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the movie club: Critic vs. critic.

Five critics dish over the year in film.

the movie club
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from: Sarah Kerr

Squareness and Decadence

Posted Friday, Dec. 29, 2000, at 12:12 PM ET

Who are these people?

David,

I didn't say that "the point" of Traffic is to teach such a banal lesson about drugs. But such a lesson gets taught, in an obvious way, and it came as a letdown after the thrilling and subtle setup. Anyway, as I say, I admired the film a lot and would probably place it on a list for the tops of the year. I'm just obeying the same sense of critical duty you pointed out in your first entry when I honestly flesh out what seem to me shortcomings that deserve a hearing. Tony's remark about The China Syndrome, etc., may be relevant here. I seem to recall in last year's "Movie Club" admiring Soderbergh's The Limey but not loving it half as much as someone--maybe you?--because it seemed to stew in a nostalgia about '70s movies that felt decadent and hermetic and ultimately not very interesting to me. It's this combination of squareness and decadence, often in the wrong places, that to my mind prevents Soderbergh from finally closing the deal. He's one of the best directors we have, I agree, but I hope for more.

Also, of course it's obvious that You Can Count on Me has roots in theater and not TV--of course--and I talked about this when I gave it a very positive review in Vogue. I was just politely agreeing to an idea someone else raised that didn't seem to me mutually exclusive: The experience of watching naively filmed theater seemed, in this particular case, easily as close to TV as to cinema. I could imagine it having been commissioned by American Playhouse--that's all I meant.

Tony, I'm so glad you pointed out Chuck & Buck, one of my favorites, too. Here was not only one of the deepest-digging love stories, but one of the few really original comedies of the year. I can't get over the brilliant conceit that a twisted young head case would inherit money, write a play about his bizarre obsession with a childhood friend, and hire a community theater complete with catastrophically bad actors to play out his fantasies. Even those who queased up at the more embarrassing moments have to thank Mike White and Miguel Arteta for boosting the career of Lupe Ontiveros, the supersharp Mexican-American character actress who plays the pragmatic theater manager struggling to work with the inexplicably likeable psycho; did you read the interviews where she talked about having to play something like 250 maids, welfare mothers, and prostitutes before she got this fun role?

More soon and all best,
Sarah

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the movie club
entries
1234567891011121314151617181920212223
from: Sarah Kerr

Squareness and Decadence

Posted Friday, Dec. 29, 2000, at 12:12 PM ET
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Roger Ebert, David Edelstein, J. Hoberman, Sarah Kerr, and A.O. Scott are film critics at, respectively, the Chicago Sun-Times, Slate, the Village Voice, Vogue, and the New York Times. This week, Slate has asked them to compare notes on the year in film.
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