Culture

This is ground control to Major Bowie…your son directed this movie.The previews for Moon are misleading and for once that's a good thing. This is not a space-age horror/time-warp/psychological thriller, but rather a socio-politico commentary on the present, taking place in the not so distant future.

The film focuses on the psychological ramifications of cabin fever and the bleak outlook of the onset of cloning. Sam Rockwell plays two roles-a lone astronaut about to go home in two weeks, and his clone. Revealing the clone is no spoiler; It's all set up fairly early.
Beginning with a TV commercial touting Lunar Industries, a company that makes safer, cleaner air by harvesting moon rocks, Moon veers into strange territory almost immediately. Sam Bell (Rockwell) is the sole worker on a moon outpost, in charge of maintaining all the equipment, vehicles and the moon station itself. His only companionship is a beat-up, helper robot computer (reminiscent of 2001's HAL) named Gerty (voiced by Kevin Spacey). Gerty shuffles and glides around to assist Sam at every step. Resembling a dilapidated X-ray machine, with a "kick me" sticker on his back and a yellow smiley face on a video screen to exhibit his "emotions," Gerty provides comic relief-or does he? Deception and perhaps hallucinations come into play as Sam receives mail from his wife in the form of delayed video feeds thanks to a busted communications satellite. Sam has little interest in anything but going home. But soon, one thing after another goes wrong and Sam is face to face with a cloned version of himself. Their confusion (and consequently ours) becomes the main focus as to what's next on this planetary agenda.

Animal cruelty?At the opening night screening of Brüno at the Old Mill cinema no one walked out. Not the giggling groups of teenage boys, not those engaged in middle-aged man-dates, not the hand-holding couples, not even the lady who gasped, "Oh my god" at five-minute intervals. No, the entire audience sat stalwartly through the sexual equivalent of Saw V. The mechanical dildos, the swinging penis, the champagne bottle butt plug, the anal bleaching, it was all very well received.

I don't think we can discern whether the Bend community is inured to onscreen iniquity, jaded, or actually more liberal than previously thought. Yet, there were a handful of moments when the laughter disappeared, and the audience quieted to a nervous-coughing hush-and from these moments we can learn. There are some things that can still shock, that cannot be tolerated, and so instead of the article that we had in mind (Bend's Ten Biggest Walk-Out-of-Brüno Moments) here instead is… Bend's Six Biggest Though-We-Understand-We're-Watching-Brüno-We're-Not-OK-With-That Moments.
1. The souvenir severed foot of an African elephant retrieved from an airport luggage conveyor. The illegal procurement of animal limbs for novel umbrella stands is NOT okay with the people of Bend and will be met with a dire silence. An African baby arriving subsequently in a box marked "fragile," is, however, very funny. And, with "awws" everywhere, also quite cute. From this we presume Bend to be extremely environmentally friendly.

dances with the devil in the pale moonlight. Public Enemies is bound to score some real fans, but I am sure it will make its share of enemies as well. Director Michael Mann takes a true Depression-era crime story and interprets it with ultra-heavy handedness beyond any sense of realism. As an art/crime film, this is an impressive flick, but its brooding quality breathes hollow.

Rising from Indiana crime sprees to Public Enemy number one, John Dillinger was regarded as a latter-day Robin Hood. Robbing banks that had gotten fat while foreclosing on famiy farms. But Dillinger embraced his rock-star status, exuding bravado and charisma. Yet the film plays out in one somber moment after another, as if everyone was still reeling from The Depression and acting all…depressed.
Johnny Depp (playing Dillinger) brilliantly festers in a uniquely restrained performance. Depp has the ability to slide into whatever role he takes and it was nice to see him in one that didn't require an English accent. A sorely miscast Christian Bale, gives us a one-note performance as FBI agent Melvin Purvis, pensively staring into space. We see him slip in and out of accents covering maybe five different Southern regions. Captivating actress Marion Cotillard, as Dillinger's love Billie Frechette, does a good job with a poorly written part. Billy Cruddup is convincing and entertaining as J. Edgar Hoover. There's a veritable avalanche of cameos and appearances by recognizable actors and some really well picked unknowns. Still, most characters come off empty. I don't care how many cool handheld shots you surround them with, it's hard to care for any character at all.

Or we could shoot hoops?Woody Allen's filmmaking career has been like one long, good conversation. He knows that sometimes he's been talking to himself, with the audience acting as psychiatrist, nodding and saying, "I see" in the right places. But Whatever Works is Woody's second wind-after losing track of the conversation to stumble about woozily, searching for the right bases; he's returned to form with a very funny, very smart farce-like comedy that beats out Annie Hall for quotable witticisms.

His last film, Vicky Cristina Barcelona is brilliant but our enthusiasm was wary, as we'd waited patiently asking of each six-monthly release, "Is this the one to get excited about?" The assumption was that he'd lost it, and so even though his most mediocre effort can be ten times better than most of what makes it onto the big screen, fun films like Anything Else got ignored. After seeing Whatever Works, you'll want to rent Vicky Cristina Barcelona, to watch it through without holding your breath.
Filmmaking is Woody Allen's way of life, and the day he wraps one film he begins to pull together the next and as he travels from country to country. Whatever Works is as much about his place in Hollywood as it is about our place in the universe. While critics complain scripts restrict his actors, to merely impersonating Allen. This time around he cast Larry David for the central character, Boris Yellnikoff – a natural fit given that David's HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm is the illegitimate child of Allen's comedy stand-up.