Review of Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) by First L — 06 Sep 2004

I didn?t find the original [b]The Ladykillers[/b] to be all that impressive, and I find [b]Kind Hearts and Coronets[/b] to be even more of a ?meh? film. Ealing Studios, in my opinion, just didn?t make good black comedies. And I don?t mean this just because filmmakers have pushed the bar much further in the past decades. It?s because I don?t think that their British style of humor translates very well to such material. There are, in general, two types of British humor; the bawdy, over the top kind, and the dry, witty, understated stiff upper lip kind. Kind Hearts contains the latter kind of humor, and that just doesn?t cut it. Dark humor needs to be exaggerated and gothic. This isn?t satire we?re talking about, it?s a plot to kill eight people to receive a dukedom. Heh, dukedom is a cool word.

This is (aside from Star Wars, of course) one of Alec Guinness? most famous films, probably because he plays eight different roles. But this isn?t like Mike Meyers, who plays multiple caricatures in his Austin Powers movies. Guinness is playing eight different actual characters. He does a great job, naturally, but since he?s not doing it as an out-and-out gimmick, it really isn?t the comedic treat you?d expect it to be. It?s just an actor inhabiting eight characters in one movie. If he'd had a little more fun with the roles, things might have been better. But not by much.

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[b]Glengarry Glen Ross[/b] is one of those ensemble dramas with a cast that you look at and drool. Jack Lemmon, Al Pacino, Kevin Spacey, Alec Baldwin, throw in a couple other quality actors, you?ve got gold. And since they?re working with a David Mamet script, it?s pretty hard to mess anything up. And of course, the acting is top-notch, though Jack Lemmon says ?fuck you? about as convincingly as Jimmy Stewart.

But the real meat and bones of the film is naturally the Mamet script. Hell, I could put those two words in quotations or capitalized them. A Mamet script has certain guidelines, like a Philip Glass composition. There are more cuss words than commas, and the dialogue has a pattern to it, a rhythm that becomes almost musical. That quality becomes kind of annoying after a while, and you find that the actors seem to be matching their readings to the words and not the feelings. The composition of the script may not be perfect, but the content doesn?t fail to fascinate. There is only one woman in Glengarry Glen Ross, and she appears for no longer than a minute. This is a movie starring men about men, and what it means to be one. It?s a full-on examination of camaraderie, superiority, and masculinity. And as such, Glengarry Glen Ross does not put a gloss on it. Male bonding and behavior seems to be a mixture of compromise, lies, and vicious insults. We men pump up the importance of Being A Man, but as Mamet might put it, it?s just a fucking load of bullshit.

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Nostalgia is a funny thing. If VH1 is any indication, we can?t get enough of it. So I guess the fact that [b]Goodbye Lenin![/b] exists is no surprise. Still, it?s not often that you see communist East Germany looked at in such a kind light. The premise is ripe for broad comedy: a middle-aged woman has a heart attack and falls into a coma shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall, and though she wakes up eight months later, her condition is so severe that any sort of shock could give her another heart attack. Since she was so devoted to the GDR, her grown son feels he has no choice but to pretend that Berlin is still Communist. It?s a complicated ruse, so hilarity naturally ensues. The thing is, the movie alternates between a disdain of the GDR days and a fond remembrance of them. It?s not just the mother who feels emotionally attached to the Party; the web of lies her son weaves increasingly turns into a socialist fantasy world which both mocks and celebrates the Communist cause of the time.

Screwball comedy could have been the result with such a premise, but it?s not, and I?m fine with that. The camerawork is inventive, Yann Tiersen?s score is bouncy, and the tone is one of discovery and celebration of a new era. It?s sweet, surreal, satirical, and poignant. A little bit of everything. I?m not saying that Goodbye Lenin! completely rejects capitalism, but it?s not the celebration that you?d expect. In the endless comparisons the movie makes between communism and capitalism, the result is a wistful longing that if only one could be more like the other.

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[b]The Whole Nine Yards[/b] is an enjoyable, forgettable little comedy that succeeds largely because of its charismatic cast. Amanda Peet stands out the most; she?s a real gem. Other than that, the plot is ludicrous, and that?s putting it lightly. The slapstick, however, works surprisingly well, which is good because the movie relies heavily on it. The film also earns minor brownie points for actually taking place in Canada, as opposed to being filmed there and labled as New York/LA/Chicago/etc.