Crazy for "Crazy Heart"

With the scent of warm, whisky breath and the soundtrack of country music, “Crazy Heart” tells a captivating story about being strong enough to never give up on life. This charismatic and down-to-earth new film is truly refreshing in today’s excessive-driven film industry. Based on a novel by Thomas Cobbs, this film naturally fulfils its tagline stating “the harder the life, the sweeter the song”. Its simple yet deep plot is remarkably captured through vivid aesthetics, light-hearted language, powerful acting, and soulful music.

“Bad Blake” (nicknamed “Bad”), played by Jeff Bridges, is an aged and washed-up Western country singer who plays small gigs in bars and bowling alleys, while drinking away his troubled past. His main attire of sloppy casual visually emphasizes his unkempt personality with unbuckled pants, unbuttoned shirts, rolled up sleeves, a cowboy hat, sunglasses, a potbelly, and cowboy boots. His scruffy white whiskers and long greasy hair further enhance his untidy appearance, which ultimately earn him the reputation of a professional mess. He is never without a cigarette and religiously carries a flask, drinking and stumbling around at all times of the day.

However, his witty and carefree charm wins him numerous interviews with reporter Jean Craddock, played by Maggie Gyllenhaal. The two soon pursue a romantic relationship, where their chemistry is surprisingly stunning and invigorating. The close camera angles and deep acting performances truly bring the characters alive and allows for a sincerely emotional connection between characters and audience.

In addition to the touching character portrayals, the script proved beyond riveting. Unique musical lyrics and relatable plot points made it an easy and beautiful film to watch. With expressive and moving lyrics like “funny how fallin feels like flyin, for a little while”, it is no surprise that writer and director Scott Cooper has been nominated for “Best Screenplay” as well as “Most Promising Director” for this film.

As “Crazy Heart” introduces Bad in the midst of the most drowning part of his life, it is rewarding as an audience member to see his linear progression as he retraces the steps of his past. The hardships seen in Bad ’s life are most likely relevant to most viewers, ranging from divorces and neglected children, to new relationships and sustainment of a career. This commonality forms a strong bond between film and audience, making the film a very meaningful experience.

For Bad, Jean is the motivation he needs to combat his chain-smoking and alcoholic crutches that have previously blurred the important things in his life. Their hopeful relationship, illuminated by outdoor sun-lit lighting eventually contrasts and overpowers his dark and gloomy-lit relationship with bars and Budweiser’s.

Thus, country fan or not, “Crazy Heart” is phenomenal and affecting, provoking a great reminder of what film industries should admire and aspire to. Merely, pure words and emotions energize the look and feel of the movie, making life seem just a little more manageable and encouraging. Hence, whenever at a loss for inspiration, Bad says it best, don’t underestimate the power to “pick up your crazy heart, give it one more try”.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugliness of "The Cripple of Inishmaan"

Martin McDonagh’s “The Cripple of Inishmaan” presented at Kalamazoo College’s Festival Playhouse over this past weekend, was clever yet disappointing. Directed by Kevin Dodd, a theater arts educator at both Kalamazoo College and Western Michigan University, this black comedy takes place on the sheltered island off the coast of Ireland during the early 1930’s. It’s characters, script, and humor is delightful, yet its high attempts to be witty took this play one step too far, for far too long.

The scenery was ideal. Plaid skirts, vests, aprons, suspenders, tights, slacks and heavy-heeled shoes all of neutral browns, oranges and reds provided a perfect tone for this antique Irish setting. Wooden barrels, shelved canned foods, lanterns, and food crates also added an effective old fashion touch.

The characters of this play were also captured extremely well. “Cripple Billy”, played by senior Michael Chodos, is first introduced through his gossiping aunts Kate, played by senior Laura Fox, and Eileen, played by first-year Sierra Moore. Eventually he shuffled in with a crippled arm, dragging his left foot. Chodos magnificently conveyed Billy to the point where viewers immediately felt sympathy for Billy with his hunched shoulders, sullen face expressions and slow movements. Johnny Patten, played by second-year Sam Bertken, was a nosy and bitter old man who always seemed up-to-date on the latest news of the island and offered daily “pieces of news” to chat about. Helen, played by first-year Rudi Goddard, was one of the stronger and buoyant characters who seemed a natural flirt. All of these personalities and even other minor personalities always remained true to their character, which was very refreshing to watch.

The script was unique and authentic. Words such as “arse” and “feckin” reined consistent of the Irish language as well as stirred good laughs from the audience. The characters’ high held value of their country was also portrayed through language: “Ireland mustn’t be a bad place if sharks want to be comin’ to Ireland”. The dialect, however, was not so successful in this particular production. The Irish accent was barely mastered by the majority of the actors. Instead of rolling the words naturally off their tongue, their speech sounded nasally and forced, making me question if we were still in Ireland or if we went traveling to a mix of some other European countries. Unfortunately, this began taking away from the authenticity of the McDonagh’s script as well as the characters.

The successful integration of harmless humor is really what kept the play upbeat through its drudgingly long duration. Everything from Billy’s fascination with cows and his overly frantic aunts, to Johnny trying to kill his Mammy with alcohol and Kate talking to stones made the Inishmaan community seem all the more blameless and fruitful.

However, not everything in this play was so humorous. The style of dialogue presented alternated between two extremes: light-hearted and heart breaking. The two together played on the emotions of audience members in a frustrating way. Things that were meant to be funny such as playing jokes on humble “Cripple Billy” and talk of stomping on a cat until its dead were demoralizing. McDonagh definitely took the black humor too far, especially when the audience finds out that Billy has believed all his life that he is cripple because his father punched his mother’s womb while she was pregnant with Billy, which is why is was born with a handicap.

Additionally, the play was a few hours too long with its exhausted conversations, discomforted silences and awkward transitions. This play was also often stretching for entertainment. For example, when Helen was cracking eggs over another character’s head, it became clear that the actors where anticipating a laugh that never actually came. The unrealistic action such as a few slow motion punches reminded me that I was in fact in an auditorium. All of these small technical faults added up fast and quickly overshadowed the tremendous character portrayals and detailed aesthetics. The longer I watched, the more I had to struggle to pay attention. I would have much rather watched cows in a field with Billy than watch this play again.

Profile Pitch Piece: Channing Tatum

I hope to be writing my final piece for March 2010 on 30 year-old actor, Channing Tatum. This “celebrity profile” will be analyzing Tatum’s ineffective and one-dimensional acting skills, if you can even call them “skills”. I truly believe that Tatum should have maintained his career as a model as he really only has his good looks going for him. He is the perfect example of why Hollywood is downward spiraling.

I will be using numerous films staring Tatum as my primary sources. These will include movies such as “G.I. Joe”(2009), “Stop Loss”,(2008) “Step Up” (2006), and his recent debut “Dear John” (2010). I will also be using a wide range of secondary sources including biographies and blogs of Tatum. Additionally, I will be contrasting him to articles describing qualities of good actors. All of these sources will support my case of Tatum’s lack of talent. It is interesting that in his wide-range of movies, he is always playing the same mysterious and afflicted character.

As an avid moviegoer of both action and romantic films in which I feed off emotional connection between actor and viewer, I believe I am the perfect candidate to speak on this topic with my ultimate frustration. It will be a witty and biting piece that Americans need to hear to bring them out of their Tatum dream world, seeing him for what he is not.

Revision: Kael's Criticism

Pauline Kael’s choice to become a writer over a lawyer was one big mistake. Although Kael is obviously very intelligent graduating from the University of California, Berkley and well acclaimed through her long career at the New Yorker, Kael’s reviews embody a subjective approach filled with strong emotional reactions and extremely polarized opinions. As a critic, Kael’s stubbornness, straightforwardness, bold claims, outdated expectations and exaggerations all confirm that she clearly takes her job too seriously.

Kael always prided herself on her independent standpoints. These, however, are the very things that have caused a lot of resistance and hostility towards her work. Her pieces undoubtedly capture attention from the first sentence, but her long rants were known for rarely saying anything constructive. In a review of “The Witches of Eastwick”, Kael claimed that “nothing is carried through; about half the scenes don’t make much sense and the final ones might as well have a sign posted: ‘We’re desperate for a finish’”. In this example, she is excessively brash and straightforward, while also inflating the producer’s alleged intentions. Maybe Kael should have spent less time evaluating and more time enjoying the film. It seems to me that Kael is a critic merely to criticize, offering very little genuine analysis.

Kael’s overemphasized claims also carry over into unnecessary questioning within her reviews. Her numerous questions prove degrading and insulting to not only all efforts of the film, but also to the readers that might have enjoyed what Kael doubted. For example, in reference to an actor’s performance, she cynically asked “Why didn’t anyone explain to him that he needn’t wear himself out with acting?” and another actor, “How can you have any feeling for a man who doesn’t enjoy being in bed with Sophia Loren?” Kael self-assuredly asks these questions hoping to intrigue her readers, but it actually comes across as Kael having an un-stimulating conversation with herself. She tries so hard to be witty and overly sarcastic for entertaining purposes, but it seizes to impress.

She even goes as far as to make high assumptions about her audience with her recurrent use of “you”. An example of this is when she is talking about “Hiroshima Mon Amour” and she remarks, “I don’t know how many movies you have gone to lately that were made to sell soap, but American movies are like advertisements”. She does this in a generalizing and manipulative way that really means, “If you don’t think like I do, you are clearly not as intelligent as me”. Evidently, Kael personifies the grandmother figure that knows best. However, she would have made a better case in court.

Additionally, Kael fails to astonish with her un-riveting endings. It is obvious that she is trying too hard in many of her assessments. She tries to sound intelligent and credible when she ends her “Hiroshima Mon Amour” review by musing, “And the question I want to ask is: Who’s selling it?” My question is “Who cares?”

Kael’s retirement came at a good time. Her stubborn nature and her inability to adapt to change were definitely a few determinants. She remarked in Davis’s “Afterglow” that “I am a mechanical idiot…I wrote by hand…but I think it was an excuse so I wouldn’t have to learn to operate machinery”. As Kael had little desire to keep up with modern day innovations, it is evident that she has no desire to keep up with modern day movies. Nonetheless, as times change, movies change, and her bitterness and pessimism noticeably increased over the years given her hostility toward current-day Hollywood. She expresses “I suddenly couldn’t say anything about some of the movies. They were just so terrible”. It seems like it finally got to the point where she inadvertently went to the movies with outdated expectations instead of seeing the film for its own uniqueness.

Kael is clearly not up to contemporary day challenges and her black-and-white thinking was inevitably going to dead-end her writing sooner or later in this new generation of film. An authentic critic should be less stubborn and self-centered, and more objective and open-minded—all of which Kael had no intention of embracing.

Kael’s Criticism

Pauline Kael’s choice to become a writer over a lawyer was one big mistake. Although Kael is obviously very intelligent graduating from the University of California, Berkley and well acclaimed through her long career at the New Yorker, Kael’s reviews embody a subjective approach filled with strong emotional reactions and extremely polarized opinions. As a critic, Kael’s stubbornness, straightforwardness, bold claims, intolerance for ignorance, outdated expectations and exaggerations all confirm that she clearly takes her job too seriously.

Kael always prided herself on her independent standpoints. These however are the very things that have caused a lot of resistance and hostility towards her work. Her works undoubtedly capture attention from the first sentence, but her long rants were known for rarely saying anything constructive. In a review of “The Witches of Eastwick”, Kael claimed that “nothing is carried through; about half the scenes don’t make much sense and the final ones might as well have a sign posted: ‘We’re desperate for a finish’”. She is excessively brash and straightforward while also inflating the producer’s intentions for the ending. Maybe Kael should have spent less time analyzing and more time enjoying a film. It seems to me that Kael is a critic merely to criticize, with very little genuine analysis.

Kael’s overemphasized claims also carry over into her unnecessary questioning within her reviews as well. Her numerous questions proved degrading and insulting to not only all efforts of the film, but also to the readers that might have enjoyed what Kael doubted. For example, in reference to an actor’s performance, she cynically asked “Why didn’t anyone explain to him that he needn’t wear himself out with acting?” and another actor, “How can you have any feeling for a man who doesn’t enjoy being in bed with Sophia Loren?” Kael self-assuredly asks these questions hoping to intrigue her readers, but it actually comes across as Kael having an un-stimulating conversation with herself. She tries so hard to be witty and overly sarcastic for entertaining purposes, but I am personally unimpressed.

She even goes as far as to make high assumptions about her audience with her recurrent use of “you”. An example of this is when she is talking about “Hiroshima Mon Amour” and she remarks, “I don’t know how many movies you have gone to lately that were made to sell soap, but American movies are like advertisements”. She does this in a generalizing and manipulative way that really means, “If you don’t think like I do, you are clearly not as intelligent as me”. Evidently, Kael personifies the grandmother figure that knows best. I don’t buy it. She would have made a better case in court.

Additionally, Kael seizes to impress me with her un-riveting endings. It is obvious that she is trying too hard in many of her reviews. She tries to sound intelligent and credible when she ends her “Hiroshima Mon Amour” review by pondering: “And the question I want to ask is: Who’s selling it?” My question is “Who cares?”

Kael’s retirement came at a good time. Her stubborn nature and her inability to adapt to change were definitely a few determinants. As Kael had little desire to keep up with modern day innovations, it is evident that she has no desire to keep up with modern day movies. Nonetheless, as times change, movies change, and her bitterness and pessimism noticeably increased over the years. It finally got to the point where she inadvertently went to the movies with outdated expectations instead of seeing the film for its own uniqueness.

Kael is clearly not up to modern day challenges and her black-and-white thinking was inevitably going to dead-end her writing sooner or later in this new generation of film. An authentic critic should be less stubborn and self-centered, and more objective and open-minded—all of which Kael had no intention of embracing.