CP Chronicle 196

With the regular TV season sputtering to its inevitable conclusion, I've been seeing a lot more movies. And I'm please to report that this week's load has been both interesting and high quality--two adjectives that seldom find their way into the same sentence here at Spud Central.

ADAPTATION (TWO SPUDS) (VIDEO)

First of all, I have to hand it to the people who do publicity for screenwriter Charlie Kaufman. They have turned him into a household name and with the exception of maybe Cameron Crowe, Robert Towne and William Goldman, that's something that just doesn't happen to a big time screenwriter.

But for Kaufman, elevation to this status is richly deserved, because Adaptation, directed by Spike Jonze, from Charlie Kaufman's screenplay, is one of the richest pieces of writing about the process of writing that has come along in at least the last two decades. In this movie, Nicholas Cage plays Charlie Kaufman, a Hollywood screenwriter who is given the task of adapting a book, called The Orchid Thief by a New Yorker Writer, Susan Orlean (Meryl Streep). The Orchid Thief, John Laroche is played as a no-tooth redneck by Chris Cooper and is one of the most fascinating American characters to ever slink through the everglades poaching rare flowers. This dude is up and down like an emotion toilet seat and his backstory is amazing.

Adaptation is about Charlie's struggle to find the movie in Susan Orlean's book, and the madness that this brings into his already overly neurotic existence. His troubles are further complicated by the fact that his seemingly vacuum-headed twin brother, also played by Cage, is literally breezing through a completely implausible horror script. While the plot of this story is interesting and kind of important to the film, it is the extreme characters of Kaufman and Laroche who carry the film. Both are fascinating because, each in their own way is a wired-way-too-tightly-for-their-own-good artist, who pursues his art with neurotic intensity that the women in their lives and the watchers of this movie cannot help but find magnetic.

Adaptation jumps around a lot in time so you kind of have to be in a fairly together headspace to watch it. It's also a bit quirky and over the top in the third act, which I wasn't too thrilled about when it started, but finally ended up understanding. This movie has been nominated for and won a slew of awards around the world including the British Academy Award to Kaufman for best adapted screenplay, and Chris Cooper's Oscar for best supporting actor, if that crap means anything to you. Adaptation is a fascinating movie to watch, because of its intensity and the pure power in the writing and performances. It's really a one-of-a-kind film, just like Kaufman's previous collaboration with Spike Jonze, Being John Malkovich. In fact, I'm thinking I need to see it again, Adaptation that is. I thought BJM was interesting but a bit odd.

EMPIRE (TWO SPUDS) (VIDEO)

This is a kind of a Hispanic version of Goodfellas, which stars Columbian born John Leguizamo as a Bronx heroin dealer who is tired of street life and tries to buy his way into Wall Street. But unlike the cliche you might expect, he's not seeking respectability or anything that noble, just a good home for his girlfriend and the kid she's carrying and a bit of a break from the homeboy nonsense he seems to have outgrown. Leguizamo does the voiceover narration in hyperactive Ray Liotta fashion and the story is a pretty lush portrayal of the jungle-like existence that is these people's lives. Written and directed by first timer Franc Reyes, Empire (which is the name of the brand of heroin they sell) covers all the standard bases of gang life in the big city. There's a very cool shootout or two, a lot of trash talking hip hoppers, a ghost ofg a presence of the police, some great looking homegirls, some extremely ruthless higher ups and a great supporting bit by Isabella Rossolini as the female drug lord who everybody works for. She's got this big Olivia De Haviland wig thing going on and she's quietly ruthless, damn scary and sexy at the same time.

As in most movies of this type (Goodfellas being the exception), the acting is not always of the highest calibre. Leguizamo kind of carries this film on his back. But he has a strong back and good time doing it. The guy is a solid actor, with a great track record of character roles and a few meaty leading character parts. He makes this movie very watchable and the screenplay strikes a nice balance between street and Hollyweird. I liked it because it didn't get all stupid and overly indulgent at the end like Scarface or any of a hundred overbaked gang pictures that figure they really need to go out in a blaze of glory.

EQUILIBRIUM (TWO SPUDS) (VIDEO)

This is one of those big budget international co-productions with big sets and some of the coolest hand to hand action sequences I have seen in a while. It stars Christian Bale (American Psycho and Shaft 2000), Angus MacFayden, (Miracles) and the everpresent black guy Taye Diggs in a very 1984ish story of a world where human emotions have ultimately been made the scapegoat for all of the human race's shortcomings and people have to hype themselves with drugs a couple times a day to keep these nasty emotions in check. There's a certain amount of illogic at work here, because there's really no way accurate to check out whether people are feeling or not feeling. It's kind of like the honour system where people rat out other people on a hunch. So it's a bit weak in that area.
Anyway Christian and Taye play these characters called Clerics who are basically the pit bulls of the administration whose job it is to go into the dark corners of insurrection (or feeling humans) and basically eradicate them. These guys are highly trained Ninja types whose methods are pure visual poetry to watch. Like 1984, the overriding themes is all about taking back the world and getting things back to normal yadda yadda. Its a lot of sound and fury that is presented in such a stylish way that it's relatively easy to overlook just how cliched a story it is. This movie lasted only a couple of weeks on the big screen, where it would have, in fact, been worth seeing. If only somebody in the big movie machine had told me about it, I would have gone.

That's all for this week. Tiger's playing and I much watch.

COPYRIGHT 2003 - COUCH POTATO CHRONICLES