Author Archive: Wayne Case
My Reaction to Oscar Nominations for 2011 Films
RANT Since the first time the Oscars were first telecast in the mid-fifties, I’ve been enthusiastic about them. I haven’t missed a telecast. Starting in the mid-sixties or maybe before, I have seriously followed the nomination process. Without exception, in the past, I’ve agreed with a huge percentage of the choices receiving nomination. NOT THIS [...]
Film 2009 As Seen By Wayne Case
Best Films (Alphabetical) (500) DAYS OF SUMMER AVATAR THE BURNING PLAIN AN EDUCATION THE HANGOVER THE HURT LOCKER INVICTUS THE MESSENGER STAR TREK THE YOUNG VICTORIA Runners-Up (Alphabetical) THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG PRECIOUS A SINGLE MAN UP IN THE AIR Honorable Mentions (Alphabetical) THE BLIND SIDE DUPLICITY I LOVE YOU, MAN THE MYSTERIES OF [...]
Redacted
Redacted, the Golden Lion winner at the Venice Film Festival and a polarizing selection at several other major festivals this fall is the latest film by iconoclastic director Brian De Palma. It revisits territory he once explored in the Vietnam War picture Casualties of War–the psychological horror of war on its participants and the evisceration [...]
Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten
Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten begins with rare, archival footage of Strummer recording the vocals for the early Clash song “White Riot.” The footage is a cappella and in black and white. Strummer spits out the lyrics with unmitigated fury, barely tethered to the microphone. Each word rips out of his throat with molotov [...]
Black Irish
Family is the gauntlet we pass through from childhood into adulthood. It’s what defines us. It’s also what we have to break free from in some fashion–either dramatic or not–to become wholly realized as individuals. Yet that rite of passage is freighted with the knowledge that breaking free of it never fully happens. Where we [...]
Terror’s Advocate
Director Barbet Schroeder (Single White Female, Reversal of Fortune, Barfly) has long concerned himself with capturing “Human Monsters” – both fictional and real. In his earlier documentary work, his subjects ranged from Idi Amin to Klaus Von Bulow and Charles Bukowski. With Terror’s Advocate, he returns to non-fiction for the first time in nearly twenty [...]
Lars and the Real Girl
What is it about Ryan Gosling’s career as an actor? This man obviously has a tremendous amount of talent, yet it seems to only shine brightest in small films. His big picture resume is littered with movies like Fracture, Stay and The Notebook, among others. Not necessarily bad movies, but not necessarily great movies, either. [...]
My Kid Could Paint That
Every good mystery hungers in some way to be solved. A question presents itself, clues are hunted down and answers are deduced from them to somehow answer that initial question. Not all mysteries can be solved, though. Sometimes the facts are distorted, or a key piece of evidence is missing–the puzzle is incomplete if you [...]
Into the Wild
At a critical emotional juncture of Into the Wild, directed and adapted by Sean Penn from Jon Krakauer’s bestselling book of the same name, Christopher McCandless, a.k.a Alexander Supertramp (Emile Hirsch), defends his actions to Jan (Catherine Keener), a fellow wanderer and his sometimes surrogate mom, with the Thoreau quote above. In a sentence it [...]
A Mighty Heart
A Mighty Heart is framed by a voiceover from the film’s emotional core, Marianne Pearl (played by Angelina Jolie). In the opening segment, over brief titles and quick establishing shots, her words set the stage for the narrative to follow. She and her husband Daniel Pearl (played by Dan Futterman) are in Karachi, Pakistan, seeking [...]
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