Cinema de Gym: 'I Am Legend'

Hey all. Kurt here with round five of Cinema de Gym. When I walked into my gym's screening of I Am Legend, otherwise known as one of the greatest movies ever made, it was just in time for sole survivor Will Smith's morning workout regimen. Y'know – the one that shows off his especially cut physique, which had a beaming Jada gushing her wifely approval to the press (or was that for Ali?). In any case, it was a good motivator with which to start, my elliptical-bound self facing the day with Will and his treadmilling dog. I do love these morning-routine sequences, which, if done well, can dole out oodles of narrative and character development with nary a spoken word. (My mind goes right to a particular season premiere of Lost, wherein we woke up with a character, partook in his a.m. ritual, then flew up, up, up a laddered pipe only to gasp, “He's in the hatch!”)

After tending to some ill-tempered rats in his basement lab (he's testing cures for that apocalyptic zombie rage virus, you'll remember), Will grabs some rifles from a locked cabinet, whistles for his pooch (Sam) and leaves the house. Outside, it's revealed that he lives within spitting distance of the Washington Square Arch, and in this moment it hits me that I walked by this very address just a couple weeks ago. Honestly, I don't know how you New York film lovers don't just completely lose your s**t on a daily basis. Maybe you do. It's crazy. You live inside the movies. Anyway...

Last man's best friend

Will and Sam take the SUV to the video store, presumably a regular errand that offers a sliver of normalcy and some much-needed sweet escape (so long as they don't rent Life After People). This, I believe, is the first scene that truly introduces us to the film's keen ability to apply considerable weight to inanimate and/or nonhuman things, be them Sam or the mannequins Will regards as everyday people. In the video store, he calls the cashier mannequin by name, and all but blushes while pretending the nearby female mannequin is giving him the eye. The film finds both comic relief and an oft-profound sense of loneliness in such scenes, and Will knows just how to play them: straight, but with bubbling pain. It's a similar pain to that of Tom Hanks's Wilson-loving cast away, and it's the same pain that hurts so good (dramatically, I mean) when – SPOILER ALERT – Sam goes viral and has to be put down.

But I'm getting way ahead of myself here, as things were nowhere near that dire moment during the little slice I watched. Not long after the video store, Will is golfing on a pier, broadcasting that call for survivors that was ubiquitous during the film's marketing campaign (“You are not alone...”). Broadcast finished, Will and Sam spot a deer amidst an ocean of abandoned cars and begin the hunt. Rounding a corner, Sam gets ahead of Will and follows his prey into the movie's no-no place of shadow, which I suppose we can now consider a bit of foreshadowing...

Conclusions?

1. Watching scenes of people working out while working out actually makes you want to work out!
2. I'm really looking forward to moving to New York, so I can live in the movies, too.
3. Will could've really used a little Kim Cattrall in that big lonely city.

And the question we all want answered: What movies would you rent if you were the last person alive?

Miscellinkia: Beatty-ful Summer, Vampiric Tilda, Gamey Thrones,

Links
Ultra Culture Cannes Abuse Checklist. An invaluable chart!
Boy Culture scores the first Val Lauren interview post Sal Mineo / James Franco casting.
Scanners Opening Shots: Woody Allen's Another Woman
IndieWire wonders if winning the Palme D'Or equals box office revenue. Well... it might if any Palme D'Or were released immediately after their win. But by the time they're released summer prestige glory is usually a footnote. Take Uncle Boonmee. No, it was never going to be a "hit" but wouldn't it have played better if it had a normal curve of buzz, release, discussion? Instead of opening 10 months later?

Tilda, Ezra and Lynne Ramsay at the WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN premiere

Movie|Line wonders if a slow burn favorite might win the Palme D'Or instead of The Tree of Life. Cannes Jury predictions crack me up each year because everyone assumes its done deals (just like the Oscars)... but it's often far from predictable.
Towleroad GLAAD Awards. Kim Cattrall's acceptance speech is quite funny. 'I played a gay man on a popular tv show'
Slash Film Tilda Swinton and Michael Fassbender for a Jim Jarmusch vampire flick? Curious and possibly awesome. I guess this means that Countess movie with Tilda isn't happening though. I can't see her doing two vampire films in a row.
Film Doctor steals notes froms the Mrs for Bridesmaids

Gagging on Game of Thrones
I know that my initial impression of HBO's Game of Thrones was far less favorable than most critics and fantasy fans, but can I at least get an amen that the casting of both "fourth in line" Renly Barantheon and his lover The Knight of Flowers, who are often described in the book as intensely charismatic, is terribly off. The casting does not reflect either The Knight of Flowers legendary beauty or Renly's reputation as the most charming fellow in the Seven Kingdoms. They both come across as whiny slightly-bitchy wimps which is about a 180 from the books wherein The Knight is someone you'd NEVER want to meet on a battlefield he's so deadly physically and Renly is someone everyone wishes were king. I really am not pleased with this. And I did not to hear those campy sound effects for well, MOVING ON... But I'll admit that for all my reservations, the series is hooking me just like the first novel did. That first novel was so brilliantly plotted but I really must stop watching this before it goes off the plot horse never to remount in any subsequent books or, uh, seasons as the new case may be.

A Beatty-ful Summer
Tonight in New York City at 92 Street Y, elusive actress/writer/director Elaine May will be showing her cut of the infamous 80s flop Ishtar starring Warren Beatty and Dustin Hoffman. May will discuss the movie afterwards which she rarely does. I'm totally going. Tickets are still available. And then in June, the man himself will be appearing at a Dick Tracy screening in Los Angeles to discuss the movie. Tickets for that are $30 but it's a rare opportunity to hear Beatty talk about his work and see that comic flick on the big screen. If I were in LA, I wouldn't dream of missing it. But then I have an unheathily attachment to Beatty and his Mrs.

10 Word Reviews (A.K.A. Nathaniel Catches Up)

As per usual, though I maintain a healthy writing clip to fill The Film Experience with new material for vous, I have some sort of mental block about traditional film reviews. So let's just get everything unreviewed that's in theaters (or in one case, HBO) out of the way right this very instant. I got places to be! We haven't talked about most of these so why not?

Deneuve, Viard and Rennier: comic successes in POTICHE

POTICHE
in which a trophy wife exceeds expectations and reforms her husband's business.
10WR: Knowing hilarious riffs on: Deneuve, 70s, sexism; But souffle deflates.  B/B+

RANGO
in which an abandoned pet lizard becomes a hero in a thirsty desert town
10WR: Surreal weirdness grounded by Western tropes. So ugly it's beautiful. B+

MILDRED PIERCE
in which Todd Haynes adapts the famous novel for an HBO miniseries in five parts
10WR: Glacial pacing but slow build payoffs. Beautifully costumed, lensed. B/B-
EPILOGUE: I'll just come right out and say it. This was not the "event" I was hoping for, neither in performance or in direction. But I did like it. Needless to say, I'll stick to the Joan Crawford gladly, despite them being two very different things.

SOURCE CODE
in which Jake Gyllenhaal keeps reexperiencing the same 8 minutes to solve a bombing
10WR: Perfectly servicable but stumbles exiting train; Needs more existential terror.  C+

MEET MONICA VELOUR
in which a washed up porn star (Kim Cattral) is pursued by a nerdy teenage fan
10WR: Cattral: effortful limited success; Movie: suffers badly from hermetic POV. C-

Finally, I do hope some of you will take in POTICHE if it plays in your town. It's quite funny and one should always support good non-English language films while they're still in theaters so that they keep releasing them; their market share is sadly ever dwindling. Potiche has done well abroad ($21 million) but is struggling in US theaters ($280,000). The cast is just delightful. I almost always like Jérémie Rénier (In Bruges) and the running gag about his lovelife has maybe the best punchline in the movie. It also amuses me that his name is so much like Jeremy Renner's and that they almost share a birthday (January 6th and 7th respectively though Rénier is ten years younger). It goes without saying that Deneuve fills my heart with joy as she always has (she's in my top ten actresses of all time list). Any Karen Viard fans out there? I'd love some recommendations as to other films as she's quite funny but I haven't seen her in many things.