Dreamgirls...you're gonna love me!

This morning I watched Dreamgirls (2006), the movie musical based on the long running play about the rise of Motown and the Supremes. Starring Jamie Foxx, Beyonce Knowles and Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls puts on a solid show depicting through thinly veiled character references how Barry Gordy, songwriters, and performers came together under Gordy's vision to become a dominant force in popular culture and business during the 60's and 70's. Creative battles, underhanded business dealings and backstabbing mark the Supremes doppelanger the Dreams rise to the top. Beyonce's Diana Ross like character in particular receives focus in the second half. The movie is ably staged and directed with the appropriate amount of glitter and spark needed.

Dreamgirls benefits from a strong cast to carry the film. Academy Award winner Jennifer Hudson is the highlight of the movie, her raw and honest performance steals everyone else's thunder. Her singing performances are showstopping, particularly on that "You're gonna love me" song. That plus the "One Night Only" song provide spine tingling thrills of vocal and emotional power. Eddie Murphy also gains sympathy as the Jackie Wilson / Marvin Gaye character. The rest of the cast provide solid performances, leads Jamie Foxx and Beyonce do the best they can with relatively static characters. I was a little disappointed Beyonce couldn't do a little more with her character, having lived the Dreamgirls experience (Destiny's Child was originally four childhood friends with equal parts until Knowles' father who managed them dropped two, brought in one replacement singer and pushed Beyonce to the forefront).

Dreamgirls had the makings of a great movie, but it's the trappings of the musical itself that undercuts it's power. The story covers so much ground (8-10 characters over the span of about 20 years) that none of the characters outside of Murphy and Hudson have a chance to connect with the audience. On top of that, the musical arrangements have not been changed and reek of mid 70's Broadwayized R&B. This becomes confusing, particularly in the 60's section where the song "Steppin' On The Bad Side" is supposed to be a 60's hit but has all the traits of the '70's. Even when the story hits the Me decade the arrangements date the music in a negative way. Every song sounds like it was arranged by Bill Conti for an Oscar awards ceremony.

So I came away mildly disappointed, but that was more due to my expectations than the actual film. Early on, the movie sets up like it's going to lead to something greater but it never gets there. Fortunately, Hudson is able to cut through the glitz to provide the few moments of real feeling. I hope when Hudson finally cuts her CD (if she hasn't already) she skips the current sound of electronic noise and sticks to the powerful soul she demonstrates in both American Idol and here.

Blow Up! Idiocracy! The dumb will rule the earth

Yeah Baby! I watched two movies today that were made a good 40 years apart and yet had some similar things to say about society. The first was Blow Up (1966) an English film directed by Italian filmmaker Michelangelo Antonini and the other was Idiocracy (2006) written and directed by Mike Judge (of Beavis & Butthead, King of the Hill & Office Space fame). From different perspectives, both films mourn the loss of feeling and ethics in society.

Blow Up is considered a classic film about a fashion photographer in 60's swinging London. The main character, well played with total self absorbtion by David Hemmings, is a successful photographer. Both on and off the photo set, he fixes his attention on one thing at a time at the exclusion of all else. He directs others in how to sit, stand and everything else and then ignores those same people once they have passed his interest. It's obvious the Austin Power's character is partially modelled after Blow Up, particularly during the photo shoot sessions where Hemming's climbs over the model shooting pictures yelling "Yes!!! Yess!!! Move your head. Move that arm. Yess!!!" like Mike Myers at the start of The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999).

Antonini uses his familiar neo-documentary camera style to depict the coldness and detachment between the characters. But, unlike say L'Avventura there seems to be a more definite statement about the lack of empathy here. Hemming's character comes across a murder while shooting pictures, but can only think of the murder in terms of how it affects his career and artistic ambitions. Like L'Avventura, the main plot device (in L'Avventura a woman goes missing, here a man is murdered) seems to have the least camera time because it's really about how a tragedy is ignored. Blow Up is done in that slow Antonini style as well, but as always it goes to underscore the waste of time these peoples lives are.

There's one bit of real excitement, the movie features the Yardbirds performing with Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck in their youth. It's the best part of the movie by far. Blow Up is OK, having a trendy setting is bound to date it and I liked L'Avventura more. As far as a portrait of selfish 60's Londoners go, I liked Michael Caine in Alfie a bit more.

Forty years later, Mike Judge made Idiocracy (2006) about how a militairy suspended animation experiment gone wrong sends Luke Wilson and Maya Rudolph 500 years into the future. In the future, they find the world has eliminated intelligence by having smart people out bred by dumb people. The future is run on automation and corporate conglomeration run amok.

Idiocracy doesn't hesitate to point the finger at a society that values sensationalism, indiscriminate capitalism and pure hype over decency, ethical behavior and realism. It has some amusing bits, such as the thought of Carl's Jr. dispensing food through electronic kiosks that gas upset customers. But ultimately, Idiocracy spends so much time looking down on everyone that it doesn't really connect as a movie. It actually would have worked better as a cartoon, but there is already a better version available in Matt Groenig's Futurama series. The one highlight is that it shows Maya Rudolph is a comic talent waiting for the right vehicle. It seems unlikely that she will find that vehicle, but if she does it could be huge.

Put the two movies together and you end up with a theme of society becoming a selfish place where people are stupid and uncaring. It's a very cynical message and while I cannot completely refute either movie I do have more hope than these filmmakers that society can become a place for cultural and technological advancement. Now I think I'll go watch Busted on the Job 3 on the Fox Reality Channel. It's disgusting when people put boogers in your hamburger!

My Life As A Dog - quirky and moving

Last night I had the opportunity to watch My Life As A Dog (1985), a great Swedish movie I saw way back when. I remembered it as a touching film about a young boy having to move to the country and something to do with a barn. I had a warm feeling when remembering this film so I looked forward to seeing it again.

I'm happy to say the movie is just as good as I remember it. There are a ton of themes at work in this movie, such as young adolesence, the need to belong, the kindness of people and hope in the face of death. The movie focuses on a young rambuctious boy named Ingmar who is too much for his dying mother to handle. She sends him off to her brother who lives in the country. There Ingmar meets a town of oddball characters where his youthful energy fits in.

In the late 80's, there seemed to develop this magical place in movies where eccentric but friendly people would live in a town together. They had their odd but forgiveable quirks and would bond together as a dream like town should. My Life As A Dog fits perfectly in that scene of places that would see it's height with Northern Exposure.

The warmth, humor and humanistic view brought across by director Lasse Halstrom is affecting and moving. Halstrom has made other movies with similar tone, such as What's Eating Gilbert Grape? (1993) or The Cider House Rules (1999). Though those movies were also well made and shared similar traits, neither are quite as good as My Life As A Dog. Arf Arf!