The Good Shepherd
The Good Shepherd was hailed by one critic as “The Godfather of CIA movies" but it is hardly that. One might get that impression because it is directed by Robert De Niro, and produced by Francis Ford Coppola; but De Niro is not the talented director that Coppola is, even though one can see how De Niro goes to imitate Coppola “Godfather” style of shots and editing.
If 2001’s Spy Game moved too fast, The Good Shepherd moves too slow. The story is told in flashback, but I see no particular benefit from this approach; it just confuses the viewer. I think some filmmakers confuse a lack of clarity with subtlety.
The general impression that is left to me is that this is the history of the CIA as filtered through the lens of Hollywood liberalism.
One scene in particular is demonstrative of this: a defector is trying to prove himself, and in a drug-induced haze tells his interrogator that the Russian threat is just a sham, an excuse for the military-industrial complex to perpetuate itself, which sounds a lot to me like the defector was channeling Noam Chomsky by way of screenwriter Eric Roth (Roth co-wrote last year’s Munich, which apparently suffered from a similar questionability of accuracy, a questionability which was able to be overlooked because Spielberg is a much better director than De Niro).
However, the scene is also useful in concretizing a question that is most relevant amid the U.S. government’s current “war on terror”: is it really justifiable, in the pursuit of some ephemeral thing called “national security”, to use the same means as our enemies? To lie, cheat, steal, murder, and torture? To drive a man to insanity in the name of ascertaining his veracity as an asset? It occurred to me that the more you steep yourself in secrets and lies, the less you are able to ascertain the truth, and people in the espionage business, if they ever started out with any idealism, don’t realize this until it’s too late.
Matt Damon and William Hurt are both competant in the roles, as in De Niro in a bit part.
But Angelina Jolie has such a throughly modern personality that although the pain she shows in character is convincing, her presence feels out of date.
Why do “right-wing”government agents always have smirks? I’ll grant you that there are those types, and maybe radical Leftists are simply more humourless, but it feels like caricature, rather than authenticity.
High Tension
I had noticed this film advertised a few years ago, and I had always wanted to see it.
I got the impression it was about two young women escaping and combatting a maniac killer who was after them, and I was expecting a story about courage and loyalty between friends in the midst of horrendous events. There are some ways in which the film could have been about that, but by the end of the story, it becomes clear that the filmmakers never had anything more in mind than a disgusting, frightful slasher film. And the ending they think is so “clever” is not clever at all, despite purported “clues”; the meaning of certain scenes is left begging if their scenario is to be believed.
I saw the unrated French-language version, which included more graphic violence than the R-rated version. The film disturbed and unsettled me. If I had seen the R version it would have been perhaps less so. It’s not that I haven’t seen violence as graphic as this before, but I’ve seen it in R-rated action films, never horror films, and this makes me think that the tone of violence contributes more to the MPAA board slapping films with an “NC-17” rating than the actual violent act.
The only other horror film I’ve actually chosen to see before was 2001’s The Ring (and its sequel, which was not as scary) a far better film, equally disturbing, but not digusting, repulsive, or repellent, and that is because The Ring relies more on the manipulation of mood than a reliance on gore to achieve its effect. Although that’s not a reccomendation on my part to watch The Ring either…
My problem with horror films, why I find them so disturbing, is not the violence per se, but the tone, which inevitably is about the triumph of evil. While evil doesn’t exactly triumph in the end here, it enjoys a considerably greater success than the good.
I’m aghast that people actually consider this film a form of “entertainment”, when I find that it put a burden on my mind and spirit.
I had a feeling it might be like it was, I should have payed attention…
La Veuve de Saint-Pierre
The night before, however, I was treated to “The Widow of Saint-Pierre”, with Juliette Binoche, a film which I thoroughly enjoyed, but which I cannot discuss at length lest I spoil the ending.
As an aside, there are lengthy interviews in the extras section of the DVD, a feature much appreciated. Many DVD extras are simply “making-of” advertisements produced by the studio for marketing purposes while the film is being made and then stuck on the DVD for the same purpose, and primarily consist of the cast and crew saying how everyone on the set was like a family, everyone was so talented, and they all cried at the wrap party, etc., and these interviews are not so much like that, although there is the (obligatory) compliments about one's colleagues.
One can tell from his comments that director Patrice Leconte is a competant director, because he uses his intuition, not gimmicky visual tricks or a theoretical aesthetic.
Especially interesting in the interview with director Emir Kusturica, which led me to discover these very perceptive comments of his on his IMDB page:
I am finished with cities. I spent four years in New York, 10 in Paris, and I was in Belgrade for a while. To me now they are just airports. Cities are humiliating places to live, particularly in this part of the world.
In Serbia a lot of people hate me because they want to westernise, not understanding that the western world is bipolar, with very good things and very bad things. Since they don't have experience of the west, they even believe that western shit is pie.
What you have now is a Hollywood that is pure poison. Hollywood was a central place in the history of art in the 20th century: it was human idealism preserved. And then, like any great place, it collapsed, and it collapsed into the most awful machinery in the world. Why don't I see a Frank Capra today? Because people aren't like this anymore? People haven't changed that much in 60 years.
My purpose is to make a movie to make you warm. To give you some heat. Now, this rational world has become a place where only what is cool is good. Do you cut the movie on the basis of the beat of modernity or the basis of the beat of your own heart?
If 2001’s Spy Game moved too fast, The Good Shepherd moves too slow. The story is told in flashback, but I see no particular benefit from this approach; it just confuses the viewer. I think some filmmakers confuse a lack of clarity with subtlety.
The general impression that is left to me is that this is the history of the CIA as filtered through the lens of Hollywood liberalism.
One scene in particular is demonstrative of this: a defector is trying to prove himself, and in a drug-induced haze tells his interrogator that the Russian threat is just a sham, an excuse for the military-industrial complex to perpetuate itself, which sounds a lot to me like the defector was channeling Noam Chomsky by way of screenwriter Eric Roth (Roth co-wrote last year’s Munich, which apparently suffered from a similar questionability of accuracy, a questionability which was able to be overlooked because Spielberg is a much better director than De Niro).
However, the scene is also useful in concretizing a question that is most relevant amid the U.S. government’s current “war on terror”: is it really justifiable, in the pursuit of some ephemeral thing called “national security”, to use the same means as our enemies? To lie, cheat, steal, murder, and torture? To drive a man to insanity in the name of ascertaining his veracity as an asset? It occurred to me that the more you steep yourself in secrets and lies, the less you are able to ascertain the truth, and people in the espionage business, if they ever started out with any idealism, don’t realize this until it’s too late.
Matt Damon and William Hurt are both competant in the roles, as in De Niro in a bit part.
But Angelina Jolie has such a throughly modern personality that although the pain she shows in character is convincing, her presence feels out of date.
Why do “right-wing”government agents always have smirks? I’ll grant you that there are those types, and maybe radical Leftists are simply more humourless, but it feels like caricature, rather than authenticity.
High Tension
I had noticed this film advertised a few years ago, and I had always wanted to see it.
I got the impression it was about two young women escaping and combatting a maniac killer who was after them, and I was expecting a story about courage and loyalty between friends in the midst of horrendous events. There are some ways in which the film could have been about that, but by the end of the story, it becomes clear that the filmmakers never had anything more in mind than a disgusting, frightful slasher film. And the ending they think is so “clever” is not clever at all, despite purported “clues”; the meaning of certain scenes is left begging if their scenario is to be believed.
I saw the unrated French-language version, which included more graphic violence than the R-rated version. The film disturbed and unsettled me. If I had seen the R version it would have been perhaps less so. It’s not that I haven’t seen violence as graphic as this before, but I’ve seen it in R-rated action films, never horror films, and this makes me think that the tone of violence contributes more to the MPAA board slapping films with an “NC-17” rating than the actual violent act.
The only other horror film I’ve actually chosen to see before was 2001’s The Ring (and its sequel, which was not as scary) a far better film, equally disturbing, but not digusting, repulsive, or repellent, and that is because The Ring relies more on the manipulation of mood than a reliance on gore to achieve its effect. Although that’s not a reccomendation on my part to watch The Ring either…
My problem with horror films, why I find them so disturbing, is not the violence per se, but the tone, which inevitably is about the triumph of evil. While evil doesn’t exactly triumph in the end here, it enjoys a considerably greater success than the good.
I’m aghast that people actually consider this film a form of “entertainment”, when I find that it put a burden on my mind and spirit.
I had a feeling it might be like it was, I should have payed attention…
La Veuve de Saint-Pierre
The night before, however, I was treated to “The Widow of Saint-Pierre”, with Juliette Binoche, a film which I thoroughly enjoyed, but which I cannot discuss at length lest I spoil the ending.
As an aside, there are lengthy interviews in the extras section of the DVD, a feature much appreciated. Many DVD extras are simply “making-of” advertisements produced by the studio for marketing purposes while the film is being made and then stuck on the DVD for the same purpose, and primarily consist of the cast and crew saying how everyone on the set was like a family, everyone was so talented, and they all cried at the wrap party, etc., and these interviews are not so much like that, although there is the (obligatory) compliments about one's colleagues.
One can tell from his comments that director Patrice Leconte is a competant director, because he uses his intuition, not gimmicky visual tricks or a theoretical aesthetic.
Especially interesting in the interview with director Emir Kusturica, which led me to discover these very perceptive comments of his on his IMDB page:
I am finished with cities. I spent four years in New York, 10 in Paris, and I was in Belgrade for a while. To me now they are just airports. Cities are humiliating places to live, particularly in this part of the world.
In Serbia a lot of people hate me because they want to westernise, not understanding that the western world is bipolar, with very good things and very bad things. Since they don't have experience of the west, they even believe that western shit is pie.
What you have now is a Hollywood that is pure poison. Hollywood was a central place in the history of art in the 20th century: it was human idealism preserved. And then, like any great place, it collapsed, and it collapsed into the most awful machinery in the world. Why don't I see a Frank Capra today? Because people aren't like this anymore? People haven't changed that much in 60 years.
My purpose is to make a movie to make you warm. To give you some heat. Now, this rational world has become a place where only what is cool is good. Do you cut the movie on the basis of the beat of modernity or the basis of the beat of your own heart?
posted by Amateur Film Critic at 3:11 PM
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