In the Valley of Elah

(2007)
Directed By: Paul Haggis
Written By: Mark Boal & Paul Haggis

Cast:
Tommy Lee Jones - Hank Deerfield
Charlize Theron - Det. Emily Sanders
Jason Patric - Lt. Kirklander
Susan Sarandon - Joan Deerfield


Tommy Lee Jones stars as Hank Deerfield a man who is searching for someone. Instead of the usual fugitive however the person he is searching for is his son Mike - who disappears after coming home from Iraq. Hank, an ex military police officer, takes it upon himself to seek him out but when his remains are found singed and scattered in an empty field the case becomes one of looking for his killers.
(Charlize Theron) is an ambitious military criminal investigator who is assigned to the case. She proves throughout the film that she is not to be messed with, especially by any chauvinistic co-workers. Both will stop at nothing to find the killer(s).
The clear message of all this is that war changes you. You don’t return the same person you left as because your experiences make you and/or break you. Unfortunately a great many are broken by what they experience. This not only effects them directly but also their families as is the case in one scene where an ex-Iraqi soldier’s wife is drowned in the bathtub. In some ways the horrors of Iraq aren’t left there in the dust thousands of miles away but come home in the thoughts and/or actions of the soldiers returning.
Tommy Lee Jones does an excellent job playing a hardened veteran looking for his son. You can tell he has been trough a lot but there is nothing to prepare him for what he goes through in the story.
In the film he sees an immigrant man putting up the American flag upside down. He tells him, that its totally wrong - that a flag upside down is an international distress signal. At the end of the film we see Hank give the man a tattered flag that his son sent him from Iraq. He hoists flag into the breeze… and it is upside down. Perhaps this says it all.
3 1/2 stars

The Exorcist

Directed By: William Friedkin
Written By: William Peter Blatty

Cast:
Jason Miller - Father Damian Karras
Ellen Burstyn - Chris McNeil
Max Von Sydow - Father Lankester Merrin
Lee J. Cobb - Det. Lt. William F. Kinderman
Linda Blair - Regan Teresa McNeil


Based on a true story that happened in Georgetown in 1949, the story centers on the apparent possession of a girl, by demonic forces. When doctors can’t find a reasonable explanation to her split personality disorder they are forced to recommend a priest.
On a parallel course to their story we have a priest, Father Damian who originally studied psychiatry and is going through a crisis of faith. When he commits his mother to a hospital because she is all alone and can’t take care of herself, she soon dies alone afterward. He soon blames himself for this misfortune.
When he sees the girl he has reason to believe that there is something going on that is more than psychological. He takes his case to the church authorities who recommend someone with experience - Farther Merrin, who has looked evil in the eye before - literally. But can Father Merrin deal with the devil himself? Or more importantly can Father Damien wrestle a demon on the outside while wrestling with “demons” inside himself.
There are some beautiful shots early on in this movie but this is quickly replaced by an overall pervasiveness of evil. Most of the rest of the film takes place in the _’s bedroom where some of the most horrific scenes in all of any movie occur.
What stands out most to me is the ending, which is shocking not only because it is unexpected but because it lasts with you for so long after you’ve seen it. Indeed the movie still resonates with audiences today because it goes and goes well into an idea where so few movies dare venture - that good and evil are external to human beings and two very real forces in the universe.
3 stars

Apocalypse Now

Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
Written by: John Milius

Cast:
Captain Willard - Martin Sheen
Colonel Kurtz - Marlon Brando
Colonel Lucas - Harrison Ford
Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore - Robert Duvall
Dennis Hopper - Photojournalist
Frederic Forrest - Jay ‘Chef’ Hicks

“I love the smell of Napalm in the morning.” Well, really I don’t, I have no idea what Napalm smells like (Nor do I want to) but Colonel Kilgore surely does. He is just one of the many colorful characters that make up Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece - Apocalypse Now. A film that explores the senselessness of murder and the breaking point that exists in everyone.
The movie is set in Vietnam during the war where special agent Captain Willard is sent to eliminate, “with extreme prejudice” a Colonel Kurtz, who has, judging from field reports and audio tapes, gone insane. He is deep in the Cambodian jungle and operating under is own jurisdiction. He has killed hundreds of innocent people and has a devoted following.
Captain Willard accepts the mission though not without hesitation as he states: “charging a man with murder in this place was like handing out speeding tickets at the Indy 500.” He goes up a river to his destination escorted by a few ‘kids’ and a boat captain.
As we go further up the river we progress like in Dante’s Inferno, deeper and deeper into hell. Man is back in his primordial element - it is kill or be killed. But it is more than just defense. There is also a deep senselessness in it all. The scenes can best be described as nightmarish. There is plenty of smoke and just that right balance of light and dark that makes for a particularly uneasy feeling. I couldn’t help but think if Rembrandt was the cinematographer he would have worked on this movie.
Everything comes to its climactic finale, the lowest circle of hell, or the end of the world, whichever you prefer, when Captain Willard meets up with Colonel Kurtz, who has become nothing less than a God to a tribe of natives and a few defected soldiers. The question soon becomes who will do the assassinating.
All in all, Apocalypse Now is a burning testament to the horror that is war. Perhaps the most horrific thing of all is what it can do to a perfectly normal human being and the idea that there might be a Colonel Kurtz buried in us all.
4 stars

Hot House

2006
Directed by Shimon Dotan

I went to see this film because it offered what I thought would be a unique perspective on a conflict that has stretched decades and ignited passions throughout the world - the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Call it a war, call it a conflict, call it an occupation, whatever you call it I’m sure you will agree that both sides know their side is right and more often than not, they won’t give an inch in the other’s direction. We usually see this conflict from one source - the media; whether it be newspaper or newscast and not from the people who are at the “frontlines” so to speak - those incarcerated in Israeli jails. But Shimon Dotan, does just that. In the film Palestinian “freedom fighters” are interviewed and we get to see conditions and social structure inside the jails itself. It could be said that the jails are a microcosm of the world outside. There are various cell blocks that prisoners share and each cell blocks occupants are either members of Fatah, Hamas or PLO. And if prison is supposed to be a demoralizing factor, these inmates certainly don’t show it. In fact many consider going to prison to be an education in itself. While there they learn from other men who where also part of crimes against Israel. They read the news extensively and learn more about the opposite side and world opinion than they would have on the outside. When they get out (if they get out, many interviewed had consecutive life sentences (one was 16)) they will almost surely be politically active again.
In fact, you could say they are politically active while in jail. There are free elections within the jail and even between jails.
The filmmaker, even though he is Israeli, doesn’t appear to take any side. Though I think it is perhaps equally hard to pick a side as a viewer. Many of the people we see don’t seem to be your typical “killers” but this is what they are charged with. Many are men with families and they are religious. Then there is also the side that says these people are murderers and would do so again in an instant to liberate their people.
Do they regret what they did? Not one interviewed did nor did they regret having contributed to the deaths of innocent civilians. But to many people these people are martyrs to the cause. I only hope that someday both sides can see that violence is not the answer to their trouble. As an old saying goes - an eye for an eye will leave everyone blind.
2 ½ stars

Murch

Directed by David Ichioka & Edie Ichioka

When everyone hears the name Francis Ford Coppola they know immediately who he is and even what films he directed. However, have you heard of Walter Murch? Probably not but if it was not for me such films as The Godfather and Apocalypse Now would most likely not be the cinematic masterpieces that they are. You see Walter Murch is the editor of films like these and other notable works like Breathless and The Conversation.
Most people may not think an editor’s job is that important but the next time you look at a film note each and every cut and you will find the editors mark there. They choose not only which shots juxtapose other shots but also they have a hand in how the sound relates to the images. Walter Murch composes with images and does so, surprisingly, standing up much like a conductor at the podium to his orchestra.
In the film I learned what a lengthy thought process it is to compose a sequence of a film and about the great amount of power the editor has in the creation process. I found it interesting that when Murch wants to make a cut from shot to shot he will not cut on an action as is the textbook norm but will try to get inside the head of the audience and make the cut long enough or short enough as to allow the audience to have a thought about that actor before the next image appears on screen. If an editor cuts too short on a piece of dialogue that holds clues to that character the audience is likely to feel that they were ‘shortchanged.‘ Another interesting technique Murch employs is editing without sound. He says it gets in the way and that a soundtrack is just “steroids” for a movie. Which is true if you think about it - if the images aren’t getting the message across to the audience, the soundtrack isn’t really going to help, it will actually hurt in the long run.
As a person who has edited video myself I took away a lot from this informative documentary and learned a lot about a man who has shaped cinema as much as any great director out there.
2 ½ stars

Taxi to the Dark Side

2007
Directed by: Alex Gibney

Create this Picture in your mind: You are driving your car to a large city along some rural road to pick up some people in the next town. All of a sudden you are stopped along a road because there was a tip that terrorists might be on the move after setting off a bomb. The police do a routine checkup and find a strange wire in your trunk which could have been used to trigger a bomb. You are quickly taken away to a jail where you aren’t told why you are arrested or given a lawyer. You are interrogated but pronounce you know nothing of what you have been accused of. New clothes are given to you and your arms are shackled to an iron mesh above your prison cell. You aren’t allowed to rest more than a few hours and even then you can’t sleep because if you doze off the handcuffs dig into your wrists and burn with pain. Later guards kick at your legs until they are pulverized. In a few days you are dead from your internal injuries.
This is a nightmare to most people - but this actually happened to one young taxi driver named Dilawar in Afghanistan. It was the first day of his job as a taxi driver and he was just driving some people he picked up in another town. He was later proven to be innocent as were the people he drove. This was unfortunately after he was beaten to death.
The film, though is not just about this one man but the many others who were incarcerated with little more against them than being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Of all those sent to bases to be interrogated , less than 5 percent were actually guilty of anything.
Taxi to the Dark Side details the mistreatment of prisoners under U.S. forces from Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan to the Abu Graib prison and Guatanamo Bay in Cuba. There is no embellishment in this film. It does not try to sway the viewer to any particular opinion. But it doesn’t need to either since the truth is right there for us to see in the degrading photos we see and from what we hear from actual prison guards at these locations.
The guards were told to think of the men there as less than human & they did a pretty good job of it - almost too good as many died from the inhumane treatment that is in total disregard to the Geneva Convention.
Taxi to the Dark Side really made me consider our foreign policy in harsher light. I had heard of the prisoner abuse scandals before and had seen pictures but to be reminded that it was our troops & most of all our leaders who had done this was especially hurtful. There was an interesting point brought up and one I’ld like to mention here. We Americans pride ourselves in belonging to a free country with inalienable rights for all mankind, where everyone under American protection can count on fairness and justice, do we not? If so, then how can we treat other human beings in such an inhumane way? It sends the opinion that if you are foreign you can be treated as: A) subhuman, B) a terrorist, C) unjustly, D) all of the above. I do wonder how many innocent prisoners became terrorists later after they were let out - only time will tell.
4 stars

Our Daily Bread

Directed by: Nikolaus Geyrhalter

Do you ever wonder where your food comes from? Sometimes I think part of the joy in eating comes from the fact that you don’t have to. Lets face it, most of us would rather not know that our burger came from cud-chewing Betsy only a few days ago or that our eggs came from chickens who exist in towers of cages that would make crowded Tokyo seem like Lincoln, Nebraska. Oh, and don’t get me started on the bacon. All of it (at least a great many food items) is presented here in its glory, uncut and unglamourized. The only sounds we hear are the sounds of conveyor belts or the sound of a saw slicing through bone and tissue. The atomization is quite spectacular and even amusing in some scenes - like a machine that propels chicks into trays like they were feathered ping pong balls (I am surprised the chicks don’t get concussions). But not all of Our Daily Bread shows the atomization of the food industry. There is a person behind that salami to be sure. Often we see them go through their daily tasks with all the exuberance of, well, aging cheese. There are a few takes to the workers taking their lunch break showing us that they eat too and their food is no doubt prepared by people like them. The real question is the woman who is putting bands on chickens all day having a chicken sandwich? I think not. Or at least I wouldn’t.
Cinemagraphically there are some great shots that give us the idea of the scope and scale of what it takes to feed billions of people whether it be rows of greenhouses or thousands of olive trees. When you think about it is quite amazing.
Many of the images are graphic and not for the faint of heart (or stomach). In Our Daily Bread the processes are shown in full detail from artificial insemination to the slaughterhouse. Everything is precisely controlled and maintained. If you are familiar with The Matrix then you will remember a scene where there are towers of human beings being produced for the specific purpose of providing energy to the machines that have taken over the earth. I wonder how the animals reaction would be if they knew they were that to us? But then again part of the joy of being an animal must be not knowing such things.
A good film and A good look for anyone who wants to see our food from the other side of the counter.
2 stars