My Review of DGG's "Joe"

Glib Reviews Of recent DVD Releases

Joe
- Directed by David Gordon Green

I have been a pretty rabid David Gordon Green fan since seeing his first (and my favourite, still of his films) film, “George Washington” at the Vancouver International Film Festival way back when. His more ‘Hollywood’ pictures starting with “Pineapple Express,” (which- namedrop- in a way long time ago time, and place, I gave notes on a very early draft of that script, given to me by Evan Goldberg) have been funnier, and less small town noir, or indie drama than his first four pictures.

“Joe,” his latest; that I have taken a week to getting around to reviewing, is a real return to that early form, albeit in a slicker style, and tone. Nicholas Cage gets to bring that off kilter intensity that he occasionally brings forth when he actually gets a good script. Cage really wears the character’s weariness at having to be an alpha male all the god damned time on his sleeve. A great deconstruction of male posturing and small town bravado involved in all the performances, from the real up and coming young actor Tye Sheridan, who stole the show in Mud, where he played a similar youngster looking to maybe the wrong father figure, but making the best of it, to all the women who don't quite accept being props for male ego, despite having few other choices made known to them. 

Sheridan doesn’t necessarily steal any scenes in ‘Joe” but he doesn’t need to. The quality of performances all round is stellar. The actor playing Sheridan’s alcoholic, nasty piece of work father was played by a local homeless man named Gary Poulter, and his turn is maybe the best performance in the film. He nails the sadness and desperation of the character. Poulter died living in the streets a few months after filming, making his on screen pathos even more poignant.

Cage himself is perfect as an aging Alpha dog of a man, to see him riffing with the locals that Green always populates his films with is delightful. The locals cast bring the whole movie down to earth, and give the film much of it’s charm. There aren’t many happy endings in DGG films, but despite all the horrors these testosterone driven beasts put themselves through, you get a sense of hope at the end, just a little. I highly recommend this picture to fans of cinema, and great performances.




9.11134 violent foregone conclusions hitting you upside the head outta 10

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Nerd-Sploitation Weekend continues

Image
Glib Reviews of New Releases NerdFest Day 2 Continuing my Nerd-Sploitation festival with the almost traditional tale of of the out of control Game Master. Earlier examples of this sort of the tiny Nerdsploitation genre includes Gamers, (and it’s sequel) or any of those movies that I don't watch, that involve video games. Zero Charisma - Directed by Katie Graham , Andrew Matthews Is a surprising solid portrayal of the aging Nerd, or Fan. The main character is in many ways a painful reminder of what its like to be so obsessed with a game (or any fantasy) that it ruins the rest of your life.  Scott The GM in question ( Sam Eidson ), may in fact be a triggering presence for many gamers, or ex gamers. Be warned, the interplay of the players and GM struggling through a ridiculously overlong campaign is more realistic than the things the players do ‘in game.’ People being talked over, outside noise causing havoc with the flow of the game, the omnipresence of snack
Read more

Review of Tangerine!

Image
Glib Reviews Of Recent DVD Releases Tangerine - Directed By Sean Baker Tangerine is one of those films that ‘feels like’ it was shot chronologically. The first few scenes are a bit rough, the acting is a bit iffy, but as the characters of Sin-Dee and Alexandra walk endlessly through their drama filled Christmas Eve Day in L.A. The picture gets more gripping, the cinematography, the acting and the script all get better, more polished in a low budget way. The locations give a nice grimy seventies feel to the whole thing. Sin-Dee (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) is especially unlikeable at the beginning of the film, her single mindedness in finding her pimp/boyfriend and the girl he ‘cheated on her’ with while she was doing a month in jail, is not terribly nuanced. The buffer of the her best friend Alexandra (Mya Taylor) trying to keep her from all the drama she is creating, while trying to hustle tickets for a show she is doing that night keeps the whole thing from being one note.
Read more

My middling review of "Night Moves" by Kelly Reichardt

Image
Glib reviews of recent DVD/Blu Ray releases. Night Moves - Directed by Kelly Reichardt This is not your father’s ‘Night Moves,’ that one is an under appreciated Arthur Penn flick with Gene Hackman. Both do crucially involve boats though. I wanted to like this film a bit more than I did. As a big fan of Reichardt’s films in general, I was looking forward to this quite a bit. It may be though my least favourite of the bunch, but that by no means says it’s a bad film, just not quite as good as the previous three films. If you like creepy atmospheric slow paced gorgeously shot in Oregon kind of movies, you will dig this. Jesse Eisenberg is at his broodingest best, here, you barely ever see under his hooded eyes, he only ever really expresses emotions over the things he perceives with horror, like the dead deer he moves from the edge of the highway to save the dead doe the dignity of not getting run over again and again, at least. The basic plot has Jesse (as Josh, commu
Read more