Delovely....
Dec. 25th, 2004 09:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatWell after throwing myself a pity party with all the trappings - you know, woe is me, I'm all alone, no one cares, might as well go outside and eat worms deal-I pulled myself together, drank some Bailey's, took a walk, called my family, and watched some DVDs. Besides it's not true about the no one cares deal - four people invited me to spend the holiday with them at the last minute. I turned them down - not because I didn't want to be with them, but because getting to them involved taking a subway or train or cab - and after this past week - I wanted at least two days away from planes, trains, and automobiles. If I could have teleported to them - it would have been a different story. But hey, if I could teleport - I'd be in Hilton Head wouldn't I? At any rate - my Xmas by my lonesome was not as bad or as lonely as I feared. There's alone and then there's *alone* after all. Plus? According to NY1, ComAir, the Independent Canadian airline that was providing Delta with its commuter flights, became completely un-operational this weekend due to a computer malfunction. The flights I was taking down and back from Hilton Head were both ComAir. Delta is reportedly scrambling to find planes to get people to their destinations on Sunday and the rest of the week. So if I'd gotten down there? I'd have been stuck. Better to be stuck here, then down there, considering the work situation. (Don't hate Delta too much - not their fault, as my Dad said - this was the worst storm to hit the Ohio Valley since 1919. Indiana got more snow in one hour than it has in years. Plus Delta apparently returned a book (a Xmas gift from me that he adored - biography of Young Ernest Heminway) that he thought he'd lost forever on one of their planes. He called them in a panic and they returned it the next day. So maybe I won't write them that nasty letter after all.) Next year, my parents have decided to come to their kids - after all they are retired, they can handle getting away two or three weeks during Xmas without pissing off a boss or losing money. And I think they missed seeing Kidbro and me this Xmas. Neither Kidbro and I had trees or decorations...due to circumstance. We may even compromise - I'll come down at Thanksgiving. They'll come up for Xmas. One additional benefit - the anxiety is gone now. You have no idea how good it feels to be free of that anxiety. The depression took a little longer, but it appears to be gone as well. Happy to be free of both at the moment. Hoping they stay gone.
Regarding the DVDS...which you're probably more interested in any ways.
Seen three so far:
1. The Day After Tomorrow - which I found hilarous in places. (I seriously doubt it was intended to be a funny movie, but honestly who could take this thing seriously? 100 tornados devastate LA in 20 minutes. LOL! Oh, a tornado just erased the Hollywood sign. It might have worked if they'd spent more time building the characters and less trying to sell the pseudo-science theory. The trick to a disaster film is the same trick to a horror film - character. If you don't care whether the characters live or die...it's bloody hard to take their peril seriously. That said I enjoyed it - very funny, but I'm a sucker for a disaster film, particularly bad ones.)
2. Dodgeball. This was a pleasant surprise. Quite the hoot. I laughed hard throughout. It was just too absurd for words. And the humor reminded me a little of Bad Santa. That wry, unbelieveably crude wit - that it's almost ludicrously so? That you find yourself laughing in spite of yourself. Also the alternate ending? Must watch the alternate ending with the commentary turned on.
3. Delovely Wasn't sure how I'd like this one. It came highly recommended. My father adores it - but then Dad's a jazz/Cole Porter fan.
Yet - he doesn't usually like bio-picks. So I was curious. But tentatively so, because I'm not a huge fan of the bio-pic either. They are either overly melodramatic or empty - as if you are watching a series of scenes about the character, but never feel as if you know them or really see them. Telling stories about make-believe characters is easier for us than real ones, we can
take more liberties - explore them in depth. Real ones? It's like your touching them with kid gloves - the real person or the ghost of the real one stands in the way. American Splendor sort of got around this dilemma in 2003, by bringing the real deal inside the film. Harry Pekar and his wife and friends were featured alongside the actors playing them. This worked to a degree - yet, I still felt that odd sense of remoteness. Same thing with the
pic "Man in The Moon" - which was very funny and featured a virtuso performance by Jim Carrey, yet still had that sense of remoteness.
Delovey...also has a sense of remoteness to it. You do feel distanced from the main character. So it may be inescapable.
But, it is a good film. Not a great film perhaps. But a good one. Takes a very unique approach - instead of doing what most of these films about songwriters do - ie. a chronological history of their life, this film takes place within the last five minutes of Cole Porters life. It's Cole Porter looking back through his life - with the idea of the wall-less theater as the stage and backdrop for it. Cole Porter's songs are used to bridge the scenes and introduce new scenes and characters. Key moments in his life are enhanced by a song that fits each one. Is it a musical? Yes. But not the traditional/conventional type. Do the characters sing and dance? Yes. Tap and swing. Lots of piano music. Very 30s style jazz - reminiscent of Kiss Me Kate and the Sinatra period. Is it a love story? Yes, and no. It's a love story about a gay man in love with a woman. The movie attempts and succeeds I think in capturing the life of a man that was not clear-cut or easily explained. And it does so by exploring what it would be like to watch your life from the end of it - to revisit certain key moments, yet have no control over their direction or how they visit you.
The movie also focuses on the love story between Cole and his muse/wife, Linda, more than on the other aspects. We do get his music and bits and pieces of the theaterical work he did. But the focus is not on that - that is used more as a backdrop a way of exploring the character. It's not about - oh Cole wrote this song and this song, it's more, this song describes this moment in Cole's life or how he felt here. And each song is sung by a different and atypical performer - Alainis Morrissette sings "Let's Fall in Love" as an actress in a play that we see Cole putting on - Kevin Kline as Cole starts the song, and she picks it up halfway through, Elvis Costello is singing Let's Misbehave in the background of a party scene in Venice. Robbie Williams sings Delovely during Cole and Linda's wedding. The songs are performed wonderfully.
And do enhance the picture. I left it humming.
The DVD - has some nice extras - a Behind the Scenes bit on the music,
the making of two scenes, a Behind scenes bit on the Making of the film,
and audio commentary by the Director/Kevin Kline as well as audio commentary by the Director/Screenwriter Jay Cocks. You can choose which one. I did watch a few moments of the one with Kline - which went into detail about the makeup process - you can also get this in the Making of the Film.
Do I recommend the film? Yes. But with certain caveats - it is a musical and does feature to a great extent Cole Porters songs. If you don't like that type of music, this is not your film. If you do? You'll be in heaven. It is also a love story, but of the platonic variety. Very interesting and complex. Yet also a little slow in places - which may be just a failing of bio-pics, pacing always seems to be a problem in bio-pics. I think the reason might be the fact that in real life - the pacing can be incredibly slow. Let's face it our lives don't tend to move as quickly nor are as fascinating as the make-believe one's on film. In the attempt to capture the "real life" of a "real individual" on screen or even in a book - the creator has a tendency to recapture the pacing of it. There's always a period of time - that nothing much happens and we
get a musical overlay showing that drift. Also unlike make-believe movies, real life isn't neat, you don't get happy endings, and too much stuff happens to fit into two or three hours. You can't condense it. Delovey makes an excellent attempt and an entertaining one. For a bio-pic, I'd say it was very entertaining and well worth a visit.
Regarding the DVDS...which you're probably more interested in any ways.
Seen three so far:
1. The Day After Tomorrow - which I found hilarous in places. (I seriously doubt it was intended to be a funny movie, but honestly who could take this thing seriously? 100 tornados devastate LA in 20 minutes. LOL! Oh, a tornado just erased the Hollywood sign. It might have worked if they'd spent more time building the characters and less trying to sell the pseudo-science theory. The trick to a disaster film is the same trick to a horror film - character. If you don't care whether the characters live or die...it's bloody hard to take their peril seriously. That said I enjoyed it - very funny, but I'm a sucker for a disaster film, particularly bad ones.)
2. Dodgeball. This was a pleasant surprise. Quite the hoot. I laughed hard throughout. It was just too absurd for words. And the humor reminded me a little of Bad Santa. That wry, unbelieveably crude wit - that it's almost ludicrously so? That you find yourself laughing in spite of yourself. Also the alternate ending? Must watch the alternate ending with the commentary turned on.
3. Delovely Wasn't sure how I'd like this one. It came highly recommended. My father adores it - but then Dad's a jazz/Cole Porter fan.
Yet - he doesn't usually like bio-picks. So I was curious. But tentatively so, because I'm not a huge fan of the bio-pic either. They are either overly melodramatic or empty - as if you are watching a series of scenes about the character, but never feel as if you know them or really see them. Telling stories about make-believe characters is easier for us than real ones, we can
take more liberties - explore them in depth. Real ones? It's like your touching them with kid gloves - the real person or the ghost of the real one stands in the way. American Splendor sort of got around this dilemma in 2003, by bringing the real deal inside the film. Harry Pekar and his wife and friends were featured alongside the actors playing them. This worked to a degree - yet, I still felt that odd sense of remoteness. Same thing with the
pic "Man in The Moon" - which was very funny and featured a virtuso performance by Jim Carrey, yet still had that sense of remoteness.
Delovey...also has a sense of remoteness to it. You do feel distanced from the main character. So it may be inescapable.
But, it is a good film. Not a great film perhaps. But a good one. Takes a very unique approach - instead of doing what most of these films about songwriters do - ie. a chronological history of their life, this film takes place within the last five minutes of Cole Porters life. It's Cole Porter looking back through his life - with the idea of the wall-less theater as the stage and backdrop for it. Cole Porter's songs are used to bridge the scenes and introduce new scenes and characters. Key moments in his life are enhanced by a song that fits each one. Is it a musical? Yes. But not the traditional/conventional type. Do the characters sing and dance? Yes. Tap and swing. Lots of piano music. Very 30s style jazz - reminiscent of Kiss Me Kate and the Sinatra period. Is it a love story? Yes, and no. It's a love story about a gay man in love with a woman. The movie attempts and succeeds I think in capturing the life of a man that was not clear-cut or easily explained. And it does so by exploring what it would be like to watch your life from the end of it - to revisit certain key moments, yet have no control over their direction or how they visit you.
The movie also focuses on the love story between Cole and his muse/wife, Linda, more than on the other aspects. We do get his music and bits and pieces of the theaterical work he did. But the focus is not on that - that is used more as a backdrop a way of exploring the character. It's not about - oh Cole wrote this song and this song, it's more, this song describes this moment in Cole's life or how he felt here. And each song is sung by a different and atypical performer - Alainis Morrissette sings "Let's Fall in Love" as an actress in a play that we see Cole putting on - Kevin Kline as Cole starts the song, and she picks it up halfway through, Elvis Costello is singing Let's Misbehave in the background of a party scene in Venice. Robbie Williams sings Delovely during Cole and Linda's wedding. The songs are performed wonderfully.
And do enhance the picture. I left it humming.
The DVD - has some nice extras - a Behind the Scenes bit on the music,
the making of two scenes, a Behind scenes bit on the Making of the film,
and audio commentary by the Director/Kevin Kline as well as audio commentary by the Director/Screenwriter Jay Cocks. You can choose which one. I did watch a few moments of the one with Kline - which went into detail about the makeup process - you can also get this in the Making of the Film.
Do I recommend the film? Yes. But with certain caveats - it is a musical and does feature to a great extent Cole Porters songs. If you don't like that type of music, this is not your film. If you do? You'll be in heaven. It is also a love story, but of the platonic variety. Very interesting and complex. Yet also a little slow in places - which may be just a failing of bio-pics, pacing always seems to be a problem in bio-pics. I think the reason might be the fact that in real life - the pacing can be incredibly slow. Let's face it our lives don't tend to move as quickly nor are as fascinating as the make-believe one's on film. In the attempt to capture the "real life" of a "real individual" on screen or even in a book - the creator has a tendency to recapture the pacing of it. There's always a period of time - that nothing much happens and we
get a musical overlay showing that drift. Also unlike make-believe movies, real life isn't neat, you don't get happy endings, and too much stuff happens to fit into two or three hours. You can't condense it. Delovey makes an excellent attempt and an entertaining one. For a bio-pic, I'd say it was very entertaining and well worth a visit.
