Movie Log: Sea of Love, Vision Quest, and THE COLOR OF MONEY
Sea of Love
1989, USA, d. Harold Becker, 1h53m, ****
Who's In It: Al Pacino, Ellen Barkin, John Goodman, Michael Rooker
File Under: 1980s, Erotic Thriller, Harold Becker
Al Pacino is a NYC detective on the hunt for a serial killer who seems to be picking male victims through the "lonely hearts" column of the newspaper. He and partner John Goodman place their own ad, hoping to go on a date with the killer. Along the way, the lonely Pacino ends up falling for Ellen Barkin, who he was pretty sure they had definitely ruled out as the killer...
This has everything you want from an '80s thriller - suspense, lots of twists - and then it also has a perceptive drama about trust issues and big city loneliness. Al Pacino does lots of great Al Pacino things. Good script from Richard Price (Clockers).
I realized when I watched Malice recently that I've hardly seen any of Harold Becker's movies, so I recently threw a bunch into my watchlist. Judging by the ratings, I may have started with his best movies. We'll see...
Sitcom
1998, France, d. François Ozon, 1h25m, **
File Under: French Comedies, François Ozon
A red curtain opens on the home of a bourgeois nuclear family. The father comes home from work with a new pet rat rescued from a medical laboratory, and when his wife objects he tells her all the reasons she is wrong. He retreats to his study, where he spends all his time "not getting involved" with family affairs, leaving them to care for the rat. Everyone starts acting differently after being bitten by the rat: the maid becomes a lazy chain-smoker, the son declares he is homosexual, and the daughter becomes suicidal and into bondage.
This was the first feature film by the prolific enfant terrible François Ozon, and although it has a cult following as a camp classic, I found Sitcom's crude attempt at satire to be mostly unfunny and tedious. It's off-putting to treat things that are no longer taboos as taboos, and I understand that this film is trying to thumb its nose at "norms" established by American sitcoms of the '90s, but the target has moved now. Ozon is an accomplished visual storyteller, though.
Evil Does Not Exist
2023, Japan, d. Ryusuke Hamaguchi, 1h46m, ***1/2
File Under: New Releases
The composer on Hamaguchi's previous film (Oscar-winner Drive My Car) - apparently suggested this as a story to him. Her score to this film is exceptional and feels well-integrated into the fabric of what it is trying to do, which is meditative but full of emotion.
We witness a little bit of life in a remote mountain village in Japan, and how they forage in the forest with great reverence for the value of small things like a rare wasabi plant or a pheasant's fallen feather. But later a public meeting is called to discuss a new glamping resort which is being developed, and the locals have concerns over inadequate septic systems poised to slowly seep into the stream which provides their drinking water.
In the film's final scene, the straightforward storytelling is fractured into a series of confusing but haunting images. As the movie explained earlier, the local deer do not attack unless they are wounded, and now there is sudden inexplicable violence between the humans. A truly startling and chilling ending to an otherwise calm meditation on the fragile harmony between humans and our environment.
Vision Quest
1985, USA, d. Harold Becker, 1h47m, **1/2
File Under: 1980s, Coming-of-Age, Sports, Harold Becker
Who's In It: Matthew Modine, Linda Fiorentino, Ronny Cox, Forest Whitaker, Roberts Blossom, Madonna
I use a randomizer to pick movies from my watchlist for home viewing, and the system said I was giving Harold Becker another go already, so here we are.
Vision Quest is based on a young adult coming-of-age novel about a high school wrestler who, far from being a jock, is studying to be a doctor but is counting on a wrestling scholarship to afford college. He has placed a somewhat arbitrary goal that he will lose a bunch of weight to wrestle an incredibly scary opponent in a different weight class. It's unhealthy to his body, and no one thinks he could do it, or beat this guy when he gets there. His supposedly Native American best friend says he is on a "vision quest".
The plot contrives for his dream girl Linda Fiorentino to move in with him and his single father, and this horndog immediately starts studying gynecology. Literally. He writes an article about the clitoris for the school newspaper. It's rejected because... it's a school newspaper, ffs...
When I tell you that this movie has multiple needle-drops of "Lunatic Fringe", and a young Madonna performing in a dive bar, and a climactic wrestling match scored by Tangerine Dream... I know it sounds like an awesome movie... But it's incredibly bland most of the time. The direction is competent, but by the numbers. The characters just don't really make sense to me. The book probably had the nuance needed to make this work.
I thought for my next essential pick, I should pick another sports movie for the Olympics, and as it happens one of my all-time favorites shares its screenwriter with Sea of Love.
The Color of Money
1986, USA, d. Martin Scorsese, 1h59m, ****1/2
File Under: 1980s, Sports, Martin Scorsese
Who's In It: Paul Newman, Tom Cruise, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Forest Whitaker, John Turturro
Billiards is officially an Olympic sport. It has never been included in the Games due to lack of organization, but if it had it would never in a million years look as cool as it does in this movie. Martin Scorsese directs the heck out of this. It has been dismissed as a lesser movie in his distinguished oeuvre, but let's be real, we all benefit when a master makes time to give us something purely for kicks.
I think some people find the ending to be a disappointing tease, but I think it is a masterstroke which you should consider in context. Paul Newman returned to one of the roles which helped establish his career in The Hustler (1961). You don't need to have seen that movie to watch this one, but you should understand that on paper this movie looks like a passing of the torch from Paul Newman to the new big star Tom Cruise. The end of The Color of Money is Paul Newman saying, "I'm still the star around here, and don't you forget it" and it's brilliant. I can't help but think that the sophisticated cinephile Cruise was thinking of this movie when he pulled a similar move with Top Gun: Maverick (at roughly the same age, if you can believe it).
