Cinematic Throwbacks: September 1993/2003/2013

1993:

I didn't really know it at the time, but True Romance was my first exposure to Quentin Tarantino. 

The screenplay for this film pre-dated Reservoir Dogs. Quentin used the money from selling this script to help make that film. 

I saw this one first, but not in theaters. Very few saw this in theaters actually. But like so many early 90s gems I saw it first on video. It was probably the following spring when I rented it. I'll admit this one was definitely more of a slow burn. I liked it right away but it took years for it to elevate to one of my favorites from this year. 

Directed by Tony Scott, his follow-up to The Last Boy Scout, this is a classic "lovers running from bad guys" tale. Christian Slater falls in love with neophyte call girl Patricia Arquette. His attempts to free her from her pimp (a wild, dreadlocked Gary Oldman) lead to them stealing a bunch of drugs and being chased across the country by the aforementioned bad guys.

Much of the film takes place in LA, in and around Hollywood, where Slater attempts to unload the drugs. What, are you telling me people in that business do drugs?

The film is loaded with big name actors playing colorful characters, which is where that Tarantino style really shines through. Slater was still a pretty big deal in the early 90s, and this was one of his finest hours. He's incredibly entertaining, and his chemistry with Arquette is really cute and charming, which works as a contrast to a very violent story. Arquette is just so sweet and cute in this. By far my favorite performance of hers.

You've also got Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper, who go toe to toe in the film's most famous scene. Probably the film's other most famous scene is a brutal showdown between Arquette and James Gandolfini.

Brad Pitt pops up for a couple scenes as a stoner who just lays on the couch. Val Kilmer plays Elvis. Sam Jackson appears for one scene. Tom Sizemore and Chris Penn are wild as a pair of cops.

The style is the star. I honestly prefer Tony Scott to Ridley for the most part. When his propulsive energy really clicked with the material he made some of the best films of the last few decades. 

No list of my favorite football movies can possibly be complete without mentioning The Program.

This film focuses on one tumultuous season for the collegiate Eastern State Timberwolves. James Caan, giving some great gruff, is the veteran coach. Craig Sheffer is the Heisman trophy candidate QB. Omar Epps is the hotshot new recruit. You've also got the star linebacker who ignores school, and the wannabe star defensive lineman who turns to steroids to make the team.

And on the love interest front, you can't do much better than some early Halle Berry and peak cuteness Kristy Swanson. 

Cliches abound in The Program. I'm sure even in 1993 I recognized them all as cliches. And certainly there is more drama in this season than any team would ever have. Yes, even the 2010 Vikings. 

Doesn't matter though. The Program is like an elite game manager, perhaps not that distinctive but always getting the job done. 

One key is that the football action is really good. Everybody is convincing as the players. It even just FEELS like fall when you're watching it. And of course the film culminates in a big game, which is really well done and exciting. The film also has just enough edge to give it some extra gravitas. 

2003:

One of the real overlooked gems of the 2000s.

Matchstick Men was directed by Ridley Scott, in his 1st film since a trio of big successes (Gladiator, Hannibal, Black Hawk Down). It starred Nicolas Cage, who was still very much in his box office prime. And it got good reviews.

Yet it came and went almost without a peep.

Cage has a role right in his wheelhouse, a con man with OCD. So he gets to do all sorts of quirky stuff, but also be charming. He's fantastic. It's one of his very best performances. 

But the reason this film was a huge deal for me at the time was the full-fledged breakout of Alison Lohman, who plays Cage's long lost daughter. Lohman had done White Oleander, but it always took that 2nd movie to really seal the deal. Well, consider the deal sealed, cause Lohman was fucking irresistible in this movie. Cute, fun, wildly charismatic. The whole deal. It was never this good again with her.

Most con man movies, even comedic ones, have a bit of a mean streak to them. Matchstick Men has a really disarming sweetness to it. That really clicks in the ending, where (I mean, spoiler alert) Cage and Lohman encounter each other some time after he finds out she wasn't actually his daughter, she was just part of a con hatched by Cage's partner (Sam Rockwell), which wiped him out.  But Cage isn't mad. He's actually kind of grateful for the experience of having a daughter, even if it turns out it wasn't real. And it kind of got him over some of his neurosis. So it's a happy ending. 

Lost In Translation was a major film in three careers: Sofia Coppola, Scarlett Johansson, and serious Bill Murray.

It's really a simple film in which very little plot happens, as Murray and Johansson strike up a friendship while each being kind of marooned in Tokyo. Much of the film is just watching them kind of wander around the foreign city. The film does a great job of conveying how strange it is to be temporarily living in a strange place.

Coppola was on the map as a director because of The Virgin Suicides, but this is the one that really made her a big deal. And it won her a best screenplay Oscar.

Her greatest coup was getting Murray. Obviously Murray was long established as one of the great comedic stars around, but he had done very little drama, and not successfully. Now, this role is not deadly serious. There are plenty of moments where Murray is funny in this, but his more serious bent here really felt revelatory at the time. And it still stands out, because most of Murray's dramatic work since this has really paled in comparison.

The film also really broke out Johannson, who was on her way for sure, but who was really elevated to stardom with this. Crazy to me that she was still technically a teenager in this. After this she went on a major run that really has never stopped. 

2013:

Director Denis Villenueve has become a hugely respected and successful sci-fi director over the last decade with films like Blade Runner 2049 and Dune. But I still think his best film by a wide margin is the decidedly not sci-fi Prisoners. 

Prisoners might be the last great movie procedural, a genre that used to be omnipresent but these days is almost the strict domain of TV. 

A pair of young girls go missing early in the film. Early signs point to a mentally disturbed man (Paul Dano) being the one who took them. There is no evidence to charge and he is set free, but one of the fathers (Hugh Jackman) takes matters into his own hands, himself kidnapping the young man and torturing him into confessing and telling him where the girls are. 

Meanwhile Jake Gyllenhaal is the lead detective on the case, who winds up becoming pretty suspicious of Jackman too. 

I had forgotten until this rewatch that Prisoners is 2 1/2 hours long, but it is thoroughly engrossing the whole way. It gets really dirty and vicious in a way mainstream thrillers rarely do. Jackman, in an angry, intense performance like nothing else he has ever done, does some awful things.

Prisoners has one of those extra twisty third acts that a lot of thrillers do, but this one lands the plane better than most. It maintains a very bleak tone throughout even when it tips into some melodramatic plot mechanations. The Roger Deakins cinematography is customarily brilliant.

The ensemble is exemplary. It is one of Jackman's best, same with Gyllenhaal (whose role is very Zodiac-y). Viola Davis and Terrence Howard (in his last great performance to date) are the other missing girl's parents and are excellent.

This is a prime example of the kind of film I wish they made more of. 

Other non-deep dive flicks:

1983:

-The Big Chill: This was a pretty acclaimed movie about a group of friends (including Kevin Kline, Jeff Goldblum and Glenn Close) reuniting for a funeral. It honestly didn't do much for me. Good performances, but I've seen some imitators of this that are just better. 

1993:

-The Good Son: This movie was kind of a big deal at the time. Macaulay Culkin playing a psycho kid. He said "fuck," which was a big story. Probably haven't seen it since theaters.

-A Bronx Tale: A coming of age gangster movie directed by Robert Deniro. 

-And The Band Played On: This was an HBO film about the early years of the AIDS epidemic. I watched this quite a bit back then. It was very good. 

-Kalifornia: Some early Brad Pitt.

-Striking Distance: A Bruce Willis action dud where he is in the coast guard or something. 

-The Age Of Innocence: My least favorite Martin Scorsese movie. I watched it a few years back and was bored stiff by it. 

2003:

-Underworld: I remember being hugely excited for this movie due to the presence of Kate Beckinsale. It did fairly well and started a franchise, but it didn't quite live up to the hopes. 

-The Rundown: Dwayne Johnson's first starring vehicle that was kind of good. 

-Anything Else: Average Woody Allen movie. Christina Ricci was really hot in this. 

-Cabin Fever: The atrocious, gross Eli Roth horror movie about a flesh eating virus. 

-Once Upon A Time In Mexico: The final entry in Robert Rodriguez's Mariachi series. It was pretty average, but I recall Johnny Depp really going for it in this. 

2013:

-Riddick: The 3rd entry in this series got back to the basics, by being damn near a full-on Pitch Black remake. It was pretty good. 

-Don Jon: Joseph Gordon-Levitt's directing debut, where he plays a womanizer with a porn addiction. He hooks up with a smoking Scarlett Johansson, who plays a loathsome character but does so entertainingly. Pretty fun movie overall. 

-Rush: Car racing movie from Ron Howard, starring Chris Hemsworth. Got some strong reviews but I wasn't into it. 

-Baggage Claim: Very bad romcom in which we are supposed to believe that Paula freaking Patton can't get a date. 

-The Family: Mob comedy directed by Luc Besson. 

-Enough Said: Solid adult romcom with Julia Louis-Dreyfus and the recently deceased James Gandolfini. 

Coming in October...

Lol okay there is a LOT. Like, no chance I'm revisiting them all.

Turning 30 are 3 very good ones: Demolition Man, Judgment Night, and Rudy.

Turning 20 is Quentin Tarantino's masterpiece Kill Bill Vol. 1.

And some of 2013's finest turn 10, most notably 12 Years A Slave, and Gravity.