Z

Appropriate that I should look at Z immediately after There Will Be Blood, since Z does well what the former botches so badly. It opens with driving music, above images of medals for the police and military, followed by footage of many important characters and a speech about "intellectual mildew", referring to left-protests, immediately followed by the disclaimer that "Any resemblance to actual events, to persons living or dead, is not the result of chance. It is DELIBERATE." In one minute and forty seconds, the movie tells you everything you need to know. This is going to be a fast-paced, politically-charged thriller, involving the police suppressing left-wing ideas it disagrees with, based in part on reality. It also declares, in big bold letters, that it and everyone involved are badasses.

Here's the story, a senator for a Greek opposition party is in town to hold a rally for peace and reduced military presence, and the police - a part of the military - are subtly trying to ensure he doesn't get to say his speech. He finds a way to say it anyway, and is assaulted in a manner that might appear to be an accident, though the viewer knows exactly what happens. The police try to cover it up, but the autopsy of the leader proves them wrong, and the person behind the investigation gets suspicious. We follow the lead investigator down the rabbit hole, discovering the depth of the police corruption. And, right at the end, we - and by extension all of Greece - are kicked squarely in the balls.

This movie is a work of pure genius. The rapid dialog and pacing are like watching a car chase with words. The film moves too fast for heavy exposition, we don't even get to learn the names of many of the main characters, just generally how they fit into the whole puzzle. Important pieces of back story are presented as blink-and-you-miss-it insert shots, entire personalities are established and easily understood merely by the characters' actions. It's masterpiece of economy, achieving much more in a succession of quick shots than some other films can manage in their entire running time.

Subtle clues are placed throughout that indicate the full depth of the police involvement, but since it moves so quickly and doesn't linger on any of the police characters for any length of time, it's easy to miss them completely and be shocked when they appear later. Everything is presented to the viewer exactly as it happens, but if you don't know what you're looking for you're not going to notice it. Other movies might linger on "this might be important later!" moments, but by hiding everything in plain view, this movie keeps the mystery alive.

This is also the kind of movie that is always dangerously close to being relevant, a story about organizations suppressing those who might threaten their power. I'm not going to bring current politics into the picture, since it was made 40 years ago and the relevance is tied to events that actually happened in Greece at around that time. Tying it in to a current problem might be trendy and cool, but it also does a disservice to people who lived through the events which were lightly fictionalized here. It's a case of learning from history, a document of what can happen when power is threatened and people want to save it.

Z is a lesson in how to make a political movie, and how to make a thriller. It's not burdened with heavy character portraits, excessive back story, and clunky subplots. It's just the events and the aftermath, shown in a way that doesn't allow you to take a breath or even blink. Z is the ultimate in economical storytelling, hell the title is only one letter. You can't get much more economical than that. You also can't get much better, if I were forced to make a list, this would easily hit my top five favorite films ever.


(I'm dedicated to random screencaps now! See? A crappy screen, but random! Though if it shows a massive spoiler and/or something not safe for work I'll try again. Also, I have pictures for sale if anyone's interested. Check the link marked "Buy my pictures!" on the side there, or click on this letter: Z)

Cloverfield

If I were in the business of making soundbites, I'd call this a non-stop action thrill ride! As I am not, I'll call it an interesting - if ultimately unsuccessful - experiment. It clearly is supposed to be some sort of American Godzilla, and like all American Godzillas, it just doesn't work like it should.

In the film, some guy named Rob has just boned some girl named Beth. And then we jump a month ahead in time to my birthday, when Rob is going away to Japan (where the real Godzilla lives!) and is having a big surprise party. Everyone's invited, including Hud, the wacky comic relief/cameraman, Jason, his brother, Lily, Jason's wife, and Marlena, some chick who Hud likes. There's some drama when Beth shows up, and there's drinking and partying, and ultimately it's all pointless because a gigantic monster shows up and blows up the Statue of Liberty. You know all of this, because it was in the famous, and well done trailer.

Now don't get me wrong, it had a good trailer. It left enough to the imagination that you wanted to know what was going to happen next. It hinted, the shaky camerawork was compelling, and you might have been tempted to have seen the film based on it. But, what works in a trailer doesn't necessarily work in a feature-length film.

Take the camera. The main gimmick is that the entire film is handheld, and shot by one of the characters. Clever, you might think, and an interesting way to make a movie. But the deliberately poor framing and jittery camerawork, which works so well in short form, gets extremely nauseating over 80 minutes. I can't imagine seeing it on a big screen, you'd get motion sickness.

You can be sure that it's very action packed, and quite unrelenting. But because of that, you stop getting attached to the characters. Here's a drinking game, take a swig every time someone says "OH MY GOD!" You'll be on the floor in 10 minutes. Instead of making characters interesting, we just listen to them shouting and reacting. It's a shame, because in the party scene the characters are actually interesting. The drama and conflict running under the surface at the party are just abandoned as everyone screams and runs away.

The aesthetic does lead to some fantastic moments - when the characters get caught in the middle of a firefight, for instance - but there are also several shots where I thought "this scene would look pretty cool with decent camerawork". It tries to provide verisimilitude, but then you notice that the camera is always conveniently filming moments important to the story. Like how they all go to a electronics store and just happen to see a news report on the incident. For me, it killed it, and it'd be a lot more interesting if you didn't know what was happening, and weren't conveniently placed for maximum exposition. There's a feeling that they didn't realize that not knowing something is just more powerful.

I admire what they did, in a way. It's a different way to make an action movie, and it does have a level of immediacy that not many films achieve and the limited perspective is a cool way to film a disaster film. I'm glad they did it, honestly, and at least they tried something different. But it's just too hard to watch, and the story just doesn't stay interesting long enough. Maybe Godzilla should be left to the Japanese?

(I have no idea what I should do with the screens. I tried random times, but I frequently ignored that until I got an image I liked better. I almost want to do deliberately bad ones, but that wouldn't be fair, especially if the movie is actually, you know, good.)