| |
Mother of Tears ***½
Original title: La Terza madre
Italy/USA: Dario Argento, 2007
Mother of Tears (or La Terza Madre, or The Third Mother) is, as most of you probably know by now, the third entry in Dario Argento's loose "Three Mothers" trilogy, the first two instalments of which, Suspiria in 1977 and Inferno in 1980, constitute two of the finest horror films ever made. Arriving in 2007, Mother of Tears shows up a good 25 years later than most of us would have liked, but the question is, has the wait been worth it? Argento, after all, has famously stated on numerous occasions that the reason for the extended delay was that he didn't feel ready to tackle the final part. Therefore, either end result is something he really believed in, or he simply got tired of putting off the inevitable.
The answer to the question, if what you're looking for is a natural conclusion to what was begun with the previous two films is "No." Mother of Tears is a very different beast - unsurprisingly, given the 27-year gap between this and Inferno. If you view it as a standalone film, or at least a different twist on the same material, it starts to look a bit better, but, even so, Argento makes a number of decisions that are questionable at best, downright baffling at worst.
The plot involves student Sarah Mandy (Asia Argento), an intern at the Museum of Antique Art in Rome. She and co-worker Giselle (Coralina Cataldi-Tassoni) find themselves in the possession of a coffin containing various artefacts: an ancient dagger, various demon statues and a shroud imprinted with strange symbols. A drop of blood and an ill-advised incantation unleashes the demons and a screeching monkey on the unwitting Giselle, who meets a particularly bloody end. Sarah elopes but finds the police incredulous, while, below the streets of Rome, the Mother of Tears (Moran Atias), awakened after hundreds of years of slumber, unleashes a campaign of madness and destruction.
It's pretty clear from the outset that Mother of Tears doesn't exist in the same fairytale world as its predecessors. Gone is the lush primary colour scheme, as is the strange, indescribable sense of otherworldliness with which every frame of these films was infused. This third outing takes place very much in our own world, continuing that same realistic look that Argento has continued to explore since the 90s. Frederic Fasano's cinematography reminds me very much of Benoit Debie's work on The Card Player crossed with the blander look created by Ronnie Taylor for Sleepless. It's strange that Argento claimed this film to have the style of his 70s outings, because nothing could be further from the truth. The colours do begin to creep in, in a decidedly subdued form, during the climax, but they are generally restricted to a handful of brief shots.
At least the film has the Italian flair that was sorely missed in Argento's Masters of Horror episodes, his most recent directorial projects prior to this. Lush architecture and classy ladies abound... although that most definitely does not apply to the gaggle of witches who fly into Rome aboard a jet liner and look more like a group of goth posers on their way to a late night rave than evil incarnate. The scenes in which they menace various fellow passengers really do rank among the most risible that Argento has ever directed, and that includes anything in The Phantom of the Opera, Jenifer and Pelts. What's worse, though, is the utter banality of Mater Lacrimarum, who is talked up as an ancient evil but turns out to basically be a Page 3 girl with too much make-up. In Inferno, Mark Elliot encountered her in a lecture theatre as an alluring, mysterious presence who whispered silent words to him, causing his perception of time and reality to be altered. Here, she's a plastic-breasted, cackling joke with bad hair who struts around in the nude with her shaved pubic region on display while her followers enjoy a rampant orgy.
I wonder perhaps if what hurts the film most is the budget. The mystical shroud worn by Mater Lacrimarum (when she's wearing anything at all) is basically a red T-shirt with glitter writing on it, while the various vignettes showing Rome's inhabitants going crazy, committing rape, murder, vandalism and the like, are on too small a scale for us to really believe that the whole city is in chaos. That, too, might explain the overly conventional colour palette, although I find it hard to believe that some of the look of Suspiria and Inferno couldn't have been achieved digitally. Speaking of computer effects, there is some really bad CGI on display, the worst being a demon that suddenly appears in the lens of a photographer's camera in the opening scene, accompanied by an obvious musical stinger. And the last said about the film's final shot, the better...
Ignoring all that, though, there's plenty to appreciate provided you can get over the overwhelming sense of disappointment that this really isn't a patch on its predecessors. Asia Argento turns in a good performance and makes for an engaging and reasonably resourceful protagonist, while Valeria Cavalli is sympathetic as the white witch who helps Sarah realise her inner potential. Most of all, there's a certain sense of infectious glee to the film's complete lack of restraint. Unfortunately, there's a feeling of leering sadism to the death scenes (case in point: a lesbian character dies by having a spear rammed into her nether regions and out through her mouth) that I just didn't get from Suspiria or Inferno, which had a far more artistic bent to their killings, while the lingering on Sergio Stivaletti's not entirely convincing prosthetic effects is dangerously close to latter day Fulci. Still, if you like over the top gore, there's much to appreciate, with an opening murder in which a character is strangled by her own intestines particularly standing out. There are fewer great set-pieces than in most of Argento's films, but an extended sequence in which Sarah has to evade both the police and the aforementioned goth witches, hopping from train to train, is definitely memorable.
Compared to its predecessors, Mother of Tears is crude and in many respects sloppy. I suspect it was always a foregone conclusion that it would fail to live up to the grandeur of Suspiria and Inferno, but even so I think it could have been better than it is. It's fun while it lasts, but it doesn't really stick with you. Essentially, it's more of a thrill ride in the vein of the Final Destination films (now there's something I never thought I'd say) than the mesmerising experience of the first two films, but I had fun and I can't say it bored me for a second.
IMDB reference
|
| |
(*) Home Alone 2: Lost in New York ***
USA: Chris Columbus, 1992
IMDB reference
|
| |
(*) The Bourne Supremacy ***
USA/Germany: Paul Greengrass, 2004
IMDB reference
|
| |
(*) The Bourne Identity ****½
USA/Germany/Czech Republic: Doug Liman, 2002
IMDB reference
|
| |
Blade Runner: Final Cut ****
USA: Ridley Scott, 1982/2007
IMDB reference
|
| |
(*) Unleashed ****
Original title: Danny the Dog
France/UK: Louis Leterrier, 2005
IMDB reference
|
| |
Miss Congeniality ***
USA/Australia: Donald Petrie, 2000
IMDB reference
|
| |
(*) Home Alone *****
USA: Chris Columbus, 1990
(Watched with commentary by Chris Columbus and Macaulay Culkin)
IMDB reference
|
| |
Norbit ½
Above: Dear god, why? |
USA: Brian Robbins, 2007
I thought it would be a long time before I came across a film worse than Dr. Uwe Boll's House of the Dead. Now, however, thanks to the magic of Amazon's rental service, I've found one.
As you may have noticed, my HD Image Quality Rankings list includes several films that I myself don't own. The reason for this is that I like to keep abreast of developments in HD-land by renting and checking out as many titles as possible. I don't always manage to watch them all the way through, but usually I can get a reasonably good impression of how a particular disc measures up within a few minutes. And, if the film happens to be particularly good - or bad - I'll be more inclined to stick with it for the duration. Late last year, I became aware that a particular film had been released on HD DVD (and Blu-ray). Its name was Norbit, it starred Eddie Murphy, and it brought with it a reputation so abhorrent that I just knew it and myself would cross paths one day.
No escape clause, unfortunately.
As you will know if you have been reading my brother's site, he is shortly to be the proud owner of a projector. You'll probably also be aware that projector bulbs aren't cheap, which means that, every time you use it, you can almost hear the pennies dropping out of your wallet and hitting the ground. The notion of using some of the bulb's valuable power on a film like Norbit wasn't exactly what he had in mind, but we eventually reached a deal: Norbit could be viewed on the projector, but only on the condition that I wrote a full-length review of it.
However, the best-laid plans of mice and men and all that... One of the problems with online DVD rental programmes is that you often don't know which title you'll be receiving next. I had banked on Norbit not reaching me until the projector had safely arrived and been installed, so imagine my surprise (and faint feelings of nausea) when it turned up yesterday. (For some reason, this title does not appear to have been in high demand.) Realising, however, that, if I returned the disc or held on to it until the projector arrived, I would have wasted one of my precious monthly rental slots, I decided to bite the bullet and watch Norbit anyway, projector or no projector.
Fifteen minutes in, my brother turned to me and said "You know, it's okay if you want to just tear up the contract."
I persevered, however. What sort of watcher of bad movies would I be if I let a little thing like Norbit scare me away. Besides, I knew that my loyal readers would be waiting on tenterhooks for my verdict...
Norbit is yet another low-brow comedy in which Eddie Murphy dons a fat suit and plays several different characters. One of these is the titular Norbit, a weedy, pathetic little man who is married to Rasputia (also Murphy), a virtual elephant of a woman with a personality as foul as her odour. Norbit is an orphan, who was brought up by a Chinese man named Mr. Wong (Murphy, again, this time in yellowface). Mr. Wong's orphanage is up for sale, and the prospective owners include Rasputia's three vicious brothers, who plan to turn it into a titty bar and make Norbit's life hell at the same time. The other is Kate (Thandie Newton), a fellow orphan and the love of poor, browbeaten Norbit's miserable life. (Can you say "ahhhh"?) Oh, but she's engaged to Deion (Cuba Gooding Jr., who can currently be seen stepping into dear old Eddie Murphy's shoes in Daddy Day Camp, the follow-up to that masterpiece, Daddy Day Care), who is in league with the evil brothers! Will this delightful fairytale romance have a happy ending, or will Norbit have his face smashed in with a rusty hook? (I know which I'd prefer.)
Norbit's humour is best summed up as a never-ending series of fat jokes that aren't funny, with copious amounts of toilet humour and a healthy dose of racism thrown in for good measure. As an example of what passes for a gag in this supposed comedy, let's take the scene in which, having failed to carry his overweight bride over the threshold (because she's fat), Norbit stands quaking in his boots in the bedroom as the delightful Rasputia thunders towards him. She lands on top of him, the force throwing him backwards on to the bed (because she's fat), at which point the bed collapses (because she's fat). Safe in the knowledge that the audience will find this absolutely hysterical, the filmmakers then proceed to repeat the exact same gag three times, the only differences being the various costumes that the two Eddies are wearing. Oh, and, on the final occasion, the bed doesn't collapse, because it has been reinforced with concrete. You laughing yet?
Take, for another example, the film's witty wordplay. At the wedding reception, the delightful Mr. Wong, delivering the best man's speech, tells the guests that he is sad for Norbit because he is married to a gorilla. The aforementioned gorilla's family take exception to this, at which point Wong hastily reassures them that he is only kidding.
That's the joke.
No really, that's it. The entire film is one long series of build-ups without any punchlines. Each time the writers provide us with a situation, we continually assume that it's going somewhere, but it never does. At the same wedding, it is discovered that a slice is missing from the wedding cake. Cut to a shot of Rasputia with icing and sponge all over her face. You assume that the laughs will come from either her or the other characters' reactions. Instead, the film carries on to the next scene. "Norbit!" screams the cover art. "Funny!" is hollers underneath. I assure you, it is anything but.
Oh, and before I forget, I must take the time to mention that Mr. Wong is easily the single most racist creation I can remember seeing in a film in god knows how long. Why Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips continues to be suppressed while Eddie Murphy is allowed to paint himself yellow and utter all manner of inanities in a guttural voice (hilariously substituting "r" for "l", by the way - gotta love the attention to detail) is a mystery to me. You get the impression that perhaps the filmmakers were aware that this portrayal of a Chinese man might be a tad offensive, so they attempt to offset this late in the game by revealing that Wong is in fact a screaming racist himself ("Yes, Wong very racist. Don't like black. Don't like Jew either. But black and Jew love Chinese food. Go figure."), which, judging by the inverse logic to which the writers clearly ascribe (the same logic which allows them to mistake "devoid of humour" for "full of humour"), presumably means that everything's okay. I should probably point out that, if a white actor dressed up as a Chinese man and made these sort of "jokes" in this day and age, he would probably be lynched. However, Eddie Murphy, as a member of a minority group, seems to have a licence to offend every other minority group under the sun.
The rest of the film is made up of the same sort of inane gibberish and schoolyard bullshit that a kindergartener could have come up with. I could be charitable and say that Rick Baker's make-up effects are impressive (Murphy's transformation into Mr. Wong is nothing short of completely convincing), but that's like dishing out accolades for coming up with a completely authentic recreation of faecal matter which even smells like the real thing. It wasn't funny when Murphy did it in his remake of The Nutty Professor and it sure as hell isn't funny now. This is a tedious, mean-spirited, nasty, unfunny, noxious, loathsome, fucking tragic waste of celluloid. Baron Scarpia, I lay down the gauntlet.
Victoria Alexander in her review for FilmsInReview.com (one of the only positive appraisals I could find) crowed about how the film "celebrat[es] a big black woman who has not been victimized by a non-achievable, absurd standard of beauty fostered upon black and white women". Assuming she wasn't being ironic, then I can only lament for a culture that actually considers Rasputia to be a positive portrayal of a fat black woman.
Oh, and to add insult to injury, the HD DVD transfer is flawless.
IMDB reference
|
| |
|
|
Movies
Welcome to the movie checklist!
This section is an archive listing every movie I've seen from January 1 2005 onwards. Films I have already seen are included and will be marked with a (*), but probably won't be reviewed except under special circumstances. I will be including a rating for each film (in stars, out of 5), and hope to be able to include a brief 1-2 paragraph review of each film, although due to time constraints that won't always be possible.
Archives
Films Viewed This Month
|
|
