Month: November 2008

 This is not a holiday movie preview. Get that out of your head. Thank you.

Yes, O.K., it is a movie preview. And it covers what’s coming to a theater near you (or annoyingly far from you) through the end of December. But this particular, peculiar, noncomprehensive list is not about “holiday” movies per se. It’s about those other movies that always show up around this time each year.

They’re the movies that intend to make up, nutritionally, for all those empty calories you sucked down over the summer. They’re the movies that should be most worthy of discussion—that is, actual spoken conversation in which you sound vitally learned and culturally engaged, as opposed to blogosphere flame wars in which you sound like a belligerent jackass.

The incredible hunk: Brad Pitt plays a man who is born old and ages backwards.

They are the so-called prestige pictures. The respectable ones. Please do not say “Oscar-bait.” That just cheapens the discourse. It dishonors the brave entertainers who work so hard all year to live your fantasies and manipulate your feelings and take your dollars. What these saintly souls have in store for us on this home stretch of the moviegoing ’08 tour may well be pure hokum. But it’s a better class of hokum. And the purpose of this exercise is to celebrate it.

Arguably, the prestige season is already well underway. But for the sake of being at least a little useful to you, and properly guide-like, it seemed best to select films for this discussion whose opening dates are at hand or directly ahead. So we won’t be covering, say, Twilight , not because sexily coiffed vampires and Stephenie Meyer bestsellers thereof automatically are not respectable, but because that film already has opened. (At our own.) Nor The Road or The Soloist, because their releases got bumped into next year.

On the other hand, because respectability would only taint Sin City maestro Frank Miller’s adaptation of Will Eisner’s comic book series, The Spirit, we won’t cover that either. We will say no to Jim Carrey’s Yes Man. And to Transporter 3 and Four Christmases. If it’s numbers you want, you will get Seven Pounds, from the writer of 8 Simple Rules (more on that later), but to the rest, we say nein. Oh, there will be Nazis, though, at the end. Wait for it.

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Land of make believe: Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman get all romantic in Baz Luhrmann’s pre-World War II epic, Australia.

Anticipation is half the fun of every moviegoing season, but especially so during the year-end season, because, well, you’ve been waiting all year for the year to end. And sometimes longer. Four years passed between director Baz Luhrmann’s Strictly Ballroom and Romeo + Juliet, and five between that and his Moulin Rouge! This time, it took seven years to bring him back to Australia, an epic, pre-World War II Outback romance starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman, and opening on November 26.

Here’s how it goes. She’s an English aristocrat. He’s, um, not. Together, to protect a piece of land she has inherited, they share a grueling cattle drive, a Japanese bombing and more. So much more. This ought to be good. Not because it’s a great or unusual concept, mind you, but because it took Luhrmann so frigging long to get it out there. Hey, no pressure, buddy! On the other hand, at least Australia has a direct and declarative title, and not a wily and potentially misleading one, like Milk, or Frost/Nixon, or even Crossing Over or Cadillac Records, each of which shall be discussed forthwith.

Got Penn? Acting guru Sean Penn does justice to the activist and civil rights hero Harvey Milk in Milk.

In Milk (also beginning its gradual-rollout release on November 26), Sean Penn plays the activist and civil rights hero Harvey Milk, San Francisco’s first openly gay city supervisor. Josh Brolin plays Dan White, Milk’s increasingly disgruntled fellow supervisor, who murdered him (along with San Francisco’s then-mayor George Moscone) in 1978. What, like that’s a spoiler? Why do you think there’s a movie? For a primer, rent Rob Epstein’s excellent 1983 documentary, The Times of Harvey Milk, which also has the advantage of not being titled in a way that creates confusion with a cow-derived beverage. Milk’s profound story could bring unprecedented focus and gravitas to director Gus Van Sant, who likes to use his films as reasons to gaze longingly at men, just as Milk’s impish sense of humor could do wonders for the famously earnest Penn. Anyway, whether the role of a killer bigot and political mediocrity should be considered a step up, or down, or sideways, for Brolin, last seen on screen as our don’t-let-the-door-hit-you-in-the-ass Commander in Chief, is for you to decide.

Speaking of sympathy for the presidential devil, and of the strange days of the late ’70s, Frost/Nixon (opening December 12 in limited release and nationwide on Christmas) is a Ron Howard film of Peter Morgan’s script of his own play, which dramatizes the now-forgotten but then-momentous 1977 TV interview between British talk show host David Frost and a post-Watergate, but still very tricky, Dick. Reprising their roles in the award-laden stage version, Frank Langella lends heft and humanity to the part of the ex prez, and Welsh actor Michael Sheen, so memorable as Tony Blair in The Queen (which Morgan also scripted) imbues his Frost with

Interview with a vampire: Frank Langella (right), of Dracula fame, infuses some humanity into the part of the ex prez, and Michael Sheen is the man with all the questions in Frost/Nixon.

a telling Cheshire Cat grin. Plus: Kevin Bacon gamely plays Nixon’s loyal military aide, Marine Colonel Jack Brennan, and Oliver Platt, Matthew Macfadyen and Sam Rockwell round out team Frost. Ultimately, it looks like another meditation on the cultural power of TV—and Howard, for all his persistent aw-shucksiness, does know a thing or two about that.

We may not need TV and the movies to remind us that things and people and history-in-progress aren’t always as they seem, but, well, we don’t need newspapers to tell us either, because who even reads those anymore? Hello? Perhaps I should make myself useful here. Let me tell you that although Crossing Over (December 3) does score points by starring Harrison Ford, Ray Liotta, Ashley Judd and, briefly, Sean Penn, you should know going in that it is not about that psychic dude who pretends he gets messages from your dead relatives. And it is not about making headway with a heretofore unfamiliar demographic, or merging entertainment-franchise properties together in stunt-like combinations.

No, silly, instead it’s a drama, by writer-director Wayne Kramer (also of The Cooler and Running Scared), of immigration and naturalization (with Ford and Liotta as INS officers), reportedly sort of in the same discursive way that Traffic was a drama of drugs and Crash and Babel were dramas of, well, pretty much the same basic stuff as this, but from a different perspective. It just goes to show how many ways there are to stir the melting pot. And the box-office cash register till.

Here’s another: On December 5, writer-director Darnell Martin—who with 1994’s I Like It Like That became the first African-American woman to direct a major studio feature, and then said it pissed her off to be categorized that way—brings out Cadillac Records, a

Sing city: Beyonce lends her voice to a drama of the 1950s music industry, with Adrien Brody as the Chicago record-company exec Leonard Chess in Cadillac Records.

historical drama of the 1950s music industry with Adrien Brody as the Chicago record-company exec Leonard Chess. You’re thinking, “Um, yeah, wasn’t it called Chess Records?” Hey, good for you, Christgau. Yes. The thing is, in the beginning, he sold records out of the trunk of his Cadillac. Get it? The promising cast includes, among others, Mos Def as Chuck Berry, Cedric the Entertainer as Willie Dixon, Jeffrey Wright as Muddy Waters and Beyoncé Knowles as Etta James. And by promising I mean, yes, kind of nice that these terrific performers don’t just have some random white dude directing them. Of course, Martin is right that her status shouldn’t matter; even if this film sucks dramatically, it’ll sound fantastic.

Come to think of it, there’s a lot of then-and-now dynamics going on in the season’s new movies. O.K., so the rule—because movie studios and their PR flaks make the rules, natch—is that we’re not supposed to call The Day the Earth Stood Still (December 12) a remake. Fine. We won’t say “Oscar bait” (not a problem when describing this film) and we won’t say the r-word either. But here’s what it’s about: An alien, Klaatu, and his huge cycloptic robot, Gort, touch down on Earth with a message for humanity from afar, which, as I dimly recall from the 1951 version, amounts to something like, “What the hell is wrong with you people?” Keanu Reeves stars. A good thought, there, but no, he doesn’t play the robot. He plays the alien. And appears to grasp his motivation. For instance, someone asks him, “Why have you come to our planet?” And Keanu-Klaatu replies, in an ominously neutral way, “Your planet?” Not respectable, you say? Well, think of how smart you’ll seem when weighing in on the various ways this version of the tale reflects cultural and technological

Fallen Reeves: Along with Klaatu, his huge cycloptic robot, Gort, an alien played by Keanu Reeves, pays a visit to our planet in The Day The Earth Stood Still.

advances, and regressions, in human civilization since the ’50s original—all while cleverly avoiding any use whatsoever of the term “remake.” Plus, the often respectable Jennifer Connelly is in it, too. And apparently there’s some sort of an environmental message.

Messages, historically, are an important part of the late-year movie season. Maybe it’s something to do with reflection and renewal. In Doubt (December 12), John Patrick Shanley directs an adaptation of his own Pulitzer Prize-winning play about…well, let’s just say a controversy in a ’60s Catholic school and subsequent inquest into moral authority. This involves, among other things, Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman shouting at each other quite dramatically—but always respectably, always so very respectably. You saw Live Arts’ production of the play last month, now see the film. What’s that? You didn’t see the Live Arts production? Well, terrific. That makes you a bit of a tool, eh? No “doubt” about that. And seeing the film isn’t going to make up for that now, is it? See it, though, ’cause, you know…there’s a message.

As there is, most certainly, in Slumdog Millionaire (December 15), a tale of an Indian orphan from, well, the slums (Dev Patel), who rockets toward victory in his nation’s version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?” But before he can achieve that final payoff, he must prove he hasn’t cheated his way into the opportunity. Ah, doesn’t the quest for wealth just bring out the best in all of us? Apparently, in a roundabout way, it does: The buzz about this almost hysterically hyped, proven crowd-pleaser of a movie is that it’s so

Oh, God: Meryl Streep is all wrapped up in controversy in a ’60s Catholic school in Doubt.

great because it’s so affirming and humane. It was directed by Danny Boyle, and there’s no reason not to figure it will present him in top form. After all, the Slumdog story is said to involve two of Boyle’s favorite things: young people wading through raw sewage (see also: Trainspotting) and coming into cash by the millions (see also: Millions).

But before we get all giddy and spendy, let’s scale things down some, to a more modest sum: Let’s return now to Seven Pounds. (The suspense was overwhelming, wasn’t it?) Anyway, re-teaming with Pursuit of Happyness director Gabriele Muccino in what someone—oh, what the hell, let it be me—surely will describe as The Pursuit of Heavy-handedness, Will Smith plays a very somber fellow who, as he puts it in the trailer, “did something really bad once.” No, you don’t understand—something really bad. You don’t understand because you’re not quite supposed to, until it opens on December 19. Just know that, for reasons that must remain mysterious until such time as you see the movie, Smith’s character has the power to change the lives of seven strangers. And he is not afraid to use that power. Or maybe he is, and that’s where the drama comes from. Be sure, though, that there will be redemption. There had damn well better be some redemption. Smith’s co-stars include, appealingly, Rosario Dawson as a heart-thawing young woman and Woody Harrelson as a blind man. And a button-cute yellow Labrador Retriever.

Man’s best “Friends”: TV megastar Jennifer Aniston’s film career goes on, this time with Owen Wilson and an adorably devoted dog in Marley & Me.

No, wait, sorry. I’m thinking of the disobedient, destructive, but utterly and adorably devoted dog in John Grogan’s best-selling memoir, Marley & Me (December 25), which has now become a movie featuring Jennifer Aniston, Owen Wilson, the aforementioned yellow lab, and warmed hearts all around. Yes, at first glance it may seem conspicuously holiday-ish and may not seem so prestigious—after all, these are two actors who really shouldn’t try to be Serious Actors. But they do manage, even as Funny Actors, to be Affectingly Poignant Actors. And look, if Michelle Williams meanwhile can rack up yet more art-house cred by playing a young woman who loses her job and moves to Alaska with only her dog for a traveling companion, in Wendy and Lucy (December 10), surely we all can make room in our hearts for poor, dear Marley. And for Me. Speaking of me, allow me to go you one further and suggest a potentially quite prestigious Lucy and Marley crossover. Or even a Crossing Over With Lucy and Marley and Slumdog & Me. Can I get a woof?

How about a WTF? The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (December 25) adapts F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1922 short story about a man who is born old and ages backwards. Weeeird. But classy weeeird, you see. Having bounced around between screenwriters and directors, the project finally took with writer Eric Roth (Forrest Gump, Munich) and director David Fincher (Fight Club, Zodiac), thus ensuring much moviegoer anticipation. And in the title role, Brad Pitt brings something like the same golden-boy quality Robert Redford brought to the movie of Fitzgerald’s Great Gatsby 34 years ago. That is, when he’s not being freakishly aged by the latest computer wizardry. Cate Blanchett and Tilda Swinton also star. Are we talking respectability, or what?

Similarly, Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio return to the general vicinity of the chilly North Atlantic, in which Titanic allowed them a memorable onscreen separation just over a decade ago. Their new film, Revolutionary Road, adapts Richard Yates’ 1961 novel of

Mission impossible: Tom Cruise portrays a real-life Nazi colonel who tried to assassinate Hitler in Valkyrie.

leafy suburban Connecticut angst and upper-middle-class marital anomie—a favorite topic, as it happens, not just among respectable films (in everything from The Ice Storm to Rachel Getting Married), but also for this movie’s director, Sam Mendes (American Beauty), who, it must be said, kinda harshes the buzz a little bit by being Winslet’s actual husband. If your heart can go on a little longer, until the day after Christmas, it’s yours.

Anticipation, right? This brings us at last to the often-delayed release of Valkyrie (December 26), in which director Bryan Singer reunites with Usual Suspects screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie for a thriller about the real-life Nazi colonel who tried to assassinate Hitler in 1944. Now, if the sight of Tom Cruise in that uniform and eye patch suggests a strenuously dignified comic book (yes, Singer also made a couple of X-Men movies and Superman Returns), just try to concentrate on the supporting cast—Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson, Terrence Stamp and Eddie Izzard—and be glad that if there’s one thing this isn’t, it’s a holiday movie.

In January of this year, UVA politics professor Vesla Weaver explained her research about voters’ perceptions of race. Now that the United States has elected its first African-American president, C-VILLE asked Weaver about what she thinks it means.

“I think that along the lines of race, I found it very interesting that younger, white voters gave their vote to [Barack] Obama,” says Weaver, adding that she is both optimistic and pessimistic about the results. “The reason why I am a little pessimistic about the results is that there is something about race that is driving partisanship.”

White voters tended to vote for Republican presidential candidate John McCain while minorities gave the majority of their support to Obama.

UVA politics professor Vesla Weaver says she is both optimistic and pessimistic about the results of the 2008 presidential election.

“The parties and their messages are being interpreted along racial lines in such a way that you’ve got this multiracial coalition going through the Democrats and this very white group that mainly John McCain won among.”

In her election “experiment,” Weaver created fictional candidates for a senatorial campaign. Two of them were white, one was a light-skinned black candidate and one a dark-skinned candidate. She found that “skin color had as much an effect as race on the candidates.” Republican voters tended to shy away from the black candidate even when they perceived that candidate to be the more conservative.

According to Weaver, what can be generalized from the findings is that racial stereotypes still matter for black candidates. But even for political scholars, the 2008 presidential elections presented new and interesting voting trends.

The use of implicit racial appeals to galvanize “white racial resentment,” says Weaver, was replaced by a more benign concept of white racial identity and solidarity.

“Speaking about the average American and small towns being pro-America calls up images of white America, but at the same time, it’s seemingly more about class or Americanness and not about race explicitly,” she says. In fact, Obama’s race was seldom discussed. “I do think that him being biracial was a net asset,” she says.

The Obama campaign’s decision to downplay race was ultimately successful, says Weaver. “Barack Obama was really able at every turn to maintain a very, very stable, clear and consistent disposition and with that message he allowed white voters to kind of claim ownership of his candidacy.”

Weaver says, however, she does not believe Obama could have pursued a unity and change message without being racially mixed.

“I think it says a lot about how far this nation has come,” says Weaver, “but it also says that we needed a certain type of candidate to get past that racial barrier, that it couldn’t be just any old black candidate.”

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.

Once again, the 50-year local water supply plan will come under intense scrutiny as the four boards that have say-so over local water issues come together on November 25. City Council is the body that’s now balking at the plan by passing a resolution calling for several studies before moving ahead with construction of a new Ragged Mountain dam. The city’s action seems to have riled the Albemarle Board of Supervisors, which runs the county, and the Albemarle County Service Authority, which retails water to county customers.

But if the results of that meeting don’t satisfy City Council, it holds a trump card: It gets to appoint the chair of the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority (RWSA).

RWSA sells water at wholesale rates to the city and the ACSA. It is charged with maintaining and improving all of the major local water infrastructure, from reservoirs to pipelines.

Compared to other positions on local government boards, the RWSA chair wields considerable power. All other members of the water and waste authority board are ex-officio. Because of local interpretation of state conflict-of-interest laws, the RWSA chair is the only member of the five-person board to vote on wholesale water rates—whomever the city picks will effectively decide alone how much city and county water users pay.

If Mike Gaffney is not reappointed as RWSA chair, the water supply debate could take a sharp turn.

Perhaps more important, the chair will also play a significant role in steering the 50-year water supply plan. Current RWSA Chair Mike Gaffney, a homebuilder, has been at the helm since the end of 2002. In 2005, a plan emerged that appeared to have consensus, and it was approved in 2006 by the four boards. The major elements of that plan were a pipeline to connect the South Fork Reservoir, which is rapidly filling in with sediment, to an expanded Ragged Mountain Reservoir, which is relatively safe from sediment.

But late last year, a local group, Citizens for a Sustainable Water Plan (which includes a former RWSA chair), emerged to challenge the plan. The four boards re-ratified their support for the current plan in the spring, but when cost estimates for the Ragged Mountain dam were doubled in September to at least $72 million, the critics redoubled their efforts.

Four people have currently applied to the RWSA chair position, and some of them are critical of the water supply plan.

Gaffney has re-applied for a fourth term. His reappointment would be a vote of confidence by the city in continuing with the current water supply plan.

But if the city opts for any of the other three, it could significantly change the direction of RWSA. Two applicants, tax accountant Mary Huey and carpenter Bruce Sherman, are critical of the current plan.

“I think particularly in light of the way that the financial situation has been unfolding in this last month and a half,” says Huey, 70, “we’re not going to be in a position in many years to undertake projects that cost millions of dollars without very serious consideration” about the costs citizens would have to bear. Huey hadn’t participated in the public discussion of the plan until November 3, when she told City Council that it should re-examine the plan.

Sherman, 54, was motivated to apply because of an interest in alternative on-site wastewater systems. “The whole world can’t really have flushed toilets,” says Sherman. “I flush the toilet and I see crowds of thirsty people.” On the water supply plan, Sherman says that he’s “very impressed” with Citizens for a Sustainable Water Plan.

The other applicant—Alex Foraste, a 32-year-old civil engineer at McKee Carson—says the plan is “probably three-quarters of the way there,” but he wants to take a closer look at the demand side of the equation. “Ultimately, those are a lot less less costly solutions,” says Foraste.

Gaffney did not return a call for comment.

Anyone else who wants to throw a hat in the ring has until December 4 to submit an application.

C-VILLE welcomes news tips from readers. Send them to news@c-ville.com.