Defending and Double-Snubbing the Oscar Doc Snubs

The film blogosphere is up in arms about the popular docs that got snubbed when the Oscar doc shortlist was unveiled.  Missing from the ranks were docs like "It Might Get Loud," "Anvil!:  The Story of Anvil," "Tyson," "Capitalism:  A Love Story," "The September Issue," "We Live in Public," and "Collapse" have all been noticed as big Oscar snubs.  Unfortunately, I have not seen the first two docs (not a big music doc fan...though I do plan on giving these two a try eventually).  I decided to give the four that I did see their fair chance in the spotlight, and give one of them my own award for best Oscar snub.

Rightly Snubbed:  The Lackluster Capitalism:  A Love Story

I have to admit that I'm one of those people that just eats up what Michael Moore spits out.  Except for this film.  And Fahrenheit 9/11.  In both of these films, Moore's attempt to strike chords with the audience's emotions fall flat on their face.  Few of the many people whose loss of homes Moore captures in Capitalism actually come off as worthy of sympathy.  The only thing Capitalism is great at doing is recounting the intricate government maneuvers in reacting to the recession.  He is, indeed, critical of the Obama administration, though he certainly is happy he is in the office, but his reluctance to do any cross-cultural comparisons à la Sicko make Capitalism a thin analysis of capitalism.

Too Flashy?:  Tyson

Wanna feel like you're living in someone else's alternative universe where morality, common sense, subtlety, and humility are foreign?  Watch James Toback's Tyson.  The argument here, told overwhelmingly through the subjects words is that Mike Tyson has been punched around too many times.  It's sad, sure, that he thinks the way he does, but in this equation, scary > sad.  The doc may have been a bit too highly stylized with its distracting graphics, but the story is artfully constructed to tell the story of a man who got famous a bit too quickly and never really knew how to deal with it all.  Perhaps Tyson will get more play if his complaints about the nomination procedure produce some more publicity.


Dated?:  We Live in Public

DiG! director Ondi Timoner came back this year with a self-distributed doc about dot-com entrepreneur/artist Josh Harris.  Harris developed internet television before anyone really had broadband.  He also did an installation piece where people, well, lived in public.  And man was it crazy!  Really important people were doing all of their intimate dealings, cameras pointed on them with a live feed to the Internet.  In an age where webcam sites seem oh-so-passé and the Internet has no limits, this doc is really only for a Gen X'ers nostalgia.  It captured the doc jury at Sundance, but understandably failed to gain a theatrical audience. 

Too Paranoid?:  Collapse

Chris Smith's new doc (after directing last year's fiction feature The Pool) is a look at the frantic, information-overloaded Michael Ruppert, a former CIA employee who Smith initially went to for information for another story.  Despite centering around images of Ruppert talking and smoking in a chair situated in the middle of a barren studio, Collapse is by far the most visually compelling on this snub list.  Though Ruppert's worries could easily be found by listing all the worries of the faculty of any liberal arts college, to such vehement and well-rounded paranoia on any one person is incredibly effective and horrifying.

My Winner...Maybe Too Conventional:  The September Issue

The September Issue may be a conventional behind-the-scenes vérité doc, but the film will go down in history as being the moment when the brain behind the September issue of Vogue will no longer be thought of as Anna Wintour. Grace Coddington, who was the creative director behind most of the 2007 issue that director R.J. Cutler follows in his doc, is absolutely graceful, endearing, and a breath of fresh air in the lofty world of high fashion.  Surely Wintour is the star of the show, but Coddington, a former model who stopped that craft after a car accident, is the hero (suspiciously, she is missing from the film's imdb page).  Wintour, after all, can't crack.  That would be the end of her, and what would a profiling doc be without vulnerabilities?  Nada.  Great soundtrack on a film that just zips by. 

--bryce

Music Top Dahgs: Atlas Sound, Menya, Flaming Lips

Arielle's Pick:  Atlas Sound's Logos

I don't know much about psychedelic indie rocker Atlas Sound, but everything I do know, I love. This ambient pleasure is actually the solo side project of Deerhunter lead singer Bradford James Cox and after hearing the recently released Logos, Atlas Sound has quickly shot up from one of those bands I keep meaning to learn more about to one of my favorite finds of the year. The album opens softly with the unbelievably mellow "The Light That Failed" that slowly coaxes you into a 45 minute ride of bliss. The tracks on the album almost seem to bleed into one another, creating a seamless album that surprisingly still has completely distinguishable tracks. The most stand out of them is probably the first single, "Walkabout," which is a collaboration between Cox and Panda Bear of Animal Collective. The pop vibe of the song almost makes it sound like a lost track from The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds. This pop quality definitely makes the song a black sheep amongst the other more ambient tracks, but in no way takes away from the completeness of the album. Whether its the intangible yet addictive collective of beats set in the background of each track or the excellent collaborators that join Cox on the record, this album is every prog rock fan's dream.


Bryce's Pick:  Menya's The Sleepover Series (Vol. 1) free download

Sure, their name sounds like the Scandinavian singer that scored a mediocre hit with Ricky Martin in 2000  and they have an aching desire to be the next Girl Talk with less than stellar mash-ups and their big break may come from Perez Hilton, but Menya's Sleepover mixtape is delightfully fun if you think of them as a postmodern hipster Weird Al.  Amidst snarky pop and hip hop reappropriation, are some stellar parodies of 3OH!3 and a former top dahg, Kelly Clarkson's "I Do Not Hook Up."  In "(So What) I Hook Up," the trio of self-aware twenty-two year old's tell it like it is, defeating the pop superstar's virginal message.  The true coup for the group, though, is their cover of Vanessa Carlton's "White Houses."  By allowing the only male member, Good Goose, to make it into an unsettling punky hip-hop ode to an unsettling high-pitched pop princess song about losing your virginity.  Yes Vanessa does actually sing "My first time. Hard to explain.  Rush of blood.  And a little bit of pain.  He's my first mistake." Download this f-u-n here.

Landon's Pick:  Flaming Lips' Embryonic

The new Flaming Lips album has caused quite a polarized stir amongst fans—with some proclaiming Embryonic a landmark moment in progressing the sound of this longstanding enigmatic band, with others declaring it the worst type of overproduced noise rock. Consider me part of the former category. The Flaming Lips have always been characterized by continuous evolution, morphing from lazy stoner underground tunes that defined much of their 80s and 90s work (“Bad Days,” “She Don’t Use Jelly”) to their smiley-faced irreligious spiritual rebirth with 1999’s The Soft Bulletin, an about-face to sincere positivism that still overshadows the cultish joy of The Polyphonic Spree. The Lips continued in this sonic and thematic direction in their work since, and probably reached the creative limit of this sound with At War with the Mystics, a joyfully listenable yet ultimately forgettable entry into their canon. (This 2007 album fit contemporaneously alongside the most accessible efforts to date by bands ranging from Modest Mouse to Blonde Redhead, an amalgamation of friendly radio play that cemented ‘07 as a year that rendered officially indistinguishable the line between indie and mainstream, between art and pop.)  The Lips are either helplessly compelled agents of innovation or have the foresight necessary to change direction before the well ran dry, as Embryonic marks yet another major sonic shift, favoring experimentation over their previous lullaby psychedelia in a way that marks a wonderful return to darker territory (heralded with last year’s Wayne Coyne-directed experimental pop film Christmas on Mars). Coyne’s similar-but-not-the-same approach to lyricism may have read as dreamy in his previous work but comes across here as brooding and haunting, challenging you with elusive meaning complemented by rocktastic hooks of—yes, I admit it—noise (e.g., the “I wish I could go back/Go back in time” refrain in “Evil”). With a necessary dose of insincerity, Embryonic reinforces the Lips’ proven ability to be one step ahead of their listeners.

-- bryce, arielle, and landon palmer
landon's blog can be found at http://www.filmschoolrejects.com/author/landon

Wild Things is a Chance for Kids to See Art and Themselves

The Times had a piece on its Room for Debate blog on what makes a children's movie scary -- is there a difference between animated and live action films?  The post was inspired by the release of Spike Jonze's adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are.  To be sure, it did not seem that the editors nor the commentators, academics in media, psychology, and child studies, had seen the film either.  Now that I and many others have seen it, no one seems to be saying that the film is actually especially scary.  Lots of people who have seen the film say that it is for older children and adults.  And yet, from all I've heard, children are liking this film.  Not many reports of young young children going to the film, but I'm certain that they'd like it.  After all, the film's success is being attributed to a high degree of nostalgia amongst hipsters, and what are hipsters but young adults expressing themselves without many age-imposed inhibitions.

The film is centered around Max (Max Records), an angsty little boy with a grand imagination and a number of things to be angsty about.  To a boy, around the age of ten, your mother (Catherine Keener) having a new boyfriend (Mark Ruffalo) is no fun.  Especially when he doesn't know how to act around kids.  Equally incomprehensible is why your sister's friends would knock down your snow fort.  These two factors motivate Max to bite his mother and go off into a fantasy world of large monsters inspired by the Maurice Sendak classic book of the same name.  The land of the wild things is truly magical, a land of expansive forests and deserts; monsters played by people in suits with CGI-manipulated faces.  The voices are pitch perfect.  Paul Dano, Lauren Ambrose, James Gandolfini, Catherin O'Hara, and more create an uneasily bizarre community in which houses are destroyed and rebuilt in new forms for no reasons, kings are eaten, and arms are broken off to the exclamation "That was my favorite arm!"  Like the book, Max is declared king upon his arrival, and like the book, Max doesn't necessarily like this world of wild things.  In the end, his mother's arms are the most comforting inviting environments on whichhe can depend.  There is certainly warmth amongst the weirdness or "scariness" in this film.  While this is not the existential brilliance that is Being John Malkovich or Adaptation, the material is not the same with Wild Things. To succeed, it couldn't have been handled any other way.

In the New York Times blog post I started this article with, my former professor Robert Thompson said  this about the propensity to Disneyfy everything for children, specifically by trying to give them "scary" or difficult narratives in animated rather than live-action form:  "Little kids like this stuff, of course, but one might speculate that perhaps the very young might also like a whole range of other stuff as well."  Once young children get a hold of Where the Wild Things Are, I think they'll latch onto the nonsensical world of the wild things.  For young young children, it'll be just like watching the wild world of adults, only the people doing the silly bickering, the illogical planning, and the grandiose posturing are a lot more fun to look at.  When these children grow up, they'll see the symbolism, the allegory, the upside down world that is the wild things -- they'll understand that there's nothing wild about them.  They'll understand the feeling that you're so angry you want to bite someone and go into a world of wild things.  Only once you grow up, the wild things are only this -- metaphors, allegorical symbols.  To go back into the psyche of Max will be the one reason adults will return to the film -- it's why the book itself is so popular.  And it's why the film, though imperfect, will be a classic.

--bryce

TV Top 9: Theme Songs

Music is back on TV thanks to American Idol, yes, but it's actually making good TV in the case of Glee.  Yes, leave it up to the co-creator of Popular and Nip/Tuck to make "quality television" that incorporates fun music.  In honor of the brilliant phenomenon that is Glee, here are the top 9 TV theme songs:

9.  True Blood

Okay, so the theme wasn't recorded for the series, but it's incredible how much this spooky bluesy country song by Jace Everett fits the opening credits to the little vampire show from Bon Temps. Before "Bad Things" was responsible for introducing every episode of the HBO phenomenon, the Evansville, Indiana native released the song as a single in 2005. Country radio didn't catch on, but given the choice, let's be honest, who wouldn't prefer being featured on one of HBO's most successful series ever? I bet the royalties aren't bad either.

8.  All in the Family

With references to Glenn Miller, Herbert Hoover, and bowling, the opening theme to All in the Family prepared the viewer for exactly what s/he was about to get: social commentary (in sitcom form) on the state of the Union from the perspective of the ever-present, American middle class. With Archie and Edith singing (badly) over the opening credits, the theme song to All in the Family was, and is, an iconic experience. In the 1970s, Archie, Edith, and their brood exemplified the “Nuclear American Family”--good and bad. And for better or worse,the family Bunker illustrated shifts in the tide of the nation for over a decade.

7.  Inspector Gadget

The syndicated animated series' theme was developed in a corporate office of the Saban Capital Group, and, in this case, songwriting-by-committee works brilliantly. The song was unfortunately sampled in the song "I'll Be Your Everything" from the boy band Youngstown for the equally unfortunate live action remake of the series. But its proven to be one of the most fun songs to recreate in unusual ways. There's a flute/beatbox version, a streetside beer bottle bangin' version, and a, wait what?, "digitech whammy pedal on the hands" version.

6.  The Adventures of Pete & Pete

Despite the fantastic characters and storylines that Pete & Pete has to offer, one the most memorable parts of the show was, without a doubt, its theme song. Written by Polaris, a band who only released one album and that album happens to be the Pete & Pete soundtrack, "Hey Sandy" is probably most famous for being almost unintelligible and fans of the show still argue over the lyrics and meaning. Even if you couldn't figure out the rest of the song, everyone knew those two simple words that you could scream along with during the show's intro. When it comes down to it, using a song about a student killed at the Kent State shootings for the opening of a show named after two brother's is an odd choice, but one that fit the show perfectly.

5.  Batman

The spinning screen, the animated characters, the simple yet addictive melody and the annoyingly offtune singers - combine all of these and you have one of the best tv show openings of all time. The original Batman series was the pinnacle of cheesy and it all began with that unforgettable opening song. Though can it really be called a song when its nothing more than one single lyrics and a handful of chords repeated ad nauseum? Then again it does have a really long wikipedia entry where Adam West claims that the voices singing "Batman!" are actually instruments. Oh Adam West...Even though it's as simple as theme songs come it's still one of the most famous. What other theme song has been covered by both The Who and Snoop Dogg?! And don't forget The Simpson's take in The Joy of Sect episode, where the Batman theme music was used to brainwash Homer into joining a cult. Now if that doesn't make a great theme song, I don't know what does.

4.  Roseanne

A harmonica and a saxophone: that's all it took to invite America into the Conner home in 1989. And to knock The Cosby Show out of the number one position in the Nielsen ratings. The round-table, all inclusive nature of Roseanne's opening is indicative of the warm, working-class aesthetic of the show itself: above all, family and communication trump trends and tragedy. Sometimes controversial and often irreverent, throughout nine seasons of Conner family ups and downs (with lyrics—coauthored by Roseanne herself—added in the final season), a panning camera and Midwestern charm is all it took for viewers to know they were “home.” 

3.  The Mary Tyler Moore Show

“You're going to make it after all.” And she did. The Mary Tyler Moore Show's (TMTMS) theme song—“Love is All Around” by Paul Williams—is perhaps one of the most iconic in sixty years of sitcom history. Full of “go get 'em” attitude and incredibly exemplary of the self-consciously infused feminism of TMTMS (though it's worth noting that Mary's interminably impressionable hat-throwing started in season two), this theme is brilliant. Williams' music and lyrics proved to a generation that Dick Van Dyke's former wife-du-jour could indeed make it on her own.

2.  The Andy Griffith Show

Family friendly television is not known for the amazing music it has produced. Just look at the work of Jesse Frederick, who wrote the songs for "Perfect Strangers," "Full House," "Family Matters," and "Step by Step." In the case of The Andy Griffith Show nothing could be cooler than the pitch perfect whistling, "The Fishin' Hole," written by Earle Hagen, that told you that it was time for the Barney Fife and a cast of characters to make the world giggle during the '60's more innocent times. It's apparently also a really fun song to teach your singing bird.

1.  The Addams Family

"They're creepy and they're cooky. Mysterious and spooky. Altogether ooky. The Addams Family." There's only one thing you can do when you hear this song - and that of course is the double snap. Half of the song doesn't is instrumental and you could say that the snaps are by far more memorable than any of the actual lyrics. Especially when shown over the opening credits. For a family friendly series that had such a catchy and nonthreatnening theme song (it contains the word "ooky" for god's sake!) its intro is still undeniably creepy. The way John Astin stares at you as he, and the audience, waits for the time to snap is suprisingly unsettling today and speaks perfectly to the nature of the show - The Addams Family thinks this is perfectly normal, so why don't you? An Addams Family musical is set to open on Broadway in 2010 and one can only imagine what Morticia's snapping will sound like with a full orchestra behind her.

-- bryce, arielle, and dana c. gravesen

"The Maid": A Character Study that Needs to be Seen

Roles have been accused of being studies for years and films have been called character studies for a fair amount of time.  But in recent years, especially amongst the Sundance crop, the character study film has had an impeccable surge of popularity.  There are certain ones, which to me, seem flat (Sherrybaby), and there are others whose richness lie in the lead actors' artistic bravery (Wendy and Lucy).  La Nana (The Maid), which premiered and won awards for director and actor at Sundance, from Chilean writer-director Sebastián Silva is one of the latter.  And it's lead, Catalina Saavedra, even more than Michelle Williams in Wendy and Lucy, impeccably inhabits a unique character.  In this film, Silva's talents are center stage; unlike other recent character studies, this film is wacky.  Saavedra's maid Raquel is absolutely insane, but like the family that surrounds her, we keep her around.

Raquel is the maid for a wealthy Chilean home.  After she becomes sick, it is decided that Raquel needs help around the house.  The only problem is Raquel does not deal well with help around the house.  Raquel acts up against the other maids in ways so absolutely ridiculous and with such nonchalant force that there are very few moments when jaws aren't dropped or sneers aren't forming amongst the audience. There is much more versatility in the character of Raquel than in most of the other recent character study films, and for that we have to thank Silva's script, co-written with Pedro Peirano. What a delight to see Saavedra go from quiet to laughing to sick to contemplative and back again and all over the place.

While other films of this genre are vanity pieces for credible indie starlets, this film is made by a relative unknown who's had stints on telenovelas. Though this will not do what the others will do, make sure a respectable actress's career has legs, with any luck, this film will have legs on the indie circuit.

--bryce

National Equality March: Holding Gaga to her Word

I spent my Sunday at the National Equality March.  I spent several hours in the nation's capital marching, with a plea for Barney Frank to show solidarity and not divide the movement written in marker on my shirt.  From a park in the Northwest part of the city, I passed, with hundreds of thousands of others, the White House on my way to the Capitol building.  It is no coincidence that a gathering of support for LGBT rights this big has not happened in ten years; most of those years were spent under the Bush administration and lots of morale defeats.  In signs and chants on the march and speeches on the step of the Capitol Building were begging the new man in the White House to live up to his campaign promises.  High on most people's lists was Don't Ask Don't Tell (which is hard for me to stand up for, when I think the highest priority of our military should be to reduce its hawkishness) and a repeal of DOMA, specifically this one that was brought to the House floor earlier this month.  There were, of course, mentions of the fact that national hate crimes and discrimination laws were not on par with the protection afforded to other citizens when it comes to lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgender people.

Out LGBT people were the primary speakers at the rally.  AIDS activist Clive Jones was passionate and fiery.  Cynthia Nixon was incredibly stoic and poetic in her appeal for civil rights for all in the United States.  City Council Spokeswoman and key supporter of the infamous third term Christine Quinn was also inspirational.  Out bisexual British "Kiss the Rain" chanteuse led an embarrassingly artificial rendition of "America the Beautiful."  But it was clear who most were excited for.  At the announcement of her name, there was a sizable shift of the audience towards the podium.  A sign with emblazoned with "Fierce Advocate" (fierce in glitter) could be seen to inch up -- no, yard up -- to the stage.  Please welcome to the stage Lady Gaga!

As the Gags made her way to the stage, she told the audience "I know Obama's listening to us."  And then screamed, "Are you listening?"  At this moment, I remembered how much I love this woman.  Her pop stardom is incredible because she is more performance artist than any other top tier pop princess could ever aspire to be (even Madge).  But Gaga said something very interesting in her speech.  In the echoing of her MTV VMA award speech, "This is for God and the gays," Gaga echoed the same calls for LGBT liberation.  She also said one thing that she didn't need to say -- that she would do her best to combat misogyny and homophobia in the music industry.  I was immediately shocked by her comment.  Of course, I am for the cause, and I wasn't shocked because the topic is tired (see recent discussion on the hip hop phrase "no homo" -- Slate article and current_ video).  However, how can Gaga say this when she was signed to the label of one of hip hop's stars most concerned with a macho image -- one that has led for him to get flak for humping a fifteen-year old onstage and for building up a hard-ass prison image that was less than honest.  This may be the only time I agree with Michelle Malkin and Bill O'Reilly, who famously insisted that Verizon pull its sponsorship of Akon's tour with Gwen Stefani.  Malkin and O'Reilly, though, were probably motivated by a little more than their superficial reason of the misogyny of lyrics like "Bananza (Belly Dancer)," but that's neither here nor there.  If Gaga is going to address music's gender and sexuality problem, she needs to explain the boss situation.  Otherwise, it looks like this might be a case of not biting the hand that feeds you...okay, stroking the hand that feeds you...or something...  So what's the deal, Gaga?

--bryce