Unknown Pleasures (on DVD)

2002’s Unknown Pleasures (任逍遥) is the last movie in Chinese Sixth Generation director Zhangke Jia’s trilogy about his home province Shanxi. The other two are Xiao Wu (1997) and Platform (2000). In an interview, Jia classified the films as “a trilogy, but with the chronology mixed up. The first one should be Platform, which is about people looking for identity within themselves after a long period of self-isolation. Xiao Wu is about the commodification of China, with all these new products coming in and infiltrating people's lives. And Unknown Pleasures is about the challenges facing the individual amid massive social change. Interpersonal relationships become something you treasure because they're so rare.”

My first exposure to Jia is his 2004 film The World. Before that movie, I had no idea about the Sixth Generation of Chinese directors, but after that movie, all other generations of Chinese directors have faded compared to him. I then found his Platform, but was ambiguous about the movie after watching it. I was happy to find that Unknown Pleasures is closer to The World in storytelling structure even though it is a “sibling” to Platform.

In Unknown Pleasures, once again Jia digs into his familiar territory and unfolds for us a picture of peripheral figures’ aimlessly wandering while tremendous socio-economic changes take place in China. Few directors in China understand those little guys at the edge of the society better than Jia. In his movies, instead of showing the audience the breadth of current Chinese society, he shows us the depth of a few souls forgotten and ignored by people too busy to advance their own lives.

Unknown Pleasures follows two unemployed teenagers’ (Xiao Ji and Bing Bing) daily pursuits in a rundown industrial town, Datong of Shanxi province. Like his other movies, it has a deliberate naturalness. Actors, locations and props all look extremely real and can almost pass for a documentary, but they are in such a way that they are obviously arranged by a director with sharp eyes for details. When characters speak, Jia lets them talk without turning down the background noises. It may be difficult for people to understand them without reading the subtitles, but it adds another layer of realistic touch. No glamorous stars are in this movie. It is hard to find an actor behind each character in the movie. Everyone seems so natural that it truly displays the genius of Jia’s direction. Jia’s favorite leading lady, Tao Zhao, plays Xiao Ji’s love interest, Qiao Qiao. She is like thousands of pretty but not beautiful girls in China and I think that may be exactly why she is Jia’s muse. Xiao Wu (played by Hongwei Wang) also has a few scenes in this movie as an experienced con man and even mentions about Jia’s former movies Xiao Wu and Platform while instructing Bing Bing about the pirated VCDs to sell on the street. Hongwei Wang has been acting like Jia’s alter ego in his movies and makes appearances so far in every Jia’s movie I saw. In a way, Jia is like Hitchcock, but instead of showing up in his own movies, he uses Wang as his stand-in. In this movie, Jia also borrows some American movie ideas and styles and mixes them with a Chinese twist. Xiao Ji talks to Qiao Qiao about Pulp Fiction and Qiao Qiao even wears a wig similar to Uma Thurman’s character in that movie. Right after Xiao Ji’s talk, the movie switches to a club dancing scene that is reminiscent of Uma Thurman and John Travolta’s dancing in that movie. Also like Thurman, Qiao Qiao is already a mistress of a somewhat powerful shady figure and Xiao Ji, like Travolta, is only a petty criminal-wanna-be.

Jia’s movie may be a hard sell for Hollywood-conditioned American audience. His movies could be viewed as slow and lacking of typical three-act structure; especially in Platform, he did a lot of experiments with camera and editing and pretty much neglected storytelling. However, in Unknown Pleasures and The World, he strikes a perfect balance between his penchant for visual styles and his deep empathy for his characters and their stories. In both movies, Jia allows us to capture a glimpse of big events unfolding in China either on a TV screen or on the streets of Beijing, unfortunately, the little guys in his movies have little ways to hop on the band wagon and have been left in the dust.

The Science of Sleep

Michel Gondry’s first solo attempt in writing an English script results in a romance/comedy/fantasy movie, The Science of Sleep. It has some interesting moments, but it needs the magic touch of his usual writing partner, Charlie Kaufman.

Stephane recently returns to Paris to live with his French mom after his Mexican dad passed away. He has a boring job but some very exciting dreams. He is in love with his next door neighbor who just happens to be called Stephanie. Gondry separates Stephane’s real world and dream land with seemingly distinctive visual styles, or does he? Gondry directed 2004’s wonderful Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind for which he and Charlie Kaufman won best original screenplay Oscar. In almost every way, Sleep feels like Sunshine being stretched to an extreme. In Sunshine, the story is structured in such a clever way that all the loose pieces are connected in the end. Without Kaufman’s magic touch on the script, Sleep simply feels loose and leaves a lot more questions than answers at its finale. In an interview with Creative Screenwriting magazine, Gondry talked about Sleep was inspired by his painful breakup with his girlfriend. In the movie, that pain appears to be the only clear theme here and everything else is debatable.

Mexico’s international heartthrob Gael Garcia Bernal plays Stephane. He is convincing as a socially awkward nerd, but I have yet to see a Dustin Hoffman rise from his short stature and boyish face. My personal favorite French actress Charlotte Gainsbourg is the love interest Stephanie in the movie. I have to admire European cinema – only in Europe, a non-traditional beauty like Gainsbourg could become a leading lady and a star. Granted she has a famous pedigree (her father Serge Gainsbourg was a famous French singer/actor and her mother Jane Birkin is a well-know British actress), it is still an amazing feat for an ordinary-looking girl like Gainsbourg to wow the audience for last 20 years and make a successful transition from a child actress to a grown-up star. Once again, she is a delight to watch in this movie. Her plain Jane look actually helps pull audience closer to her role and more easily identify with all her emotions. In spite of these two international stars, I believe French actor Alain Chabat steals the show. One reason may be his role is the best written one in the entire movie, but it still takes a seasoned actor like Chabat to give that role life on screen. Chabat is aptly named Guy, Stephane’s coworker and everything that Stephane is not. He delivers one hilarious line after another, yet he plays the role completely straight and does not strike one false note.

The Science of Sleep is not a movie for general public and may not even for art movie lovers. Anyone who watches it is certain to come up with his own interpretation of the movie.

The Descent

The Descent has a promising start, but director Neil Marshall wastes it all and turns it into just one of many horror movies that are out there these days.

The movie starts one year ago. Sarah suffered a horrific car accident in which she lost both her husband and her daughter. A year later, her friend, Juno, who seemed to have some kind of complicit relationship with Sarah’s husband, organizes a caving expedition as a way for Sarah and all the friends to start afresh. Thus six young women embark on an adventure that may never see them come back. Soon after they descend into the cave, they find themselves trapped and that’s when the movie becomes really interesting. It is mesmerizing to watch them struggle with nature and see different personalities clash in time of danger. However, half way into the movie, Marshall has to introduce some kind of cave-dwelling, flesh-eating monsters to spoil the adventure. It soon just descends into another blood fest with the monsters and becomes indistinguishable with hundreds of other monster horror movies. It becomes completely unwatchable for someone as weak-hearted as me. The movie’s ending is simple nonsensical. What a shame!

All six actresses are believable as athletic types, but none of them really stands out and becomes memorable except the one who plays Juno looks very much like ET hottie Vanessa Minnillo and another actress who is a spitting image of Kelly Ripa.

By the way, I find The Descent poster very cleverly designed and it reflects the theme of the movie perfectly – six young women descending and forming a skull shape. Unfortunately, the movie is a lot more than just one image and Marshall fails to sustain the momentum he builds in the first half.

Crank

Crank has been called by the critics as Speed without the bus, but to me, it is more of a close cousin to Hong Kong action movies as made by the MTV generation. It is likely to play in midnight cinemas alongside John Woo’s Hard-Boiled for years to come.

The premise of this movie is quite silly, but it is essential for setting up the non-stop action and introducing all the seedy parts of the LA underworld. Chev Chelios (played by Jason Statham), a professional hit man, wakes up in his apartment only to find out that he has been fatally poisoned. He doesn’t have much time left to live and he can only keep going if he is able to keep his adrenaline high. Thus he sets out to exact revenge on his killers while trying to find means to pump his heart up. As if he didn’t have enough to occupy himself, he also has to get to his girlfriend’s house in time to rescue her and show her his true love before it is too late. Story wise it is very much like John Woo’s Hong Kong action films – hard core assassin falls in love with a girl unaware of his profession, sets out to start a new life, but his past has caught up with him. Style wise, it doesn’t have much of John Woo’s slow motion shots or his melodramatic sob fest. It takes its cue mainly from MTV programs, with loads of dizzying fast editing and split screens. Crank does not strive to be high art. It is comfortable to simply become a cult classic. It caters to all our base desires – violence, gore and sex.

Jason Statham has created quite a reputation for himself playing tough good-looking thugs, but prior to Crank, I had only seen him playing minor roles in some big studio productions and one major supporting role in The Italian Job. Chev in Crank is probably very similar to the roles he has played in Guy Ritchie’s movies and The Transporter series. He may not get an Oscar for playing these thugs, but he is definitely a charismatic bad boy that could charm his way into female fans’ hearts.

Sometimes people go to the movies not necessarily seeking challenges. If that is the case, then Crank may be a ride that will surely keep you awake.

Transamerica (on DVD)

Since the beginning of the cinema, filmmakers have always been attracted to road movies. To artists, road not only brings people from one place to another, but also helps connect us emotionally and spiritually. 2005’s Transamerica is not an ambitious project, but it is a sweet little indie road movie that satisfies the audience far better than most big budget studio products. Much has been said about Felicity Huffman’s portrayal of Bree, a male-to-female transgender. It is clearly one of the best female performances of last year. While watching the movie, I was equally intrigued by Kevin Zegers, a newcomer that plays Bree’s son, Toby. His delicate features bring a sense of precociousness and fragility to the character. I also love the movie’s soundtrack. The songs are chosen carefully by director Duncan Tucker to reflect the places Bree and Toby travel through and the people they meet on the way. As good as Huffman is as Bree, I still feel that Bree should be played by an actor instead of an actress. Huffman is superb at capturing Bree’s awkwardness with the whole sex transition and she manages well a manly deep voice, but maybe because I know she is a woman, when I watch Bree on screen, I see a woman doing her best to be a man to be a woman. If an actor plays this role, we could witness a genuine struggle with his sexuality and appearances. I am probably being way too picky here, this movie and Huffman’s performance are worth checking out.