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hey there... (Reply to this comment)
by sleeper54,  in Movies
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Less than I expected from a macresarf1 review but perhaps more. Which surprises me. In a pleasant manner.
This film seems to have made little impact, controversial or otherwise, here in the middle land. Will be interesting to see if it has legs.
Very nicely done.
...tom...
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Aug 15 '06
6:46 pm PDT
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Re: A great career gamble? (Reply to this comment)
by criteeker
To Waynio: Gamble schmamble. Oliver Stone makes many superior films as a director, writer and/or producer and most everyone loves him. Then he makes ONE sub-par film and his career is on the line? No way. He's an amazing visual artiste. And I'm not just saying that because I was fortunate enough to work on one of his films.
To Macresarf1: Wonderful review! BUT... his name is William Jimeno not Jemeno.
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Aug 14 '06
12:05 pm PDT
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Re: Re: Re: A great career gamble? (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
Paul: You had me thinking that you were playing Hemingway-esq literary pool there for a moment. Never fear. My point is that Stone, like Dravot, like Alexander -- like George Armstrong Custer -- are obsessed men. Stone understands them, as perhaps you and I do, from different perspectives.
I urge you to look at my review of John Huston's THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING:
http://www.epinions.com/mvie-review-4AAB-D5016E0-39287A12-prod5
You are "a stranger going to the West to seek for what was lost."
And you have come "from the East, hoping you will give [me your] message on The Square, for the sake of the Widow's Son."
Neither am I a Mason, but I understand the message.
With sincere wishes of good luck to you.
Alex
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Aug 04 '06
3:44 pm PDT
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Re: Re: A great career gamble? (Reply to this comment)
by colonialpara
Hey Alex,
Be careful about what you say about Daniel Dravot! He was one of my heroes, even if he was a scoundrel of sorts! Plus, as brother member of the craft, I understood him better than other non-Masons.
Cheers,
Paul
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Aug 04 '06
8:03 am PDT
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Re: I couldn't bring myself to see United 93 (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
I understand, Patti, but I have to call movies as I see them, and this one is down the middle. Should we wait one year, five years, ten years, a hundred years? Who should we let direct the picture?
WORLD TRADE CENTER, like FLIGHT 93, tells a human story, before anyone had a chance to analyze the facts, one way or another.
If you asked me on day two, day two, day ten, day 1500, I would have, and do have a different answer. Let me refer you to my own answer, ten days or so in:
http://www.epinions.com/content_40908590724
Meanwhile, WORLD TRADE CENTER is a pretty good movie.
It will be interesting to see all the back and forth in the media about the politics of this movie.
But I understand your reticence.
Alex
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Jul 27 '06
2:19 am PDT
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I couldn't bring myself to see United 93 (Reply to this comment)
by AliventiAsylum, in Movies
and there's no way I can go see this either. I just think of the people I knew who were in there and I get knots in my stomach.
Patti
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Jul 26 '06
6:38 pm PDT
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Re: very interesting! (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
I was moved more by WORLD TRADE CENTER, but that may be because it concentrates on just two lives in the disaster, and it has a more conventional upbeat ending. But both WORLD TRADE CENTER and FLIGHT 93 take a very respectful, old fashioned patriotic approach to the material.
And right you are about A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE. I didn't care for the picture myself, thought it a bit simple minded and not well motivated, and so, possibly I just wanted it to be called A Natural History of Violence because, in my opinion, that was its point.
If you like Nicholas Cage in WORLD TRADE CENTER, Jan, get ready for this! I heard, just this morning, on the radio, that Cage has bought the rights to a script about Liberace, and intends to play the leading role. Now there's a test of his acting range!
All the best, as always.
Alex
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Jul 26 '06
10:36 am PDT
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very interesting! (Reply to this comment)
by jankp
I did watch United 93 and was quite moved, so I'll give this a looksee. Hey, it's just A History of Violence. Another brilliant movie. I'm glad to hear Cage does a fine job. I don't always care for him.
Jan
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Jul 26 '06
1:00 am PDT
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Re: hmmm (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
You are quite welcome, Barbara.
That's what I'm here for.
Alex
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Jul 24 '06
10:51 pm PDT
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hmmm (Reply to this comment)
by ifif1938
I really wasn't sure if I really wanted to see this film but now I know I'll have to...
This is by far a most helpful review and I thank you
Barbara
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Jul 24 '06
8:57 pm PDT
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Re: A great career gamble? (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
Certainly a career gamble, waynio.
Hard to say.
The older viewer may not come out for WORLD TRADE CENTER because Stone has been so vilified in the past. The Fox Network machine, etc, can now have it both ways, claiming that Satan has seen the light while crowing gleefully (or tsk-tsking sadly?) should the picture fail. Younger viewers, expecting the razzle-dazzle of JFK or BORN ON THE 4TH OF JULY, may find the picture too staid for them.
The picture is Spielberg on steroids, or James Cameron without a psychopath running around firing a big pistol at the hero and heroine in the rubble of the Trade Center.
Stone took no official part in the writing of WORLD TRADE CENTER, and neither the script nor the editing displays more than a couple of his notable trademarks. He avoids even pressing fair comment ironies, such as the two separate incompatible phone systems Mayor Giuliani's people had sold to the police and firemen (causing the forces to be unable to communicate with each other during the disaster).
Unlike Alexander II, John Kennedy or Ron Kovic, his heroes in WORLD TRADE CENTER are simple men with no great ambitions nor radical political views. Whatever its failings, Oliver Stone was obviously crazy about Alexander the Great, as John Huston had been about Daniel Dravot in THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING. I'm sure Stone fought every change and snip in that film, right or wrong, because in some Conradian romantic way, he saw himself as Ålexander. Here, he is just doing a respectful, honest job about two men who did their duty, and are remembered mainly for having survived when hundreds of their brothers and sisters in the New York Police and Fire Department did not.
Two points I think we should make, waynio:
1) Anyone may attend WORLD TRADE CENTER assured that neither partisan politics, sentimentality nor jingoism will overwhelm them. These men display no politics to speak of; their families have experiences, soap operish though they may strike some, that most of us have known in times of crisis; and aside from the obsessed David Karnes' dedicated search, there is no evidence of super-patriotism. People are caught up flatly in that 9/11 moment, and the facts speak for themselves.
2) More significantly: What has been done to Oliver Stone is representative of something unprecedented since the days of McCarthy, perhaps in American History. In the last 25 years, the Right Wing has gone after every institution in America which promised any relief from the disposable, regimented, consumerist, militaristic, one people, one political view, one leadership society. The have attempted to destroy or control the New Deal, unions, education, the family, the churches, the news organizations, publishing, the media, the professional army, the Democratic Party and any group representing independent thought. Two institutions have held out better than the others -- one new, one fairly old: the Internet and, surprisingly, Hollywood -- both driven primarily by the motive the Right Wing dare not touch: large profit.
What Dan Rather was to Network News (no matter what you might have thought of him personally), Oliver Stone was to Post-Vietnam Hollywood. They brought Rather down on a ruse, and they have been battering away at Stone (and a few others) in Hollywood for over twenty years.
When he goes, only the wham-bam CGI blockbuster, the video game scenario and the "indies" about couples rubbing their sandals together to buy a ten million dollar, two bedroom house will remain. They will be transmitted cyberneticaly to become the wall paper in out utilitarian homes. The blockbusters will be about "Rods from God" being cast down upon "Evil Doers" from on high in the "long war," nay, "the endless war," by fearless idealogues (hoping for that Great Come-and-Get-It Armageddon Day) who shall serve the upper one percent in America, those living in the United States of Exclusivity. It will all be about great deserts dotted with a few gated, hermetically sealed watering holes and resorts.
I should not want to over-estimate Oliver Stone either as a director or a man (he has problems on both counts), but let's wish him well, for he is like a giant canary in the mine shaft.
Thank you for your intelligent remarks and questions, waynio.
Alex
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Jul 23 '06
1:49 pm PDT
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A great career gamble? (Reply to this comment)
by waynio
Or a pact with the Devil? In 3 weeks we'll see if Oliver Stone redeems himself after his last catastrophe. Given the built-in controversy (as you indicated), any successful A-list director would've been wary of taking on the WTC project. The fact that Stone avoided challenging the official 9/11 narrative (resorting instead to tunnel-vision focus on two men) speaks volumes about his desperation to salvage his career from the rubble of "Alexander".
Already Fox News & the Media Research Center have given World Trade Center the thumbs-up. The commercialization of a major traumatic event is typical of Hollywood; movie-goers are amazing gluttons for punishment, after all. But given current trends in the Middle East, Stone may have inadvertently made propaganda perfectly timed for our next World War. Or do you think his film is too isolated from 9/11's causes & effects to be effective as propaganda?
Thanks,
Wayne
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Jul 23 '06
11:02 am PDT
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Re: Love or hate.. (Reply to this comment)
by macresarf1
I think you will find, even if it takes a while, WORLD TRADE CENTER will grab a hold of you.
Cage looks as if he lost 20 pounds for this role, which he really can't afford! A note said that he spent hours in a sensory deprivation chamber to accustom himself to claustrophobia.
Thanks for the praise.
Alex -- Macresarf1
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Jul 22 '06
11:13 pm PDT
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Love or hate.. (Reply to this comment)
by zenmachado, in Movies
I always find Stone's films to at least not be boring. I end up utterly hating his movie or loving it.. and by the looks of your review.. Im in for a nice little view.
I guess it help that my ever favorite actor is right in the middle of it, of course I speak of Nic. Cage.
Thanks for this early review, and I hope not to end up feeling like that guilty party that just wore out your asterisk.
ZeN
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Jul 22 '06
10:17 pm PDT
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