<n>These are my notes to remember what I watched and kinda what I thought about it. I've recently transferred my reviews to IMDb and made <a href="http://www.imdb.com/user/ur1323291/ratings">the list</a> of almost 1200 ratings publicly available. I've included the individual ratings with my notes for each movie. These ratings are not absolutely comparable to each other---I rate the film on how well it suited me for the <i>genre</i> and my mood. YMMV. Also, I make no attempt to avoid <b>spoilers</b>.</n> <dl dt_class="field"> Life is Hot in Cracktown (2009) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0901494/">6/10</a> <div>This movie starts off with a brutal gang rape, within the first minute. The poor girl is taken to a dirty mattress in a dingy, tiny courtyard. She's been there before, exchanging sex for crack with he boyfriend. After he and his friend are finished, he tosses her two vials. The next scene is in a bodega. A guy tries to buy beer and cigarettes with food stamps. Two prostitutes buy 6 condoms apiece, getting a receipt for reimbursement. They worry that their pimp will be mad if they don't get more customers than that---<i>that night</i>. The next scene is of the young man who was working in the bodega, this time at home with his family. He goes to his second job as a security officer in a shabby tenement. Two little kids live there, seemingly alone, left begging for change to buy food. The children's parents return. The boy goes out and heads off with a "friend" (a gentle-seeming dope-fiend) to scope the corner girls. They see "Melody", new to the game, being pimped by her mother. We meet another "girl" who works for crack money for herself and her pimp boyfriend. He seems to genuinely like her, but she's a he (or has, at the very least, a penis). We're back to the gang of four young guys, pure animals, destroying everything in sight, raping everyone in sight, demanding protection money. They assault an old man in a home invasion, blasting him with a giant enema when he doesn't have their check. They destroy everything in his apartment. The security guard can't get any sleep because his baby boy will not stop crying. He fights with his wife. Two cops on the beat investigate a report of screams. It's a young woman who self-aborted (I think). The leader of the gang-rape and protection-racket gang of animals apparently has a back-story. I have no idea why we're expected to care. We're back to the family of four, eking out enough cash for the parents' crack addiction by begging in the streets. The young boy hits the street to hang out with Melody, whose mother gave her the night off <iq>because she's bleeding.</iq> The four youths are hired for a hit. They continue to predate the community, but they're young. So the head of the gang has a young girlfriend who "loves" him. They have sex in the back of a burned-out car. The gang carries out the hit, but one of them is gut-shot. The parents of the family of four abandon their kids to their own fate, jettisoning the extra baggage in search of more crack. The leader of the gang is red-hot now, being sought by rival gangs, who've already killed some of his friends in brutal ways. He laughs and respects them for their savagery. Willy (the little boy) abandons the apartment with Suzie to go rescue Melody, who doesn't need his help. The gang leader prepares for his last stand. A couple is reunited in a hospital. The young security guard/bodega worker shoots an armed robber. Everybody smokes crack all the time. Blow jobs are a de-facto currency. This movie is based on the book of the same name. The director is the writer of both the book and the screenplay. Everyone and everything is depressing and depressed and broken. This movie reminds me a bit of the unstoppable downward hurtle in <i>Requiem for a Dream</i>, but that was better---both the book and the movie. There's no real thread or statement other than hopelessness. Not recommended.</div> Untitled (2009) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1132193/">8/10</a> <div>Adam Goldberg plays Adrian, a musician whose work is, in the words of one critic, <iq>emotionally bankrupt with no relation to the way that human beings make sense of sound</iq>. His brother Josh (Eion Bailey) is a painter whose work hangs in every hallway of one of the largest hotel chains in the world. Naturally, Josh thinks Adrian should think about a different angle, though he's generally supportive. Adrian thinks Josh is a sellout. Josh attends one of Adrian's concerts with his girlfriend Madeleine (Marley Shelton). There is almost no-one else there. The concert is as bad as you can imagine, with random shrieks and shouts, very little structure, no melody. Adrian literally kicks a bucket You really have to be in the mood for it. Madeleine liked it. She was deeply moved. She likes to wear loud clothes (a rubberized raincoat, a feather boa-skirt, a rubber skirt that made me cringe). She invites him to play her latest gallery opening, for Ray Barko (Vinnie Jones). She shows them around the exhibit, telling them <iq>trying to read a piece is a mistake. They're so personal.</iq>, to which Adrian responds <iq>some things are so personal...you should keep them to yourself.</iq> Next we see Adrian playing classical piano (Chopin) in a fancy restaurant, making note of all of the other noises coming from phones and diners. They don't seem to notice him, so he starts to play something of his own, aphonic and loud. Diners scatter. Adrian and friends are back at the gallery, putting on a show. Even the gallery attendees laugh.<fn> At the dinner afterward, they grill Adrian about his music, asking why he's not more popular, to which he responds, <iq>because once you move away from tonality and harmony, the audience is small.</iq> <bq quote-style="none"><b>Unknown:</b> What is the difference between art and entertainment? <b>Madeleine:</b> Entertainment never posed a problem it couldn't solve.</bq> Madeleine invites Adrian over for a party, but he's the only one there. The motive is clear. As they fall to the white-shag carpet, atonal music plays while they struggle mightily to divest themselves of the intricately fastened hipster clothing they're both wearing. It's clear why she goes for Adrian---he is, at least, an artist. Josh is not, but his sales are keeping her gallery afloat. He thinks he's an artist, though. At the same time, tech billionaire and collector Porter Canby (Zak Orth) becomes smitten with Adrian's bandmate, The Clarinet (Lucy Punch). His apartment is an absolute zoo of bizarre art that he's purchased in order to give himself meaning. When we see Ray "making" his art, our ears are now drawn to the sound of the pearl strands as they knock against each other, then as the pearls drop to the floor. Already, we're focused more on background noises, on atonality in our soundscape. Madeleine and Adrian discuss another artist, Monroe: <bq><b>Madeleine</b>: Monroe is an important, emerging artist. <b>Adrian</b>: Monroe is an important, emerging serial killer. <b>Madeleine</b>: You know it's amazing: you can be so experimental in music and so reactionary about art. <b>Adrian</b>: What art? The guy doesn't make anything. <b>Madeleine</b>: Oh, I see. And I suppose when you were at the conservatory, you majored in <i>bucket</i>.</bq> After a disastrous practice/recording session, Adrian is back at the piano, playing a wedding. He has chosen a funeral dirge (Mozart, I believe). The various artistic personalities collide, they grow disillusioned, they stick to principles, they struggle with finance vs. art. Who's conning who? Who's crazy? Who's actually an artist? Do you have to make something? Do you have to make it yourself? Do you have to not care about money? Madeleine thinks she's doing it for art, but is she? What happens when emotion distorts everything? What the fuck is art? Especially in a purely capitalist context like ours? Madeleine capitulates to Josh's demands to show his work. Josh's corporate clients choose a different direction. Madeleine is ruined, then saved by Ray Barko's death, which catapults his prices into the stratosphere. Adam Goldberg is perfect in this role. Marley Shelton is also surprisingly apt.</div> The Woodsman (2004) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0361127/">8/10</a> <div>Kevin Bacon stars as Walter, who's trying to put his life back together after getting out of prison. He's very thin. His brother-in-law is Carlos (Benjamin Bratt), who is quite supportive and helpful. Bob (David Alan Grier) gives him a job. Mary-Kay (Eve) hits on him, but he turns her down. He meets Vicki (Kyra Sedgwick) at work, but she's hostile. He lives right across the street from a grade school, but he has to keep his distance---he is a convicted child molester. Carlos brings back a table that Walter had made for his wedding (hence the epithet "woodsman", I guess. Walter begins to keep a journal, as instructed by his psychiatrist. He documents his observations of "Candy", a man who hangs around the school. Vicki and Walter hook up. Mary-Kay looks cooly on. She warns Vicki away, saying he's <iq>damaged goods</iq>. Soon after, in bed, Walter confesses his crime to Vicki. She thought she could handle it, but she's shocked to her core. She rallies, <bq quote-style="none"><b>Vicki</b>: How old? <b>Walter</b>: Between 10 and 12. <b>Vicki</b>: What did you do to them? <b>Walter</b>: It's not what you think. I never hurt them. Never.</bq> He sends her away. Yasiin Bey (Mos Def) plays a Sergeant Lucas who shows up to question Walter about an attack. He treats Walter like a prisoner. Enters without permission. Searches without a warrant. Yells, being abusive as hell. Walter follows a girl at the mall. He is unsettled. He still has the urge. He confesses to his shrink. He's trying to keep it together and he's staying honest, but there are cracks. He talks to the shrink about his sister. He talks to his brother-in-law about his niece. He is in torment. Walter gets off the bus early to track a young girl. Lucas shows up again, asking why Walter got off the bus early. He knows. <iq>I don't why they keep letting freaks like you out on the street. It just means we got to catch you all over again.</iq> Mary-Kay sets him up at work, telling everyone else what he did. Bob gets his back, but things are unraveling. Bob is right to do so. But Walter is tipping. Vicki confronts Mary-Kay and rats her out to Bob. She's trying to save Walter from himself. She's too late. He's meeting Robin in the park to watch birds. And have her sit on his lap. Walter tries to lure her to a <iq>quiet place</iq>. She tells him no. She tells him <iq>my Daddy let me sit on his lap</iq>. Walter is shocked to see what he does. He said above <iq>I never hurt them</iq>, but now he sees differently. She asks if he <iq>still wants [her] to sit on his lap</iq> and he says no, <iq>go home, Robin</iq>. She hugs him and leaves. Of all people, she sees and knows his illness. Moving, really well-done.<fn> Later that night, Walter sees Candy letting a young boy out of his car and Walter gives him a thrashing. Walter returns to Vicki and they start a life together, slowly. Kevin Bacon puts in a hell of a performance. So do Yasiim Bey and Kyra Sedgwick, for that matter.</div> Russia's Toughest Prison - BBC Documentary --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3164988/">8/10</a> <div>The prison is a 7-hour drive from the nearest civilization. It houses 260 inmates. It is bitingly cold, -40ºC in the winter. Escape attempts aren't even discussed. Presumably the guards also live on-site and spend long months there before switching out. Some of the guards look very young and I think I saw a female during one interview. It was hard to tell since they're all bundled up all the time. Inmates are allowed 3 days of visits every 3 months. But it's a long haul for the families. One family talks about how it's 60 hours of travel for a 4-hour visit. Another woman, the mother of an inmate, discusses on the bus how she has a total of 5000 miles to travel, there and back. She mentions that she will probably be seeing her son for the last time because it costs so much to visit. There are two parts: 85 inmates in solitary confinement and 175 in general population. Many had their death sentences commuted to 25 years when Russia eliminated the death penalty in 1996. The solitary confinement looks very bleak, but no more so than America super-max prisons. The Russian prisoners get 1.5 hours per day "outside", walking in a cell with an open ceiling, but below ground. They are always walking. They are not allowed to lie down during the day. The prisoners do not interact in the high-security part. In the other part, the buildings are older, but warmer, more friendly. There is wood, windows, curtains, normal furniture. Each inmate has his own food bowl.<fn> The other cutlery and kitchenware is normal. They have a pretty civilized-looking bathhouse. They live in what looks like a normal home, with bunk beds in one room, a kitchen with wallpaper and a wood stove. They have most of their interaction with the outside world via letters. A privileged few get to use a videophone. They don't use the television very much. They don't watch much news. Their workout regimens are pretty neat, with a lot of body-weight fitness and balance/gymnastic exercises. They have chores, cleaning, chopping wood---yeah they get to use axes. It reminds me a bit of the stories of Norwegian prisons (the low-security part anyway). These prisoners live what amounts to a monastic existence, with lives structured by the state rather than a religion, but their routine ends up being a religion of sorts, to them. The documentary follows the lives of several inmates, from young to old, from cold-eyed killers to one-time passion killers. For example, one prisoner is about to be released and discusses his fear of not knowing what to do in the outside world, of not fitting in, of the world not needing him. They also interview the guards and warden, who, for the most part, have no love for the prisoners. You can watch it in its entirety at <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ya2RFtzfAnI" source="YouTube">Russia's Toughest Prison - BBC Documentary HD 2016</a>. Recommended.</div> Happiness (1998) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0147612/">5/10</a> <div>This is a movie about deviants with no idea how to go about social interaction in a meaningful or useful way. There's the shrink who fantasizes about going on a shooting spree in a park (Dylan Baker), then buys a young-boy's magazine and beats off to it in the parking lot, only to go home to his ludicrously chipper wife (Cynthia Stephenson) who doesn't see any of this, or the awkward guy (Jon Lovitz) who gives his non-smoker girlfriend an ashtray, then takes it back because she doesn't love him enough, or the super-awkward guy with severe sexual repression (Philip Seymour Hoffman, who else?) who has unfathomably dirty/violent and physically impossible fantasies about his neighbor (Lara Flynn Boyle). This movie doesn't really go anywhere for the first 75 minutes. I'm finding it difficult to carry on. Some of the actors are good, but the script about forlorn, unhappy, occasionally not-unsatisfied people is just not convincing me. Some of the acting is good. Jared Harris as Vlad is great. He is a relentless paramour, charming his way into Joy's heart by playing <i>You Light Up My Life</i>. Then turning into a very dark and typical Lothario. I think the part that's supposed to be shocking is that these people are supposed to be terrible, but they're just normal. The normal sort of terrible. Except maybe for the pedophile dad, but he's a bit off the spectrum. I know we're supposed to be gratified at the open dialogue, but it's just not doing it for me. I guess it's kind of funny that the saddest character in the movie is named Joy. And that her sister---the prettiest person in the movie---is basically a sociopath. The laser-like focus of half of the movie on a pedophile plot-line as well as a quarter of the movie on whether or not a young boy is going to be able to masturbate himself to orgasm for the first time---without bothering to give the boy any personality other than that...somehow there was a spark missing. I found it to be too long and didn't enjoy it very much. Not recommended.</div> Kung Fu Killer (2014) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2952602/">7/10</a> <div>This is a very pretty and solidly made Chinese action movie starring Donnie Yen. He plays a highly skilled martial artist who is an advisor to the police. He accidentally kills a man in a duel and is sentenced to five years prison. In prison, he is visited by a mysterious young man who wants to learn the ways of Kung Fu. The words "Kung Fu" and "martial arts" are spoken by all players dozens of times. His protegé Fung Yu-Sau has is highly skilled despite a deformity in his legs. He's also mentally unstable as hell. His wife died of cancer. He has a gigantic chip on his shoulder. He's covered in scars. his face twists into a grimace of delight when he fights. He starts picking off the most highly skilled martial artists in various disciplines: boxing, kicking, grappling, weapons and ... not sure what the last one is, but it's probably pretty awesome. Yen gets out of jail to help nab the killer and he and the cops are led on a merry chase all over Hong Kong until, of course, the final showdown. Despite the animosity, they are both interested in a fair fight. Each wants to have won fair and square. Spoiler alert: Donnie Yen totally kicks his ass in the end, decisively. Yu-Sau turns out to be not quite as much an adherent to the martial way as Yen and tries to kill him after Yen shows mercy. The police detective shows up and shows us all that, no matter how much Kung Fu you know, it doesn't make you bulletproof. The fight choreography is pretty great (Donnie Yen was in the <i>Ip Man</i> movies). The dialogue is pretty stiff and the plot is super-predictable, but it's well-made and fun and has good action without a ton of bloody violence. Saw it in Cantonese and Mandarin with English subtitles. Recommended.</div> Chaos Theory (2008) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0460745/">3/10</a> <div>A tightly wound efficiency expert (Ryan Reynolds) has his life turned upside-down by a series of unfortunate coincidences. This movie is proof that Ryan Reynolds can't save everything.<fn> It's pretty painfully bad. It's not terrible, but it's shallow and badly written and doesn't make any good use of anybody. It's got a neat twist in the middle where his wife thinks he's having an affair and has had a child with another woman, but---and here's the twist---after his paternity test, he finds out that he's sterile, so it's his wife who's had a baby with another man. BOOYAH. OK, Ryan Reynolds isn't completely wasted in this movie, but he's been better. These were the doldrums before <i>Deadpool</i>. I would have had a hard time believing that he'd made a worse film than <i>Green Lantern</i> before seeing this movie. I am wiser now. Sarah Chalke as a "home-wrecking bitch" gets an honorable mention. I could easily die without ever seeing Emily Mortimer in a movie again. She's either a lovely person and a great actress or a terrible person and a terrible actress. Subtracted one star each for the two saccharine musical appeals in the last ten minutes, Definitely not recommended.</div> </dl> <hr> <ft>I've been to one or two jazz concerts that went in this direction. What they play isn't even a parody---there really is jazz like that. It's an acquired taste and you have to be in the right mood for it, but it can be interesting.</ft> <ft>I've no idea how possible this actually is nor do I exactly care. It was a well-written scene.</ft> <ft>That detail made me think of Solzhenitsyn's <i>One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich</i>, as I did during <i><a href="{app}view_article.php?id=3254">Cool Hand Luke</a></i>.</ft> <ft>As if we needed more proof than <i><a href="{app}view_article.php?id=2722">The Green Lantern</a></i>.</ft>