3096 Days (2013) @ 3096 Tage

How much weight did Antonia Campbell-Hughes lose to play a paedophile's muse? Apparently he kept her malnourished so she'd look more like daddy's little girl.

The real Natascha Maria Kampusch

At a glance:

3096 Days (2013) by Sherry Hormann (Desert Flower, 2009) is based on the 2010 autobiography of Natascha Maria Kampusch, the Austrian woman known for her abduction at the age of 10 back in 1998. Kampusch was held in a secret cellar by her kidnapper Wolfgang Přiklopil for more than eight years, until she escaped in 2006. The lass has gotten worldwide attention since and she's some kinda celebrity activist now, takin pics with Sri Lankan kids and whatnot.

Bad news on the doorstep:

Since the movie is based on her account of the harrowin events, we get a decent technical runaround e.g. the renovated dungeon and other physical details of the incarceration. However, while Antonia Campbell-Hughes really gives her all as Natascha and Thure Lindhardt makes a memorable villain, the little emotions are absent in this screenplay and her terrible ordeal -- one that you would expect to be riddled with desperation, reflection and total anguish -- seems as if it wasn't even a true story. Guess what? Maybe it isn't. There are plenty of documented instances where Miss Kampusch was caught lyin about the details and you can read online the many competin theories as to what really happened durin those 3096 days. See, some people think she's not so much a victim as she makes herself out to be. Apparently, she even cried when told about the fate of her abductor. All the speculation is infinitely more fascinatin than the movie proper, so do give it a Google. Read the IMDb boards, if you like. It would surely go some way towards explainin why these characters seem so one-dimensional. There simply isn't enough goin on here to convince the viewer than Natascha was bein held against her will.

"Fuck. I'm gonna miss prom night."

Perennial wonderment:

Maybe if the renowned German filmmaker and director Bernd Eichinger didn't die with his unfinished script, we'd have a better movie. After all, he did option her book and wanted Kate Winslet for Natascha, you know? Couldn't been like The Reader (2008), maybe. Anyway, this movie is apparently also based on his unfinished script.

Thirtysomething Antonia Campbell-Hughes playing a thirteen-year-old girl?
It would've been illegal to cast someone true-to-age, perhaps.

Home but never alone.

Reminds me of:

A bit of Trade (2007) and The Reader (2008) but those were well above average movies. This one's more like The Seasoning House (2012) if you're talkin about how hollow it feels.

I can't remember if I cried:

The sight of Antonia Campbell-Hughes in all her frail nakedness invites disgust and some sympathy but it's hard to invest in her character because we don't get to see what makes her tick. Some sequences in this drama approach art but somethin just ain't right with the whole setup. By the way, extended scenes of the girl in the nude do serve as one of the few ways by which we can feel some force of realism behind the turns of events, so you're pretty much completely shortchanged if you're watchin anythin less than the 1hr50min cut.

Most memorable line:

None. However I would like to mention that the dubbed British English dialogue is rather strange and off-puttin. Did they manage to go as far as they wanted to with this production idea? One reviewer I read remarked that you get Irish and Danish actors, playin Austrian people who talk with German accents.

Some of them want to use you.
Some of them want to be of use.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

A follow-up movie oughtta be interestin. One that disputes her version of events. It would've been a more meaningful endeavour that would've been taken seriously if little Amelia Pidgeon played the girl throughout the whole show, without an older actress supplantin her. Meanwhile, we can all watch Michael (2011) or go kidnap our own pre-pubescent chick to see for ourselves if it really is this easy to keep a girl in your cellar for 3096 days and take her out shoppin once in a while.★★
Bonus material:

So this is what Miss Kampusch does with her time these days.

Lovelace (2013)

Peter Sarsgaard tickles Amanda Seyfried's tonsils in Lovelace (2013).

At a glance:

The real Linda Lovelace.

How far does a girl have to go to untangle her tingle, asks the poster for Deep Throat (1972), the purported most profitable indie flick of all time at some $600m (not accordin to the mob who funded it), out of which tragic starlet Linda Lovelace received none of the US$1250 owed to her. I wish I were livin in those pre-Internet days to experience fuck flicks at standalone cinema wankathons, at least once in my life. If I did, I wish I got to know Linda Susan Boreman, the unassumin Florida schoolgirl turned world famous porn star, often credited as bringing adult entertainment into the forefront of mainstream attention. This very sympathetic and one-sided Andy Bellin / W. Merritt Johnson treatment is a biopic based on Eric Danville's 2001 book The Complete Linda Lovelace, focusin on how the lass escapes her religious mother (Sharon Stone) to meet and marry the charismatic hustler Chuck Traynor (Peter Sarsgaard) who would end up bein her papa pimp and punisher. Who would've thought that Linda's impressive capacity for fellatio would send her up the dizzyin heights of international superstardom and then down so far to the lowest levels of human depravity? Lovelace (2013) is a movie I was excited to read about and I wanted to like.

Bad news on the doorstep:

Juno Temple would've been my top choice for Linda.

Dirty beauties Juno Temple and Chloe Sevigny both have small roles in this and I wish either of them had landed the leadin part instead. Was Amanda Seyfried cast because of her freckles and her 60s style, upside-down heart-shaped tits? I read that Kate Hudson was first choice! What a disaster that would've been. Far more critical than that, of course, is how easily the picture goes down, when contrasted against the cultural significance of its characters. I'm talkin about how it "reduces an immensely disturbing, politically byzantine tale to a series of cartoonish vignettes" and how "this celeb-studded biopic squanders a gutsy performance by Amanda Seyfried while making '70s porn look scarcely more sleazy than a movie-of-the-week melodrama from the period", accordin to Rob Nelson for Variety. Sarsgaard and Adam Brody especially give some layered, highly watchable performances but the way all the characters enter and exit the proceedings, e.g. Playboy legend Hugh Hefner played by James Franco, simply devalues the explosive subject matter. Not only is the camerawork rather static, the characterisation makes caricatures out of everyone and many potentially powerful scenes lose their emotional gravitas, e.g. Dad (Robert Patrick) talkin to his little girl on the phone about how he had to walk out of the cinema, and Linda survivin a beatin in the streets only to be rescued by cops who were more interested in gettin her autograph.

Well, at least the retro typeset and production design was spot on.

James Franco's pipe-wielding Hugh Hefner!

Perennial wonderment:

Will we ever find out how much the movie actually made? Did Hugh Hefner really get a blowjob from Linda and was he really a sympathetic figure who wanted her to be a legitimate movie star? Was Linda actually a pathological liar and used everyone, just as much as they used her? It would've been nice to at least cover the other angle about how she felt the anti-porno movement also manipulated her durin her last days.

Reminds me of:

The wonderfully depressin biopics Auto Focus (2002) about Bob Crane and What's Love Got To Do With It (1993) about Tina Turner - both of which are vastly more resonant and wholly entertainin than this one.

I can't remember if I cried:

When it stopped at 92 minutes. What kind of self-respectin biopic has such a short runtime? No wonder everythin seems rushed!

Most memorable line:

Chuck says: "No, Linda, it's Shakespeare. I told them you do a great English accent, particularly with a cock down your throat."

Innit sad that a movie so big gave so little to Linda?

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

Total Film's Kate Sables notes that for a movie obsessed with truth-tellin, Lovelace "ignores the competing accounts of its heroine’s porno past, privileging only her own version". Another online comment dismisses Lovelace as "nothing more than a by-the-numbers, woman empowerment, Lifetime channel Movie Of The Week…with nudity". I do feel it's not very tender and disappointingly mediocre. For a more academic view on the topic, check out the 2005 documentary Inside Deep Throat. By the way, does anyone know what happened to that other Linda Lovelace story that was supposed to be out this year, Inferno: A Linda Lovelace Story (2013), starrin Malin Akerman and Sasha Grey? I read that Lindsay Lohan was supposed to be the lead. Oh well, meanwhile I'll have to check out Paul Schrader's The Canyons to see how LiLo is doin. ★★1/2
The day the music died:

R.I.P. Linda "Lovelace" Boreman (26 Jan 1949 - 22 Apr 2002)
and Charles Everett "Chuck" Traynor (21 Aug 1937 - 22 July 2002)

Bonus material:

Some of them like to use you, some of them like to be of use.

Zaiton: Ceritaku (2012)

Nadia Aqilah is the best thing about Zaiton Ceritaku but it's too little, too late.

At a glance:

Me mum taught me the lyrics to Menaruh Harapan, the powerful ballad that immortalised Zaiton Sameon in that sequined red dress at Juara Lagu 1987, so as a fan I've been followin this project ever since I heard years ago that Upin Dan Ipin mastermind Burhanuddin Razdi and his wife Ainon Ariff paid the troubled songstress some RM10k for the rights to a biopic about her. It pains me to discover it might not be out of order to write that Zaiton Sameon is just plain bad luck. If the Zaiton: Ceritaku (2012) that fell short of grossin even RM 60k in its short-lived theatrical run is the end product that Burhanuddin Radzi dared to put out as his best foot forward, I wonder just how bad the earlier discarded Fauziah Nawi / Mislina Mustaffa version was?
Bad news on the doorstep:

Nadia Aqilah

This is a biopic of a fallen 80s star that everyone in the Malaysian entertainment scene knew - but that's no excuse to make a movie with only a long trackin shot in the openin moments to establish who Zaiton was. The best thing about this movie is Nadia Aqilah Bajuri (she does all the singin herself), so to open with a performance from her doin Zaiton's Kabut Serangkai Mawar is an excellent decision. However to follow that up with a long take that makes her come across as a bitchy primadonna does itself few favours. Why should we care for Zaiton if we're introduced to her as a spoiled star who goes around givin cheek sandwiches, speakin gedik English? It's an uphill battle from thereon in, tryin to connect us emotionally to Zaiton, no matter how hard Nadia cries or how messed up she looks. The direction of this movie under debutante (stand-in?) director Esma Danial is faulty but we can cut him some slack because at least he flat out admitted the movie tanked in its first week and refused to blame Skyfall (2012) for it, or that self-defecation of an unwatchable movie which opened on the same day, Budak Pailang (2012). Perhaps it's the direction of the project in the first place that is ill-conceived. One of the better reviews I've read on this movie happens to be one written by my ex-colleague and you can believe him when he tells you how bein sensitive to the subject, a livin person, has taken the life force out of the movie. The decision to wade in a shallow, soulless narrative has hurt the movie. Fuck larger than life - she appears petty and more mediocre than ever! Anyone in the payin audience who doesn't know who Zaiton Sameon was and is would ask: why does this story deserve to be told? In Zaiton: Ceritaku, instead of showin us somethin interestin like her vocal prowess or even the loss thereof, what came to be after the unfortunate events that almost claimed her life, we're given annoyin family squabbles and banal dialogue about fame and fortune, underscored by that repetitive Menaruh Harapan riff. One of the few scenes in the movie that actually had a little depth was the roundabout confession from Zaiton about wearin susuk. However, Zaiton had already lost us by then.

Perennial wonderment:

I was present at this interview with Mislina Mustaffa.
She claims she did her best and knows not why they didn't like her.

Will we ever get to see the discarded version? For what it's worth, my colleague at Tontonfilem and I both know this can be good business, not that it will ever come close to recoverin the money they spent on the whole project. Producer Burhanuddin Radzi told reporters he'll only let uni kids have a look at it for academic purposes but among the dejected responses you can read on the movie's official Facebook page, you can find one from the admin concedin it may not be out of the question to include the forgotten movie as a DVD extra. As Zaiton is currently makin its VOD run on Astro First, we'll just have to see what happens next.

Reminds me of:

Zaiton in her heydays.

Once I was havin a drink with a pub singer friend of mine and somehow I felt sorry for all the local musicians whose short shelf lives are always starin back at them from the bottom of a beer bottle. Will my friend find herself jobless some day with nobody to help her, I wonder? You can read interviews of Zaiton expressin her disappointment with some scenes in the movie depictin her as crazy, although she generally approves of the picture, concedin that she has signed the indemnity agreements and there isn't much she can do. Her mental state is all the more questionable when you watch videos of producer Burhanuddin denyin any wrongdoin and defendin himself by tellin the press she can even fail to recognise him on the premiere night, but we can give him credit for havin the tact to euphemise it as her "forgetfulness".

I can't remember if I cried:

When I saw production stills of Esma Danial muckin about with the crane on set. Wow. That was a quite a waste, wasn't it? My heart goes out to Burhanuddin Radzi and the hardworkin crew. The man has had no prior experience workin with film people bein largely an animation producer but had the money and the balls to call for a complete redo after the first failure and also to distribute the movie themselves under the banner Bruang Filem Sdn Bhd. I believe his heart was in the right place when he decided to make this movie.

Most memorable line:

None - but I do remember me dad tellin me that he once shared a beer with Zaiton durin her early days as a nightclub singer... or somethin to that effect.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

If you sat through till the epilogue where Zaiton herself makes a short statement, you'd realise this ain't no Sunset Boulevard (1950). Kak Eton, I wish more could've been done for you but this was probably the wrong time to tell your story. ★★
Bonus material:

Producer Burhanuddin Radzi at the premiere.

Nadia Aqilah and Zaiton Sameon.

Lincoln (2012)

Daniel Day-Lewis does not carry an axe in this movie.
Repeat: Daniel Day-Lewis does not carry an axe in this movie.

Rorschach! Freddy Kruger!
The Confederate States Of America VP!

At a glance:

While thankfully avoidin the hollow stylings in disappointin recent biopics such as, say The Iron Lady (2011), US$50mil DreamWorks/Fox project Lincoln (2012) is a laborious Steven Spielberg exposition on presidential academia, obviously aimed away from the same audiences who were lappin up Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012) back in June. That is to say, this drainin, 150-minute history lesson is unapologetically talky and probably serves as school syllabus material as well as conversation fodder to the real-life U.S. presidential election in a matter of days. The same writer-director team last did Munich (2005) together, if that helps you picture what kind of biopic this is. Adapted from a 2005 biography by Doris Kearns Goodwin, it reportedly focuses on the final four months of Honest Abe's life, and central to the proceedings is the technical, even mathematical aspects of how the Thirteenth Amendment (abolition of slavery) in 1865 came to be. The timin of its release is supposed to echo the upcomin 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.
Bad news on the doorstep:
By now you'd have figured out that I'd appreciated more help for the uninitiated, as this movie speaks directly to those already familiar with American history. With only title cards to punctuate the course of events, my movie experience at an advance screenin at Cineplex Odeon Winston Churchill in Oakville, Ontario, was compromised by my poor familiarity on the subject matter. Perhaps you'd want to read a more qualified review, say from Variety's Peter Debruge but even he writes that Lincoln "offers a largely static intellectual reappraisal of the great orator... Spielberg's most play-like production yet... a style that will keep many viewers at arm's length."

Perennial wonderment:

Can Daniel Day-Lewis ever put a foot wrong? By most accounts, the man has outdone himself again with several months of exhaustive method actin, what with the huge amount of dialogue, he definitely did need to stay in character. However, Tommy Lee Jones as radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens provides the moral heart of the story that audiences can relate to with ease.

Sally Field got a great run-out here.

Reminds me of:

Seein Sally Field again reminds me of Forrest Gump (1994). How I wish there were more roles like these for her so we can see her more often. She played Peter Parker's Aunt May in this year's Spidey movie but I stayed away from that one. Other big name cast members I recognise include Joseph Gordon-Levitt (as Lincoln's eldest son Robert), Tim Blake Nelson, Hal Holbrook, Jackie Earle Haley and John Hawkes.

Most memorable line:

Probably said by Tommy Lee Jones.

Tommy Lee Jones - the most fun character here.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

Abraham Lincoln is here portrayed as an endearin storyteller and warm family man but I wished more could be brought up about how he's allegedly as racist as any other, or that he was more Jewish than Christian, or any of the less desirable qualities that have been claimed. The movie doesn't allow him much room as a table-thumpin public defender hero either because his motivations and emotions are presumed onto us without an arc. Spielberg's slave movie Amistad (1997) was more accessible to me and I'd recommend this only for DDL if you're not academically interested in AL.

Bronson (2008)

Tom Hardy goes full frontal as Charles Bronson.

At a glance:

When Tom Hardy isn't beatin Batman to a pulp in The Dark Knight Rises (2012) or beatin Channing Tatum to a pulp in Warrior (2011) or beatin mythical monsters to a pulp in Minotaur (2006), he's beatin prison guards to a pulp in Bronson (2008), a stylised, comical and surreal biopic of Charles Bronson. Not the similarly bemoustached American actor in Western flicks, mind you, but the incorrigible problem prisoner that has gained international attention as Britain's most violent detainee. Born Michael Gordon Peterson, the bane (sorry, couldn't resist) of all correctional facilities across England has a well-documented life behind bars (30 years in solitary confinement!), stretchin decades and formin a catalogue of wonderful ball-breakin material to work with. He's still in jail as far as I know and has Danish filmmaker Nicolas Winding Refn to thank for fuellin his narcissism. Fans of his Drive (2011) and his powerful Pusher films will attest to the director's precision in filmmakin.

Matt King in a standout supportin performance
as a mastermind poof.

Bad news on the doorstep:

It's a first person narrative play, you know. You might not like the drollery if you thought this was Un Prophète (2009) meets Chopper (2000). Bronson is portrayed as an inarticulate, attention-seekin slab of muscle with a penchant for theatrics. His excesses are crude, futile and disaffectin to watch. However, a resplendent Tom Hardy does give a very disturbin intensity to him - an underclass anti-hero who just doesn't seem to know any better. Your views on crime and punishment will come into play when relatin to such a crass character, which in turn may determine just how much you enjoy the film.

"You shouldn't mess with boys bigger than you."

Perennial wonderment:

Can someone like this be helped? I'd buy ol' Charlie some nasi kukus ayam berempah and maybe he'd lighten up a little, after so many years under Her Majesty's Pleasure.

Reminds me of:

I don't know. How many ex-cons do I know who's also a Moslem apostate (Charles Ali Ahmed), post office robber, exercise book author, bare-knuckle boxer, Tesco worker, painter and cartoonist? Is it any surprise that he's apparently also a friend of the Kray twins?

"Fancy a cup of British char?"

I can't remember if I cried:

Go visit the official website where they tell you Charles Bronson has been in jail since 1974 for stealin £26.18. He's only still inside because he keeps fightin back and not because that's the sentence for petty theft. Still it's agonisin to read such a summary. I also felt a strange despair watchin Bronson's zoned-out girlfriend Allison (Juliet Oldfield) dump him for havin no ambition. I guess that's Tom Hardy's talent, herein proven to be a commodity that's beyond the 100 pounds of muscle he put on for the role.

Most memorable line:

Nothin he says particularly stands out but the throwback soundtrack really hits all the right notes. It includes the Walker Brothers' The Electrician and Pet Shop Boys' It's A Sin - definitely worth a download.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

★★★ 1/2 for an innovative, unexpected approach. Variety's John Anderson notes that Bronson has cult hit written all over it and that gleeful brutality and intellectual mischief have become the bloodstained callin cards of Nicolas Winding Refn while Film Four's Jonathan Crocker says he has framed this anti-biopic of Britain’s most notorious prisoner as a 21st century Clockwork Orange (1971), damned near pullin it off. Well, here's one for the Sorry True Stories tab, eh. So, when's a Mike Tyson biopic gonna be made?
Bonus material:

"Why so serious?"

Citizen Gangster: Edwin Boyd (2012)

"What? You mean some other joker is already famous
for robbing banks with face paint on?"

At a glance:
A decidedly indie Canadian product made by Canadians and starrin mostly Canadians, about the true life story of a Canadian bloke who went from war vet bus driver to wannabe actor and accomplished bank robber in 1949. The eldest son of a police officer, this slippery son of Toronto with two jailbreaks under his belt was Edwin Alonzo Boyd - and as I understand it, not that widely known among locals after all. In an interview, Canadian main cast member Kevin Durand said he didn't know about the Boyd Gang prior to his involvement. The movie trailer plays Boyd up a flamboyant, tapdancin rogue who flirts with the blushin tellers, but conceivably he and his band of miscreants were actually responsible for the biggest bank robbery of all time in Toronto. In fact, their unprecedented manhunt, escapes and arrests became the subject of the first news report on CBC TV.

"Are you sure nobody will make a movie about our scandalous
extra-marital affair and embarrass our grandchildren?"

Anyway, Boyd's story had been told before in the TV movie The Life And Times Of Edwin Alonzo Boyd (1982) starrin Gordon Pinsent but it was in 1995 that Toronto uni student Nathan Morlando contacted the real Edwin Boyd for biopic aspirations. They apparently developed a phone relationship and after 15 years, last week the husband-and-wife team of debutant director Morlando and producer Allison Black were at hand to see the Canadian general release of Citizen Gangster: Edwin Boyd (2012) after its debut at the Toronto International Film Festival last year.
Bad news on the doorstep:
Hey, you know it's pretty hard for me not to sing praises about any half decent gangster flick that comes my way, especially one about a real life criminal with folk hero qualities. However, as I watched this at the Lightbox on openin night with the filmmakin duo in attendance for a little Q & A, it dawned upon me that Citizen Gangster: Edwin Boyd was only half the movie it could've been.

Canadian actor Scott Speedman is Edwin Boyd, Toronto's slipperiest son.
The director says he actually looks like Edwin Boyd.

Despite a classy muted colour scheme to lend credence to the period detail, what he have here is an uneven crime drama, diluted by the dynamics of undue heed paid to various parts of Morlando's homework that he selected i.e. the uneasy focus on supportin characters when Speedman's Boyd was already in danger of appearin too pedestrian. The titular character had authority and looked great in the trailer but suffers from havin to have to share too much of the spotlight with other people who muddy the proceedings and have us askin what's so great about Eddie Boyd in the first place?

The real Edwin Alonzo Boyd
(1914-2002)

Through some admission by the filmmakers, we learn of production compromises that were made, and now they had me reduced to guessin which relatives said no to what, as the story arc did less and less to help make Boyd larger than life, somethin one has legitimate expectations of from watchin the trailer. Morlando's depth of research has somehow failed to convert to its emotional equivalent onscreen and we are left with a labour of love that definitely reflected the filmmaker's ambitions but flawed by production exigencies that weren't only concernin its admittedly small budget.

Standout support from Kevin Durand as a villainous colleague.
Maybe he would've made a more memorable Boyd?

Perennial wonderment:

Did Boyd's kids effectively disowned him? In an interview with Morlando, he was quoted as sayin: “The way he [Boyd] talked about his bank robbing exploits, he was still very excited by it. But when I talked to him about his relationship with his children and his relationship with his ex-wife, he couldn’t hide behind the fun of the bank-robbing… You could see it in his eyes that there was incredible loss and regret.” Yet the daughter, Carolyn, seemed to have approved of the movie accordin to the filmmakers, who are in turn heavin a sign of relief. Morlando told the Lightbox openin crowd that it was her creative input behind the literal money-launderin scene.

"But darling, if you steal grocery, you can't get the air miles!"

Most memorable line:

This is what I mean. They didn't even give him some cool lines to say.
Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?
At the end of the movie, we learn through title cards of Eddie's fate but not before an unusual sequence of events that would lead him to some form of bizarre redemption. These events, if they had only been featured in the slightest, would've possibly reconnected us to Boyd and given the picture a badly needed gloss of epic. Perhaps Liam Lacey's take is more mature than mine, as he wrote: "In the Hollywood version, Edwin Boyd should have gone out in a hail of bullets and twitching limbs. Citizen Gangster deals him a more ignominious sentence: He is forced to become ordinary again." ★★ 1/2

Trailer for the curious:

Auto Focus (2002)

At a glance:

Memorable improvised biopic about sex addict TV actor Bob Crane, star of the American 60s hit comedy series Hogan's Heroes. Movie starts off cheerfully enough with Bob (played by Greg Kinnear) leadin a healthy, successful life then he met and made friends with a video technician (Willem Dafoe) who would form a sexploitative relationship with him as they became obsessed with filmin themselves boinkin women and keepin records of their conquests.

Bad news on the doorstep:

Some will say it's offbeat, uninspirin and trivial. It can be rather depressin due to the gloomy texture of the film in the last act or so and I wouldn't recommend it to viewers lookin for a feel-good film. This is a film about a man who destroyed himself and did not have the chance for redemption.

Perennial wonderment:

Why has Greg Kinnear never gone to the next level of Hollywood stardom? I've always felt that Greg Kinnear is an under-rated actor who really deserves more roles in Hollywood A-List movies. He has an amazin intensity to him which permeates and ebbs well with the flow of this film. His portrayal of Bob Crane here is impressive and there are many scenes where the bleakness of his life just spoke through his eyes, behind those 70s tinted glasses.

No white shirt ever looked better on a woman
since Alex Menesis in Auto Focus (2012).

Watch out for:

Willem Defoe playin Crane's sex-crazed sidekick. He's always done well with twisted, destructive characters, hasn't he? However I must confess that the only reason why I first bought this film was to catch a glimpse of the adorably dirty Maria Bello (Coyote Ugly fame) as Crane's on-set lover and later wife.
I can't remember if I cried:
As this is not a thriller by any account I will tell you that Bob Crane met an unexpected end at the hands of a an unknown murderer in his room as he was sleepin and this remains one of Hollywood's most perseverin unsolved homicides. Did some readin and it appears that the events that are shown on the film are mostly improvisational and that Crane's second family had dismissed it altogether. In any case, Paul Schraeder (writer of Taxi Driver and director of Affliction and Raging Bull) has made a very interestin account on his life here.

Most memorable line:

A day without sex is a day wasted.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

Great that it wasn't overdone. Love the bits of video entertainment history. Useful sleaze. ★★★1/2
Trailer for the curious:

Public Enemies (2009)

"What does zit mean, zis word, moll, Johnny?"

At a glance:
Johnny Depp, Christian Bale and Marion Cotillard in the same movie? It's a biopic about a violent Depression Era gangster? Bring it on!
Bad news on the doorstep:
It's a 140-minute struggle to care about a bank robber who, although played with some measure of suave and swagger by the chameleonic Johnny Depp (check out the pickup lines he gets!) it suffers from an uneven, peculiar narrative style. We just can't couldn't give a toss about John Dillinger - whom musta been helluva more interestin than this damn movie. Hell if it didn't finish strong, I might even have hated it. On the whole, it just seems like a whole lot of A-list stars just decided to appear in a B-grade flick. Michael Mann - why laa?
Perennial wonderment:
Of whether Marion Cotillard can finally go Hollywood has been solved! Yay. Her English comes off odd, though.
Reminds me of:
The Untouchables (1987) and Lonely Hearts (2006). Hell if they made it just a little goofier, I wouldda thought of Bugsy Malone (1976).
Watch out for:

The bedroom scenes between Cotillard and Depp and tell me how they were because I sure as hell didn't see me none at TGV Bukit Tinggi in Klang where I caught this. I'm surprised this movie even made it to Malaysia.
Most memorable line:
The one about his favourite things in life.
Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?
A gangster movie has either gotta have lotsa class or lotsa intensity - this one has neither. Will see if I can get the 1991 TV film Dillinger (or even better the 1973 one) and see if they're any better. This movie didn't teach us too many things, except that Billy Crudup, who was Dr Manhattan in Watchmen (2009), does a good J. Edgar Hoover impersonation. Aah... who's gonna make the next L.A. Confidential (1997)? ★★★