If you haven't been to Sporcle, you need to check it out immediately. If you haven't heard of Sporcle, you're about to learn. First, it's a website consisting of every type of trivia imaginable. Its slogan "mentally stimulating diversions" can easily be renamed, "Learning instead of working," "How much stupid crap do I know," or "Why the freak do I NOT know that capital of Missouri?! I totally aced that quiz when I was six years old!"
Do any of you 20-somethings remember GeoSafari growing up? No? Maybe I'm just a nerd, but I played that thing all the time back in the day, and I constantly bothered my family with boatloads of useless geographic knowledge picked up from hour-long binges in front of the GeoSafari (Now I know why my mother called me Rain Man growing up. At first I thought it was a complement, but now that I think about it, I may be offended sometime in the next 15 minutes).
Sporcle is an online version of GeoSafari, and expands from geography to touch on hundreds of categories that are sure to distract even the most diligent worker on the planet. If you think you know your presidents, take the quiz. If you think you know Oscar winners, take the quiz. If you think you know every single element in the periodic table, take the quiz. If you think you know every 300-game winner in MLB history, there's a quiz for that too. I'm tellin' ya, they have a quiz for everything. They even have a quiz for the greatest songs of the 80's, 90's, and 00's. When you take each quiz, you're given the name of the song; and you have to list the artist who performed it. I was taking these quizzes at work the other day and came to 3 quick conclusions:
1. The capital of Missouri is Jefferson City.
2. The 80s and 90s rocked.
3. Starting in 2000, guitars were uninvented.
Seriously, can you name 5 bands who got their start in the 21st century and don't sound like castrated 10th graders? All I got are The Killers, Jet, Three Doors Down (who started in '96, but didn't make it big until 2000), John Mayer (who released Inside Wants Out - my favorite album - in '99), and Evanescence. Everyone else sounds like some version of Sum-41/Yellowcard/Fall Out Boy/Good Charlotte … or T-Pain. Even rap sucks now ... and that's the only thing on the radio today. The only highlights of the 00's have been the peak of Jay-Z, Eminem, and a couple start-ups like Ludacris, T.I., and The Game. Lil Wayne sounds like a poodle with asthma, and listening to anything done by an artist from Florida makes me want to revoke my birth certificate. All the best music of this decade came from artists who emerged in the 1990s (or '80s, for all you U2 and Red Hot Chili Peppers fans).
You can almost say the same thing about movies. Truly unique movies are so few-and-far between now; and when something DOES work, their production company launches multiple sequels that dumb down the original. (On a positive note, these sequels are responsible for several box office records, and have helped the industry stay afloat through a recession and writer's strike. 26 of the top 50 all-time highest-grossing domestic releases are sequels, and over 20 were released this decade.) Furthermore, many believe we're reached a point in cinema where everything has been invented already, and that it's impossible to figure out new ways to present a story on the big screen. To back up this philosophy, we've seen an onslaught of post-modern and apocalyptic works that combine all the same storytelling techniques and narrative we're used to seeing, but using them to predict a very bleak future on the human existence (I am Legend, No Country for Old Men, Children of Men, and WALL-E). While several of these films are very, very good, I still believe they represent echoes and homage of the 90s.
The Top 10 Films of the 2000s represent an evolution in filmmaking. Slumdog Millionaire re-defined fate and brought India to the limelight; Finding Nemo took animation to the sea; Good Night, and Good Luck told Edward R. Murrow's story just how Murrow would tell it; Minority Report took film noir to the future as a cautionary tale for the present; Gladiator gave us a classic story through an epic lens; and Almost Famous showed us actual music from a time when music made a difference (and a sick rendition of "Stairway to Heaven" as a special feature of the Untitled Director's Cut).
Memento (#6) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (#3) show us the importance of remembering, even if we want desperately to forget. These are films so hard to describe that my only recommendation is to experience it for yourself.
If you're about 20 minutes into either Memento or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and you're thinking "wtf am I watching," that means Christopher Nolan and Charlie Kauffman have you right where they want you. Were you ever forced to become retarded in order to see Forrest Gump or I am Sam? No, but you were forced to sympathize for Forrest and Sam. Did you have to cut off your hands to see The Best Years of Our Lives? No, but you were forced to sympathize with Homer Parrish (and the true-life background of Harold Russell). Was The Piano a silent film made for you to experience life as a deaf person? No, but you were forced to sympathize with Holly Hunter's Ada McGrath, nonetheless.
If you see Memento - and I highly encourage you to do so - you will immediately experience what it's like to have short-term memory loss. I'm going to try and explain how the film is told; but to be honest, it's nearly impossible. As mentioned before, you have to experience it for yourself. Each scene is constructed as a glimpse in Leonard Shelby's life (played by Guy Pearce). All color scenes are told backwards, and all black-and-white scenes are told forward. The first scene in color is the last scene of the story - in which Leonard kills Teddy. The next scene (which is in black-and-white) is the first scene of the story - in which Leonard wakes up alone in a hotel room. From there, writer/director Christopher Nolan cross-cuts between color and black-and-white. The black-and-white scenes go forward; and the color scenes back up until eventually, the film ends with a surprise twist... get this... in the middle of the story. Will you care? Nope. By this time, you've quit trying to figure out what's going on and have now become Leonard Shelby - a detective lost in the life he creates for himself, yet refuses to take responsibility for. You may not understand Memento the first time around, but on a second viewing it'll make a LOT more sense. Also, if you buy the Director's Cut DVD, there is a hidden special features that allows you to see the film in chronological order, in which it becomes a different movie altogether.
Never before has a director used non-linear storytelling like Christopher Nolen. Sure, Quentin Tarantino has worked wonders with Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill, but his technique is more stylized; whereas Nolan's is surgical. Every block of dialogue and every cut are set in place like bricks of a home, and the house called Memento will remain sturdy for a long time to come.
Just like Leonard Shelby would like to forget what he did to his wife, Clementine Krazinski is trying to get Joel Barrish erased of her mind altogether. Thanks to the best screenwriter EVER, Charlie Kauffman, that is possible in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. After Clementine (Kate Winslett) successfully removes every memory of her boyfriend altogether, we get to see the operation performed on Joel. Through this operation, Charlie Kauffman allows us to re-live all the memories Joel and Clementine created, only to have these memories erased moments later.
Much like Memento, Eternal Sunshine moves backwards while moving forward. The memory procedure starts with Joel's most recent memory of Clementine and makes its way back to the day the two met. Meanwhile, we see the people who are performing the procedure; and the subplots surrounding each of them. Each scene peels off a layer of complexity, while at the same time letting you into the hearts of Clementine and Joel. Winslett and Carey's chemistry works so well that by the time Joel's operation approaches completion, we're fighting just as hard as they are to prevent their relationship from dissipating. It's a love story unlike any other you have ever seen; and along the lines of something you will never see again.
While few films pushed the envelope this decade, Memento and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind challenged the way movies are written, structured, and put together. So far, no other film has been put together as pure as Christopher Nolan’s Memento; and no film has been as satisfyingly bizarre as Charlie Kauffman’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
These movies can’t be described; rather, they must be experienced.
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