In The Name Of The Father

Criminology was one of my favorite classes in school mainly because I got to get a look behind all the bullshit of the justice system, well hopefully it was honest. Still I got to read some great books about people who had been imprisoned for crimes they did not commit. It was sad to realize how many people had been set up under false pretenses and had to stay in prison for years even though they were innocent. Even more than that it really showed me that I couldn't trust cops or anyone in the justice system at any time. Now I am not trying to say everyone is innocent all the time, but there have been so many innocent people that have served jail time that it could really happen to anybody. So then we throw Daniel Day Lewis in the mix and we have In The Name Of The Father which came out in 1993. It truly is weird seeing a younger Daniel Day Lewis and thinking about all the fame and honors waiting ahead for him. He teams up here with Jim Sheridan, the man who directed My Left Foot, so things look good.

The year is 1974 and at the Guildford Pub in London has been attacked by a terrorist bombing all while London and the IRA are constantly fighting in the streets. Unfortunately for Gerry Conlon (Daniel Day Lewis) he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Gerry gets arrested for the crimes and after days of senseless physical and emotional abuse is forced to sign a confession to the crimes. Then in court Gerry, his father, family, and friends all get charged for terrorism, Gerry specifically getting 30 years to life. They face their time but along the way meet the man who actually bombed the Guildford Pub and a lawyer looking to help fight for their innocence. Gerry must find the strength to fight for his family, his name, and for justice.

Upstream Color

When I first saw Primer it was the first experience for me where I walked out having no clue what was going on. I had at least a grasp of that plot in a majority of films but with Primer it was a completely different experience. I had to do extensively research and rewatch it few times and I am sure that I still am missing stuff about that movie. That said I was glad to see a movie, especially a sci-fi time travel movie, trust its audience so much and didn't feel the need to explain every single detail of the plot. It is a film that wants you to become engrossed in its world and then figure out all the clues. It was an enriching experience as a cinephile to see a movie challenging me and making me analyze everything instead of being spoon fed everything. Now come to the present and it seems like forever since Primer came out and I know I wasn't the only one dying to see what else filmmaker Shane Carruth, he wrote, directed, editing, and did basically everything on Primer, had up his sleeve of visual storytelling. So it takes 9 years of waiting to see what else Carruth has to bring to cinema and he gives us Upstream Color. 

Upstream Color stars Amy Seimetz as a young woman who finds her life turned upside down but horrific event out of her control. An unknown man comes into her life and takes her savings, house equity, and more while she is powerless. As she tries to rebuild her life after the traumatic events she meets Jeff (Shane Carruth) who seems to have a emotional but also metaphysical connection with her. After times passes the two become close and fall in love with each other but then strange things begin to happen. Memories collide and strange noises come from no where as together they must discover about their past and connection to each other. Meanwhile, a strange man takes care of some very unique pigs.

The Piano Teacher

Speechless. Utterly and completely speechless. I think we all want to have this feeling at the end of the film. We want stories to shock and rock our world to the core and make us question ourselves and everything we just sat through and yet few movies are able to achieve this feat. Well to give cinema a fair fight it is pretty hard to do this. In the past two or three fews I can only think of a few films that actually felt like a punch in the stomach at the end, films like Inception, Incendies, and Kill List. Look at that list though, even though its not a comprehensive list of what I am discussing it shows the power that affect has on film goers. Those three films have been some of the biggest critical successes of the past few years. What does it take to have that great gut punch and leave jaws on the floor? Well for one you need deep, thoughtful characters that feel real and that the audience wants to root for or at least sympathize for. Next you need a well crafted story with a great pull the rug from under your feet moment that is the least thing anyone would have suspected. So when a film comes around with the gut punch it is a wonderful experience especially when you are least expecting it. It makes me think "this must've been what it felt like when Darth Vadar said I am your Father for the first time". So why am I talking about the drop your jaw moments? Well I want to talk about one of my favorite filmmakers Michael Haneke who time and time again dominates the visual storytelling medium unlike any other filmmaker. He is brutal, honest, thought provoking, brave, but most of all he is raw. He takes life as we know it, especially the parts of life we are afraid to face in the mirror, and shoves it in our face and says "Deal with it". His films stick with you for days and you become obsessed with them and over analyze them. Or maybe thats just me. Either way there is no debate on his pure genius and skill. I say I love filmmakers but I exhalt Michael Haneke.

The Piano Teacher follows Erika Kohut (Isabelle Huppert), who is surprisingly a piano teacher, licing a trapped life with her overbearing and obsessive mother. Her students frustrate her and resembles all of your most strict teachers combined into one. Rarely smiling or even showing signs of life, we soon learn that there is more than meets the eye when it comes to Erika. That is when Walter (Benoît Magimel) comes into her life, a prodigy student who wants to be taken under her wing, and makes it very evident that he has romantic intentions for her. As he continuously forces himself into her life, she slowly but surely lets him in. We discover Erika's dark, deep secrets and how Walter reacts to them leading them into a dark rabbit hole together.

Why Cinema?

I often wonder what about cinema draws me in so passionately. What about movies makes me constantly want to talk and discuss it with everyone. Why do bad films annoy me and why do I spend thousands of dollars on going to theater and buying movies so I can watch them over and over again. Why do I push myself as an editor to be better and improve everyday so I can improve my skills? Do I want to achieve such glory as the people that have lived before me and made some of the greatest stories ever told? Do I see movies as an escape from my own life? To answer any of these questions would take longer than a simple blog post but today I feel inspired to write, to write about why I love movies. I must admit that watching a recent video on youtube (Birth to Death as told by Cinema - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BppqSwvuLRA) is what caused this burning inside of me to write so check it out for yourself it is a great video.

So what got me into film into first place? Well as a little kid I grew up watching Jurassic Park from age two when my father put me in front of the TV and played the movie for me. I didn't realize it for a long time but this was the beginning of my love for cinema. I would watch that movie every day countless times waiting for the huge T-Rex and stealthy velociraptors to show up. I was entranced and fixated on the screen whenever it was playing. From there I would constantly try to watch any movies I could find, everything from Disney films to Small Soldiers. As I grew up the fire inside me grew, any time my family went to the movies I was ecstatic and I wanted to talk about them afterwards non-stop asking everyone what their favorite part was or what they did/didn't like about it. I also grew up with a father who would always talk films with me, quoting his favorite lines and telling me some of the great movies I would have to watch when I got older. It was a great way for my Father and I to connect.

Nothing else happened for me until I reached high school and I saw a class called "Intro to Film Studies" and being a dumb freshman I thought watching movies for class was going to the be the easiest thing ever. Little did I know that from there I would become a cinephile and it was really all thanks to a film called Pickpocket. Released in 1959, Pickpocket was written and directed by Robert Bresson and in those short 75 minutes I was in awe of this movie because of the simplest little thing, the noise of shoes tapping against the ground as people walked. I am sure I had heard this noise before but something about Pickpocket fascinated me and from that day on I was engulfed in a world I still am gladly in today. The rest of the class taught me to look at film as an art rather than pure entertainment. I saw a wide range of films from Singin' In The Rain to Days of Heaven. I was experiencing a whole new world and loving every second of it. I was fascinated by this visual medium that was showing me such beauty that I never knew could exist in this world whether it was the beauty in nature or the beauty in humanity.

I started to watch films more critically and becoming a fanatic, trying to find more people who felt the same way I did. I couldn't stop thinking about movies, day and night they would play in my head. I was obsessed but I still hadn't had that moment of realization. Something was missing for me and I had no clue what it was. Then one fateful night when I was 16 I was flipping through channels on TV and came across a film I had never heard of before, Requiem For A Dream. My world would be changed forever. No longer did I look at the world or film the same. While most people get depressed after seeing Requiem For A Dream I was inspired and awe struck. Never before had I seen a film perfectly blend everything together so cohesively. The music, the people, the editing, the dialogue, the story, and the climax was on a whole new level of cinema that I was just beginning to grasp. From that day on I knew that my life would be surrounded by movies. Ever since then I have been a movie addict, watching movies obsessively and uncontrollably and loving every second of it.

So I still haven't really answered why. Why movies? Is it the exploration of worlds unknown to us? Well that certainly plays a part because while we can never see everything life has to offer us, film gives us a little insight into worlds that we may never have the chance to see otherwise. Is it because film brings us together? Undeniably film speaks a universal language that brings people together unlike any other medium in my opinion. These questions and more could serve the answer but I look at a quote from Michael Haneke that explains to me why I love film so much.


"Film is 24 lies per second at the service of truth, or at the service of the attempt to find the truth."

Truth. This is what burns the fire inside of me when it comes to film. I am in the never ending search for truth. It could be the truth of the human experience or of the universe around us. Film is constantly attempting to find that truth. When I watched Chasing Amy recently I discovered truth about myself and my own personal problems that I let get in the way of relationships and it spoke to me like few films could. You can also look at films like The Breakfast Club and American Beauty that speak truths of life and how we as humans work unlike anything else could. Its more than just that though. For me action films speak truth to me about the inner warrior in me that wants to go out and kick ass like in The Raid Redemption. Films like The Tree of Life make me explore my personal views on the universe and existence. Comedies like Groundhog Day help me rediscover laughter and what affect humor has on life. I could go on but for me films speak to us on a personal level unlike any other medium. While some could argue video games are a step above movies because of the interactivity and I understand that argument but nothing impacts me more than watching characters on a screen and watching a story come to life. I learned in Psychology about mirror neurons, neurons that are activated in our bodies like for crying or laughing when we see someone crying or laughing. So when watching someone cry on screen our brains are activating the neurons in our brains that make us cry. On a biological level whether we know it or not we are connecting with characters no matter what the go through. It makes sense then why we get pumped up watching 300 or sad when watching Awakenings. In my opinion it is because of that connection where we are able to find that truth in cinema.

Nevertheless I have no idea whether any of this made sense or if anyone will read it but I wanted to write it. Films speak to me about human truths more than anything else in the world. Humans creating stories for the world to see. Characters being brought to life in front of our very eyes and making us question our own life. With me there is no such thing as  "fourth wall", in my opinion film is just as much a part of the real world as we are.

-William McAbee

Chasing Amy

I am a big fan of Kevin Smith but not necessarily his films. While i enjoy hearing his opinion and analysis of films like Superman Returns, I didn't love Clerks and Cop Out was hard to watch. That said I don't blame him for Cop Out and I personally thought Red State was a great flick. So after hearing about Chasing Amy multiple times I finally decided to check it out to see if Kevin Smith could win me over.

Chasing Amy follows Holden (Ben Affleck) and Banky (Jason Lee), two best friends who write and draw their own independent comic book, who one day run into Alyssa Jones (Joey Lauren Adams). After a great night and game of darts, Holden quickly becomes interested in Alyssa and wants to have a shot at her. Unfortunately for Holden he learns that Alyssa is a lesbian who isn't interested in men at all. While Banky tries to convince him to give up, Holden stays persistent and eventually falls in love with her and ends up winning over Alyssa. The rest of the film explores the dynamic relationship between Holden and Alyssa, the changes and challenges they face, their own personal issues, and how their relationship impacts the friendship between Banky and Holden. The films battles the themes of trust, friendship, love, forgiveness, and our own personal demons.