Check out my full article on the film over at Movie Mezzanine.
Showing posts with label Jayne Mansfield. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jayne Mansfield. Show all posts
Saturday, March 16, 2013
The Girl Can't Help It (Frank Tashlin, 1956)
The three Tashlin films I've seen thus far have all been exemplary displays of comedy, their feverish blend of intricate aesthetic craftsmanship and rapid-fire farce a tremendous live-action application of the director's animation background. If The Girl Can't Help It lacks the same level of total perfectionism as Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, that is only because even Tashlin cannot bring the rawness of the emerging rock scene fully under his satiric control. In its own way, that makes this even more exciting, as no other film has ever so perfectly captured the depth of social upheaval rock 'n roll brought to the kind of society Tashlin plays up as stagnant around explosive acts like Fats Domino and Little Richard. In a particularly amusing twist, gangsters past their prime find new vigor in the rock scene, but it is the music, not their criminal pasts, that bring back their menace.
Check out my full article on the film over at Movie Mezzanine.
Check out my full article on the film over at Movie Mezzanine.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Capsule Reviews: A Perfect Getaway, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, Marnie
A Perfect Getaway (David Twohy, 2009)
David Twohy's A Perfect Getaway is a lean, juicy thriller with a twist so good that not even an hour's worth of teasing it saps its effect. "Nothing bad ever happens in Hawaii, right?" says one character during the film's placid opening, though even then his voice betrays doubt, and Twohy's sweeping panoramas of lush forests and beaches communicate remoteness and isolation as much as postcard-ready beauty. Steady long takes let the murmurs of a double murder on a neighboring island sink into the frame visually, casting shadows on its small but dynamic cast of newlyweds and lovers who come to fear for their safety. The actors do their part too, with Steve Zahn's nervously darting eyes suggesting first humorous discomfort, then mounting dread, and Milla Jovovich getting the best opportunity outside one of her husband's films to show off her enigmatic poker face reactions. Perhaps best of all is Timothy Olyphant, almost endearingly arrogant as a "man in full" (as his girlfriend calls him) When the other shoe drops, Twohy's stately, patient direction obviously shifts into a higher gear, but this only shows off other facets of his skill. A chase through the forest is subtly propelled further by comic-panel-like screenwipes that elide over a few steps to give the sequence even more momentum. The final showdown manages to consolidate even the characters' relationships into its tense payoff. (A sidenote: stick with the streamlined theatrical version over the director's cut, which adds most of its extra time to a key flashback, nice and nasty in the original version but overlong in extended form).
David Twohy's A Perfect Getaway is a lean, juicy thriller with a twist so good that not even an hour's worth of teasing it saps its effect. "Nothing bad ever happens in Hawaii, right?" says one character during the film's placid opening, though even then his voice betrays doubt, and Twohy's sweeping panoramas of lush forests and beaches communicate remoteness and isolation as much as postcard-ready beauty. Steady long takes let the murmurs of a double murder on a neighboring island sink into the frame visually, casting shadows on its small but dynamic cast of newlyweds and lovers who come to fear for their safety. The actors do their part too, with Steve Zahn's nervously darting eyes suggesting first humorous discomfort, then mounting dread, and Milla Jovovich getting the best opportunity outside one of her husband's films to show off her enigmatic poker face reactions. Perhaps best of all is Timothy Olyphant, almost endearingly arrogant as a "man in full" (as his girlfriend calls him) When the other shoe drops, Twohy's stately, patient direction obviously shifts into a higher gear, but this only shows off other facets of his skill. A chase through the forest is subtly propelled further by comic-panel-like screenwipes that elide over a few steps to give the sequence even more momentum. The final showdown manages to consolidate even the characters' relationships into its tense payoff. (A sidenote: stick with the streamlined theatrical version over the director's cut, which adds most of its extra time to a key flashback, nice and nasty in the original version but overlong in extended form).
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