Defending Your Life (1991) Review

Title: Defending Your Life
Year: 1991
Director: Albert Brooks
Country: US
Language: English

Previously I've seen/reviewed Albert Brooks' Lost in America (1985) and Mother (1996). Enjoying them both tremendously as a great mesh of drama and comedy.  Defending Your Life (1991) was next on my random Brooks' list. I had high expectations for it and am proud to say that it exceeded them. The afterlife has never been so funny, while simultaneously being incredibly heartfelt.

Daniel Miller (Albert Brooks) is killed in a car accident and goes to Judgment City, a waiting room for the afterlife. During the day, he must prove in a courtroom-style process that he successfully overcame his fears. If he wins he stays in Heaven, if he loses he is reincarnated on Earth. At night he falls in love with a beautiful young woman named Julia (Meryl Streep).

My wife and I have said for many years that our ideal version of Heaven has a buffet, where the food tastes wonderful all the time & you can never get fat. This movie's version of heaven has exactly that! It's so blissful to see them eat to their heart's content! This is also the butt of many jokes "Do you want nine pies? I make you nine pies!" The writing is remarkable; never compromising the heart of the picture for Brooks' observational comedy. 

Defending Your Life is a lovely picture that will encourage you to be more courageous in your own love life. Perhaps you may spend more time with your loved ones and cease some grand moment with them. It's almost as good as It's a Wonderful Life (1946) in the way it sweeps you off your feet and puts your head in the clouds. 

I look forward to watching more of Brooks' filmography in the coming months. His comedy is remarkable; certainly a style of humour that doesn't droll or become boring with each passing film. Defending Your Life is a hidden gem in American cinema. 

Polyester (1981) Review

Title: Polyester
Year: 1981
Director: John Waters
Country: US
Language: English

Have you ever wanted to smell a movie, but didn't know how to? Well now you can! With Polyester John Waters (Pink Flamingos) provided scratch n' sniff cards to audience members. They would use these cards when the screen prompted them to. Sometimes you'd get a nose full of beautiful daisies, and other times you might get the unpleasant odour of skunks. Waters' creativity new no bounds. 

Francine Fishpaw (Divine) is an upper middle class suburban housewife in Baltimore. Unfortunately for this "good Christian woman", her life is about to completely fall apart.

John Waters' Francine Fishpaw has worse luck than William H Macy in the Coen Brothers' Fargo. She is a perfectly innocent women with very simple goals, but unfortunately everything slowly falls apart. When you think it can't get worse for her it does. Polyester is a crazy movie that is equal parts uncomfortable and funny. You want Divine to stop suffering, but when even the dog hangs itself you can't help but roll over laughing. 

Polyester is a Douglas Sirk (Magnificent Obsession) melodrama turned up to 11. The acting is over-the-top, the falls are tremendous, the villains are dastardly, and the hero is hopeless. The film looks like it's going to turn over a new leaf and give Fishpaw a happy life, only to have the rug pulled from under her. Waters does a great job at exposing the dirty underbelly of the middle class in a most outrageous fashion. 

I enjoyed the film, even though I had one eyebrow raised the entire time. Polyester, as with most Waters' movies, is weird to the point of polarizing. Some people will hate it, and for some of the run-time I did, but I found it had a uniquely repulsive charm that had me glued to the screen. If anything, it's absolutely fascinating. 

Aladdin (1992 & 2019) Reviews

Title: Aladdin 
Year(s): 1992 & 2019 
Director(s): Ron Clements & Guy Ritchie 
Country: US
Language: English

Aladdin (2019) is a live-action remake of the animated Aladdin (1992) which has elements of Thief of Bagdad (1940) which itself is a remake of the silent Thief of Bagdad (1925) which was inspired by A Thousand and One Nights, a collection of many middle eastern stories that was first published in 1704. The genie, magic carpet, jafar, princess in distress etc. have all been told for hundreds of years and had a LONG fall to get to...Will Smith. 

Aladdin is both poor street rat and "diamond in the rough". Jafar is a villain who wants to enter the "cave of wonders" to get a lamp which evokes an almighty genie, but needs Aladdin to do so. Chaos ensues, Aladdin is in possession of the lamp & wants to use the genies' powers to make himself a prince so the princess will marry him. 

Much of Aladdin (1992)'s success is due to Robin Williams' portrayal of the genie. Disney Execs obviously believed this to be true, considering they marketed the hell out of his likeness. He's charming, funny and endearing. His genie appeals to children because of his zany adhd behavior and appeals to adults because of the random-ass celebrity impersonations. Groucho Marx in a 90's animated movie? Really!? 

The film itself is a nice compact 90 minutes that doesn't meander and gives every scene a reason to be there. The animation provides an epic feel to each song, Prince Ali in particular has quite distinct and powerful visuals. They really emphasize how important Aladdin is now that he is a prince. Jafar's voice actor creates a menacing and powerful villain. I appreciate his transormation into a giant snake near the end of the picture. 

Aladdin (2019) is terrible in comparison. Will Smith can't even carry Williams' bags. He's an unfunny dad-joke genie that doesn't do impersonations, doesn't improve Aladdin (Menna Massoud) and adds very little soul to his musical numbers. There isn't enough CGI in the world to improve the lazy Prince Ali number. Smith does not bring much charisma to this role. The effects from the 1940 movie are more convincing. 

Marwan Kanzari also lacks a great deal of acting ability in his role of Jafar. The 1992 animation elicits more fear than this possible Starbucks manager. Conrad Veidt would be spinning in his grave if he saw such lackluster acting of the same character. 

Aladdin (2019) also adds 38 minutes to its run-time, none of it improving the story even slightly. We get the Genie flirting with a human girl, a "girl power" ballad and a lot of filler that I've forgotten. Yikes! The changes don't improve the picture at all. Instead of a menacing snake Jafar turns into...a giant parrot? Huh? 

The only positive thing that I can say about Aladdin (2019) is that Naomi Scott is incredibly beautiful. I can certainly understand why Aladdin would want to move mountains for her & I would love to see more pictures that she is in.

Lacking any type of heart I'd avoid Aladdin (2019) and stick with Aladdin (1992) or the two Thief of Bagdad films. None of these "live-action" (although mostly CGI) remakes have been as good as the animation. All, except Jungle Book, have been  hollow and lifeless. 

Aladdin (1992)

Aladdin (2019)

Spider-Man Far From Home (2019) Review

Title: Spiderman Far From Home
Year: 2019
Director: Jon Watts 
Country: US
Language: English

Spider-Man Far From Home has put its director, Jon Watts, in a tough position due to its place in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Not only does this need to be a worthy successor to Homecoming (2017), but it also has to be a pallette cleanser from the heavy Avengers: Endgame, while also providing audiences a taste for things to come. This is quite a tough challenge and I don't envy the film-makers' position. 

Peter Parker (Tom Holland) attempts to woo MJ (Zendaya) on his class field trip to Europe. Meanwhile "the elementals" are wrecking havok and a new "superhero", nicknamed Mysterio (Jack Gyllenhaal, is attemptinig to take down these creatures.

Coming off the time-travel multiverse Endgame, Far From Home feels like a much more grounded and light affair. The villain and their grandiose scheme often feels secondary to the romantic comedy unfolding between MJ and Peter. One could argue that the film's structure does not reveal itself around the action, but around the teen-romance. 

Far From Home owes a lot of its story to the hit television series Scooby Doo Where are You? (1969) The villain's motivations, the nefarious trickery and even the big reveal are very reminiscent of that show. I half expected Mysterio to yell "and I would have gotten away with it too! If it weren't for you meddling kids!" We can only hope more films are inspired by Scooby Doo.

The film is a great building block for Phase Four, showing us a fraction of what we could expect and leaving us with a tremendous taste for more. Far From Home is as endearing as it is entertaining. It surpasses every Spiderman film before it. 

10 Best Criterion Editions

10 Best Criterion Editions

The Criterion Collection is a home video company known for distributing amazing editions of your favourite classic and contemporary films. The impressive picture quality, sound quality and supplements of each release cannot compare to more mainstream blu-rays & dvds. Criterion is vastly superior compared to its competition, unfortunately this also means they're more expensive ($30+) 

I've been collecting Criterions since, well, a decade ago. In 2009 my friend gave me their parents' copy of Rashomon. I remember being bewildered that people made dvd's of 1950's Japanese movies. "What is Criterion!?" I did some research and, out of curiousity, bought The Seventh Seal and was blown away by it. "I need more!" 

Throughout this decade my collection has increased and decreased dramatically, mostly depending on my financial situation. I credit Criterion for jump-starting my love for cinema, as there would be a tremendous amount of films I would not have seen without them. 

Currently they have a streaming service called Criterion Channel. I would recommend it for people who don't have the money to buy a decent collection. However, when you do have the $$$, here are my top ten Criterion recommendations. 

10. It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World 

9. The Apu Trilogy

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8. On the Waterfront 

7. Persona 

6. Seven Samurai

5. Bicycle Thieves 

4. Three Colors Trilogy

3. Dekalog

2. The Essential Jacques Demy

1. Ingmar Bergman's Cinema