Arts & Entertainment
Friday,
March 25, 2005
Volume 33,
Issue 12
Sat, Nov 21, 2009
IN THE SGN
SECTION ONE
Front Page
MORE/ALL
SECTION ONE
STORIES
SECTION TW0
Arts & Entertainment
Art you need to rush to see...Honey, its so worth it!Three new films open Friday |
||
|
|
||
| Dot the i, Game Over and Walk On Water | ||
| by Derich Mantonela
- SGN A&E Writer
Dot The i Bernal finally lands in the doghouse (plays at The Varsity) After starring in hits like Y Tu Mama Tambien, Amores Perros, Motorcycle Diaries and Bad Education, sex-Mex superstar Gael Garcia Bernal may be forgiven for finally landing in the doghouse, covered with fleas. Dot The i, a lame, contrived, predictable Whos conning whom? potboiler melodrama, ought to register itself with the AKCif the latter has a mutt division. Writer-director Matthew Parkhills gimmicky, unbelievable script has Bernal involved in an adulterous triangle with a pair of bratty, selfish snobs (played by Natlia Verbeke and James DArcy). It seems that the latter has set it all up in order to make a movie about it. The problem is, its impossible to care about the shallow, self-obsessed characters, much less be concerned about the silly plot twists. Dot The i takes place in the UK, so Bernal is forced to come up with a British accent, his failure at which is explained by his Brazilian origins. At one point he says something like, You have no idea of the humiliations Ive been through in the past... (not an exact quote, but close enoughI was having trouble staying awake). Perhaps he was referring to giving blowjobs and being cornholed in Bad Education. In any case, hes far more interesting when he isnt trying to play it straight in a conventionally dull film like this one. Game Over Chess and the end of civilization as we know it (plays at The Varsity) Heres a documentary about then-reigning world chess champion Garry Kasparovs 1997 man-versus-machine world series of chess against Big Blue, an IBM computer programmed with the help of chess grand masters. The film begins six years after the fact, as the still-dejected (and still very handsome) Russian visits the scene of his defeat (by two games to one, with three draws) in New York, reminiscing about what one anchorman ominously described as a major defeat for humankind. Switching back and forth between contemporary contemplations/analyses of the competition and film of the actual event in progress, director Vikram Jayanti lets Kasparov more than insinuate that it was all a set-up: IBM cheated, and did so in order to boost its stock value. Kasparov took home a measly $400,000 for finishing second to a contraption. IBM made uncountable millions off of the affair, capitalism crushing Russia all over again (not that Kasparov himself wasnt a millionaire already himselfoh, the irony). But if you watch this film carefully youll see that Kasparov in fact beat himselfhe blew a chance for a draw in the second game with a very obvious and uncharacteristic blunder, and in the final, deciding game, he simply succumbed to the pressure and had an old-fashioned nervous breakdown, virtually handing away the match. Yes, chess players at the highest level are paranoid, neurotic control freaks. But just being paranoid doesnt mean that someone isnt out to get you. There is nary a mention of Kasparov having a wife, girlfriend, or female groupies, but his mother is very much evident, if behind the scenes, pushing all kinds of buttons. There no Mom like a Russian Mom for running the show while making her little man think hes a god. Its beyond melodrama, or mere sex, its high epic operatic cataclysmic world politics and revolution, weightier than religion or death; its chess. The world as we used to know it came to an end back in 97, or werent you paying attention? Computers now run the world. Well, computers, and the Nazis currently in the White House. Walk On Water Its that sexy Israeli again (play at the Harvard Exit) If you saw him in the grossly-overlooked and underappreciated Late Marriage of a couple of years ago, youll surely want to catch ultra-sexy Israeli actor Lior Ashkenazi again, in Walk On Water in which he plays a troubled Mossad assassin assigned to befriend a handsome, sweet-natured young man (Knut Berger) in order to trick the latter into leading him to his grandfather, a Nazi war criminal in hiding. Theres a tender scene on the beach between Ashkenazi and Berger which is just about as erotic as anything youre likely to encounter this side of porn (all the more erotic here because the sex is understated, more implied than virtual). Hardly surprising, given that Walk On Water is directed by Eytan Fox, whose Yossi and Jagger dealt subtly, joyfully, and poignantly with a love affair between a pair of hunky Israeli Army men (besides which, it happens to be a very good movie). All of this talent comes together in Walk On Water, a film which, if you missed it at last years Seattle International Film Festival, dont let this second chance pass you by. |
||
|
|
||
|
||
|
|
||
|
|
||
|
|
||
|
|
||
|
|
||
|
|
||
 GENERAL GAYETY Leslie Robinson |
 LESBIAN NOTIONS Paula Martinac |
