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Reviews
Infested (2002)
Big Chill brilliantly meets Body Snatchers
Lives there a man with soul so dead as to not be amused by Infested? Yes, perhaps a humorless, irony-challenged, insipid Aschcroftian Puritanical yuppie somewhere can't respond to this homage/trashing of several different genres. But for the rest of us, what's not to like?
Infested brilliantly deconstructs the cosmic bogosity of Yuppie-Angst Cinema, while remaining true to the highest principles of the B movie, i.e., "Anyone can die at any time!" And they're especially likely to die if they have sexual thoughts or make the mistake of emphasizing their vulnerability by appearing nude. And, when Infested, they die in such interesting, well-deserved and filmically unprecedented ways.
There's great stuff in this picture: the greatest eulogy ever given on film (Bar none!) excellent babeage, hilarious music, effects which span the spectrum from nauseatingly real to brilliantly cheesy, apt cultural references to Kierkegaard, Presidential politics, and Power Puff Girls, and the omnipresence of wit, both broad and dry, in every scene.
They Do make 'em like this nowadays, when we're lucky. May they keep on.
Dark Blue (2002)
Excellent, hypnotic, despite a very few cheesy moments
"Dark Blue" is an extraordinary cop-opera, a melodrama, in the best sense of the word, and a sort of 'Gunfight at the South Central Corral.' Some critics have carped that it's overplotted, but those are mostly the type who found "Memento" indecipherable. It struck me as totally straightforward, complex but uncluttered. It is a bit stylized, and it traffics in stock characters, but it revitalizes them with really fresh, well-crafted dialogue.
All the performances are stunning, especially Kurt Russell. This is his best thing since, well, "The Thing", which he almost single-handedly raised above the B line. (Let us also pause to remember his astonishing work in the tragically neglected "Used Cars"). Lolita Davidovich is smokin' hot as burnt-out Chivas-slugging cop-wife, though we don't get to see enough of her. But, again, all the performances are entrancingly human, right down to the smallest perp.
There are some really, really evil characters, but even they are made captivating, given moments of crack-brain insight and wit. I am reminded of "Miller's Crossing," a piece in a very different key, but another film wherein every character is given a moment of brilliance, a bit of throwaway eloquence, which lets us empathize and believe in their stylized world.
"Dark Blue" is Dark, full of menace, and verbal violence, and some actual gore. It really does try to show us evil in operation, not as a metaphysical process, but as a natural one, and a bureaucratic one, inevitable as growing callous, and s*** rolling downhill.
There are a few cheesy moments, and some plot holes, but the exhilarating momentum carried me right over those. Best thing I've seen in a good while. Much, much better than "Training Day".