The DVD Report #44

I had hoped to review Todd Haynes’ I’m Not There and Warner Bros. Fordibben Hollywood, Vol. 2 this week, but I’ve been told their DVD releases scheduled for today have been postponed, the former to May 6, the latter to March 25. No matter, there are still lots of other new releases to keep us busy during the winter doldrums.

Criterion has released a mammoth four-disc edition of Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1987 Oscar winner The Last Emperor. The first disc contains the film’s theatrical cut, the second the expanded edit shown on TV while the remaining discs feature tons of supplements. The richly detailed film itself has never looked better.

Telling the life story of Pu Yi, emperor of China at 3, deposed leader at 6, western playboy, Japanese collaborator, repatriated prisoner and finally tranquil gardener, Bertolucci’s sumptuous film elicits a career high performance from John Lone as Pu Yi, with memorable support from Joan Chen and Peter O’Toole among others. The eye-popping film won a clean sweep total of nine Oscars including those for Best Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, Art Direction, Editing, Score, Costume Design and Sound.

A sense of sadness and foreboding runs through Sean Penn’s Into the Wild, a beautifully filmed chronicle of the adventures of a young man who disavows the material world in his exploration of the wonders of nature. Emile Hirsch gives an extraordinary performance as the idealistic Christopher McCandless aka Alexander Supertramp who abandons his car, gives away his money and sets off on his own after his college graduation. His travels are peppered with interesting folk on the road that leads him ultimately to the Alaskan wilderness. Chief among them are Catherine Keener, Vince Vaughn, and Hal Holbrook in a terrific Oscar-nominated performance. That the film itself wasn’t nominated for a slew of Oscars as had been expected is one of the award season’s most baffling mysteries. The film did start off awards season on a high note with its seven Broadcast Film Critics nods, more than any other film this year, and Hirsch, Holbrook and Keener were all nominated for SAG awards as was the film’s ensemble. Only Holbrook and the film’s editing garnered Oscar nods.

The two-disc special edition includes two documentaries, one on the source material and one on the making of the film.

Inexplicably meeting with less than enthusiastic reviews from major critics, Ang Lee’s Lust, Caution plays like a leisurely paced novel, which may make it a better bet for home DVD viewing than for sitting through in theatres. Tony Leung gives another of his fine performances as a corrupt Chinese politician who rises through the ranks of the country’s World War II puppet government in collaboration with the Japanese. As the naïve young spy whose job it is to set him up, Tang Wei gives an impressive, smoldering performance. She and Leung were nominated for Independent Spirit awards, Lee earned a Best Director nod from the Satellites and the film was nominated for a Golden Globe as Best Foreign Film, but that was about it for major American awards recognition.

The DVD is available in two versions, the NC-17 theatrical cut with its near-graphic sex scenes intact and the R rated version apparently intended for blue-haired old ladies.

Another film that plays like a leisurely-paced novel is Milos Forman’s Goya’s Ghosts, another film that the critics were not especially kind to. Granted the story about the great painter’s involvement in the waning days of the Spanish Inquisition is not historically accurate, but since when did that stop audiences from enjoying a film? Stellan Skarsgard gives another impeccable performance as Goya, but it’s Javier Bardem as a crafty cleric and Natalie Portman in a dual role whose performances earn the film’s acting honors. The film’s costumes were nominated for a Satellite award and fittingly the film was also nominated for Spain’s own Goya awards albeit again in technical categories for costume design, makeup and special effects.

Yet another film to unwind at a leisurely pace, Francois Girard’s Silk is a beautifully rendered love story about a 19th Century French merchant turned smuggler whose perilous journeys to Japan in search of silkworm eggs force him to leave behind his beautiful young wife. He becomes increasingly infatuated with a Japanese concubine until a mysterious letter puts an end to the affair. Michael Pitt is a bit wooden in the lead, but Keira Knightley as his ravishingly lovely wife and Alfred Molina as his friend and benefactor are at their best. Sei Ashina as the concubine doesn’t have much to do but look beautiful, but acclaimed Japanese actress Miki Nakatami has a pivotal role as the Japanese madam of a French brothel. The film was nominated for five Genies, Canada’s Oscars, all in technical categories: cinematography, art direction, costume design, score and sound, winning for costume design.

A very black comedy indeed, Frank Oz’s Death at a Funeral is about a dysfunctional family gathered together to say good-bye to the family patriarch. Recreational drugs hidden in a bottle labeled Valium sets off a chain reaction of one farcical event after another. The eclectic cast is led by Matthew MacFayden as the relatively normal son of the dead man, Keeley Hawes his straight-laced wife, Rupert Graves his famous but broke writer brother, Jane Asher his uptight mother, Peter Dinklage his father’s secret lover, and Alan Tudyk, hilarious as the supposedly dull lawyer engaged to his pregnant cousin. The film starts off with whimsical title graphics and the wrong body being delivered to the family’s ancestral home and doesn’t let up from there.

Benicio Del Toro gives one of the year’s best performances as a recovering heroin addict in Suzanne Bier’s Things We Lost in the Fire opposite Halle Berry as the widow of his best friend who offers him a room in her converted garage until he can get on his feet. That’s it, there’s no sex, no romance, Del Toro and Berry are just friends, and remain so throughout the film. Subplots involving relapse and confused children are of the kind more typically found in a TV movie these days, not a major theatrical release so maybe it will play better on home screens than it did in theatres. There’s really nothing to recommend here other than Del Toro’s heartfelt performance. For connoisseurs of fine acting that may be enough.

Based on the 2003 Dutch film by the late Theo van Gogh, Steve Buscemi’s Interview is basically a two-character study of a political reporter reduced to doing fluff pieces and the starlet he is forced to interview. It’s instant dislike for the two who play an extended game of cat and mouse well into the wee hours of the morning. Sienna Miller was deservedly nominated for an Independent Spirit award for her savvy portrayal of the starlet and Buscemi himself gives another of his fine, understated performances as the reporter.

Comprised of five-minute vignettes by twenty world class directors, Paris, Je T’aime is designed primarily to show off the city. With directors like Alexander Payne, Gus Van Sant, Tom Tykwer, Walter Salles, Alfonso Cuaron and the Coen Brothers, and actors like Juliette Binoche, Gena Rowlands, Fanny Ardant, Miranda Richardson, Nick Nolte, Ben Gazzara, Bob Hoskins, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Elijah Wood, Willem Dafoe, Steve Buscemi and Natalie Portman, it comes as something of a shock that the sweetest vignette is the one directed by horror master Wes Craven in a cemetery with Emily Mortimer, Rufus Sewell and the aforementioned Alexander Payne as the ghost of Oscar Wilde.

A nicely done little movie about adoption, Martian Child from writer-director Menno Meyjes, tells the story of a science fiction writer, widower John Cusack, seeking to fulfill a promise to his late wife by adopting a child. Kindly orphanage director Sophie Okoneda puts him together with Bobby Coleman, an unwanted child who is convinced he is from Mars. Amanda Peet as Cusack’s nominal love interest, Oliver Platt his inevitable comical best friend, Anjelica Huston his demanding publisher and Joan Cusack, (his real life sister) as his sister, help flesh out the story, but it’s really all about John Cusack and Coleman getting to know one another.

A slight, but engaging romantic comedy,Scott Hicks’ No Reservations, features Catherine Zeta-Jones as a humorless chef doing her best to ignore the romantic overtures of assistant chef Aaron Eckhart while Abigail Breslin as Zeta-Jones’ orphaned niece steals the film. Breslin, whose idol is 1940s child star Margaret O’Brien, does her best O’Brien imitation to date complete with several crying scenes. A pleasant time killer, it is eerily reminiscent of the Oscar winning Ratatouille, albeit without the rats or the animation.

In addition to The Last Emperor, two other classic films have received deluxe DVD re-issues.

Fox has added a commentary and two featurettes to Sidney Lumet’s 1957 debut film, 12 Angry Men. Included are interviews with Lumet and Jack Klugman, the last living member of the jury that also included Henry Fonda, Lee J. Cobb, Jack Warden and E.G. Marshall among others.

Disney has provided a re-mastered version of 1961’s 101 Dalmations complete with loads of extras across two discs.

Out next week: this year’s Oscar winner for Best Picture, No Country for Old Men.

-Peter J. Patrick (March 4, 2008)