Novel Eye

I could go on all day about iconography. Clearly, seeing George Clooney in a movie like Ocean's 11 (12 or 13) brings with it the whole knowledge of George Clooney as style maker and playboy. What then do we make of Werner Herzog's casting of Christian Bale as Dieter Dengler in Rescue Dawn? As a young boy in Germany, Dieter Dengler was almost killed by American fighter pilots. From that moment he resolved to be an American fighter pilot. In the Vietnam war he was shot down on his first mission, taken captive in a Laotian POW camp from which he then escaped and amazingly made it back to safety. As a young boy, Christian Bale starred as the fictional version of the real author J.G. Ballard who was taken to a POW camp by the Japanese where he developed a fascination/love for the Kamikaze pilots who took off from the airfield next to the camp. Coincidence? I think not. Now Bale is an amazing actor. I thought it when I saw him in Empire of the Sun and I've thought it ev...

Last year two films came out about competing magicians in the 1800's. How strange is that? We obviously watched the one above tonight. Annoyingly because we both shuffle the Netflix list we are getting The Illusionist tomorrow. I really didn't plan to watch them back to back. That said, this movie blew my socks off. Unfortunately, it's like Children of Men . I don't know how to talk about it without spoilers. It is a slow, beautiful, horrifying movie, wandering through different times fluidly and effortlessly as in Christopher Nolan's earlier Memento . And like Memento , it explores the problems with obsession and manipulation (I like finding through lines in director's work). Like Memento the time twists are essential to the response of the audience. They are not arbitrary or unnecessary . I know that it's possible to watch Memento "in order" but I cannot think that the impact would be the same. I will say this: this film and it's final tw...