Mayhem: June 17, 1994

It was the most memorable image of a saga that would drag on for three years. A white Ford Broncos cruises at low speed down a deserted Los Angeles freeway, followed by a dozen police cars, and two dozen news helicopters. Inside is O.J. Simpson, a fugitive from the law, once the greatest running back of all time. He is wanted for the murder of his ex-wife and her lover. And he has a loaded gun to his head. One of America's most beloved athletes is about to commit suicide. On live television.

To commemorate its 30th anniversary, ESPN has commissioned 30 filmmakers to tell a forgotten or overlooked sports story from the past 30 years, each with a personal touch. Barry Levinson mourned his Baltimore Colts through their marching band in The Band That Wouldn't Die; Steve James (Hoop Dreams) went back to his hometown of Hampton, VA, to examine the trial of Allen Iverson. While the "30 for 30" series has been entertaining and informative both as documentary and commentary (Billy Corben's film about the inner city invasion of college football, The U, remains the highlight), they have stayed in "pretty good for TV" territory. With June 17, 1994, director Brett Morgen (The Kid Stays in the Picture) has transcended the medium. 

We are used to documentaries being compilations of found footage, photographs and after-the-fact interviews, often tied together with a voiceover. June 17, 1994 eschews the traditional form, giving us only news footage and highlights of other sporting events going on during the O.J. Drama, linked only by time stamps. Morgen makes staticky jumps as though channel surfing, starting at the N.Y. Rangers victory parade to celebrate their first Stanley Cup in 30 years, then meandering over to Arnold Palmer's final round at the U.S. Open, later settling on an impressive on Ken Griffey Jr. home run. He was on pace to break Roger Maris' record, but the players would strike later that summer - that small tragedy, that the unjuiced Jr. would not hold baseball's most sought after record, is a footnote-level tragedy. 

"30 for 30" has been about untold stories and unique perspectives. Surely, a simple recount of the day O.J. Simpson was captured by police would not qualify as anything new or interesting. Morgen's film is not really about the car chase or the murder trial - it's an examination of watershed moment in media. It is estimated some 95 million viewers saw that Bronco on the 405 - viewers were so entranced that NBC cut into game 5 of the NBA finals that night so Tom Brokaw could give viewers updates. Tiger Woods and Ben Roethlisberger are small potatoes; this was 24-hour to the minute media coverage commensurate with a natural disaster or a presidential assassination. 

The best moments in June 17, 1994 come off-air, when old-school sportscasters like Chris Berman and Bob Costas sit in disbelief between reports, trying to balance the event they're covering with the spectacle unfolding in Southern California. Pat Riley was asked a question about O.J. after his Knicks had taken a 3-2 series lead. This was the day scandal became more important than the on-field result. Morgen's film is nothing but a collage with some music, but the commentary is unmissable; June 17, 1994 was when sports and scandal worthy of time on the evening news. Look, there's bill Clinton giving a speech at the World Cup!

The day also revolutionized news itself, how it was defined and how it was covered. The internet didn't exist in any conventional way, but the O.J. chase, and the case that would follow helped create the 24 hour news cycle. Now news, both local and national, could hook viewers even if it was only of the tabloid variety. Lacy Peterson. Jon-Benet Ramsey. Brad and Jen. Is it a coincidence Simpson's close friend Robert Kardashian (you know, of the ones you have to keep up with) read a letter written by the juice to reporters, while Simpson was still at large? June 17, 1994 was the day we got too close, the story became too big, and reality TV was born. 

The Killer Inside Me

Eight years ago, film festival audiences got their collective outrage on over a nine-minute uncut rape scene in Irrversible. In 2009, critical ire was directed towards Charlotte Gainsbourg's nearly unwatchable self-circumcision in Antichrist. Controversy aside, both of those films turned out to be quite good. This year at Sundance, there were more than a few walkout in the first half hour of The Killer Inside Me. An adaptation of Jim Thompson's 1952 novel, it  faithfully depicts a scene narrated as such: "I backed her against the wall, slugging, and it was like pounding a pumpkin. Hard, then everything giving away at once.”


Thompson's particular world view is twisted even for a purveyor of hard-boiled fiction. His pulp novels tend to go into deeper and darker crevaces of the human experience than say, Raymond Chandler, ruminating on everything from the Holocaust to child abuse. Other than Stanley Kubrick's two collaborations with Thompson (The Killing and Paths of Glory), no one has ever quite taken his word verbatim to the screen. The two most successful American adaptations of his work, The Getaway and The Grifters, were white-washed Hollywood fare, focusing more on plot than the characters, opting for the sexy, dangerous surface over the disturbing interior. The best Thompson film is probably Bertrand Tavernier's Coup de Torchon, which transplants Pop. 1280, a tale of a bumbling sheriff on a killing spree, to colonial Africa. Though true to Thompson's picture of human nature, Coup still filters the material quite a bit. 

Casey Affleck plays Lou Ford, a mild-mannered deputy sheriff in Central City, Texas. One day, when a prostitute played by Jessica Alba slaps him, all hell breaks loose. Ford is changed into a calculating killer with a taste for sadomasochism, and begins methodically tearing his surroundings apart. The Killer Inside Me is a rapid descent into madness - or so we think. Affleck does not give us the unambiguous insanity of Christian Bale in American Psycho or Anthony Hopkins in The Silence of the Lambs. There's too much logic in his schemes, too much contemplation as he listens to Mahler on the phonograph, to assume Ford is all the way gone. That is what makes his pummeling to death of Alba early on in the film so disturbing; he's not the one dimensional villain of J-horror torturn porn, but rather a believable human being. 


The chief concern of most Thompson novels is exploring the limits of man's morality, through a post-war lens. While many directors have interpreted this as film noir, Winterbottom takes special care to not propagate that misconception visually. The film takes place mostly in broad daylight, in Victorian homes and small towns that remind one more of Edward Hopper than Jacob Riis. However, while The Killer Inside Me might be a period piece, this is by no means an opportunity to blow out the producton design on nifty hairdos and swell diners. Like Revolutionary Road before it, Winterbottom's film treats the setting as background, rather than as an explanatory crutch for Lou's behavior. 

In fact, there's little explanation to be found anywhere in The Killer Inside Me, book or film. Lou snaps at some point, and from then on, it is just a matter of time until he gets caught or killed. Without the fatalistic shadows and bars noir, it all seems a bit random, but that may make it the best representation of Thompson's vision. After WWII, we had come face to face with our violent nature; Lou simply unleashes what's inside. The treatment of women in the film may be all the more disturbing due to the lack of stylization and genre landmarks. As in Sam Peckinpah's Straw Dogs, the violence is not allegorical. 


I would stop short of calling The Killer Inside Me a great film; most of the supporting characters are non-entities, and Ford spends a good deal of time explaining his actions in his head or to various authority figures. It may be that Thompson's material is not as screen-ready as some in Hollywood would like to believe; too much of it is internal. However, Casey Affleck is riveting in bringing Ford's psyche to th surface, and continues to build upon his reputation as one of the best actors under 40. See the film for the performance alone.

New Flesh: Splice

"Was this ever about science?" -Clive, Splice


Though a necessary part of life, few films are made about the conception and raising of a child by two competent, loving parents. On the surface, there is nothing difficult about it - that is, nothing out of the ordinary. Perhaps is does not interest audiences to see the creation and flourishing of happy families. Judd Apatow scored a major hit with Knocked Up, but that was about the pre-family - a comedy about two adults finding each other. In Vincenzo Natali's Splice, there is no romance, no recently aroused passion in the relationship between Clive and Elsa (Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley; they've been lab partners and lovers for some time. When they decide to bring life into the world, they seem ready and eager to do so; however, what they are about to spawn "won't be entirely human."

The setup is very similar to that of David Cronenberg's The Fly (1986): scientists, funded by heartless corporations, create terrifying mutants, and attempt to lend them humanity. Clive and Elsa have been combining the DNA of half a dozen species to make a superblob that can provide medicinal proteins; however, they have yet to incorporate the human element. When they finally do (against the wishes of Globocorp, or whatever) an armless, furless, albino squirrel creature is born. Elsa is overjoyed and names the baby Dren; Clive insists they kill it and forget anything ever happened. This conflation of cloning and the abortion issue is but the first of Splice's abominations against God, depending on your political outlook. Although Dren may act like a fidgety pet, with the litheness of a cat and the spring of a rodent, her eyes contain unquestionably human characteristics.

For some reason (the writer's need to move things along), Dren is aging rapidly, and within a month or so she is played by supermodel Delphine Chaneac. Still hairless, but now with powerful hindquarters and basic communication skills, Dren has to be moved to stock sci-fi horror location #2, Elsa's family farm. There she embraces Elsa as her mother, while Clive continues to be reluctant about the whole affair. Sound like a family being torn apart by an unexpected pregnancy? Natali goes overboard pushing the similarities on us, although it does give the actors the chance to step outside of their clinical shells and be loving, if concerned, parents.

Splice isn't all emotions and social commentary however; it pays its dues both to the genre and its audience. Chaneac's alluring physique, some gross out moments and one hilarious mating ritual gone awry justify the film as a summer creature feature. Perhaps casting a supermodel limited the range of emotions Dren could display, but one can't help but be mystified by the new creature. Like Frankenstein's monster, it should be the star - human, animal, one of a kind, the philosophical possibilities abound. However, the twin engines of sex and violence drive the box office, and will always have more screen time than metaphysical inquiry.

[SPOILERS] Soon enough, we find ourselves out in the woods with a very powerful, very dangerous creature. There have to be lives at stake, I suppose, to make the movie interesting and engaging, but once Dren goes postal the family aspect goes out the window. Splice is itself an unstable crossbreed, at first intelligent sci-fi, then degrading into cheap thriller territory. In a film with only one minor scene of violence, the final ten minutes do more than make up for it. Everyone is wiped out except Elsa, who leaves us in the classic Terminator sequel setup pose, looking out at an unforgiving urban landscape, representing the future. Son of Splice will lack the punch of the original; just as with The Fly II, when the experiment has been observed already, it no longer seems groundbreaking. [END OF SPOILERS]


The biggest casualty of the CGI revolution may have ironically been the genre for which it was invented: science fiction. While Transformers and the Star Wars prequels have dominated international ticket sales, it appears smaller films are making a resurgence. With limited F/X and strong scripts, Splice and last year's Moon achieved a great deal on a small budget. And rather than focusing on fantastic galaxies or hyper-advanced machines unimaginable in the present day, both focus on genetics and cloning. The next frontier is always more interesting than one generations down the road. And far more terrifying.

The Vault #56: Spartan

Humphrey Bogart never slept on screen. He might lie down on the bed, puffing a loosely rolled cigarette while pondering his next move, but his mind was scheming to fast for rest. Bogey, as a private eye, police detective or whatever other shady voyeur he might be playing in a world gone astray, was an engine. Start to finish, the noir hero, whether cop or criminal, is not interested in comfort, in settling down, in enjoying the drink he has at the end of the day. Comfort is a distraction, the drink a means to an end. There is perhaps no living writer who understands this mentality as well as David Mamet and Spartan, his take on the hard-boiled stoic, takes the persona to its rational endpoint.

The president's daughter goes missing from Harvard and the powers that be call the best man for the job, Scott (special agent? Private mercenary? Ex-military? Val Kilmer at his most inscrutable) a to-the-point jack of all trades. First seen administering combat training to marines, Scott has the thousand mile stare and no patience for bureaucracy (it's not ten minutes after the disappearance that he has a knife in someone's eye socket). Fearing the kidnappers may kill the girl once they realize who they have, Scott's CIA contacts (Ed O'Neill and William H. Macy) leak to the media she's been killed in a boating accident. However, the first daughter being sold into white slavery in Dubai doesn't sit well with our hero, who embarks upon an investigation of his own.

Mamet distinguishes Spartan from like-minded politicalish thrillers early on through his lead. Kilmer is quick-witted, goal-oriented and obsessive about completing the task at hand. There's no hard drinking, love interest or joking with the boys. Scott is not a role that would appeal to Nicholas Cage or Russell Crowe. It appears Kilmer was asked to do as little possible, delivering his lines as a man possessed. Whether posing as an ex-con or or a police officer, Scott is cold blooded machine who lives for two words: mission accomplished. Take this sample of dialogue:

David Mamet has been criticized for the inhumanity of clever exchanges like that one, but that's what makes Spartan so effective. Rather than give us an affable, Bruce Willis-type action star, Mamet and Kilmer deliver the man suited for the job, one more like the actual Black Ops agents who are asked to do the unthinkable on a daily basis (if we assume such people exist). There's no joy in it, and no sadness either; when a colleague is brutally gunned down, Scott takes no time to mourn him. Like his film noir ancestors, there is no room for emotion either way. They just keep moving.

Spartan came at a time in Mamet's career when he was at least superficially interested in political matters. Along with The Spanish Prisoner and Ronin, Spartan is a propulsive thriller theoretically couched in pertinent issues of state. Whether Mamet actually has an opinion about the intelligence community is up for debate; all references to the president and the Middle East may just be jokes, like the "mayor's office" in Basic Instinct. These plot points do have some value, however; as the embodiment of the NSA, Ed O'Neill gives us another reason to remember him for something other than Married with Children. Impassioned and ideological, he provides the perfect counter to Scott, the pawn who is content to act without thinking - to a point.

Spartan loses its way a bit in the final act, when Kilmer finally tracks down those responsible and gun play takes center stage. A scenery-chewing William H. Macy give an all-too-convincing "this was a failed movie with a message" speech in the penultimate scene that erases a lot of credit Mamet had built up in character construction. However, no 11th hour plot twist can erase Kilmer's portrayal of Scott, the laconic hero too stubborn to eat, drink, sleep or quit before he earns his next medal.

Woody in Hiding

"Oh, he used to hate every movie. Then he married a young, big bosomed woman and now he loves every movie." - Tony Gardella, Celebrity

With happiness can come complacency; that axiom applies quite well to the career of Woody Allen. Married and divorced twice before ever being a credited director, the Brooklyn-born director exploded onto the scene with formless slapstick comedies, then mellowed to broad romantic fare like Annie Hall and Manhattan. Allen's tumultuous, cerebral marriage to Mia Farrow brought out his philisophical and dramatic side, as he channeled the likes of Aeschylus and Bergman in Crimes and Misdemeanors and Shadows and Fog. Farrow and Allen split over his affair with their adopted daughter. So often the star of his own films, the dyspeptic neurotic strutting and fretting until the punchline, Allen finally found a sort of happiness with Soon Yi. And this began his downfall. 

Allen and Farrow broke up some time in 1992; from then on his films took a cheery turn. However, despite the success of Mighty Aphrodite (the Greeks again), audiences began to wear thin on Allen, who was growing older, less and less believable courting the blonde bombshells. Small Time Crooks, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Hollywood Ending and Anything Else were all critical and financial failures. We had seen Woody Allen being Woody Allen for too long; Wes Anderson was bringing a fresh take on the bookish New York of so many Allen films. Woody's oppresively static takes, his repeated and interchangeable characters, and well worn upper East Side romances were dinosaurs. Many might have packed it up then and there - but Woody Allen reinvented himself. 

Maybe Match Point benefited from lowered expectations, or younger viewers being unaware of how closely it cribbed its plot from Misdemeanors. One thing is certain: it reminded everyone how great a writer Allen was and is. The dialogue sparkled, Scarlett Johansson's performance was magnetic, and the film didn't have a crotchety middle-aged protagonist gumming up the works. Match Point was thrilling, snappy and sexy; one of the best facsimiles of Hitchcock made since the master's death. And that's the most important part - where Small Time Crooks and even Sweet and Lowdown constantly reminded us of Woody Allen, meek intellectual, Match Point concealed the filmmaker entirely.

It is Woody's marital bliss that has finally allowed him to appreciate and write female characters that exist unto themselves, as opposed to simply being the object of his gaze. Following Match Point, Johannson delivered strong performances in Scoop and Vicky Cristina Barcelona; she is the new muse, but unlike Keaton in the 70s or Farrow in the 80s, she is not defined by her relationship or conflict with a man. Johannson is type-cast as a beautiful, self-reliant, intelligent woman, but where in earlier films this character often represented temptation or lust (e.g. Juliet Lewis in Husbands and Wives) now Woody can portray her independent of his physical attraction.

Following from this, if Match Point restates Crimes and Misdemeanors, Barcelona is latter day Manhattan, only with the genders reversed. In the 1979 film, Isaac (Allen) and Yale (Michael Murphy) competed for the attentions of business-minded, even masculine Diane Keaton. In the updated version, two very different women have relations with an artistic, capricious artist played by Javier Bardem. Halfway around the world, the conversations about love and luck are fundamentally the same, but the shift background and setting have created a fresh story.

While Allen has enjoyed a resurgence with these Euro-centric films, one notable miss was the star-studded Cassandra's Dream. The Dante's Peak to Before the Devil Knows Your Dead's Volcano, Cassandra's Dream depicted two brothers (Ewan McGregor, Colin Farrell) who get into a heap of trouble when they agree to kill a stranger for money. With myriad references to greek tragedy and a morose score by Philip Glass, Dream is a dark slog through fate and morality, far too serious for its own good. The audience might buy the pristine Jonathan Rhys-Meyers as a tennis pro, but Colin Farrell an auto mechanic? Cassandra's Dream tries to fling B-noir plot into the artistic stratosphere, only to come crashing back to earth. McGregor, the protagonist, has evokes none of the appeal or sympathy Allen normally lends his characters. Allen here had slipped back to his old ways, with academic references and wooden romance, only this time without a sense of humor.

There was once the feeling that Woody Allen had a small, but dedicated, audience, who might support him into his old age. In the past five years, he has made great leaps to broaden his viewership, and revitalized his career. He has found new actors, locations and social strata to explore, even if still illustrating his age-old themes. By sheer force of will and pen, Allen is once again a relevant figure in  cinema.