Patrick Ogle
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The Fighter Is Good But Is That ALL You Have To Say About Micky Ward? Really?

12/28/2010

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The Fighter is a pretty good movie. The film is well paced, well written and well acted. Everyone, justifiably, is touting Christian Bale as a shoe-in to win an Oscar for best supporting actor. There isn’t much bad to be said about the film--except that it misses an opportunity to be more than just another boxing movie.

The film is about Micky Ward who, despite the film’s end, was not most famous for winning the lightly regarded WBU Light Welterweight title. He won against Shea Neary. Neary, maybe, wasn’t a complete bum but he wasn’t anything special and that fight wasn’t a particularly shocking win. Neary was BRITISH for God’s sake! Shocking wins are Spinks beating Ali, Douglas beating Tyson or Braddock beating Baer. Not a top notch American dropping a Brit like a sack of moldy potatoes.

Micky Ward’s story was more interesting than the formula. The movie DOES get at a lot of why; his brother, family etcetera but what Micky Ward is best known for are his three brutal fights with Arturo Gatti.

He lost two of those fights and, likewise, two of those fights sent both fighters to the hospital. I was baffled as to how you could make a movie about Ward and mention those fights with Gatti only as a postscript. I suggest this is because boxing movies MUST follow the Hollywood script—fighter has promise, fighter loses way, fighter gets another shot and then fighter triumphs.  We have seen it a hundred times (usually not executed this well). I am, of course, doing something I would complain about if it were a reviewer discussing this—writing about a movie that should have been made rather than the movie that was made—but in this case I feel justified. And I am not a reviewer.

Such a story would require a more complicated script, I suppose, and in general poses some issues but issues that could be handled. How do you make a film about someone who lost two of three in his most noted fights?  Especially considering he lost the last two. By concentrating on the fact he could have easily won them all perhaps? By concentrating on the fact he never quit and that the difference between being great and being regarded as great is an elusive thing that can be based on a butterfly flapping it’s wings as much as by any design. It is, to me, an integral part of the man’s story, as much as his older brother (who could have a movie made about him alone) and his family.

But, as I said, there is a lot to recommend The Fighter, even if it made me think of Invincible, which also featured Mark Wahlberg.

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How Can A Professionally Shot, Edited, Paced, Directed & Acted Film be Ungood?

12/13/2010

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Is this a movie about a descent into madness? What it takes to be a true artist? The loss of innocence? Who cares? It is a well crafted film but I figured out basically what was going on in about ten minutes and was waiting for the details for the next hour and a half (and I wasn’t waiting with bated breath).

Ever see a movie that seemed to really, consciously, think it was profound? But it wasn’t? Sometimes that happens and the movie is still good. Donnie Darko springs to mind. The legion of Donnie Darko worshippers should read the previous sentences carefully. I liked Donnie Darko, just probably as much as YOU, you freak. It was good but I am not basing the rest of my life on it. I do not own any Donnie Darko pajamas or a lunchbox.

Another thing, how many good movies have you seen where you never, even for a second, forgot you were watching a movie? I forgot that when I was watching frigging Avatar. This movie I never actually got to that point. I was watching a movie, thinking about, initially how I liked they use of tight shots on people’s faces, on dance shoes etcetera. Then I was vaguely wondering how the obvious “split personality” concept was going to play out in this particular movie. And I was wondering when I was going to have time to do my laundry. I am out of socks.

I would like to say, because this movie is by Darren Aronofsky, that it is an ambitious failure, that it is a film that strives for some grand artistic purpose but falls short. I kept thinking about Persona and All That Jazz and wishing I were watching either. No film should ever let you think about another movie while you are watching. Afterwards, maybe but during, never.

As I noted the movie looks fine. It even has an odd claustrophobic feel sometimes, as if you are in the disturbed mind of a particular character. But for THAT to matter you have to care about the character. You just don’t, even though all the actors are all fine. Natalie Portman conveys fragility and makes you believe her as a dancer who may, or may not, be unraveling mentally. Barbara Hershey has moments in her role as Portman’s mother. She alternates between doting and crazed-stage mother effortlessly. The always excellent Vincent Cassel is as good at playing the lecherous impresario as is possible (although you have to wish he had been given more to do). None of their efforts matter.

But I sound too much like I am reviewing. It isn’t the aim. Most of the time you can watch a movie and say: “the acting sucks,” “my god, did they shoot this with a 1980s vhs recorder?” or “Did a third grader write this dialog?”  None of these apply here. The acting is fine, the cinematography and direction don’t seem to be amiss. The film is evenly paced. The writing isn’t horrible, even if it is mundane. It just doesn’t work.

Perhaps it is that the subject of the unraveling mind of an artist has been done so many times or that it has happened so often in life as to make such a representation redundant. Nonetheless, Black Swan just doesn’t work and it is almost shocking coming from the director of Pi, Requiem for a Dream and The Wrestler. Hmm, maybe it does seem like the director of The Fountain though.

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    I don't think of these as "reviews." they may seem like it sometime but they are more just...impressions.

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