Whiteout (2009, U.S.)

This was a surprisingly good movie. I've seen a lot of bad reviews on it, but you have to keep in mind that's it's not supposed to be an Academy Award winner. It's supposed to be a scary, unlikely suspense flick.

Basically, a U.S. Marshall stationed at the American station in Antarctica must investigate a murder, and a special UN agent comes to help her investigate. They also get some assistance from a helicopter pilot and the station's doctor. The investigation turns up a string of bodies, a buried Soviet plane from the '50s, a smuggling operation, and all kinds of other fun stuff. When the rest of the station leaves for the season, this handful of people is left behind. Whiteouts and other dangerous situations abound, and the murder appears out of the blizzard with no warning.

Is it silly? Yes. But is it scary in its way? Yes. It's a fun, mindless flick, exactly what it's supposed to be.

Rating: 3.5

James Dean (2001, U.S.)

I'm a huge Dean fan. Own all his movies (and a few tv performances), read several biographies, have visited his hometown/museum/birthplace/grave site. I've been putting off seeing this made-for-tv biopic because I just had a feeling they wouldn't do him justice.

I was right.

Surprisingly, I thought the best part of the film was Jame Franco. I say it's surprising partially because I find Franco to be hit or miss with his performances and because I didn't think anyone could really play Dean. Franco wasn't perfect, but it was obvious that he'd gone to considerable effort to study Dean and his mannerisms, and he wasn't bad at all. I thought he came remarkably close to capturing the brilliant, fragile, remarkable, talented, insecure, artistic, unique, and perhaps slightly crazy Dean.

The sets were also great, particularly the sets of the sets of East of Eden. (Incidentally, events during the filming of East of Eden were pretty consistently documented with the least disagreement, and therefore these scenes in the biopic seemed the most realistic.)

For the most part, I was disappointed. For one thing, they tried to cram an incredible life into only 95 minutes, flying here and there and skipping over very important parts of his life. (Though at least they captured his relationship with his father fairly well.) They also skipped over any discussion of his bisexuality. While this could have been a fair choice (since the issue is widely debated), I really didn't like their portrayal of him as so clearly heterosexual either. Perhaps I just didn't like their Pier Angeli.

They should have kept the working title of James Dean: An Invented Life. I think they just tried to hard to present their film as fact, when so much of Dean's life, especially his personal life, was clouded.

Rating: 2.5