The NPR Effect

It's pretty much a foregone conclusion that Slumdog Millionaire will win as Best Picture tonight.  I believe that not because Entertainment Weekly tells me so, but because Nate Silver does.  Frankly, he scares me a little bit.

Now, Slumdog is a fine film, nay, a really, really good film.  It is undeniably well-directed by Danny Boyle, and his Best Director Oscar (again, I rely on fivethirtyeight.com) will be a well-deserved accolade.  Boyle is a gifted filmmaker who also has the discipline and craftsman's attitude to vault him past the Robert Rodriguez's of the world.  I can find little to say against the film.  Sure, I've argued that women who look like Frieda Pinto don't need the likes of Dev Patel to rescue them from the slum; a man in a long car would pull up beside her and say, "Hey, would you like to leave the slum?"  It's more likely that she would be taking him with her than vice versa, but the movie is a fairy tale and it doesn't treat her as a passive, virginal object of desire.  Maybe I'm just jealous.  Whatever.  I think you can dismiss that gripe as baseless, or at least horribly, horribly shallow.

So what's my beef with the movie?  Why would I be just as happy if Milk (not Benjamin Button; please Lord, not that) won?  Why am I not rooting for Slumdog?  Why am I, truth be told, harboring a little resentment toward it?

Well, I think it's the NPR effect.

What?

The NPR effect.  Let me explain.  National Public Radio was always just the least offensive alternative to for-profit media; even in its salad days, it wasn't really a rabble-rousing outfit.  In the last decade, however, it has been crunched from two sides.  Under Kenneth Tomlinson, all public broadcasting was excoriated as demonically liberal.  This was a double-edged sword, and both edges cut NPR.  First, the corporation became safer, more mainstream, in order to deflect these criticisms.  However, Tomlinson's (and others of his ilk) jeremiads also made listening to NPR seem like an act of rebellion to many middle-of-the-road types.  In a strange way, the more milk-toasty NPR became the more it was used as a stamp of "outsider" cred to the incurably middle-of-the-road listener.  You know them--the people who, at a party, mention something and then conspiratorially whisper, "I heard that on NPR!" Yes, you brave soul, you.  Tomorrow, all of us who listen to Morning Edition will be headed for the gulag.  Movie studios are not fools, at least not the kind of fools we like to think they are.   A movie like Slumdog Millionaire is squarely within the Hollywood rags-to-riches, underdog wins tradition, but start pimping it on NPR and suddenly millions of people think they are making a daring artistic choice by plunking down $8 to see it.  I have a neighbor who falls in this demographic; hearing about a movie on NPR means that ipso facto that movie will be good, or at least "quality."  It also spares her the work of really learning about cinema or music on her own.  She can just trot out her NPR-approved short list.  "Slumdog Millionaire? Check.   Amadou and Miriam?  Check.  Now I know everything that's going on in 'independent' cinema and 'world' music."

This is not a diatribe against either Slumdog Millionaire or NPR.  The movie is good and I enjoy the radio; it certainly beats listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd and Aerosmith on an endless loop of "classic rock" or cramming wacky drive-time DJs into my skull.  To be fair, the same "NPR effect" could apply to The Wrestler and to Milk, although less so to the latter, I think.  I just get irked when a movie of quality (and I believe Slumdog is quality) becomes a shorthand expression of someone's "edginess."  Slumdog is a fine, mid-priced Hollywood movie that is being pimped as "outsider" and "indie" when it's really anything but, and the people who make that possible annoy me.  Slumdog's win will seem to me to be a validation of this cynical, lazy marketing-above-all approach.

Still, it's better than Titanic.

Catch-up Time

I got around to watching Dollhouse, Joss Whedon's new joint. Two words: Pee and yuke.

Whedon is a clever, facile writer who excels at taking genre tropes and stereotypes and resurfacing them into something shiny and new-looking. At his best (season 2 of Buffy, IMO) he creates powerful pastiches that combine humor and sentiment in a novel, refreshing way. At his worst, he's convinced that he's created a work of storytelling genius when he's really just reinventing the wheel. Whatever the result, he will not be dull.

Until Dollhouse. First, Whedon chose to build the show around Eliza Dushku (Faith from BtVS and Tru from Tru Calling), an actress of limited range but real charisma (even in the craptastic Tru Calling, the camera loved her). This creates an effect exactly 180 degrees away from what Whedon intended (I think). She plays Echo, a character who has her mind wiped away after each adventure as a negotiator, an assassin, or what-have-you. Rather than seeming remotely plausible, the show kept making me think, "Hey, now Faith's pretending to be a stripper!" It doesn't help the first episode was introduced by a brief prologue that looked and sounded exactly like Faith checking into rehab. Echo needs to be character who disappears into each assignment. Dushku cannot remotely do that. It doesn't help that the "wiped" Echo was written to seem mildly retarded.

Plus, I can't figure out why this secret organization even exists. It reminds me of Tru Calling, a show with a mythology so poorly thought-out that I couldn't even begin to care about the characters or plot. Seriously, there aren't enough hookers in the world? You need women who can be "programmed" to be the perfect lover one week, a world-class athlete the next? Why?

Maybe it will get better, but right now it's a miss, not a hit.

I've checked out on 24. It's just too ludicrous and mean-spirited. On the other hand, I am digging the return of Burn Notice. Jeffrey Donovan's Michael Westin is the perfect anti-Jack Bauer. And while I'm on the subject of checking out, I've decided that Heroes can't be fixed. Until they fall out of love with Sylar, the show has nowhere to go. Maybe if Brian Fuller could get back, stat, or if Brian K. Vaughn smothered Tim Kring with a pillow, but no other way.

Four episodes of Battlestar Galactica left. Man, will I miss this show when it's over.

And, as always, the funniest show on television is Smallville.

stopping by woods on a snowy evening

It's been a long time since I've seen a movie as intense as Let the Right One In. There aren't really words to describe the film's impact; this quote from Pajiba's review is as good an introduction as I can imagine:

It’s difficult to convey the experience of watching Let the Right One In with words. It doesn’t traffic in many words itself, for one thing, and those it does use are all Swedish. It would be easier to give a sense of the movie’s tone and impact, which has stayed with me for 72 hours and promises to linger for a while longer, by sitting down to perform a haunting piece for cello, or by standing alone with you, silently, during a snowstorm near an abandoned warehouse.

LtROI does not traffic in any of the easy tropes of American horror movies. In that way it's the opposite of the excellent French thriller Tell No One. That movie so thoroughly understood and inhabited thriller conventions that it was able to use them to tell a much bigger story. LtROI will be marketed and described as a horror movie, and there is much in it that fits that description, but the intensity that I described in the opening sentence is an intensity of emotion, of disquieted alienation, not that of adrenaline-loaded thrills.

LtROI was directed by Tomas Alfredson and adapted by John Ajvide Lindqvist from his own novel. The protagonist is Oskar, a 12-year-old who is so passive and boxed-in by life (he is tormented by loathsome bullies at school and lives with his single mom in the dreariest apartment building imaginable) that he barely deserves the designation. Alfredson's presentation of Oskar's life reminded me of both Bekmanbetov's Night Watch and The Lives of Others, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's Oscar-winning German film, in its depiction of the mundane details of lives going nowhere, and how the weirdest, gravest things may be happening in those lives. When Oskar meets Eli, who says she's "been twelve for a long time" and "not really a girl" (an offhand remark that carries much more weight in the novel; there's one brief shot in the movie that really explains what the character means), even the facts and hints of her vampiric existence are introduced in scenes of surpassing banality.

I do not want to write a plot synopsis. The movie's story is well-done and involving, but it is the emotional quality, especially the growing bond between Oskar and Eli, that insinuates intself into your soul. Let the Right One In is not an easy movie, and it's not for everyone, but I found it moving and I believe it will stay with me for a long, long time.

An Embarrassment of Riches

Friday night is kind of the mother lode for the next few weeks, with Monk, Friday Night Lights, and Battlestar Galactica all residing there. The goodness is made more poignant when you remember that this is BSG's swan song and could easily be FNL's last hurrah.

Monk is not in the same league as those two, but it features a winning performance by Tony Shalhoub. He is ably assisted by Ted Levine and Jason Gray-Stanford, and I've even grown tolerant of Traylor Howard as Monk's assistant, Natalie. It's a lightweight comedy that's fine for watching with my daughter, who loves Tony Shalhoub, and my wife, who does not care about movies and TV with nearly the fervor of my daughter and myself.

FNL struggled during it's second season, but it was still head-and-shoulders above almost everything else on broadcast television. The third season has started with a strong episode and the show's trademark camera work--FNL is one of the few shows that actually feels cinematic; the producers seem to actually care about how the pictures look and how they tell the story--is as engrossing as ever. This show may construct the music montage as well as any show ever. It's good to see it back.

BSG ended with it's survivors finding Earth, and finding that Earth was a bombed-out shell. I've read reactions to "Sometimes a Great Notion" that say things like "depressing," but I disagree. It's sad, yes. It's dark, yes. But I wasn't depressed; I was exhilarated by the show's willingness to follow its chosen path to its logical place. I hope the rest of the season stays strong and wraps up this saga in a worthy manner.

"if there was a ticking time bomb..."

24 is back tonight. I enjoyed the show for the first four seasons, but 5 and 6 blew donkeys. At its best, 24 is a popcorn orgy. At its worst... well, we know what it inspires at its worst. Still, this is the funniest assessment (that I've ever read) of certain people's attitude regarding the show.


Update:

Well, I think it's extremely funny that Janeane Garafolo is on the show, and I'm looking forward to seeing Carly Pope because, well, I think she's really hot. Still, the show committed its first major bedshit. When? Oh, at about 9:55 or whenever Agent Walker said, "They deleted the files."

See, I'm no technical maven, but I know that unless you run the hard drive through a woodchipper, the data can be recovered. Of course, watching Chloe, or this season's facsimile of same, poke around a hard drive doesn't give certain people a boner like watching Jack threaten to jam a pen in a guy's ear, so I guess we go for entertainment value.

Anthony Bourdain alert!

New season of No Reservations begins tonight (BTW, I love the cable concept of "seasons": 'Anytime we run more than three episodes and then take a break, it's a season.'). Bourdain might be kind of an asshole in person, but I'm hooked on this show. My wife even digs it.

I think it's the concept that I like, the whole feeling that Bourdain is actually trying to find unique destinations, or a new facet to already popular sites. The emphasis on food don't hurt either.

Also, when is The Middleman going to be out on DVD?

The Oscar should go to Richard Jenkins!

I know that Sean Penn was great in Milk. I know that the Academy will want to reward him for many reasons, most of them noble ones, but... damn, Richard Jenkins swung the weight in The Visitor. Jenkins is a member in good standing of the "Hey-It's-That-Guy!" club; dude's been in everything. It was so good to see him get a part like this and so touching to watch him play it. Not to short Penn, but the Oscar should go to Richard Jenkins.

American Teen and Self-Consciousness

The family will watch American Teen tonight. My daughter and I saw it in the theater and liked it well enough to cajole my wife into watching it. My daughter loved the movie; I kind of liked it, but there was one aspect of it I found interesting and a little disconcerting.

American Teen takes place in a "small" Indiana town (I put "small" in quotes because I've noticed that in the movies and on TV, 50,000 qualifies as "small". I live in a town of 4500. I know from small.) What I noticed was that every kid on screen, every one of them, was completely comfortable with and aware of the camera at all times. Late in the film, when one girl blows up at her best friend, she carefully removes her body mic before storming out of the room.

I don't know if this has any greater meaning. I could speculate about our media culture, a steady diet of reality TV, or the belief that being on screen gives life meaning. I could wax philosophical about how our dreams have shrunk to the point that we cannot imagine anything higher than being on film. I could, but I won't, because that would be stupid. I don't have enough data or a concrete thesis. Take it for what it is--something that poked me in an uncomfortable place.

The Middleman on DVD?

As soon as this 12-episode gem is available for pre-order, it's on the way to my home.
"Hawks of the Luftwaffe!"

Hello, 2009!

Well, 2008 sucked. My brother was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, my mom fell and broke her hip (necessitating replacement), and my daughter came down with mono and spent September, October, and most of November dragging herself through the day.



Now, though, it's 2009. If you haven't yet seen Man on Wire, do it now. Great movie about an unforgettable character made more poignant by the involvement of the World Trade Center.