My August 2006 Viewings

Includes my personal ratings.
Recommended DVDs in bold.

The Hudsucker Proxy 08/29/06 (A)
To Die For 08/24/06 (B)
Wild Things 08/21/06
Tape 08/16/06 (B)
The Deep End of the Ocean 08/16/06
The Libertine 08/10/06 (C-)
Iris 08/10/06 (C+)
Monk 4:4 08/07/06 (B)
Curb Your Enthusiasm 2:1 08/07/06 (B)
The White Countess 08/01/06
The Confession 08/01/06

The Hudsucker Proxy (1994)

Capra-esque

When giant Hudsucker Industries' president, Waring Hudsucker (Charles Durning), leaps 44 stories to his death during a board meeting, the company's second-in-command, Sid Mussberger (Paul Newman), spawns a plot to prevent the general public from buying up Waring's 83 percent interest in the company while also driving down the stock value so he can buy up controlling interest in the organization.

Enter one innocent yet ambitious young Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins), a new Hudsucker mailroom clerk who is assigned to deliver an important missive to Mussberger's own hands.

In his anxiety of being in the top floor executive office, poor Barnes turns into a total doofus who first raises Mussberger's ire and then becomes Mussberger's vision of the perfect proxy -- a new president for the company who Mussberger can control and ultimately use to manipulate the stock to suit his plan.

With young Barnes as president, the stock does go down and fiesty reporter Amy Archer (Jennifer Jason Leigh) sets about to expose him in a wonderful reincarnation of all the Katherine Hepburn/Rosalind Russell fast-talking, dazzle-'em journalist style from the films of the 1930s.

Will good prevail and redemption be feasible?

Ranks right up there with It's a Wonderful Life!

A fun and stylish film by brothers Ethan and Joel Coen.

Unrated by MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America).

To Die For (1995)

The Dark Side

Cue Suzanne!

Though she's far from the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, Suzanne Stone (Nicole Kidman) certainly is the most determined, cunning, cold, calculating and aggressive wannabee ever. She has lived her whole life to be a television news reporter.

Enter the darkly handsome Larry Maretto (Matt Dillon), a restaurateur in his Italian family's business, who sets his sights on the beautiful but shallow Suzanne. After their marriage, Suzanne immerses herself in the serious business of gaining recognition in TV by going to work as a clerk at the cable access station in her hometown, the tiny Little Hope, NH.

The self-absorbed manipulator bowls over her boss Ed (Wayne Knight, Seinfeld's Newman) and becomes the self-important weather girl for the small station, but she knows her real break will come only if she does something significant.

She then interviews students in Mr. Finlaysson's (Buck Henry) class about what teenagers are thinking for a series she is producing. Meanwhile, she's decided that her husband Larry will ultimately be an impediment to her success. He'd prefer she stay home and raise children but he doesn't prohibit her cable station duties and is proud to watch her reports on TV at the restaurant every night.

But once Suzanne has made up her mind about something, the cogs turn quickly. Suzanne seduces the pensive young student Jimmy (Joaquin Phoenix), befriends and promises great things in the future for the frumpy and lonely young Lidia (Alison Folland), and lures their friend Russell (Casey Affleck) into a dastardly plot to annihilate Larry.

The story is told with many cut-aways to the perfectly coiffed and attired Suzanne in the television studio telling her side of the story with counterpoint comments from Larry's loving sister Janice (Illeana Douglas) who has always been suspicious of Suzanne's motives and selfishness.

Does Suzanne succeed in her plot? Does she become a mega news celebrity? Awwww, come on! I can't tell you that! :)

Directed by Gus Van Sant. Adaptation to screen by Buck Henry. Music by Danny Elfman.

Rated R for strong sexual content, and for language.

Tape (2002)

Powerful Character Studies

One has to be in the right mood to watch Tape. It's intensely psychological and, at times, disturbing. It takes a little getting used to the method used to make this film but ultimately, it's the best way to tell this particular story. Completely filmed in one room with a cast of three and no background music, it has the feel of an amateur film despite the fact that it was directed by Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused, The Newton Boys and others).

The story plays straight through without flashbacks or lapse of time between scenes, and the camera is mostly hand-held making for some jumpiness and ping-pong shots back and forth between characters. Once you move beyond these stylistic elements, you can get into the story.

Vince (Ethan Hawke) has come back to Flint, Michigan, to see the debut of his old high school pal's first film at a local Film Festival. He's staying in a seedy motel room awaiting the arrival of his pal Johnny (Robert Sean Leonard).

After 10 years, the reunion is exciting and the fellows have some fun joking around, but it doesn't take long to see that Vince and Johnny have gone in very different directions. Vince is a hard-drinking, cokehead drug dealer while Johnny is a USC film grad set on making a name for himself as a film director.

Vince is dead set on getting Johnny to confess to an indescretion Vince is sure Johnny committed in the waning days of high school. He plays significant head games on Johnny for an hour or so and then calls and invites over their high school friend Amy (Uma Thurman) who is an assistant district attorney in Flint.

Vince wants Amy to hear the tape of Johnny which Vince secretly captured during their earlier conversation. To tell more than this would give away the story but this is a fascinating character study of three very different people.

Rated R for language and drug content.