One More Saturday Night

Charlize Theron received the annual Half-Life award, probably because of all that radiation she was subjected to in The Astronauts Wife. Which is just a really lame joke, The Half Life award goes to someone who has amassed an impressive body of work, but still has many productive years left. Last years recipient was Samantha Morton. The conversation with Charlize was spiced up immeasurably by the presence of Dennis Hopper whom is starring in the Theron-produced Sleepwalking. (If you imdb this the former title Ferris Wheel is still being used.)

The clip they showed was very compelling. Hopper is in mean-drunk-father mode and Theron (again glamoured way down) plays a woman returning home out of desperation with a surprise that for now she is keeping a secret. The surprise has to do with AnnaSophia Robb (who is fast shedding her curse as the poor mans' Dakota Fanning) The terrific Nick Stahl is also on board and the scene between he and Theron was enough to whet anyone's appetite for this film. Given the right role, Theron can just flat act. She also acknowledged her Producing partner AJ Dix who was in the audience and who was also gracious enough to agree to read my script (please like it, please like it, please like it, please like it, please like it, please like it.) If any of you happen to know A.J. put in a good word.

Vangaurd Actor Award – Ben Kingsley

Certainly the most intimate and illuminating conversation was with that Sexiest of all Beasts, Sir Ben Kingsley. He was just mesmerizing to listen to and carried himself with such grace and humility that it came as a disappointment when they had to end it in order to screen his new film You Kill Me. There were a number of fascinating revelations about Ben that I'll touch on later, but as he talked about the craft of acting, how he approaches, his philosophy about it – it was just spell-binding. Even though very soft spoken there was such a respectful hush in the theater that it was a little uncanny.

Few fans of the man who Oscared for Ghandi probably know that he was offered a recording contract by Brian Epstein. If I remember right Ben was starring in a musical called "A Smashing Day" which John Lennon and Dick James of (Northern Songs) saw and recommended a meeting with Epstein. (I'm reading this off painfully scratched notes taken in the dark so you'll have to excuse any inaccuracies) but it was along those lines. This was circa 66-67 And I believe the story went that while he was considering this path he was offered the title role as Baal by the Royal Shakespeare Company and he thanks that bit of divine intervention from saving him from a life of ruinous indulgence. This may well be, but I wonder if mankind hasn't been shortchanged to have trudged on without knowing the brilliance of the Kingsley of Rock and Roll. Thank you vury much.

For a good balance of his time he discussed working with the really very noteworthy cast of You Kill Me. He fairly gushed about his leading lady Tea Leone, comparing her with Audrey Hepburn, confessed his fanboy status as to Luke Wilson. He also liberal with praise of director John Dahl and his ability to put actors at comfort and coaxing terrific performances from everyone. He mentioned what a kick it was to work with Dennis Farina. He did fail to mention anything about whom I thought really stole the show from everyone but Ben himself and that was Bill Pullman. The only problem of the whole experience was that Ben had built up our expectations for the film way beyond anything that it was able to deliver. Now that I consider it from the light of the key performances I think I'm going to upgrade my original mark, but anyway here goes -

You Kill Me (R)
Cast – Ben Kinglsey, Tea Leone, Dennis Farina, Phillip Baker Hall, Luke Wilson, Bill Pullman

As Black comedies go the two most recent examples of near perfection are Hot Fuzz and the underrated The Ice Storm. After listening to the praise of Kingsley I was expecting the finest acting performances in the history of cinema. After all the cast is truly stellar and John Dahl is no slouch as a director. I think it's fair to say I was pretty pumped. But after sitting through The Land of the Merry Misfits I'd say my expectations will never again be over-inflated.

You Kill Me certainly gets off to a promising start. The way Kingsley's aging, alcoholic, disillusioned hitman character is established was very funny. And seeing a group of mobsters doing a sincere intervention is a comic idea that couldn't miss. For his part, Kingsley trying to deny that a problem exists while shit-faced is equally sure-fire. Sadly from about this point on the film gradually loses altitude as we are asked to accept one implausible circumstance after another. Dahl seemed unable to pick a tone for the film and as a result it foundered at times like a rudderless ship - never finding the right tack.

Black comedy is perhaps the hardest genre in the world to get right and I felt like most of the blame lies in the script. Far too much of the dialogue was so-so and the jokes were mostly sitcom caliber. Tea Leone's character just made no sense whatsoever. The writer's offer absolutely no justification as to why a beautiful young woman would be attracted to an aging hitman with a severe drinking problem, currently working as an assistant mortician. Sure, he's a Sexy Beast and so forth, but he never does or says anything to turn a woman's head – at least that I saw. And then with absolutely no character development let alone any kind of arc, we're expected to believe that Leone decides to start killing people as a show of affection toward her man?

It just didn't work. What little screen time she has she spends spouting off acerbic one-liners, because? Her father was a bastard? Also plaguing the believability of You Kill Me is the fact that they paint Kingsley out to be a drunk so inexorably hooked by the hootch that he literally carries a fifth with him everywhere he goes. It's so bad that his mob family has threatened to off him if he doesn't dry up. So do they send him to rehab? Nope, he just goes to AA meetings and the next thing you know the raging alcky has pretty much kicked the bottle, other than the occasional slide off the wagon. That's just insulting.

Perhaps the biggest lapse in plausibility is that without Kingsley's gun to keep business running smoothly, the family's rival mob (lead by the completely wasted Dennis Farina) waltz in and take over. And when it comes down to the final shoot out to decide which mob is to rule the roost. There are only three or four men in each mob. Were it not for Leone picking up a pistol, Kingsley and the clan would have been terribly outnumbered – what the hell, I thought it was mandatory to worship the Godfather?

Now all of these gaping holes could be forgiven if any of this would have been cleverly written or even well paced. But all this film really offers is a great cast who are given precious little to do. It does have one great big saving grace and I don't have to tell you what that is. When Kingsley was on camera everything worked like magic and luckily for everyone he was front and center much of the time. His ability to take on indignation without bullets or bottle was dead on, and he was able to captain the ship through the shallows and safely into port. He's undoubtedly one of our finest.

B-

It's a testament to the maturation of CineVegas as a festival to be regarded with respect that of the 15 or so films that I screened there were only 3 that I wouldn't recommend. At the top of that list, way way way up on top is In The Land Of Merry Misfits, a film Adam will review, My Name is Bruce (Bruce Campbell's attempt to lampoon his life and peculiar career, missed the mark but I'll leave it at that) and the film I'll comment upon now. Being an incurable punster I should say that this Mexican import was very much a borderline call, but ultimately didn't quite cut it for reasons I shall now expound upon, thusly, in the following manner, ergo

Never On Sunday (NR)
Cast – Silverio Palacios, Humberto Busto, Maya Zapata, Fernando Becerril

Daniel Gruener directed this black comedy set in present day Mexico City – the fact that it's based on a true story certainly lends it's in-your-face morbidity a measure of legitimacy. Had Editor Gabriel Rodriguez been willing to wield and assertive pair of clippers Never On Sunday could have been groomed into an effective and well paced film. As it stands, Never on Sunday ends sometime Monday morning.

The story is certainly compelling and given the fact that, allegedly, it all actually happened, makes the grave nature of the foul play and the misadventures that result all the more . . . unpleasant? The unpleasantness begins when Uncle Julio dies after a protracted illness on the most unluckiest of Sundays. (Why it is so unlucky is never made clear) but the story leaves little doubt that it was indeed an unlucky day to have died. Due to the day and the fact that the deceased's family is not well to do, they must settle for the services of a shady mortician Eleuterio (Raul Mendez) who is in the habit of making an extra peso or two by selling the corpses of those unfortunates whose family choose to have their loved one cremated. In order to provide a plausible amount of ashes to fill the urns of the bereaved, he either kills a stray dog or a stray homeless person and fires up the human hibachi.

The task of handling this bit of unpleasantness for the family falls to their teenage son Pedro (Jose Antonio Gaona) who smells a rat after meeting the disreputable owner of the morgue. He does however, smell something else entirely after catching a glimpse of his punky princess of a daughter. The morticians typical M O with regard to the disposition of the bodies is to sell them to the Universidad for use as cadavers for their medical students.

Everything starts to go bung for pretty much everyone involved begins when Eleuterio forgets that he promised the cadaver to a corrupt agency of the government who needed it immediately to cover up a little assassination that they found necessary. I think you can start to see a pattern developing here, as their beloved Uncles' wrinkly old body is subjected to one indignity after another.

The scenarios start out quite comically as Pedro uncle begins to bounce around Mexico City like a pinball. There are also some clever moments in the morgue where Pedro and Eleuterio's daughter are forced to hide from him in a casket. In fact they are forced to spend so much time in such close quarters that by the time the coast is finally clear they decide to remain inside and close a deal of their own.

Never On Sunday had three major problems that could have been ironed out in post, particularly in editing. One, I'm convinced they used a real cadaver for Uncle Julio and by the third act the corpse had undergone such advanced decomposition that when he started popping up "ha ha" it stopped being funny and started being gross.
Two, Uncle Julio's travels began to be so frequent and convoluted that it was very difficult to follow exactly what was happening. Plus pats of him were practically starting to fall off. You can only take black comedy so far and Uncle Julio stopped being funny well before he reached his final place of rest.

Thirdly, the film was just too long, two hours plus is too long for a cadaver caper regardless if it was a true story. Had they tightened it up by 20-25 minutes it would have worked much better. Pedro and the morticians daughter were in the coffin together for at least 15 minutes. Still there was a lot of things to like about the film. I liked how the creators played hopscotch with the blame until it became awfully blurry as to who the really bad guys were and who were just the hapless cabrones just trying to line their pockets a bit. Again all of this would have been so much more effective if I hadn't stopped caring about any of it about half way through.

Grade: C

Speaking for myself, Adam, Kyle and Jeff we just want to acknowledge the competent and courteous staff from Trevor Groth all the way down to the cheerful volunteers. CineVegas is just a pure joy and I can only hope that it remains as delightful an experience even as it grows in the years to come.

After You Kill Me on Saturday Night they through an all out rager at the Beach at Mandalay Bay and oh my goodness. A seafood buffet that wouldn't stop – there was this crab sushi that was just beyond description, the place was lousy with celebrities and more importantly the friends we have made on our many sojourns to events in Vegas. To all of them and to all of you – ciao – just try to keep us away next year.