INLAND EMPIRE

As the year is coming to an end, I thought I would post some sort of commentary on new releases in cinema that I have seen this year. Note, that this is a commentary on new releases and not films that I have seen this year that have already been released, or are part of the Chauvel Cinematheque, which I have enjoyed.

Last year, the highlight was (no doubt) Matthew Barney's epic Drawing Restraint 9 which actually came out in 2005. I saw this at the Chauvel Cinema, in Paddington, Sydney, and was truly amazed by the film. This year, my enthusiasm for cinema has drooped, and in all honesty I have not seen that many new releases. The new releases that I have seen this year include the following (although I'm sure that I've left some out):

• The Fountain (2006, dir: Darren Aronofsky)
• Volver (2006, dir: Pedro Almodovar)
• Marie Antoinette (2006, dir: Sophia Coppola)
  
• The Presitge (2006, dir: Christopher Nolan)
  
• 300 (2007, dir: Zack Synder)
• Scoop (2006, dir: Woody Allen)
• The Simpsons Movie (2007, dir: David Silverman)
  
• Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten (2007, dir: Julian Temple)
• Death Proof (2007, dir: Quentin Tarantino)
• Une Vielle Maitresse (An Old Mistress) (2007, dir: Catherine Brelliat)
  
• Control (2007, dir: Anton Corbijn)
• Rescue Dawn (2006, dir: Werner Herzog)
• INLAND EMPIRE (2006, dir: David Lynch)
• Beowulf (3D) (2007, dir: Robert Zemeckis)
  

And there was also, of course, some remastered films, which included the following:

• El Topo (1970, dir: Alejandro Jodorowsky)
• The Holy Mountain(1973, dir: Alejandro Jodorowsky)
• Blade Runner (the final cut) (1982, dir: Ridley Scott)

After a burst of new releases that I was keen on seeing in December 2006/January 2007 including The Fountain, Volver, Marie Antoinette and The Prestige, cinema seemed to die down and there was nothing (that I was aware of) that interested me. There was the new film by renown music video director Michael Gondry, The Silence of Sleep, which I never got around to seeing and a few others, but all in all, I saw cinema become more and more a corporation run by multinationalists which is subordinating true art and artists.

The other day I finally got around to seeing David Lynch's latest offering, INLAND EMPIRE. I had heard about it basically ever since the idea for filming it was conceived and so have been eagerly waiting for its release. Earlier in July, with INLAND EMPIRE still not out, I saw on Amazon that you could pre-order it. I waited though, because watching something at home and at the cinema are entirely different experiences. And I'm glad I did wait, because after watching it, and already a few days after I'm convinced it's probably Lynch's best film, and one of my all-time favorites. I wont talk about it, because after all, I think it deserves to be experienced and that any attempt (by me) to verbalise it would devalue the film's nature. Having said that, I greatly admired the way it captured even more of the same darkness of Lost Highway and combined everything I liked about a Lynch film into something incredibly original and fresh. To top it all off, it was 3 hours long, and worked perfectly. I have heard that quite a few people hate this film, which I don't understand. In an interview on Lost Highway, one of the actors stated that his films are to cinema what Picasso's paintings were to representational art. I highly agree and I am glad that Lynch is challenging what is predominately narrative approaches to cinema.

Out of all the new release films I managed to see this year, INLAND EMPIRE is one of my favorites. I very much enjoyed The Fountain, from earlier this year, and that in retrospective I have to say that I disliked Volver (even though I very much like Pedro Almodovar). Recently I saw Une Vielle Maitresse (An Old Mistress). I keep telling people I talk to that it's a "period drama" but it isn't really, I just cant think of a better term. It's kind of in the same genre as Barry Lyndon, which I adore, and is definitely the best film that I have seen in the genre since. Really, it made Marie Antoinette look cheesy and unsophisticated especially in regards to Une Vielle Maitresse which was beautiful, sometimes dark, detailed, sophisticated and intelligent.

I admit, as far as commentary goes this post is pretty lacking. I, for one, do not have enough time to give a perceptive discussion on all the films I have seen this year. From the truly spectacular, to the more mainstream (300, The Simpsons Movie and Beowulf), to the late trend to have music-related films, one of which I very much liked (Control) and the other I felt a bit lacking (Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten) to Quentin Tarantino's postmodern film Death Proof, which I enjoyed, but would rather now see Tarantino do something more original. I actually saw two films this year at the IMAX, 300 and Beowulf (2D and 3D respectively) and I did enjoy viewing/experiencing advancements in technology, so enjoyed both films technically. Creatively, however, both of them were wanting, though it was good to see Beowulf in 3D, which marked a radical departure (and advancement) from those early 3D films I saw, like Spooky Mansion or whatever it was called. There was also the new Werner Herzog film, Rescue Dawn, which to me has affirmed that Herzog has moved away from his German New-Wave roots and stuck to documentary/biopic films that, recently at least, seem to still have a fascination in the wild/jungle that was at the fore in Aguirre, The Wrath of God and Fiztcarraldo. However, I must admit that, as much as I enjoyed watching the film, I was disappointed to see Herzog adopt more Hollywood conventions and abandon the bizarre, more avant-garde nature of his earlier films. One thought I would like to add is on The Simpsons Movie: Although, when it opened, I enjoyed its satirical comments on consumerism and pop-culture, I found that as it developed it less and less made satire of the well-worn Hollywood conventions as it adopted them, and by the end it didn't seem to parody but become what it had originally parodied.

In addition, the remastered prints I saw were all very good. Both El Topo and The Holy Mountain are superb films in my opinion; the latter of which is one of my favorite films at the moment. Blade Runner was interesting too, also because it was in High Definition and looked marvelous. And of course, the Chauvel Cinematheque is also interesting, largely because it contains (mainly) films that I would not have heard of/seen otherwise.

In conclusion of this rather sketchy post, I must say that even though I will be seeing one more film this year (I'm Not There), INLAND EMPIRE will have had the greatest impact on me.