Finally!! Rescue Dawn and Sunshine!!!

So I've been working on this for about a month now...and I think I have it just about right. I don't feel like working on it anymore, so if there are problems or inconsistencies....you can blow me. Enjoy!

Last week I got the pleasure of watching two of the best reviewed, and my own most anticipated, films of the summer. They are extremely different, so I have no way to tie them together other than the fact that they are independent dramas released in the summer (a rarity these days). But, the conversation to follow will be long, so I felt they deserved their own post.

First, Werner Herzog's Rescue Dawn. Starring Christian Bale, Steve Zahn, and Jeremy Davies, this is the true story of American POWs in Laos just prior to the Vietnam War. Bale stars as Dieter Dengler, a young Navy pilot whose first mission goes awry, leaving him stranded in the jungle, eventually to be captured. At the POW camp, he meets Zahn's Duane, who has been imprisoned for at least a year, and Davies' Gene, who has been there the longest around 2.5 years.

We meet their prison guards, whose nicknames, given to them by the prisoners, range from Lil' Hitler to Jumbo (who, as the only and ugliest Laotian midget I've ever seen, steals the movie). Dieter brings some hope to the prisoners, with talk of escape and possibly taking over the prison until the American planes and helicopters that fly overhead can be signaled. There is resistance at first, but eventually, due to a number of environmental, mental, and emotional factors, the necessity of escape becomes almost undeniable.

I won't go too much further into the plot, as from this point on, it really just comes down to escape and survival in the vicious jungles of Laos and Vietnam. The key to this film isn't the plot or the story, because in those regards, we've seen most of this before. The strength, as in almost all of Herzog's films, is the acting, and the director's almost criminally insane pursuit of realism.

First, we'll tackle the superb acting. By now, I think we all realize that Christian Bale is among, if not the, finest actor of his generation, and he continues that consistent level of talent here. Between his desire to inhabit a character and Herzog's desire to almost punish his actors with his methods, Dieter becomes real (he was real...just watch Herzog's 1997 documentary Little Dieter Needs to Fly), and his decisions and reactions are no longer scripted. His fear and his courage are almost tangible. Bale is the star of this film, and, without his talent, I think it would fall apart.

Steve Zahn...star of Saving Silverman and National Security...may deserve an Oscar. I've always liked Zahn, and always felt he was capable of so much more than he has done. Here, he finally proves that he has the dramatic chops I've always wanted him to have. He's still a sidekick here, but rather than being the stoned, dopey sidekick, he's the scared shitless, almost hopeless sidekick. It almost seems as if Dieter is there just to save this poor guy. His interactions with Dieter, and Gene in particular, show just how low this guy has fallen. He's barely hanging on. Not just physically, although that is a problem. His mind is almost gone. The year of being handcuffed, tortured, beaten, abused, starved, and constricted every night has worn him down until there's almost nothing left. Zahn uses facial tics and constantly darting eyes to express how his far his mind and humanity have been chiseled down. This isn't a flashy performance. Nothing in this film is. Zahn is at the brink of being completely pathetic. I can't help but feel that Herzog's insanity almost drove him to that stage, but you can see that Zahn gives everything he has, commits himself wholly to Herzog's madness. And the results are mesmerizing, eye-opening, and, above all, heartbreaking.

Finally, Jeremy Davies. Every review I read of the film just sort of tossed in a line or two basically saying, "Jeremy Davies plays the same role he has been mastering since the beginning of his career: the wimpy, whiny, weaselly wuss, and here he does it adequately." I'm going to have to go ahead and disagree with the mass populace of critics. Davies is certainly most well-known for his turn as the wimpy, whiny, weaselly wuss of a translator in Saving Private Ryan. I've always stood up for that film, and for his role. He's a tragic pussy. He shouldn't be fighting. He's a translator. He's not meant to be out there trying to save one man amongst a few million. Yet, when he stands by and doesn't stop the German soldier from going up the stairs to brutally kill Adam Goldberg's character, you cannot help but hate how cowardly he is. He starred in that film, opposite some amazing actors, and held his own. Here, he does it again. His character was a pilot doing recon over Laos. He has been in the prison longer than anyone else, and it shows. He still has the wimpy factor that we'd expect, but he brings a fierce madness to the role that I didn't expect. He's cocky. He's been there longest, and knows how things are done. He knows that escape, or even thinking of escape is stupid. Their only hope, according to him, is that the war will never start, and they will be rescued or negotiated for. He fights with Duane and Dieter every step of the way. When the plans are finally set, he goes along, mostly because he knows he'll die if he stays. His following actions are never fully explained. There is no closure. I love the last scene he has. It really wraps up his character nicely, but never wraps up his fate, which will bother some.

Now to talk about the humanized form of insanity that is Werner Herzog. If you know anything about the man, you know what I am speaking of. He dragged a steamboat over a mountain. He ate his own boot. He almost shot his best friend and favorite actor, Klaus Kinski. He was accidentally shot in London last year, and, later that week, pulled Joaquin Phoenix out of his burning car after an accident. I know. It doesn't sound real, but it's true. But what makes him even more unreal, is the ways he tries to illicit realism from his actors. Here, he takes that to an extreme. Zahn lost 40 pounds for his role. God only knows what Bale lost (going from The Machinist to Batman Begins to Rescue Dawn the to The Dark Knight...his body's going to kill him). I'm convinced Herzog locked Jeremy Davies in his basement for 2 years, letting him only eat what he could find. He ties Bale's legs together, and drags him behind a bull (really). He covers Zahn and Bale in leeches (really). I think he made Zahn and Bale both shit their respective pants on film. I honestly can't recall everything that he put these actors through, but you can tell through their performances that he put them through hell. It shows, and it makes the film better. Their performances feel more authentic because of it, and that authenticity is what this film relies on.

Overall, if only for the performances and fine direction, I cannot recommend this film enough. But, I will warn you, the last five minutes of it, absolutely suck. They feel so out of place. They belong in another movie, and it left a very bad taste in my mouth, to the point where I had to wait a week before I could write this. Most won't find this in theaters (sadly), but I would say it is definitely worth the rental price.

Second, let's talk about Sunshine. If you thought that last review was long, you might want to go get a snack...some pudding would be nice...yes...go get a snack pack, then come back. Actually, eat one snack pack, and bring a second one with you...it's going to be a long trip.

I love Danny Boyle. He always makes fucking awesome movies. Rather he makes two-thirds of a fucking awesome movie, then kinda goes a bit crazy and sort of loses his focus. So, this review will have at least four distinct parts. I will discuss the first two-thirds of the film, a spoiler-free discussion of the last act, a spoiler filled discussion of the last act, and an overall look at the film.

First, let's talk about the first two acts. It's simple, and can be summed up thusly...absolutely wonderful. Granted...Boyle does borrow heavily from other Sci-fi films. Solaris and 2001: A Space Odyssey are combined to form the very base of this story. The sun is dying. We sent a space vessel with a huge fucking bomb attached to jump-start it. They failed. No one knows why. We took every last bit of the Earth that we could, and built another space vessel/bomb and sent it up. It's this crew that we follow. The Earth is in an Ice Age, and all will die if they are not successful. The failure of the first ship casts a giant shadow over the hope that this one will be successful. We first meet the crew just before they are to lose all communications with Earth.

The crew is truly an international affair. Almost every corner of the planet is represented, but very rarely do any cultural differences cause problems, or are even mentioned. You can look up the full cast yourself, but the three that stand out in my mind are Cliff Curtis, Chris Evans, and Cillian Murphy. Cliff Curtis has been acting since the beginning of time, or so it seems. He normally pops up a few times a year playing a cop or a military man in the background, has a few lines, then disappears. He's the first crew member we see here. We hear Murphy's voiceover narration, as we circle the ship. The first scenes inside the ship are in the gorgeous sun room, which is a room in which the crew can view the sun safely behind super-powerful filters. Curtis's Searle, who is the ship's psychologist, is bathing in the beauty of the sun from behind those filters. He wants to experience it as fully as he can, and asks the ship, named Icarus, to turn the filters down as low as is safe. As the film progresses, we watch as his addiction to the sun worsens. His justifications for his addictions are interesting, but, after the twist of the story has occurred, we see just how serious the implications of it could be. It's hard for me to discuss this character without mentioning the twist, and how the story progresses after it. I will discuss Searle more later on. Curtis brings an interesting psychosis to what could have been a very one-dimensional character. His addiction at first seems superficial, but ends up being so central to the story that its initial oddness and near innocence are, by the end, nearly removed from our consciousness.

Chris Evans. I know. He chooses shitty movies. But, I've always argued that he had a lot of charisma, and could be a damn good actor if he stayed away from things like Fantastic Four. Here, he finally fulfills that prediction. He's fierce. He's oddly likable. He knows what needs to be done, and does it. Not just his character...I mean Evans. He knows that the drama on the ship, whether it be between shipmates or just the whole humanity's last hope thing, has to be totally believable in order for the film to work. He wholly trusts Boyle, and allows him to tame his intensity and charisma to make his character believable. He's a dick, but the kind of dick that you know will save your ass one day. And because of this, he's not only invaluable, but he's likable. It's a great change of pace for Evans, and, hopefully, one that he takes to heart (and hopefully turns down Fantastic Four 3).

Cillian Murphy rocks hard almost all the time. He continues his tradition of awesomeness here with a performance that showcases his known strengths, but never really pushes him beyond what we've seen before. He's heady, but not irritatingly brainy. He's sarcastic, but not a prick. He's strong, but believably so. Murphy's strength has always been a quiet, reserved intensity, and here he's almost at his best. I would have liked to have seen some stretching on his part, but that certainly doesn't make any less of a great role for him.

The first two acts set up a great, claustrophobic, incredibly tense atmosphere that never lets up from the beginning on. It's similar to the aforementioned films, because, as the film progresses, the inevitable disasters begin to pile up. A human error leads to disaster, and, as the destruction and body count piles up, the near hopelessness of their cause becomes more and more apparent. That is until they find the first ship. I'm not going into the full details of they're encounter with the Icarus I, but Boyle does a fantastic job of building tension throughout the sequence. The set design within Icarus I is just great. What happens as a result of this run-in with Icarus I sets up the entire tone for the last act of the film, which I think I'll talk about now.

Spoiler-free first. As the crew that have survived thus far continue to work out how they can complete their mission, the Danny Boyle-patented third act mind-fuck begins to show its ugly mug. Before the film came out, I read a ton of reviews, most of which said the same thing: "It's great until the last act, which is so out-of-nowhere that it almost ruins the film." I think that's an exaggeration. The last act does come out of nowhere. It doesn't make much sense. The other thing I had read a lot was that it contained a spiritual/supernatural element that you would either go along with or just jump off it for good. This is perhaps where I was most disappointed. The thing that makes this act so out of place, while supernatural, doesn't really seem to have much to say. It's pointless. It's just another obstacle for the crew to overcome to reach their goal. It's a plot device, not a revelation.

I will discuss what I wish they would have done in the spoiler section to follow. Despite it's irrelevance, I stuck with the film after this event took place, and it was definitely worth it. There are very few directors that can use just an image, just visuals to evoke emotions so strong that it brings you to tears. Mulligan mentioned Terrence Malick a few posts back, and I think he is one of the few. I know that many weren't fans of The New World, but I happened to have loved it. The plot or story wasn't hinged so much on the dialoge as much as it was on the images Malick captures. The serenity of this "new world" and how it would soon be tainted by those who considered it new. Last year, Darren Aronofsky did this feat again in The Fountain. The closing scene of the cosmonaut flying into the dying star were among the most breath-taking images I've ever seen on film. Here, the finale, with Cillian Murphy attempting to set off the big-ass bomb in time, is almost as amazing looking as The Fountain, and, as much as I didn't care for that thing in the last act, it is truly cathartic.

Spoiler Alert!

So, what pissed me off, and how could they have done it better? After they debacle on the Icarus I, some strange stuff begins to happen on the Icarus II. People start dying, things start getting sabotaged, and the Icarus II computer is reading that there is 1 more life form on board than there should be. Turns out that the life form is the supposed to be dead, and definitely insane, captain of the Icarus I. During his crew's mission, he spent tons of time in the sun room, soaking himself in sunlight (much like Searle). There, he heard the voice of God tell him that mankind's time is up, so, he kills his crew and spends the next 6-7 years in the sunroom becoming a lovely shade of charred flesh. Now, he's on the Icarus II trying to sabotage their mission for his God.

My problem with this story line is the supernatural aspect. This guy lived in a sunroom for 7 years?!?! Just the look of him took me out of the story a bit. Worse is that his supernatural-ness and his spiritualness bring nothing to the film. They aren't presented in a manner that makes the film more intelligent or philosophical. They just don't make much sense really. I wish they would have done a similar story line with Searle. The two characters have the similar addiction to sunlight, so why couldn't Searle have been driven mad by it. We aren't forced to accept the stretch that is the Icarus I's captain, but we still get the drama of space-madness. And, if they had wanted to delve into the religious aspect still, they could have gone more in depth and given us a better idea of the philosophy they wanted to portray. There simply isn't enough time that late in the film for any of it to sink in and make sense. Perhaps a slow build through Searle would have given them a better opportunity to explain some of the more complex philosophical and religious thoughts they wanted to get across, but didn't.

Also, while in spoiler mode. The scene of immense beauty I was writing about a few paragraphs up was when Murphy detonates the bomb just as the radiation from the sun had reached that exact spot. The two forces opposing each other on either side of Murphy. Just breath-taking.

End Spoilers!

So...it's time to wrap this long ass post up. The film as a whole? Damn good, if slightly disappointing. Boyle is a visual master. His cinematography is spectacular. His use of color and shadow is wonderful. Unfortunately, he and screenwriter Alex Garland have a tendency to over-complicate or just totally jump off track towards the end of their films. The only other problem I had with the film was the soundtrack. As times, it felt very manipulative. At others, it was so loud and blaring that it was hard to hear the dialogue at the time. It's a minor complaint that may have just been the theater I saw it in, but it was bothersome a few times throughout. Despite these flaws, the first two acts, the fantastic acting, and amazing visuals make this a must see for sci-fi fans, Boyle fans, and just film lover's in general.