Searching for a buffalo nickel

AMERICAN BUFFALO (1996)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 1997)

Based on David Mamet's own fabulous play from the 70's, "American Buffalo" is the latest dark, uncompromising David Mamet work of two lowlifes. It is hard-hitting and gut-wrenching, and often tough to take.

"American Buffalo" is based on a David Mamet play from 1975, and it stars as Dennis Franz as Donny, the owner of a junk shop who mistakenly sells a buffalo nickel for ninety dollars reputed to be worth more than twice that amount. He conspires with the grungy Teach (Dustin Hoffman), who practically hangs out at the junk shop daily, to rob the nickel from the buyer's house. The trouble is that a semi-trustworthy kid (Sean Nelson) has bought the same nickel, but from whom?

The film is essentially a three-character play, and it succeeds in never being stagy or dull. Director Michael Corrente never chooses to be flashy for the look of the film - there is no need. The junk shop looks like a dusty junk shop with amber tones, and the town looks desolate with hardly a soul in sight.

As for the three characters, it would be difficult to imagine actors better suited to the roles. The magnetic Hoffman, appearing like a long-haired hippie, is often too frenetic but he performs with gusto as the loquacious Teach who mistrusts everyone. Dennis Franz is more restrained as a man slowly erupting in anger at the thought that a kid may have betrayed him - his verbal exchanges with Hoffman are about as juicy and profanity-laden as expected from the acid pen of Mamet. The ending shocks because we get to know the characters so well, that an unexpected single violent action may lead some to leap forward from their viewing chairs. It is refreshing to know one can care that much about characters (including Sean Nelson, the most sympathetic character in the film) who are somewhat seedy and have a solely vested interested in a coin.

 "American Buffalo" is not on the same wavelength as previous Mamet works such as "Oleanna" or "House of Games," but it is a captivating and engrossing look at failed, miserable men.

Tears of a Clown who lived in a van down by the river

I AM CHRIS FARLEY (2015)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

I managed to elude Chris Farley from my moviegoing habits, as well as his Saturday Night Live viewings. To be fair, during the 90's, I had not seen Adam Sandler and Phil Hartman engaging in comical shenanigans on SNL (though I had seen some of their movies). But I have seen clips of Mr. Farley since and he was certainly a raucous, wildly out-of-control comedian who (if memory serves from having read about him in Entertainment Weekly in the 90's) drank 40 cups of coffee a day, engaged in drugs and alcohol and came through the screen, both big and small, as a runaway freight train ready to entertain. It is the sadness clouded by his comical outbursts that remains the most insightful aspect of the documentary, "I am Chris Farley."

Farley's fairly happy upbringing in Madison, Wisconsin is evoked whimsically, and his siblings and his father goofed around a lot. Dad (an oil company owner) was serious when he needed to be, yet he couldn't help but laugh about Chris's outrageous behavior in school. After Chris had done several improv shows at Chicago's Improv Olympic and Second City theatres, SNL in New York and breaking into the movie business expeditiously, he became a movie star with comedies like "Tommy Boy" and "Black Sheep." Reaching mainstream success in his early 30's, Chris had no time to adjust to his newfangled fame. His realization that having a really good time and knowing who your friends are and who may or may not have an ulterior motive became his cross to bear.

Most of "I Am Chris Farley" is tinged with sadness and regret, mostly because there was not enough of a career post-Chicago and SNL to see what he could really accomplish. In that sense, it is like hearing about John Belushi's premature death due to drugs - another comedian who had just barely tested the waters. Directors Brent Hodge and Derik Murray unveil precious moments with Chris's siblings and his own friends and guest co-hosts from SNL (including Adam Sandler, Mike Myers, Christina Applegate and many more). There are copious tidbits from Chris's partner-in-crime, David Spade, whose most revealing comment is that he was never the same again after Farley's passing. That is the most insightful moment, that and Chris's own father responded good-naturedly to Chris's pratfalls in school (dropping trou for one). The documentary doesn't exactly criticize the comedian or demonize his drug habits, thankfully. It is a reaffirmation of a lovable goofball who wanted to make people smile, but couldn't smile at himself. 

Wilson the volleyball is my friend

CAST AWAY (2000)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Originally reviewed in 2000

When it comes to Tom Hanks, it is difficult to criticize him. Why you may ask? Because as an actor, he becomes so enveloped in his roles that it is hard to notice when he is or isn't acting - the Jimmy Stewart of our generation simply becomes the characters he plays without any obvious tics or methods to his madness. And make no mistake, Hanks is not playing himself, he is acting but since it is invisible, it is harder to trace. From his Oscar-winning turn in "Philadelphia" to last year's sympathetic prison guard in "The Green Mile," Hanks is one of our best actors because he consistently surprises audiences and critics alike in his choice of roles. As the efficient Chuck Noland, Hanks has his most demanding role to date, eschewing his soft side for a more snippy side considering the location he is placed in - the rough terrain of a lost island.

At the start of the film (in a far too long prologue), Chuck is already in a race against time considering he is a Fed-Ex employee. He chastises the Russians in Moscow for late arrivals of packages (he keeps timers inside packages he self-mails to prove his point). His intent is to keep the business efficient and on the mark, or else the whole company will end up like the U.S. mail.

Chuck barely maintains an intimate relationship with his girlfriend, Kelly (Helen Hunt), whom he tries to propose at Christmas time in good old Memphis (It is no surprise to discover that Chuck is an Elvis lover). Unfortunately, time is another scapegoat as Chuck is off on another trip in his busy work schedule, delivering a package that must arrive overnight to its designated location. He hands Kelly an engagement ring in a box, to be opened when he gets back. And off he goes yet during a catastrophic thunderstorm, the plane crashes near some uncharted island...and if you have seen the trailers for this film, you'll know Chuck becomes a castaway and is thus cast away as well from civilization.

Chuck arrives in this uninhabited island on a deflated raft. Some Fed-Ex packages wash ashore as well, but what is this man going to do? He has no cell phone, no plane, hardly any food except for coconuts (a natural laxative), and is in an island where nobody ever comes through. He has to depend on his survival instincts of course which develop rather quickly, including spearing fish, building fires, gathering wood, making videotape with rope, using roller skates as cutting tools, living inside a cave for shelter, and so on. Chuck is our modern-day Robinson Crusoe without benefit of videographers or unwanted bystanders from the popular "Survivor" show - he is truly an isolated man who finds a partner in a Wilson volleyball.

The scenes on the island are truly awesome, and director Zemeckis is often at his best here evoking long silent pauses in many of these scenes, as it should be. At least we are spared the bickering of Anne Heche and Harrison Ford in the charmless "Six Days, Seven Nights." This is an existential journey for Chuck, left pondering about his existence and his girlfriend Kelly and if he will ever get out of the island. How long can a man talk to a volleyball before becoming insane?

I will not give away too much more of "Cast Away" but I will say that the film's bookends are less stronger than the crux of the story - a man's survival in an unnamed island forced to deal with the losses in his life. This was the same flaw in "Green Mile" and "Saving Private Ryan" - when will Hanks step out of these damn bookends? The last few scenes in the film do work, and there is a level of ambiguity that is much appreciated in these days of cookie-cutter Hollywood movies. But it is not as powerful as all those scenes on the island.

Hanks does some of his best work ever here, exuding a little toughness, snippiness and cynicism about himself and his past and future existence - this may well be Hanks's first existential, fully mature leading man role to date. The transformation from a fastidious workaholic to a harried man ("I just have to keep breathing") is quite affecting to watch.

Helen Hunt, an often bland actress, gives a surprisingly touching performance. Her Kelly is aware that Chuck may not always be there for her because of his strenuous job, and thus becomes aware of loss early on. It's a small role for Hunt but not a thankless one (as it was in "What Women Want"), and about as magnetic as her work in the Oscar-winning "As Good as it Gets."

"Cast Away" is finally about loss and how to deal with it in purely fundamental terms. Being cast away from civilization as we know it may be a greater loss than one can fathom, and Chuck knows it for the period of time he remains on the island. If the opening and closing sequences had been truncated somewhat and if Zemeckis had spent more time on that island, then "Cast Away" would have been a superb motion picture. As it stands, it is a solid entertainment and there are scenes as moving as any I've seen in all of 2000, yet it could have been so much more. Still, my vote stands for "Cast Away," casting aside "Survivor" any day of the week.

When Women Wanted Mel Gibson

WHAT WOMEN WANT (2000)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 2000)

When I go to the movies as frequently as I do, I eavesdrop on people's responses. I can tell you that after I sat through a screening of "What Women Want," what women want is Mel Gibson, pure and simple. Gibson is often a delight to watch in this movie but he is not allowed to break loose and neither is most of the cast. What remains is an insipid, boring, snail-paced romantic comedy that trashes the outrageous concept it has in store. That can't be what women want.

Gibson plays Nick Marshall, a self-important womanizer and ad executive (aren't they all in these kinds of movies?), who one day has a freak accident while trying out new women's products. Nick suddenly develops the ability to hear women's innermost thoughts (not to mention a female poodle!), their desires, wants, and essentially what they are really thinking when on a date or having sex or walking by him. Nick is annoyed at first at this magical new sense, but he learns to use it to his liking. He has his eye on the cafe waitress (played with alarming zing and smooth sex appeal by Marisa Tomei), who apparently wants Nick sexually. This works in Nick's favor, and the irony is that Nick has not changed much - he just knows what women want from him and he learns to listen to them as much as anything else.

"What Women Want" has a terrific premise that is squandered by far too many subplots. There is the silly romance between Nick and the new boss of the agency, Darcy Maguire (Helen Hunt), a position Nick had coveted. Hunt and Gibson have zero chemistry and so their romance barely lit my fire. Then there is the whole song-and-dance about Nick's teenage daughter whom he is trying to understand and come to terms with - there is even a cliched montage where the daughter dresses up in various prom dances to the tune of a pop song. How many more of those do we need?

And to add more insult to injury, there is the suicidal worker in the agency whose thoughts naturally register to Nick. Nick sees trouble and tries to save her but what the heck does any of this have to do with the movie's main focus on Nick's superb ability, often leading to bedding women? It just feels tacked on as a simple-minded moral statement about using one's uncommon gift to good advantage. Oh, please!

The problem is that "What Women Want" does not truly exploit its central idea - a man listening to and hearing women's thoughts is ripe for lots of imaginative scenes. And what if Nick had another freak accident and could hear men too? The possibilities are endless. Think of "Being John Malkovich" which took its idea of people entering the mind of Malkovich and milked it for all it was worth. The difference is that "What Women Want" doesn't have the courage of the former - it wants to be a chick flick where women can swoon over the close-ups of Gibson's face and restrained charm while he tries to romance Helen Hunt. Hunt is so vapid in this movie and Gibson becomes so monotonous in his comic delivery (save for the final scene between him and Tomei) that audiences, particularly women, are more likely to groan.

Doing the Wrong Thing

SUMMER OF SAM (1999)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

(Originally reviewed in 1999)

Has he lost his mind? Has Spike Lee lost all sense of reason or purpose in making a film? After the greatness of a disturbing, provocative documentary like 1997's "Four Little Girls," Spike made a noisy, pretentious, overheated basketball drama called "He Got Game." Its chief merit was Denzel Washington's controlled performance. Now we have the noisy, melodramatic, overheated, overbaked and needless retelling of the "Summer of Sam" - a hot, noisy New York summer of 1978 when the Son of Sam killer was loose in the streets and made media headlines. I assume the latter is Spike Lee's intention as well with each film he makes.

Make no mistake, "Summer of Sam" is not an introspective character study of Samuel Berkowitz. Instead, the writers Michael Imperioli, Victor Collichio and Spike focus on the sweltering summer itself - the paranoia and the decadence that surrounded the frenzy of Sam's murderous rampages in the city of New York. For a while, "Summer of Sam" works and keeps us on guard. We see the local Italian gangs rallying against Sam by keeping track of everyone who comes and goes in the neighborhood; the brunettes wearing blonde wigs to escape Sam's wrath upon blondes; the all-night disco clubs; the promiscuous activities at Plato's Retreat, an orgy club; the swagger and sweat of the macho, sexist Italian men; the constant hurling insults; the cops vying for a local Mafia boss (Ben Gazzara) to help in the murder investigation, and...wait a second. I know where I have seen this type of anthropological view of New York's boroughs before. I've seen it in Martin Scorsese's mob dramas, and I could not wait to see one of those films again as opposed to Spike's stereotypical portrayal.

The main story in "Summer of Sam" deals with the rocky relationship between the endlessly posturing Vinny (John Leguizamo), a hairdresser, and his darling, faithful wife, Dionna (Mira Sorvino), a waitress at her father's restaurant. Vinny is a philanderer and unfaithful - he will have sex with anything that crosses his path. After witnessing one of Sam's murder victims, he decides to mend his sinful ways, though it is short-lived since we are treated to a needlessly long sequence involving the infamous Plato's Retreat.

The most interesting characters in this overlong effort are the punk rocker, Ritchie (Adrien Brody), who sports a thick British accent, and his sexy girlfriend, Ruby (Jennifer Esposito) - their scenes are electrifying and stimulate the senses. I wish Spike focused on this couple since their scenes have no clichés and rivet our attention. In marked contrast, the Vinny and Dionna marriage becomes repetitious and tiresome after a while, and the actors bring no dimension or spin to their characters. There is only so much of Leguizamo's swagger I can stand.

There are a couple of sequences that do work mainly because they involve the racial parameters of a community - Lee's forte ever since "Do the Right Thing." There's a sequence involving the Mafia boss talking to the police officers about trapping Sam, and the boss rightly pointing out that there are murders in Harlem every day and nobody reports them. I also like the subplot where the gang is convinced that Ritchie is Sam because of his deviant activities, such as his nightly gay dancing and punk rock sensibilities (he also lives in a garage). The idea of needing a scapegoat in a community that is lost with desperation to find the killer is timely and profound - this is all pure vintage Lee.

Beyond that, we get heated scenes of marital discord, hurling obscenities (Joe Pesci was never this obscene), and countless scenes of burly Sam roaring with pain in his bedroom and close-ups of his shoes pounding the pavement as he approaches his victims seated in parked cars. Since the film is not truly about Sam Berkowitz, do we need countless shots of gunfire? Do we need to see a ludicrous scene of a dog speaking to Sam? Has Spike Lee become too literal-minded? Has he forgotten how to draw insight from his characters?

In terms of visceral filmmaking, Spike Lee is still a demon of a filmmaker, but he is no visionary. The film is exceedingly well-shot and edited (many high-contrast shots; delirious montages) but it all serves little purpose, meaning or significance. What we learn about the fervent summer of 1978 is that there were power outages, the weather was hot and humid, and people cursed and had sexual escapades. Spike has forgotten how to do the right thing within all the madness - to forge drama and insight from it all..

A beautiful, bloody bore

THE HUNTED (2003)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Originally reviewed on March 21st, 2003

William Friedkin's "The Hunted" could be aptly retitled "Hide and Seek." There is the hunter and the hunted, and all they do is hide from each other and then get into prolonged knife fights. Seek and you shall find, and thus you shall be pierced by sharp knives. I hate to think that after one hour and forty minutes, the best that "The Hunted" could do was remind me there was nothing besides hiding, seeking, maiming, and bloodily violent hand-to-hand combat.

Benicio Del Toro plays Aaron Hallam, an Army agent who specializes in killing his prey with superbly timed skill. Tommy Lee Jones is Lt. Bonham, a specialized tracker whose job is to train Army soldiers to kill using hand-to-hand combat. Aaron is seen in the opening sequence fighting the Serbs in Kosovo. He systematically eliminates a Serb commander with his trusty knife. He is obviously affected by the war and can't seem to dispel images of an innocent child seen standing near the corpses. So Aaron heads out to Portland, Oregon and begins killing deer hunters! The retired Lt. Bonham is called in to service to help find him, which he does a lot quicker than the FBI does. Bonham used to train Aaron and knows his every step being an efficient tracker and killer himself. He also mentions that Aaron might cannibalize his victims after perusing crime scene photographs of disemboweled bodies. I wonder why this fact was omitted from the rest of the film.

Every scene thrives on sheer implausibility. A chase through city streets and forest hills where the grizzled lieutenant somehow knows Aaron's every single move made me think the lieutenant was psychic. Then there is the train sequence that leads to a bridge sequence where Aaron climbs the top of the bridge to only jump a few hundred feet into the water. Then he forges a serrated knife at a construction site. Somehow the lieutenant's psychic powers lead him to the construction site where he finds the spot where Aaron forged his knife! Oh, the lieutenant also makes a handy knife himself. And there are logs used as booby traps in the exact spot in the woods where Aaron wants him to be! How convenient!

"The Hunted" is beautifully shot and composed with lovingly choreographed shots of leaves, dirt, snow, landscapes, cityscapes with clearly drawn close-ups of Jones and Del Toro's faces. Friedkin also knows how to handle hand-held camera shots better than anybody (lest we forget his classic "French Connection") thanks to superb cinematography by Caleb Deschanel. The action scenes are also well-shot and choreographed though slightly unbelievable. But this is a pointless exercise in nothingness. Aaron and Bonham lack character development so that we have no clue, no insight into their lives and thus care almost nothing about them. This is certainly a waste of time for Jones and Del Toro, two of the more charismatic, powerful actors in the cinema right now - how can they play characters devoid of any single dimension or characteristic? In fact, there is not one character I cared about on any level.

"The Hunted" shows FBI agents getting sliced-and-diced, Tommy Lee Jones and Benicio Del Toro getting sliced-and-diced, and that is about it. Oh, yes, there are some metaphors regarding wolves with injured paws (animals represent no harm to their own breed), children symbolizing innocence (don't they symbolize that in general?), single women who hate lovers for leaving them for extended periods, and so on. It's an old cliche for a bad movie but I do not mind repeating it: "The Hunted" is a beautiful bore. Hide and seek a better movie.

Black Mystique

BONE (1972)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Ten Best Films of the 1970's

The radicalized comic underpinnings of "Bone" are not for the faint-hearted. Ostensibly a black comedy, the film is more black than comical, a purely relentless and obscenely funny look at racial tension and living the alleged high life in L.A. in the 1970's. That it comes from B-movie director Larry Cohen is a big plus.

Yaphet Kotto appears very quickly in the opening scenes of "Bone" as a supposed exterminator - actually, he is planning to rob the biggest house on the block in Beverly Hills. The occupants of this classy house are an irritated car dealer, Bill (Andrew Duggan), and his wife Bernadette (Joyce Van Patten), who expect their pool to be cleaned promptly though the wife barely uses it. Bill thinks there is a dead rat in their pool and, thus, we see Bone (Kotto) who removes the rat. Bone is not there to exterminate rodents - he wants their money. Lo and behold, it is discovered that Bill is not adept with his finances and it upsets Bernadette, who seems to be married to the guy only for the money. Bone instructs Bill to get cash from a bank in an hour, or else he will rape and kill Bill's wife. Bill is not as quick on his feet to get cash as you might expect, and Bone's simmering, irascible rage is dulled by Bernadette. In one truly riveting scene, a naked Bernadette questions Bone as to why he did not rape her on the pool table. She begins to see that he is not what she expected.

Meanwhile, Bill turns out to be a quasi-philanderer, allowing himself to be picked by a kleptomaniac (Jeannie Berlin from "The Heartbreak Kid") who steals food from a supermarket by way of a cliched ruse - a banana peel! This girl turns out to be emotionally brittle yet manipulative - Cohen gives every small character role a chance to breathe rather being some mild throwaway type. While Bill is having his proclivities, Bernadette cheats on her hubby, seducing Bone and reminding him he is a charmer after all.

"Bone" is directed with tantalizing skill by Larry Cohen, implementing with admirable restraint the use of abrasive, flash cuts to increase the tension. Sometimes, there are scenes that leave you incredulous such as Bill's car commercial that shows dead bodies in every car on the lot! A scene like that comes from Bill's own cluttered mind, as if he fears losing his job by selling every car with mechanical problems will result in dead drivers. Also extricated from Bill's mind is the absent son who is in Vietnam when in fact, he is not. Then to complicate matters, Bernadette and Bone have ulterior motives that drive Bill to a conclusion that is hardly a foreseeable one. Or perhaps Bone is a figment of the white couples' imagination, which would make the film the most stringent and damaging look at race in the 20th century since before Spike Lee stepped up to the plate. The fact that it is still prescient says much about the supposed evolution of our society.

"Bone" is an unusual, highly entertaining and powerful dissection of race, relationships, wealth and especially the plight of the black man in the early 1970's. Yaphet Kotto (who considers this role his career favorite) sums it up beautifully, using raw, provocative language to convey how the black man as a stereotypical rapist is no more because they have been accepted into society through integration and education - the black man, that is, not the rapist. "Bone" is lacerating, frequently hilarious, disturbing and illuminating. You can't compare it to anything else and that is a major plus. The film is a revelation and an absolute must for anyone with a passion for cinema, and especially those passionate for a discourse on race.

Footnote: Producer and distributor Jack H. Harris thought the film as something more appealing to the blaxploitation market and horror film fans, thus the film has several alternate titles including "Housewife" and "Dial Rat for Terror."