Crash Love

by Courtney Hilden

Although I might be later embarrassed to admit this, I am an A.F.I. fan. I first became aware of them when they were mostly a punk band, and I liked the supernatural melodrama of their album The Art of Drowning, which struck me as a perfect soundtrack to shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Later on, when they released their Sing the Sorrow, I was impressed by the breath of influences (80s neoromantics, metal, punk, goth, pop) and their lyrical content, which focused on the same apocalyptic themes but with more imagery. In songwriting, it is so easy to tell listeners; it is so much harder to show them. Then Decemberunderground came out, and I was so disappointed by the B-side-esque quality of the most of the music, I was simply to afraid to try their next album, Crash Love. If it was bad, it would break my heart, because then it meant that A.F.I. was no longer the band I had loved. So I put off listening to it, even though I purchased it in late 2009.
What a mistake putting that off was.
Crash Love is not a perfect album, but it would be hard for anyone to beat out Sing the Sorrow. Crash Love is still wonderful, and breaks new ground lyrically for A.F.I. The album's lyrics are mostly centered around a souring relationship, which, considering the focus of some of their earlier work, is both new ground for them and old hat for most bands, which usually focus their work of this exact subject. What makes A.F.I.'s take on the subject interesting is how unrelentingly and unembarrassingly messed up and melodramatic this whole unraveling relationship is. Several of the songs, like "Beautiful Thieves" talk about committing crimes together, in a way that strangely conjures up Bonnie and Clyde, if they were modern criminals who shopped at Hot Topic. Many of the songs discuss pretending within the relationship, like in "Veronica Sawyer Smokes" mentions "feigning falling" and "Okay I Feel Better Now" where the singer admits "faking for you." The song "Too Shy to Scream" prophetically works through the breakup, noting that the other person will not even pause their life after ending a relationship, just simply move on. Hughes films are even referenced in "Veronica Sawyer Smokes."
The song that is actually the most interesting (and perhaps the most lyrically impressive) is "Sacrilege." It is the only song that is not obviously about a deteriorating relationship. Instead, it appears to be a critique of religion from an atheist point of view. It brings up multiple aspects of religion, calling it obsolete, filled with "hysteric fairy tales" and "one big joke." It twists and flips religious imagery and phrases in clever ways. "Say your prayers, they're the final punchline./I don't see the love/below or above," Havok sings. "Please believe I'm doing just fine." Given that so much of A.F.I.'s previous music has referenced apocalypses and religious imagery, this song is particularly interesting and sheds a new light on their older work.
The album is a perfect distillation of the power punk pop that A.F.I. is so famous for. There is something invigorating about the overall sound of the album, and unlike most pop out there, the songs deal in uncommon ways with love, and in the case of one song, critiques religion in an impressively passionate way.

Two Essays on The Wizard of Oz

by Courtney Hilden

Salman Rushdie, the author of books such as The Satanic Verses, writes about The Wizard of Oz, the movie that everyone loves in two short essays "A Short Text About Magic" and "At the Auction of the Ruby Slippers" in a short book called, naturally, The Wizard of Oz.
"A Short Text About Magic" explores the world of The Wizard of Oz comparing it, interestingly enough, with Bollywood films, with Rushdie, an Indian native, is familiar with.
Rushdie also gives the audience some fine trivia as part of his essay. He discusses the differences between the movie and book, including the ruby slippers originally being silver shoes. He discusses the story of the actors and actresses who played the Munchkins. He even tells the audience about how the tornado that transports Dorothy to Oz was made. (Muslin stiffened with wire, naturally.) The one detail he wishes the movie hadn't changed was the realism of Oz itself, explaining that within the original book, there was no question that Oz was a real place, but in the movie, it is simply make-believe. Rushdie believes this introduces "bad faith" into the audience, and is a pity that it did so. Rushdie here ignores the way most viewers construct the film: they ignore the suggestion it was all a dream and see it as a place that exists beyond what most humans can see, like other mythical places in modern literature, notably Hogwarts or Alice's Wonderland.
Rushdie also explores the women of the film, concentrating much of his time comparing the witches of the story. He notes that the Witch of the East (the one who dies in the beginning of the movie) was probably not much of a despot, since the streets were clean and homes well taken care of and that she didn't rely on soldiers of any kind to keep her world safe.
"At the Auction of the Ruby Slippers" is less an essay in the traditional sense and more a (possibly fictional) exploration of what the ruby slippers mean to an unnamed narrator. Rushdie is famously part of the magical realism movement within fiction, and this story/essay/whatever is not different, moving through with a dreamlike pace and tone. There are lots of details, but they feel random, as if plucked from a generator.
Both pieces feel strangely nice together in this tiny little package. It was a dream reading both of these essays, and both complement and contain the magic of their subject.

Is Salt a Feminist Movie?

A review of Salt.
by Courtney Hilden
Spoiler Alert!: Part of this plot, though not the final twist, is given away in this review.  

There was a lot of talk on blogs and forums on the Internet about Salt, a movie starring Angelina Jolie.  Before the movie came out, there was a lot of enthusiasm over how the movie was originally written with a male main character, but once Jolie became interested in the project, the gender was changed to reflect their star's.  Feminists celebrated this as a moment where gender didn't determine the casting of an actor.  After the movie came out, the movie was given mixed reviews, discussing it as a fun and well-made popcorn movie, but complaining it was not especially deep.  But it must have captured someone's attention, as it managed to make $70.8 million in ten days. 
But after the movie came out, there was not much of a discussion about if the film was feminist in and of itself.  And, given that other reviews have already dissected so much of the other aspects of the film, it seems important to talk about how this movie, being the only film I can think of where the gender of its main character was purposeless changed, about how gender operates in the movie
First and foremost, it was a relief to see Jolie not play up her sexiness or body.  She wore frumpy work clothes that looked unflattering and unfashionable.  She had a miserably bad haircut throughout the beginning of the movie, her blond locks looking like a bad dye job.  (While her character's actually dye job looked utterly normal on her, the kind of hair someone who only washes it every other day looks.)  Considering Jolie is the woman who, about ten years ago, played Lara Croft, where, because she apparently was not what the directors and producers wanted, had to wear fake breasts.  In a world where one of the most beloved film stars has an imperfect body, you know the standards are far too high.  It almost felt like Salt was purposeless not more than just a woman with a government job.  It was nice to have a heroine who was relatively ordinary.
But the plot's reliance on Salt's dedication to her husband is troublesome.  Early on in the film, Salt's husband, Mike, is taken by Orlov's group.  After he is killed by Orlov's men, it becomes Salt's apparent motivation, leading her to follow enough of Orlov's plan to dismantle it.  (I say apparent motivation here because it is possible that other things are motivating her, but her husband's murder is the only clear force propelling her.)  Salt's dedication is admirable, but it's troublesome that her only motivation throughout the movie is her love for her husband.  If this movie really had been about a man, it is hard to believe that it would follow this same plot.  A male character in those circumstances would have other things motivating him.
It is also important to note the lack of female character, beyond Salt.  All the other characters are male, and apparently, other than Salt, everyone important at the CIA is male.  Although women have historically struggled with jobs in the CIA, they do exist.  The complete lack of other female characters within the story just serves to remind the audience that even if the main character's gender was changed, that it was because one of the biggest stars in the world became attached to the project, not because it was a moment to make a statement about gender and characters in the movies.  And of all the things about this movie, from the ludicrous chase scenes and the McGuyver moments and the unbelievable idea that Russia has trained children to eventually bring down the U.S., that indifference to gender within the story is the most disappointing. 

She's the Man

by Courtney Hilden



She's the Man follows around high schooler and high society girl Violet (the charming Amanda Bynes) as she impersonates her twin brother Sebastian at his new school to prove to her former high school soccer coach and captain that girls can play soccer as well as boys. While at her/his new school, she befriends Duke (Channing Tatum) and Olivia (Laura Ramsey). Olivia falls in love with Sebastian and Duke falls for Violet at a carnival. Violet pretending to be Sebastian must make win the big game aganist her old school and navigate relationships and she pretends to be two different people. The plot is obviously a modern remake of Shakespeare's Twelve Night, similar to 10 Things I Hate About You.
Bynes gives another winning performance. She has wonderful facial expressions and uses her body to give a Chaplin-like performance. She manages to play an awkward but well-meaning young man, and blends in relatively well.
Unsurprisingly, everything ties up neat in the end, just as most of Shakespeare's comedies do. It's too bad that even the remake is unable to address the issues of identity and sexuality that the film does it's best to avoid.

My Sister's Keeper

by Courtney Hilden

Spoiler Alert!: The ending is given away in this review.

My Sister's Keeper is about a young girl named Anna (Abigail Breslin) who decides to persue medical emancipation from her parents so that they won't use her body to help save her older sister, Kate (Sofia Vassilieva) who is dying from cancer.
Obviously, this is a weepie movie, and only someone with a heart of stone could watch this and not feel anything for this family, which struggles not only with death but with neglect. The characters also seem far more kind and calm than anyone could reasonably expect them to be, given the circumstances.
Parts of the movie are poorly concieved. For instance, the early part of the film allows each character a monologue, and after the second one they start to feel like the screenwriter is incapable of more subltly and creatively introducting its characters. The movie also moves around in time, but because there are few points of reference, it's hard to tell where the narrative is at times, highlighting how contrived much of the action.
What is most disappointing in this movie is the attempt at romance. As Kate begins chemotherapy, she meets another cancer patient, Taylor (Thomas Dekker), and they fall in love. After Taylor dies, Kate apparently loses all the will to live, because her next move in the story is to facilitate her own death by manipulating her sister to manipulate her brother to manipulate her Mom. After all her fighting to stay alive, a boy she barely knows becomes the factor that determines how she lives or not? This is either incredibly poor motivation or a reminder of how pathetic heterosexual girls become within our society.

A Little Bit of Feel-Good

A review of I Could Have Been Your Cellmate
by Courtney Hilden

Mo'Nique's I Could Have Been Your Cellmate is two smaller films in one: a stand-up performance and a documentary on a women's correctional facility in Ohio.
As uninformed as most Americans probably are about correctional facilities, they’re probably even less informed about those facilities for women. At this particularly facility, “the Farm,” over 80 percent of the prisoners have suffered from some kind of abuse. A large majority of women prisoners are mothers.
The most powerful part of the documentary are her interviews with the women. The women all look incredibly normal, not like, say the women in Lady Gaga’s “Telephone” music video. One of the prisoners Mo’Nique talks to looks like an-about-to-retire Grandma. A fair amount of the women have very positive attitudes about their incarceration, saying that they have jobs or are taking classes in an effort to improve themselves.
Mo’Nique herself obviously believe in rehabilitation for prisoners, which is part of the reason she filmed this documentary and comedy show. She herself explains that they deserve “A Little Bit of feel-good.” She even admires them, because they’re still standing. Even if you don't like Mo’Nique, but seeing her here as a caring, respectful, kind observer of prison life will make you respect her in turn.
I also ended up learning more about her. For example, I had no idea that Mo’Nique was a mother or that she had been abused by her first husband. Upon further research, I discovered that her own brother abused her and was later sentenced to jail. This detail gives the documentary an extra oomp, since, as she keeps saying in her standup performance, “could have been your cellmate.” And maybe that’s the most interesting thing about Mo’Nique: she sees the prisoners and her as more similar than different. Her comedy is about uniting people in humor, not isolating them into groups.
She discusses a lot about sexuality. There were little hints of it in the beginning, mentioning the race problems within the prison and the belief that female prisoners are lesbians. She riffs entirely on the idea of anal sex, saying that she respects and pities gay men. She then criticizes those who use the Bible to defend or reject homosexuality, saying that it’s about what they think, not what the Bible says. “I don’t feel like you have to turn to the Bible…for all of your righteousness,” she explains.

The only thing odd about the film was it's structure. In the beginning, Monique interviews several prisoners. Then they cut to her standup performance at the prison. Then, at the end of the film, they go back to interviews and shots of her seeing other parts of the facility. Why it's structured this way is never clear, and it feels incoherent.
Mo’Nique is always fun to watch, especially where she wears an orange-jumpsuit designed dress. What makes this comedy special different is that, as an audience member, you can tell that Mo’Nique was working to make a cathartic experience for these female prisoners. It’s hard not to admire that desire.

Possession

by Courtney Hilden
Spoiler Alert: The ending of the movie is given away in this review.

If you had been following the drama over the release of Possession, you might have gotten the idea that the movie was terrible, since no one wanted to release it, spending several years finished by unavailable, even though it stars Sarah Michelle Gellar and Lee Pace, both respected, though not overly-loved, actors. You’d be wrong.
The movie is about Jess, a newlywed, played by Gellar. Her husband, Ryan (Michael Landes), has a ne’er-do-well brother, Roman, played by Pace. Roman’s been in and out of jail, dresses like a punk, and abuses his girlfriend. While on parole and living at Jess and Ryan’s home, Roman suddenly leaves. Ryan chases after him, and the two get in a crash, dramatically enough on the Golden Gate Bridge, both falling into comas. When the body of Roman awakes, he claims instead to be Ryan. Jess is forced to consider that either her husband’s spirit is inside Roman or that Roman is playing her. Much of the drama, subtly but well-executed by Gellar and Pace, revolves around who really woke up.

To be fair, Possession doesn’t break much new ground until the end. It’s a stylish thriller a la Seven or Playing God. The cinematography is beautiful and smartly lets the lovely Northwest scenery do much of the work. The blues used in some scenes is well done, and it looks like an expensive, Duchovny and Anderson-less version of The X-Files.
Both Gellar and Pace give terrific performances. Given this and their other work, they really both deserve to be bigger stars. The movie was shot with two different endings, so both of them had to do more than just play one set of motivations: they had to play two.
The movie seductively allows the audience to fall in love with Pace’s character, who, up until the end, it is unclear if he is Roman or Ryan.
The ending is a well-won pay off. Roman turns out to be exactly who Jess fears he is, and he turns violent. Pace is better known for his lovable romantics, but is just as good at playing someone evil and manipulative. Jess’s creepy and deluded belief that her husband will wake up leaves the audience wondering if Jess was so easy to fool because her connection to reality was tedious at best.
There’s also that alternative ending that leaves us with more questions than answers. Jess decides that Roman really is lying and is not Ryan. She decides not to say anything, and goes about treating him as if he is her husband. We’re left to wonder what her motivations are. Does she love Roman? Is it really Roman if he’s pretending to be Ryan? Does she believe he has changed into a “good” person, and is worthy of loving? Is she just desperate, even for someone that is lying to her? Is she afraid of him, since he has a violent past? The ambiguity is delightful. It is this that really makes the movie more than just a thriller: it makes it the sort of movie you think about well after you’ve watched it.