Full Metal Jacket (1987)

5/5

Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket is a flawless evocation of war's penalties, of its atrocities and its victims. The film is split in two parts, the first describing recruit training on Parris Island and the second reporting battles in war-torn Vietnam. Neither is forgiving, and the first is as brutal as the second.

The film starts with a ferocious intensity; the first forty-five minutes set up a suspenseful introduction that never lets you breathe until it's over. It composes a darkly comic atmosphere that is simultaneously unsettling and disturbing. You might find yourself laughing, but then quickly stop yourself as the horror mounts. The second half is almost as funny and just as frightening. It is the visceral counterpart to the cerebral first. Kubrick uses this symmetry, and echoes it in his shot compositions, to reveal multiple layers of meaning. A thematic analysis seems to be first and foremost in this film's creation. (For further analysis, I have linked a five page paper I wrote on it for class here.)

While Kubrick makes few, if any, cinematic mistakes, I am a bit baffled by some of his choices for dialogue and acting. The macho battle between Joker and Animal Mother when they first meet seems awfully staged and preposterously over-the-top. He clearly intended something by it (it would be impossible for him not to notice), but I just can't figure out what. Additionally, a few shots in the barracks/training scenes didn't quite match up. These complaints detract very little from the experience. After 20 years, it still holds up remarkably well and its easy to see its influence on future war movies. This is one film you don't want to miss.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093058/

Nayakan (1987)

2/5

According to Schickel and Corliss, Mani Ratnam's Nayakan is supposedly one of Time's ALL-TIME 100 Movies. And Crash is supposedly the best picture of 2006, so you never know. Just as Criterion is wrong about House of Games, so are the Time reviewers when it comes to Nayakan. This is a terrible, terrible excuse for a movie. The plot concerns Velu, who witnesses his father's murder as a young boy and grows up to become a mobster boss in the vein of Godfather meets Robin Hood. While it steals heavily from The Godfather (which I'll get into later), there are some interesting nuggets unique in this film that weren't stolen from better ones. These are few and far between, and instead what makes up the majority of the film is crap.

There were too many music/dancing interludes. I'll be the first to admit that I just don't get them; they are nothing but absolute wastes of time for me. They have nothing to do with the movie and make it 30 minutes longer. The music itself, which was good at first, quickly became overused and trite. While the acting could very rarely be good at times, more often than not it sounded fake and stilted. I feel uncomfortable judging the cinematography and sound, as I feel half of the fault is the DVD I have. However, I saw the only DVD version of it available in America, so I saw the same version you would be seeing. And with that in mind, the cinematography and sound SUCK. The concepts and ideas behind the camerawork were often valid, but in execution they just didn't work. Ever. It looked like it was shot on a handheld, miniDV camera, and perhaps it was a bootleg copy. I wouldn't be surprised.

The extent of the plagiarism of The Godfather makes me sick. Velu's family is attacked in his home, just like in the second Godfather. A series of murders are committed during a religious ceremony, just as there is in the first Godfather. There is even a murder where a man is garrotted in his car, and in his struggling, he breaks the windshield with his feet. Velu is asked by a man to punish young men who beat up and disfigured his daughter. This movie misses all the things that make the Godfather good, and instead imagines its qualities are in simple plot devices instead of subtlety and nuance. It's almost an insult to The Godfather to watch this film. If you have any respect for quality filmmaking, don't watch this movie.

IMDb link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0093603/

House of Games (1987)

1/5

House of Games is about a psychiatrist who gets involved with con men. And it sucks. Awful, made-for-TV acting. Awful, ugly actors. Awful, hollow script. Awful beginning, mediocre middle, and predictable end. Average cinematography. Competent editing. Pleasant music. It's been picked up by Criterion, but sometimes they do make mistakes. Terrible, terrible mistakes. Do not watch this movie. No matter what.

IMDb link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0093223/