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Posted: Sun Aug 12, 2007 2:08 pm
by Eric
I'm with Precious Doll on this. Major disappointment.
Posted: Sun Aug 12, 2007 2:07 pm
by flipp525
Christian Bale is sexy as shit. And an awesome actor. His Patrick Bateman in American Psycho was fantastic and he's managed to breathe life back into the tired old Batman franchise. He can be as smug as he wants to, in my opinion. It just ups his hotness factor for me.
Edited By flipp525 on 1186945650
Posted: Sun Aug 12, 2007 1:16 pm
by Sabin
I don't understand your problem with Christian Bale. At all.
Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 7:06 pm
by Precious Doll
Sonic Youth wrote:Sabin wrote:Jeremy Davies gives another performance of shellshocked incoherence to fine result, this time a Charles Manson-esque hipster convinced of the American dream,
There may be a good reason for that. Davies played Manson in a TV biopic a few years ago. Guess he couldn't shake it off.
What a funny movie this was. Jackass III: Vietnam Vacation. But after seeing this, The Prestige and especially Batman Begins, I have one question. Is Christian Bale the worst young American actor working today? Probably not, but he out-smugs even Tom Cruise.
No Sonic, Christian Bale is not the worst young American actor working today because he from the United Kindom (Wales actually).
Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2007 5:10 pm
by Sonic Youth
Sabin wrote:Jeremy Davies gives another performance of shellshocked incoherence to fine result, this time a Charles Manson-esque hipster convinced of the American dream,
There may be a good reason for that. Davies played Manson in a TV biopic a few years ago. Guess he couldn't shake it off.
What a funny movie this was. Jackass III: Vietnam Vacation. But after seeing this, The Prestige and especially Batman Begins, I have one question. Is Christian Bale the worst young American actor working today? Probably not, but he out-smugs even Tom Cruise.
Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 5:45 pm
by Big Magilla
This has been pretty low on my radar, but both Entertainment Weekly and The Envelope (Tom O'Neill) are promoting the hell out of it. EW gave it an A- and in a separate article is touting both Christian Bale and Steve Zahn as early favorites for next year's best actor and supporting actor Oscars, respectively.
The envelope has a podcast with Bale and Werner Herzog.
Posted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:56 am
by Precious Doll
I saw Rescue Dawn a couple of weeks ago and had I not known that Herzog directed the film I would have thought it was directed by some hack for producer and sometimes director Menahem Golan. It is very uncharacteristic of his work far more studied and phoney without the free wheeling documentary style of his earlier work.
I also had the misfortune to finally catch up with his 2005 doco/drama his worst film to date The Wild Blue Wonder last week.
Herzog's golden period of the 70's is well and truly over. He should stick to documentaries as his recent Grizzly Man and The White Diamond illustrate.
Posted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:19 pm
by Sabin
Watching 'Rescue Dawn', I was reminded of 'The Pianist' for both comparable and contrasting reasons. Both movies concern the spirit's indomnitable and at times even absurd will for preservation. Szpilman was a more accidental survival, a man who was aided both by a more mesmeric luck attributed to the Holocuast survivor, both by the hand of man and fate. Dieter Dengler's survival was due to his mad will, that and that alone. Bale's Dieter is the more active protagonist, whereas Brody's Szpilman is the more passive, which is not to detract from either actor's accomplishments. Christian Bale's Dieter Dengler is a carefully studied performance of the man's effervescent German joi de vivre and mannerisms. Whereas Brody always seems perplexed in Kafka-esque proportions, Bale seizes every nominal attribution as if it is a blessing from God, be it a secret chamber for hidden rice or a bowl full of maggots he wolfs down.
Both stories are incredibly intriguing, and yet what makes Polanski's movie the more successful ultimately is his control over the finished product. 'The Pianist' is a European production with a Focus release, whereas 'Rescue Dawn' is an MGM film. There is no doubt in my mind that the edits I am watching in 'Rescue Dawn' are not Herzog's, nor is this his music, and ultimately the movie's emotional curve feels a mite stunted. There is a director's cut of this movie that will blow my mind. And yet, 'Rescue Dawn' still manages to be both an incredible motion picture and a truly Herzogian motion picture. No manner of studio interference can keep this madman down, and we are still treated to moments of weirdness like Vietcong doing somersault kicks in the air, a dog entering the frame on his hind legs, and an observant lens that picks up every moment of madness and desperation pivotal in the scene.
What I love most about 'Rescue Dawn' is whereas any other filmmaker would film these men of desperation giving long speeches about their present condition, wants and needs, Herzog films them like animals in wait, often times just not knowing what to do both in captivity and even more horrifying freedom. Herzog keeps his actors, professional and natural, on the same wavelength and the result is both disconcerting and mesmerizing. Christian Bale's studied performance grows as the film goes along, a half-mad eternal optimist whose charisma feels unforced and untenable. Jeremy Davies gives another performance of shellshocked incoherence to fine result, this time a Charles Manson-esque hipster convinced of the American dream, that he does not have to struggle for survival, that they will come and get him no matter how long he waits. The freedom that Herzog allows is truth-to-the-moment above all and in Davies, he encourages the visible thought process above coherence.
And then there's Steve Zahn and his doleful eyes and the age lines below that seems to cradle his sad. Here is a hugely underrated and charming actor (in films deserving and undeserving: an 'Out of Sight', a 'Riding in Cars with Boys', terrific in both) pushed beyond any expectations I had of him. He gives one of the saddest and sadly hopeful performances I've seen in ages as a man deprived of any dignity and finds a patient friends in Dieter Dengler. I see 'Rescue Dawn' hanging in throughout the Oscar season, in a "Have you seen 'Rescue Dawn' yet?" kind of way, and a video release that bolsters its Oscar chances; I would be astonished if Steve Zahn did not receive some kind of nomination for his performance as Duane. More so than that, this movie has National Society of Film Critics written all over it, for Herzog, Zahn, Bale, and the movie itself. It might also have Oscar written over it as well. There are so many moments of unabashed Herzogisms, as well as an ending that had the audience I was with (many of whom chatted through the film, did not turn off their phone, the walking, talking human detritus you hate in a dark room) deeply, deeply affected.
'Rescue Dawn' is a compromised, major piece of filmmaking.