Sundance 1998
by Andy Demirsian
Park City, Utah, home of the Sundance Film Festival ’98, gets invaded for a week in January by indie filmmakers, writers, producers, sycophants, and more sunglasses and cellphones than you can shake a stick at. There were also a few movies.
If pale imitations of Pulp Fiction get you hot and bothered, Montana (dir. Jennifer Leitzes, starring Kyra Sedgwick and Stanley Tucci) is a wet dream. The creator’s admirable idea to develop a strong feminine role in the well-worn organized crime genre is mired in an embarrassingly dull story and dialogue. The glum, disillusioned atmosphere of the picture becomes claustrophobic within 20 minutes. John Ritter continues his indie film work, but the part isn’t nearly as well-written as his Sling Blade character. The odd thing about this picture is it seems to want to be both a raw emotional independent film and a Hollywood blockbuster death rampage. The two don’t mix well and the last scene culminates in a hysterical shootout that’s so romanticized you’ll be laughing in the aisles if you haven’t fallen asleep. Not even worth a video rental, avoid this if you don’t like being bored to tears.
Orgazmo, the feature-length comedy by South Park co-creator Trey Parker, is easily one of the funniest movies of the nineties and will hopefully be distributed nationwide this year. Created before the successful Comedy Central cartoon, this non-animated film stars Trey in the leading role. It’s the touching story of a Mormon couple who want to get married at the Temple in Salt Lake, but can’t afford the cost, so the male character secretly begins starring in kung-fu action pornos to cover the costs. If you are offended by just about anything, steer clear of this movie, it’s the most beautifully profane piece of cinema you’ll ever see. Some scenes play out just a little too long and would benefit from some tightening up in the editing room, and maybe there’s one fight scene too many, but to offer any criticism of this work is almost blasphemous in a age where everything is a supercalculated marketing ploy with fast food chain tie-ins.
Ted Demme’s new movie Snitch, set in Charleston, features Denis Leary acting as well as co-authoring the script. The premise is a very interesting one that hasn’t been done before in the organized crime genre. It’s an examination of the gray area which occurs when your means of survival is also the source of your frustration and pain. In this case, Leary is a carjacking underling for an Irish organized crime unit in Charleston. He becomes increasingly infuriated with his boss’s “business” techniques, but there’s a code of silence in this tough-knit family that won’t allow for any feedback. The film has great intentions to make a small personal statement and was made with lots of passion, but the dialogue often runs into well-traveled territory and doesn’t offer any new insights into a guy who should probably leave town and start all over again. There’s also a great cameo from Cam Neely, which went right over everyone’s heads at the festival. I hope this film does well. You’ve got to root for any film shot in or around Boston, but you might be better served renting a copy of The Ref if you’re in a Denis Leary mood.
The Big Lebowski, by Joel and Ethan Coen (Fargo, Raising Arizona) is a feast for the senses. The Brothers Coen are some of the greatest craftsmen in film today, but what’s really cool is that they work in such a wide variety of genres, you never know what to expect next. This piece is an anti-detective story like Robert Altman’s McCabe and Mrs. Miller is an anti-western. The protagonist (Jeff Bridges), by a random act of fate, gets trapped in a kidnapping case and must solve it or answer with his life. Bridges, by immersing himself so thoroughly into this character, blows away the pathetic work of his contemporaries like Al Pacino or Bob DeNiro, who, at this point, seem to only be playing vague caricatures of themselves. This movie works on so many different levels it’s like a seven-course meal on a kick-ass rollercoaster. It takes off on fantastic trippy dream sequences unexpectedly, then ends up in a bowling alley; it’s surrealist Americana. Even John Goodman, who’s usually reprehensible, is surprisingly engaging. Don’t miss this, and expect the unexpected.
