This is nothing like my top ten of 2007. I don’t not do top ten lists because I think they’re stupid, pointless or pretentious. I don’t do them because I never see enough films in the year to feel I’m adequately representing what is the best of the year. I don’t even feel I could represent my favorite of the year, since later on I’ll likely see some great films from this year that would qualify as my favorite(s). So, I’m just going to present some movies (or parts of movies) I really loved this year, and tell you what I loved about them. Because to me best of lists are merely a reminder of movies I still need to see, consider this a list only of things you might have missed and should definitely check out.

• Sunshine and The Last Winter - Two incredible science fiction stories that each ends rather disappointingly. Fortunately both are good enough until their denouements that they are completely recommendable to serious sci-fi fans and anybody else who wants to spark up some discussions about environmental issues and/or psychological implications of being out in the middle of nowhere.
• The Boss of It All - Not the most remarkable Von Trier film, but proof that he can make a simple comedy if that’s what he wants to do. I especially enjoyed it because I’ve had a passive boss who was exactly like the one in the film. Also, Ibn Hjejle has now been redeemed for her awful, out-of-place presence in High Fidelity.

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• I can’t quite get it up to care about The Golden Compass. Apparently people are worried that it’s going to create godless youth? I’m pretty sure There Will Be Blood has a better chance of doing that than just about anything else, but in any case, Vulture says we have nothing to worry about. Perhaps the five minute clip Anne Thompson’s linking to will help you make up your own mind.
• “Be warned: if you let your children see Alvin & The Chipmunks they will eat their own shit.” That, and three other Awful Things The New Alvin & The Chipmunks Movie Is Responsible For, courtesy of The Hater.
• “I am perhaps not the best person to write about Control, and what follows is not a review.” Natalie Curtis, daughter of Ian Curtis, writes about watching Anton Corbijn’s biopic about her dad. Via The Underwire.
• Film critic Annette Insdorf has allegedly been edged out of the National Board of Review, who are coincidentally announcing their annual awards this week. Jeff Wells explains why this matters.
• “Yeah, I’m a lesbian. You wanna make somethin’ of it, or do you want me to help you hotwire that getaway car? That’s what I thought. Now step aside, little lady.” On the eve of Queen Latifah’s apparent coming out party, Defamer remembers one of her finest on-screen moments.
• Filmdrunk has taken to calling Ben Kingsley “Special K.” I think that made me laugh a little bit harder than it probably should have.

• The Sundance Lineup: What does it all mean? The Hollywood Reporter’s story grumbles that a high percentage of filmmakers who got the call “seem to come out of nowhere”; you may call it a good day for independent film, but they seem to think it’s a red flag. Meanwhile, at Variety, noted blog skeptic Todd McCarthy doesn’t quote Geoff Gilmore directly on the matter, but says the Sundance director “suspects that the blogging phenomenon that has unleashed a torrent of personal opinion online may, in a way more metaphorical than literal, have influenced the filmmakers.”
• Anton Corbijn’s Control swept the British Independent Film Awards last night, taking five trophies, including Best British Independent Film. Julien Temple’s Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten took the doc prize.
• Woody Allen has had a falling out with Mediapro, the Catelan production company that was to shepherd three upcoming Allen films, including the already-shot Vicky Cristina Barcelona. There was a bit of controversy last summer during the filming of Vicky, when it was revealed in the local press that 10% of the movie’s budget had been paid by the city of Barcelona.

A number of films that we’ve covered previously on SpoutBlog are either opening or expanding this weekend:

Across the Universe: Julie Taymor’s Beatles musical has grossed almost $9 million over the last month in limited release, mainly drawing (as I predicted) repeat crowds of young women. The weekend, it expands to just under 1,000 screens. I’m not personally much of a fan, but I figure every generation of teenage stoners-cum-theater brats need a Hair, and I can’t begrudge them that. Read my Toronto coverage here.

Control: I was a big fan of Anton Corbijn’s Ian Curtis biopic at Toronto. In hindsight, I do wonder if the film will fall flatter for those who don’t go in with an emotional attachment to Joy Division’s music. But it’s still a fascinating character study, and of course, the cinematography is tremendously satisfying. Read my Toronto review here.

Elizabeth: The Golden Age: Destined to become some kind of camp classic, this sequel to 1998’s Elizabeth is artless at concealing its Freudian metaphors in a way that only truly miscalculated films can be. At Toronto, I wrote: “The Golden Age plays out in a very binary, comic-book reminiscent universe, in which Spain isn’t merely a sovereign nation pursing interests in conflict to that of Britain–the country as a whole is a supernatural embodiment of evil…The Queen is able to bounce from emotional devastation to patriotic warmongering with a flick of a switch; for the rest of us, the transition may not be as easy.”

The Darjeeling Limited: Another shot of crack for fans of Wes Anderson’s visual style, but with a stronger emphasis on character than some of his recent outings. If the idea of a film revolving around a set of limited-edition Marc Jacobs luggage sounds really annoying, this may not be the film for you. But watch the short-film prequel, Hotel Chevalier, on iTunes, read my coverage from NYFF, and if your Anderson allergy hasn’t yet flared up, go see the movie.

I’m way too tired (three film festivals in as many weeks will do that to you) and far too far removed from academia to make a coherent argument on this right now, but in trying to make a dent in my backed-up feed reader I came across some fascinating, British Marxist rumination on Joy Division. I think some of this writing might help me reconcile the two portraits of the band/singer Ian Curtis that I saw in Toronto: Grant Gee’s documentary Joy Division (which I have not yet had time to write about) and Anton Corbijn’s nominal Curtis biopic, Control (which I reviewed rather rapturously here).

Of specific concern: Gee’s provocative but not exactly fully realised thesis, that the story of Joy Division is synonymous with the story of the band’s home town of Manchester; and the philosophical concept of hauntology. You can find workable definitions of hauntology here and here, but both skew towards Derrida on one end, and music theory on the other. In relation to these two films, I think it’s more useful to simply think of hauntology as a tool with which to posit Ian Curtis as spectral presence in Control, and Joy Division as the ghost haunting Manchester in Joy Division.

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Do edgy American filmmakers of yesteryear go soft after living in Hollywood for a few decades? We look at Neil Jordan’s new film The Brave One, starring Jodie Foster, and ask how it measures up to her grittier predecessor, Taxi Driver. Also, Karina shares her picks from the Toronto Film Festival, including the much-buzzed western, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Anton Corbijn’s Joy Division biopic Control, and two fresh Iraq-umentaries, Heavy Metal in Baghdad and Operation Filmmaker.

 

 FilmCouch #37 [23:36m]: Play Now | Download

FilmCouch #37

The Brave One, Heavy Metal in Baghdad, Operation Filmmaker

ReelerTV is back with another episode from Toronto. This time around, Stu talks to Anton Corbijn, director of the amazing Control, and Karina offers up her thoughts on the film.Previous installments:

Episode 2: Scott Hicks, Love Songs and Heavy Metal in Baghdad

Episode 1: Neil Jordan and Terrance Howard talk The Brave One; Karina on Juno and Margot and the Wedding

The two films that have hit me the hardest here in Toronto are Control, which I wrote about here, and The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford. Both films, based on real-life characters and incidents, are simultaneously technically superlative and heartbreaking. With one day left to go in my Toronto 2007 tenure, I find myself nursing heartache for two, studio-backed movies which I’ll soon be able to pay $11 American to see again at will. And sitting here in my hotel room, listening to Joy Division and New Order and thinking about Sam Riley’s performance in Control and Brad Pitt and Paul Schneider’s in Jesse James, there is no such thing as soon enough.

Two weeks ago, The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford was the film Warner Brothers had “no idea what to do with.” As of this writing, it’s the most gushed-over title at the Toronto Film Festival, and word has hit the wires that star Brad Pitt has won the Best Actor prize at the Venice Film Festival. If the folks at WB still havn’t figured out what to do with Andrew Dominik’s masterful, Malickean tragedy of celebrity envy, they probably don’t deserve to have their name on it.

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Ian Curtis (Sam Riley) is about 18. He lives with his parents in Macclesfield, England, in a massive suburban housing complex with rounded safety windows that look like 1960s TV screens. He goes to school, but sits through his classes in a near fugue state. One day he brings home a vinyl copy of Aladdin Sane, which he listens to whilst wearing a fur coat over his bare chest, and simultaneously smoking and applying eyeliner. In the middle of this ritual, a friend comes over with a girl. The girl and Ian lock eyes in Ian’s bedroom mirror while she’s making out with his friend. After the girl and the friend leave, Ian sings along with David Bowie and plots stardom, imagining himself the toast of New York’s Warhol-centric counterculture. A star is born … and doomed.

Anton Corbijn’s Control smashes the music biopic mold by portraying the star at its center not as a mythological creature, but as a real-life, fucked-up kid in over his head. The Joy Division frontman’s talent doesn’t drop out of the sky; it’s something he keeps to himself until, after enough practice in front of the mirror, he’s sure he’s got it right. Likewise, his tragedies are almost entirely of his own doing, born from a borderline pathological desire to seize control of himself and the world around him, and exacerbated by his immature inability to do so. Particularly in the balance it finds between transcendence and dread in suburban family life, Control has a lot more in common with the British realism of the films of Mike Leigh than it does with even the recent wave of rock-star-as-antihero pics like Walk the Line. Corbijn’s actors, particularly Riley, hauntingly recreate the band’s image and sound, but the director is really only concerned with the milestones of the band’s career in so far as they give him an opportunity to talk about Curtis’ personal struggles.

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