08 Nov 2005

Killer Instincts: "Jarhead," "Good Night, & Good Lunck.", "Chicken Little," and "The Weather Man"

By Mike Schulz

Jake Gyllenhaal in JarheadJARHEAD

In movies, nothing is harder to define than tone, and the tone of Sam Mendes' Jarhead, based on Tony Swofford's Gulf War memoir, is so elusive that, hours after it ends, you might still not know what to make of it. In many ways, the movie is like a two-hour expansion of Full Metal Jacket's first 40 minutes, as the 20-year-old Swofford (Jake Gyllenhaal) and his fellow Marine recruits, pumped up to an almost insane degree, train for their mission in the unbearable desert heat and prepare for battle. In Mendes' film, however, there is no battle for his protagonists to respond to; the war ends while the Marines' bloodlust is still reaching a boil. The film is, in many ways, about the maddening banality of service, and it has resulted in an occasionally maddening movie, but its shifting tones and air of unpredictability make it impossible to shake off; at the finale, you might not know exactly what you've seen, but you certainly know you've seen something.

01 Nov 2005

The "M" Word: "The Scottish Play - A Travesty!" at Black Hawk College

By Mike Schulz
What makes the blood of most stage performers run cold? Seeing the first audience on opening night? Hearing silence after delivering supposedly hilarious dialogue? Knowing there's a critic in the house? Well, yes, yes, and yes.
01 Nov 2005

A Freshman Talent Provides the Importance for Seeing "Earnest": "The Importance of Being Earnest" at Augustana College

By Mike Schulz
Augustana College's production of Oscar Wilde's classic comedy of manners The Importance of Being Earnest is perfectly acceptable entertainment, rarely inspired but always watchable. Yet it has the enormous good fortune to feature one performance that shoots way past the acceptable and enters the realm of the extraordinary - David Cocks' portrayal of the delectably devious John Worthing is the sort of riotously funny and brilliantly executed stunt that makes you more than eager for his next appearance; he's so elemental to the show's success that it's nearly distracting when he's not on stage. And here's the kicker: This is freshman Cocks' first appearance on the Potter Hall stage. The mind boggles at what may be in store for audiences over the next four years.
01 Nov 2005

"Saw II" Effective, But Not Much Fun: Also, "Doom," "Stay," and "Prime"

By Mike Schulz

Saw IISAW II

Since we're no longer forced to endure Cary Elwes shrieking his hammy little head off for 90 minutes, Saw II was inevitably going to be a less annoying experience than 2004's Saw, but the movie is pretty effective in its own right. Not entertaining, mind you, but effective. Last fall's surprise horror hit saw Elwes and another mad overactor at the mercy of the serial killer Jigsaw (Tobin Bell) - who devises for his prey wildly elaborate devices of torture that defy both description and belief - and in one of Saw II's few impressive twists, he's apprehended at the end of the movie's first reel. What follows resembles what might result if you watched The Silence of the Lambs and Seven in picture-in-picture format. As Jigsaw - in sinister, I-know-something-that-you-don't Hannibal Lecter mode - is interrogated, and his master plan dissected, by Donnie Wahlberg's quick-to-boil cop, a whole new slew of potential victims, including Wahlberg's teenage son, try to survive a vicious spook house by evading Jigsaw's contraptions and deconstructing the maddeningly obtuse sets of clues the killer has left them. (Like its precursor, Saw II makes explicit what Seven left to your imagination.)

25 Oct 2005

Shakes-peerless: The Prenzie Players' "Twelfth Night: Or, What You Will"

By Mike Schulz

In the Prenzie Players' hugely entertaining production of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night: Or, What You Will, there's an encounter so heart-stoppingly strong that it might be the single most effective stage moment I've witnessed all year.

25 Oct 2005

Closing Out of Town

By Mike Schulz

Citing "the cost of film rentals and insurance" and "really low" attendance, Mike Reid, director of the Open Cities Film Society, announced that the organization was discontinuing its New York City Film Series at Davenport's Figge Art Museum, nine weeks and eight films ahead of schedule.

25 Oct 2005

"North Country" - For the Easily Outraged: Also, "Domino"

By Mike Schulz

Frances McDormand and Charlize Theron in North CountryNORTH COUNTRY

At a serious, well-intentioned "issue movie," you will periodically hear from a sect of the audience whom I refer to as the tsk-ers. Tsk-ers are especially vocal at works in which the leading figure - always righteous and noble, and prone to suffering in silence - finds him- or (generally) herself experiencing painful hardships in the cause of Doing the Right Thing, while their families, friends, and the world at large all turn against them.

18 Oct 2005

St. Ambrose University's "Urinetown": So Funny I Almost...

By Mike Schulz
Since St. Ambrose University's production of Urinetown at the Galvin Fine Arts Center has already closed, there's probably not much point in a review. So consider this a thank-you note instead. I had more fun at the school's production of this 2001 musical comedy than I have at nearly any other entertainment I've been to over the past few months. The show was terrifically staged and, almost across the board, vibrantly performed, but most inspiring of all, the audience was truly alive to it; Urinetown smashes the understood conventions of musical theatre to smithereens, and the Friday night crowd appeared positively delighted that it did. The show was a risk, and one that paid off big time.
18 Oct 2005

Almost Heinous: "Elizabethtown" and "Two for the Money"

By Mike Schulz

Kirsten Dunst and Orlando Bloom in ElizabethtownELIZABETHTOWN

After a reportedly disastrous screening at the Toronto Film Festival in September, Cameron Crowe trimmed some 18 minutes from his latest project, Elizabethtown, before its national release on October 14. Of course, I never saw Crowe's Toronto cut, so I can't venture a guess as to what scenes wound up getting the boot. But having seen the finished project, I'm thinking that the loss of those 18 minutes was in no way satisfactory - to be honest, I'm not sure which scenes Crowe should have left in. For Elizabethtown is, in almost every respect, shockingly weak, so tonally incorrect and irrationally pleased with itself that it left me a little dazed. How could Crowe, who has made such wonderfully humane, marvelously detailed comedies, have gone so far afield?

11 Oct 2005

Richmond Hill Plants a Not-Bad "Seed"

By Mike Schulz
The Richmond Hill Barn Theatre's production of Maxwell Anderson's The Bad Seed is entertaining stuff, yet you might not believe more than a few words of it. The sincerity that director Jalayne Riewerts gives the piece is admirable, but also a little misguided, because the show often aims for penetrating insight and forgets why audiences love The Bad Seed in the first place - not for its psychology, but because of the inherent fun in watching an eight-year-old sociopath get away with murder.

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