From Mexico City to the shores of Hawaii, the recording studio to Chinese battlefields, the world of cinema yielded rich film discoveries this summer–proving there was more to this season than Michael Moore or “Shrek 2.”
We asked our movie experts to pick some of their summer favorites. Though you may have overlooked some (or many) of these films, trust us: They deserve a few hours of your moviegoing life. They’ve touched, challenged or delighted us, and you still have a chance to see them in the theaters (or on DVD) before the fall contingent arrives.
Which summer films do you think are worth the effort to see? Tell us what you think. E-mail us at [email protected].
`Before Sunset’
Occasionally a movie really steals your heart. In recent years, that’s happened to me twice, with two pictures by Richard Linklater: his original 1995 “Before Sunrise” and its sparkling, heart-stirring sequel “Before Sunset.”
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These two romantic comedy-dramas trail Ethan Hawke’s brash American Jesse and Julie Delpy’s entrancing French belle de jour Celine as they first fall in love in Vienna (“Sunrise”) and, nine years later, reconnect in Paris (“Sunset”). And, using the talky French style of an Eric Rohmer romance, they violate most rules of contemporary American romance films. They’re all talk and little lovemaking; they ask us to get a crush on the stars as much for their brains as their bods. But that’s why they’re so superior. The films have consummate dialogue and acting, and Linklater, Hawke and Delpy give us precious gifts: They show us how people fall, and stay, in love. MPAA rating: R.
`Festival Express’
Many of the best rock ‘n’ roll concert movies and documentaries date from the late ’60s and ’70s, the era of “Gimme Shelter,” “Woodstock,” “Wattstax,” “Elvis: That’s the Way It Is,” “Monterey Pop,” “Mad Dogs and Englishmen,” “Don’t Look Back” and “The Last Waltz.” This film, which chronicles a mad and wonderful train-concert tour through Canada by an amazing group of musicians that includes Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, The Band and Buddy Guy’s Blues Band, was shot (by later-famed cinematographer Peter Biziou) in 1970.
But it sat in vaults until director Bob Smeaton and producers Gavin Poolman and John Trapman uncovered and finished it–adding contemporary interviews with survivors. The results really rock; among the film’s treasures are terrific scenes of the musicians spontaneously jamming on the train. Jerry Garcia once called this tour the best time he ever had in music. If you love ’60s-’70s rock, it could be one of yours, too. MPAA rating: R.
`Hero’
The exciting period saga of China’s first emperor, The King of Qin (Chen Daoming), and the assassins on his trail is a true movie lover’s hot pick for an obvious reason: It’s the latest effort from contemporary Chinese film master Zhang Yimou, the artist who gave us transcendently beautiful classics like “Raise the Red Lantern,” “Red Sorghum” and “The Road Home.” But though Zhang’s new film, a big-budget, all-star extravaganza, is the biggest grosser in Chinese movie history and the latest vehicle for action superstar Jet Li, it’s still a movie that might miss its audience here.
How? Some hard-core Jet Li fans may find the movie’s magnificent visuals and sheer romanticism too arty for their macho tastes. Devotees of the dramatic acumen and exquisite photography of Zhang’s earlier films may be taken aback by this movie’s violent and fantastical fight scenes (courtesy of that great action sequence director Tony Ching Siu-tung). Anyone expecting another “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” may be disappointed too, though “Tiger’s” Asian popularity was much less than “Hero’s.” But “Hero’s” rich traversal of genres, astonishing images and great cast (Li, Chen, Maggie Cheung, Zhang Ziyi and Tony Leung) are all a part of what makes an instant classic. (A tip: Zhang’s next action epic, “The House of the Flying Daggers”–which played Cannes last May–is even better.) MPAA rating: PG-13.
— Michael Wilmington
`Donnie Darko’
Richard Kelly’s genre-bending coming-of-age film confounded and dazzled audiences, most of whom discovered the film on DVD, with its mind-warping mix of time travel, horror and teen angst films. Music from ’80s band Tears For Fears has never been used better on film.
Kelly’s new version of the cult film, with 20-odd minutes of added footage, stars Jake Gyllenhaal as the title character, an emotionally disturbed teen whose life turns inside out after an airplane’s jet engine lands on his house. This recut version adds a “Watership Down” subplot and better explains “The Philosophy of Time Travel,” a book pivotal to Darko’s existential plight.
“Donnie Darko: The Director’s Cut” doesn’t spell everything out, but it does offer this enigmatic cult classic a second life in theaters, so a new flock of film aficionado’s can discover its twisted allure. MPAA rating: R.
`Metallica: Some Kind of Monster’
This rock documentary weighed in as one of the most revealing, unnerving and awkwardly funny films of its kind. Directors Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky followed rock icons Metallica through the recording of the album that would become “St. Anger,” during which the group lost its bassist, sent its singer into rehab and hired a touchy-feely “performance coach” to work out their damage. The result: a painfully honest self-examination of metal gods turned middle-aged parents and rock stars.
A rare insight into the group’s creative dynamics and universal themes elevate this monster among the best rock films ever made. MPAA rating: R.
`Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War’
This isn’t a fringe film, but its subtitled status might make it less accessible to English audiences. It shouldn’t be.
Writer/director Kang Je-gyu’s movie is a human-scale epic, inspired in content and style by “Saving Private Ryan.” He doesn’t get caught up in the politics of Korean War and is more interested by those who are caught in the jaws of history.
After brothers Jin-tae (Jang Dong-gun) and Jin-seok (Won Bin) are forced into the South Korean army in 1950, Jin-tae attempts to send his baby brother home by rising through the ranks and becoming a war hero. Ordinarily, this would be enough to fill an entire movie, but Kang follows his characters into darker territory, making it one of the strangest, grittiest war films ever made. MPAA rating: R.
— Robert K. Elder
`The Bourne Supremacy’
It’s a slap in the face to all us sequel-bashers. The follow-up to 2002’s “The Bourne Identity” has enough style and suspense to stand on its own. And unlike most summer action flicks, its plot, based on a Robert Ludlum novel, makes sense.
Matt Damon is Jason Bourne, a CIA assassin gone AWOL and amnesiac. In an attempt to piece together his past and live to see his future, Bourne must outsmart the CIA and a bunch of Russian evildoers–and must drive the hell out of a taxi in the summer’s most adrenalized chase scene. There are no robots. No aliens or predators. And no “Day After Tomorrow”-style Armageddon. Just intense, jarring camera work and the rock that is Damon. MPAA rating: PG-13.
`Garden State’
I’m in love again with Natalie Portman. And not even the schmaltzy finale and precious dialogue in her summer movie, “Garden State,” could make me love another.
Writer-director-star Zach Braff’s coming-of-age film is the touching, often-funny, wildly perceptive story of Andrew Largeman, a 20-something actor/waiter who returns to his New Jersey home for his mother’s funeral, leaving his Paxil and Zoloft and Xanax behind. There he connects with old friends–most notably stoned gravedigger Mark (Peter Sarsgaard)–and falls in love with Sam (Portman).
Yes, OK, I admit it: Andrew starts to feel again, and it’s corny and sentimental and everything you’d expect it to be–but it works. MPAA rating: R.
`Riding Giants’
After biting off all your fingernails in Ludlum-land, I present you with the sun, the sand and the surf that is “Riding Giants,” Stacy Peralta’s poignant and passionate surfing documentary. In a summer packed with political polemics–“Outfoxed,” “Fahrenheit 9/11,” “Manchurian Candidate,” “The Corporation,” to name a few–“Riding Giants” stands out for its pure and righteous love of subject and a welcome lesson in surfing’s counterculture roots. MPAA rating: PG-13.
(And speaking of counterculture, just a quick plug for “Bukowski: Born Into This,” a raw look at the life, torment, and softie inside of writer Charles Bukowski.)
— Allison Benedikt
`The Hunting of the President’
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OK, so the tagline “the 10-year campaign to destroy Bill Clinton” won’t exactly charm the socks off Rush Limbaugh fans. What’s more, some of the cuts between talking heads and stock silent-era footage of barking dogs and such seemed strange and silly.
But in election year when things are already heating up, this film, politics aside, raised some fascinating talking points. No matter how one might feel about Clinton’s actions in the Monica Lewinsky scandal, it’s tough to watch Whitewater figure Susan McDougal discuss her ordeals in jail and not be moved. “Hunting” also makes a compelling case for a Ken Starr investigation that went out of control, spending millions of taxpayer dollars as it veered from its original scope.
So here’s to unity in the community: Liberals and conservatives, watch this film together. You’ll both shake your fists at the screen. No MPAA rating.
`Nicotina’
In crime thrillers, cliches and action-scenes-on-steroids fly like so many bullet casings from an Uzi. That’s what makes Mexico’s “Nicotina” such a delight. It’s steeped in bloody black humor and is full of deft twists–with characters large and small who make their screen time count.
From the vicious, burly trigger man who turns tail from a junkyard dog’s snarl to the happy cop in the barber chair unaware of the dead man seated next to him, “Nicotina’s” players resemble a surreal “Seinfeld” cast.
The film is also blessed with a taut screenplay by Martin Salinas. “Nicotina” stars Diego Luna (“Y Tu Mama Tambien”) as Lolo, a computer hacker who splits time between swiping Swiss bank accounts and peeping on his neighbor, cellist Andrea (Marta Belaustegui). When Andrea catches him, and a deal to deliver the bank data goes horribly wrong, the movie begins its brutally funny, slow burn on the mean streets of Mexico City. In Spanish with English subtitles. MPAA rating: R
`Tom Dowd & the Language of Music’
By the time you read this, this little documentary will have vanished from local screens. But it was simultaneously released last month on DVD, and it’s definitely worth checking out–largely because Dowd was one of those unsung music industry vets who made so many great recordings. (Fact: Dowd basically wrote the drumbeat for Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love” when the rest of the band, including Eric Clapton, got stuck.)
As a studio engineer and producer, Dowd worked with everyone from Ray Charles and John Coltrane to Clapton and the Allman Brothers. One highlight shows Dowd manning a mixboard to recreate a mix of “Layla,” highlighting the dizzying interplay between guitarists Clapton and Duane Allman.
But it’s not just the music; Dowd himself is a fascinating figure, a former physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project. Sadly, Dowd passed away in 2002 as the documentary was being completed. But he did get to see a rough cut–and if you’re a devoted pop music fan, chances are you’ll be captivated by this completed film of his life story. No MPAA rating.
— Louis R. Carlozo
`Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle’
The title here is enough to seduce generations of red-blooded Chicagoans, whose teen rite-of-passage included obligatory rounds of sliders wolfed down in latenight booze fests. Updated here to include more current enthicities, this contagious comedy, from director Danny Leiner, glories in stereotypes and then upends them, too. Bill and Ted and Wayne and Garth are all looking down and smiling from dude/babe heaven. MPAA rating: R.
`Open Water’
Enthusiasts of “Jaws”-like chills and bloodthirsty thrills have written to complain of the relative quiet of this hypnotic, innovative terror. But Chris Kentis’ tale of a yuppie couple left stranded and afloat in the sea is primal in its tweak of the psyche and elegiac in its deadly, all-too-fateful denouement. MPAA rating: R.
— Sid Smith