Movie Review: Werner Herzog's CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS

In 1994, what is believed to be the oldest known prehistoric cave drawings were discovered in a mountain range in southern France. Hundreds of paintings of animals were catalogued from Chauvet Cave including several extinct species and others that have never been seen in prehistoric art before. Although the age of the paintings is in dispute among scientists, the drawings are believed to be 30,000 years old.


Due to the sensitive nature of the art, the cave is not open to the general public and great care has been insured to preserve the drawings, including the installment of a large thick steel door blocking the entrance to the cave. German filmmaker Werner Herzog (Grizzly Man), received special permission from the French Minister of Culture to enter the cave and film the drawings under strict conditions. He and his crew were allowed only six days of shooting of four hours each. They were not allowed to touch the walls or floor of the cave, (the camera was placed at the end of a long mechanical arm), and they were confined to a two-foot built walkway traversing the paintings.



The culmination of that expedition is revealed in Herzog's new film, Cave of Forgotten Dreams, a 90 minute film shot with 3-D cameras that record much of the artwork. The 3-D technology is used to magnify the contour and delicacy of the art and successfully brings depth and life to the paintings. Shadows in the cave cast an eerie wavering effect on the pictures as if the play of shadow and light were of the artist's intent. Multiple images of wild horses aligned with one another gives the illusion of the horses running when a light is cast upon them.



As magnificent as it is to view the paintings in the ideal conditions of a dark movie house, Herzog's film is a bit menial in scope for the cinematic movie screen. It's singular photographic effect would be better served on television. Cable TV's The History Channel co-produced the production.



It's also a bit preachy. Serving as philosophical narrative, Herzog, his crew, and several archaeologists and scientists offer their reactions to the paintings, which sometimes disturb the sedate nature of the art. Ideally, one wishes to bask in the pictures with the advantage of Herzog's 3-D technology and ponder one's own historical, spiritual, and philosophical thoughts without a thunderous musical score and idle, maybe even pompous chatter.



It is what the camera does not show where the film leaves its deepest impression. Much of the ancient art and evidence of human activity is unreachable and could not be filmed, and one is struck with wonder as Herzog points to an area of the cave, not captured on camera, where a boy's footprint, possibly the most ancient footprint ever documented, had been found next to the paw print of a wolf. Herzog poses the question, were the boy and wolf walking together, or was the wolf chasing the boy? We will never know.



Herzog's film sheds light on the magnificent etchings of ancient man found in Chauvet Cave. It is the next best thing to being there. Very soon The History Channel will likely be bringing these deeply moving images to the comfort of your own home.





this review was first published by the author at blogcritics.org.

MOVIE REVIEW: Jane Eyre (2011)

The new movie version of Jane Eyre, directed by Cary Fukunaga, is the equivalent of a Reader's Digest condensed novel. All the elements of the story are evident but the writer's pace, breadth, and strategy are whisked away, reducing Bronte's proto-feminist literary work to melodramatic romance in a spooky mansion.

It would have made a splendid four-hour BBC mini-series with time to breathe like a fine wine, with its genuinely chilly England in the 19th Century atmosphere, and a broad if not probing view of class and sexual discrimination. The lovely on-location scenes from the often handheld camera gives the film a fluidity of movement, absorbing the stuffiness from a classic Gothic love story set in the lush English countryside. The supporting cast is as fine as Masterpiece Theatre can provide and the story remains riveting. At a roughly two-hour running time though, key plot elements and character motivation are sacrificed to the beating hearts of a plain, sex-hungry virgin and an older been-around guy beast.

Jane Eyre, the grand-mommy of Gothic romance, tells the story of an orphaned English girl suffering a loveless childhood under the rule of abusive relatives and a cruel school for poor girls. In preparation for a life in servitude to the upper class, the intelligent Jane savors the independence of adulthood.

She gains employment as governess to a French ward at Thornfield Manor, a spooky country estate governed by the mysterious and wealthy Mr. Rochester. Despite their difference in social status, chemistry clicks and this odd couple fall in love. For Jane, it would be Gothic romance heaven, if it weren't for a scary madwoman roaming the mansion at night, (the Gothic element), and Rochester's flirtation with the feminine elite, (the romantic conflict).

Mia Wasikowska is a quirky Jane with the high headiness the character seems to have been born with. Her few kind adult mentors during childhood are not included in this version, making her empowered feminist stance seeming to spring from nowhere. Demure and humble, she lacks a depth of character and there is a rush to capitalize on social independence in sparring matches with Rochester. Wasikowska's performance is nonetheless effective and the fault lies with the novel's narrative being unrealized.

In the book, Rochester is described as a brooding ugly man possessing a pronounced sexual allure. The dashing Michael Fassbender certainly doesn't look the part, but broods well, and again, establishes a rush to identity to curtail the novel's lengthy passages. He hides a dark secret conveyed through facial worry lines, piercing glances, and an unsettling carefree behavior.

Dame Judi Dench manages to duck our from under her royal celebrity crown and offer a believable portrayal of the lowly and kindly housekeeper, Mrs. Fairfax. There is also a wonderful and brief performance from Tamzin Merchant as one-third of a trio of siblings who save Jane from certain death on the English moors.

This is a fine movie, falling just short of tapping into the excitement of the novel. As a final example, a memorable moment of the book, Jane's confrontation with the "ghost" of Thornfield Manor, is omitted from this version. Its inclusion would have added a needed element of suspense to the highly charged emotional atmosphere and would have helped make more of Bronte's purpose come through.

this review was first published by the author at blogcritics.org

Jimmy Webb at The Tralf, January 22, 2011

On a frigid snowy night in Buffalo, New York, songwriting legend Jimmy Webb strolled onto the stage of The Tralf Music Hall, before an unpacked house of about 200, looking as anonymous as a Neil Diamond cover artist. He sat down at his grand piano and played "The Highwayman", his composition made famous by country super-group The Highwaymen; Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, and Kris Kristofferson.

And that reminds him of a funny story. It's the one about Waylon Jennings strolling off the set of the Dinah Shore show, (Dinah!), in the 1970s. While taping the show with The Highwaymen and Webb, Waylon kept wandering off camera interacting with his fellow musicians while playing his guitar, much to the dismay of the camera crew who told him to keep still. Being the free spirited outlaw he is, Jennings eventually wandered off camera, off stage, and right out of the building while the band played on.

The night was filled with as many stories as music. My favorite was of a drunken night in a London pub with the late Harry Nilsson. In a slip tongued stupor Nilsson said to Webb, "Do you know what's wrong with your music?". Webb said, "What?". Harry said, "It stinks.".

It seemed Webb felt the need to fill the night with the imagery of celebrities more luminous than himself. An anecdotal story with a famous name, Frank Sinatra, Richard Nixon, and Linda Rondstat to name a few, followed nearly every song. A member of the elite class of songwriters who rose to fame within that perimeter, (Burt Bacharac is another), Webb has been recording and performing his own music since 1970.

His list of songwriting credits is astounding; Wichita Lineman, Galveston, By The Time I Get To Phoenix, MacArthur Park, and countless others including the movie score for the excellent Robert Redford western, "Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here".

Big fat snowflakes could be seen piling up outside the window as Webb warmed the room like a ski lodge fireplace with a 90 minute set that found him in strong voice, (although his singing is not his strength), and fanciful strides on the piano. "Wichita Lineman" stirred the pot of nostalgic A.M. radio gold, a slow and almost religious interpretation, and "All I Know", a hit for Art Garfunkel in 1973, was faintly recognizable as a Christian hymnal, a source Webb gains much of his inspiration from.


Perhaps the most musical moments of the evening came when Webb concluded a song with an improvised soft staccato on the piano, so quiet you could hear the snowflakes dropping. It was a fitting personal signature to the song, and indeed to a wonderful career.

THE NOISE

I was online Thursday night
I was ebay and out of sight
and I thought I might
see if Broadcast was all right

so I hung out at their dormant blog

the next day they whistled in my ear
iPod, dear
and their dormant blog

I'll have to pay
to broadcast in my ear
I hate you iTunes
speak to me in my dream machine
have you ever seen Medium
i can't get through 20 minutes of that program

and I'll be goddamned if I'm not cursed
even though she's got it worse
in a chat room written by some jerk
Trish Keenan died at 9 AM this morning.

don't roll over, make some noise
don't roll over, make some noise
don't roll over, make some noise

YouTube - Broadcast - Come On Let's Go

TRUE GRIT (2010)

Truer to the original novel by Charles Portis than the 1969 movie starring John Wayne, the new TRUE GRIT is a smaller film in scope. In the original film directed by Henry Hathaway, the big western sky and rolling horizon were a mighty backdrop to the simple story of a young girl on a quest to avenge the murder of her father. With aging beloved John Wayne in the saddle, that film projected a sunny, big country shine as wide as Wayne's ten gallon cowboy hat.

Directors Joel and Ethan Coen trust the big sky hangs overhead and are more concerned with the shadows cast by a small group of people traversing a vast and lonely Indian territory. The camera angles are at eye level here as if the point of view is over the shoulder of characters saying, "you're on your own, partner.". The new country is dark and cold, not sprawling and inviting, guided by human endeavor and what brilliant light there is comes only from the aspirations of the characters.

In the film, fourteen year-old Mattie Ross, (Hailee Seinfeld) arrives in town to claim the body of her murdered father, and hire a gunslinger to kill the culprit, Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), who killed her dad. Wrangling and bargaining as if buying a cow, she chooses aging drunken Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), to track and bring Chaney to justice. Rooster's killing decree is legendary and he'll do it for fifty bucks.

Or so he says. He swipes the fifty bucks, buys her a ticket home, leaves her a note, and hightails it out of town on the trail of a bigger bounty reward for the capture of Chaney. He forms a two-man posse with Texas Ranger La Boeuf, (Matt Damon), also on the trail of Chaney for the killing of a Texan.

But hold on, cowboys. The little lass has got bees in her britches and doesn't take kindly to being left behind. She soon gallops up from behind to join the posse. In traditional western style, the three searchers ride off into a bleak and snowy sunset in search of justice and reward.

And so goes TRUE GRIT, an allegorical western in which the search is a near desperate attempt to connect with humankind. Young Mattie will bargain her dying breath to avenge her father's murder and the two gunmen discover motivation in themselves beyond cash and dutiful reward.

Directors Joel and Ethan Coen, masters of several dark and cynical films, (Fargo, No Country For Old Men), have allowed this film to run free of their cutting edge input, leaving it indebted to the original novel and western genre. At times brutally violent, as you can expect from a modern western, it is often profoundly emotional with a heartening decency we haven't seen from these directors before.

Jeff Bridges as one-eyed Rooster Cogburn is skillfull in recreating a beloved character so recognizable as belonging to John Wayne, (Wayne won his only Oscar for the role). With a steely-eyed smirk, drunken sensibility and rattlesnake reaction to gun play, this wilder and more introspective Rooster Cogburn shakes the boots off any preconceived cowboy.

But beyond Bridges and the entire casts wonderful performances, it is the Coen Brothers' grasp of Americana virtues and violence that make this film memorable and even haunting. I entertained a gulp in my throat as the movie rode into its final sunset.


this article was first published at http://blogcritics.org/video/article/movie-review-true-grit-2010/

STREET PLAYER, My Chicago Story, Danny Seraphine

As told by founding member, drummer Danny Seraphine, this autobiography about the formation, rise and decline of the rock band, Chicago is a comprehensive, if narrowly recalled history of this band. Given Chicago's publicly elusive identity, any history of this brass and guitar ensemble should be enough for an engaging rock and roll read.

Seraphine holds several gripes with the band, not the least of which is his firing from Chicago in 1990, and this odd-man-out point of view, (he eventually finds himself hermit-like in the Colorado wilderness literally contemplating life), leaves the book a little slanted in perspective and just short of trusting, even as you anxiously hang onto his simple and sometimes eloquent prose.

With an outgoing Italian-bred excitement, Seraphine's book is like a cross between a juvenile teen novel championing street gangs and petty crime, and a confessional rock and roll expose. His reconstruction of the Chicago timeline is told with all the enthusiasm of a teen-ager hot-wiring his first car.

Yet one feels slighted by recollection of events that are given the once over by Seraphine's 'kid from Chicago' narrative. I have a difficult time believing he was fired from the band because his playing was inadequate. Surely the band would cite otherwise.

Their debut album from 1969, "Chicago Transit Authority" (their original name) is a slick and perfect pop album (one of my favorites), steeped in shiny production and jazz influenced innovative arrangements, and Seraphine's hurried recollection implies the band simply went into a recording studio and put it to wax. That no mention is made of the brilliant percussive finale to the song, "Beginnings" by this drummer-writer, while the song itself is briefly mentioned, suggests a team of producers and a whole lot of money lie unaccredited.

This and other glossed over incidents make Seraphine's passive mob connections, (he insists they are just friends from Chicago - two of them were found shot through the head in a cornfield), all the more genuine.

Yet the book sparkles with interest in other venues. Encounters with Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and other rock and roll icons are incidental brushes with life that go believed. We'll take his word that he called Janis Joplin a bitch to her face after a bitter exchange, and trust him when he tells us it was his good buddy, and not himself who spent an intimate night with her. He may be pulling our chain informing us his buddy had claw marks down his back the following morning.

The sad death of Chicago founding member Terry Kath, (guitarist and memorable lead vocal on "Make Me Smile" and "Colour My World"), a presumed suicide (or not) in 1978, is a heart breaker and serves as a driving force to Seraphine's rags to riches, (and back to semi-precious rags) story.

His identifying himself as an absent father is commendable, and his gentle plea to reconcile with Chicago at the end of the book is cloying.

Still despite reservation, I can't help but like author Danny Seraphine. My grandmother also made killer lasagna. It's enough to believe that he believes everything he says.

the paper days

My Angie Baby song list seemed like a good idea at the time... it was momentarily cosmic ... I came home from work and had no heat, no water, no gas, and my living space was drenched from the dead hot water tank. indeed it was making a strange growling sound I chose to ignore. sounds of the house at night are getting fierce, I said. rehearsal in an hour. favorite books were a mash of soggy ink and pulp ... (quote) "soon the (x) will be gone and we'll get on with this thing called life",... i've never had a rehearsal schedule that has lasted more than 24 hours. As soon as I got the schedule I scheduled all my remaining vacation days at work to coincide with the theatre schedule ... not bingo ... I am working with the finest group of actors I've ever seen assembled. I am acting as if I've never spoken aloud before ... a cocktail rocky horror in pink tights with my ability to delve into simple minds I am not, ... you. you hacked into my computer to dig some dirt up and I've bored you to death. ... true story! but years old - i'm going, going, gone ...