JLA: World War III (#34-41)

At the end of the final issue of Morrison's JLA run, Metron says "We have shown you the shape of the world to come. Now you must find the way there." That basically sums up Morrison's goal with the series, and with most of his work, to prevent an aspirational model of the humanity that could be. For him, the superhero is a vision of what humanity could be, the next step in evolution, and that concept is at the center of this arc.

I think the final issue is fantastic, but the earlier stuff is a bit more hit or miss. I do like the way Morrison brings back some old villains, which gives a nice sense of closure to the arc. It's like everything has been building to this point, which is true in some respects. However, the arcs are generally standalone so the payoff in this final arc isn't going to be the same as it is in The Invisibles, or New X-Men, where each arc built on what happened previously, bringing us to a big overall conclusion at the end.

One of the issues with writing for the JLA is it becomes very difficult to keep topping yourself. I feel like One Million was the ultimate threat for the JLA, and since then the smaller arcs actually worked better, where the focus was on character rather than just making massive foes. In this case, Prometheus and Luthor are good villains, but they seem to be here only to show how massive a threat Mageddon is. Side note, but I'll just mention that the Bee Queen seems like a precursor to The Filth, with both her visual design and the nastiness of her setup.

Mageddon works better as a thematic villain than as a an actual foe. He's a concept, and can create destruction, but we don't have a huge emotional stake in his destruction. That said, when you're dealing with the JLA, normal villains don't work. What they're fighting in Mageddon is the destructive force of regression. It is a holdover from a previous world and is trying to destroy the world that has grown up since his time. So, it's the ultimate conservative force, the anti-sun, an impediment to human progress. In this respect it's similar to the Sheeda, who harvest civilizations when they grow too powerful.

Morrison heroes are always about evolution, so Mageddon is the ultimate foe for them to fight. During the arc, there's a lot of different phases of evolution. What we realize by the end of the arc is that the whole reason the New Gods were working with the JLA was to fight Mageddon. They were there to guide humanity through this trial then leave them to grow on their own. If we view the New Gods as humanity's parents, this arc is all about humanity proving that it's strong enough to stand on its own.

However, humanity here is divided into two distinct categories, regular human and superhuman. The New Gods serve as parent figures to the superhumans, and the superhumans act to guide the regular humans. This series has been all about the way that these God like beings have the mandate to inspire regular humans to be better.

The ingenious thing that Morrison does at the end of the arc is reveal that Mageddon is literally preying on humanity's primal, unevolved weakness by activating our dormant reptilian DNA. Side note, but it was great to see Animal Man back in a Morrison comic. I think Morrison gave the character the perfect conclusion to his own series, but it's nice to get to see him just keeping on. Similarly, it's cool to see Zatanna as well, I would love to see Morrison write an ongoing series with the character, his work on her miniseries was phenomenal.

Anyway, if Mageddon's going to fight them by targetting our primitive weakness, the JLA decides that the best way to combat this is to tap into humanity's potential and evolve the world. On the one hand, this feels like territory Morrison has gone over many times, but I give him a pass because it works wonderfully here. I love the idea that the JLA is giving humanity a preview of what they could be. Morrison's core thematic statement is contained in this speech by Oracle:

"Hi, everyone...don't be afraid...what we're feeling are new structures opening up in our brains...It's like a preview o evolution. All this amazing stuff you're seeing and feeling is what Superman feels like all the time. It's why he wants to save us."

That sums up the whole series right there. The JLA are the ultimate form of humanity, what we hope to be. In a panel right out of Flex Mentallo, but still potent, we see an army of ordinary people flying up to battle Mageddon because they want to thank Superman for saving them. Juxtaposed with this is Superman's crisis of faith while figthing Mageddon. It's this tribute from ordinary people that gives him the strength to absorb the energy of the anti-sun and defeat Mageddon. It reminds me a bit of Buffy's "The Prom," where we see that ordinary people really do notice what these superhumans do for them. It's a really powerful moment that perfectly expresses so much of Morrison's personal philosophy.

For him, superhero comics are a way to examine humanity's future and construct a model of what we want to be. Having the ordinary citizens become superpowered is the equivalent of the reader being brought into the comic to fight alongside the characters. Batman mentions that the JLA always end up winning, and the way the ending is structured implies that it's the reader's faith in the characters that ultimately gives them the power to triumph over evil. On a literal level, the fact that we keep buying the books and seeing the movies means that the characters remain viable properties and there will not die. So, reading the book does keep them alive.

Reading a lot of Morrison JLA can numb you to just how strong his ideas are. But, if you step back, the torrent of crazy concepts in this final issue is unmatched by virtually any other author at any time. And by this point, you just accept it because he's built a world where all this is viable, it's a world where imagination and strength of belief are enough to win the day. Look at Green Lantern, he just has to believe and his ring works again, it's not the ring that matters, it's his belief in the ring.

The series ends with humanity having received a preview of the world it can one day have, and Metron giving the JLA the goal of bringing that world to fruition. One day everyone will be like Superman, and in the world that Morrison's created, great power does not corrupt, it allows you to see the wonder of the world. The bad guys in this series are the ones with petty, individual concerns, the good guys are the ones who can transcend that to fight for the good of the world as a whole. And in the final panel we get one more meta nod to the reader with the hilarious line, "We're the Justice League. You know you love it."

I once heard someone say that Morrison always has problems ending his series. That's absoultely ridiculous, Morrison's endings usually do a wonderful job of wrapping up the loose ends of the series and providing a vision of the characters' future. Animal Man #26, Doom Patrol #63 and The Invisibles #1 are three of the best comics you'll ever read. JLA #41 isn't on that level, but it's still a thoroughly satisfying wrap up to a great run.

Ultimately, World War III suffers from fatigue. By this point, it's very hard for Morrison to surprise us. So he probably made the right choice by exiting the series then. However, the final issue is a wonderful topper to the run, perfectly articulating the thematic concerns that made his work so unique. It was an issue that had me cheering.

Next up, I'm going to do a wrap up of the run as a whole. So, look for that in the next couple of days.

Weekend Update

New Music

I've listened to a few new albums this week. One is The Cocteau Twins' Victorialand. The Twins are a band I've heard mentioned a lot and have always been meaning to get around to listening to them. I finally did and I really enjoyed the album. It's very ethereal, a less rocky predecessor of Sigur Ros. It's one of those bands with a really unique sound, perfect for a film soundtrack. I also listened to Justin Timberlake's Future Sex/Love Sounds, an album that's really successful, if a bit long on the first listen. The album is so now, with a great dirty electronic vibe. Timbaland's production is fantastic and I think he and Justin succeed in pushing him beyond the territory of Justified. A lot of rock bands never get beyond making the same album over and over again, and I'm glad to see Justin experimenting and pushing things a bit.

Not Yet Rated

Last week saw the release of the documentary This Film is Not Yet Rated, which has drawn a lot of attention to the MPAA ratings system. I actually don't have a major problem with the ratings system, the issue I've got, that isn't mentioned in any of these articles, is the fact that the NC-17 rating just isn't commerically viable. The whole point of the rating was to try to separate artistic films with explicit content from pornography, yet, because so many people won't advertise/show the films, the NC-17 just isn't commercially viable. Rather than trying to change the MPAA, I think the best idea would be to force theaters to show NC-17s, and make it like the X originally was, back when Midnight Cowboy, an X rated film, was able to win the best picture Oscar. How can this be done? Well, a lot of it goes back to America's puritanical morality, and there's an implication that you shouldn't be watching NC-17s. But, if a studio put out a legitimately good film, that also had popular appeal, with an NC-17, perhaps an audience would show up. Personally, I'd love for the rating to catch on so I don't have to deal with kids at screenings. A major issue is the fact that studios always target kids, so the NC-17 can be market death.

Grant Morrison Quote

I was reading this fairly recent interview with Grant Morrison, fascinating as always. Anyway, the interview has a quote that I love:

And think about the emotional experience of reading comics. Nothing but ink on paper , right ? Yet people fall in love with Jean Grey and threaten to commit murder in her name! People cry when Ted Kord gets shot dead! As we all know, inert drawings and words on a page can produce an absorbing, often addictive, unfolding illusion of life, movement and even personality but surely the reader's 'experience' of the 'story' in a comic is actually a hologram - a virtual reality generated by the overlapping of multiple human consciousnesses - 'creator' consciousness interfacing with 'audience' consciousness through the medium of print.

This touches on a lot of the themes that I got out of his work back in 2003 after I read The Invisibles, the idea that fiction is just as real, if not more so, than our so called reality, because it can create actual emotional responses in people. I love that Morrison is thinking so much about the very nature of the medium, you just don't see this sort of examination in film, and where it is, it's bogged down in Academic babble. Morrison has ruined college for me in some respects because his pop! philosophy puts academic writing to shame. The Invisibles not only tells you about the nature of the universe, it also tells a great story. You're not going to get that from a traditional philosophical text.

Rome and Rescue Me

I recently watched the first episode of these two series. Rome was pretty good, certainly the production values were amazing, but it suffered from the same problems as a lot of period pieces, namely a lack of relatability to the characters. There was a lot of potential though and I could see this being quite good once they get the cast sorted out. Rescue Me felt very much like a typical 00s cable show pilot. It was really well made and easy to watch with strong character drive right from the start. My major issue was the too cliche dead cousin talking to the main character and the fact that I just don't usually like stuff set in those really macho all male environments. But, I'll give this one some more episodes too. Neither completely grabbed me, but they both feel totally watchable.

Upcoming Dates of Note
9/22 - Science of Sleep Releated
9/24 - The Flaming Lips at Hammerstein
10/8 - Inland Empire at NYFF
10/20 - Marie Antoinette Released
10/25 - Seven Soldiers #1 Released
11/22 - The Fountain Released

Splendor

The journey through Gregg Araki's filmography comes to a close (for now) with Splendor. Every successful indie director usually reaches a point where they are offered a mainstream project, and the success of this project will determine whether they "sell out" or continue in the indie world. Splendor certainly isn't your everyday romantic comedy, but it's so toned down from the excess of The Doom Generation and Nowhere that it can't help but feel like a stab at mainstream success. This is like Dazed and Confused after Slacker, or Mallrats after Clerks, a film that takes the director's idiosyncracies and fits them into a more mainstream form, in this case the romantic comedy. For Linklater, doing a mainstream film actually helped curb some of the excesses of Slacker and made for a fantastic, albeit unprofitable, film. Splendor is more like Mallrats in that it feels like Araki made some concessions to the mainstream that ended up blunting that which was so unique about him. Splendor isn't a bad film, it's just one that that's not particularly unique.

That said, the first half hour or so is very successful, and very Araki. The Halloween club scene, with intense blue light, is right out of The Doom Generation and Veronica is like a female version of James Duval's characters in those films, naive, yet full of strong desire that will drive her through the film. I really like the device of Veronica speaking directly to the camera. For one, those shots are gorgeous, with the ethereal white background and rings of light in her eyes.

Tracking back a bit, it's interesting how Araki uses near identical openings for all his films. We usually start on a white background with white letters on top, ethereal music playing as the camera pans down to a scene. I love the opening shots here, and the way the white soon fades into purple, it's fantastic visual stuff.

A film like The Doom Generation is notable for its complete visual assault on the audience. But, as Splendor forges ahead, we get less and less of visual interest. The opening club scenes give way to a rather standard domestic scenario, becoming more and more mundane as the film goes on. I'm guessing that the opening visual intensity is designed to disguise the fact that what we're watching is essentially exposition, but I'd rather watch this interesting exposition than the plot stuff that happens later.

The plot itself is at once transgressive, in its basic conceit, and totally ordinary, fitting the mold of countless romantic comedies. When the film begins, we're presented with a love triangle with no easy resolution, two guys who each have their own unique merits. When combined as one, they become the perfect guy, the fusion of physical and mental prowess serving as the ideal mate for Veronica. I found this pretty interesting, the troubles they have trying to navigate life as a threesome. I think there was more potential for comedy there, particularly in putting them in contact with more 'normal' social situations, maybe bringing in a character who knew Veronica back in her suburban home, directly contrasting her old life with her new.

Though I suppose that role was filled by Ernest. Ernest is a classic romantic comedy character, the nice guy who seems perfect for her, except for the fact that she doesn't love him. Once he enters the film, things start to descend. I was still emotionally involved in the story, but I wasn't really sure how to feel. On the one hand, Veronica doesn't love him, but at the same time, the story goes out of its way to make Ernest seem like this perfect guy, it feels a bit cruel for her to string him along then dump him. It's a bit of a cliche to make the romantic rival into a jerk, but that's done for a reason, because it makes it easier for the audience to get behind the heroine dumping him for the guy she really loves. In this case, the two guys seem so slackerish and unproductive, and Veronica so dissatisfied with them, that it's hard to accept that she has a deep love for them.

But, that's what the story's about. I think the ending is particularly troubling, with the really goofy jumping off the hotel balcony bit, which feels like a much different film. This, for all the goofiness, had a generally real world feel. But that final stunt felt like something out of an Adam Sandler movie.

In the end, Veronica's decision to embrace her alternative lifestyle ties directly in to Araki's central theme of people growing up and leaving behiind the repressive power structures of generations past. This is dramatized in a crazy way in The Doom Generation, and also represented in the totally out of touch parental figures in Nowhere. But it feels the most like Mysterious Skin, where Wendy has to choose between staying in Kansas and growing up to live her parents' life or heading for, and embracing the big city.

The film has most of Araki's thematic and stylistic tropes, but they're shoehorned into a conventional romantic comedy structure that really limits him. Mysterious Skin does a much better job of moving out of the hyper style of TDG and Nowhere and into more sedate, 'mature' filmmaking without sacrificing his visual style or narrative ambition. But, Splendor was a necessary step along the way.

Looking ahead, his next film is Smiley Face, a stoner comedy, which could be another attempt to move into the mainstream. He could play it as an over the top insane journey, a la Nowhere, but I'm guessiing it will be more restrained and conventional. Will this be successful, and more importantly will it be good? I'm still hoping that he gets Creeeeps going, that one's been talked about for a while, but doesn't seem to be making much forward progress.

Veronica Mars: The Second Season

A while back, I watched the first season of Veronica Mars, which I liked but didn't love. However it was enough to get me to watch season two, a season that solves a lot of the problems I had with the first season, but still has a bunch of issues of its own. I don't think the show has made it to greatness, though it's always entertaining.

The major place that this season improves on the first is in the episode to episode continuity. Back in season one, there was some character development, but the focus of most episodes was on the stand alone mystery of the week, with some development in the Lily Kane case going on in the background. Here we get a lot more subplots and development for the secondary characters, and much like second season Buffy, it becomes a serial show, where there's sometimes a standalone plot as well. Generally speaking, the standalone plots have a thematic tie in to what's going on in Veronica's life.

This season, the overall mystery, the bus crash, was usually a secondary plot element, weaved in to the tapestry of events going on in the characters' lives. On the one hand, this works because less of the season's success is reliant on the progression of the mystery. However, I think the fact that the bus is made up of a bunch of characters we don't know means we can't sympathize with the town's initial sadness at the crash. I do like the way they gradually develop the people on the bus, particularly in the dream sequence heavy episode with Veronica imagining she's on the bus. But, by the point we get to know these people, the initial impact of the event is gone, so we never get an emotional jolt from what happens.

This ends up causing problems when we get to the season finale. Because of the show's structure, we can never get a clear villain. It's a world where everyone's a bit nefarious, but not until the final moments of the season can Veronica have a clear antagonist. This causes a bunch of narrative issues when they try to turn Beaver, the goofy, troubled kid we've known all season, into a dangerous, menacing figure. Because we've been pulled through so many theories and loose ends, the actual revelation of what happened is rather underwhelming. The extent of the investigation seems to reveal that the actual person responsible for the crime doesn't particularly matter, the kids are still dead either way.

So, they have to make Beaver more than just the guy who blew up the bus, and this leads to one of the most uncomfortable plot decisions on the show, to say that Beaver raped Veronica when she was unconscious at the party back before the show started. Technically, this fits with what we've heard before, but it just doesn't make sense with the character we've seen, and it comes across as a really crass attempt to make Beaver come across as a villain. Plus, it just pours the misery on Veronica a bit thick, to think that she was forced into sex by two guys in that one night. Come on, that's a bit excessive.

In the case of this show, it's really the journey more than the resolution that's fun. Some shows are designed to build up to the season finale, most of Buffy or Six Feet Under, each season working as a coherent chapter structured to climax in the last episode. Veronica is like that, except the resolution here just didn't work for me. For one, the piling on of atrocities didn't quite fit with the tone. The Woody Goodman molesting children thing in particular was tough to match with Veronica's quip happy persona.

Because Veronica is such a caustic character, it's difficult to emotionally relate to her, and this means I don't get engaged in her pain in the same way that I did with someone like Buffy. She always remains cynical about things, and that makes it difficult to fit the Woody Goodman stuff, or the episode about the college rapist, into the show's world. I think it's good that they tried to branch out into heavier stuff, but it takes a lot of skill to move between a rape and comedy, and I don't feel like that episode was able to handle it that well. Plus, the Woody Goodman stuff came across as a retread of Mysterious Skin.

However, despite all this, I still really enjoyed the season. It just goes by really smoothly, the cliffhangers make it easy to back to back an episode and I liked a lot of the expanded cast. Dick Casablancas in particular was always hilarious and I'm hoping he'll make it back next season. Charisma Carpenter was interesting, playing someone who's basically Cordelia if she'd never met Buffy. The dialogue was always snappy and I loved the continuation of the Aaron Echols storyline. I just wish he hadn't gotten offed at the end of the season, it'd be great to see him and Veronica continue sparring.

So, this is one of the shows that's always entertaining, a lot of fun to watch, but lacks the intellectual cohesion of a truly great show. I'll still be watching the third season, and hope that the show does get a bigger audience now that it's paired with Gilmore Girls.

Top 22 Directors: Part I: 22-11

Here's a list of my twenty-two favorite directors. I'm not trying to present some authoritative view of the twenty greatest directors of all time, in the history of cinema, Francis Ford Coppola's certainly more notable than Sofia in the overall development of movies, but for me personally, Sofia's work has been more affecting. The way I see it, this list's order is determined by who I'd be most excited to see a new film by. Along with the name, there's the number of films I've seen by this person, as well as the number of films they have in my personal top 100 and the number of points they have, with 100 being 1, etc.

22. Bob Fosse
Seen: 4 (of 5)
Top 100: 1
Points: 37
Best Film: All That Jazz

Fosse is best known for his choreography work, but unlike a lot of multitaskers, his films are uniquely cinematic entities. All of his films are based around show business, usually focusing on the negatives, but occasionally showing us why people get involved in the first place. He's got a very dynamic camera and can edit a musical sequence better than anyone. All That Jazz is an extremely inventive film, most notably in the finale, one of the best film endings of all time. His most harrowing film is Star 80, a brutal assault on the viewer with one of the bleakest endings of all time. That film shows that he can work well outside of the musical genre.

21. Lars Von Trier
Seen: 4 (of 8)
Top 100: 1
Points: 65
Best Film: Dogville

Lars Von Trier makes films that frequently frustrate me, he challenges the viewer and I think that the strength of emotional reactions to his material indicates the power of his filmmaking. His 'Golden Heart Trilogy' bothered me at times, but the end of Dogville rebukes a lot of the criticisms there and provides his oeuvre with a violent catharsis. His relentless experimentalism is refreshing, if nothing else, you can always count on Lars to create something different.

20. Terrence Malick
Seen: 4 (of 4)
Top 100: 1
Points: 35
Best Film: The New World

Malick makes films that invite you into a world. Much like Wong Kar-Wai he forsakes traditional narrative for voiceover laden, philosophical and emotional journeys into moodiness. He's at his best when dealing with very simple stories, like the love triangles of The New World and Days of Heaven. In this context, he allows nature to represent the characters' emotions, and gets to show off his always gorgeous photography.

19. Gaspar Noe
Seen: 2 (of 2)
Top 100: 1
Points: 75
Best Film: Irreversible

Like Trier, Noe makes films that actively confront the audience, challenging the viewer to look away. I Stand Alone is a really difficult film to watch because Noe so thoroughly immerses you in the mindset of its racist, psychotic main character. Then with Irreversible he creates his first masterpiece. It's one of the most technically dazzling films of all time, wowing you with the photography while simultaneously horrifying you with the intensity of its content. Very few films could accurately be called an experience, but Irreversible is. It's a film that changed the way I view the medium.

18. George Lucas
Seen: 5 (of 5)
Top 100: 3
Points: 229
Best Film: Star Wars

I think of Lucas more as a storyteller than a director. He didn't have to actually direct Empire or Jedi to get his vision across. However, his direction is still notable, Star Wars changed the possibility of what could be done with science fiction cinema by creating another universe that is totally believable. In Star Wars, I find it hard to believe that cameras are there or even that these people are acting, watching those films completely erases the layer of fictional awareness. People say that Lucas ended New Hollywood with Star Wars, but by creating a film that conveyed his unique vision in a traditionally creative bankrupt genre he was doing the same thing that Coppola did to the crime genre with The Godfather. It's only what happened after that caused things to go bad.

17. Gregg Araki
Seen: 6 (of 8)
Top 100: 0
Points: 0
Best Film: The Doom Generation

Araki is another director who's notable for making really challenging films. His early work is very hyped up, always messing around with film convention, be it in the meta titles on Totally F***ed Up or the genre extremism of Doom Generation. He puts a lot of effort into making visually interesting compositions and backing them with great soundtracks. Mysterious Skin is more emotional than his previous films and manages to keep the visual greatness even in a more realistic narrative world.

16. Kim Ki-Duk
Seen: 6 (of 12)
Top 100: 1
Points: 11
Best Film: 3-Iron

Kim Ki-Duk is a filmmaker who works almost exclusively with visuals and music, frequently spotlighting mute characters who communicate through facial expressions and touch rather than through words. In this sense, he makes uniquely cinematic films and there's a lot of joy to be had in watching him construct worlds out of shots. He's got a fantastic eye and can create really powerful moments through the combination of visuals and music. Sure, he's a bit repetitive, every film seems to be involve water and/or prostitutes, but his films are always interesting, so more power to him.

15. Robert Altman
Seen: 11 (of 35)
Top 100: 1
Points: 8
Best Film: Nashville

Altman's made so many films, it's hard to pin down a specific style. I could easily see the guy who made Nashville making Short Cuts, or the guy who did Images making 3 Women, but connecting everything is more difficult. However, Altman is notable for making realistic films, in the sense that they capture words as spoken, not as scripted, and emotions in an underplayed way, trauma internalized rather than shouted out. I respect Altman for continuing to work, and excel, well in to old age. A Prarie Home Companion is one of the best films of this year and his filmmaking is still innovative and exciting.

14. Park Chanwook
Seen: 4 (of 6)
Top 100: 2
Points: 67
Best Film: Oldboy

Seeing Park's Oldboy for the first time was one of my most exhilarating film viewing experiences. The effortlessness of his craft is dazzling, each frame a beautiful composition and the stylistic flourishes, backed by over the top orchestral techno score left me really happy that such a cool film existed. Lady Vengeance was one of my most anticipated films of last year and it messed with my expectations quite a bit, however I've come to love the more serious approach to vengeance he takes there. No director has a better eye for composition, for creating a really striking image, than Park.

13. Sofia Coppola
Seen: 2 (Of 2)
Top 100: 2
Points: 73
Best Film: Lost in Translation

Sofia Coppola is an even better director than her father, and I love Francis Ford's work. Both of Sofia's films exists in a dreamy realm not far removed from Wong Kar-Waiville, a world where absolutely gorgeous visuals and perfectly chosen music illustrate stories of everyday events that happen to be hugely important to the characters involved. She understands the fact that cinema is a visual medium first, a storytelling medium second, and all the critics who complained that nothing happened in Lost in Translation totally missed the point. Those moments of nothing, beautiful pauses, are where the soul of the film lies. I'm eagerly awaiting Marie Antoinette.

12. Michel Gondry
Seen: 2 (of 2)
Top 100: 1
Points: 80
Best Film: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Gondry is arguably the most innovative visual director working in film today. In his music videos, he went to many crazy places, and is the only director in this CG age who's still able to make you ask "How'd they do that?" Beyond his videos, he's made one masterpiece. Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind is a totally unique fusion of very real emotional drama and surreal visual dreamscapes. It was such a leap for Gondry and I'm confident he's going to keep things going in his next feature, the soon to be released Science of Sleep.


Part II Coming Soon

Defining Indie

At last year's Oscars, there were a bunch of articles about the fact that indie films were dominating the Oscars while the studio offerings failed to get many nominations. Concurrent with this was the idea that said indie films were out of touch with the mainstream, and the notion was that the Academy should try to nominate more "mainstream" film.

The major issue I have with this line of thought is the fact that these so called "indie" films are usually far from indie. Looking back at the Academy Awards last year, we had that indie Crash, which featured such obscure arthouse players as Sandra Bullock and Ludacris, or Good Night and Good Luck directed by and starring arguably the largest movie star on the planet. More recently, we've had the indie success of Little Miss Sunshine, starring the hottest comic on TV and star of one of last year's highest grossing comedies, Steve Carrell.

Even if these films are technically made with independent financing, with the talent involved, it's pretty clear that they're going to get some play. When picked up, they're put out by smaller divisions of major corporate studios, like Warner Independent or Fox Searchlight. So, saying that all these indie movies are coming out of nowhere and snatching up the nominations that should have went to major studio films is rather nonsensical. Whether it's Warner Bros. or Warner Independent, the money goes back to the same place. Actual independent films, like Andrew Bujalski's lo-fi stuff, or classics like Linklater's Slacker very rarely get any Academy attention, or viewers for that matter.

Essentially what's happened is that independent has become a synonym for art movie, a film where the quality of the piece more than the actors or effects is the primary draw. The studios were making such blatantly commercial films that they bought up smaller indie distributors to put out films that would get critical respect and award nominations. There's nothing wrong with this, most of the good American movies come out of these specialty divisions, Focus Features in particular has put out a bunch of really great films.

However, my issue with this is that the spectrum of production of shifted. Back in the 70s, a film like Good Night and Good Luck would have been a big studio film, targetted at a mainstream audience. Same for Crash, which is far from an art film. At that time, there were bad blockbuster type films, but in general, the films that were popular were the ones that also had artistic merit. That's the major difference between then and now, big films are sold as multi-media events and become commodities. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest may be a decent movie, but the quality of the film is insignificant compared to the marketing juggernaut around it.

Because the mainstream has become these generally lifeless blockbusters, formerly mainstream films are shifted into the indie world. That raises the question of what happens to true indies? If art house screens are taken up with a film like Little Miss Sunshine, where can foreign and really independent films play? Very few places is the basic answer, with a small amount of exceptions, foreign films get very little play here, same for artier American films.

Look at a film like Altman's 3 Women, this was made at a mainstream studio back in the 70s, today you'd be hard pressed to get any play for it. Even A Prarie Home Companion, a really accessible film with a whole bunch of stars, got limited play. To some extent, critical reaction can help out these smaller films, but in a lot of cases really indie films dont' get the critical support they deserve. Ellie Parker is a really well done indie comedy, but reviews just end up cracking on the digital video look. I saw the same thing in the early reviews for Lynch's Inland Empire, even though IE may look aesthetically worse than the polished film look of a big Hollywood movie, I can guarantee that it's more visually exciting than perfectly lit, but visually dead mainstream films.

So, this massive spectrum shift hurts us all as filmgoers. Mainstream films could be better, we've already seen it in the indie community. And indie films should be more challenging and innovative, not just there to provide something halway decent for a studio's award campaign. Strangely enough, the last three American films that I've loved were all released by major studios, Universal's Miami Vice and New Line's Domino and The New World, all doing more innovative filmmaking than anything in the indie community. So, occasionally a quality film does slip through, and I'm confident there's a bunch of good stuff coming up this fall.

Related Posts
The New Lynch Film and Digital Filmmaking (5/12/2005)
Great Films (12/19/2005)
Seriously, Crash? (3/6/2006)

Weekend Update

Back to School

Tomorrow I'm pulling a Rodney Dangerfield and heading back up to school. What does this mean for the future of my web endeavors? Well, for one I'll have a lot more free time to watch movies, and hopefully I'll see a lot of stuff worth writing about. I'll be back on Netflix, so some eclectic stuff will be coming in. While up at school, I'll also be shooting more of All Good Things, as well as kicking off my thesis film. So, it should be a productive time. I've been working all the time this summer so it'll be good to return to the freedom of college.

Veronica Mars

I finished up Veronica Mars season two. I'm planning on doing a review of the whole season soon, but as with Carnivale, this may end up not happening. I had a bunch of issues with the end of the season, a lot of those inherent to the structure of a season long mystery. If you've had twenty-two episodes of buildup, any reveal is going to be a bit disappointing, and in this case, there were so many red herrings, there were a whole bunch of people who could have easily done it. However, the actual episode to episode work on the show was a big improvement over season one and I'll be glad to make a Gilmore Girls/Veronica Mars double feature this season. And side note, I think Lauren Graham on a Sorkin show, guest hosting Studio 60, is brilliant.

Future Plans

With Veronica Mars done, I'm looking to start up a new series. I'll probably Netflix the first discs of Rome and Deadwood, then see what catches my fancy. I'm also planning on watching Babylon 5 soon, though the awful reputation of the first season is not encouraging me. In terms of comics, after I wrap up JLA, I'm planning on doing an in depth reread of From Hell. I first read the book back in May 2003, here's my reaction from back then, and with nearly three and a half years gone, I think it's time to return.

Upcoming Dates of Note
9/22 - Science of Sleep Releated
9/24 - The Flaming Lips at Hammerstein
10/8 - Inland Empire at NYFF
10/20 - Marie Antoinette Released
10/25 - Seven Soldiers #1 Released
11/22 - The Fountain Released

JLA: Crisis Times Five (#28-31)

This storyline works in a similar way as a lot of the other big, multi-part arcs that Morrison has done, piling crisis on crisis, swamping the JLA with the sheer amount of things they've got to deal with. As usual, some of them are traditional superhero stuff while some are crazy cosmic things. Crisis Times Five encapsulates a lot of what's good about Morrison's run, but it also feels a bit conventional. Of course, reading the Mark Waid issues surrounding it show that Morrison's conventional writing still trumps nearly anything else out there.

There are two really fantastic pieces of this storyline. The first is Zauriel and old Green Lantern's trip to heaven to try to wake the Spectre. Here we get a great Morrison concept, the idea that the Spectre has been imprisoned by planting a civilization on him. So, waking the Spectre to save Earth would mean destroying an entire world. It's a clear precursor of stuff that Morrison deals with in The Filth, the idea that smaller microbial worlds are as equally valid as the one we think is real. As above, so below was the big thing from that series, and this civilizatiion on the Spectre parallels the way our own bodies house billions of microbes.

In one of the most stunning pages in any Morrison work, we see Zauriel watch the growth and decline of this entire world over the course of billions of years, experienced in an hour. I love the idea that they move so slow they seem like statues to the people in the world. It's simple, yet mindblowing.

The other really cool thing here is Green Lantern and Captain Marvel's trip to the fifth dimension. In looking at The Invisibles, I was struggling to come up with a way to comprehend the idea of 4-D time as described in the series. Eventually, I realized that people looking at our world from a 4-D perspective would see it much like a comic book, each seperate moment frozen in time, the people involved unaware of their future even though we could see it by just flipping forward a few pages. So, all of time always exists, it's all about which piece it you choose to experience at any moment.

What Morrison does here is take that metaphor but put it to work within the comic book world. In the fifth dimension, Green Lantern becomes a 2-D figure with no depth, just a piece of paper. All the stuff there is great, Captain Marvel's goofiness maximized by the retro coloring and Green Lantern still in awe of the crazy stuff he gets to experience. For Morrison, the fifth dimension is one of pure imagination, by writing something Captain Marvel is able to make it real. Morrison's a big proponent of chaos magic and sigils, the idea that concentrated thought can affect the nature of reality. What Marvel does by skywriting the two colors together is essentially cast a sigil that quickly becomes reality.

The storyline that isn't particularly successful here is Triumph's attempt to defeat the JLA. His elaborate masterplan is too close to what Prometheus and the Keymaker already did and there's nothing particularly interesting about his struggle. The stuff with the two genies is decent, but they end up feeling more like just really big bad guys than a particularly exceptional fifth dimension threat.

That said, I d enjoy the stuff with Huntress and Wildcat fighting them on the streets. I read this trade a few years ago, without reading the rest of the series, and I remember being annoyed by the sudden appearance of these random characters like Wildcat, on top of the already huge cast. However, reading the series through, you really get to know all the main cast, and the guest appearance of Wildcat serves a crucial role in the ongoing evolution of Huntress as a JLA member. Her arc has been the most interesting character development during Grant's run. She's still not sure why she's on the team, but always seems to wind up serving some crucial role in the JLA victory. By this point, and in the subsequent Mark Waid issues, she seems to have realized that her role is to be the ordinary citizen, the voice of humanity on the JLA, and she serves that purpose well.

Back when I started doing these JLA reviews, I talked about the fact that the book was about icons, so the stories couldn't be traditional narratives, they had to play more on the characters as mythology, gods. That's why I think Morrison chose to bring in the secondary cast, people who didn't have huge powers and were actually vulnerable to attack. For one thing, they can actually be in danger, as Steel is in this storyline, but they also have more doubts about the JLA's purpose. All of the secondary seven are uncertain why they're there, but gradually proving themselves through battle. So, there is a clear character progression even though each of these arcs is essentially standalone. I'd previous read the series in just random chunks, but it's definitely something that should be read in order.

Crisis Times Five is perhaps the representative Morrison JLA arc, containing the crazy concepts, subtle character development and innovative use of DC history that make it great and the weaknesses as well, too many villains who seemingly have the ultimate key to the JLA and a repetitive structure of threat appears, creates chaos then gets stopped. But, the flaws don't prevent this from being a really fun arc that towers over the other writers working on JLA. To think that something full of this many crazy concepts could be the top selling comic shows that in at least one medium, you can still do really great, innovative work in a mainstream context.

Related Posts
JLA: Return of the Conqueror (#22-23) (8/10/2006)
JLA: One Million (8/19/2006)
JLA: Executive Action (#24-26) (8/24/2006)

Ellie Parker

Yesterday I watched the film Ellie Parker, a DV feature starring Naomi Watts. As a big David Lynch fan, this film is interesting because it's like another chapter in the story of Naomi's Mulholland Dr. character. If her friend Sam from this film got big, I could easily see their relationship segueing into the story of Diane and Camilla. I don't think this film is anywhere near as good as Mulholland, but it's not setting out to tell a story with that ambition, rather this film is concerned with reality of everyday life for an aspiring actress. It takes place in a world that feels very real, and I would guess is largely based on Watts' own experience as a struggling actress in L.A.

She's in virtually every scene, so the film pretty much is Naomi Watts' performance, and again she proves that she's one of the best actresses working today. Her work in the audition scene in Mulholland Dr. is one of my favorite all time acting moments, and here we get to see her similarly move in and out of different characters, shining above the subpar scripts she's sent. It's easy to see how a great actress can make even bad material work really well when she delivers the "I sucked Vinnie's cock" monologue with total commitment to the role. At the end, surrounded by coked out producers, she still gives her all and sells the script.

Being somewhat involved in the film industry, I feel like I can better sympathize with what Ellie goes through over the course of the film. I'm still in school, making films that may get some festival play, but not too much, and certainly won't make any money. Yet, when I held auditions for The Perfect Dose, we got tons of people, some of them who had traveled hours just to audition. I'd like to consider that a compliment to the script, but it's also about the fact that people are desperate for roles to put stuff on their reel and try to get cast in bigger roles. As an actress, she's totally powerless, forced to grovel to the producers because they hold the way for her to her name out there. Witness the scene with Chris after the car crash, in which she offers to appear in basically anything he does, just so she can get something on her reel.

I think the opening chunk of the film, depicting Ellie moving from audition to audition, does a fantastic job of drawing you into her world and showing what it's actually like for a struggling actress. It's only a glamorous world once you become famous, for the vast majority of actors, it's all about slumming it, trying to get that big break. I'd like to think that the people who ended up doing my film all felt it was a worthwhile experience, but ultimately they have ended up feeling like they were wasting their time because they're better than the material. Certainly, if you look at Naomi's IMDB credits list, roles in Tank Girl and Children of the Corn IV probably weren't the most fulfilling acting experiences. And I'm guessing that she poured a lot of that frustration into both her character in Mulholland Dr. and into the character here.

Ellie wasn't a particularly well reviewed film and I think a large reason for that is that people feel like films about film are too self referential and clever, and to some extent that's true. I really disliked The Player because it was about all too obvious gags about how stupid Hollywood thinks the audience is. So, the audience gets to laugh at the big wigs because of their calculated self deprecation. Ellie is a much more real film, the setting is Hollywood, but the feelings of degradation and loss of self could apply to a wide variety of jobs. The film is about the way that people sacrifice parts of themselves in pursuit of stability and happiness, never made more clear than in the discussion about using traumatic experiences as fuel for acting. Ellie is jealous of people who had awful things happen to them because she feels like it gives their acting a verisimilitude she can never match.

Take a look at books, we've all read some of the "Poor me" memoirs, like Angela's Ashes, that take a bad childhood and turn them into a best seller. If Frank McCourt didn't have an alcoholic father and an awful childhood, would anyone read his book? So, at this point in his life it would seem that those awful experiences were actually a blessing. A JT Leroy type scandal makes clear how envied these bad experiences are. Beyond just the fuel, I feel like Ellie wants an experience that makes her special, more than just countless other actresses at auditions. She wants gravitas, but for all her skill, can't find it.

I can definitely relate to her issues here, I often view social situations as experiments to eventually incorporate into films. I think part of being an artist is this distance from direct emotion, the knowledge that everything you do could potentially wind up spun into a film, performance or song. At the end, when Ellie rejects her acting career she tries to restart communication with a bunch of friends she'd lost touch with. The implication is pursuing acting disconnects her from reality and puts her in a bubble where her emotions are used only to service a performance, yet all the roles she auditions for are cliched and not worthy of her suffering.

The film was shot on digital video and I read a couple of reviews that really criticized it for the look. On the one hand, yeah, it could look better, but the actual shots and style are much better than a lot of films that look better aesthetically. I also saw The Illusionist yesterday and it was alright, but the compositions were so staid, I was waiting for the film to give me a big pop moment and got nothing, while Ellie was consistently full of innovative, exciting shots and moments. I feel like shooting on DV gives you a freedom to be much more experimental, I know I'd rather see a film that's shot in an exciting way than one that just puts the tripod down, sets up the lights and does wide, single, single coverage.

Doing a couple of days on a film set over the weekend really reinforced this. They would spend hours getting the lighting right on a shot than just do a boring conventional shot. Where's the handheld, where's the dynamic two shot? I like some well composed still shots, but very rarely is traditional coverage the best way to do a scene, and luckily Ellie keeps things interesting. I would consider the cinematography on Ellie Parker better than that of The Illusionist even though The Illusionist clearly has the aesthetic advantage. For me, cinematography is more about motion and creating energy than just making a pretty picture. That's why the best cinematography is stuff like The New World or Doyle's work on Fallen Angels, films that have tons of energy and crazy handheld moving work, but also are aesthetic marvels in every frame.

In terms of wielding DV, I feel like Lynch's new one is going to be a major achievement because this is a guy who's a master cinematic composer totally freed from the restrictions of traditional film, able to engage in a lot more experimentation. That's the thing that people don't consider when looking at the final product of a film, the fact that DV may not look as good aesthetically, but it gives the artist freedom to try a lot more shots, more movement, more depth, that will ultimately make a better looking shot than you would get with traditional film.

But, back to Ellie Parker. This is the sort of film I want to make, and have made with Ricky Frost and the upcoming All Good Things, films that a snapshot of a person's life, following them through a series of ordinary events that when looked at from afar, have a thematic cohesion not apparent in one's daily life. I love the style, I love the subject matter and most of all I love Naomi Watts' performance, totally becoming the character to the point that you don't see the acting at all. Definitely give this a look.

Related Posts
Mulholland Dr.: Some Analysis (4/11/2004)
My Favorite Actresses (1/17/2005)
The New Lynch Film and Digital Filmmaking (5/12/2005)

Fall Movie Preview

I think one of the signs of moving from childhood to adulthood is that the fall movie season replaces summer as the season you're most looking forward to. Normally you've got to preface these articles with some snide comment about how Hollywood is churning out crap and maybe we'll get a decent film this year. Well, none of that here, I'm more excited for this fall's batch of films than I've ever been before. There's a ton of potentially great stuff here. Now, I'm sure some of these release dates will change, but for now, here's what I want to see.

September 1
Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles - After a foray into martial arts film, Zhang Yimou gets back to his roots with this drama. I'm not sure I'll make it to this one in theaters, but I'll definitely check it out on DVD. I'm curious to see how Zhang's style has been altered by his foray into martial arts stuff.

September 8
Sherrybaby - A gritty indie drama with Maggie Gyllenhaal is definitely something I'm inclined to check out. The plot sounds exactly like Clean, it worked great there and there's certainly potential for some quality here.

September 15
The Black Dahlia - A fantastic trailer pretty much sold me on this one. Josh Hartnett's noir voiceover brings back memories of Sin City, and the plot seems like it's got a lot of potential for twisted stuff. If the film can keep the very modern energy of the trailer and combine that with the 40s setting, it's got potential for greatness.

September 22
The Science of Sleep - After seeing his Director's Label DVD, I'll watch pretty much anything Gondry does. However, the trailer for this one could sell anyone, there's more incredible imagery in those two minutes than in any other film released this year. This is a more personal film for Gondry and if he can fuse the very real emotion of Eternal Sunshine with some of his more whimsical, outre video style stuff, we could have a masterpiece. Plus, I'm curious to see Serge Gainsbourg's daughter in something other than his 'Lemon Incest' video. I saw Gondry speak yesterday and the few clips they showed from the film were great, very funny and imaginative. I just hope this one gets the audience it deserves.

Renaissance - A CG/live action sci-fi film, I haven't heard too much about this one, but I'm always up for a good dystopian thriller. The issue with a lot of films in the genre is that the fact that they're building a whole world means they don't get around to building believable characters. It's a good cast though, so this should be at least worth seeing.

October 6
The Departed - I love Infernal Affairs, I think it's one of the most stylish, twisty crime thrillers in recent memory. Michael Mann touched on similar themes in the brilliant Miami Vice, but I think it's the kind of concept that's always got something new to explore within. I'd be a lot more excited if this wasn't a remake, particularly since the trailer indicates it's pretty faithful to the original. However, I'm guessing that Jack Nicholson will keep things fresh, I've heard that he no longer learns his lines, he gets them sent in through an earpiece to keep things fresh, and there's some odd stories about him wearing a strap on at some point. I'm intrigued.

October 8
INLAND EMPIRE - If all goes well, I'll be able to see David Lynch's new film at the New York Film Festival on either the 8th or 9th. I've written about my love of Lynch's work many times before and he's been totally on his game since Twin Peaks: FWWM, up through Lost Highway and Mulholland, he's been developing and refining similar themes. So, I'm curious to see where he goes now that he's been freed up to go more experimental. I'm trying to learn as little about the film as possible, go in completely clean and just be blown away. This is my most anticipated film since Revenge of the Sith.

October 13
Sunshine - Danny Boyle's made two really great films, and as he showed in 28 Days Later, he can bring a lot of humanity to genre filmmaking. This one's got a great cast and a cool premise that I'm confident Boyle can pull off. Should be cool.

Shortbus - I'm always interested in looking at cinema that pushes boundaries and this film's explicit sexual content does just that. There was good buzz coming out of Cannes, though I'm guessing this one won't make it to too many theaters, so it will probably be a DVD view.

Little Children - Being from suburbia, I'm always up for a film that addresses the issues of suburban culture. The trailer for this is great and the lead actresses are two of our best. This will probably be the 'cool' Oscar pick, the film that's nominated for a bunch of things and critics will lament that fact that it has no chance of winning, despite being better than the big Hollywood films that are the favorites.

Tideland - New Gilliam. This one's been getting mixed buzz, but it at least seems to be more personal than The Brothers Grimm. I doubt he'll ever match what he did with Brazil, but I'll be glad to watch him try.

October 20
Marie Antoinette - With any luck, I'll get to see this one a week early at the New York Film Festival. This one's been getting a lot of bad reviews, but the criticisms all sound like positives to me, a focus on visuals and music over traditional biopic structure. I love the way that Sofia's blending modern stuff with the historical setting. Her previous two films are brilliant and I'm pretty sure this one'll be good as well.

October 27
Babel - Inarritu's got a very distinctive style and this seems to push everything he's done to the next level. The cast is fantastic and the trailer indicates a lot of visual energy and greater narrative ambition than anything he's done before. I'm sure a lot of the press will focus on Brad's celebrity, but he's shown again and again that he can sink into a role and steal a film. This is another I'm really looking forward to.

November 3
Volver - I'm not a huge Almodovar fan, but I usually enjoy his stuff and this one seems to be full of his classic themes and great visuals. Buzz out of annes indicates that it doesn't go far beyond his previous work, but is still reliably entertaining. This is another one I'll check out at NYFF if I get a chance.

November 10
Stranger than Fiction - This one seems to be a foray into Charlie Kaufman territory, and there's certainly room for more films like that. I'm not sure how Ferrell will do outside of his usual comic area, but if Jim Carrey could do Eternal Sunshine, I'm sure Ferrell can pull something decent together.

November 17
Casino Royale - I hate to get excited for this one because I'm sure even with the new Bond and series reboot it will still have a lot of the awful lines and implausible set pieces that the late Brosnan films had. Plus, the fact that the producers didn't choose to have Goldfrapp do the theme as was rumored is a bad choice. But, who knows, maybe it'll surprise me. Eva Green was amazing in The Dreamers and the trailer was quite good. I'll at least sample.

Fast Food Nation - I'll see anything Linklater does, but the Cannes buzz doesn't have me too thrilled for this. Still, there's a lot of potential and a great cast. I've liked a lot of Linklater stuff that didn't thrill critics so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt here.

Come Early Morning - Joey Lauren Adams was fantastic in Chasing Amy and I'm curious to see her directing debut. It's been getting good buzz, though I'm guessing this won't get much of a release and it will end up being a DVD view.

November 22
The Fountain - I've been waiting for this one for six years. This film has one of the most imaginative premises ever and promises to go into territory that only Kubrick in 2001 touched on. This is very Grant Morrison stuff and there's very little of that in cinema. On top of that, it's made by the man who made arguably the best first two features of all time, Aronofsky makes films that you don't watch, you experience, merging innovative visuals with great scores. This is right up there with Inland Empire as my most anticipated film of the fall.

Deja Vu - Tony Scott's Domino is one of the most underappreciated films of all time, a near avant garde masterpiece of visual innovation. I'm guessing he'll scale back from that style a bit, but if he just reaches Man on Fire level, it'll still be interesting to watch.

For Your Consideration - Christopher Guest movies are always fun, if ultimately inconsequential. The addition of Ricky Gervais could definitely help this one, I hope he brings some of the raw emotion of The Office to the usually cartoonish Guest world.

December 1
The Nativity Story - Catherine Hardwicke's Thirteen was a really exciting film and Keisha Castle Hughes was great in Whale Rider, even if the film ultimately didn't work. If she brings the edgy style of Thirteen to this story we could have a really cool film, if it's a somber retelling, I've got no particular interest in seeing it.

The Good German - Soderbergh films are consistently entertaining and always bring something new technique wise. This seems to be him in his big Hollywood mode, but Clooney and Blanchett should keep things interesting.

December 22
Rocky Balboa - Having come through five films, don't I have to see the last one? If the reviews are decent, I'll definitely go, I do have a soft spot for the series, and I'd love to see Stallone make a great film here. I guess we'll see what he can do.

December 25
Dreamgirls - The buzz on this one is ridiculously good, and I always enjoy a good musical. This is another film with a top notch cast and solid director, I'm guaranteeing at least ten Oscar nominations for this.

Children of Men - The premise is great and the awards season release date indicates a high degree of confidence in the film. Julianne Moore is one of my favorite actresses, hopefully this project will bring her back from a bit of a slump. Between this, Sunshine and The Fountain, we should get at least one really good sci-fi film.

Pan's Labyrinth - Fantastic buzz on this one coming out of Cannes, I'm hoping to catch it on the closing night of the NYFF. It sounds like the sort of crazy fantasy film that rarely gets made, vintage Gilliam territory. I hope it lives up to the hype.

Perfume - Tom Tykwer's Run Lola Run was a masterpiece, but I haven't seen any of his other films. That said, the trailer for this is great, and I've got high hopes.

What a season, at least five films with the chance to be all time classics and some of these others might surprise. I'm psyched.

Related Posts
2006 Film Preview (12/27/2005)
Summer Movie Preview (5/3/2006)
Fall TV Season (8/3/2006)

Kanye West @ Nokia Theater

Going to a lot of shows, you encounter a lot of bands who seem to have a real problem with doing what the audience expects. To some extent, you've got to withhold and space out your big songs, but a lot of times you'll hear people playing their hits like it's a chore. It's understandable considering how many times they've probably played the song, but at the same time, you're making a living playing your music and ultimately what you are is an entertainer. Kanye definitely understands this, putting on a really up tempo live show that overcame the issues with live rap performance by just constantly giving you something new and interesting.

The setup was similar to the one used by Gnarls Barkley, a string section, backup singers, though in this case a DJ replaced the keyboards and drums of Gnarls. And, in the center of it all Kanye. The set looked vaguely ancient Greek, white with purple curtains and a bunch of TVs that looked like picture frames, but broadcast live footage. The string section had cool looking makeup, a stripe of red over the eyes that made them look like Pris from Blade Runner.



He came out with 'Diamonds From Sierra Leone,' which made great use of the string section and got a lot of crowd energy right from the start. He then segued into 'All Falls Down,' which kept the crowd going. He was pretty hyper at the beginning, running around the stage, speeding through the verses. But, it worked because the crowd was really into it, a lot of diamonds were in the air for the opener and the crowd seemed to know the lyrics for every song. Hearing all these songs back to back, it was amazing how good every one of Kanye's solo songs are. I was excited to hear practically every song he brought out.

From there, he went into my favorite of his songs, 'Kanye's Workout Plan,' which is notable mainly for the vocoder breakdown, which wasn't much different live than on the album. Short of actually breaking out a live vocoder, that's the kind of song that doesn't gain much live. Rap is generally considered to be inferior live to rock, and I would generally agree. Especially for smaller artists, what you get is basically the guy rapping over the record, which isn't much more exciting than just listening to the album. However, the string section and live singing, plus dynamic DJing made this more than the album. Plus, particularly with this crowd, a lot of the coolness of the show came from the crowd's enthusiastic reaction to everything that went on. Anyway, the 'Workout Plan' closed out with a snippet of 'Sweet Dreams are Made of This,' a track I always enjoy, a nice bonus.

Shortly after this, John Legend came out and did a solo song, 'Ordinary People.' It was alright, probably the kind of thing that goes over better on record than live. After the high energy performance Kanye did, the laid back piano of Legend was a bit lacking. However, they did a nice version of 'Heard 'Em Say' after, with Legend on the piano. After this, Common came out and they did a great version of 'Get 'Em High.' They did another song that was really familiar, but I don't actually know what it is. Anyway, the guest appearance was solid.

After this, Kanye did a segment where he played excerpts from songs he'd produced. This was another of those rap show only moments, where Kanye would just do the vocals on 'H to the Izzo,' and it went over huge with the crowd. Unlike a rock band doing a cover, he was able to bring out the exact recording of the original song, but it felt weird for him to get a big crowd reaction with a song Jay-Z did. However, he did produce it, so I suppose he earned it.

This sequence ended with Kanye playing 'Drop it Like It's Hot,' and a guest appearance by Pharrell. I love Pharrell's producing work and his two albums with N.E.R.D, but the tracks I've heard from his solo album have been generally uninspiring and he lacked Kanye's live presence. They did a long version of 'Can I Have It Like That,' which was mostly interesting for the crowd's enthusiastic reaction to Pharrell. Eventually they did 'Number One,' which is another track that doesn't live up to either artist's previous work. In terms of Pharrell's future, I'd like to see another N.E.R.D album, both "In Search Of" and "Fly or Die" are fantastic.

After Pharrell left, Kanye did more solo tracks, a string of massive hits. 'Jesus Walks' was great, the best use of the string section all night. Then he did 'Spaceship,' which I was happy to hear, it's one of his best tracks. 'Golddigger' was in there as well, punctuated by the most memorable quote of the night from Kanye: "White people, this is your one opportunity to use the word nigga." 'Through the Wire' was cool too, around this point Kanye said he was happy just to get the chance to share this music with people, normally you'd think that's just a line, but he really seemed to enjoy himself, and the songs still felt fresh despite the fact that he's performed them countless times.

Things closed out with 'Touch the Sky,' and then an abrupt conclusion, no encore. I actually like that there was no encore, it's always annoying to wait for the band to come back, just do all your stuff then get going. I'd have loved to hear 'Roses' or 'Drive Slow,' but all of the solo Kanye stuff was great. Hearing his songs against some of the other artists' tracks, it was really apparent just how good Kanye's stuff is. Every song ignited the crowd and was a lot of fun to hear.

So, this was a great show. It had just as much energy as any rock show and it was great to get to hear such a high profile artist in a small venue. There was just so much crowd energy going back at him, I totally got caught up in the show. Very cool. That said, I'd still be curious to see how Kanye went over on the dates he opened for U2 back in the fall. I'm not sure how those two audiences would have mixed.



Related Posts
On Music (1/19/2005)
In the Mix: January 2006 (1/11/2006)

Idlewild

SPOILERS BELOW

I've been looking forward to this film for a few years now, since back when it was an HBO TV movie. Outkast is the best hip hop group of all time and they've done some really fantastic videos. This film harkens back to classic musicals of the 30s quite heavily, even more so than something like Chicago, a film that refused to indulge in the basic pleasure/absurdity of the musical genre, the idea that characters will just start singing. In this film, characters will sing to show their feelings, though not that often. The film functions as a fusion of two classic 30s genres, the backstage musical and the gangster film.

A lot of reviewers seem to take issue with the film's basic conceit, the idea that Outkast's hip hop music exists in the 1930s. Whenever you're watching a movie, you have to accept the idea that the people on screen aren't actors, they're characters in a story, and that what happens to them isn't the result of a series of choices made by the writer it's due to the hand of fate or what have you. So, if you're going to accept the basic fictional nature of the universe, is it really such a stretch to imagine a world where hip hop existed in the 1930s? If a rapper had made a sudden appearance in Gladiator, that could be trouble, but this is the world the film created and I don't find the rapping out of place at all. Most of the songs have instrumentation that makes them sound like what rap would be like if it was out in the 1930s, Rooster's opening number, "Bowtie," fits perfectly with the club atmosphere, and is staged in a really exhilirating way with swooping camera and dynamic cutting. Tracking back, the opening credits sequence reminded me of Samurai Champloo, with its transposing of a hip hop aesthetic into a period film.

The major criticism of the film that I do think is valid is the fact that the story has a lot of cliches. On Andre's side, the woman singer who's got talent but just needs a break and the artist who just needs to get his stuff heard are both stock figures from 30s musicals. The only thing that could make it more cliche is if the real Angel broke her ankle on show night giving Sally the chance to to perform. With Big Boi, the 30s gangster aesthetic has been done to death, as has the roguish, but likable low level hood like Rooster. He actually gets saved when a bullet hits his bible, is there a more cliched situation?

However, I don't think this is a problem. For one, the film uses these aesthetics and setups, but then messes with them enough that it feels fresh. If you're emotionally engaged with the story, it doesn't really matter if it's not the newest territory. Look at the "Take Off Your Cool" sequence, on the one hand, it's totally cliche to have the two characters meet up and kiss in the rain. Yet, because you're attached to both of them, the moment is still fulfilling. Plus, the shots of them walking in slo mo in the rain are very cool looking. The song's one of my favorites off The Love Below and it makes for one of the best shot/edited sex scenes I've seen. It's difficult to pull off a sex scene without taking the audience out of the story and making them more aware of the actors themselves than the characters. And music is always difficult because you don't want something that sounds like a porn soundtrack, nor does R. Kelly style R&B usually work. Michael Mann's music choice for the Tubbs/Trudie sex scene in Miami Vice was one of his few missteps. However, the subdued "Take Off Your Cool" enhances the emotion of the scene and makes you feel the emotions the charactes are going through. Really well done.

So, I'd argue that since the story works on an emotional level, it can get away with the cliches. It's the same deal as Joss's tendency to kill off characters after moments of happiness, on the one hand, it's a bit tired, but that doesn't make "Seeing Red" or "A Hole in the World" any less powerful. And I think the emotions of the story, particuarly on the Andre side were really satisfying. I loved watching Percival and Angel work through the song and then succeed in making the audience like it. The gangster stuff generally works too, though I do think that Sunshine Ace was a character who totally didn't work and I'm not sure why he was played in such a cartoonish way.

Ultimately, the film earns its perhaps cliched happy ending because the characters go through so much on the way. Terence Howard's Trumpy was a very menacing character, and the fact that he was so heavy meant that all the characters were in real danger. I wasn't expecting Angel to die and the fact that she did means that the ending feels much more earned. The characters have gone through some bad stuff, so we're even more happy when they're finally successful. To some extent, it's odd to end with Percival so happy considering her death shortly before, however, I think it works because it shows that Angel did make a major impact on him. For the first time, he has the confidence to really express himself and he's found out that his songs do have the power to captivate an audience.

Most of the film's high points are the musical number, however I think the story itself works a lot better than most of the 1930s musicals it's homaging. I was always looking forward to the next musical number, but the gangster stuff is very successful and Percival's romantic subplot is great too.

That said, the musical sequences are the most memorable part. "Bowtie" was fantastic, and I wish we got to see a couple more Rooster performances, or at least a Rooster/Percival collaboration. "She Lives in Your Lap" is another highlight off The Love Below and it was used in a really odd, but successful sequence. The mortuary subplot brought back some memories of Six Feet Under, and I was expecting the corpses to start dancing at some point. However, the subplot pays off nicely with that sequence. On the album, "She Lives..." is a very sexy, nasty song. Here, some of the instrumental elements are removed and it becomes more somber, perfectly fitting his sadness at that moment. It was a really unexpected use of the song, and it worked perfectly.

I think the film could have done with a few more songs in general, only during "Bowtie" and the final sequence do we see fully staged musical numbers. The final setup is clearly aping Busby Berkley's stuff, though it never ascends into the bizarre realm that his work did. Andre is great there, but I think Barber could have gone a bit further. That said, both of those songs are really fun and great to watch.

I find it odd that this film has gotten a generally lukewarm reaction while something like Chicago got massive acclaim. I think it's partially due to people accepting more oddness from works that are part of the canon. If you came out with something like Hamlet today, people would be saying that the ghost of his dad appearing is ridiculous and the ending is just excessively violent. However, because it already exists, people just accept it. When you do something new, like this movie, people aren't prepared to accept the conceits, the idea that hip hop can mix with the 30s, or that light musical numbers can mix with heavier subject matter.

This film, like a Miami Vice or Revenge of the Sith, certainly has some flaws, but it's got so much good stuff that I find it hard to believe people didn't enjoy it. I was really hooked in to the emotional story and the film had some of the most consistently exciting visuals in recent film. It's a film that's always entertaining and intelligent. The film is clearly being pitched towards an 'urban' audience, but I think this film could have a lot of mainstream appeal. I could see old white people going and enjoying this movie as much as teenagers would.

So, I always enjoy a well done musical and this one is great. The music is top notch, the visuals great and the story well done and engaging. I would highly reccomend checking out Idlewild.

Weekend Update

Kanye Show

I'm looking to pick up tickets for the just announced Kanye West show at the Nokia Theater. I love Kanye's stuff, most rap albums can't sustain the seemingly obligatory 75 minute running time, but both Kanye albums are great listening experiences through and through. Admittedly, rap doesn't translate as well live as rock music, but I'd still like to see him, if the price is right. Plus, Pharrel is there as well, I love his work on N.E.R.D, though I've yet to check out his generally panned solo album.

Veronica Mars

I've started watching Veronica Mars: Season Two on DVD, through the first six episodes. It's a good show, I really enjoy watching it, but I don't think it has the depth of a really great show, like Buffy to which it's frequently compared. That said, the second season is stronger than the first because there's more character continuity. The first season had much more focus on the standalone mystery of the week, while here the standalone mysteries are generally incidental, a way of commenting on the main plot. I'll definitely be watching when the show starts its third season in October.

New Films

The trailer for my new film, All Good Things, is now up online. Head over to the official Respect! Films site to download it, or just watch the Youtube below. I've got one more day of shooting on that film, probably Monday, then I'll be editing it for a release at some point in September. I've also got to get the new workshop film online, that'll be up at some point this week.



Upcoming Events of Note
8/29 - Arrested Development Season 3 on DVD
8/29 - Michel Gondry @ Apple Store
8/29 - Kanye West @ Nokia Theater
8/31 - North @ Trash Bar
9/22 - Science of Sleep Releated
9/24 - The Flaming Lips at Hammerstein
10/20 - Marie Antoinette Released
10/25 - Seven Soldiers #1 Released
11/22 - The Fountain Released
11/22 - The Fountain Released

Nowhere

My film watching pattern is usually to find a director I like then watch all the films he's done. It started with Tim Burton and I've since gone through a whole bunch of other directors. One of my current people is Gregg Araki. Mysterious Skin was good enough to make me want to see everything else he'd done and that's led me to Nowhere.

Nowhere is clearly stylistically indebted to Araki's previous feature, The Doom Generation. TDG took place in a stylized cartoon universe where characters spoke in an odd, unnatural style and everything was overplayed to a severe degree. Nowhere is set in the same basic universe, but an even more schizophrenic over the top world than The Doom Generation. And, unlike The Doom Generation's narrow focus on three character, Nowhere wanders through a whole bunch of plots, using a similar structure to American Graffiti or Dazed and Confused.

Because this is such a short film, only 78 minutes, and there's so many characters, what you take away from it is more the style, both in terms of production design and also editing. Everything is pushed to extremes, the lighting casts the characters in bold, primary colors and particularly towards the end bares very little resemblance to what we know as reality. I think this is a fantastic choice, the whole point of the film is to push real life tendencies to the extreme and using the set design to parallel character feelings takes advantage of what only film can do. I've never seen another film, besides The Doom Generation, that looks like this, and that's a big compliment.

The opening sequence is actually the high point of the film, as rapid editing shows Dark's masturbation fantasy. I love the transitions between different scenes, showing the different elements of the character's sexuality, and the conflict presented here is what will drive him throughout the film. It's a really dynamic opening for the film, perfectly scored by Araki's choice of music.

The early moments of this film remind me a lot of Totally F***ed Up, the first film in the Teen Apocalypse Trilogy. The videotape diary is the most obvious example, but also the way the characters interact. Outside of the moments of stylization, the jealousy and sense of abandon are right out of TFU. The major change is that TFU takes place in a world that's essentially our reality, while this film takes place in a totally exaggerated world. Outside of Mel and Dark, pretty much everyone is a caricature, right down to their names, like Christina Applegate's Dingbat, whose kitten sweater and braces are the most obvious stereotype of a geeky girl.

The b characters, particularly the celebrity cameos like Rose McGowan and Heather Graham all feel completely unreal. Heather Graham's Lilith has no character traits whatsoever outside of the fact that she likes to have sex. But in this film, that's fine, Araki's goal isn't to promote an emotional reaction, it's more about immersing you in his stylistic world. So, we don't really care what happens to Lilith, no more than we do about Elvis and Alyssa, but it's still enjoyable to watch them because of the way Araki constructs a scene.

In this respect, the film is very different from The Doom Generation. There, we had the heavy surface stylization, but there was also a lot of thematic exploration and emotion. The ending of The Doom Generation, when the characters have a threesome, is a strong emotional payoff for what we've been through. Then, the intrusion of the neo-nazis is a really disturbing moment, both because of Araki's strobe heavy presentation and because we care about these characters and don't want to see them hurt.

Here, that emotional connection is lost, so we only watch for the style and presentation of events. That's fine because most of the film is pretty light and consequence free, however, it causes problems in the moments of real emotional violence. In such a cartoony film, it's disturbing to see a realistic rape scene. It just feels out of character with the rest of the film. The tomato soup beatdown at the end is still disturbing, but fits into the world better. And, I love the way he can get away with a ridiculous amount of blood by throwing the tomato soup into the scene. For the viewer, there's no difference between the two.

Sometime between watching The Doom Generation and this, I actually saw a picture of Gregg Araki, and there's quite a resemblance between him and James Duval, which would lead me to assume there's a good bit of autobiography behind Dark here. Dark is the only character who's really developed, and to some extent, I think his very real issue of being torn between the sexually free world he lives in and the more traditional relationship part of him wants is perfect fodder for a serious film. However, here the moments that are actually emotional wind up feeling a bit out of place.

The biggest issue with this is in the final scene with Montgomery. On one hand, I love the absurdity of Montgomery returning from an alien abduction, and the idea of an alien just wandering the town in general. However, the scene slows everything down and feels like it's from another movie. It might have worked if this was a movie based in reality that was just paced really quickly, but we have no basis for processing real emotion so it winds up feeling off. I do like the end when Montgomery turns into a bug and flies away, it's a really nice, bizarre note to close the film on.

Nowhere was a really fun film to watch, but it lacks the thematic depth of The Doom Generation, or Araki's later Mysterious Skin. It's primarily of interest as a style piece, and there it works wonderfully. Araki always picks perfect music to accompany his images, and this film works as his Fallen Angels, pushing everything to an extreme before a retreat to something a bit more conservative. I'm interested to see where he goes next, Smiley Face sounds like a rather mainstream teen comedy, but I'm sure he'll bring something crazy to it.

The one really lingering question from Nowhere for me is how was this made? This is a really odd film, yet Araki managed to get tons of stars to appear. I'm really glad that he got the freedom to do this kind of film with such a high profile cast, but it perplexes me how it happened. I don't see this film getting a wide release or appealing to a mainstream audience. But at least a really personal, unique film can still be made in America.

JLA: Executive Action (#24-26)

This JLA arc introduces the Ultramarines, and this seemingly unimportant story will have wide ranging consequences for the future of GM's corner of the DC Universe. Just thinking about the arc of these characters in mindblowing. They start out here as Authority style superheroes, then eventually get used as living weapons then injected in the micro-universe Qwewq. From there, they battle a virus of evil that was injected in the universe, which grows into Neh-Buh-Loh billions of years into the future. There, they succeed in making Neh-Buh-Loh spare Misty, and eventually return to the present and help Frankenstein defeat Neh-Buh-Loh. That's a journey.

I'm assuming that Morrison didn't have these wide ranging plans in place when he wrote these issues. When he went to do Seven Soldiers, he probably looked through his JLA run, saw some cool concepts and decided to bring them into his new series. In the case of the Ultramarines, it's certainly left open for them to return, and they may even return later in this JLA run. But, I would not have been expecting to see the infant universe of Qwewq again.

Anyway, this arc itself isn't particularly noteworthy. It's a lot more grounded and conventional than the outre, mindblowing journey of something like One Million. I find it impressive how Morrison turns the Shaggy Man into a major threat, while simultaneously noting the goofiness of the character. I prefer Morrison's approach to Silver Age concepts like this to Alan Moore's. Moore would do a pastische of the character, a la the untold tales of Supreme, creating something that feels like a 60s comic. What Morrison does it make a comic that gives the same emotional reaction to present readers that those 60s comics did to 60s readers.

The character introductions here are great, all using the superhero's logo to announce their presence. Superman's is particularly cool with its depiction of what time looks like to Clark. We also get some more time with the New Gods. I read the TPB of Kirby's New Gods to study up for a reread of Seven Soldiers, but I'm really glad I did because it's critical to a lot of Morrison's JLA. Metron is a perfect character for Morrison to work with and I'm glad that he got a chance to write for him.

The main story has some issues, namely the fact that the US would choose to try to build their own superhero army and alienate the JLA. In the DCU it should be apparent that the JLA is the ultimate force and you can't build someone to match them. I suppose the point of the arc is that this General is so egotistical he thinks that he's the one who can defeat the JLA, but then we end up with a story just like Prometheus or the Keymaker where we see someone who's found "the perfect solution" to defeat the JLA, a solution that we inevitably know will not work.

I do like the way that Morrison splits the team, by making the ordinary, less powered characters fight the General it builds up narrative tension. Huntress is the most expendable member of the team, so it's smart to put her in danger. So, over with the main team we see a lot of creative uses of powers to battle the Ultramarines. I like the Flash turning the water guy into steam and particularly Superman using his gravitas to stand down an entire battalion of military troops. He commands such respect in the DCU, and that scene pretty much sums it up with the soldier who says "I can't shoot fucking Superman."

However, the more entertaining piece is with Batman and Huntress battling Eiling. This is a really well done fight, with a lot more bruises and nastiness than the typical JLA battle. I love the dynamic Morrison has created between those two characters, with Huntress constantly wondering why she's on the team and Batman as the sage who seemingly knows everything, but won't tell her the answers.

The finale of the storyline sets up another division between an Authority style super team and the traditional JLA. Superman is all about trying to help ordinary people realize their potential while the Ultramarines are more about protecting their own, hence the creation of Superbia. It's good territory to go to because it works on both a meta level and in the story, however I think it was fresher back then than it is today. I do love the final page through, where Hourman appears and says "I expected to arrive in the midst of Earth's war with the fifth dimension." Only in Morrison's JLA.


Related Posts
JLA: Prometheus Unbound (#16-17) (8/6/2006)
JLA: Return of the Conqueror (#22-23) (8/10/2006)
JLA: One Million (8/19/2006)

Top 25 TV Characters

This one's been going around. They're in alphabetical order by character name. Look out for spoilers for the characters' fate.

Adriana La Cerva (The Sopranos) - She was the one character on the show who was able to remain uncorrupted by organized crime, right up to her exit. That was a huge turning point for the show and it's been missing something ever since.

Angel (Buffy/Angel) - On Buffy he was one of the best villains the show ever had, but other than that rather uninteresting. However, the longer his own show went on, the more complex he got, culminating in a finale where he makes a series of incredible sacrifices to try and save the world. It's heartbreaking stuff. And this occurs in the same season in which he turns into a puppet. That's range.

Anya (Buffy) - She started out as a fantastic comedy character, drawing attention to the absurdities of human behavior. However, that naivete was wrenching in "The Body," and her ultimate choice to fight in Buffy's final battle is full of such mixed feelings. Is she embracing her human side, or has she been so messed up by recent events she doesn't care if she dies? Regardless, the final shot of Xander looking for her dead body is the most haunting moment of the series finale. Plus, her solo episode, 'Selfless' perfectly encompasses the way that Buffy can mix really broad comedy with heartbreaking tragedy.

Brenda Chenowith (Six Feet Under) - One of my favorite moments in the series, when Brenda yells at Nate not throw his engagement ring at her because "it's so cliche, I'll fucking barf" encompasses everything great and flawed about her character. This is someone who's so worried about not being normal and boring she's trying to preserve her originality rather than engage in the emotion of that moment. Her growth in the final season was astonishing and I love the way things ended up for her. Rachel Griffiths' work here is one of the all time great performances.

Christopher Moltisanti (The Sopranos) - Christopher is an endlessly frustrating character, someone who has dreams outside of the mob world, but can never quite make it. It's painful to watch him continutally fail, never more so than in the series' best episode, 'D-Girl,' in which he comes so close to getting out, but winds up retreating back into the family at the end.

Dale Cooper (Twin Peaks) - From his very first scene, Cooper is a fully formed personality, totally unique. I love his blend of rationality and mysticism, never better realized than in the early episodes, where his quest to save Tibet and throwing of rocks at bottles provides great entertainment. His mad run through the black lodge is another character highlight, pushing the best TV episode ever forward on the back of his personal tragedy.

David Brent (The Office) - He's absolutely hilarious throughout the series, but what makes Brent special is the few moments of humanity, his crying when he's fired and his sadness throughout the Christmas special. The "Fuck off" to Chris Finch is such a satisfying moment of character growth.

Faye Valentine (Cowboy Bebop) - When she joins the crew, they start to become a family and it's that uneasy family connection that makes for most of the emotionally powerful moments in the show. My three favorite Faye moments are the older her watching her younger self cheering for her on video and realizing that her life is nothing like what she expected. Then, the heartbreaking moment where she runs to find her childhood home and finds nothing but an empty lot, and finally, her tearful request to Spike not to go after Vicious, one of the saddest moments in all of TV.

Gob Bluth (Arrested Development) - The funniest character on a show stocked with hilarious characters. His ridiculous level of sleziness, the "Final Countdown" dance, Franklin. Some bizarre and great comedy.

Jack Bauer (24) - The Jack Bauer Power Hour is called that for a reason. At first it seemed implausible that Jack could do so much, but it's become a conceit of the show and now you just accept that this guy can do anything. I love the way that an entire military division could fail, but you send in Bauer and you get the job done. There's such an underlying sadness to the character, as he is forced to sacrifice all personal connection to get his job done. The last hour of the show has to end with Jack's death.

Jet Black (Cowboy Bebop) - The gruff on the surface, but big hearted father figure to the Bebop crew, the thing I love about Jet is the way that he never says how much he cares about them, but we know that he'd do anything for his friends. His two best moments are when he rescues Faye in "Jupiter Jazz," and his quiet request to Spike not to go after Vicious. He loves them so much, but he can't save Spike.

Lindsay Weir (Freaks and Geeks) - She's someone who's looking for a higher purpose for life, but finds nothing in her suburban environment to match her lofty ambitions. I love her search for personal identity as she moves uneasily between social worlds.

Lorelai Gilmore (Gilmore Girls) - Another woman in search of her place, though this one's a lot older. Lorelai is one of the funniest characters on TV, but it's her tragic side that appeals to me. She desperately wants something more from life, but feels like she'll never be able to find it. I loved her sad journey through the sixth season, particularly the painfully awkward speech at Lane's wedding. But, it's not all bad, her enthusiasm and quirks are always entertaining, she's someone you'd want to hang out with.

Fox Mulder (The X-Files) - His total devotion to finding the truth was the fuel behind the entire series, but what made Mulder so endearing was his quick wit and ability to move from deeply serious stuff to really goofy quipping. The character took on a life of his own and made the series what it was. Just look at the post Mulder episodes to see how crucial he was.

Nate Fisher (Six Feet Under) - Nate is someone who always wanted more, he was looking for a higher purpose in life, a more fulfilling relationship, a more meaningful existence. This quest is what propelled him forward, but it's also what doomed all his relationships. Nate's story is a tragedy, but you can still respect him because he never settled. The other Fishers may have been built for ordinary life, but that existence was toxic to Nate. He was the soul of the show and my favorite TV character of all time.

Nick Andopolis (Freaks and Geeks) - Yet another character in search of something more than his everyday life, Nick was undermined by his lack of initiative and work ethic. His work in the final episode is brilliant, the character still clinging to the hope of a relationship with Lindsay throws himself into an apocalyptic disco dancing contest. I don't see good things in his future.

Dana Scully (The X-Files) - I don't think it was either Mulder or Scully who was crucial to The X-Files, it was the combo. They had such perfect chemistry, it could enliven even the stupidest monster of the week episode. However, when they did get the emotional mythology stuff, Scully went to many intense emotional places, always remaining relatable. She went through so much awful stuff, but remained strong through it all. Their relationship was the show by the end, and it was great.

Sharon Valeri (Battlestar Galactica) - The ultimate questioning of purpose, Sharon had to deal with the revelation that she wasn't actually human, while simultaneously another Sharon was dealing with the fact that she was a cylon, but could have human feelings. I love the line between artifical and human life and this character is like a TV version of Roy Batty. Her appearances kept the middle chunk of season two watchable.

Spike (Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel) - Here's a character who totally owned every scene he's in. It's no coincidence that the show started to get good when he first appeared, and Angel had its best season during the time he was on. Spike was such a charismatic character that he made everyone he interacted with more interesting. Buffy was the most interesting during his season six trysts with Spike and Angel was at his best when the two of them worked together. I love the way Spike tries to project this really cool image, but is a sappy romantic at heart. He's full of endless complexities and there's no character who's more interesting to watch.

Spike (Cowboy Bebop - Another complex Spike, he's the cool image of Bebop, totally above emotion and feeling. At first this is his attraction, but as time goes by, we see that it's his greatest flaw. The end of Cowboy Bebop, and Spike's role in it, is totally frustrating, but it's the only way he could have went out. Rarely do you see such a tragic character depicted on TV, someone who just can't move beyond his past.

The Smoking Man (The X-Files) - Whenever I saw William B. Davis in the opening credits, I knew that we were in for a good episode. Davis owned every scene he was in, and is the ultimate representative of conspiracy in fiction. As time went on, he became more complex, and his tragic nature was never better expressed than in 'Musings of a Cigarette Smoking Man,' or particularly in 'En Ami,' where we saw a man whose whole life has been squandered consigning himself to death. He's a very compex antagonist and despite Carter's best efforts, the character never lost his cool.

Tim Canterbury (The Office) - The ultimate everyman, he hates his job, but can't get it together to move beyond it. His facial expressions are priceless, look at Hat FM, or any scene with him and Gareth. His quiet "She said no by the way" in the second season finale is one of the saddest moments in the show, and his joy when Dawn returns is the best moment in the whole series. It's difficult to make a really ordinary character and not make him boring, but they pull it off with Tim.

Tony Soprano (The Sopranos) - The most complex TV character of all time? Maybe, he's certainly one of the most interesting. Tony is at a slight remove from the mob world, aware of his moral transgressions, but endlessly justifying them, blaming them on his mother or claiming that every white collar businessman is doing the same thing. He's a distinctly early 21st century guy, caught between alpha male tradition and the need to be more sensitive today. He's never been more interesting than post coma when his new moral code forces him to break out of traditional patterns.

Wesley Wyndham Price (Angel) - Wesley's journey is what makes the character so interesting. He starts out as a hopelessly inept guy not suited for the real world and ends up a hardened warrior so emotionally numb he has to die. And, that journey is totally organic, there's no one moment of change, it just happens as time passes and then you look back and realize how far he's gone.

Willow Rosenberg (Buffy) - Much the same, Willow has a huge evolution over the course of the series and is almost always more interesting than Buffy herself. I love Willow and Oz and I love Willow and Tara. Hannigan can do comedy and drama with equal skill and I hope that she does some serious work soon and doesn't just get typecast in a sitcom nitch.