The DVD selection at our small local library isn’t what you’d call expansive and leans more to the popular than the classic. A few nights back, I was heading home to face a mountain of laundry screaming for my attention and decided that I was okay with popular. I had heard a great deal about Twilight, both the book and the film, and decided it couldn’t be any worse than The Princess Protection Program which I had watched early in the week with the kids. Relative to its genre, the movie was more than half bad— interesting storyline and a plot that keeps you (or at least me) hooked till the end. I did, however, feel more than slightly self-conscious when explaining to Jim what I was watching. In an attempt to keep myself from looking like a total loser who sits around folding laundry and watching teenie bopper flicks, I decided to call it “cultural observation” and make a post out of it. Therefore, you the reader can benefit from my wisdom (or suffer through my folly).
If you don’t have any teens in your life and haven’t heard of the Twilight series, the basic premise is this: Bella, a young woman who has recently moved to live with her father in Washington state, becomes intrigued by and then falls madly in love with Edward, an aloof outsider who initially repels Bella’s attempts to befriend him but continues to pop up just in time to come to her rescue. Eventually it is revealed that Edward as well as his “foster” parents and siblings are vampires. Edward desires to save Bella from the monster within him and thus tries (and fails) to prevent her from getting too close. Now I realize that this sounds like the plot of myriad love stories, and in many ways it is just a new spin on an old tale. But isn’t that what draws us to so many narratives? We identify with the thread of narrative that runs through these stories, which also often runs through our own lives.
Whenever I have a strong emotional response to a film, which was certainly true in the case of Twilight, I become very suspicious of that film. The female heart is so susceptible to manipulation, I must keep my guard up lest I find myself in the garden taking a big bite of something that Forked Tongue over there said would do me some good. There is definitely some heart string pulling in Twilight and if Maggie was old enough to watch it (or read it) I would want to have some long talks about what true love means. We see Bella wanting to give up the very essence of who she is, a human, in order to be with Edward. Certainly I have experienced to varying degrees that feminine tendency to lose perspective in my relationships, both romantic and otherwise. There is something seductive in the idea of submerging to the point of drowning. Ironically, as soon as we have finished plunging head first, we seem just as likely to deeply resent any call to submission and spend the rest of our lives trying to fight our way to the surface or get out of the pool all together.
Back to the point at hand, my head is still aswirl from trying to dissect this movie. Whatever it is selling, it has certainly inspired a great deal of head scratching on my part. Head scratching is a good thing, right? Despite our desire (or at least my annoyingly predominant desire) to categorize everything into neatly assigned species and subspecies, there is something to the postmodern idea of gray areas and ambiguity. In the end the most compelling part of the story isn’t the love story but Edward’s inner battle. Something in his struggle against his very nature resonates with my own grappling against the flesh. I have faith that in the end, the monster won’t win out and that all will be made as it should be, including my heart. But there are many days when it feels as though the beast in me has been unleashed, as Johnny Cash would say. All I can do is hold on tight and hold out for dawn. I suppose we all have hearts that are living in the twilight, waiting for the dawn.
Gran Torino — I can’t remember the last time I saw a film I liked as much as I like Gran Torino which was surprising to me. I was pretty sure it would be well done but I had braced myself for the racially charged theme and overall dark atmosphere that often accompanies a Clint Eastwood movie. Though the film was by no means a tip-toe- through-the-tulips kind of experience, it felt a lot like life—ordinary days made up of seemingly ordinary moments punctuated by life-changing moments of drama. I must admit to having a bit of a crush on Eastwood’s character, Walt Kowalski, despite his crusty outer shell. I could even tolerate the less than heroic token Christian. If you have an above average tolerance for bad language, this is a must-see.
Henry Poole Is Here — It was a slow night at the Spiegel household and I thought I would check out this Luke Wilson flick. I really didn’t have any expectations for a dark comedy about the face of Jesus appearing on the side of a suicidal man’s house. I am not sure that the filmmakers themselves knew exactly what they wanted to convey or, if they did, they weren’t entirely successful at conveying their message. I appreciated their openness to the supernatural but hated that they couldn’t bring themselves to draw conclusions or make a more explicit statement about faith. Still, good performances and an uplifting theme make it a great slow night movie.
The Reader — Okay, I don’t care if she played a great Elinor Dashwood (Sense and Sensibilty) or not, Kate Winslet is no longer invited to my first slumber party in heaven. (This is a game I play with myself when feeling like all my heroes predate me by a couple hundred years. I imagine sitting around eating cheese puffs and drinking beer with Charlotte Bronte, Jane Austen and Elizabeth Gaskell. Sad, but true.) Jim tells me this story represents nihilism, the complete meaninglessness of human history. It was maddening because since there is no meaning, there can be no villains, no heroes, no redemption—something this movie greatly needed. Winslet is a talented actress who delivers a stellar performance (most of which she gives in some state of undress), but nothing could redeem this film’s harsh take on the choices we make.
Up — You know a movie is good when you can pay an obscene sum for admission, including a ridiculous additional charge for equally ridiculous-looking 3D glasses, and have to put up with somebody’s one-year-old crying and yapping through half the movie and still really enjoy yourself. I have become so suspicious of anything marketed for children, especially when it hails from Hollywood, that despite the great reviews, I always have my doubts. Up is funny (I can’t tell you how many movies my kids watch without even cracking a smile), touching, and creative. I am not a fan of 3D, or the eyewear, but I highly recommend this one for the big people as well as the little ones.
The Visitor — This film was repeatedly recommended to me (including by Jim, since he saw it at Sundance last year), so finally I gave in. The performances were great and the story one that deserves be told. It manages to have a message without losing the magic of its storytelling. By tipping their political hand, subtly but unmistakably, early on, the filmmakers put me on my guard which was disappointing. Had they just let the story speak for itself and trusted the audience to draw our own conclusions, it would have been a much more powerful movie. Still, it is worthy of the recommendations. Keep them coming!
He’s Just Not That Into You — Romantic comedies used to be a guilty pleasure that, while lacking in nutritional value, you could ingest without fear of being poisoned. With movies like Knocked Up and Then She Found Me as the new template for a light-hearted evening, Hollywood has replaced fluff with rat poison. In the case of He’s Just Not That Into You the toxins are very carefully concealed in some descent performances, good writing and LOL moments. All of these elements are like the peanut butter masking the poison, tempting you to take a bite even though you know what is waiting in the middle. I planned to quickly dismiss this movie as just bad but found it more disturbing because it was well-done. All the clichés were present (the married couple who never have sex and are both miserable; the shacked up couple who are the only healthy relationship in the bunch; the disproportionate number of homosexuals with great advice and even better hair) while giving you the overwhelming sense that you had seen this film a hundred times before. Unlike so many that have come before, this movie was much cleverer. Be afraid—very, very afraid.
The film’s sentimental farewell also parallels that of Dorothy bidding adieu to her three friends, but with a crucial difference. The latter occurs after a technological failure—the balloon launch mishap which carries away the bumbling wizard to who knows where—while E.T.’s return home is the result technological success. And, interestingly, as E.T.’s spaceship zooms away from Earth, it leaves a rainbow in the sky, which of course hearkens to the “somewhere over the rainbow” theme of The Wizard of Oz. Coincidence? Surely not, given Spielberg’s astute sense of narrative and film history.
Changeling — Recently, I concluded that there is an inversely proportional relationship between the amount of hype that Hollywood gives a film and that film’s actual quality. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Changeling is an exception. Having avoided this movie like one avoids “Toys R Us” on Christmas Eve, I finally caved and am so glad I did. The whole atmosphere of the film is spellbinding and, for the most part, even-handed. The bad guys are really bad but entirely believable; the good guys are good but not saints. Though the clear hero of this story is Angelina Jolie as the courageous mother of a missing boy, there are other characters along the way who follow their conscience against the pressures of corruption. There is the policeman who goes with his gut rather than following orders; and the pastor who desires justice for his community but cares for the individual as well as the collective. It is the sum of their efforts which result in justice being served, and though you aren’t allowed a perfectly happy ending, you certainly feel the world is a better place for their struggle.
Australia — Back to my theory on the relationship between hype and quality… If I was tempted to throw it out completely, the film Australiacertainly relieved the temptation. Now I will admit that the site of Hugh Jackman galloping across the plains of said continent is enough to make any girl inwardly swoon and, yes, Nicole Kidman looks really pretty in skirts and has great taste in head apparel. But that is where most of the charm of this “epic” sadly ends. It is as if they put Indiana Jones and Dances With Wolves into a blender, and the combination is none too tasty. Though easy to dismiss for being just bad, I think the most disturbing aspect of this film is its message regarding what it means to love. Love is not sacrificing your own happiness for someone else’s. Love is not committing yourself to their well-being. That is imperialism! Love is freedom, this film tells us—the freedom to be who you are, whatever the price to those around you. Certainly I don’t believe that love means conforming yourself entirely to the wishes and demands of others, but there must be something deeper holding love together than sex and emotional whims.
Half Nelson — I have a habit of putting off films that I know are going to be good but not easy. It’s like saving your green beans for last. Sometimes it is tempting to eat the rolls and mashed potatoes first because they go down so much more easily. After months of pushing Half Nelson around my plate, so to speak, I was rewarded for the effort with a great story. Despite the occasional jarringly misplaced political rant, this film is an authentic slice of life. Too often, when films depict relationships between characters of different ethnicities, there is a hyper-awareness of race that breaks the illusion of the film. In this film, though the main characters are of different ethnic backgrounds, racial issues are never really discussed outright. They are just there. The overall message of Half Nelson falls somewhere between Requiem for a Dream hopelessness and Remember the Titans optimism. Lean too far one way and you are a nihilist. Too far the other and you are Pollyanna. This movie stays right in the middle. You won’t even have to hold your nose while chewing. 
