Remembering Gene Wilder

Another brilliant creative light has been extinguished with the passing of beloved comedic actor Gene Wilder yesterday at 83.

My first exposure to the gentle soul with the wild hair and mischievous smile didn't come with Willy Wonka or Young Frankenstein, but rather 1976's Silver Streak.

I was six and as usual my Saturdays were spent seeing a movie with my mom. The film featured a runaway train, enough of a draw for a young boy, but I can remember instantly being drawn to Wilder's "funny" face and easy-going demeanor. He was a soft-spoken leading man, calm and articulate, until events caused his inevitable comedic "eruption," an unmatched cacophony of grunts, groans and hollers that endeared him to you even more.

I was too young to see 1980's R-rated Stir Crazy in theaters but I can remember catching it repeatedly at a buddy's house on cable and reveling in the effortless interaction between Wilder and Richard Pryor. I seem to recall "We bad" became an anthem of sorts as we strutted around the playground.

It wasn't until my teens that I discovered Mel Brooks' horror-spoof Young Frankenstein. Talk about a perfect vehicle for Wilder's talents. It became an instant favorite of mine and remains one I still seek out whenever I'm feeling down and in need of a little pick-me-up.

Gene Wilder's films are all classic pick-me-ups, like good chicken soup when your sick. They comfort, fill you with warmth and make you smile. And they'll do so for generations to come.

Top 10 Films of the 21st Century

Yesterday the BBC unveiled their list of the 100 greatest films of the 21st century (2000 and beyond). As usual with lists of this type, critics from around the world were polled for their selections. And as usual, I disagreed with many of their choices. For me, engaging stories and characters always supplant self-indulgence and incoherency. But to each his own, right?

Their list reminded me that I posted my own ranking of the 21st century's top ten films at the end of 2009. Looking it over again, I found I'd keep most of my selections, albeit in different order, but there are a few I'd remove to make room for more deserving, recent releases.

Below is my revised top ten films of the 21st century (in descending order). Let the debate begin.

10. Gladiator (Dir. Ridley Scott; 2000)
9. Memento (Dir. Christopher Nolan; 2001)
8. The Artist (Dir. Michael Hazanavicius; 2011)
7. Boyhood (Dir. Richard Linklater; 2014)
6. Wonder Boys (Dir. Curtis Hanson; 2000)
5. The Royal Tennenbaums (Dir. Wes Anderson; 2001)
4. No Country For Old Men (Dir. Joel Coen; 2007)
3. 12 Years A Slave (Dir. Steve McQueen; 2013)
2. Sideways (Dir. Alexander Payne; 2004)
1. There Will Be Blood (Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson; 2007)


Honorable Mentions:

About Schmidt
Aviator, The
Brooklyn
Cinderella Man
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Contender, The
Crazy Heart
Dark Knight, The
Departed, The
Grand Budapest Hotel, The
High Fidelity
History of Violence, A
In The Bedroom
Inglorious Basterds
Life Itself
Lord of the Rings Trilogy, The
Madmax: Fury Road
Minority Report
Moonlight Kingdom
Zodiac

Quick Flick Review: Jason Bourne

Paul Greengrass' Jason Bourne features one exhilarating, expertly crafted action sequence after the next. Unfortunately when it comes to evolving the storied franchise, things fall a bit flat.

It's been nine years since we last saw Matt Damon as everyone's favorite amnesiac government assassin. In that time, Bourne has kept his head down, living off the grid and making ends meet as a bare-knuckle street brawler. (You gotta eat, right?) It isn't until his old Treadstone ally Nicky Parsons (Julia Styles) tracks him down claiming to have new information on his past that Bourne becomes the hunted once again.

It seems in addition to possessing revealing details on Bourne's father, Parsons has uncovered files on a shadowy new CIA surveillance program called Ironwill. Well of course the agency can't have knowledge like that in the hands of its most-wanted rogue operative and soon they dispatch a team, led by cyber-terrorism chief Heather Lee (a steely Alicia Vikander), to neutralize the threat.

What ensues is basically the same been-there-done-that formula as the three previous films. Sure, the action is great, breathless and clever, but to what end? There are really no new disclosures, nothing to evolve the characters or storylines.

Tommy Lee Jones steps in as the resident top-ranking government baddie, but he's really just another incarnation of the ones played by Chris Cooper, Brian Cox and David Stathairn. Apparently the agency gets these guys off an assembly line.

Both Damon and Greengrass have always resisted reviving the character unless the story was something special. This was the best they could come up with? Grade: B -

Remembering Garry Marshall

Just a quick post to acknowledge the passing of producer/director Garry Marshall yesterday at 81.

I don't think many could deny having a soft spot for at least one of Marshall's films or television shows over the last 40-plus years.

From creating the beloved sitcoms Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley and Mork & Mindy to directing such hits as Young Doctors in Love, Nothing in Common, Pretty Woman and The Princes Diaries, Marshall excelled at delivering popular, relatable entertainment that never really tried to do much more than put a smile on its audience's faces.

Sure, many were a little schmaltzy and wore their hearts on their sleeves, but that's what we all liked about them, whether we admit it or not. They went down easy and didn't require too much thought. They made us laugh, cry and learn a little more about a thing called humanity. Not a bad legacy if you ask me.

Quick Flick Review: De Palma

Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow's new documentary De Palma is a fascinating, career-spanning look at a man born to tell stories visually.

All of virtuoso filmmaker Brian De Palma's classics are touched upon - Sisters, Carrie, Dressed to Kill, Blow Out, Scarface, The Untouchables, Carlito's Way - each providing an insightful, often humor-filled glimpse into the process of one of cinema's most engaging-yet-polarizing technicians.

Briskly paced and full of wonderful big-screen memories tailor-made for a darkened theater, De Palma is simply a film geek's dream and easily one of the best films of the year. Grade: A

Remembering Prince

Like most, I'm still processing the sudden passing of Prince yesterday at 57. As with the loss of David Bowie earlier this year, the news hits straight to the gut and takes a few hours, if not days, to fully absorb that someone so dynamic, vibrant and full of life is actually gone.

I grew up in the '80s as part of the MTV Generation, discovering artists and their songs mainly through the advent of music videos rather than traditional radio airplay. Oh, I was a slave to Top 40 radio, too, religiously taping songs off Casey Kasem's Sunday-morning AT40 shows from age 12-15, but I mainly found and soaked up said artists and their songs through highly stylized three-minute films beaming from my television every afternoon after school.

One of the first videos I can remember seeing was for Prince's "Little Red Corvette" in 1983. A great song wrapped in a pretty low-key performance video (they were all like that in the early days): just a microphone stand, back-up band and a man in a shimmering purple suit. Pretty simple. Except that the man was Prince. He may just have been standing there for three minutes, but he oozed such charisma and style you couldn't take your eyes off of him.

The next year brought the soundtrack to the film Purple Rain. The first single was "When Doves Cry" and both the song and the video just blew my then-13-year-old mind (I still consider it one of the top ten songs of the entire decade). From there came "Let's Go Crazy." I can remember buying that one as a 45 and playing it and the b-side "Erotic City" over and over on my little Emerson turntable with my bedroom door closed so my mom couldn't hear certain lyrics. Ah, good times.

By 1987, I had transitioned from Top 40 to alternative and I can't say I bought any Prince tunes after
that (well, maybe the Batman soundtrack in 1989). But I was always interested in what he was doing. You couldn't be a fan of music and not be interested in what Prince was doing next.

Prince was in a league of his own. A pure genius and a talent unlike any we'll ever see again. I cut my teeth on the music of the '80s. It'll always be a reminder of my youth and basically encapsulates a 30-plus-year passion for sonic creativity. Prince's music will always be a big part of that. Thank you, my friend.

Quick Flick Review: Midnight Special

Jeff Nichols' Midnight Special is a well-acted, compelling sci-fi thriller, one of those come-out-of-nowhere surprises that actually renews your faith in the power of original cinema.

The film opens on a local news broadcast playing on the television inside a Texas roadside motel room. From it we glean an Amber Alert has been issued for eight-year-old Alton Meyer and that his alleged abductor is one Roy Tomlin (Michael Shannon).

As the camera pulls back inside the room, we spy Roy loading a shotgun into a bag and another man (Joel Edgerton) securing cardboard over the window and peephole. Sitting in the center of the room, reading a comic by flashlight under a bed sheet, is Alton (Jaeden Lieberher), goggles over his eyes, construction-grade headphones over his ears. Roy tells him it's time and soon the three are hitting the road under the cover of darkness.

We soon learn Roy is Alton's father and the two have fled a religious cult that had been exploiting the boy as a pseudo-messiah. You see Alton is special, prone to speaking in odd tounges and light bursts shooting from his eyes. With the help of childhood friend Lucas (Edgerton), Roy is determined to get Alton to a secret location where something remarkable may or may not happen.

It isn't long before cult members and the government (led by Star Wars: The Force Awakens' Adam Driver) are pursuing the trio across the highways and in the shadows of the American South.

Midnight Special definitely has a Close Encounters/E.T. vibe about it, albeit a little more intense and enigmatic. But it's those qualities that provide an engaging, contemporary freshness to the tale and set Nichols' film on its own path away from those Spielberg classics.

Shannon, Edgerton and Driver all give solid, memorable performances and Kirsten Dunst provides a nice, quiet turn as Alton's excommunicated mother.

The only complaint is that Alton's powers are really never explained, other than they mirror beings who inhabit a world "on top" of our world. And when that world is eventually revealed, it resembles a utopia straight out of last year's ill-fated Disney debacle Tomorrowland.

Those quibbles aside, Midnight Special is a satisfying, deeply layered and highly effective piece of cinema, one that makes you look forward to what Jeff Nichols does next. Grade: B+