As I sit here writing this, Jolie is very much a respectable figure, one who doesn’t appear in as many movies she once did. When she does act, it’s almost always in the type of big and rather glossy films that inevitably seem to be destined to be described as potential Oscar contenders. She’s so identified with the work that she does for UNHCR that it can be argued that she’s even better known now as a human rights activist than as an actor. (On Wikipedia, her career is listed as being “actress, director, humanitarian.”) Angelina Jolie has made the move from acting to directing and even though none of her directorial efforts have been especially memorable, they still tend to get a lot of attention because she’s Angelina Jolie. Angelina Jolie is definitely a part of the establishment and, let me make this very clear, there’s nothing wrong with that! She’s still a good actress. She seems to be far more sincere about her activism than many of her fellow Hollywood performers. Personally, I think the efforts to get her to run for political office have been a little over-the-top (and they seem to have died down after an attempted presidential draft in 2016) but again, she’s earned her success and she deserves it.
That said, it can sometimes be surprising to remember that, before she became so acceptable, Angelina Jolie was Hollywood’s wild child, the estranged daughter of Jon Voight who talked openly about being bisexual, using drugs, struggling with her mental health, and playing with knives in bed. This was the Jolie who, long before she married Brad Pitt, was married to Billy Bob Thornton and used to carry around a vial of his blood. This was the Angelia Jolie who had tattoos at a time when that actually meant something and who went out of her way to let everyone know that she was a badass who wasn’t going to let anyone push her around. This was the Angelina Jolie who was dangerous and unpredictable and who wore her wild reputation like an empowering badge of honor.
That’s the Angelina Jolie who starred in Gia.
Made for HBO in 1998, Gia was a biopic in which Jolie played Gia Carangi, one of the first supermodels. The film followed Gia, from her unhappy childhood (represented by Mercedes Ruehl as Gia’s mother) to her early modeling days when she was represented by the famous Wilhelmina Cooper (Faye Dunaway) to her struggles with heroin and cocaine to her eventual AIDS-related death. During the course of her short life, Gia falls in love with a photographer’s assistant named Linda (Elizabeth Mitchell) but, as much as Linda tries to help her, Gia simply cannot escape her demons.
That Gia is a fairly conventional biopic is not a shock, considering that it was directed by the reliably banal Michael Cristofer. He starts the film with people talking about their memories of Gia and he doesn’t get anymore imaginative from there. That the film works and is memorable is almost totally due to performances of Elizabeth Mitchell and Angelina Jolie, both of whom give such sincere and honest performances that they make you truly care about Gia and Linda. Jolie, in particular, portrays Gia as being an uninhibited and impulsive agent of chaos, one who follows her immediate desires and who makes no apology for who she is and what she does. There’s a lot of physical nudity in this film but the important thing is that Jolie allows Gia’s soul to be naked as well. There’s nothing hidden when it comes either the character or Jolie’s empathetic and passionate performance.
Jolie won an Emmy for her performance in Gia and her work in this film led to her being cast in 2000’s Girl, Interrupted, the film for which she would win the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. Since then, Jolie’s become, as I said at the start of this review, very much a member of America’s cultural establishment. My hope, though, is that someday, someone will give Jolie a role that will remind viewers of who she was before she became respectable. I think she still has the talent to take audiences by surprise.
Gabriel Caine (James Woods) is a fast-talking con man fresh out of prison who’s already set up his next big scam. Along with his partner Fitz (Oliver Platt), Caine is targeting Diggstown, a small, boxing-obsessed community ruled over by the corrupt John Gillon (Bruce Dern). Gillon controls the town because he rigged a fight that left local boxing legend Charles Macum Diggs (Wilhelm von Homburg) completely brain-damaged. The scam involves getting Gillon to take a $100,000 bet that 48 year old “Honey” Roy Palmer (Louis Gossett Jr.) can defeat any ten Diggstown fighters in one 24-hour period. Once the fights start, you can bet that both sides will have lots of surprises up their sleeves, but the question is who will be standing when the final bell rings?!!
Since today is Bruce Dern’s 89th birthday, I decided to watch DIGGSTOWN, one of my favorite movies featuring the birthday boy. A box office flop when it was released in 1992, making less than $5 million at the box office, the reputation for the film seems to have gotten stronger over the years. The film has an excellent cast! James Woods exudes cockiness and intelligence as conman, Gabriel Caine. He somehow pulls off the feat of being both sleazy and very likable, which is a testament to Woods’ skills as an actor. Louis Gossett Jr. is great as “Honey” Roy Palmer. I remember when I first saw the trailer for DIGGSTOWN, I thought he was too old for the role. After watching it though, he’s able to make the boxing scenes work, especially when you consider some of the help he’s given as part of the con. With the huge personalities of Woods and Bruce Dern surrounding him, Gossett’s more grounded performance anchors the film. Bruce Dern is perfectly cast as the villainous scuzzbucket, Gillon. He’s the type of guy you really want to see get his comeuppance at the end. Now that I think about it, Gillon is such an A-hole, Caine can’t help but seem likable in comparison! Finally, I did want to give a shout out to Oliver Platt, who’s extremely funny in his role as Caine’s partner in con. It’s one of the first movies I remember seeing Platt in, and he’s great!
For DIGGSTOWN to really work though, the boxing scenes need to work and the con needs to be smart. Director Michael Ritchie (THE BAD NEWS BEARS) does a good job setting up both. The boxing sequences are well choreographed by Benny “The Jet” Urquidez, and you can’t help but root for the old guy as his opponents keep on coming. Of the 10 fights, some are funny, some are quick, and some are very intense depending on the situation. Ritchie is able to keep the stakes high enough during the boxing scenes to make sure we remain invested in the story. It’s a nice balancing act as the con plays out in the background of each fight. And what a con it is! I won’t spoil it for you, but it’s a stroke of genius that resulted in a massive amount of satisfaction for this audience member!
Overall, DIGGSTOWN is one of those movies I’m sure to watch every few years. With its great cast, punchy sense of humor, and genius triple-twist of an ending, I can’t imagine anyone leaving disappointed. I highly recommend it!
Bruce Dern is a favorite actor of mine. He’s one of those performers who, over the course of his very long career, has appeared in all sorts of different and occasionally odd films, sometimes as a lead but most often as a character actor. He appeared in biker films, westerns, literary adaptations, and Oscar-winners. He killed John Wayne in TheCowboys. He introduced Peter Fonda to acid in TheTrip. (Dern, for his part, has said that he the only person on the set of that film who has never done acid.) He captured the trauma of Vietnam in Coming Home. He played one of the great hyperactive cops in The Driver. He came close to playing Tom Hagen in The Godfather and was the original choice for the attorney who was eventually played by Jack Nicholson in Easy Rider.
In 2013’s Nebraska, he broke my heart.
In Nebraska, Dern plays Woody Grant, an elderly man who is convinced that he’s won a million-dollar sweepstakes. Everyone around him, including his wife (June Squibb) and his oldest son (Bob Odenkirk), realizes that the sweepstakes is a scam and that Woody has actually won nothing. But Woody is convinced that a million dollars is waiting for him. All he has to do is somehow make it from Montana to Nebraska. At first, Woody attempts to walk along the interstate. When that doesn’t work and the police end up arresting him and sending him home, his youngest son, David (Will Forte), agrees to drive Woody down to Lincoln, Nebraska. David knows that there’s not any money waiting for Woody but, unlike his mother and his older brother, David hasn’t given up on the idea of connecting with his father.
Nebraska is a road movie, with the majority of the film following David and Woody as the drive through rural and smalltown America. They stop off in Woody’s former hometown, where they meet Woody’s brother (Rance Howard) and also Woody’s former business partner, a bully named Ed (Stacy Keach). Ed is convinced that Woody stole money from him. Woody blames Ed for the loss of his air compressor. Their anger has simmered for years and, at first, it’s tempting to assume that it’s simply one of those grudge matches that old men seem to have a weakness for. But Ed turns out to truly be a rotten human being and Woody …. well, Woody his own problems but at least he’s not as bad as Ed.
Before I say anything else, I want to praise the entire cast. June Squibb, Bob Odernkirk, Stacy Keach, Rance Howard, Melinda Simonsen (who has a small role as a receptionist in Lincoln), they all bring their characters to memorable life. Will Forte is the heart of the film, trying to keep his family together and standing up for his father when it matters. If you only know Will Forte as MacGruber, you need to see Nebraska. That said, this film is dominated by Bruce Dern’s poignant, sad, and often very funny performance as Woody Grant. Woody is a flawed character and Dern wisely doesn’t try to sentimentalize or downplay any of those flaws. He drinks too much, he neglected his family when he was younger, he holds a grudge, and he’s incredibly stubborn. But, as played by Dern, you just can’t help but like Woody and hope that he finds some sort of happiness. Even though the viewer, like everyone else in Woody’s life, knows that the sweepstakes is a scam, it’s still hard not to spend the film hoping that Woody will prove everyone wrong when he makes it to Nebraska.
Nebraska was nominated for Best Picture while both Bruce Dern and June Squibb picked up acting nominations. That year, the Best Picture race was dominated by 12YearsASlave. Matthew McConaughey won Best Actor for DallasBuyersClub while Lupita Nyong’o won Best Supporting Actress for 12 Years A Slave. Alexander Payne lost Best Director to Gravity’sAlfonso Cuaron. Gravity also won the Oscar for Best Cinematography, defeating Nebraska’s gorgeous black-and-white imagery.
Oscars or not, Nebraska is a wonderful, late career showcase for the great Bruce Dern.
Today, the Shattered Lens wishes a happy birthday to Shane Kippel!
Shane Kippel, as I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, played Spinner Mason on Degrassi: The Next Generation. He started out as the school bully but, by the time the third season began, he was pretty much the heart of the ensemble. How cool was Shane Kippel? He was so cool that Spinner ended up getting held back three times just so there would be an excuse to keep Kippel on the show!
(“What type of idiot fails his own language!?” Spinner once said when confronted with his grade in English. Oh, Spinner!)
Today’s song of the day features Shane Kippel on drums. From Degrassi, here is Downtown Sasquatch with Dust!
(The other members of the band are Jake Epstein on vocals, Aubrey Graham on guitar, and Adamo Ruggiero on bass.)
Today’s music video of the day is for a song that she wrote about not being able to tour during the COVID lockdowns. The song is all about how much she misses traveling with her band. When the song was released, it was used to raise money for Morissette’s backing band, who couldn’t work because the governments across the world tried to ban mass gatherings.
Seriously, I think some people have forgotten — or have chosen to pretend to forget — just how insane things got with the COVID lockdowns. We were all missing our friends, our family, our lives …. our band.
(Sorry, I’m not yet ready to forgive and forget. 15 Days To Slow The Spread because 48 Months To Do What You’re Told Or Else. I just spent a week and a half watching Clint Eastwood films so I’m definitely not in a rule-following mood right now.)
In 1984’s CityHeat, Clint Eastwood plays Lt. Speer, a tough and taciturn policeman who carries a big gun, throws a mean punch, and only speaks when he absolutely has to.
Burt Reynolds plays Mike Murphy, a private investigator who has a mustache, a wealthy girlfriend (Madeleine Kahn), and a habit of turning everything into a joke.
Together, they solve crimes!
I’m not being sarcastic here. The two of them actually do team up to solve a crime, despite having a not quite friendly relationship. (Speer has never forgiven Murphy for quitting the force and Murphy has never forgiven Speer for being better at everything than Murphy is.) That said, I would be hard-pressed to give you the exact details of the crime. CityHeat has a plot that can be difficult to follow, not because it’s complicated but because the film itself is so poorly paced and edited that the viewer’s mind tends to wander. The main impression that I came away with is that Speer and Murphy like to beat people up. In theory, there’s nothing wrong with that. Eastwood is legendary tough guy. Most people who watch an Eastwood film do so because they’re looking forward to him putting the bad guys in their place, whether it’s with a gun, his fists, or a devastating one-liner. Reynolds also played a lot of tough characters, though they tended to be more verbose than Eastwood’s.
That said, the violence in CityHeat really does get repetitive. There’s only so many times you can watch Clint punching Burt while various extras get gunned down in the background before it starts to feel a little bit boring. The fact that the film tries to sell itself as a comedy while gleefully mowing down the majority of the supporting cast doesn’t help. Eastwood snarls like a pro and Reynolds flashes his devil-may-care smile but, meanwhile, Richard Roundtree is getting tossed out a window, Irene Cara is getting hit by a car, and both Kahn and Jane Alexander are being taken hostage. Tonally, the film is all over the place. Director Richard Benjamin was a last-minute replacement for Blake Edwards and he directs without any sort of clear vision of just what exactly this film is supposed to be.
On the plus side, CityHeat takes place in Kansas City in 1933 and the production design and the majority of the costumes are gorgeous. (Unfortunately, the film itself is often so underlit that you may have to strain your eyes to really appreciate it.) And the film also features two fine character actors, Rip Torn and Tony Lo Bianco, are the main villains. For that matter, Robert Davi shows up as a low-level gangster and he brings an actual sense of menace to his character. There are some good things about CityHeat but overall, the film is just too messy and the script is a bit too glib for its own good.
Burt Reynolds and Clint Eastwood had apparently been friends since the early days of their careers. This was the only film that they made together. Interestingly enough, Reynolds gets the majority of the screentime. Eastwood may be top-billed but his role really is a supporting one. Unfortunately, Reynolds seems to be kind of bored with the whole thing. As for Clint, he snarls with the best of them but the film really doesn’t give him much to do.
A disappointing film, CityHeat. Watching a film like this, it’s easy to see why Eastwood ended up directing himself in the majority of his films.
Through the Shattered Lens 