I usually like to write my reviews of new-ish movies without spoiling anything.  For this, I’ll save all my spoiler-ish content for the end and try to warn you as much as possible.  Because when I think of this movie, there is so much to talk about and is worthy of discussion, but it is hard to do so in speaking with generalities.  After all, this is a movie that is all about the tense, on the edge of your seat, moments.  Bomb defusers working in areas anything can and will go wrong.

The Hurt Locker is another movie that has been following the trend of managing to break out of it’s independent shell to catch the eye of of a more mainstream cinematic audience.  And as the case tends to be, when the buzz gets to you about such a movie, it’s worth investigating.  Hurt Locker is entirely worth investigating, and hopefully by now is playing in a theatre near you.  The narrative is great, the characters are fleshed out and interesting, the tension is thick, and somehow through it all, it manages to do all of these things without making too much direct commentary on the Iraq war itself.

One comment to start with, is something I didn’t realize until the end.  Who directed this film.   This is going to sound incredibly ignorant, but I can’t help but speak the truth on the subject.  I had subconsciously presumed that this epic war movie filled with testosterone and only a handful of women who even had lines was directed by a man.  Little did I know, or my co-worker, have any idea that a woman had taken this challenge on.  It struck us as interesting that such thoughts still pervade our minds, for certainly gender constructs have come a long way in the cinematic world.  Yet our preconceived notions got in the way, and as the credits rolled, we were caught off guard and very intrigued.  And it isn’t just me, it is also simply a fact that  many of the movies you see today are still shot by men. The article actually interviews Bigelow herself, in which she adds a bit of first-person insight.

Bigelow says that, despite what some might assume, being a woman filming a nearly all-male movie in the Middle Eastern country of Jordan was simply not a big deal. She says you don’t think about being a lady while you work.

“You’ve got a four-story-high explosion taking place along an avenue, on which on any given day there are 250,000 cars, so … ” she pauses, “that begins to take precedence.”

To continue to harp on this point thought would be hypocritical.  I don’t really care what gender the director is, I want to know how good the product is.  And her work here was excellent.  The different elements of this film come together brilliantly.  She has a few big name actors, but they are not always in the biggest on-screen rolls.  She films in the Middle-East, which as far as we’ve come in film making, adds a genuine feel of heat and sand that I have a hard time imagining being recreated.  Even the small budget they shot this film with doesn’t seem to detract from the settings or special effects.  I almost slipped a long “bang for your buck” pun in here, but fortunately for you I resisted.

With modern war movies, we need gray area.  We can still have our John Wayne’s (is the similarity in name and heroic act to John McClane an accident?) in some films, but in depicting events based on reality we as a society have transcended the purely good and bad motifs.  Bigelow gives us this with incredibly complex characters.  In a sense, you can make this characters out to be very surface level.  You’ve got two veterans, one who is by the book and another who is a loose cannon.  And then you’ve got the younger, green guy who’s too scared to be incredibly useful.  They could have simply had these cookie cutter types play their roles.  Sanborn, who is by the book, even thinks that he has James, the wild one, pegged from day one, but instead when these men are given personality.  Probably even  more important than this, the story is taken a step further, and the Iraqis are personified as well.  From children hocking DVDs to suicide bombers, we get a range of characters that seemingly never manages to be judgemental.  Everyone plays their role, literally as characters and as people of this world, and they simply go about their roles without much opinion being expressed.

The same could be said for the movie as a whole, and its depiction of the Iraq war.  While I’m sure one could read into the movie anything they want, the movie has such a narrowed focus, that you don’t get any sense of political vibes from the movie.  If I had to attempt to guess anyone on the creative team’s personal thoughts on the war, it would be a 50/50 shot.  The thoughts they convey on war are simply about the people in them.  What drives them, what they are scared of, their good moments and bad moments.  And because this movie is about the people, the tension surrounding the actual focal point of the base plot for this movie, defusing bombs, everything is heightened.  We learn early on in the movie that things go wrong.  And when things go wrong defusing bombs, they go very wrong.

However, it is important to note that just as much as we learn about the characters and their world via the missions they are sent on, we also see them in their downtime and learn a great deal about what is going on.  Without spoiling anything, suffice to say that these characters are very human, and we come to quickly appreciate the qualities of what makes them human.

Even when not in downtime, the gang certainly gets itself into some very intense situations.  While many of the bomb scenes are certainly unforgettable, I think the images that are still freshest and most stuck in my are from a scene involving a sniper.  You’ll know it when you see it…I’ll talk about it more later.

To me, while I haven’t really seen t many others talking about this, Hurt Locker really capture Hitchcock levels of paranoia. The soldiers, as if disarming a bomb were not enough to get the sweat running, anyone non-American in the area became a threat.  Anyone becomes a threat.  Young kid with a cellphone, old man with a camera…anyone could have the trigger, or anyone could get in your way.  So why not be paranoid?  And it doesn’t help that everyone watches, somewhat hiding but unable to take their eyes off the bomb team.

I could keep rambling, but I feel I’m beating around what I really want to talk about, which is all the spoilerish stuff.  So if you haven’t seen it yet, run off now, and figure out where this is playing by you.

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Anyway, Staff Sergeant James is one of the most fascinating characters I’ve ever seen in a war movie.  Specialist Sanborn accuses him of being a simpleton…a redneck adrenaline junkie who gets his thrills from being so recklessly close to death.  James kind of snickers a little bit at the fact that Sanborn has him so type-casted…and we learn to snicker a bit too.  The movie starts off with the quote “War is a drug,” by Chris Hedges, and to that effect we see the truth in James.  Even he is not immune to the paranoia, despite seemingly doing the best at blocking it out.  When on the mission, he gets tunnel vision.  He respects the bomb maker, and even seems to have an appreciation for a well done job.  While there may be someone around the corner, ready to detonate a bomb that’s going to blow him up…he is in the zone.  But he is not immune, as we see with Beckham, who seemingly has a more emotional impact on him than his own family does.  While some claim this is a bit out of character, I think it fits James perfectly when he goes after the guys who strapped a bomb inside Beckham.  He has internalized this to mean someone was gunning for him, and used a kid to do so.  This sets James off into a reckless pilgrimage that shows the futility of it all.  In particular the moment where he has been called a guest by the professor, and it looks like they are about to sit down and have a positive, meaningful moment, he is chased out by presumably the profs wife.  A moment that could have had a tender moment of peace between opposing forces ends abruptly due to fear of the unknown.  I’m stretching it a little, I confess, but I still think there is a valid thought here that summarizes the plight of war.  All sound and fury signifying nothing, and so on.  All James gets for his efforts is a few cuts and bruises, and seeing Beckham later on.  When he cuts Beckham off, you get the sense he’s back in tunnel vision mode, not allowing anything to break him off from his focus.  But then, he goes back home.  And in the quiet serenity of the grocery store, we are sobered to his reality…and this isn’t it.

What I like about this scene is the quietness James has.  In talking with Sanmore, and talking to his kid…we start to get James, even if James doesn’t get it himself.  There are things in life that we can’t explain, but that we must do.  For James, like he says, there are very few important things left in his life.  And he has to keep on doing it, even if it does mean he’s a little crazier for it.  The box of stuff that almost killed him in a symbol to his depth.  He is aware that he is putting his life on the line.  But that’s all he’s got.  And to use a little Jack Nicholson classic, we need him on that wall.

In the end, I think back to his first scene.  He lets in the sunlight at the risk of mortar attack…simply because a piece of plywood up against a window won’t stop the roof from caving in.  That’s James.

Sanmore perfectly contrasts him.  The veteran who has also been there and done that, but takes refuge in the routine and sensibilities of his training.  There is a reason that procedure dictates this and that, and if Sanmore and his fellow soldiers follow these procedures they just might make it.  And we certainly sympathize.  This makes this as predictable as possible in an unpredictable scary world where Sanmore has already lost friends.  In fact, to the average viewer, I imagine Sanmore is far more relatable.  We wonder with Sanmore what the bigger danger around him is, the bombs or the man in the bomb suit.  Sanmore clearly feels threatened by both.  Yet James seems to be ok with Sanmore.  Even if they have completely different styles and approaches, the sniper scene in which James seems to be in control but lets Sanmore make the call is beautiful.  James fully shows his control in this scene by how he also interacts with Eldridge.  I don’t recall the exact quote, but Eldridge basically points out to James that there is a sniper on his 6, and wonders what he should do about it.  James could have scolded him, freaked out, taken maters into his own hands, or any number of things.  But he empowers Eldridge, who is in dire need of some empowering, and only mutters to himself about the matter.  It’s a gross scene, covered in dust and flies and the death of a few seemingly good soldiers.  This was the scene that really sold me on the movie actually, I knew at this point that what I was watching was a fabulous film.

I guess its not so much spoiler…but I really had to dig around to find out the meaning of “The Hurt Locker” as a title.  It seemingly a very “in” military term that is almost beyond description…for something that’s just that bad.  There is also a poem by Brian Turner called Hurt Locker from a few years back which doesn’t seem to have any specific relation other than the fact that they both try to put into an art form unknown suffering.

Another great scene to me that just shows all the characters in their elements is where Sanmore and Eldridge consider the idea of blowing up James.  James foolishly goes down to a detonation site to get some gloves he forgot.  Sanmore seems ready to go through with it to protect himself and others.  Eldridge is intrigued, but just can’t bring himself to go along with it.  Not that I blame him for chickening out, but its a great brief scene that really lets you get the characters.

Now I’ve pretty much left out all the peripheral characters…such as the oblivious (I can only imagine) out of ROTC officer who plays doctor to Eldridge (though on a side note, loved him playing Gears of War 2…just a sweet touch).  This wasn’t because their performances and substance was un-noteworthy.  Heck, I loved the Col. who is obsessed with James the wild-man.  So over the top, that you know he’s gotta be based on someone very real.  While they all were grand and, in reality, quite noteworthy, they didn’t capture me the way the main three do…which I suppose is supposed to happen.  Those are the three I care about.

A final thought of my own…I think alot of movies like this tend to lend a helping hand.  I can only imagine the average movie goer, like myself, is ignorant to the terminology and methodology to disarm a bomb.  Some movies might have cut to flashback of James being trained, used it as character development but more importantly give us a brief tutorial on what to look for.  No such luck here.  And to a certain extent, we never figure it out.  Only upon further searching around the internet did I find this clip which has Bigelow talking about how insurgents would often have two initiating devices.  One that is for deception, one that is the actual one, as to hopefully fool a bomb diffuser.  A great and interesting tidbit, but something you can’t pick up on simply from watching these experts comb over wires.  Which also makes me incredibly excited to see this movie come out on DVD and listen to the commentary.

With that, one of my favorite articles/review I read comes from a Roger Ebert post.  I will simply quote in full, as he quotes someone else, and goodness knows that I’m far enough removed from my college days to recall any sort of proper citation or due course. The full post is far better than mine, and one of the better ones I read on the movie.  I  highly recommend you check it out if you like the following section from it.

“The Hurt Locker” is completely apolitical. It has no opinion on the war in Iraq, except that there is one, and brave men like James and Sanborn are necessary, and rookies like Eldridge of course are sometimes terrified, and will get no quicker sympathy than from veterans like Sanborn and James. In that sense, “The Hurt Locker” is arguably the most pro-Army feature to emerge from the war. Pro-Army, not pro-war. But the U.S. military declined to assist in its production or allow the film on a U.S. base, and the Bigelow team shot with its own resources in Jordan, sometimes within three miles of the Iraqi border. It was not an easy shoot. Renner speaks of boards with nails in them being dropped on them from rooftops, and he was shot at more than once.

In contrast, another current film received lavish aid from the military. That would be “Transformers.” According to a well-researched article in Variety by Peter Debruge, it was the first film ever to receive sooperation from the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines. This taxpayer-supported assistance included use of uniformed and armed troops as extras, and a hardware display including, he writes, “Marine hovercrafts, Navy subs and nearly every kind of Army helicopter and Air Force plane in service (from the Frisbee-topped E-3 Sentry to a retired SR-71 Blackbird that transforms into the Decepticon character Jetfire), all coordinated through special arrangement with the Department of Defense.” Some scenes were bankrolled as “training exercises,” including, he writes, “a day at White Sands when a formation of six F-16s popped flares over the set, simulating a low-level, air-to-ground attack.”

In what way was the military exposure in “Transformers” more beneficial than cooperating with “The Hurt Locker?” I am grateful to my reader Marie Haws for steering me to an interview with Bigelow’s screenwriter, Mark Boal, in Vanity Fair. He says:

“A lot of people in the military have seen the movie because there are pirated copies all over Iraq. People saw it almost six months ago. A few people have seen it here in film festivals. So far the response has been good. Although I’m sure people will say we got this or that detail wrong…Unless you are going to make ‘Transformers.’ I literally had a conversation with a guy who was telling me how realistically that movie is in its depiction of the military. I said to this senior military guy, ‘What part of fighting aliens is realistic?’ He replied, with a straight face, ‘If we were going to fight aliens that’s how we would do it’.”

Yes, that’s how the Army would fight aliens, by playing a supporting role to a college kid, his girlfriend, his best buddy and his parents, who turn up in Egypt and save the day. And depending on the Egyptian military not noticing U.S. Army fighting with robots who are ripping apart the Great Pyramid. And depending on a pass from the Israeli army as the Americans and the robots cross their nation on the way to Jordan.

So yes, I liked this movie.  It was fabulous.  Unnerving, tense, raw, documentary like, brilliant.  The person I went to watch this with and I talked about it the entire way home…and decided that wasn’t even enough and headed out to Chili’s to talk for another hour.  And I’m still talking about it.  And I’m still wanting to talk about it.  So do yourself a favor.  If you like war movies, action movies, stories with good plot, stories with good characters, stories with ambiguity, stories that make you laugh and cringe, or you just like damn good movies period, check it out.  I want to write and talk about it even more, but if you’ve read this far, I feel I should cut you some slack.  So if you’ve seen it, feel free to chime in, there is alot of ground to cover here.

Now, I don’t think it was the most entertaining, mind you.  That would have to go to Ratatouille for my money.  Very close though.  But geez…have you heard the reports of the people crying within the first 20 minutes?  What kids movie does that people?

This one.  And it is very, very good.

It is rated a whooping PG, hang on for a ride!

I still kinda go through an emotional rollercoaster throughout the entirity of this track. And it is strange.  The part that gets to most people…we know its coming.  You can’t have avoided the trailers for Up…and when people see the Married Montage unfold, we know where it is headed.  It still wrenches our emotions….along with the trailer cutting up just exactly the circumstances of Carl deciding it was time to go on an adventure.  Up, literally, doesn’t take off for for quite a chunk of the movie, but it works fantastically.

Carl was the reason I wanted to see the movie.  I’m not sure if that’s true for most.  I loved his crumedgy-ness that the trailers expressed.  In that, he didn’t disappoint. Gruff and endearing, and perfectly voiced by Edward Asner who I still think of fondly as Lou from the Mary Tyler Moore show. You need a guy who can pull off the grumpy old man talk and tenderly…and in Mr. Asner I trust.  In fact, all the voicework stood out…but none so much as the lead character.

Another thing that really worked in its favor, I think Pixar found a great way of making a movie with a minimum of dialogue in Wall*E.  But in a movie that is often about solitude and loneliness, they manage to keep up the pace of the movie and find other vehicles for moving things along.  Well done again Pixar, I tip my cap.

I suppose I already touched on the soundtrack…but I really do enjoy it.  Particularlly the main theme is very simple, and often repeated, but never over used or inappropriately used.  Of all of Pixar’s work, the score for this movie was the best.

The narrative is where this movie shines though.  Through touching moments, comedic moments, and everything in-between, the movie plots along with less of a over-handed moral than Wall*E.  As far as I’m concerned, that’s great.  While there are strong, central themes to this movie that are very much note worthy, they are more general and less political than Wall*E.  In fact, the only thing that I would question was that some of the central themes are very, very heavy…and its a kids movie.  But I can’t genuinely question this, as I couldn’t help but look around me and try to gauge the interest of the surrounding kids in the theatre.  They were all enthralled.  And why not?  It’s a brightly colored movie with plenty of cheery moments to go along with the heartbreaking bomb shell they start the movie with.  So I guess I can’t have a legitimate complaint on that note.  There are actually MANY moments that could get people choked up though.  And they do.  Carl and his company are all too easy to relate to in terms of their highs and lows…and the movie draws you into those highs and lows.  You get caught up.  We are constantly bombarded with hope and disappointment.  And of course, squirrels.  Good times, good times.

I wish I could put my finger on what it was that truly makes this movie outstanding.  The relatability surely scores high.  The comedy is great.  Characters are great, in particular the antagonist and Carl.  Everything is…great.  And it almost shocks me.  In a world of easy money grabs, particularly for summer kids movies, that Pixar once again steps up to the plate and delivers a movie that currently ranked in IMDBs top 20 (atleast today) and has one of the most insane Metacritic scores I’ve ever seen.  Nothing in the red.  So much green.  Sooooo much green.

Again, if this is spoilerish, I’m shocked…but this paragraph will talk about previous Pixar movies with a few early spoilers.  Both Finding Nemo and this movie pretty much start with the death of a could-have-been-leading female character.  My buddy Matt pointed this out to me, and it got me curious.  The only two Pixar movies that I have are Ratatouille and and…well, I guess I don’t have UP yet, but I will.  So for anyone of you with a bit larger of a collection, refresh my memory…how does Monsters Inc start, or The Incredibles?  Does Pixar actually have a morbid tone to the beginnings of many of their movies?

Two final thoughts.  An article that is very touching.  Thanks Anne.

Also, I’ve heard mixed reports from people about whether or not they thought the 3D was worth it.  I’m firmly in the “very much worth it” camp.  Drive a little farther if you have to, spend a little more if you have to, but check this one out in 3D.  Pixar’s attention to detail is apparent, and a great great to us viewers.  So if you haven’t seen this movie yet, you are only cheating yourself.  Plus, its easier to pretend you aren’t crying.  Not that I had to worry about such things…>cough<…anyway.

Again, I find myself behind on the times and talking about a movie that everyone has already been talked to death about.  This is what happens when you start a second blog…but that one has already run its course.  So I’m going to stop talking and you should go see this fine craft of a movie.  Find a little cousin or someone to take with you if you are feeling weird about it being a “kids” movie.  But go see it.  Right now.  I don’t care that its summer and nice outside.  Bike to the movies if that is the case.  But if you haven’t seen this, you are missing the movie of the summer, as well as what should be a no-brainer for Best Animated Feature come Oscar season.

You cannot say to the sun, “More sun.” Or to the rain, “Less rain.” To a man, geisha can only be half a wife. We are the wives of nightfall. And yet, to learn kindness after so much unkindness, to understand that a little girl with more courage than she knew, would find her prayers were answered, can that not be called happiness? After all these are not the memoirs of an empress, nor of a queen. These are memoirs of another kind…

This post requires some preface before I start behaving along the lines of a giddy fanboy.  First off, I believe in two ways of approaching of genres.  One is a more factual, universal genre.   These are things such as labeling this movie as romantic comedy, or that movie as an action movie.  While there is some debate (I still recall finding Princess Bride in some very strange locations at various Blockbusters) as to where some movies fall, it is still fairly quantifiable.

The other genre is the personal genres.  The ones you make up, or share.  These genres are the “I can pop this one in anytime,” or “My comfort movie,” or “My brain-dead movie.”  Or in the case of the genre of movies I was referring too…I call them “throwing rock” genre.  This requires deeper explanation yet again, and is totally skippable.  The short version is, these are the movies that you heard the hype, and you knew that it could never live up to the hype, so you actually lowered the bar when you heard it was good.  So you put off seeing it, and finally get around to seeing it with those low expectations, only to find the hype worthwhile.  The longer version will make sense if you read this:

Now consider the same game of RPS with unequal (but clearly defined) payoffs. If you win with rock, you win $10. If you win with scissors, you win $3. If you win with paper, you win $1. Which move do you play? You clearly want to play rock, since it has the highest payoff. I know you want to play rock. You know I know you know, and so on. Playing rock is such an obvious thing to do, you must realize I’ll counter it ever time. But I can’t counter it (with paper) EVERY time, since then you could play scissors at will for a free $3. In fact, playing scissors is pretty darn sneaky. It counters paper–the weakest move. Why would you expect me to do the weakest move? Are you expecting me to play paper just to counter your powerful rock? Why wouldn’t I just play rock myself and risk the tie? You’re expecting me to be sneaky by playing paper, and you’re being doubly sneaky by countering with scissors. What you don’t realize is that I was triply sneaky and I played the original obvious move of rock to beat you.

That may have all sounded like double-talk, but it’s Yomi Layer 3 in action. And it had quite a curious property: playing rock was both the naive, obvious choice AND the triply sneaky choice.(taken from here)

The article this was taken from is an extremely interesting but nerdy analysis of video games.  So I shared this with a friend, and “throwing rock” became synonymous with anything in media that got to the point where you could over-analyze it so much, that the hype and the talking about it and everything surrounding it almost makes you numb and gives whatever the piece of media is a fresh chance in your mind.  I’d draw an equivalency to, I don’t know, if you haven’t seen Dark Knight yet, I imagine that for all you heard about it, none of it is fresh with you.  You could watch it now without voices in your ears talking about Supporting Actor or pencil tricks.  

Really, the only reason I put this on here is because I want to know what movies have done this for you.  Because as much as I am about to babble about Memoirs of a Geisha and how much I supremely enjoyed it, I’m curious to all of your experiences as well.  And of “all” I guess I just mean Garrett.  But if you read this, feel free to prove me wrong.  So if you have an experience where you finally got around to seeing a movie numb to all the hype, only to have all the hype make sense, give it a shout out.  In the mean time, my actual post.

Wait, one more thing.  Because we need to set the mood.  Head here and “play all” on the soundtrack.  C’mon, when John Williams is involved, how can you go wrong.  Ready?  Now you are in the mood.  

Mameha: [in voiceover] Remember, Chiyo, geisha are not courtesans. And we are not wives. We sell our skills, not our bodies. We create another secret world, a place only of beauty. The very word “geisha” means artist and to be a geisha is to be judged as a moving work of art. 

My goodness!  This movie just had it all.  Great story filled with crazed scenes of energy and the subtle tension of passive aggressiveness that still gets you on the edge of your seat.  A few laughs, a few tears, great plot, great characters, incredibly scenery/imagery/cinematography, and hopefully you’ll soon agree a heartfelt and well composed soundtrack.  Some obvious but not in your face symbolism.  It’s rich, its complex, its potent.  I’m babbling again.

The cinematography is a nice foundational point, I think.  When you win Oscars for costume design, art direction, and (of course) cinematography, you gotta be shooting something right.  Throughout much of the movie, the mood is set with the misty gray softened light.  The set itself  seems to capture the mood as well.  I was never in 1930s Japan.  And there are some who complain about the authenticity (we’ll get to this later) of it all…but for my money it does what its supposed to do.  It puts you in pre-war Japan.  I mentioned the obvious symbolism earlier, and I might as well start going with it.  Rain and water are continuously coming up.  And why not, every other movie does it.  Water can be peaceful and tranquil, water can be fierce and deadly.  It has always worked on many levels, and always will.  But the despairing drizzle on the transforming Chiyo to Sayuri.  For the sake of this article, we will speak of the main character by her geisha name, Sayuri.  

Sayuri Nitta: She paints her face to hide her face. Her eyes are deep water. It is not for Geisha to want. It is not for geisha to feel. Geisha is an artist of the floating world. She dances, she sings. She entertains you, whatever you want. The rest is shadows, the rest is secret. 

What makes all of the gray, overcast tones in lighting and mood pack so much punch, and what I can only imagine the academy fell in love with, is one word.  CONTRAST.  When everything melts away, and we have scenes like the snow dance or cherry blossoms in the garden…superb.  The colors pop out at you, and a beautiful world is opened to us and Sayuri at the same time.  It’s mesmerizing, though as we learn with Sayuri, not without its own perils below the surface.  So three cheers for the visuals…from the breath-taking, the haunting, and everything inbetween. You guys nailed it.

Some people complained about the accents and the acting.   And one could understand why when you look at the facts…we are talking about multiple main characters who didn’t speak English about to make an American movie.  However, I don’t really understand the issue.  Maybe I’ve grown attuned to it, but for all of you who also have this problem, its a simple matter of turning on the subtitles for a few minutes, getting used to hearing voices pronounce things, and you’ll be ready to rock and roll for the rest of the movie.  

While we are on the subject of accents, lets clear something else up.  Yes, that is a primarily Chinese cast playing an entirely Japanese character base.  Supposedly, they opened casting up to Japanese actresses first, but no one showed up that could pull off the part.  So, critics of the world, would you have them no make the movie due to its lack of authenticity?  The film works as is, get over your high horses.  And its true, Japanese people don’t often have as blue of eyes as Sayuri does.  But I do believe that’s the point made throughout the movie…Sayuri is unique.  And maybe they went a little over the top with the contact lenses, Sayuri’s specialness needed that bit of eye color.   Final point being, no, I doubt that if you bring a genuine geisha from the period back to critic the movie, she’d give 5 out of 5 stars for hitting the mark of genuineness.  But this is a movie.  And while part of the movie was of course to capture the “Memoirs of a Geisha,” it is simply a movie.  Not a history text book.  Enjoy the movie for the merits that it creates, and if it inspires you to go and learn more about the culture, what they did right and what they did wrong, all the better.  But enjoy the movie for what it is, and please don’t harp on what it isn’t.  Now let us all move on.

How far have you got in the soundtrack?  Potent, simple stuff.  Oscar nominated, but no victory.  Still worthy of notice though.  It’s not the best of the year, and it certainly isn’t the best ever to carry the name of John Williams, but I believe is still significantly enhances and moves the movie, which is what I think counts.  For a movie that really replies on capture a mood, and bringing you into it, you need a soundtrack that is going to work hard for you and not just fill in voids.  And for that, this soundtrack works remarkably well.  

The plot, is cliche’d to the point of being a classic.  It’s your typical Cinderella with a twist.  The characters all play their parts in the narrative, the good characters being very good and the “evil” characters being “evil.”  So while I know some who didn’t enjoy this movie for the lack of depth in character, again I really emphasize the importance of working with the movie with what it is giving you.  If you don’t mind the lack of depth in Cinderellas step-sisters, why mind the lack of depth from Sayuri’s competition?  Lots of feel good moments, lots of set backs, and a pretty good ending.  For as clear cut as everything else is, the question often come up of how to define happiness in the world of geisha, which is probably one of my favorite themes of the film.  Ending is different in the book, so if that intrigues you, check it out.  

A final thought on the dialogue…while I already mentioned the accents, I didn’t really speak to the script.  Maybe its just because I am a weird person, but I adore the passive aggressive ones-up-manship constantly going on.  Again, there really is no lack of subtly.  The act or the word may be subtle (one thinks of the scene in which it is discussed that a simple turn of the naked wrist will really get the men in the tea houses going) but in reality the world knows what is going on.  Yet you keep appearances, and you play out the customs, and you talk as you should.  The dialogue captures these sentiments with simple statements that made for powerful, overhanded, blows.  I may have even laughed a time or two inappropriately, but whatever, it was brilliantly enjoyable.  

I’m so glad I waited to check this out a few years later.  And its inspired me to go back and check out all those movies that were heavily hyped but I have long since forgotten. Who knows what else the critics had right, but has become over shadowed by more recent films?  

Though speaking of recent, I am a freer man now than I have been.  Hopefully get a posting of Up before the middle of the month.   And yes, I will be giving I am not worthy of trying to explain how great that movie is.  I’m still gonna go with it.  And no, obviously, the blog is not dead.  If you want to write for it so that I don’t have to change the name of my blog, that’d be just plain…spiffy.