We Don't Stop Here.

Ok, so in moments of tiredness and laziness I tend to fall back on ol' favs. Hence returning to R + J just recently. I also went back to one of my favourite films of the noughties, Mulholland Drive.


David Lynch is a genius. Let's just get it out there. And Mulholloand Drive is, quite obviously, the work of a genius at the peak of his nutcase powers. I am yet to see Inland Empire (bad me), but I understand it is also quite cray cray, so I'm going to assume that he's still at his peak. And Blue Velvet and Lost Highway were damn fine pieces of cinema, so he's been at the peak for, what, pretty much his entire career. We all love Twin Peaks. Sure there have been some minor misfires (we all remember what I thought of Wild At Heart), but in general I pick up a David Lynch film I know I'm at the very least going to be in for a wild ride. (On that note, I simply MUST check out The Straight Story, because it just sounds too different to miss.)

Meanwhile. Mulholland Drive. It started out as a pilot for a new television series, which wasn't picked up, but some people chucked some more money at him and asked him to make a film out of it. That film I saw back in the break between high school and uni in 2001/02 (it was late one year or early the next - I forget which.) I remember the film ending, and me turning to the two friends I was with and saying 'I have no idea what that was about, but I know that it was brilliant.' A number of years and many viewings later, I think I have some idea, but I don't know how much I will go into it for fear of ruining the experience for anyone who may stumble across here without having experienced the full magnificence of the film.


Naomi Watts scored her breakout role here as Betty/Diana. As the film begins, she is a young ingenue in from the mid-West, staying at her aunt's house in Hollywood while her aunt is out of town shooting a picture. Randomly, one evening, Rita/Camilla (Laura Elena Harring) is in a horrible car accident on Mulholland Drive and stumbles down to collapse, concussed, in the front yard of the aunt's building. The next morning, she wakes to find the aunt leaving - what a coincidence, she manages to sneak into the apartment that Betty shall soon occupy. Betty's good nature means that she only wants to help Rita, and the two become friends, even though Rita is not her real name and she has no idea who she is or what happened to her. So begins a long and twisted tormented journey into what may or may not be really going on - is the reality of the beginning a fiction brought on by Diana's own failings and jealousy at Camilla's success? The lesbian undertones are alluded to with the addition of director Adam (Justin Theroux), a presumably talented man who sells his soul to get his film made. Cowboys, man speaking care of tubes and spat out espressos are all too common in this fable about Hollywood, and anything is possible in a world where Ann Miller is the landlady of an apartment complex that once housed a prized boxing kangaroo. Hell, even Billy Ray Cyrus pops up.


This is an absolute tour de force. The mind that came up with it (that would be our dear friend Mr Lynch) should probably be hospitalised, but that would be such a waste to all of us waiting with bated breath for his next move. Watts' performance made her a star, literally overnight. Her audition scene, going from sweet and naive to sultry and malicious was and remains stunning, an incredible indication of the turning point that will send the movie spiraling into insanity (or reality.) And the Spanish performance of Roy Orbison's 'Crying' by Rebekah del Rio never fails to move me to tears in its power, beauty and the trick of falsity.


There is so little to say about the film outside of the fact that it will go down as one of the most unique pieces of truly compelling filmmaking in the history of cinema. Watching it goes past a must. 5 stars.

That's A Very Fine Chardonnay You're Not Drinking.

Meh, I've got very little to say about American Psycho. Based on the (far superior, in my humble opinion) novel by the terrifying Bret Easton Ellis (does anyone else think the man should be committed? Well, only if he's still allowed to write), the movie focuses on Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale), high up at a (law?) firm, young, very upwardly mobile with a whole lot of friends in exactly the same position. What makes Bateman different? He's a psychopath with a penchant for killing prostitutes and people he doesn't like in gruesome ways. And being very meticulous about it.

Yeah, I'd still probably go there.

He kills some people, including a 'friend' of his Paul Allen (Jared Leto) before Detective Kimble (Willem Dafoe) begins to sniff around. The paranoia induced leads him to kill more and more people, perhaps inspired by the fact that he also seems to be constantly mistaken for various other people - he is not memorable, so he is trying to make a name for himself. His friends pay him no attention, not picking up on his distress signals (played by the likes of Justin Theroux and Josh Lucas), his secretary has a big fat crush on him (played by Chloë Sevigny) and his fiance is oblivious (played by Reese Witherspoon.) And then there's a nice little twist at the end.


The film is so, so cold. The book is scary and twisted and disturbing, but that doesn't come across in the film. It probably has something to do with the fact that Christian Bale has about as much charisma as a dying fern. I swear to god I've never liked him in anything. Yes, he's filthy hot in this film, but I still feel like I'm watching a lump of wood walking around. I'd believe that was the character he is playing in the film if I didn't think the same in every film he does. And then, even the terrific supports don't seem to be doing much more. Dafoe seems confused, Sevigny seems to be playing with her eyes closed. And there is no emotion anywhere in the film. At no point did I have any feelings of empathy towards a single character, except maybe a moment when I felt sorry for Sevigny due to her infatuation with someone who is quite obviously an enormous knob. I guess money and hot abs have worked for me in the past, but still.


Blah blah boring. I was truly bored watching the film. It must just be me, though, because all through my Bale hating years everyone keeps saying 'yeah, but watch American Psycho, it's so good.' Well, now I've watched it, and I'm stopping just short of asking for my money back. 1.5 stars. (What's the half star for? Bale's body and great casting, even if they didn't live up to their full potential.)