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CMJ
Jun 19th, 2002, 08:28:40 AM
Yes we all hate Jeff Welles, but I wanted to post his thoughts on "Perdition" because it's really the first review I've seen so far....

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The talk this week is all about Minority Report (20th Century Fox, opening Friday), which many are calling one of Spielberg's best. But I'm feeling closer to and more admiring of Sam Mendes' Road to Perdition (DreamWorks, July 12), a beautifully measured and proportioned gangster drama I saw Monday afternoon. I think it's a brilliant mainstream art film, an echo-laden father-son relationship drama, an exquisitely filmed and designed slice of 1930s Americana, and a wonderfully spare work of cinematic poetry.

That's a mouthful, I realize. But I love this film, and I want to take this opportunity to wipe away any impressions I may have given in previous columns — which I wrote early last year (or was it the year before?) after reading a couple of early drafts of David Self's script — that it contains an attempt by Tom Hanks to soft-pedal his gangster-dad character, which he definitely does not. Or that it's somehow less of a film than Mendes' American Beauty. It's a different bird, all right, but anyone who compares Road to Perdition unfavorably with that 1999 Best Picture winner is simply missing (or dismissing) the value of it.

It's obvious after the opening two or three minutes that each and every aspect of Road to Perdition is pure quality and pure class. Remarkable care, precision and pictorial beauty have clearly gone into every frame. There may be some who will call it a bit precious or pretentious, but it won't matter. I believe I know the difference between films trying to get by on art-house brush strokes and shrewdly crafted films that place a high premium on connecting each and every dot, and this is one of the latter.

Year-end Academy prejudices against summer releases aside, Road to Perdition is a clear candidate for Best Picture, Best Director (Mendes), Best Actor (Hanks), Best Supporting Actor (Jude Law, whose somewhat gimpy, oddly dressed hitman/photographer character is as much a visual treat as a performing one), Best Cinematography (Conrad Hall), Best Adapted Screenplay (Self), Best Production Design (Dennis Gassner's period trappings are a movie in themselves), Best Editing (Jill Bilcock) and Best Original Score (Thomas Newman, whose brilliant American Beauty score was Oscar-nominated), to name but a few.

As most of you probably know, Road to Perdition is about a gruff Chicago assassin named Michael Sullivan (Tom Hanks) trying to save himself and his son, Michael Jr. (played by an arresting newcomer named Tyler Hoechlin) from brutal death by forces within the Al Capone-led Chicago mob, who have already murdered his wife and younger son. Paul Newman plays a craggy old Irish mob boss named John Rooney, whose son, Connor (Daniel Craig), a hair-trigger psychopath fallen far from the tree, is the cause of the elder Sullivan's troubles. Self's script is based on the graphic novel by Max Allan Collins and Richard Piers Rayner.


The story isn't the greatest ever concocted (it's got some loose ends here and there) but it eventually settles in to a meditation about the legacies left to sons by their fathers, with the focus not just on the two Michaels but also the tragic synergy between the Rooneys. On one level the movie says that a father and son who rob and kill together are definitely going to get to know each other in ways that fathers and sons who play catch and go on picnics together are going to miss out on. On another level it reminds us that sons disturb their fathers like no other force on earth.

I liked Self's script, but the movie is much better, partly because so much of the dialogue has been pruned down. The main reason Road to Perdition wasn't ready to go out in late '01, I've been told, is that the honing process hadn't been completed. The extra time and effort was worth it. It now runs a very tight and true 119 minutes. If there was ever a film that proved less is more or that careful editing can really count, this is it.

(The editing did produce a casualty, however. Anthony La Paglia's Al Capone character, which I was looking forward to seeing, has been completely excised.)

I've heard grousings from exhibition sources who fear audiences won't support Road to Perdition as much as they or DreamWorks would like, possibly because mainstreamers might not like watching Saint Tom play a hit man. I can only throw up my hands when I hear stuff like this. The movie, after all, delivers and Hanks is quite good. It seems shallow to presume that audiences are only interested in "up" confections and will reject quality material just because it's occasionally violent and has a somber emotional quality.

The idea of Hanks as a quasi-bad guy might throw some people, but he invests Michael Sullivan with rivers of choked-off, unexpressed feeling. Maybe Hanks' reputation as a reservoir of decency and likability is too potent for this character to seem truly malevolent or murderous. I found his acting fascinating because of this tension; it's almost a revelation. I totally believed in his fearsomeness. I loved the taciturn, marvelously measured way he speaks each and every line. Hanks lets in emotions and moods I've been waiting to see him make the acquaintance of for a long while.

Conrad Hall's cinematography is drop-dead beautiful in a grayish, almost monochromatic way, contrasting sharply with the luminous colors he used for American Beauty, for which he won an Oscar. It's true what I heard about this movie being drenched in rain. It makes you feel damp just watching it.

The violence in Road to Perdition is extremely vivid and jarring. (My sons Dylan and Jett, now 12 and 14, were especially impressed by this aspect.) There are several shootout scenes, and each is not only thrilling on its own terms but done in a way we've never quite seen before. The first is filmed entirely from the viewpoint of the younger Michael, spying on his dad as he executes a victim and eyeballing everything from a small cranny hole near the floor. There's another gangland rubout scene that happens without a single gunshot on the soundtrack. We're shown nothing in an early scene in which two innocents are murdered, but the sound alone is terrifying. Time and again, Mendes always goes for the oblique or unusual approach.

It's extremely gratifying that two intelligent, first-rate films — this and Minority Report (which I'll get into with Friday's column) — are here to counter-program the mid-summer moron trade. This is turning out to be a pretty good warm-weather season. Here's hoping Eight Legged Freaks is another score.

Sanis Prent
Jun 19th, 2002, 02:30:37 PM
(shrug) I wasn't impressed with the preview I saw. It seemed too much of a "I'm Tom Hanks, gimme my Oscar" movie.

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 19th, 2002, 03:20:55 PM
I am going to keep an open mind and we all seen Tom Hanks can pull off oscar worthy performances before. Namely Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan, and The Green Mile. This film is too intriguing!

CMJ
Jun 19th, 2002, 07:31:45 PM
It looks freakin' fantastic to me. Plus, I'm REALLY interested to see how Mendes follows up "American Beauty".

FLMKR4EB
Jun 19th, 2002, 07:59:16 PM
This is the one I'm gonna call movie of the summer. When I saw the trailer I was so intrigued and gitty, the only movie I anticipated more was Attack of the Clones. I'm hoping to get an early screenign of it. But if I don't I'll see it first showing I can. I'm also gonna jump the gunn and name this as my first preminition for the Oscars at least as a nominee for best picture, and best actor.

I can't wait to see it!

CMJ
Jun 19th, 2002, 08:01:18 PM
It definitely has the pedigree to be remembered come Academy time...but the early release will hurt it.

Like I said in an earlier post...this and "Minority Report" are my only 2 must see's the rest of the summer.

FLMKR4EB
Jun 19th, 2002, 09:12:23 PM
Gladiator was several months earlier than Road to... and it took home the big prize even though it had such an early release. I think this film has all the best ingredients to make a Best Picture worthy film.

FLMKR4EB
Jun 20th, 2002, 08:10:29 AM
I just watched the trailer once again (I have it on my comp, I love Quicktime!). This movie looks so good. I can't describe how excited I am about it. All I needed to see was that shot of Tom Hanks walking down the hallway and drawing his gun from behind his back. Its so sweet.

CMJ
Jun 20th, 2002, 09:06:12 AM
Thats a great shot I agree. :)

Personally I'm all about the rain. It looks like a Kurosawa film. ;)

FLMKR4EB
Jun 20th, 2002, 01:52:01 PM
Looks like you and I are the only people who care about this one.

CMJ
Jun 20th, 2002, 03:44:18 PM
Well...it's still a few weeks off. Alot of people are only focusing on the moment I guess. :)

JonathanLB
Jun 24th, 2002, 06:02:25 AM
I have believed this is going to be the best movie of the actual summer for a long time now. AOTC is easily best of the year, and to me best ever, but Road to Perdition looks like the best movie from, say, June 21 through September 21, hehe. I CANNOT wait until this film opens. The preview seemed awesome to me. I think the film looks great.

I'll have to see, though, because Minority Report should give Road to Perdition a major run for its money as far as quality. Both films, though, are serious Oscar contenders. This summer is perhaps one of the best in history.

For anyone to call 1999's summer one of the best, uhh, were you born yesterday?! LOL, I remember when people on the forums were saying that. I wanted to shoot myself. Ok, TPM... and... The Sixth Sense. Everything else was HORRIBLE practically, except Big Daddy was a solid 3 stars. Jesus, what an AWFUL summer -- the worst summer in Hollywood history I think. TPM was all I cared to see the entire time, and it was all I did see.

2002, now this summer rocks. So hard to have AOTC playing with all of these other great films too.

Lilaena De'Ville
Jun 24th, 2002, 10:48:53 AM
I can't wait to see this movie. I saw the trailer for the first time last night in front of Minority Report, and it sucked me right in. I'm definetely seeing it ASAP. :D

Tom Hanks as assassin. How could anyone NOT want to see this movie?!

Roddy Two
Jun 24th, 2002, 11:11:22 AM
The same reason I left "Cast Away" wanting my money back, probably.

FLMKR4EB
Jun 24th, 2002, 11:34:25 AM
Wow, didn't like Cast Away. That's one of my fave Hanks films. I don't know anyone who didn't like it. To each his own. I'll quote my friend Steve...
"That's why they make more than one movie a year..."

Roddy Two
Jun 24th, 2002, 11:41:26 AM
Holy Hell in a Handbasket...if that isn't a "three strikes and you're out", I don't know what is.

How can you like that movie? Its Lord of the Flies redux, except much less interesting, and with Tom Hanks lamenting to a volleyball in hopes of having another oscar drop in his lap. That's all it was...a Tom Hanks trophy-snatch.

Lilaena De'Ville
Jun 24th, 2002, 02:05:20 PM
I liked Wilson! :mad

Figrin D'an
Jun 24th, 2002, 05:46:23 PM
I just think it's amusing how so many people really liked a character that was an inanimate object.

I, too, was not all that impressed with Cast Away... to me, it was a lot like A Beautiful Mind was this past year, a way for a major Hollywood actor to garner more Oscar attention. Tom Hanks has had some incredible, Oscar worthy performances, but that one was just overbearing and annoying because it screamed "I want another Academy Award."


I am looking forward to Road to Perdition, though. I just haven't been talking about it a lot yet because of Minority Report opening this past Friday... that kind of had my attention for a couple of weeks, and it still does... I really need to go see it again this week... But, "Perdition" does have a lot of potential. I'm really hoping to see a different side of Tom Hanks in this film.

JonathanLB
Jun 24th, 2002, 07:31:39 PM
Cast Away was a great film. I was pleasantly surprised and I'm not a huge fan of that director. I mean, yeah he is supposed to be so great, and I liked Back to the Future, but sorry, Forrest Gump is horribly overrated and boring. What Lies Beneath was dull and boring, one of the summer's worst films.

Cast Away was actually great, though, thank the maker.

A Beautiful Mind was definitely an Oscar attempt for Crowe. I really don't like that film. It's just incredibly boring and uninteresting, not too well made, it's just a horrible Oscar film. Overall it is average, 2 stars, at best.

CMJ
Jun 24th, 2002, 08:42:22 PM
Man so much to comment on. I'm only gonna touch on a few items. First off...I really dug both "Cast Away" and "A Beautiful Mind".

I don't think either film was a blatant attempt at an Oscar(Hanks doesn't need to be blatant...he already owns 2, he won't win another till he's about to die: as for Crowe their was no way in hell he was gonna win back to back Oscar's) though both gave performances worthy of one.

NOW back to "Perdition". I can't wait....:)

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 25th, 2002, 02:25:06 AM
Honestly I failed to see anything oscar worthy about "Cast Away" especially Tom Hanks performance. I felt it was rather mediocre and for the best of me, still can not comprehend what is so great about this movie. Why is the film and Tom Hanks considered a cut above any of it's predessors? None of them gained such notoriety yet they were no less an achievement!

JonathanLB
Jun 25th, 2002, 03:54:31 AM
It was incredibly hard making a movie like Cast Away where there is basically just ONE main actor and he carries the entire film and somehow makes it interesting anyway. I thought it was really great, and the ending certainly is not a copout, it's a pretty sad ending, but it's realistic. It's life. That is probably what would really happen most of the time, if something like that ever happened (and I am sure it has...).

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 25th, 2002, 04:29:35 AM
The movie's concept is far from original. Concerning Hanks one man troupe, there are solo-performances in Broadway and Stage productions with live acting where no cuts are permitted. Nor moments spared in which to prepare and psyche one's self for a scene. At least not during the show. I am not sure performing alone is more difficult than performing with several actors. I am not an actor, so I can not shed light. But when a production calls for multiple actors to perform in front of that camera together. Each actor/actress has to convey emotions of their character in a convincing manner while maintaining a scene's atmosphere with proper interactive timing. Plus, Cast Away uses short clips, (what I would call log-clips) which were filmed over a great length of time by cast and crew during the movie's production. Just my non-professional but hopefully insightful thoughts on the matter! ;)

Sanis Prent
Jun 25th, 2002, 08:50:53 AM
Forrest Gump is horribly overrated and boring. What Lies Beneath was dull and boring, one of the summer's worst films.

And Jon wins the Ebert award for bad taste of a polar-opposite manner.

Arya Ravenwing
Jun 25th, 2002, 11:33:59 AM
I heard that What Lies Beneath was incredibly good and exciting. But I haven't seen it. Charley! Put it on the list of movies to see in Alabama. :D

Roddy Two
Jun 25th, 2002, 12:43:41 PM
Hmm...I dunno. Our time is rather precious. I wouldn't put it on that list...but its a good one to watch.

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 25th, 2002, 03:38:00 PM
Originally posted by Arya Ravenwing
I heard that What Lies Beneath was incredibly good and exciting. But I haven't seen it. Charley! Put it on the list of movies to see in Alabama. :D

What lies Beneath... I have seen the movie. A suspense tale with a ghostly twist. I felt the movie was decent at best but had a terrible ending. Nothing remarkable!

JonathanLB
Jun 25th, 2002, 06:33:15 PM
Ok, so I have bad taste because I don't like a STUPID movie like What Lies Beneath? No, I am sorry, but I do not believe anyone WITH taste would like such a horribly cliched, boring, uninteresting, unoriginal film. It's decent, at best, and yes, a terrible ending. Not one moment of the film excited me or thrilled me and I was staring at my watch every 5 minutes after the first hour. I kept waiting for it to go somewhere, but it never did.

My mom hated it. My dad hated it. I hated it. It sucked, plain and simple. Just a lousy piece of filmmaking. Do NOT waste your time.

As for Forrest Gump, I recognize it is a pretty good movie, but that doesn't mean it's not overrated. I just do not care for the story. It's not interesting to me. The character is not interesting. His life is not interesting. The manner in which it was made was not in my opinion high quality. The film looked stupid when I saw ads for it, it looked stupid when I first saw it on VHS, then it looked stupid again when I saw it on HBO with my family who was watching it and I had nothing better to do, but that was years later and I felt I should give it another chance. WRONG. It still was lame the second time I saw it too.

Maybe third time is the charm. I'll see it again to review it in due time. lol, I very much doubt it though.

Zemeckis is like Dr. Jeckyl, Mr. Hyde. Half of the time he is an absolute HACK, i.e. Forrest Gump and What Lies Beneath, then the other half of the time he is a genius, i.e. Cast Away and Back to the Future.

FLMKR4EB
Jun 25th, 2002, 08:29:12 PM
Again, this is why they make more than one movie a year.

I LOVE FORREST GUMP, in my opinion, which means aboslutely nothing, its the greatest film ever made.

Cast Away, again very good. Not as good, but so solid.

What Lies Beneath-Very Mediocre, i didn't hate it, but I wouldn't say I liked it that meuch.

BTTF, incredible.

FLMKR4EB
Jun 25th, 2002, 08:32:59 PM
Beautiful Mind, i hated it. Good movie, but not even close to oscar worthy. Lord of the Rings or Moulin Rouge deserved that Oscar. I'd even take Amelie in the Best Pic category, which was amazing.

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 25th, 2002, 08:44:40 PM
Originally posted by JonathanLB
Ok, so I have bad taste because I don't like a STUPID movie like What Lies Beneath? No, I am sorry, but I do not believe anyone WITH taste would like such a horribly cliched, boring, uninteresting, unoriginal film. It's decent, at best, and yes, a terrible ending. Not one moment of the film excited me or thrilled me and I was staring at my watch every 5 minutes after the first hour. I kept waiting for it to go somewhere, but it never did.

My mom hated it. My dad hated it. I hated it. It sucked, plain and simple. Just a lousy piece of filmmaking. Do NOT waste your time.

I couldn't have said it better! But want to reiterate here alittle. First off, what is with this generation's movies getting all this praise for things that have already been done before. I am beginning to feel old... lol! Anyways, if you want a great ghost story with true chills and frights, try 'Stanley Kubrick's The Shining'. One of the scariest horror pictures ever made and there isn't a better ghost story out there. Do not waste your time on a pitiful hack picture like 'What lies beneath'. ;)

FLMKR4EB
Jun 25th, 2002, 08:45:04 PM
One more comment on this thread. Addressing the matter of "unoriginal". Eveything has been done. There arre only 300 some odd basic plots in movies anyway, which actually all boil down to three categories. Man Goes on a Journey, Man comes into town, and one other that escapes me. Think about it, even with those two you can swallow many, many movies. All the plots have been done in there basic forms, its the presentation, that one uses to tell the story, add twists, combine plots that makes things interesting.
No offence, I'm just sick of hearing this talk of unoriginality. Cast Away, no it was not original, but Zemikus even states that is a retelling of the Robinson Caruso charcter.
I love Cast Away because it is to me an excellent retelling. Its a story I've actually written, and wanted to shoot as a film, only Zemikus did it first. I love the Wilson character because he isn't real, he's inanimate, and inanimate objects make for such interesting characters, to me.

Now, Peridition looks like another great story. How exciting.

CMJ
Jun 25th, 2002, 11:04:31 PM
Man...so...much...to...respond...to...

I don't even know where to start...or if I should even bother(I was out all day, otherwise I wouldn't have gotten so far behind the discussion).

Hmmmm I'm gonna be lazy and only address the last post. I believe I read there are actually seven basic plots that all STORIES fall into(not just three). Still, your point is well made...and it's one I've stated as well.

Nothing, storywise, is "truly" original(well I still haven't figured out what category "Being John Malkovich" falls into). The only originiality is how it is presented....

Lilaena De'Ville
Jun 26th, 2002, 02:16:25 AM
Hey! Maybe I *won't* watch What Lies Beneath. Sheesh!

*watches Josie and the Pussycats again* :D *eats popcorn* :)


:lol

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 26th, 2002, 02:46:10 AM
:lol :lol :lol



Believe me, you will thank us for saving your soul from 90 minutes or so of garbage! :lol

Lilaena De'Ville
Jun 26th, 2002, 02:51:12 AM
Saving my soul!? I wasn't planning on worshipping the movie, but..o..k....

Now, JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS, that is a quality movie that generations to come can enjoy wholeheartedly. :D

Well, I *do* find it intensely amusing. :D

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 26th, 2002, 02:56:40 AM
Josie and the Pussycats sounds like a movie I would have to be thoroughly inebriated to enjoy. :lol


I haven't seen the movie but with all those glitzy gals in it, I thing a headchange is necessary. :lol

Lilaena De'Ville
Jun 26th, 2002, 02:59:42 AM
Hey you get a new title at my board! Go see! :D

Ilyn Pyke
Jun 26th, 2002, 03:23:52 AM
Yeah, some revenge! Darn...

Lilaena De'Ville
Jun 26th, 2002, 03:42:18 AM
>D