Last March, I visited the set of "Twilight" for the Los Angeles Times and watched vampires play baseball. Here's the resulting Sunday feature.
I also made a CulturePulp comic about the filming of a sequence in which vampires walk out of the woods at 30 miles an hour.
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'Twilight' taps teen-vampire romance (Los Angeles Times, May 11, 2008)
CulturePulp 72: Vampires on the Carpet (Webcomics Nation)
1. I totally forgot about this until I saw it in the comic-book store yesterday:
For one of the first CulturePulp comics, I watched the great David Chelsea crank out a 24-page comic in less than 24 hours.
That CulturePulp now appears in the back of "24 x 2" -- a Top Shelf book collecting two more of David's 24-hour comics.
2. Also, as mentioned earlier: I once participated in an evil little comics jam called "Pope-O-Puffs." It appears in the premiere issue (Spring 2008) of the Daydream Visual Journal -- now available at these locations.
Since his Hollywood debut (in 1997's "Amistad") the only common thread in Chiwetel Ejiofor's performances has been that they're electrifying -- whether he's playing a Nigerian refugee ("Dirty Pretty Things"), a drag queen ("Kinky Boots"), a spacefaring samurai ("Serenity"), or (as he did recently on the London stage) Othello.
In "Redbelt," the latest offering from writer/director David Mamet, Ejiofor keeps up his habit of never assailing the same role twice. The British actor plays Mike Terry, an American master of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Mike is a quiet, principled self-defense instructor who refuses to "sell out" his martial art, testing the patience of his breadwinner wife (Alice Braga) -- until a series of misfortunes force him to compete in the world of professional mixed martial arts, or MMA.
That's right: David Mamet just made a martial-arts movie. (Actually, he disputes that characterization, more accurately referring to it as a "fight movie.")
"Redbelt," which opened May 9 in Portland, is a strange blend. It mixes Mamet's vivid, specific dialogue (and his love of elaborate con games and male honor codes) with authentic-looking bouts of Jiu-Jitsu. It's performed by an equally strange cast -- one that includes Mamet regulars like Ricky Jay and Joe Mantegna, Tim Allen as a drunk action-movie star, and real, weather-faced fighters like Ray "Boom Boom" Mancini and Portland's own MMA legend Randy Couture.
Ejiofor anchors it all with a quiet performance punctuated with moments of perfectly understated, graceful violence -- moments that look like they were just brutal to learn and choreograph.
I talked with Ejiofor about Mamet, martial arts and the chances that we'll see his glowingly reviewed Othello on these shores any time soon. An edited transcript follows the jump.
From the Friday, May 9 Oregonian....
What does it cost to remain pure?
Mike Terry (Chiwetel Ejiofor) has a black belt in Brazillian Jiu-Jitsu. He's a calm instructor who repeatedly asks, "How can I help?" He teaches the moves and the philosophy of his academy to cops and victims. And he annoys his wife (Alice Braga) by refusing to sully his principles by competing professionally -- because, as he puts it, "a competition is not a fight."
We learn all this about Mr. Terry in the first few minutes of "Redbelt." And then writer/director David Mamet spends the rest of the movie torturing him for his principles.
Mike helps two weak people -- a nervous lawyer (Emily Mortimer) and a drunk action-movie star (Tim Allen). It sets in motion a tightly plotted series of misfortunes and betrayals that force Mike into a corrupt fight league.
There are a lot of ways that "Redbelt" is like other David Mamet movies: It's a story about male honor codes and market pressure and the art of the con. Mamet regulars Joe Mantegna and David Paymer and Ricky Jay are here, of course, effortlessly selling cool metered Mamet lines.
But what makes "Redbelt" fascinating is the way the writer/director uses his own real-life study of martial arts to explore his ideas.
Here, the usual con men share the stage with real-life fighters (including Ray "Boom Boom:" Mancini and Randy Couture) -- and they all surround a quiet, soulful, principled and very physical hero. On its surface, "Redbelt" looks like a martial-arts movie without much actual fighting, but that's precisely the point: The real "fight" here is Mike Terry vs. those who would use him to make money. The question is: Can Mike use his Jiu-Jitsu philosophy to prevail?
(Anyone walking into the theater expecting another "Never Back Down" is going to be violently disappointed. Their loss.)
Ejiofor grounds the film with the same sort of sad calm he brought to everything from "Dirty Pretty Things" to "Serenity." One of the movie's best moments involves Mike, wordless and numb with grief, doing little more than stare at a punching bag. The actor's also terrific in his fight scenes, which have a non-showy authenticity you rarely find in film combat.
"Redbelt" isn't completely successful: A few moments -- a grab for a handgun; the final minute and change; the mask-wearing, drum-playing theatrics of the fight league; a fight promoter's business card literally found under a pile of Mike Terry's bills -- feel artificial or a little too on-the-nose. This makes it "minor" Mamet, I suppose. But Mike Terry's uncompromising fight for his principles also makes for a fascinating, beautifully acted study in philosophical tension.
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B; 99 minutes; rated R for strong language.
'Redbelt' (The Oregonian, May 9, 2008)
From the Friday, May 9 Oregonian….
You know how some movies feel like they were made by committee? "What Happens in Vegas" feels like it was made by checklist.
The premise is slick enough: A goof-off (Ashton Kutcher) and a career-minded woman (Cameron Diaz) meet cute and marry drunk in Vegas ... and immediately regret it. But just as they're about to part ways, he wins $3 million on the slots with her quarter. And a cranky judge orders them to stay married, cohabitate and go into marriage counseling for six months before they can split the winnings.
There's a perfectly serviceable screwball idea here, and Kutcher and Diaz are both (for my money) underrated comic actors. But while the actors are game, the movie just isn't terribly inventive or funny. It's content to grind through the plot points and stock characters of a certain repetitive breed of rom-com -- filling the screen with flat lighting and wacky best friends and montages set to tinkly music and interrupting the bickering with chases and cute-girl slapstick. After the initial charm wears off, the whole thing gets check-your-text-messages dull.
C-minus; 99 minutes; rated PG-13 or some sexual and crude content, and language, including a drug reference.
'What Happens in Vegas' (The Oregonian, May 9, 2008)
Catching up with my Friday "Cort and Fatboy" appearances:
NOTA BENE: I feel honor-bound to post an addendum to my on-air "Speed Racer" review. We ran out of time before I could get into my very real problems with the film (which I liked nevertheless). The problems are these:
But I still totally dug the movie once it got going. It's too inventive to dismiss.
Cort and Fatboy (KUFO)
The turnout at Cinema 21 for the cancer fundraiser for Doug was nothing short of incredible. Every silent-auction item sold (including, to my mild surprise, all three donated copies of "Santa's Lil' Gimp"). The readings and the music came off well. Spirits were high. And the preliminary estimate of money raised is in the five figures.
Shawn Levy has the full post-show report, with photos.
There are at least two more D.K. Holm fundraisers in the works. More info soon.
As mentioned earlier: My pal D.K. Holm has cancer and no insurance. There's a fundraiser this Sunday (April 27) at Cinema 21.
The latest CulturePulp comic is an extra-long installment previewing the Stumptown Comics Fest -- set for this weekend (April 26-27) at the Lloyd Center DoubleTree in Portland.
Here are three ways to read the strip:
(Oh, and while you're at it, be sure to check out the other Stumptown preview comic, which Mudron and Dylan Meconis crafted for the April 24 Portland Mercury. And here's a big list of media mentions of the Fest.)
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CulturePulp 73: Inside the Stumptown Comics Fest (Webcomics Nation)
From today's Oregonian....
Memo to smart, funny TV stars in smart, funny TV shows: When you take similar wares to the big screen and expect me to pay full ticket price to follow you there, I'd better laugh at least as hard as I did at home.
Is that unfair? Yes. Does it ignore the vicissitudes of the creative process and the sad statistical march of time? Absolutely. It's especially unfair today, with the best TV writing enjoying a sophistication seldom matched by the modern studio comedy (Judd Apatow notwithstanding).
Nevertheless, major TV comedians: You set your own bar. Deal. Steve Carell: Every comedy you help bring to the multiplex must be as clever and provocative as "The Office" and your "Daily Show" segments. Oh, and Tina Fey: Your "SNL Weekend Update" was the best since Dennis Miller's, and "30 Rock" is one of the funniest, strangest shows on TV.
But "Baby Mama," I'm sad to say, is just sporadically funny, bland, talent-wasting junk.
The movie -- written and directed by Tina Fey pal Michael McCullers -- concerns an upper-middle-class executive with a "bad uterus" (Fey) who hires a trashy woman-child (Amy Poehler) as a surrogate mother. Poehler soon moves into Fey's tidy magazine spread of an apartment, and easygoing "Odd Couple" gags start slowly tumbling down the slopes of Mt. Sitcom.
"Baby Mama" is fairly good at three things:
It serves as a showcase for Poehler's superior comic chops; she bounces off straight-woman Fey like a Superball, and layers her character with amusing detail (including what must be the least convincing offer to contribute gas money in cinema history).Unfortunately, the movie throws in a stupid plot twist just when it starts to build the slightest puff of satirical steam, and the rest of the film is an easygoing, chuckle-to-yourself farce peppered with crappy music, uninteresting drama and a superfluous romance with Greg Kinnear. It's not horrible, but it's droopy, and it left me craving "30 Rock"'s vastly superior skewering of the privileged and self-involved. Fey should stick to writing her own material.
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C; 96 minutes; rated PG-13 for crude and sexual humor, language and a drug reference.
