Howl, a cinematic adaptation of the Allen Ginsberg Poem from 9/17/2010

9/17/2010

Note: Not sure if this makes sense and I didn't proofread it so sorry. Also, it comes out in theaters and on demand next Friday. 

Hey all,

So some of you asked for my opinion on this film and others I just decided to include because I thought you liked the beatniks or James Franco or visual storytelling or something … Just sharing my thoughts, open to discussion with whoever so it, will see it, has opinion on this stuff in general

Simply put, Howl is a beautiful, compelling, and original film in my opinion. While it covers many topics, I found the overarching discussion is on the question what is poetry. Most of the film is an analysis of what is poetry and what makes good or bad poetry (or rather, is there such a thing as good or bad poetry). At the center of this discussion and this film is the Ginsberg poem “Howl.” Every moment of the film lives and breathes off of the poem. Every rhythm of the editing or the music or the plot is played to the beat of the poem. The reason the film is special is because it maintained this sort of rhythm. I can’t think of a single film where everything was in sync and simply so poetic. And when I call it poetic, I don’t refer to the philosophical musings or one-liners or profound speeches (although they are there); I refer to the way images, editing sequences, and transitions interact with the what’s going on.

Other important things of note:

James Franco is amazing in this role, nothing much to be said. Even if you don’t like the movie, you’ll probably still marvel at his performance and his reading of the poem throughout the film.

Another quality that makes the film so interesting is that it’s extremely documentary style. Most biopics (like Oliver Stone ones **cough** hate **cough**) really wind up showing the directors opinion of a person. Howl, being made by two men who have done only documentaries up to this point (including The Times of Harvey Milk and The Celluloid Closet), really let Ginsberg speak for himself. Every single line from his trial is verbatim from transcripts as are the interviews with Franco as Ginsberg in the film. Whether you like it or not, every image (including the animations) or beat of this film comes from Ginsberg’s works.

So in conclusion, I loved it and found it to be something very unique. I complete understand someone disliking it but I loved it and this is why.  

2010 in Film: The Brandy Awards

Accidentally edited this post instead of creating a new one when I did the "update" recently. This should be exactly what I originally posted back in January 2011. I've since seen many more films, including ones I've listed below as glaring omissions. 

I emphasize these are SUBJECTIVE picks with some objectivity thrown in. I don’t believe there are “best” things but these are the ones I want to highlight that were important in these categories for ME. I was going to write long explanations but I don’t think anyone cared about what I wrote last time. If you want to hear more or discuss why I have something or why I omitted something than feel free to message me on facebook and I will write you loads about each especially the best picture choices. It doesn’t matter if you were tagged or even if we’ve spoken in years feel free I’m open to talk to anyone about this stuff. Hopefully you’ll find some good recommendations in here.

Some facts (to perhaps validate my shaky qualifications):

Films seen released in 2010: 151

Foreign Films Seen: 36

Documentaries Seen: 41

Animated (yes pathetic): 7

Considerably important films I did not see (not including foreigns and documentaries because there are too many and they’re impossible to access often times: Tangled (for animated), Buried (actor), Daddy Longlegs (actor), The Way Back (anything), Let Me In (anything), BIGGEST MISS = Another Year (definitely foreign and screenplay but anything also)

AGAIN, contact me if you want to discuss I’m all ears to differing opinions. Feel free to tell me why you hated The Social Network and/or why The King’s Speech is the best thing since sliced bread. I could go on for a long time as to why those picture 10 (/12) are there especially for The Social Network, Blue Valentine, and Howl.

Picture: The Social Network

Runners up: Blue Valentine, Toy Story 3, Howl, Black Swan

6. Enter the Void

7. Shutter Island

8. Inception

9. Exit Through the Gift Shop

10. The Illusionist

Honorable mention: Cyrus, Catfish

Director: Gaspar Noe for Enter the Void

Runners up: Derek Cianfrance for Blue Valentine, Slyvain Chomet for The Illusionist, Darren Aronfsky for Black Swan, Christopher Nolan for Inception

6. Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman for Howl

7. Olivier Assayas for Carlos

8. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritui for Biutiful

9. Mark and Jay Duplass for Cyrus

10. David Fincher for The Social Network

Honorable Mention: Debra Grabnik for Winter’s Bone, Sofia Coppola for Somewhere

Male Acting Performance: Jesse Eisenberg for The Social Network

Runners up: John C. Reilly for Cyrus, Javier Bardem for Biutiful, Christian Bale for The Fighter, James Franco for Howl

6. Ryan Gosling for Blue Valentine

7. James Franco for 127 Hours

8. Edgar Ramirez for Carlos

9. Vincent Cassel for Black Swan

10. Leonardo DiCaprio for Shutter Island

Female Acting Performance: Michelle Williams for Blue Valentine

Runner up: Greta Gerwig for Greenberg

3. Jennifer Lawrence for Winter’s Bone

4. Zoe Kazan for The Exploding Girl

5. Carey Mulligan for Never Let Me Go

6. Natalie Portman for Black Swan

7. Marion Cotillard for Inception

8. Isabelle Huppert for White Material

9. Nicole Kidman for Rabbit Hole

10. Elle Fanning for Somewhere

Honorable Mention: Rebecca Hall for Please Give, The Town

Original Screenplay: Derek Cianfrance, Cami Delavigne, Joey Curtis for Blue Valentine

Runners up: Christopher Nolan for Inception, Darren Aronofsky, Mark Heyman, Andres Heinz, John J. McLaughlin for Black Swan

4. Mark and Jay Duplass for Cyrus

5. Noah Baumbach, Jennifer Jason Leigh for Greenberg

Honorable Mention: Lisa Cholodenko, Stuart Blumberg for The Kids Are All Right

Adapted Screenplay: Michael Ardnt for Toy Story 3

Runner up: Dennis Lehane and Laeta Kalogridis for Shutter Island

3. Aaron Sorkin for The Social Network

4. Sylvain Chomet, Jacques Tati for The Illusionist

5. Kazuo Ishiguro and Alex Garland for Never Let Me Go

Honorable Mention: Jane Goldman, Matthew Vaughn, Mark Millar, John Romita Jr. for Kick Ass, David Linsay-Abaire for Rabbit Hole, Erin Cressida Wilson, Anne Fontaine for Chloe

Foreign Film: Enter the Void (France)

2. The Illusionist (France)

3. Biutiful (Mexico)

4. Carlos (France)

5. White Material (France)

6. Alamar (Mexico)

7. The Secret in Their Eyes (Argentina)
8. Pepperminta (Switzerland)

9. Four Lions (England)

10. The Secret of Kells (Sweden)

Documentary: Exit Through the Gift Shop

2. Catfish

3. Jena-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child

4. Kings of Pastry

5. Waiting for “Superman”

Honorable Mention: Boxing Gym, Inside Job, A Small Act, The Oath

Animated Feature: The Illusionist

2. Toy Story 3

3. The Secret of Kells

Film Editing: Lee Smith for Inceptoin

2. Jim Helton, Ron Patane for Blue Valentine

3. Kirk Baxter, Angus Wall for The Social Network

4. Jay Deuby for Cyrus

5. Guy Lecorne for White Material

Cinematography: Andrij Parekh for Blue Valentine

Runners up: Matthew Libatique for Black Swan, Wally Pfister for Inception

4. Edward Lachman for Howl

5. Harris Davides for Somewhere

Honorable Mention: Rodrigo Prieto for Biutiful

Art Direction (All-encompassing art award including cinematography, sets, music, costumes, etc.): Black Swan

Runners up: Howl, Inception

4. The Illusionist

5. Pepperminta

6. Enter the Void

7. Carlos

8. Biutiful

9. The Social Network

10. ODDSAC

Honorable Mention: Blue Valentine

Best Use of Low Budget ($5 million or less): Blue Valentine

Runner Up: The Exploding Girl

3. Winter’s Bone

4. The Kids Are All Right

5. Rabbit Hole

Honorable Mention: Please Give

Best Theatrical Trailer: Blue Valentine

Runners up: The Social Network, Howl, Black Swan, Somewhere

6. Inception

7. Rabbit Hole

8. The Town

9. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

10. Waiting for “Superman”

2008 in Film (a list from 1/13/2009)

1/13/2009

This was a random list in a mostly music related 2008 in review list.

My ten favs of this oscar season: (Not my opinion of best, my personal favorites)

1. Milk
2. The Dark Knight
3. Wall-e
4. Revolutionary road
5. Man on Wire
6. Synecdoche, NY
7. Vicky Cristina Barcelona
8. Burn after Reading
9. My Winnipeg
10. Doubt
11. Encounters at the End of the World
12. Tropic Thunder 
13. The Wrestler
14. Slumdog Millionaire
15. Forgetting Sarah Marshall
16. Religulous
17. The Visitor
18. Iron Man
19. Paranoid Park
20. Kung Fu Panda

As of today, 3/8/2011, here's my tops for 2008:

1. Milk

2. Wall-e

3. The Dark Knight

4. Synecdoche, NY

5. Revolutionary Road

6. 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days

7. The Wrestler

8. Man on Wire

9. Forgetting Sarah Marshall

10. Tropic Thunder

11. Vicky Cristina Barcelona

12. Frozen River

13. Wendy and Lucy

14. Doubt

15. Trouble the Water

16. Encounters at the End of the World

17. Elegy

18. Snow Angels

19. The Betrayal

20. Burn After Reading

Honorable Mention: Choke, Religulous, Towelhead, Slumdog Millionaire, Iron Man

Best Picture: Milk

Director: Gus Van Sant for Milk

Male Acting: Heath Ledger for The Dark Knight

Female Acting: Melissa Leo for Frozen River and Kate Winslet for Revolutionary Road

Best Original Screenplay: Milk by Dustin Lance Black and Synecdoche, NY by Charlie Kaufman

Best Adapted: Revolutionary Road by Yates and Haythe, and Doubt by John Patrick Shanley

Art Direction: Che

Documentary: Man on Wire -- runner up: The Betrayal

WILL DO FULL AWARDS with nominees once I've seen 100 films from 2008 (currently at 98)

Welcome!

Hello! Quite simply, I'm sick of reading movie reviews so I'm going to write my own the way I want them to be. I like to just free write and not edit. I think it's really cool to put something out as if you're saying it. Editing can remove personality from the piece so I tend to stay away. I'll try my very hardest to not making any spelling or grammar errors! Feel free to "stalk" my art opinions and viewpoints at my twitter, facebook or mubi all linked below.

speaking of, expect entries about the use of the term stalk in terms of facebook and also about mubi!

Moving forward, I plan on posting everything on mubi or facebook as well as on the blog at least at the beginning to help grow readership. In the future I hope to have a more sophisticated website and more writers... only if there are readers who want that!

ALSO, will be posting all my old (recent) pieces. Off the top of my head this is an end of the year list in 2009 &10, and a bunch of reviews (or snippet reviews) on mubi over the last year (including a bunch from Sundance 2010!). In the works I'm working on (like a huge super nerd) watching every in competition film from Sundance 2010 (to be realistic just the domestic 32 not foreigns) and making MY jury decisions (plus a ranking of the top 8!). 

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