EDIT: For a quick infographic with the Official JAJ 2012 Oscars Drinking Game, go here.

I’ve never posted anything besides a review on this blog, but I’m more than just an amateur film critic, dear reader – I’m a human being, too. I have dreams and desires. And plans. Plans for the Academy Awards this Sunday!

Although I’m not an indiscriminate fan of the film industry – I’ve got problems with the MPAA and the current trend for films to be painfully unoriginal, to name a few – I do make it a habit to watch the Oscars every year. It’s kind of my Super Bowl, not being into sports and all.

I usually have a few people over and we play an Oscars drinking game. Every year since I started doing this (2008), I’ve managed to catch at least all of the Best Picture nominees prior to the awards show (the exception being last year when I missed three of them – The Kids Are All Right, True Grit, and Winter’s Bone).

This year, all of those traditions were in jeopardy. I no longer live at my own place, I’ve yet to see four of the Best Picture noms, and, much to my surprise, Google couldn’t provide me with a single Oscars drinking game for the show this year.

But James A. Janisse, Analytic Critic, is no quitter. No siree.

I made accommodations as far as my living arrangements go so that I can still have some peeps over, I’m devoting the next four days to catching up on Oscar fare, and I’ve decided that I’m experienced enough in this whole “Oscar Drinking Game”  situation that I can make my own.

So come here on Sunday and join me as I live-blog the Oscars. The live-blogging will get progressively more awesome as I continuously succumb to the first-ever Official JAJ Oscars Drinking Game (2012). I’m posting my unGodly creation below so that you can join me in this inebriating affair. See you on Sunday!

The Official JAJ Oscars Drinking Game (2012)

• Take 1 drink any time…
  • …someone mentions Uggy the dog.
  • …someone makes a (liberal) political statement.
  • …someone mentions Whitney Houston.
  • …someone says “Wow” during their acceptance speech (1 drink per “wow”)
  • …the camera cuts to Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie
• Take 2 drinks any time…
  • …someone thanks God in their acceptance speech.
  • …someone says “Scorsese”.
  • …someone says something that gets censored.
  • …a muppet appears onscreen.
  • …Billy Crystal makes reference to his hosting experiences in the past.
• Take 3 drinks any time…
  • …someone’s acceptance speech gets interrupted by the orchestra playing them off.
  • …someone makes a (conservative) political statement.
  • …someone makes a reference to The Tree of Life being weird, experimental, pretentious, etc.
  • …there’s a mention of Michael Fassbender getting screwed over in these awards.
  • …there’s a reference to Twilight.

And the part of the game that will really test your resilience:
For every award being given, before the winner is announced, say:
1.) Which nominee you want to win
and
2.) Which nominee you expect to win

• If the winner is the nominee you want to win, congratulations! Take 1 drink!
• If the winner is the nominee you expect to win, you’re so smart! Take 2 drinks!
• If the winner is a nominee you neither wanted or expected to win, learn from your mistakes! Take 3 drinks!
• If the winner is the nominee that you both wanted and expected to win, nice job! GIVE 3 drinks out to someone else! (suggestion by Reddit user ajcfood)

Good luck on Sunday to all the Oscar nominees, and good luck to all of our livers!

–James A. Janisse

Film #15: You Only Live Twice (1967)

James Bond film #05 (Sean Connery Bond)

Sean Connery is back as James Bond in the fifth film of the series, You Only Live Twice. SPECTRE’s back again, trying to goad the US and the Soviets into a war by eating up their astronauts with a big ole hungry spacecraft. Despite the fact that SPECTRE just stole two atomic bombs in Thunderball, the Americans and Soviets blame each other, so of course it takes level-headed Britain to take care of things. Noting that the mysterious hungry hungry spacecraft landed somewhere in the sea of Japan, they dispense their top agent to the land of the rising sun to see what’s up. During his mission, Bond finally comes face-to-face with SPECTRE’s number 1, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, as played by Donald Pleasance and as spoofed by Dr. Evil in the Austin Powers series.

You Only Live Twice, like From Russia With Love and Thunderball, is a movie where every single minute seems to be spoofed in Mike Myers’ late 90s series. As someone who grew up watching those movies and never really saw the Bond films until now, it’s impossible for me to view them without the influence of the Austin Powers parodies. As such, plenty of things in the Bond series make me laugh when maybe they wouldn’t have without this backwards viewing order – most egregiously of these, Blofeld. He’s supposed to be the top bad guy in all of SPECTRE, but he’s about as threatening as the cat that he seems to obsess over. The Bond films clearly don’t try to take themselves too seriously, but I wonder how much of the humor I derive from watching them was intended, and how much was caused by Mr. Myers. But back to the film.

At this point, producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman could probably make a Bond film in their sleep. They know the formula. We know the formula. Does it matter that these movies just recycle the same things with slight variations? Not really, because the variations keep things entertaining. For instance, the usual car chase scene is transposed into a mini-chopper battle around a volcano. Yeah, that scene is plagued by bad projection screens behind Connery and obvious dangling props when the enemy choppers explode, but it’s still a fun play on Bond’s usual endeavors.

One of the most appealing aspects of the Bond series for me is all the globetrotting that goes on. In the past four films, Bond has been to Jamaica, Turkey, Switzerland, the US, and the Bahamas – and the production team always follows him for on-location shooting. By going to these places and getting shots of the Jamaican beaches and the Swiss Alps, the audience is able to go on vicarious vacations. And since these movies are nearly five decades old, they also serve as time capsules. That’s why I can be such a huge fan of these films despite the ridiculous sexism that pervades each one. I’m looking into a window of how people thought in an era that preceded my existence by almost two generations.

Anyway, this role as cultural educator is more prominent in You Only Live Twice than in any of the films that came before it. Part of this is the source material: Screenwriter Roald Dahl compared the Fleming novel to a “travelouge”. The entire movie (minus the Hong Kong-based opening sequence) takes place in Japan, and it doesn’t mind lingering on cultural events as Bond witnesses them. We get to see a sumo wrestling match, a Japanese wedding, and freaking ninjas. Ninjas all over the place. It’s great. And throughout all his travels, Bond is never dismissive of the other cultures he encounters (then again, what reason has he to dismiss this film’s Japanese culture of totally subservient women?). Bond is a cultured gent – he has to be, if he’s about to sleep with women from every corner of the globe.

You Only Live Twice is Bond as usual. Connery’s starting to look a little aged, and the movie has more moments of cultural education and political manipulation than straight-up action scenes, but there are still mini-choppers and ninja battles for those who want to see some Bond-style ass-kicking. Blofeld’s a bit of a disappointment, but it’s probably because the Bond films have become so infused in Western popular culture that it’s impossible to separate him from his spot-on parodies from the past few decades. It’s just another Bond movie, but luckily, I’ve yet to have a Bond movie disappoint me.

Final rating: 7/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• Cheesy Bond Post-Kill Line of the Film: (after sending silent henchman Hans into the piranha pool): “Bon appetit!”
• Once again, Bond gets used for sex by a woman, this time henchwoman Helga Brandt, who sleeps with him and then tries to kill him in a helicopter crash.
• Brandt’s failure gets her fed to piranhas. PIRANHAS! Last movie we got sharks, this time piranhas. I’m hoping the next film gives the super villain evil squids!
• Little bit of rare Bond biographical information – apparently, he’s a Cambridge man.
• Best gadget: The cigarette rocket.
• How many times is Bond going to have sex in an emergency raft?

Film #15: Thunderball (1965)

James Bond film #04 (Sean Connery Bond)

After their absence from the third Bond movie Goldfinger, SPECTRE is back in Thunderball to screw with the world and try to kill James Bond in the process. This time, hook-nosed, eye-patched #2 Emilio Largo (Adolfo Celi) hijacks two atomic warheads from NATO and threatens to destroy Miami unless he gets 100 million pounds in diamonds. It’s a classic hostage situation that must have reminded audiences of the contemporary Cuban Missile Crisis, and it’s a great return for an evil organization that uses Cold War fears to enrich themselves.

As for Bond himself, he’s up to his usual games. Thunderball Bond is a cheeky chap, and the movie is injected with a more noticeable amount of humor. It’s mostly little things – tossing flowers onto a fallen foe, popping a grape in his mouth after an intense fight scene, coming out of a black-out with a quip – but it lends the character and the film more of that playful awareness that’s been growing ever since From Russia With Love established the template for Bond films. Indeed, there even seems to be referential callbacks to earlier moments in the series, such as when 007 emerges from the water in a very Honey Rider fashion. Also, with the Bond standards familiar to fans by now, Thunderball plays with the regulars and lets us see them outside their usual structural constraints. M isn’t confined to his desk in a small office – he gets an entire conference room and a league of double-O agents to direct. Q doesn’t show up until much later than usual, and he’s at his snarkiest yet, decked out in a Hawaiian shirt and a fedora as he gives Bond all of his underwater gadgets.

The underwater aspect is probably the most defining feature of Thunderball, and with good cause: Apparently, an entire fourth of this movie takes place underwater. I won’t say that’s too many scenes underwater, but anyone with a fear of drowning might want to avoid watching this. And actually, I lied – I will say that it’s too many scenes underwater. They lack dialogue and are sometimes unclear in their action, so they grow a bit tedious. I don’t mean to dismiss them entirely – the sequence where SPECTRE steals the atomic bombs (and Largo ruthlessly leaves henchman Angelo strapped in the cockpit seat to drown) is awesome, and the final gigantic fight scene between scores of SPECTRE henchmen and US Coast Guardsmen is nothing less than epic – but I would have appreciated the effective ones a whole lot more if there hadn’t been so many boring ones alongside them. Also, with a runtime exceeding 2 hours,Thunderball is the longest Bond film yet, and when a quarter of it is underwater without dialogue, it doesn’t help speed that time along.

By the way, Bond is, as always, pretty rapey in this movie. I realize it’s part of his character and all, but the amount of times he forces himself onto women really dilutes my enjoyment of the series. However, I will say that Thunderball plays up the sexual power dynamics a bit. Usually there’s an attractive female ally of the super villain that Bond seduces and gets information out of – see: Tatiana Romanova, Jill Masterson, Pussy Galore, etc. Here, however, it’s Bond who’s seduced by the foxy Fiona Volpe (Luciana Paluzzi), who waits for him in his bathtub, has sex with him, and then captures him. She even taunts him about it all. In fact, Volpe is a badass through and through, driving a car fast enough to unnerve James, killing an incompetent villain with a motorcycle-seated rocket launcher, even capturing Bond’s fellow MI6 agent Paula Caplan (Martine Beswick). Alas, she is ultimately killed, but she’s an excellent addition to Bond lore, as a woman who is finally impervious to his seductive charms.

Thunderball is a James Bond film like all the others before it – complex, playful, and above all, entertaining. It runs too long and it spends too much time toiling underwater, but the successful return of SPECTRE and another awesome villain in the form of Emilio Largo makes Thunderball a welcome addition to the Bond series.

Final rating: 7/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• Cheesy Bond Post-Kill Line of the Film: (after shooting henchman Vargas with a harpoon) “I think he got the point.”
• The above may have been the cheesiest, but I lost it after Volpe was killed and he set her down at a table, saying “Would you look after my friend? She’s just dead.”
• Implied underwater sex! Whaaaatttt!
• I didn’t mention Domino at all in my review. I thought that Claudine Auger was wooden from the first line she delivered. Maybe my least-favorite “Bond girl” so far.
• As usual, we get an excellent opening title sequence. Maurice Binder, who created the gun barrel sequence and made the titles in Dr. No, returns after an absence from the previous two films. He gives us silhouetted nude women swimming around to a powerful Tom Jones vocal performance. Good stuff all around.
• Terence Young, director of the first two Bond films, also returns for this installment after sitting Goldfinger out. Today I learned that Young was pretty much Bond himself – a smooth and cultured lady’s man. He actually took Connery out and taught him enough so that people said Connery was just doing a Terrence Young impersonation when he was Bond.
• I find it funny that Martine Beswick is, to me, the most attractive woman I’ve seen yet in a Bond film (which is certainly a high honor), and she’s the only female who Bond doesn’t sleep with.
• Panavision! Used to GREAT effect when all those Coast Guardsmen parachuted into the sea. Amazing scale of action there.
• Editor Peter R. Hunt really ups his game here, and a lot of the editing seems more modern than his work in the previous films. Some parallel editing and whatnot. Then again, there are still wipes and the showy close-ups of Q’s gadgets, but even if those seem out of date now, they still work great as part of the Bond film experience.
• SPECTRE apparently has an entire branch devoted to execution. And Largo has a POOL OF SHARKS. Why would Angelo try to extort them? You shouldn’t even be doing business with them in the first place, fool!
• Bond even shoots rifles from the hip. He simply doesn’t give a damn.

Film #14: Goldfinger (1964)

James Bond film #03 (Sean Connery Bond)

Goldfinger, the third in the Eon Productions James Bond series, sees Connery return to the role for what many consider the quintessential 007 film. Amidst the usual babes and bad guys, Bond is after eponymous villain Auric Goldfinger (Gert Fröbe), who plans to attack the United States’ gold depository at Fort Knox. Goldfinger takes the formula that From Russia With Love established and adds many things to it that would become staples of the series. It’s also chock-full of iconic lines and scenes. Many things that spoof Bond pull dialogue and imagery from this third installation, so if you’re watching this for the first time (like I was), you’ll undoubtedly be stricken with a constant sense of déjà vu.

Goldfinger starts with a great opening sequence that ends up being entirely unrelated to the rest of the film. In that sense, it works as a sort of 007 short film, even foreshadowing the way Bond eventually disposes of Goldfinger’s henchman Oddjob. It’s everything you want in a Bond film condensed into 5 minutes – judo, explosions, hot women, and a tuxedo underneath a dry suit. It even takes the cake for the film’s cheesiest Bond post-kill line. After this exhilarating cold open, we are treated to one of the best cinematic theme songs of all time, sung by a throaty Shirley Bassey accompanied by a memorable wailing brass section. With all of this out of the way, we finally move onto Goldfinger proper, starting with the Act I template that most Bond films hereafter will follow (I believe – I haven’t seen most of them).

That template includes Q (Desmond Llewelyn) and his gadgets, introduced properly in FRWL but fleshed out to their full extent here. Q begins his dry, friendly antagonism with Bond, asking him to return all of the gadgets in vain, while the gadgets themselves get upgraded both technologically and in their importance to the plot. The modified Aston Martin DB5 is used to great effect in the obligatory car-chase scene, and a homing beacon allows Bond to track Goldfinger after a not-so-friendly game of golf. That golf scene actually seemed a bit out of place to me. It was pretty long and uneventful, and the information acquired through it could have easily been gathered in a much more interesting way. Overall, I felt like Goldfinger, while not boring by any means, toned down the non-stop action that was a feature of From Russia With Love.

Not the sexism, though. It actually boiled over for me early on, when Bond literally slapped a girl on her ass as he pushed her out the room, explaining that it was time for “man talk”. That just went above and beyond the cheeky chauvinism that I can tolerate in a Bond flick. Honor Blackman plays Goldfinger’s personal pilot, a strong female character (for once), but one whose strength is taken away by her name (Pussy Galore – sorry, it’s too unlikely a name for me to accept) and the fact that Bond pretty much rapes her in a barn. Overall, not a lot of good stuff in the whole “women are people too” department, but to be fair, I’m also more sensitive to gender issues than most people generally are. Maybe it won’t be as much of a hang-up for you.

Whatever social commentary the movie may provide, one thing clearly makes Goldfinger stand out, and that’s Auric himself. While Dr. No was a phantom until the final stages of the first movie, and FRWL featured more of a cabal of SPECTRE higher-ups than any one focal villain (don’t argue for Red Grant, dude was pretty milquetoast), Goldfinger finally gives us an evil mastermind. Even his scheme is way better than anything from the first two films; he wants to make the US’s gold supply radioactive to help the Chinese and make his own gold that much more valuable. What a dick. An awesome dick, who delivers what is probably the greatest super villain line ever (“No, Mr. Bond – I expect you to die!”). And lest we forget, he also has one of the most memorable henchmen of all time, the silent Korean Oddjob, who goes around breaking peoples’ necks with his bowler hat. Between Goldfinger’s nefarious cunning and Oddjob’s freakish brute strength, the antagonists of Goldfinger are what make this Bond film stand aside the greats that preceded it.

  There’s a little less action and a little more sexism than what From Russia With Love offered, but Goldfinger‘s villains and more mature plot make it just as excellent as the previous Bond films will have led you to expect.

Final rating: 8/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• Cheesy Bond Post-Kill Line of the Film: (after electrocuting a man in a bathtub) “Shocking. Positively shocking.”
• There were some BEAUTIFUL zoom shots in the Swiss mountains there, when Tilly was shooting at Goldfinger. I can’t even imagine how long that lens must have been.
• Jump effects used all over the opening sequence, so still on the lookout.
• I can’t recall if Bond actually wore a hat in the film itself (though I’d bet that he did), but he does in the gun barrel silhouette in the opening.
• I guess I’m obligated to say something about Jill Masterson’s iconic death. Hey, there’s a chick covered in gold here. And I guess that killed her via “skin asphyxiation”. Sure, all right.
• That’s how Goldfinger goes out, really? I kind of wish he had escaped to scheme another day.

Film #13: Stay (2005)

In the mood for a mystery, I consulted my film library and randomly chose one. I had never heard of 2005′s Stay, written by David Benioff and directed by Marc Forster, but its attractive cast made the case for a spontaneous viewing. The film begins with a rollicking POV shot of a car accident on a bridge. Henry Letham (Ryan Gosling), a 20-year-old survivor of the wreck, goes to see his usual psychiatrist, only to find a “substitute shrink” in the form of Dr. Sam Foster (Ewan McGregor). After Henry tells Sam that he plans to kill himself in a few days’ time, Sam is distressed enough to confide in his girlfriend Lila (Naomi Watts), herself a suicide survivor. Sam starts to investigate Henry’s background more in-depth, and as he does, his reality begins to unfold, leaving him unsure of who, exactly, is the crazy one in all of this.

Stay belongs to a class of films that I’ve only known as a profane term (mindf***), but that can apparently also be called “brain burners”. These movies often employ stylized surrealism to obfuscate so-called objective reality with more subjective states, like dreams and psychoses. There’s plenty of them out there – from popular cult films like Memento to lesser-watched fare like Jacob’s Ladder – and because they’re often able to blend interesting filmmaking with cerebral storytelling, they usually win my affection. Unfortunately, Stay failed to successfully combine these equally-important elements.

The film establishes its surrealism immediately after the car crash opening. The characters live in a sort of dreamlike state, transporting impossible distances, their actions and thoughts rendered incoherent through jump cuts. Sam especially seems shackled in uncertainty, constantly shot behind frosted glass or boxed inside of tight, closed frames. That dreamlike quality I mentioned exists right off the bat, but Sam seems unaware of it at first. After meeting Henry and being introduced to his schizophrenic perspective, Sam becomes more cognizant of the warped world he inhabits, creating a positive feedback loop wherein reality unravels at a faster and faster rate.

There’s a lot of apparent symbolism early on that intrigued me. Dialogue and filmmaking decisions revolve around identity questions to the point where I was wondering if we were in for the old Fight Club twist. Character speak of things from “another life”, and the 180-degree rule is shattered in the initial scene between Sam and Henry, putting them both on the left side of the frame as though it were a single person talking to himself. Other instances are more subtle, such as when the characters switch positions after temporarily walking behind a wall. This symbolism is accompanied by some fantastic visuals. Forster and his constant cinematographer Roberto Schaefer create great compositions, do a lot of nice things with colors, and shoot more than one beautiful sequences that take place on staircases. Editor Matt Chessé works in a very hands-on manner that keeps the film energetic while adding to the tone of disorientation. And the entire cast is commendable, especially Gosling’s tortured Henry, a character you simultaneously want to hung to comfort and get away from for safety.

But all of these elements can’t salvage the story. Stay holds out too much information for far too long, and as the film continues in its second half, you begin to wonder what the point of it all is. By time Henry begins to perform near Jesus-like acts of healing, you’ll have given up trying to make sense of it at all, and will sit impatiently waiting for the ultimate explanation. For what it’s worth, the ending and “twist” of the film is a bit interesting, but even though it retroactively makes sense of a lot of the film’s surrealism, it also leaves a feeling of “What was the point?”

Well-acted and well-crafted, Stay is a psychological thriller that initially intrigues but ultimately frustrates, relying far too much on an ending that doesn’t make up for the 60 minutes of confusion that precedes it.

Final rating: 5/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• Those two staircase sequences really were great to look at, though. The first one, dominated by blue glass, had a very modern aesthetic, while the second, with its stone spiral staircase, created a more medieval look appropriate for the Hamlet stuff that surrounded it.
• I liked that Sam has a girlfriend who’s an artist, but is continually told that he’s a poor judge of artwork.
• Adding to the dreamlike unreality pervasive in the film, I noticed that a lot of the extras in the background were dressed in pairs and triplets, which makes some sense given the final reveal.
• The exception to the excellent cast was B.D. Wong (holy shit it’s Henry Wu from Jurassic Park!), who plays the acerbic Dr. Ren with way too much disinterest.
• I liked the sequence in Henry’s mom’s house, with the unnaturally bare rooms and the quietly foreboding dog. In fact, there were so many good individual sequences in this movie. It’s sad that they were ruined by a subpar story connecting them all.

Film #12: From Russia With Love (1963)

James Bond film #02 (Sean Connery Bond)

With the success of Dr. No, the makers of the first James Bond film were given double the budget to do it all over again. And boy, did they. From Russia With Love, released a year after its predecessor, ups the ante on everything that made Dr. No such an excellent flick. Taking place mostly in Turkey, this installment sees Bond (Connery once again) agree to help a beautiful Russian agent (Tatiana Romanova, played by Daniela Bianchi), purportedly defect, in order to obtain a cryptographic machine known as a Lektor. Little do either of these absurdly attractive secret agents know, the entire engagement is a ploy by the terrorist organization SPECTRE, which is planning to kill Bond in vengeance for the death of Dr. No.

Although it was an awesome and exciting action movie, Dr. No was relatively slow-paced and quiet compared to the Bond movies that would come later. Like I said in my review of that film, it was busy setting down a foundation. With that foundation soundly laid, From Russia With Love is able to take off full-speed. The filmmakers looked at Dr. No, boiled it down to its essence, and then magnified those things to excess for the sequel. This movie is the Empire Strikes Back to Dr. No‘s A New Hope. Everything is pumped up – from the colorful and inventive title sequence (with words going in and out of focus as they’re projected onto belly dancers) to the number of awful one-liners James spouts after killing people. But the things that see the biggest gains are the two most fundamental features of Bond: The action and the women.

While Dr. No had a couple of cool fist fights and an explosion or two, From Russia With Love seems like it’s just a series of kick-ass action sequences connected by ligaments of plot. There’s a boat chase scene that ends with Bond using a flare gun to light a bunch of shit on fire. There’s a sort of amped up North by Northwest scene where Bond has to use a rifle to take down a mini chopper that’s gunning for him (For the record, NxNW is one of my favorite movies, and this homage more than does justice to that infamous scene). Even the hand-to-hand combat scenes are way better. With the support of an increased budget, Bond is finally able to start getting neat gadgets thanks to Q, and uses them to great effect in the sapphire fight scene with Red Grant (Robert Shaw) on the train.

And then there’s the women. Whereas Dr. No‘s chauvinism could be chalked up, at least in part, to being a product of the 60s, From Russia With Love cannot rely on this anachronistic excuse. It’s just straight-up overt here. Nothing exemplifies the excess of this film better than the scenes in the gypsy camp. It starts with a belly-dancing sequence, mirroring the opening credits, that goes on far too long for comfort. Just when the viewer is relieved of the hypnotism of that gypsy woman’s hips, the story segues immediately into an extended woman-on-woman wrestling match, complete with ample fleshy close-up shots. The argument between these women is resolved in the most appropriate way possible, of course – an implied threesome with our dashing hero. At this point, it probably takes Bond more effort to not get laid.

Commonly regarded as one of the, if not the, best Bond movie, From Russia With Love is fantastic entertainment. High-energy and completely indulgent, it’s a great viewing experience, provided that you’re able to laugh off the absurdity of some of its excess.

Final rating: 8.5/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• Cheesy Bond Post-Kill Line of the Film: (Rosa Klebb is shot after trying to kick Bond with a poison-spiked shoe) “Yes, she had her kicks.”
• Oh man, what was with that cheesy-as-all-hell wave goodbye at the end? Like something straight out of Warner Bros.
• I shall now be on the look-out for the first Bond film that doesn’t use jump cuts to ill effect.
• Similarly, I’ll be looking for the first film that Bond doesn’t wear a hat in. I know they went out of fashion right around this time, since Kennedy was the first President to be inaugurated without wearing one.
  • Oh holy shit, that claim is totally false. My bad. But that’s what the Googles is for. Always challenge your beliefs, kids!
  • This was, however, the last movie that Kennedy ever watched – it was actually chosen as the next Bond story to film because Kennedy said it was his favorite. He saw it the the night before he left for Dallas, on November 21st, 1963. Unless it turns out that that’s also bullshit.
• Frau from Austin Powers is a pitch-perfect parody of Rosa Klebb.
• I always thought that Sterling Archer was just an exaggerated version of James Bond. But, no, it’s not exaggerated at all. Maybe just a little less inhibited.

Film #11: Dr. No (1962)

And all of a sudden, I started the James Bond series. I don’t know how long it will take me to get through the 22 films in the series, but join me as I do it. Or else.

James Bond film #01 (Sean Connery Bond)

Dr. No was the first movie based on Ian Fleming’s series about British secret agent James Bond. This is the one, man. The one that started it all. The first step down a road that would eventually see 22 (and counting) movies, 6 different actors taking up the role of Bond, and nearly $5 billion in domestic box office revenue. Coming just after the demise of the studio system, this is the movie that created the secret agent genre, pitting a ridiculously adept protagonist against the forces of evil in the political world. It’s now been fifty years – a full half a century – since Dr. No was released, and there’s simply no other way to view this film than with the knowledge that it was the start of something huge.

This progenitor film sees James Bond, as played by Sean Connery, head to Jamaica to investigate the death of another agent. His questioning and playboying eventually leads him to the island of Crab Key, where he runs across the beautiful Honey Rider (Ursula Andress) shortly before they both fall captive to the island’s nefarious owner Dr. No (Joseph Wiseman). So, how does this semicentennial work of cinema hold up? Let’s establish right away that this movie is a product of the era in which it was made. This means that it has a lot of the hallmarks of 60s filmmaking and culture, and most of those hallmarks are difficult not to cringe at. Technically, you have red paint splotch gun wounds, jump cuts galore, shoddy-looking projection screens, and screeching orchestral strings on the soundtrack (at their finest when they accompany Bond’s beatdown of a poisonous tarantula). Culturally, where the offenses are less quaint, you have lots of segregation, superstitious natives, the Cold War East vs. West (read as bad guys vs. good guys) mentality, and white people playing any foreign characters that actually have lines. You even have Bond, philanderer and assassin extraordinaire, passing some moral judgment on Honey Rider after she reveals that she killed a man in retaliation for his raping her. None of these facts are pretty; they are, however, like I said, par for the times, and if you can reach the point where you just accept them as wrong-headed anachronisms, you have a kick-ass spy movie left over to enjoy.

Indeed, Dr. No is pretty much the textbook standard for action movies of this sort. It seems like so much is established in this film that has since become staples in the genre. Of course you start off with the snazzy title sequence (I wonder if Maurice Binder had any idea what he was starting when he made that silhouetted Bond shoot toward the camera) and the iconic theme music (which is liberally employed to make any scene feel important and daring), but its influence extends past those aspects as well. This movie establishes the visual rhetoric for action movies that’s still being used today. Bond silently kills a man behind a translucent wall. There are rough-and-ready fist fights, with the most suspenseful (if somewhat swift) one being saved for Dr. No himself. And in general, there’s just some really nice compositions in the cinematography. It’s hard to know whether the filmmakers knew they were starting something huge or if they just got lucky and made a fine piece of work; for instance, Bond’s introductory scene at the card table is the stuff of legend and the perfect first glimpse of the character. It almost seems unlikely that they were able to start the legendary character so befittingly.

And how is the man himself, Mr. James Bond, in his first cinematic outing? Well, with no precedent filling him in, the character is a blank canvas that Dr. No attempts to fill. How do they shade him in? Well, they make him intelligent, both clever and insightful. He’s smug, already spouting off one-liners after his enemies perish. He’s a man of action, and a bit of a maverick to the higher-ups in his organization. And, of course, he’s suave. But ‘suave’ isn’t powerful enough a word to describe James Bond. This man is a straight-up dog. Every female he shakes hands with winds up in his bed, even the ones that he knows are double-crossing him. The man is a sex addict who faces no problems scoring another hit – hell, he’s practically his own dealer. Still, for all his super hero-like Casanovian skills, Bond seems pretty human in Dr. No. He gets scolded by M and seems shamed when it happens; sometimes he escapes only because of luck or the ineptitude of his foes; he even lets Honey know at one point that he is, in fact, familiar with the emotion of “fear”. He’s still audacious  enough to roll up to an embassy with a dead body in the backseat, but this depiction of Bond is probably his most human until Daniel Craig takes over – except, of course, for his obscenely successful seduction methods.

Though the slow, suspenseful pace may disappoint adrenaline junkies, Dr. No is the original action spy movie, and it establishes the perfect foundation for a monumental character and film series. It’s fun, it’s exciting, it’s intelligent while not bogging itself down in twists and turns – in short, it’s Bond, and that makes it nearly perfect.

Final rating: 8.5/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• Cheesy Bond Post-Kill Line of the Film: (after watching some bad guys drive off a cliff to their deaths) “I think they were on their way to a funeral.”
• As someone new to any pre-Bosnan Bond film that doesn’t star Christopher Walken, and as someone who has really only seen Connery since his white beard became standard… holy shit, was that man good-looking.
• The man gets laid a lot, but it’s only scandalous by 60s standards – we’re talking LOADS of implied sex.
• Watching the Bond series is going to make me appreciate Austin Powers and Venture Bros. that much more.
• I’m really, really excited to watch all these Bond movies. If you couldn’t tell.

Film #10: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (2011)

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, based on the novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, is a film with sensitive subject matter. Nine-year-old Oskar Schell (newcomer Thomas Horn) lives in New York City and very possibly has Asperger Syndrome. It’s not debilitating or anything, but he does have some trouble in social situations and he has a strong proclivity for logic and order. It’s hard for him when something happens that doesn’t make sense. And when his dad (Tom Hanks), the only one who seems to really “get” him, is killed in the World Trade Center attacks on 9/11, Oskar has a real hard time coming to terms with it. A year after “the worst day”, Oskar finds a key hidden inside a vase in his father’s closet. Convinced that this is the start of an elaborate game set up by his father, and hoping that by solving it things will make more sense, Oskar sets out to contact 417 people with the surname “Black” scattered around New York City.

I had a difficult time enjoying myself for the first part of this film. Although I found the story – a kid with some personal issues but intelligent as all hell setting out on a quixotic mission to find meaning in the face of tragedy – pretty neat, it had to take some pretty preposterous turns to get there. I was rolling my eyes at the way he fought himself into Viola Davis’ house, the first ‘Black’ he encounters, and at the answering machine tape swap that was important to the story but seemed entirely unlikely. Worst of all, the tone was dreary for far too long. I understand that when you have a movie with a critical moment hinged upon 9/11, it’s not going to be the cheeriest of films, but there was an oppressive angst to the entire first act. For the longest time, Sandra Bullock (as Oskar’s mom) got to play only a single note: Distressed mother. And there’s a ton of weight on Thomas Horn’s shoulder, onscreen for every scene, with narration to boot. I worried early on, when he started listing the things that made him nervous ever since “the worst day”, culminating in his broken voice shrieking each word. It was all very unpleasant, to say the least.

But then something amazing happens, something I rarely see in movies that start off bad: It pulled itself together. I’m going to give a lot of credit to Max Von Sydow, nominated for a Best Supporting Oscar for a role that seriously breathes life into the film. Though his mysterious role is easy to decode early on, it doesn’t make his silent ‘Renter’ character, with “yes” written on one hand and “no” on the other, any less fascinating. I previously read Foer’s Everything is Illuminated, and it seems like he has a knack for writing interesting old men with troubled pasts. It’s good that they found such a seasoned and talented actor for the part. The Renter brings back the playful wit absent from the film since Hanks’ departure, and gives Horn a steady force to bounce his acting off of. The scene when Oskar breaks down and tells the Renter what he’s been doing is one of the high points of the film, and totally redeems Horn for the aforementioned yelly list scene.

From that point on, the movie is quite an enjoyable watch. Horn’s mission culminates in another excellent scene, this time with Jeffrey Wright, where the two characters, despite their generational gaps, share in their despair over the way their fathers left them. It’s a quiet and somber scene, and though it may not be the end to his search that Oskar was hoping for, it’s definitely an end to the movie that makes it all worth it.

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close at first seems like it’s going to be the sappy and pretentious Oscar-bait you may be fearing, but after Max Von Sydow’s entrance, the film is able to find a perfect mixture of emotion and fun, and wraps itself up beautifully.

Final rating: 7/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• I also appreciate the part of the film that was post-Jeffrey Wright, with Sandra Bullock’s character getting some redemption. It may have taken a little away from Oskar’s quest for me, but it put much more into her character.
• There were a couple of really cool shots of grandeur showing the city of New York. The first was on the bridge right after Horn squawked out the list of things that upset him, another was when he was first setting out on his journey through the city.
• Props to Alexandre Desplat for yet another fine score. The music was perfect, hitting every note it needed to, from playful to melancholy.
• Oh yeah, John Goodman was in there. Good times watching him cuss at little kids. Good times.
• It always pisses me off when well-known adult actors get top billing instead of newcomer child actors, even when the latter is onscreen a thousand times more than the former.

Every year around January/February I realize I haven’t seen most of the Oscar-nominated films, and I make a scramble to see them all so the awards show can be more satisfying. I’ve got a little over three weeks to catch 6-15 movies (depending on how many categories I want to be prepared for). We’ll see what happens.

Film #9: Casino Jack and the United States of Money (2010)

Man, if it’s not a horror movie, it’s a documentary, right? I promise that eventually I’ll expand the scope of films that I review, but lately I seem to either want to scare myself or learn something. Casino Jack and the United States of Money gave me an opportunity to do the latter. This 2010 documentary by director Alex Gibney (who’s also made documentaries about Enron and Eliot Spitzer) focuses on super lobbyist and all-around scumbag Jack Abramoff. In 2006, Abramoff was convicted of fraud, conspiracy, and tax evasion, and his conviction brought down several other government officials, including Representative Bob Ney. Ney contributes interviews for the film, as do loads of other politicians and Washington insiders – pretty much everyone except for the man himself. The film covers the rise and fall of Abramoff in the Washington scene, and how he lobbied for various corporations by wooing Congress members with trips to Scotland, VIP treatment at his restaurant, and of course, good ole fashioned cash.

Stylistically and as a piece of art, I’m not sure if there’s a lot to say about this film. It’s pretty standard as far as political documentaries go. We get interviews with people who were involved in the scandals, archival clips that give us quaint comparisons to how things supposedly worked in the past, and ironic music accompanying footage of dastardly deeds. There’s nothing wrong with taking the tried and true method as long as you succeed in the end. As far as informing the viewer about Jack and his deeds, Casino Jack does succeed – one might even argue that it succeeds in that end too much, since the documentary at times feels like information overload. More disappointing, however, is the film’s failure to satisfyingly make the jump from specific to general, the way truly good essays and documentaries do. It should have been able to use a very narrow subject (Mr. Abramoff) to make a statement about a much broader one (lobbyists and money in politics, a timely topic nowadays thanks in no small part to the Occupy Wall Street protests). It never really does, though, and while it’s good to know the details surrounding Jack Abramoff’s crimes, the final result is a feeling of missed opportunity.

If you’re looking for something to get you pissed about politics, though, you’ve found a gem in Gibney’s film. It reveals a full-on procession of hypocrisy and swindling, with Abramoff the criminal cross-bearer. The section on Saipan really stuck out to me as a sickening display of greed and American exceptionalism. Here you have Congress members traveling to this North Mariana island, an American commonwealth, to investigate working conditions in factories. Abramoff brought many members of our government out there, but all they did was give a cursory glance, declare that everything was a-okay, and used the rest of their time to have a tropical vacation. It wasn’t until Representative George Miller went there afterward that anyone even bothered to talk to a single worker.

Casino Jack and the United States of Money is a perfunctory political documentary, giving an in-depth examination of Jack Abramoff and his time influencing members of our government, but never doing much to go beyond this very narrow scope of interest.

Final rating: 6.5/10

–James A. Janisse

Stray Observations:

• It baffles me that politicians are okay signing their name to a pledge circulated by Grover Norquist – I wouldn’t even want to be a known associate of his after seeing him in this film.
• In addition to the Saipan segment, those emails belittling American Indians were also hard to stomach. Some people are just bad human beings.
• Seems like most complaints about government waste and inefficient use of taxpayer money lead to conclusions that we need to cut spending, but I feel like maybe we should start with cutting out all the bribery bullshit before, say, education, and see where that leaves us first.