Filmenthusiast2000: Lord of War is getting really good IN MY MIND.
clarencecarter: I have to give credit to a movie that completely shucks pretense and stops giving us reasons to like its main character. unlike really fatuous shammery like Thank You For Smoking.
Filmenthusiast2000: I love Nic Cage when he plays dead (spiritually) like this--Windtalkers is another example; one of the most stand-offish, resolutely unlikable central performances I’ve ever seen in a cineplex movie.
clarencecarter: I like that this starts him off as likable and then strips it slowly away. You can rationalize the gun-running for a bit: oh, he's doing it to get out of Brighton, or he's doing it to get the girl. When in reality he's just doing it because he's good at it. How awfully banal is that?
Filmenthusiast2000: The Brighton material is pretty weak though, as is the movie in general when it comes to detail work. I kept thinking about Walsch's The Roaring Twenties, a film which exists on a similarly broad, historically-specific canvas, but which sells itself with detail work: the domestic scenes between Cagney and central casting "best pal" Frank McHugh, the late night ride home on the LIRR...
Filmenthusiast2000: I think Lord of War hurts from the lack of any equivalent scenes... The Brighton stuff is all borscht and synagogue; it doesn't feel like anyone involved had set foot in the neighborhood before the shoot.
clarencecarter: The Liberia stuff is the same: near parodic, and definitely a set.
Filmenthusiast2000: I'm sure if I had even the vaguest grasp of world affairs, I'd find a lot to laugh at in this movie.
clarencecarter: it certainly works better as an idea for a movie than an actual movie (like Gattaca), but I still left the theatre pretty bummed, even if there's nothing in it I couldn't get from dailykos.com or dating a crunchy girl.
clarencecarter: maybe its just the sheer implausibility of it's existence (a) in commercial theatres and (b) among the top grossers of the past few weeks
Filmenthusiast2000: I joked that pretty soon all the Puerto Rican kids on the street are going to be wearing shirts featuring Yuri Orlov instead of instead of Tony Montana.
clarencecarter: maybe he'll make inroads with the orthodox kids
Filmenthusiast2000: I watched one of my favorite movies, also set in Brighton Beach, Little Odessa right after this--they make a nice macrocosmic/microcosmic double feature.
clarencecarter: I watched it right after History of Violence.
clarencecarter: which is a much better movie, but also a good double bill
clarencecarter: I think the focus on Africa really makes Lord a nice antidote to the relatively placid Hotel Rwanda
Filmenthusiast2000: I also liked the bravura bullet assembly-line opening, which makes a nice antidote to the relatively placid Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
clarencecarter: well put.
Filmenthusiast2000: And I'd be remiss not to note that Leto and Cage are supposed to age TWENTY YEARS in the course of the movie, despite no apparent ravages of time...
clarencecarter: conscious aesthetic strategy, or did Niccols blow the make-up budget on AK-47s?
Filmenthusiast2000: Oh, and Ethan Hawke plays a ATF agent with the great, paperback-thriller worthy name "Jack Valentine!"
clarencecarter: the more I think about the specifics, everyone in the film not named Nicolas Cage is handled pretty poorly. (Leto’s ok) You'd think the African warlord and son stepped out of a Bruce Willis vehicle.
filmenthusiast2000: Yeah, if I have to stop and take it apart, everything would seem to suggest that Lord of War is a pretty "meh" piece of work, but it's never less than watchable... and I'm a sucker for oversized American history lessons delivered with gangster flick platitudes.
clarencecarter: In an ideal world, I'd say its giving audience members "lots to chew on," but I'd guess it's blowing right by most because of that watchability--oh, its not really a serious flick.
Filmenthusiast2000: But it's got a concluding audience address (hello, Brecht!)... And it's "based on true events"... And Jeff Buckley!
Filmenthusiast2000: I seem to be making fun, but it'll probably make my top ten.
clarencecarter: It'll be in my Top 20 for sure.
Filmenthusiast2000: Moody Nic Cage is like crack to me.