Kathyrn Davis

As the film’s resident do-gooder, hers is the life of Hobbesian brutishness; owlish idealism in a modestly furnished, curiously cheerless basement apartment, save for the twilight rendezvous that pre-dates her violent, fiery death by mere hours. Taking pity on dear Paul as if his arm-length rap sheet transformed a murderer’s heart into a puppy’s nuzzling nose, she sizes him up, rails against a broken system, and ingests what remains of Kersey’s ebbing bodily fluids, all with the resigned hunger of a woman who knows this is her last shot to feel a man press her down into a cheap mattress, even if he’s more musty corpse than gentleman caller. As played by Deborah Raffin, with eyes just this side of twinkly despair, Miss Davis is the film’s unbreakable misogyny made flesh, where women exist to scream in agony, bare chocolate breasts as the hot breath of rape lurks around every corner, and re-energize our heroes so they might continue their righteous butchery. She’s also the cinema’s final word on the efficacy of social work, where bookish liberals take their clipboards teeming with hope and meet their end via the sucker punch of urban lawlessness. It helps, too, to own the one car in Christendom that explodes on impact at a speed approximating a late-morning jog.

Richard Shriker

He’s the only cop worth a damn, striking deals with vigilantes as if negotiating sick pay with the teacher’s union. He wants bodies on slabs, and he wants them now, even if a few of them are goofy cops who haven’t the sense to drive into a war zone with bulletproof vests or weaponry exceeding the power of cap guns. And his refrain — “I’m a cop, which means I get to violate your Constitutional rights” – evokes the unvarnished masculinity of the Gipper era with tear-down-that-wall efficiency, but also speaks to any age that sacrifices its nutsack on a pyre of limp wrists and liberal equivocation. Fortunately, Shriker saves the best for last, as he damns the torpedoes, his badge, and any hope of escaping a life sentence in Rikers in order to join Kersey for the world’s most delightful turkey shoot. That final massacre, Michael Winner’s own personal reimagining of Grenada, is Paul’s catharsis, yes, but it’s Richard’s hard-on; a desk guy’s fevered orgy of revenge for every tortured cold call he had to make raising money for the policeman’s ball. With a scowl barely masking that newly found grin of a life finally lived, Shriker regains his inspiration for ever joining the thin blue line in the first place. He even lets Paul go at the end, as if to insist that he take credit, bask in the glory, and hastily announce his run for office as the Murderin’ Mayor.

Justice

An abstraction to some, an impossibly distant dream to others, it is finally given its tangibility at last in Kersey’s New York. For one screeching black mama who waves her arms at death as if asking for an encore, it means that the man who stole her purse can die with a basketball-sized hole in his chest, once again setting the universe back on course. “I’m glad he’s dead!”, she shrieks, singing the heavenly chorus of victims everywhere, and also boldly equating the loss of a few dollars in food stamps with capital murder. But her joy is nonetheless infectious, and we share in her religious fervor. For Kersey, every killing is, of course, a cry against those who were never called to account for ending his late wife’s earthly journey with spray paint, rape, and callous humiliation, but in each scene, he kills for nothing more than a cheap automobile, or even the loss of a lousy camera. “It’s my car!”, he protests, defending property rights in the only manner available to a man not twisted by feminism and homosexuality. Unarmed, fleeing, or even bowed in surrender, all must die for the crimes of others, or perhaps what they too will one day commit. Guilt is assumed, and not even God would dare sort them out.

Oh, What a Time

Was that really America? Where we could order elephant guns through a PO Box, which itself handed over its keys without bothering to ask for a name, let alone a form of ID? When a broken arm led to death because to be raped under Reagan was an admission that the pussy was acquiring too much power? Or when cowardly Mexican men sent their wives to the corner store – ALONE – because the daily gunshots, streets littered with trash, endless sexual assaults, muggings, and burning cars weren’t enough to clue you in that a woman by herself, and with nice tits to boot, just might be kidnapped by a roving gang of thieves, punks, killers, and rapists? When the biggest jugs we’ve ever seen in an action movie belong to a dehumanized black prostitute who AVOIDS rape because she’s sleeping with the director? All that, and the only time on record where a young black man was just as likely to fall from a roof to his death as receive a bullet in the head.

Chuck Cunningham, Esq.

Gavan O’Herlihy, Manny Fraker to you and me, gave up the green pastures and fat paychecks of Happy Days to play, if not inhabit, the era’s foremost villain. From his reverse Mohawk to crayola-inspired war paint, Fraker is exactly what the genre needed, and was the perfect foil to Kersey’s running commentary of righteous bloodlust. From the moment he sees Paul in the jail cell and has his lackeys bust the old man’s chops, he’s clearly in charge, using that brief interlude to convey one of the film’s most precious nuggets: “Tell you what, I’m gonna kill a little old lady, just for you…Watch it on the six o-clock news.” And I’ll be damned if he doesn’t do exactly that. He kills members of his own gang simply to exert power, has committed the entire neighborhood’s phone numbers to memory (his initial call to Paul, asking, “Hey, what are ya doin’ in there?” is a classic, considering that it comes about 15 minutes after he butchered Paul’s best friend in that very apartment), and lays claim to a queer sense of morality (despite killing dozens, he is outraged when Paul does likewise). He’s the oddest duck to control so diverse an urban gang, as he lacks the usual physical appeal and charisma, but upon his death, unseen to everyone in the street, he elicits screams of woe from his flock, as if they could sense a world without his soul. But when he dies, the violence stops forever, and the city is once again returned to kindly Jews, entrepreneurs, and Korean War vets with the pull to sneak home weaponry usually reserved for bringing down entire tank divisions.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)

Andrew Dominik’s The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is a work of the most supreme audacity. A Western with little action, a history lesson without any heroes, and a character study that uses contemplative silence rather than the roar of gunfire, the film is everything I had hoped it to be and more; one of the few movies all year that actually got better as it went along, reducing its 160-minute running time to a mere flash of brilliance. Who could imagine that in 2007, a time when Hollywood is in such an advanced state of decay that every move seems pre-approved by focus groups and teams of cautious lawyers, we would be honored with such risk and bold artistry? After all, here’s a film concerning one of the most famous figures in history, an outlaw known by young and old alike, and rather than pander to the obvious with a romp of hard riding and gunplay, that very man is reduced to a supporting character; a symbol, yes, but not at all the driving narrative force. Thankfully, blissfully, this is not a tale of bank heists and train robberies, showdowns at high noon, or cat and mouse dramatics that reduce the untamed frontier to clever criminals and no-nonsense lawmen. Instead, this is a film about nothing less grandiose than America itself — its myths, its illusions, its raw, wounded identity — with the necessary sense of wonder to pull it off. Such ambitions are fraught with peril, of course (resentful glances and accusations of unjust pretension, to name a few), but each and every frame is a testament to the overall success, and by the final act — a coda concerning the days and nights of Robert Ford after the infamous assassination that stands as some of the finest filmmaking I’ve ever seen — we are not exhausted, or burdened, or bereft, but thankful at having lived to see it all. The decade has seen its masterpiece.

The Wrestler (2008)

Darren Aronofsky’s The Wrestler, a film that on its face doesn’t sound like much at all, is not without convention, or cliché, or even a hint of familiarity, but its brilliance is not in its ability — or desire — to revolutionize the medium. Through one simple character, the washed-up slob that is The Ram, America itself is laid bare (and where Jersey has never looked so Jersey). And who knew that when the chips were down, Mickey Rourke would come to set things right? His performance is a revelation to be sure; a realization so penetrating, wise, and achingly authentic that it deserves to sweep Oscar off its feet. It is greatness in raw, unflinching defiance, both as a physical embodiment and through sheer emotional resonance. It’s the epitome of the Method’s still unsurpassed approach to the art. Rourke never overreaches, or plays to the cheap seats, or asks us to find him appealing. His faded has-been is a bastard through and through, as well as the sort of man incapable of breadth, scope, or even a moment where he isn’t out to prove his worth through the channel of an appalling self-loathing. His is the vanity of utter stasis; where, preserved in amber like a prehistoric insect, he bathes in nostalgia to keep the world from penetrating his tomb. He lives as he did, stunted for all time, unable to grapple with the parade that long ago passed him by. He’s a muscular, scarred Norma Desmond; the ring his musty, cobwebbed estate.

United 93 (2006)

It’s the film that was never supposed to work. It simply couldn’t. Every conceivable minefield was glaringly apparent; it would function as little more than propaganda, a rallying cry, a spur for Bush’s approval ratings, or a perverse, exploitive justification for invasion and revenge. Heroes would be oversimplified, villains even more so, and the audience would be invited not to observe and recoil as we must in the face of unthinkable tragedy, but bare its teeth and believe, absurdly, that we would have acted more forcefully ourselves. No, this is not that movie, and for that alone, it deserves recognition as the most restrained account of actual events ever filmed. It would be more fitting to describe what we see, what we hear, and hell, what we feel, as just shy of cinema verite; a peeking behind the curtain of an event we think we know from top to bottom, when of course we could not possibly have any idea. It’s all terrifyingly real, for we know the grisly outcome, and the film wisely presents every moment leading up to the actual hijacking as routine, banal, and just this side of boring. It had to be. Our perspective, so viciously unfair as the worst sort of hindsight, screws the tension tighter than we can handle, and we wait it out; a death watch that damn near drives us to the brink. But again, and why this masterpiece will last beyond the raw wounds it portrays, this is above politics, and war, and terrorism itself; these are human beings, fragile and fearful, confused and astoundingly brave, doing whatever they could, which, sadly, was very little, to simply survive. Simply, when it’s everything? But fight on we do, brutes of a single-minded devotion, even when the whole damn enterprise is doomed. More so.

A Prairie Home Companion (2006)

It’s the sweetest example of a cinematic valedictory – Robert Altman, aging, frail, yet still teeming with wit and insight – faces the cold breath of mortality with A Prairie Home Companion, a delightful ode to endings; some happy, some not, but all unfailingly inevitable. Given that I was not at all familiar with Garrison Keillor’s radio broadcast (nor much of his career, period), I expected little from the movie, and must admit that I was moved to go only out of an obligation to Altman, one of the true giants of the art form. I figured that at best I would be distracted by a few corny jokes, a silly song or two, and that unmistakable overlapping dialogue that has been much imitated, but never equaled. Who knew that Altman (along with Keillor’s charming script) would focus so intently on the matter-of-factness of death itself; that while it will come for all of us, it need not be the only way in which to punch that final clock. In many ways, the film understands that before we’re carted off for the last time, we can release ourselves from the passions that drive us, and the noblest among us know when it’s time to give it a rest. This may in fact mean the end of life for many, but stepping aside can be as simple as a gesture; the nod of agreement that yes, my time in the sun is no more. There are others waiting for their shot. And there always will be.

Before Sunset (2004)

As the rarest of birds – an intellectual engagement between two adults without a trace of pretension or suffocating irony – the film stands as the decade’s most insightful romance, even though our couple remains physically uninvolved throughout. More than unrequited love, or a revisiting of what could have been, these are two older, and not necessarily wiser characters who have arrived at true adulthood with little but quiet resignation to bind their wounds. Jesse and Celine, perhaps the only cinematic pair that warranted a sequel, have an effortless grace together, while their hesitations and despairing glances reveal not the will of a screenwriter, but the hazards of the engaged life. It’s all talk, yes, and elevated beyond our normal unbearable exchanges, but the words rely not on the esoterica of the self-appointed elite, or the instant wit of the smirking wiseacre, but actual ideas learned not in the armchair of youth, but through experience and survival. It’s as if these two, slightly hardened by idealism’s inevitable decline, come together to spend a few hours in a cocoon slightly more tolerable than the ones they already inhabit. Marriage and family, as Jesse has discovered, are not “what adults do” per se, but are the only acceptable escapes left us in a world ever-intolerant of genuine solitude. Celine and Jesse work, such as it is, because they’ve never faced the actual scrutiny of life beyond the glow. At last, a film where one listens, one learns, and one recognizes all too well that our accidental encounters make the routine bearable.

On the same evening I staggered from a disappointing screening of Tom Ford’s A Single Man, I came across an article in New York magazine concerning Larry Kramer, the notorious AIDS activist and rabble-rouser now reduced to the shadows of American life. It seems that in the absence of any compelling reason to give two shits about a disease that no longer kills anyone in the regions of the world that still matter, Mr. Kramer continues to work on his magnum opus, The American People, a now 4,000+ page doorstop that, above all, posits the farcical notion that American history is but a conspiracy to keep gays closeted good and tight. More curious, or predictable, if we are to know and understand our gay activists, is that all of our iconic figures, from George Washington to Abraham Lincoln, are mincing homosexuals. A satirical look at our past through a subversively queer lens? Perhaps, but Mr. Kramer isn’t taking a fictional approach for granted. In fact, color him inflexible on the matter. The marble gods of our past, up to and including such legendary lotharios as Alexander Hamilton, were pink right down to their pantaloons. He knows it, believes it, and isn’t above misinterpreting and ripping assorted letters from their historical context to prove his point. His “point,” such as it is, is but a continuation of the age-old agenda of narcissistic over-inflation, with a pit stop at crippling insecurity. For any member of a despised minority, life is only worth living if it can be assumed that one’s hated status is the result of jealousy and, ultimately, the hypocrisy of the majority power. They, whoever they might be, hate said cocksucking because, well, they too would like to join the party. Only they can’t, because they’re too busy hating homosexuals.

Larry’s absurd drive to bring the world entire under his cloak of ass-tickling is, of course, an old gimmick pulled out whenever the self-hatred becomes too depressingly uncomfortable, but it’s appropriate when considering the movie in question, if only because A Single Man, for all of its stellar acting and stunning cinematic tones, is yet another exercise in the tired cliché that no greater sin exists than the man – the Gay Man – not allowed to bloom as the flower of his own choosing. For Ford, a fashion designer and hence, gay at least by implication, to be gay in 1962 (or at any time) is so difficult as to warrant suicidal inclinations. It is also, thankfully one might assume, an opportunity to be idolized from afar and pursued from the halls of academia to the grocery, a fortunate turn that befalls our gay man in question, George (Colin Firth). Throughout the course of a single day, a day beyond which George does not plan on surviving, our hero, impeccably tailored and mannered as per the era, is sexually desired on at least two separate occasions, that is, if one does not count the flirtations from innumerable females. George, an English professor, is the target of a young student first and foremost, a come-hither glance that quickly develops the legs of a manic pursuit. Kenny, the fresh-faced lad, is, of course, lacking all manner of depth, and his existence seems to hinge on his joining the college ranks to bag an aging professor. The two engage in the only banter left to two oppressed souls, but are soon naked with alarming alacrity.

Oh yes, it does become important to know that George has decided to end it all because he can’t get over the death of his young lover, Jim, the sort of man impossibly handsome and saintly in any film not affiliated with homosexuals. Disallowed a real affair by the strictures of their culture, the two hold court with the only kind of love one could expect from an initial meeting at a sleazy bar. But endure they do, some sixteen years, in fact, even though Jim’s youthful glow means that, at best, he was seduced as a sixth grader. But he’s dressed as a seasoned Navy man, so that’s not entirely believable. But George mourns, as we all do; only he’s not allowed to do so openly, as it would seem odd for a grown man to weep over his gentleman friend unless sexually involved. Which was unseemly for the time, as the film never tires of pointing out. And sure, it’s sad that a man can’t toss flowers graveside or demand an adjoining plot. But Ford’s film asks that we accept George as a symbol of a numbing, barbaric age, even though he lives far better than any teacher ever has, at least if we are to measure our success by the usual yardsticks of wealth, security, and real estate. You see, George is, like all gay men throughout recorded history, astoundingly well-off, which makes it almost impossible to feel for his plight. That, and the man could get laid standing in line at the bank. With money to burn and blowjobs at the ready, one wonders how being gay is the new black. Who among us wouldn’t deal with daily incontinence if it meant a gorgeous spread in a pre-Watts Los Angeles? Or so much currency that one can leave stuffed thank-you envelopes for the maid? Or maybe, you know, the maid herself?

As if the student weren’t enough, George is also propositioned by a Spanish stud after bumping chests at a liquor store. Needless to say, he’s named Carlos. When most of us finally decide we’ve had enough of the world, we’d be likely to get the finger. George gets opportunities for anal. But see, the world is teeming with such avenues because, well, everyone is gay. Or wanting to be. Here, I was reminded of Before Night Falls, a critically-acclaimed movie about a Cuba that, if even remotely accurate, was the Fire Island of the Caribbean. And I’ll be damned if any writing or poetry took place, as every bathroom stall not nailed down was packed to the gills with gyrating gentlemen and exposed penises. It was as if Castro sought not a Communist utopia, but a haven for the world’s leather set. And so we have A Single Man, where gay men do not interact with, speak about, or relate to anything that isn’t about sex. They curse oversimplification and stereotype, then do little but reinforce them over the course of a given story. George and Jim are meant to be an enviable couple, but mutual attraction is all we’re given as a selling point. I can’t exactly hope for a world that would embrace their nuptials, then, as that would be the surest way to remove that which defines their coupling. And Jesus, George, sixteen seasons of uninterrupted lovemaking? Where a lover’s flesh never sags, and glows more golden with the years? We should all be so persecuted.

At last, we have George’s neighbors, a heterosexual couple defined by its inauthenticity, which means unhappiness reigns wherever men are not allowed to add the bathhouse to their to-do list. They are silly and repressed people, if only because their love is based on a lie. And George’s best friend Charley, played by an unusually sedate Julianne Moore, is the epitome of heterosexual unhappiness, as her own marriage fizzled inside of an hour. And so she’s longed for George ever since, topped by her tendency to drink away the pain. Charley’s evil is verbalized when she dismisses George’s love affair with Jim as a mere trifle; an experimental dalliance that couldn’t possibly mean as much as the straight world’s interpretation. Citing longevity as proof that in fact it does mean more, George falls into the trap of thinking endurance itself connotes meaning, when few would trade a weekend of fluid-swapping for decades of cold indifference, between the sheets and otherwise. Moreover, George seems to love Jim for no other reason than his beefy chest, so he’d best avoid the casting of stones. Are his memories and flashbacks not exclusively of Jim’s physical attributes? Eyes, lips, and torso? But that seems to be Ford’s mission, to so fetishize the male form that we’ll leave the theater as foot soldiers in the cause. Or at least a little hard. He weeps aloud for our collective humanity, then pisses it all away with the ultimate in degrading reductionism. How silly, then, to deny us the poor chap’s suicide, felling him instead with a foreshadowed heart attack, as if to preserve his martyrdom for all time. Not by his own hand, but God’s; a homophobic deity presiding over a world that still refuses to learn.

Miranda July

Born in 1974 in Barre, Vermont, likely to a bearded mid-wife as the winter wind whipped a patriarchal moon, Ms. July, merely responsible for the criminal act otherwise known as Me and You and Everyone We Know (“merely” in a way that Stalin merely purged his republics of entire generations), is perhaps the decade’s most emblematic atrocity; a self-absorbed, self-involved, dull-witted razor across the wrists of a dying culture who so upped the quirk quotient that we’ll likely never again witness a straight face. Her maiden cinematic effort, the type where her sweet-tempered cancer of a character asks only that you call her at 3am, utter the word “macaroni”, and return to your obsessive navel-gazing, left me reeling for the better half of the decade, and at last gave the Mark David Chapman in me my own personal John Lennon. And then, as if to nudge us ever closer to the brink, she released a collection of smirking short stories, No One Belongs Here More than You, coupled with the short film, Are You the Favorite Person of Anyone?, which posits that if someone, somewhere isn’t thinking about you every minute of every day, it’s best to fill the gap yourself, preferably with doodle-ridden post-it notes. Among her other accomplishments, she wears funny hats, goofy glasses, and wide belts, and isn’t above going out in public sans bra. She also believes that if it can’t be done with a dollop of gay, a cup of whimsy, and a bucket of menstrual blood blessed by an Apache medicine man, it isn’t worth doing at all. Thankfully, she’s left us the world’s worst website (www.mirandajuly.com), which obnoxiously shifts everything to the right side of the screen, while proving that any revolution worth its salt must first figure out the ideal daily affirmation to leave on one’s pillow. I’d wish a brutal rape upon her vile soul, but she’d only turn it into an award-winning performance piece.

Erin Brockovich

Every decade needs its feminist icon, and who better than a self-righteous, screeching slab of entitlement fury portrayed by Julia Roberts? Oh, that Erin, having all those kids by all those different fathers, flying into a rage when her free babysitter has the audacity to move away, or believing that big tits and a gaping vagina are reasonable substitutes for a law degree. She’s the All-American gal: pushy, vain, and compensating for her mental midgetry with sassy put-downs and the kind of reverse-snobbery only a white trash mother could love. And why not? While others slave away with the actual heavy lifting, she’s sitting on assorted couches listening to sob stories and bullying boob-struck men into letting her photocopy sensitive documents. By all means pay her millions of dollars! Yes, she’s the kind of woman who fucks degenerate bikers, quits jobs where she’s not allowed to dress like a prostitute, drops out of school in the 3^rd grade, and nastily rebukes anyone who isn’t charmed by her abusive demeanor, all while bemoaning the unfairness of a cruel world. And yet, she’s consistently rewarded for her efforts, as if to argue that because women aren’t cut out for life with accountability, they should chug any cock that will sign their paycheck. It’s not a bad argument, if only the film meant it. No, Erin is the bulldog heroine in the best populist tradition; the relentless bur in the backside of corporate greed and masculine indifference. In reality, she’s the decade’s flowering of femininity: the world will forgive your hateful, bitter, brain-blasting ways so long as you look good in a mini-skirt. Act like this with the mug of Betty Friedan, and guess who’ll be collecting unemployment.

Garden State

We all know a guy like Zach Braff –  hip, smug, indifferent to the world’s turn – but how many secure the necessary funds to write and direct a motion picture? Fortunately, the world is unkind, though this film and its rush of imitators are enough to degrade our collective taste all on their own. Yep, there’s adorable Zach in the corner of the classroom, gripping his dog-eared notebook while he chews pensively on his writing instrument. He stares at the ceiling for a moment, flashes that unmistakable grin yet again, and quickly jots down another idea.  He’ll recall bits of a conversation he had the week before, adding a dash of color to push it along just so into the realm of the unbelievable. Here a scene, there a scene, all lacking continuity, of course, but making for brilliant set pieces in search of an idea. Year after year, Zach collects these tidbits and morsels of twee for the movie to come; the one he feels compelled to make, and will most assuredly bring him the fame promised by guidance counselors and smothering Jewish mothers alike. The hero, a drug-addled young man coping with loss, who believes recovery can only be found in the mad eyes of an eccentric epileptic who conducts hamster funerals when she isn’t collecting your tears in a Dixie cup. And be sure to add the kid who wears a full suit of armor at the breakfast table, or the Gulf War trading cards, or screaming with cathartic release next to a boat that’s been turned into a house, or maybe even a rich kid who invented something he calls silent Velcro. Or match the hero’s shirt with the wallpaper while a sad pop song plays on the soundtrack. Or even the odd duck of a black guy who becomes a detective to find out who exactly urinated on his video game console. My god, how we loved them all. Representative of no one, reminding us of even less, we were transfixed in no uncertain terms; imagination unhinged in the face of cruel conformity. He spoke at last for a generation that can’t stop talking about itself.

Zooey Deschanel

She first came to my attention in the fevered nightmare of All the Real Girls. She told me she had a dream where she invented peanut butter. Then she stood – like that – in the bowling alley. You know, the way one does when they want the whole fucking enterprise to shut down and look in their direction. She demanded love, and got it, because every man on earth should want the girl most likely to leave you 634 voicemails on the Friday you don’t call her back. She’s the girl who speaks in riddles, sing-song blather, and allusions to college radio. And then in Yes Man, where she fronts a group called Munchausen By Proxy, a bar band with three fans, just in case you wondered how she could afford to live in Los Angeles. And in case she didn’t have you convinced of her authenticity, she put a seahorse on her head to, you know, separate herself from someone who gives a damn. But again, you’ll love her, because she’s so cute and cuddly and warm and fuzzy and, well, psychotic, but in a way that might lead to anal. And then, in (500) Days of Summer, she’s the new Annie Hall, a la-de-da sweetheart for a new generation unaccustomed to sanity in their women. She has you at hello because she’s unpredictable, zany, and prone to chronic unemployment. She’s the girl who doesn’t have to try, falling back on soft tones, warm eyes, and a paycheck that involves leading joggers at 6am as they learn how to take pictures as they sprint. A fuckable Miranda July who loves video games, comic books, and your kind of music which is so fucking cool, if only you don’t mind the crying fits, bizarre disappearances, and requests to dance naked in the rain. She’s hot, but not too hot; approachable enough for desperate nerds everywhere who don’t mind a pink, spangle-dusted boot heel on the groin whenever you fall and fall hard. She’s irony incarnate, and gone by breakfast. She was also in my favorite movie of the past 25 years, which might be her most devious crime yet.

Juno

When the history of this most appalling decade is written, few need consult a source outside the comfy confines of Diablo Cody’s ode to the improbably articulate teenager; the one film of its time so pre-occupied with being clever and smarmy and whip-smart that it failed to realize its own rich status as the most conservative slice of American culture since the slasher film equated sex with violent death. But that’s our Diablo: so desperate to jam in allusions to cartoons and TV icons that pre-date our heroine’s birth by mere decades that she becomes the only pro-life advocate with pink hair and a guild card. Sure, young people do in fact speak in sly slogans and tele-speak, but the ones who get pregnant don’t exactly have two working parents around to gently poke their ribs. Hell, they don’t even stay in school. But rather than delve into the reality of teenage motherhood, with its poverty, neglect, and decided humorlessness, our sweet Juno makes it so damn appealing that we’d gladly submit our own for insemination if it meant they’d be as well-read and up to speed on classic rock. It’s the Hollywood gloss that grates, and the insistence that language should get us nowhere but the next witticism. There’s also a creepy condescension afoot, where Diablo’s sense of superiority is voiced by the stepmom-cum-nail tech, a stand-in for the armchair populist’s sense that expertise or accomplishment are diminished in the face of knowing the names of He-Man’s comrades. Where being flippant can get the job done just as well as training, education, and dedication to craft. And where even the most sarcastic, mean-spirited demon can’t Shop-Vac her spawn because being smart is always a cover for being scared shitless. Oh yeah, and Michael Cera. And the Daniel Johnston-inspired soundtrack. And the track team motif. And a mailbox overrun with Tic-Tacs. Because we all know the corner store that stocks them by the thousands.

Dishonorable Mentions:

Slumdog Millionaire – Because the most beautiful woman in India shall be sold into prostitution and remain a virgin.

Wes Anderson – Because you forever ruined “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard.”

Adrienne Shelly – Because she’s dead and gone and I want to kill her myself for Waitress.

Lady in the Water – Because having a character named Cleveland Heep was not the worst thing about it.

Jennifer Hudson – Because she now has exactly one more Oscar than Stanley Kubrick for bleeding out eardrums worldwide in a ghetto fright wig.

The Pursuit of Happyness – Because homeless black men so rarely become millionaires. Or demand sole custody.

Rent – Because transvestites with AIDS should pay for their own damn cups of coffee.

A History of Violence – Because William Hurt is not Irish. Or a gangster. Or an actor.

The Passion of the Christ – Because I don’t like to mix my anti-Semitism with my homoeroticism, at least not in public.

The Brown Bunny – Because the biggest assholes always have the biggest cocks. Always, I says.

What the Bleep Do We Know? – Because New Age is the new Christianity. And stupid is the same stupid.

Dare me to hate a movie, and I’ll be damned if I don’t do just that, especially when I’m also asked to forgive a bounty of head-slapping clichés simply because the director has the ability to stare down the naysayers into a stupefied silence. Invictus is simply The Mighty Ducks with Gandhi as the zamboni driver, or Little Giants featuring Mother Teresa in zebra stripes. Here, the sport is rugby, which only makes matters worse, as the game will be incomprehensible to the only people who will bother to show up for this monstrosity. Yeah, the South African team wins the World Cup in the end, but I’d have no idea had the scoreboard not flashed the final tally in bold, clear numbers, or Eastwood not resorted to the slo-mo standby. From where I sat, people formed some huge huddle, passed the ball around, and kicked it through some uprights while playing grab-ass from time to time. For all the fucking sense this made, they could have been engaging in nude wrestling for the future of mankind and I would not have been the wiser. As expected, the final match is against the Best Team in All the World, a New Zealand unit reduced to a handy symbol: the Maori superstar who grunts and powers his way forward with one dynamic set of thighs. Still, as dehumanized as they are, they’re still kindred spirits in emptiness with the South African team, even if they’re presumably the ones we care about. Thank goodness we have Matt Damon to bond with, even if he does have that funny accent.

The big game, stripped of joy, excitement, and coherence, comes about due solely to Mandela’s need to heal the country after being elected president. Rather than dismantle this once damning bulwark of apartheid, Mandela uses it to unite the races around a central point of pride and self-respect. It’s a wholly populist move, one that reveals Mandela’s understanding of the power of political symbolism. Such keen insight might mean something in a deeper, more ambitious picture, but as translated by Freeman, it’s more a ticking of the clock until the necessary third act denouement. Freeman’s Mandela is no more a flesh and blood man than had he been created by computer, and it’s a testament to his own powers of persuasion that he’s allowed to get away with it (and secure the expected Best Actor nomination). I didn’t buy this shuck and jive for a single minute, and for a film centered around such an engaging real-life personality, the film actually suffers whenever he appears. Freeman’s Mandela is in a state of perpetual winking; always more clever than anyone else in the room, not because he proves it, but because he’s not to be questioned as Africa’s Jesus. My god, the man even pours his own tea! And partakes of a nightly jog with only two bodyguards! The lone attempt to render him real – a scene involving a question about his estranged family – is brushed aside so quickly we can’t be sure it actually took place.

Given the setting and subject matter, it should come as no surprise that, outside of the rugby matches, there are but two types of scenes left us: the smiling, cheering facades of anonymous blacks as they gather around the radio or TV, and black and white members of the new administration eyeing each other warily, usually as they mumble under their breath. And yes, such silliness culminates in the only possible culmination, where the two biggest adversaries on the security detail come close to hugging after the championship match, only to agree to a hearty handshake. Elsewhere, a young black boy, whom we are led to believe is about to rob a taxi, is actually just trying to hear the game on the radio, and darn it all, is he not lifted to the sky by a once-sneering Afrikaner after the final whistle? Speaking of red herrings, what about the one where we think this shady white dude is casing the stadium for an assassination attempt, only to become an even shadier pilot we think is about to crash a jet onto the field, only to be revealed at last as the ultimate rugby fan by virtue of the cheerful message he has written on the underbelly of the plane? Regardless of the historical record, I refuse to believe this shit ever happened, and shame on Eastwood for perusing the screenplay and raising no objections. That it’s dopey is beyond dispute, but it also stands as one of the most manipulative elements of a movie that thinks little of having you in a vicious choke hold for over two hours. Why not have the mostly white rugby team visit Mandela’s former prison cell while you’re at it? Or play some Lion King shit on the soundtrack whenever black people appear, or that Ladysmith Black Mambazo from that Paul Simon record? Wait, what? Really? Fuck me again.

And does Freeman recite the poem that gave us the film’s title in a soaring voiceover? What was it old Red said as he got busy living? You goddamn right.

Nanette Bernstein can go straight to hell. Instead of a probing, investigative look at the rot passing for American youth, this “documentary” filmmaker saw fit instead to celebrate the pastiche of quirkiness that has all but swallowed our civilization alive. More than that, the movie is a lie from the opening bell, as the director has clearly re-created scenes, assigned dialogue, and fashioned scenarios that would fit with her pre-conceived agenda. As such, authenticity takes a backseat to a “good story,” which might apply if the only criteria were a platform for self-obsessed monsters lusting for martyrdom. And let’s not forget Hannah Bailey, my selection as the year’s most vile creature. Among her many sins, she rails against the beautiful people, yet joins them the first chance she gets, and despite claiming to be above it all, is sidelined with depression the moment she isn’t noticed by the guy of her dreams. And oh how she dances! Yes, she’s one of those obsessively creative types who wants to act, sing, write, paint, sculpt, and build not for the inherent worth of art, but to be noticed, praised, and handsomely paid. I haven’t hated someone so completely in years, but Bernstein thinks she’s a star; a worthy young woman who should garner our sympathies and hugs. I hope for a sequel, but only if it centers on the little cunt’s funeral.

The Devil and Daniel Johnston (2006)

In many ways, the treatment of the mentally ill has made great strides over the years, resulting in scientific breakthroughs and enlightened attitudes that have genuinely improved lives. And yet, despite understanding much more than we ever have regarding the human brain, we have reversed course once again and threaten to move into a new barbarism, though one that avoids stigma, physical abuse, and grotesque warehousing. Instead, we have reached a critical new low, where in fact we so romanticize the mentally ill that they become objects of amusement, rather than desperately sick human beings in need of care. In our desire to remove the pain that comes with diagnosis, we believe that these people are no different than anyone else, and are simply in possession of “quirks” or “eccentricities” rather than deep, and often dangerous afflictions. It’s a bizarre cultural turn than once had good intentions, but now does far more harm to the patients themselves, as they are encouraged to so indulge their sickness that it becomes confused with “brilliance”. The Devil and Daniel Johnston is, in fact, one of the most vile symbols of this new course, as it takes a sad, demented individual (likely a schizophrenic, but surely a severe manic depressive) and rather than pull him aside for hospitalization, turns him into a hip rock star; a cult hero whose music and drawings reveal a genius that hasn’t been seen since Dylan’s basement tapes. Or so his former manager would have us believe.

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (2008)

Who knew that Ben Stein, that sad-eyed, monotone little man from the silver screen, harbored a heart so black and so twisted that he – not Pat Robertson or James Dobson – would argue, without a trace of irony, that Charles Darwin was directly responsible for the Holocaust? The scene where Stein stands before a statue of the great thinker – you know, the one where the soundtrack features the exact same music as that which filled the screen during shots of Europe’s death camps – is so morally and ethically insidious that I couldn’t help but wonder why Mama and Papa Stein had been spared during the period. As expected, every possible scientific argument is twisted to serve Stein’s agenda, and interviews are selectively edited to ensure that the scientists themselves are turned into stammering clowns. Stein, though a Republican, always struck me as a man who was reasonably intelligent at the very least, but having decided that his inane Jewish heritage is suddenly more important than the whole of Western thought, he has joined with the mouth-breathers and truth assassins at last. More than a shot across evolution’s bow, this is a no-holds-barred war against the Enlightenment and all it hath wrought through the ages. Depressing, mean-spirited, and devious to its core, Expelled celebrates stupidity as the American virtue.

Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus (2004)

Think of the possibilities — filmmaker Andrew Douglas picks up a classic Chevy convertible and takes us on a journey through the deep, deep South, where the Pentecostal religion oozes out of every pore, and the music stands as a reflection of their sorrow, woe, and passion for life. What would we find on this bizarre trip? Snake-handlers? Faith-healers? Murderous fundamentalists? Yes, we found the nuts, the losers, the freaks, and the schizos, but Douglas, rather than genuinely explore their lives with critical detail (or at the very least, detached objectivity), has genuine fondness for these people, believing that they and they alone have found authenticity in the American landscape. As such, the trip becomes a loving valentine to a people; the very sort who deserve our unending scorn for failing to evolve beyond the 18th century. Admirable? Why, because they believe in a literal heaven and hell? That running water is a tool of the devil? And because Douglas is such an irritating guide, he makes it as much about him as his subjects, which leaves me with absolutely no one to care about. But here’s the kicker — we explore Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Kentucky, and at no time (and I mean AT NO TIME) do we see any black people. Not one man, woman, or child. That would be like filming a documentary about Los Angeles without finding a single Latino. Honestly, can anyone hope to understand Southern music without blacks? Are you fucking kidding me? That glaring omission pissed me off, and caused me to question the director’s motives. Conclusion? He’s a racist asshole who would rather spend time with some drunk lunatic with a hard-on for Jesus than an old bluesman.

Tarnation (2004)

Ignore the hype, disregard the bullshit regarding the film’s budget ($218 my ass), and prepare yourself for one of the most unpleasant (gay) experiences you’ll have in front of a movie screen. Do I say this because the film concerns a young (gay) man’s portrait of his nutty mother, in addition to the abuse, the foster homes, and the pain? You know me better than that. I enjoy depressing films, and am usually dissatisfied unless someone worthwhile dies violently. Jonathan Caouette’s (gay) movie stinks up the joint not because of its honesty, but rather because of its fundamental dishonesty. Far from a cathartic experience, this is (gay) narcissism in its ugliest form; an 88-minute excuse for a wannabe (gay) actor, wannabe (gay) filmmaker, and wannabe (gay) All-American star to stick his pathetic (gay) mug before the camera at every opportunity, all in the hopes that he’ll get noticed by someone at the William Morris Agency. Even the scenes of (gay) despair seem staged, as if (gay) Jonathan knew that the best way to attract attention to himself was to emote like some (gay) method actor. As the format is limited — Caouette pulled together photographs, (gay) home movies, answering machine messages, and (gay) phone calls, and slapped them together on his home computer — any (gay) meaning must be extracted from what are obviously disconnected items. But the only theme I could find was that whenever there was something to be filmed, (gay) Jonathan was there. And hey, anyone who films every last detail of their (gay) life from age 11 is clearly someone who has planned for (and expects) fame to drop in his (gay) lap at some future moment.

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While perhaps disappointing to those expecting a skillfully edited montage of bodies breaking apart on the waves while power chords drift and moan, The Bridge is much more than a voyeuristic death rattle. The images of human beings jumping from San Francisco’s famed Golden Gate Bridge are undeniably wrenching, but this is not exploitation. We watch because we must; these stories, told by friends and loved ones after the sad events have taken place, need that final act to lend credence to the words of the survivors. Their anger, sadness, and sense of betrayal deserve the big leap, for what other cruel reminder could suffice to let us know that for that brief moment, a monstrous selfishness won out over the feelings of others? One’s death is one’s own to be sure, as we’re the ones who have to experience it, but to watch these people — men and women, young and old alike — pace, pause, reflect, and finally jump, could only lock down the understanding that suicide is vanity’s last gift to the world; a final kiss of hoped-for infamy that will force civilization, even an extremely small portion of it, to never be able to forget. Why else would anyone commit suicide in this manner?

Cocaine Cowboys (2006)

Corben’s film is so damned exhilarating because of its self-conscious, hip style, but the facts of the matter are what sell this glitzy package. There is no shortage of interviews, news accounts, archival footage, and anecdotes to punch it all home, but its guiding theme — much like the nostalgia we feel for the older, better, mob-driven Vegas — transforms mere journalism into a grand sociological statement, irrefutable in its logic. Is the American dream — our dream — on par with the brutality and greed of barely literate, amoral gangsters? Not line for line, of course, but there stands that brilliant, glass-filled Miami skyline — a testament to economic power and success — and what else brought it from dirt and dust but the billions of dollars generated by drug sales? No one’s denying that cocaine country was a brutal, rigged game that enriched but a chosen few (no parallels to the “legitimate” economy, eh?), but their money (and theirs alone) bought the houses, drove the cars, paid the bills, raised the clubs, the restaurants, and the bars, and, most of all, was laundered through dozens of wildcat banks, which in turn promoted a construction boom unlike anything the area had ever seen. Throughout, cops, politicians, and all those deemed “respectable”, knowingly turned away. It’s worth noting that while the rest of the country suffered through a recession in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Miami maintained its time in the sun, as if walled off from reality by a haze of addiction. Snowblind, indeed.

Darwin’s Nightmare (2006)

The cinematic arts are often meant to inspire, instruct, and entertain, but on those rare occasions when the mood has but one direction, they are meant to produce a level of disgust and outrage so overwhelming that it’s all one can do to get home in one piece. Darwin’s Nightmare, Hubert Sauper’s new documentary, is so punishing in its bleakness, in fact, that it acts as a white flag for all further endeavors. The liberal humanist in me always wants to believe that mankind might improve, or that through various political actions, despair and exploitation might be tempered with a bit of justice, but after today, I can’t point to a single shred of evidence that justifies my cautious optimism. After 107 minutes of such pain, cruelty, savagery, and callousness masking itself as “the laws of business,” I’m not sure how to approach each and every hour of the coming days; where I am constantly reminded that we in the West — fat, content, and so blissfully successful that we have to invent problems in the absence of real troubles — must either check out via the blade, bullet, or pill, or else find a way to live with hypocrisy and crushing guilt. As I’ll still be here tomorrow, I know I’ve made my decision (I’m no saint), and I’m not nearly sanctimonious enough to judge others for joining me on my well-trod path. The world suffers, whereas I do not, and I’d be lying if I claimed to be doing anything real about it. That said, Darwin’s Nightmare is a perfect repudiation of the idea that anything can be done at all, absent altering man’s essential nature. With atomic weapons.

Deep Water (2006)

I’m convinced that no one returns from the sea unchanged, and more than any other form of adventure available to the ever-curious human animal, it holds the greatest risk of madness and death. The lust for exploration is built into our very DNA, and we the timid owe a great deal to those who pushed beyond their borders to better the lot of mankind. But now that the conquering spirit has been tamed by our modern age, all that remains is adventure for its own sake — contests, competitions, and collisions of ego that might hold vicarious thrills for spectators, but by and large are little more than senseless trips of vanity. So if we are to concern ourselves with these stories any longer, there must be an insight into the human experience that moves beyond mere winners and losers. Thankfully, Deep Water is just such a tale; a documentary that begins with a now-forgotten competition (a 1969 London Times-sponsored event that would bestow a cash prize upon the first man to complete a solo boat trip around the world), and winds up as an examination of man’s fragility so profound that it leaves us stunned.

Grizzly Man (2005)

Werner Herzog’s decidedly unromantic vision of the natural world and the foolish vanity of man was the year’s most thought-provoking work; a hammer blow to a curious self-absorption that pits the lust for relevance against an indifferent habitat that knows only survival. Timothy Treadwell, the poor sap in question, just might be insane, but there’s a touch of innocence in his quest to devote his life to Alaska’s bears, which is precisely what gets him killed. In this realm, after all, only cold-eyed realism will suffice. Herzog, as expected, is fascinated by this man’s obsession (he is our best chronicler of human beings at the extremes), and while he refuses to judge from a privileged position, the narration speaks to a differing point of view that makes Treadwell’s account seem hopeless by comparison. And no film better captured the unique intersection of sadness, thrill-seeking, and delusion so often found in individuals unable to find their place in an increasingly alienating world. At the end, we can safely assume that Treadwell wanted to die — on his terms — for martyrdom quickly supplants all else in the mind of a narcissist. In all, a devastating account, and it deserves to be recognized as among the finest documentaries ever made.

The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007)

Ali vs Frazier. Bird vs Magic. Borg vs McEnroe. Wiebe vs Mitchell. Of all the great rivalries of sport, it is arguably the latter that best defines the American experience, despite being the least recognized, as well as the only one that did not actually involve head-to-head competition. But don’t be distracted by the absence of a field, rink, or stadium, or even a blood-filled trench of athletic endeavor, because these two men, far, far away from arenas packed with roaring crowds, did battle in garages, basements, and lonely arcades, where only the nerdy and nostalgic do not fear to tread. The game is Donkey Kong, the warfare is real, and by the end, we have witnessed a film with as many twists and turns as the boldest fiction, with heroes atop noble steeds and dastardly evildoers in black hats to match. Seth Gordon’s The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters travels through these minefields of obsession, compulsion, arrogance, and unholy competition, but above all, takes the lives of two men — Steve Wiebe and Billy Mitchell — and the classic video game that has consumed each for the better part of the past quarter-century. It is a heartfelt, unflinching look at a bizarre, almost grotesque subculture, but more than that, it channels the drive to escape anonymity and mediocrity that afflicts high and low alike. And while we might recoil in horror at the utter seriousness by which these gamers live out their days, it is impossible not to end the screening in hysterics. Above all, this is a riotous, supremely entertaining work, and through style, music (Leonard Cohen has never seemed more appropriate), personality, and the complete absence of condescension, it becomes one of the best films of the year.

Overnight (2004)

As an exploration of hubris and unrestrained ego, I’ve never seen a more blistering portrait than Overnight, and I doubt I’ll ever encounter a viler monster than self-proclaimed genius Troy Duffy. A Shakespearean villain who would have both Richard III and Lady Macbeth for breakfast, Duffy was Hollywood’s new “Golden Boy” back in 1997, when his screenplay for The Boondock Saints sent movie executives scrambling for both dollars and superlatives. Given the opportunity of a lifetime (a generous contract to direct the film, as well as a record deal for his band The Brood), Troy lost it all not because of unfortunate circumstances or the cruelties of fate, but due entirely to his own bitterness, stupidity, arrogance, and unparalleled vanity. The film is both a document of a poor boy’s rise to the top (the filmmakers were initially asked to chronicle a “star in the making”), and a complete meltdown that might have been perceived as tragic had Troy had an ounce of human decency. About fifteen minutes in, we know what’s coming (Troy is a prick to everyone, especially the most powerful people in the business), but the ride down is never anything less than a laugh-filled, entertaining riot; the most glaring example of schadenfreude ever witnessed. I’d sooner trust my fate to Hitler, Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao or Pol Pot than Mr. Duffy, the most putrid stain on humanity since the earth first cooled. I defy you to spend 81 more pleasurable minutes in the presence of something that isn’t naked.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (2003)

Everything filmmaking should be: passionate, exhilarating, dramatic, and spirited. This documentary about the attempted coup in the spring of 2002 against Hugo Chavez, the democratically elected President of Venezuela, contains the pure, heart-pounding excitement of a summer action movie because we are witnessing history (and life) as it unfolds; raw and unscripted. Originally, the filmmakers (Ireland’s Kim Bartley and Donnacha O’Briain) were in Venezuela to make a film about Chavez alone, but a military coup began as they were filming and their cameras continued to roll throughout the crisis. We are taken right into the heart of demonstrations, behind the doors of the Presidential palace, and into the minds of both the participants and those defending the Constitutional order. The film does not shy away from its sympathies for Chavez and his radical reforms, which posed a great threat to the ruling elite as well as an American government heavily dependent on Venezuela’s oil. After witnessing how little respect conservative forces in that country have for democracy and the rule of law, we can make connections to our own country — whenever an election doesn’t go their way, right-wingers seem hell-bent on reversing the “unfortunate” outcome, regardless of morality or simple legality. And based on how much American corporations had to lose from Chavez’s nationalistic and redistribution policies, it stands to reason that America strongly endorsed — if not outright aided — the coup attempt. But again, politics aside, this is filmmaking at its finest: literally edge-of-your-seat fire and anger swirl about, leaving the viewer dizzy with outrage. Easily one of the best films of the year and frankly, a masterpiece of the documentary form.

Running Stumbled (2006)

Johnny Roe, Jr. and his common-law wife Virgie Marie Pennoui, once beautiful, talented, and full of life, are now the scariest, most bizarre human beings you’re ever likely to see; two lost souls so pathetic, so riddled with addiction, abuse, and self-loathing, that not even John Cassavetes, tortured by visions of Grey Gardens and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, could have conceived of characters so demented. They are sick, vile, appalling, and unnaturally cruel; dancing around a relationship that long ago ceased to be anything other than sadomasochistic dependency, crossed with a heavy dose of murderous rage. Only they’re real — all too real — and their passion play is set before Johnny’s estranged son, rather than an indifferent director. Having not seen his birth father for over 25 years (he was taken from the home after his father deliberately crashed the car they were riding in, bringing forth charges of attempted murder), he has brought his camera to a dirty, dank home in Terrytown, Louisiana in order to exploit the living hell out of people he has never really known. And thank fuck for that, as what transpires is a hilarious, gut-busting treat; not only one of the best films of the year, but one of the most entertaining visions of hell in the history of the cinema. The truest test of its greatness lies in the fact that at 83 minutes, it’s not even remotely long enough, and I could have watched this bloody train wreck for dozens of hours, if not days. Hell, let’s cut to the chase: it’s damn near a masterpiece for our times. Seek it out immediately if you value all that is honorable and true.

The Staircase (2004)

I hadn’t experienced an emotional reversal of fortune this dramatic since discovering that the soft-featured prostitute devouring my member was, in fact, a transsexual named Robert. Like that moonlit night long ago, an orgasm is still an orgasm, but it’s forever tempered by disgust and shame. Jean-Xavier de Lestrade’s documentary The Staircase, then, is a cinematic wonder of technique, insight, and suspense, though after a bit of research within minutes of the film’s conclusion – I had neglected such things prior to the screening, so as to avoid ruining the surprise – I was forced to undertake an immediate reassessment tantamount to a thunderous rug-pulling. While the film played – all six hours of it, spread out over three nights – I was enthralled, stimulated, and even pushed to the brink, but now that I know the facts of the case, the film becomes a hollow exercise in manipulation, deception, and outright falsehood. I’ve been hoodwinked and bamboozled, ladies and gentlemen, and I feel like an utter fool. No, the film portrays an actual case (this is no mockumentary) with flesh and blood human beings occupying the frame, but instead of taking us through the intricacies of the event, the filmmaker instead operates from a position of contemptible bias; using his film to fulfill a sinister agenda, rather than shed light on an infamous murder trial.

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Barely released and seen by no one, Karen Moncrieff’s The Dead Girl is a spare, wholly depressing collection of interlocking stories, all of which center around the sad, pathetic life of Krista (Brittany Murphy), the young woman of the title who is found dead at the film’s opening. The theme of connectedness is, by this late date, trite and overused (and likely buried for good after the Crash debacle), but this time around, it’s less about a sense of togetherness than the surrender of hope. These people are linked not because they help each other, or put things in perspective, or offer convenient life lessons about shared responsibility, but only so that we might see how many lives this little stink of a girl helped ruin along the way to her untimely, but entirely expected death. As Krista is a whore, a drug addict, a runaway, and a shitty mother to boot, she’s refreshingly unsympathetic, as we know her death came not as she was on the heels of redemption, but simply as cruel happenstance that could have easily been something else at some other time. Yes, she’s brutally murdered, but given her habits, an overdose or back alley beating could have been just around the corner. I’m not even sure there’s a larger message to be had, thank fuck. Instead, this is simply a somber tale about an abused woman who suffered, failed again and again, and died. She’s the kind of girl who left a trail of sorrow behind, but also one who will be stripped, prepped, buried, and easily forgotten. She’s quite literally “the dead girl” – nameless, anonymous, and hopelessly irrelevant.

The first story, “The Stranger,” involves the painfully meek Arden (Toni Collette), a cruelly browbeaten woman who lives with her tyrannical mother (Piper Laurie) and, as the movie opens, happens to come across Krista’s body. The discovery brings some unwanted attention by the media, as well as the wrath of her mother, who appears to be the type who would unleash a 20-minute monologue for having her bathwater too cold. Arden’s sudden brush with fame (or what passes for it in her world) leads to a date with Rudy (Giovanni Ribisi), a dimwitted cretin who appears to be interested because Arden just might be an easy lay. At the very least, the body’s discovery seems to bring Arden somewhat to life, as she does her hair and puts on makeup for what must be the first time in years. Her mother is appalled, all but says she wishes Arden had died instead of her brother, and eventually drives Arden to an explosion of her own. It is here, in the first but most tangentially related segment, where a pattern begins: the establishment of sexual dysfunction as the root of all evil. Perhaps that’s overstating the case a bit, but there isn’t a moment of healthy sexual contact to be had in the whole of the movie, and Arden is so deranged that she seems to think being tied up by a relative stranger — even raped, if the occasion calls for it — is normal, if not expected. Here is a woman who never escaped the shadow of a domineering parent, which stifled any and all social skills, including normal sexual urges and exploration.

Next up is “The Sister,” which focuses on Leah (Rose Byrne), a depressed medical student who, while performing an autopsy, comes across the dead girl and believes it to be her sister, who had been abducted 15 years before. Thankfully, it is not the same girl (such a coincidence would have been too silly to believe), but she wants it to be so, if only finally to put the matter to bed and get her mom back, who has been rigidly obsessed with locating her daughter. While under the impression that the body is her sister’s, she is able to escape her own fog, finally accepting a young man’s party invitation and even enjoying a round of sex. But with the revelation that the dental records do not match, she is sent back into her morose state, which will likely continue until the actual body is found. Once again, we have a female character who has no real relationship with her mother (it’s likely that in her maniacal focus on getting her daughter back, mom retained little emotional connection with everyone else who remained in the house), and as such is rudderless regarding interpersonal relations.

Third, “The Wife,” brings us the man who will eventually take Krista’s life, but his story is secondary to that of Ruth (Mary Beth Hurt), his frantic wife who can’t understand why he’s constantly leaving for hours at a time. One day, she finds some suspicious garments in a chest of drawers that sits in a storage unit the couple owns. She eventually discovers a driver’s license that happens to belong to one of the women recently found murdered in the area. She’s horrified, of course, but does little but use the information to taunt her husband, never actually pushing it to the level of full-tilt accusation. One would think that this knowledge would be enough to send Ruth to the cops or another state altogether, but she hesitates and changes her mind, as we quickly deduce that this is the sort of woman who wouldn’t know what to do without her unhappy circumstances. At least it’s predictable, she might argue. Finally, she collects all of the garments and sets them aflame, saving her own attire for last. Walking away completely nude, we can’t imagine she’ll return to her husband, but why else would she enable his crimes? And given that she’s tolerated her husband’s constant whoring for years, why care now simply because he’s killing them?

From there, we move to “The Mother,” which tells the story of Melora (Marcia Gay Harden), the dead girl’s estranged mother. She arrives in L.A. from the state of Washington to identify and “collect” her daughter, who left after having endured sexual abuse at the hands of her stepfather. The “abuse leads to prostitution” line is a bit tired, but despite my hopes that women could enter the sex trade for orgasmic and altruistic reasons, it is an unavoidable reality that such women are almost always damaged goods. Alas, it’s a failure of our species that good girls from stable homes don’t leave the nest and start chugging cock for a living. Melora also discovers that her daughter has a child of her own, which she is now, by guilt alone, obligated to raise. Melora spends much of her time with her daughter’s roommate, Rosetta (Kerry Washington), a fellow junkie and whore who, when not sleeping away her days, spends most waking hours getting beaten to a pulp. It’s a tramp’s life, and no heart of gold lies behind this bruised chest. She’s about money, and the fix, and trusting men who let her down, so spare her the lectures about getting back on her feet. Melora offers, of course, but Rosetta knows better. A fresh start is pure fantasy; she’ll stay put and likely end up just like her friend. It’s simply a matter of time.

Rounding out the film is “The Dead Girl,” which shows us the final hours of the young woman in question. While she’s hopelessly lost, there is a measure of charm to her personality, best reflected by the scene where she pushes a boy to the floor after he insults his sister. She even offers to help him up and further injures him by scratching his hand. At once, she’s defending a girl who was like her at one point (before the true horror began), while staking a claim for all those who have wanted to watch a kid take a fall just for being a dick. Or maybe because the action immediately reminded me of my wife, a woman who is not above shoving a youngster out of the way when he or she gets a little too obnoxious. For good measure, Krista flips the boy off as he leaves the store. Ahh, memories. And so, Krista is desperate to get to Norwalk to visit her daughter and present her with a present on her birthday. She has to “visit,” of course, because she lost her child to a mean-old state agency that unfairly assumed that a diseased junkie whore couldn’t adequately care for her little one. I’m not sure how shipping her off to an overwhelmed Mexican woman in a bad neighborhood is an improvement, but at least the caregiver didn’t have a needle in her arm or a john in her ass. The birthday visit also requires a ride, which is apparently solved when the butch dyke motel manager lends her a motorbike. But when the vehicle conks out on the freeway, necessitating a hitchhike, Ruth’s husband pulls up, all too happy to provide a solution.

Sure, there’s a familiarity to the surroundings, but it’s comfortable rather than shopworn. There are no happy endings, and the lives as we leave them are defined by their anxiety, not the possibility of bright tomorrows. And while the thread of unhealthy sex runs through from start to finish, it’s not so much a prudish finger-wagging as a simple observation; clean, dispassionate, and matter-of-fact. I tend to agree with Woody Allen that no orgasm could ever be a “wrong” one, but girls such as Krista do in fact end up dead when that very release becomes synonymous with power and control. Still, any agenda is entirely fabricated, as there’s no ax to grind with these characters. As with her previous film, Blue Car, Moncrieff presents the difficulties of sex without any of the usual judgments, content with the knowledge that the very thing that keeps the species alive is often the thing that stops the process cold. And that parents kill our spirit, and withhold their love, and pay attention only when it’s too late. Wives nag, husbands kill, and hookers hitch a ride once too often and end up food for worms. It’s how things are, and it need not mean any more than that.

William Castle’s deliriously goofy Mr. Sardonicus doesn’t quite reach the dizzying brilliance of either The Tingler or Strait-Jacket, but it’s a gem in its own right; a preposterously insipid B-movie with the gothic grandeur to match. Taking place in an Old Europe only a comfortably stateside studio set could provide, as well as the sort of cold, isolated estate you’d expect to find in a cheapie Nosferatu remake, the film might very well be confused for an old fashioned morality tale, if not for the fact that Castle himself makes an appearance to delight in the villain’s suffering. Under the guise of a “punishment poll” (a particularly clever Castle gimmick), the director emerges from a dry ice fog to ask the audience whether or not the nasty Baron Sardonicus (Guy Rolfe) should be given a last-minute reprieve. Given that only one possible outcome was actually filmed, and that Castle is one of cinema’s most gleeful, smirking sadists, we are delighted to have our baser instincts confirmed. The Baron, in fact, will be destroyed at last. But that’s for the conclusion. The journey to that indelible moment is so engaging and bizarre that we can’t help but wish our current hacks had Castle’s wicked regard for cheap, satisfying entertainment.

The story itself is all Castle: Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis), a respected doctor with the power to heal every conceivable ailment with what amounts to a gentle massage, is summoned by the creepy Krull (Oscar Homolka) one evening to visit the home of Mr. Sardonicus. All is shrouded in mystery, but the bait is sweetened when Cargrave is informed that his former love, one Maude Sardonicus (Audrey Dalton), is also in dire straits. Of course it’s a trap, but who knew that in the end, Cargrave would be asked to use his medical knowhow and revolutionary techniques to give Sardonicus a new face. You see, the Baron has lived for years with an unholy grin (imagine the Joker with wax lips and Mr. Ed’s set of choppers); a curse laid upon him after he dug up his father’s grave to retrieve the winning lottery ticket he accidentally placed in his pocket. Who knew the old man would finally have a run of good luck, even though it took dying to see it through. And so we flash back to that fateful night in the cemetery, when the Baron’s life forever changed after coming face to face with his rotting husk of a dad. We too see the body, and it isn’t that revolting, but apparently the guilt is too much for poor Sardonicus, and his new-found riches are soon tempered by Hollywood’s worst-ever make-up job. No wonder they shroud the actor in shadow most of the time (that is, when he isn’t wearing a mask).

In some ways, we can’t blame Sardonicus for his methods (he tells Cargrave that if the “surgery” fails, he will be swiftly killed by Krull), but he’s soon established as an even bigger bastard by kidnapping pretty women for sick experiments. Under the guise of a “night with a millionaire,” Sardonicus selects a single beauty among many to submit to unthinkable torture. It is claimed that these women are dying to help Sardonicus lose the smile, but we know he’s just a bad, bad man. To dispel any further doubt, he hangs people by their thumbs and keeps a secret room under lock and key, where disobedient victims are sent so that they can spend some quality time with the Baron’s dead father. An added quirk is the Baron’s insistence that while picture frames dot the estate, no pictures will be found within them. As Krull explains, “The baron is an unusual man, of unusual convictions. In such frames, ordinary men would honor the portraits of their forefathers. But the baron has disowned his forefathers in one magnificent gesture.” It’s the kind of dialogue that would have made Ed Wood proud.

In the end, the doctor is successful in removing the grin (he seems to have used an experimental muscle relaxer and more vigorous massage), but in the spirit of The Twilight Zone, Sardonicus’ face has so relaxed that he can no longer open his mouth. The irony! Watching the nasty Baron attempt to eat and drink after realizing his new curse is a comic highlight, though one filled with unexpected pathos. Not really. It is then that Cargrave reveals his own secret: he used a simple placebo, while the grin (and locked mouth) are both psychosomatic afflictions that could have been reversed with simple will power. All those riches, and no way to save himself. And so Sardonicus will die alone, afraid, and at the hands of an angry Krull, who uses the Baron’s weakness as an opportunity to get revenge for losing an eye to his master’s savagery. If only Castle had found a way to sneak in Vincent Price before the credits rolled.