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FILM REVIEWS 2006 T thru Z
2006 Films Seen * 2006 Rankings * 2006 Top 10 * Best of 2006 * Worst of 2006

13 (Tzameti) Directed by Géla Babluani 71 out of 100 Shot in sharp black and white like any good film noir should be, 13 (Tzameti), from young Soviet-Georgian-born French provocateur, Géla Babluani, plays like some sort of mixture of Roman Polanski, Jean-Pierre Melville and Kafka. At once melancholy and intense, this is the story of Sébastien, a young Georgian-born French immigrant (played by the filmmaker's younger brother, George) who, through a matter of happenstance, finds himself pretending to be a dead man so he can collect whatever type of "prize money" he knows the man has coming to him. I suppose with that scenario, we could throw Antonioni's The Passenger in with all the other philosophical imaginatives that Babluani has piled on top of one another, such as the aforementioned film noir and a little bit of Sergio Leone and Truffaut to boot. Without giving it all away (though the film's trailer cleary already does so), Sébastien finds himself trapped inside a hellish game of russian roulette where there are 13 participants (tzameti translates as thirteen in the Georgian language) and they are to load one bullet into their guns and stand in a circle pointing their guns at the back of the heads of the men in front of them. Meanwhile rich, perverse men are betting hundreds of thousands of dollars on the outcome. Now we can add The Deer Hunter to that list as well. As the game gets more intense with each successive round (and the bullets become two and then three and then four per gun) the level of excitement grows too - alleviating any previous problems of implausibility one might take away from the film. Shot in sharp black and white as any good film noir should be, 13 (Tzameti) weaves back and forth between Eastern European disconsolation and paranoia and French Nouvelle Vague malaise with a remarkable ease. [09/15/06]

Three Times Directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien 80 out of 100 Wandering through the decades with a formalistic melancholy, Hou Hsiao-hsien's Three Times is a triptych tale of love seen through the eyes of three different couples, set in three different periods, yet played by the same couple - the sublime Shu Qi and the august Chang Chen - in each seperate part. Opening in 1966 Taiwan, the first movement, titled "A Time for Love", is very possibly some of the most gorgeously filmed moments in cinematic history. Plotless for the most part, and filled with the pulchritude of The Platters' "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", this is Hou at his very best. Going slightly downhill form the opening salvo (though this is sort of like saying Welles' Touch of Evil is inferior to Citizen Kane, both great films indeed) Hou proceeds back to 1911 in "A Time for Freedom" and forward to 2005 in "A Time for Youth". Each part following a certain style from Hou's own ouevre (City of Sadness, Flowers of Shanghai and Millennium Mambo respectively), it is perhaps Hou's farewell to his past cinema and a welcoming of an all new Hou Hsiao-hsien. Of course any Hou Hsiao-hsien is a good Hou Hsiao-hsien. [02/21/07]

Tideland Directed by Terry Gilliam 12 out of 100 Before this film starts and just after the lights go down, Terry Gilliam - Monty Python cartoonist-turned-free flowing auteur of the estranged - tells us that many people will hate his film, and many people will love it. One hundred and twenty-two minutes later I would have to plant myself firmly and steadfastly upon the ground of that former group of people. A mess from beginning to end (which seems a lot longer away than two hours should ever seem), Tideland is more of a disaster than Gilliam's failed Don Quixote project - at least that film had the good fortune to have never been allowed to see the light of day. Made even more difficult to swallow with the use of Jeff Bridges - in my opinion, the greatest living actor - although it is his performance, as well as the extremely truncated role given to Jennifer Tilly, that gives the film the slight meaning that it has - before the downward spiral that is its storyline gives way. Toss in a creepy one-eyed wild woman, her mentally retarded brother and Jodelle Ferland as the lead freak (think Dakota Fanning without the great agent) and you have yourself one really really fucked-up movie - and not in the good way that many of Gilliam's past works have felt like. At the beginning of the film, Gilliam tells us he has finally found his voice and it's a twelve year old girl - perhaps he should have waited a while longer and kept searching for that voice of his. [11/20/06]

Twelve and Holding Directed by Michael Cuesta 37 out of 100 Ridiculous and pathetic may be rather strong terms for a film that is essentially not all that bad. The acting - by a mostly child cast - is actually quite good, but that is about as far as this critic is willing to go in praise of what is otherwise a, what did I say, oh yeah, ridiculous and pathetic little film. From the same mind that brought us the, again, well-acted-yet-rather-pathetic arthouse hit L.I.E., a film about child prostitution, comes this little diddy about, among other things, revenge, obesity and reverse pedophilia. No real need explaining such a description since that would only mean rehashing a plot that is somehow both by-the-book and completely mad. Again, the film could have been worth something in the performances alone, but unfortunately it sinks in a mire of bad taste and even worse storytelling. [01/12/07]

The U.S. vs. John Lennon Directed by David Leaf & John Scheinfeld 67 out of 100 Although I was not yet three when The Beatles called it quits (and John Lennon "divorced" Paul McCartney) my first taste - my first memories - of music was that of The Beatles. Thanks to my aunt and uncle who handed down my first 8-tracks (now there is a blast from the past, huh) of "their" music, I grew up listening to Abbey Road and Sgt. Pepper (it may be rather apocryphal on my part, but I honestly believe I remember hearing Hey Jude for the first time as a mere babe). With all that musical "education" as a child, and putting aside the fact that Hey Jude is actually a Paul song, it was inevitable that John Lennon would have a great impact on me as a person or thing or whatever. Of course with all this in mind, it should also be inevitable that nothing new will be learned while watching The U.S. vs. John Lennon, but the nostalgia and wave of emotion that comes with it is surely palpable. Watching Yoko - twenty six years later - still well up with tears when talking of that fateful day is indeed tear-inducing in and of itself. And let us not forget the political what-if that comes along with this story. What if John Lennon had not been gunned down on December 8, 1980? [09/14/07]

Woman is the Future of Man Directed by Hong Sang-soo 56 out of 100 My first look at the man everyone is calling the best young Auteur in the world (the same title with which critics hailed Kiarostami, Hou Hsaio-hsien and Weerasethakul in their burst-on-the-scene days). Beautifully still and technically supurb, yet Hong's newest film (still not released in the US as of January 2005) is merely a pretty looking bore. I can see moments in this film that show a potentially great filmmaker at work, and although rather derivative of Hou's more recent deadpan masterpieces, Hong is a name that is currently held in relatively high regard (maybe I'll like him more after watching his first four films - available only on DVD's in other regions right now - a shame that Americans cannot easily see certain foreign-made films - luckily for me, and my region-free player, I don't have to wait any longer), for someday he may mature into the great filmmaker everyone already says he is. [01/21/06] see also: The 14th Philadelphia Film Festival

World Trade Center Directed by Oliver Stone 36 out of 100 The last thing one expects from the sledghammer arm of Oliver Stone is a subtle recreation of events - pretty much exactly the way they happened - and a legitimate emotional response to said events, yet that is exactly what we get from what is probably Stone's most relentlessly impassioned, yet most articulately manicured film since his sophomore breakthrough, Platoon. Never - and this is saying a considerable amount considering of whom we speak - does Stone needlessly resort to cheap theatrics or over-the-top circus stunts (with the possible exception of the "paid for" announcement finale). Instead Stone plays the subtle card - on a film with huge exploitive potential - like he never has before, and gives us an honest portrayal of that fateful day five years ago. All this from the man who gave us the cartoonish brutality of Natural Born Killers, the homoerotic buffoonery of Alexander and the conspiracy-laden bravurity of JFK. The tragic events of September 11th are now so ingrained in the minds and psyches of America - not just in New York who saw it first hand that day, but also to those in Lawrence, Kansas and Camp Hill, Pennsylvania and Peoria, Illinois - that the potential for exploitation - from both the Republican red states and the Democratic blue states - teeters ever so precariously upon the very precipice of any film with the daring-do to set its sights upon that modern-age day of infamy. Perhaps this does not exactly qualify as great filmmaking, but considering the absurd auteur it hails from, it ain't all that bad after all. [08/03/06]

X-Men: The Last Stand Directed by Brett Ratner 36 out of 100 Although the genre will not allow it, I was hoping for better from this final(?) installment of the Marvel Comics mutant franchise. Growing up on comics (especially Marvel and titles such as The Avengers, Daredevil, The Defenders, Dr. Strange and The X-Men) I did enjoy the first two films (the second being the better, just as it was with Spider-Man) for what they were - a manicured retooling of Stan Lee's mutant outsider superheroes. The third film however - involving what is probably my favourite of all the comic's storylines, The Dark Phoenix - is merely a let down in all respects. Tired and formulaic - which I am sure has a lot to do with the defection of original helmer Bryan Singer to Superman Returns and the subsequent hiring of the much weaker visioned Brett Ratner - this film, which claims to be the last one (although the ending makes way for a fourth film of course), has none of the giddy childhood memeories that the first two had. Even Magneto - my favourite character in both the comics and the movies - and his "real-life" counterpart Ian McKellen seems to be tired of doing the whole shabang. Perhaps it is time Apocalypse comes and ends it all - and the fanboys know just what I mean. [12/03/06]

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