listing "Production Babies" in the credits. No one at home cares that someone managed to work on an animated film AND reproduce at the same time...anyway, those kids are probably neglected since Daddy (or Mommy) spends so much time crunching pixels at the Disney or Dreamworks cartoon factory. If that seems mean-spirited, let me point out that I spent 3 years at film school and 5 years in the music-video trenches before I got my name in the credits of an animated feature, and all those kids do is get born - it's just not fair.

Also starring the voices of Andy Richter, Cedric the Entertainer, Harland Williams, and Fergie and Will.I.Am from the Black Eyed Peas. And one of the penguins is voiced by Chris Miller, director of "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs", who also used to be an intern at one of my jobs. So that's tonight's personal connection...(the animation community is like that, everyone seems to know everyone else)

RATING: 6 out of 10 parachutes

Kung Fu Panda

Day 362 - 12/28/09 - Movie #362

BEFORE: My personal connection to this film is that Ethan Reiff, one of its writers, used to live right above me in a condo in Park Slope, Brooklyn, before he moved out to L.A. - so I knew about this film years before it was released. Ethan also co-wrote the movies "Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight" and "Bulletproof Monk", and the TV series "Brimstone" - so tonight he gets a shout-out from me.

THE PLOT: Po the Panda finds himself chosen as the Dragon Warrior despite the fact that he is obese and a complete novice at martial arts.

AFTER: Yay, Ethan! This was a really good one. Lots of action, and the voices were really well cast, especially Jack Black as Po the Panda. Dustin Hoffman was also great as Master Shifu, and so was Ian MacShane as Tai Lung, the snow leopard. Holy cats, that was Angelina Jolie as the Tigress, and Lucy Liu as the Viper? I recognized Seth Rogen (again?) as the Mantis and David Cross as the Crane, but didn't recognize Jackie Chan rounding out the Furious Five as the Monkey.

What I liked about this film was that it at first seemed very unlikely for a panda to learn martial arts, in fact it seemed like he was picked to be the Dragon Warrior at random, and a poor random choice at that. But then once his teacher found the proper way to motivate him (using food as a reward) he not only trained hard, he found a way to put his size and his innate panda skills to work for him. He retained his "panda-ness", and didn't have to conform the same rigid training method the other animals did.

And that's important, since the members of the Five all had different fighting skills - one wouldn't expect a monkey to fight like a tiger, or a snake to fight like a bird. And just because no one had ever seen "panda-style" kung fu before shouldn't mean that it is without merit or its proper place in the dojo.

If I had any complaint, it might be that the kung fu action was a little TOO slick, and overly complicated. Some fight sequences were so quick, it was sometimes hard to tell exactly what was going on. I guess when you're dealing with CGI warriors, you can literally make them do anything, without worrying about wires being seen, or actors getting hurt, or the laws of physics. The only limits on the fighting sequences were the imaginations of the animators, so why not go all out? I just would have preferred that they keep one foot (just one...) in the realm of reality so I could follow along.

So there's a great message (you know, for the kids) about following your dreams and having self-confidence, and succeeding in your own individual way, and the message doesn't get too preachy. I had an experience of my own today while giving a friend a tour of the animation studio where I work - and he was a little envious of my job, which is something I should think about when the daily grind gets me down. I've had some great opportunities, and I've taken advantage of them in my own way, and I should remember how lucky I've been, since there are other people who haven't had the same opportunities.

But still, what was the deal with the panda having a duck for a father? Obviously he's adopted, but the film never addressed this point. Will we be seeing Po's mysterious father in the sequel? The IMDB's synopsis for the sequel (due in 2011) says that Po will "discover the secrets of his mysterious origins". OK, we're cool...

RATING: 8 out of 10 dumplings

Horton Hears a Who!

Day 361 - 12/27/09 - Movie #361

BEFORE: Back in NYC, the holiday is over and so are my holiday movies - but I'll watch back-to-back Dr. Seuss (and Jim Carrey) movies, and end the year with a chain of animated films.

THE PLOT: Horton the Elephant struggles to protect a microscopic community from his neighbors who refuse to believe it exists.

AFTER: It's a little tough to get a handle on this one, since I remember it as a kids' story that took about 10 minutes to read (perfect for small kids and their short attention spans) so just like with the "Grinch" movie, it takes some doing to bump it up to a 90-minute film.

What starts as a somewhat silly film about a huge elephant and a tiny life-filled speck can also be seen as a commentary on the nature of the universe - hey, maybe we're all just floating on a speck, or maybe our earth is just an electron in a giant solar-system sized atom, which is a tiny piece on the toenail of some giant creature...wow, man, I'll have another hit of whatever Dr. Seuss was smoking...

But then there's sort of a commentary on religion, as the Mayor (voiced by Steve Carell), the only Who in Whoville that can hear Horton (Jim Carrey), has to get the rest of his community to believe in the giant elephant in the sky, even though they can't see or hear him. And if they do, then their world will be saved, but if not, then it's certain doom. You can draw your own parallels to Judeo-Christianity, or Islam, Scientology or whatever. And religion is a bit of an all-or-nothing proposition for me - if some part of it is bogus, then it's all bogus. Christmas is a fun time for me to engage in religious discussions with my parents - can you guess which side I'm on?

What makes God any more or less real than a giant invisible elephant, or Santa Claus, or a flying spaghetti monster? But I digress...

I suppose you could draw an analogy to science as well, since at one point people weren't aware of tiny things like germs or bacteria - and when some scientists figured it out, they had to convince people that maybe washing hands, sterilizing scalpels and wearing surgical masks were good ideas.

The point is, Horton believes in the Whos, and the Whos believe in him - but Horton's obsession with tiny, invisible lifeforms angers Ms. Kangaroo (Carol Burnett) who sends Vlad the Vulture (Will Arnett) to destroy this clover supposedly containing tiny lifeforms that she can't see or hear.

I would like to believe that there is something bigger (or smaller) than humanity in the universe - that somewhere, someone is in some kind of control (the "Daddy's driving" theory of religion) but I'm certainly not arrogant enough to say that I've got it all figured out, one way or the other. Why can't part of my belief system be in a higher power that I don't think I'm designed to understand? My god is funny like that - he doesn't want me to think I've got all figured out.

But I do admire a movie that raises a few questions...

Also starring the voices of Seth Rogen, Amy Poehler, Jonah Hill, Jaime Pressley, Charles Osgood, and Niecy Nash.

RATING: 7 out of 10 leaf-bugs