Any Given Sunday - Modern Gladiators and Awful DVD Menu Screens

There are a few go-to movies for me when it comes to sports. When baseball season starts, I’ll re-watch Bull Durham or Major League or Cobb. With golf, I go with Tin Cup. With football, it’s Any Given Sunday, Oliver Stone’s frenetic film that both celebrates and condemns the sport. It’s a film that’s messy and unsure of itself, which is perfect for football. 

Any Given Sunday makes it quite clear that pro football players are modern day gladiators. And while gladiators are typically given glorious treatment in history and pop culture, they were basically slaves putting their life on the line to distract the masses. In that way, it’s an apt comparison, though obviously there’s a lot more money and fame involved for modern athletes, and the deaths are far slower. I don’t think it’s an unfair comparison, especially cinematically-speaking. 

Stone, of course, isn’t subtle about any of this; just watch the dinner scene between Pacino and Foxx with the chariot race from Ben-Hur playing in the background and intercut into the scene. That doesn’t make it wrong, but the bluntness of it is distracting at times. Then again, is there a more blunt sport than football?

This is why it actually feels natural for there to be so many scenes of men discussing their legacy and whatnot in relation to a game. It’s silly, but it’s real. These broken men abuse drugs, women, their families, etc. They might be gladiators, but they live like they’re in Caligula. It makes all the talk of the importance of leaving behind a legacy of greatness seem pretty fucking stupid. Sanctioned excess will do that to people, and what organization is more hypocritically perfect for this than the NFL?

The NFL, which unsurprisingly did not participate in the film (the Dolphins are referenced at one point, implying that the fictional league of this film co-exists with the NFL somehow), presents the sport with the same reverence Any Given Sunday does. But they try to bury any negative side effects of the sport like drug abuse and CTE and abhorrent off-field behavior. At least Any Given Sunday presents both sides of the game.

This is all getting appropriately sloppy, and it’s not necessarily by design. And I don’t think Stone was going for some meta-commentary with his sloppy film, either. But when you address both this film and the sport it portrays, it’s impossible to be simple about it. The viewers of both are complicit. I’m okay with Stone’s head-spinning approach because I find it enjoyable, much the same way I’ll still cheer for the horrible Miami Dolphins while also condemning the NFL from time to time. That’s America, and Oliver Stone, for better or worse (especially in the ‘90s) was great at capturing that dichotomy.

One of the worst DVD menu screens of all time.

My basement was the go-to weekend hangout spot in high school and beyond, and I always had a movie on when everyone would fall asleep. This was no big deal until the movie ended and the DVD menu screen came up. Auto-play wasn’t a feature back then (or my DVD player simply didn’t have it), and interactive menu screens were the norm. Any Given Sunday is one my friends and I talk about to this day.

First off, when I watched this on my new 4K player, it only played through twice, and then the movie started. Not sure if this is more modern technology taking over or what, but I could have used it twenty-five years ago. Anyway, as you can hear, that bland ass hard rock music is terrible, but imagine that blaring on a loop at three in the morning.

Some others that came to mind were Fight Club and Super Troopers:

There are plenty of others I’m just not remembering now, but even though these were annoying years ago, they take me back now. Even though I still watch plenty of physical media, the technology has still made this mostly obsolete. First off, I almost always go to sleep with something streaming playing, so the worst case scenario now is an annoying show or movie auto-playing or a series of previews constantly cycling. As for blu-rays and whatnot, even without auto-play, the vast majority of menu screens these days are still images or maybe a little music from the film. They are much more subdued whereas the early 2000s DVDs wanted you to wake the fuck up and watch a movie. 

The modern situation is undoubtedly better. But popping in an old DVD like this and seeing that awful menu screen takes me back to a simpler time. And it also reminds me that this movie needs a 4K upgrade. What the fuck is going on here? 

Random Thoughts / Favorite Quotes 

I tried to watch the streaming option on Fandango, but it’s the theatrical cut, which I've never seen, and there were so many little differences it annoyed me. Not to mention the three minutes of commercials every five minutes. 

It's not that the director’s cut is better, it's just what I'm used to. For instance, the DC has Beamen getting yelled at for not being ready whereas in the theatrical cut he just appears next to Pacino, ready to go. I wasn’t committed enough to stick it out the whole movie and look for differences.

The editing of Stone's films of the 90s should be studied in film school. How coherent films, much less good or arguably great ones, are cobbled together from all that footage and different film stock is a miracle to me.

“Cherubini? What'd he fall off the bench? What's next? Stigmata?”

Love that triple take Pacino gives Foxx.

Can't believe I just found out Jim Brown's name in this is Montezuma Monroe. Still not sure if the full name is said on screen, but that's what he's credited as in the credits.

That caricature of Oliver Stone at the bar is fucking diabolical.

“I don't get strokes, motherfucker, I give ‘em!”

I bet Dick Butkus calling Pacino a f****t was a Butkus adlib.

Met-Rx went all in fast on Willie Beamen.

Pacino says he's glad he's old then pays a prostitute with a check. Consistent.

“Fuck you, coach! I ain't buyin' yo brand!”

I see the DP went to the Last Boy Scout school of cinematography for that rainy night game.

Dennis Quaid wearing a chef's hat while grilling hot dogs is fucking hilarious. 

I like what they do with the playoff game having an announcer from each team calling the game, bickering the whole time.

Heston understood the assignment. Show up, bear those bottom teeth, and deliver the hell out of this line: “I honestly believe that woman would eat her young.”

Nixon - Now More Than Ever

In my previous article, I found that JFK made me nostalgic for a simpler time in the conspiracy theory world, which is ironic since the JFK assassination and most theories in general are dizzyingly complex. As I moved on to Nixon, I found myself nostalgic for a simpler time in politics, despite Nixon’s presidency representing the most chaotic political climate in US history…up to that point. But before I get into my nostalgia for the good old days of political corruption, I want to gush over this amazing movie.

The Sorta Sequel to JFK

Nixon is nothing like JFK from a story perspective. JFK wasn’t really about the president; it was about his assassination. Nixon is a straight up (well, straight up for Oliver Stone) biopic. But aside from sharing a director, there are a few brief moments that tie the films together. First off, the film uses a part of JFK’s score when the assassination happens, and the assassination looms large on Nixon’s presidency since his presidency would likely have never happened without Kennedy’s death. Because of that, it seems like Stone can’t help but accuse Nixon of having something to do with the assassination. Nixon forebodingly talks about “opening up that whole Bay of Pigs thing.” Haldeman explains it’s Nixon’s code for the assassination, meaning Nixon at least knew the assassination was going to happen, which is later confirmed with his scene with Jack Jones in which someone with a Cuban accent tells him, “Suppose Kennedy don’t run in 1964.” 

While I believe that Nixon’s presidency doesn’t happen without the assassination, I don’t think Nixon had any prior knowledge about it. Stone is crossing a serious line with this, but I don’t care, just like I don’t care about the inaccurate or exaggerated stuff in JFK. I don’t care about the inaccuracies and/or made up moments and characters in Nixon because of this amazing bit of text that opens the film: 

This film is a dramatic interpolation of events and characters based on public sources and an incomplete historical record. Some scenes and events are presented as composites or have been hypothesized or condensed.

Every film “based on a true story” should be required to add this at the beginning. This is Stone admitting “I’m making up a lot of this shit.” What makes it hilarious to me is one word: “hypothesized.” In other words, “We don’t know what happened, but maybe this did.” What a ballsy move to just flat out tell the audience that some (who knows how much) of your movie about a real person is made up. Of course, this is necessary for any movie about real people or events. But it’s nice to have something more honest than “Based on a true story” at the beginning.

With that admission at the onset, Stone is allowed to unleash Nixon the character rather than Nixon the real person. But this only works because of Anthony Hopkins’s performance. At first glance, Hopkins makes little sense. He simply does not look or sound like Nixon naturally. He still doesn’t look all that much like him, and he still sounds more like Anthony Hopkins than Richard Nixon, but he created a character rather than a caricature of the man. There’s no silly fake nose or outlandish Futurama-esque “aroos.” Hopkins embodies the man. He is eloquent and forceful during the speeches (the convention speeches are amazing, both in performance and cinematically). He is a jittery mess when his world is crumbling. He’s awkward when out in society. And his eyes show the true paranoia of Nixon that ultimately ended his political career. It’s such a great performance that when I think of what Nixon sounds like (this happens more often than you’d think), I hear Hopkins instead of the real man.

Beyond Hopkins, Nixon is much like JFK in that seemingly every small part is portrayed by either big names or great character actors, including future Nixon portrayer Dan Hedaya (who, let’s face it, is a much more natural fit for the role than Hopkins). Long movies like this flow much better when actors like Ed Harris, Madeline Kahn, Powers Boothe, David Paymer, etc. are peppered throughout. 

Almost as important as the cast is the insanely foreboding tone of the film. Stone obviously believed the Nixon presidency was the darkest moment in American political history (up to the year the film was made, at least). Near the beginning of the film, there is a slow zoom on the White House during a thunderstorm as a horror film-like score blares. You expect to find a monster in the White House when it cuts inside, and there is one: Nixon. This is what I love about Stone’s best work: serious shit handled seriously. He’s not trying to lighten anything up at all or give the audience a chance to relax, because that was the reality of the moment, be it the Nixon White House, the Kennedy assassination, or the Vietnam War. The people involved in these situations were not given a break, so why should the audience get one?

So how does this add up to an enjoyable experience? Because I’m a Nixon fan. Just like with the Kennedy assassinaton, I find this stuff fascinating and at times in my life I’ve done quite a bit of research on the subject (I’ve read The Haldeman Diaries, for fuck’s sake!). But that takes time. Compared to reading an 800-page biography, a three hour movie is a breeze. Nixon is a nice fix for me these days because I don’t have the time (or youthful devotion) to do real research. Instead, I can watch this and be reminded of my interest in the subject, and I get to experience a serious movie with great performances as a bonus.

Now More Than Ever

I used to shy away from referring to myself as a Nixon “fan” because it felt odd to claim to be a fan of a politician, much less a disgraced one. These days, I don’t feel so bad about it; interpret that however you like. But I’m a fan the same way I’m a fan of sports teams in that I like them but I also get to be extremely mad at them when they let me down. So while I find Nixon’s paranoia and “dirty tricks” reprehensible, I don’t let them completely define the man.

I still find him to be one of the best speakers in presidential history, and many of his policies are downright liberal by today’s standards (like creating the EPA or wanting universal health care). And his foreign policy is unmatched, and I don’t think he gets enough credit for laying the foundation to end the Cold War. 

Of course, I only learned these things after I claimed he was my favorite president. When I was younger, I just liked being a fuckhead by claiming the “worst” president was my favorite. Who knew I would discover, through research, that he actually was my favorite? “Favorite” is another term I didn’t like using. I would usually say, “Well, he’s not my favorite; I just find him to be the most interesting president.” That’s still true, but it’s easier just to say he’s my favorite. 

When I first became interested in Nixon, he was still commonly referred to as the worst president of all time. As time has gone on, he has been reevaluated but, more importantly, political discourse in this country has dissolved into madness. Truth matters less than ever, and opinions and beliefs rule the day. 

I’m not going to wade into the shit swamp of current politics. Instead, I’ll just say that my interest in Nixon now makes me look back on his presidency as a simpler time. The foreboding tone of Stone’s film has less relevance because that scene of the White House as part of a horror movie? That’s now a common theme in political ads made by whichever party isn’t in the White House. You can’t claim something is right or wrong anymore without it becoming an argument. Back in Nixon’s day, even he finally admitted he fucked up because he resigned. 

When people talk about Nixon now, they like to imagine how he would be perceived by today’s standards, but that’s not fair. In many ways, Nixon is to blame for what political discourse became as he viewed politics as warfare. Yes, even he had his limits (hence the resignation), but he didn’t have the foresight to see what he was helping create. I can sit here and point out a dozen things he wanted to do that would have been great, but they didn’t happen because he fucked up. And the scariest part about imagining Nixon in today’s world is that in today’s world there’s no fucking way he would have resigned. 

Nixon was a product of his time, and it makes little sense to look at him otherwise. But I’ll still do it, especially when I’ve had a few beers and want to try to impress someone with my Nixon knowledge (I’m a huge hit at parties). And yes, it’s easy to use his campaign slogan of 1972, “Now more than ever,” as an ironic way of pointing out how nice it would be if politics today were more like they were back then; but that’s bullshit. That’s just as dumb as people wanting “the good old days” back even though the “good old days” weren’t good for everybody. And with politics, it’s important to remember that the passing of time has a way of making things seem simpler than they really were. In the moment, things were pretty fucking dire. And when I look back at Nixon, either through the movie or through books, I try to remember that. The past isn’t a fantasy to aspire to, it’s what led us to the current shitshow.

JFK - Back When Conspiracy Theories Were Fun

I find myself watching JFK (or at least the beginning hour or so as I go to sleep at night) once a month because it’s almost always on a streaming service I have (currently on HBO Max). Each time I watch it, I plan on watching Nixon soon after, but rarely get around to it, as Nixon is almost never on a streaming service. And because of my idiotic principles, I refuse to rent it or buy it on digital because I already own it on DVD…and the basic premise of this site concerns movies I physically own, so I finally got the DVD out and watched Nixon the old fashioned way. But first, some thoughts on conspiracy culture and JFK.

Back When Conspiracy Theories Were Fun

JFK had a huge effect on me when I first watched it. I already fancied myself a history buff and was proud of my knowledge of the era. My stupid high school mind was not ready for the all out attack of this film. I became obsessed with the JFK assassination which resulted in reading a few books and writing way too many essays on it once I got to college. 

At the time, I just wanted to believe every bit of Oliver Stone’s conspiracy fever dream. I wanted to know who those hoboes were that were arrested by the train station. Who killed Lee Bowers? How many fake Oswalds were there? Did Clay Shaw really admit to being Clay Bertrand? Was X a real person? And on and on and on.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve calmed down, though I still think that head shot came from the front. But I’m no longer making people look at fucked up pictures of David Ferrie like I did to my intro to speech class in college…definitely got a few bewildered looks that day. 

I still want to believe everything in the Stone movie, but common sense (and light research) show that a lot of it is pure fiction/fantasy. JFK is a perfect example of how a conspiracy can scratch an itch you didn’t even know you had. 

Take an accepted historical event or common fact, present the unknown “truth” behind it, follow that rabbit hole to the center of the fucking planet. It’s very satisfying. Watching JFK the first time, I felt like part of some secret club finding out all kinds of cool secret shit the CIA never wanted me to know. But just being aware of the “truth” isn’t enough. Then I had to read some books so I could throw out some extra facts that weren’t in the movie to prove I was more in the know than your basic conspiracy theorist. Eventually, though, I had to accept that there isn’t “truth” out there, only belief. And that’s when this shit gets scary.

I finally accepted that there will never be the evidence I need to prove exactly what happened on that day. The closest thing I’ll ever get to that is suspending my disbelief and rewatching JFK, which is exactly why I’ve watched it so many times. This is when conspiracy theories were fun and mostly harmless. But at some point, the conspiracies got crazier and the facts were even more ignored, and it became dangerously close to becoming mainstream. 

People would often give me weird looks when I would go deep on the JFK stuff while we were hanging out, and rightfully so. I was being a fucking weirdo about something that didn’t really matter and could never be proven. But now, mainly thanks to the internet, instead of ranting and raving at sane people who will eventually calm you down (hopefully), now all the conspiracy theorists find an online echo chamber and things get too dark. 

It’s as if being a conspiracy theorist went from being a hobby to a deranged profession. JFK didn’t necessarily create this problem, but it’s tied into it by bringing a major conspiracy theory into pop culture. I feel like this is one of the most acceptable conspiracy theories out there thanks to this film. 

These days, I watch JFK for entertainment purposes and as a cautionary tale for going too deep into a theory. The cast is insane; you have guys like John Candy and Vincent D’Onofrio showing up for just a few moments. It’s hard to find a scene that doesn’t have a recognizable actor in it. And most of them are fucking going for it. Kevin Bacon talking shit to Kevin Costner is a standout moment, and Joe Pesci deserved an Oscar nom just for how he smoked during his first scene with Costner. For a three hour movie that has a dozen plot threads and red herrings, JFK never drags and is always entertaining thanks to Stone’s frenetic style and the aforementioned cast. 

Because of those elements, I can turn my brain off and enjoy it all. When I want to engage with the film a bit more, these days I focus on Costner’s home life in the film. The first few times I watched it (before I had a family of my own, by the way), I wrote off Sissy Spacek and all their kids as the typical hindrance to the hero’s devotion to the “right” thing to do. Watching now, I see Spacek as the real hero of the film, putting up with Costner’s crazy shit. If I ditched my wife on Easter and left her to take all the kids to a busy restaurant, I wouldn’t be here typing this nonsense right now. In this film, though, Costner just brushes it off to “not checking the calendar.” As if Tommy Lee Jones couldn’t wipe off the silver body paint and come into the office on another Sunday? Come on!

That’s the story of the film that gets lost in all the magic bullet and “back and to the left” (and realizing that Newman was in the magic bullet scene and the Keith Hernandez magic loogie scene in Seinfeld) stuff. Now I watch this and see the damage fully committing to a conspiracy theory can cause. The victory at the end of the film isn’t that the jury agreed a conspiracy existed and Costner brought about the only trial for it; it’s that Costner, even though he swears to keep fighting (but he doesn’t sound nearly as convincing as he did in his closing argument), walks away from the crowd with his wife and son. And now instead of reading a book or writing an essay (um…aside from this one just this one time) or going down a reddit rabbit hole, I walk away from it, too.

Echoes in Eternity, Part II - "Alexander"

SPOILERS ahead.

Moving on with my Echoes in Eternity trilogy, I revisited Alexander (technically titled Alexander Revisited: The Final Cut), which is chronologically and thematically the logical next film to watch. But before I get into the themes of immortality and glory, I need to address all the different versions of this chaotic film from Oliver Stone. I saw the theatrical cut in theaters and honestly liked it a lot. I admired the ambition of it, and even if Colin Farrell’s hair looked goofy at times, I loved his unhinged performance. But it was destroyed by critics, and it was a bomb. Stone made a director’s cut for the home video release that was oddly shorter in an attempt to make the movie more action-packed and digestible. After DVD sales did surprisingly well, Stone was allowed to make this “final” cut, which added pretty much everything he filmed to the movie. Due to the success of that release, he then made an “Ultimate Cut,” which I only learned about after rewatching the final cut. From what I’ve read, the Ultimate Cut is a little shorter but very similar to the Final Cut, so I doubt I will buy this movie again. Anyway, this article is based on the Final Cut, and not we know that “ultimate” is more final than “final.” Perhaps some day I’ll write about the eventual “Immortal Cut.”

Echoes in Eternity, Part II

Alexander is the logical next film to write about because it references Achilles so often. Alexander is constantly told he is Achilles (Hephaestion is his Patroclus) and is a son of Zeus. Because of this (and the fact that he is a king, he feels the need to prove himself and gain enough glory to be remembered along with the heroes of myth.

For Alexander, it’s not just about winning battles, though. Unlike Troy, which makes the fighting seem more important than the war itself, Alexander is about gaining fame by changing the world with war. Alexander isn’t trying to conquer the known world for bragging rights. He dreams of unifying the world and bringing it peace...through war. 

Alexander is a bit misguided and naive in his goal for world peace, but at least he’s aiming for more than just glory. He wants his triumphs to mean something. This is a refreshing progression from the ideas posited in Troy concerning glory and fame beyond death. Still, Alexander is seemingly punished for his goal, and is warned about it, as well.

A key scene in the film takes place in a cave of murals with Alexander’s father, Philip, talking about the myths and the gods. He talks about how the gods, and time itself, will destroy everything in the end, and that men are “slaves” to the gods, or simply the progression of time. Nothing man can do will be permanent. Glory will always be temporary. But, like most heroes, these warnings fall on deaf ears for Alexander. It’s a common theme in films about ambitious people; they’re told something is impossible or pointless, but they do it anyway and prove the naysayers wrong. But with Alexander, the naysayer is right because reality is right. Time will destroy everything. 

Ptolemy confirms this in his final scene. He explains how forty years after Alexander’s death, his empire was gone. So what was the point? Was it to be painted on the walls like Achilles? It seems as if Alexander himself realizes in the end that there’s no comfort in knowing he built an empire that would be remembered for years. He died surrounded by people but actually alone. All around him were just concerned with what power they would retain, gain, or lose upon Alexander’s death. 

Alexander seemed to realize, after Hephaestion’s death, that his conquests, great as they may be, were for nothing if he ended up being alone. All through the film, everyone pleaded with him to return to Babylon to take control of his empire, but also to enjoy himself and have a life. As usual with characters such as Alexander, he only realizes the wisdom of these requests too late. But had he heeded them, there would be no story to tell in the first place.

That is the paradox of stories like Alexander. They glorify these flawed, ambitious people while also conveying the message that they should have never bothered with all of this in the first place. This isn’t a fault in the story; it’s a truth about life and the passage of time. It’s natural to want to be remembered, but the more people who end up remembering you, the fewer you end up with in your life that have a real connection with. Sure, Alexander had plenty of lovers and whatnot, but he was too consumed with his goal of conquest to have an actual life with any of them. The same goes for anyone today who becomes famous or memorable or whatever. They must devote so much time to their work or expanding their influence that any attempt at a normal, real life is lost. 

But once again, even those that we eventually watch movies about will be forgotten. So even when someone like Alexander achieves his goal of immortality through fame, it’s not truly immortality because it’s finite. It may last thousands of years, but there will be an end to it.

Alexander is unique because it addresses this a bit. Along with the cave scene with Philip, there’s the sequence near the end of the film with Alexander’s men becoming tired of fighting. Alexander chastises them for “falling in love with the things that destroy men.” He means the comforts of life (gaining money and taking wives and whatnot), but he also seems to be talking about forming emotional attachments that keep you from questing for glory. His soldiers yell at him about wanting to see their children and grandchildren again before they die. Is love for your children a “thing” that destroys men? The soldiers have reached their breaking point because you can only ask a foot soldier to continue for so long just for glory. These men know their names will be lost to time; they want to spend what time they have left with the few people who will remember them. At this point in the film, though, Alexander is still more in love with creating his myth than he is with any actual person.

Alexander finally decides to go home after a brush with death, but he would have been better off dying on the battlefield. Sure, he realizes what he missed out on while he dies, but the tragedy of Alexander is that he would never be able to enjoy life. He could only think of missed opportunities at a regular life when he was physically dying. When Alexander was healthy, he would only think of the next conquest. This is why we remember him, for now, and it’s why he died surrounded by power-hungry vultures instead of loved ones.

Why Do I Own This?

I know this movie gets shit on and outright dismissed by a lot of people, but I love it. On top of the cinematic elements I enjoy (the scope of it, the unhinged performances, the battles, etc.), any movie that can make me ponder what it means to live is a movie I want to own and watch again. Also, I’ve enjoyed every version of this movie, and I’m a sucker for new cuts of movies I like. But I have reached my limit with this one, especially since the most recent cut was part of a collector’s set that would cost at least $40. I just can’t bring myself to spend any more money on this film.

Random Thoughts

Stone’s introduction is great. “If you hated it, you’ll probably hate it more.” He doesn’t give a fuck at this point. He just made the version he wanted to see, and it’s honestly better because of it.

I love the shot when the camera leaves Alexander’s speech to follow a bird as it flies over the battleground. 

I like a good pre-battle speech as much as anyone, but let’s face it, maybe ten percent of Alexander’s men heard what he was saying.

More war movies should let the audience know which part of the battle we’re seeing.

At one point, one of Alexander’s commanders yells, “Back and to the left! Back and to the left!” No way that’s an accidental quote from JFK.

You have to appreciate a battle scene in which someone decapitates an enemy, and then uses the head as a weapon.

“Alexander, at 25, was now king of all.” Fuck. I was just the king of Jagerbombs when I was 25, and even then that’s a stretch. Maybe an archduke of Jagerbombs is more accurate…

Val Kilmer’s Philip is pretty much his Jim Morrison constantly at his most fucked up.

Brian Blessed as a wrestling instructor is perfect casting.

“Do I seem so old?” No, you don’t Angelina, and you’re definitely too young to play Farrell’s mother since you’re less than one fucking year older than him!

The cave scene with Val Kilmer is just a series of quotable lines. The scene itself is basically there to map out the plot for Alexander. “You’ll defy the gods and gain glory, but it will all be destroyed in the end. But even knowing this, you’ll try it anyway.”

Jonathan Rhys Meyers’s line reading of, “Alexander, be reasonable!” is so fucking strange and out of nowhere.

I can’t think of a more awkward wedding night than having your new wife discover your male lover and your eunuch lover. That’s something you really need to ease your new spouse into…

“When the local water turned putrid, we drank the strong wine.”

The last hour is easily my favorite as it shows Farrell at his craziest.

Easily my favorite image of the film is Alexander and Bucephalus facing off against the elephant.

No one before or since has said, "Execute him!" better than Farrell in this movie. Nor will they ever.

..

"Savages"

Directed by Oliver Stone, written by Stone, Don Winslow, and Shane Salerno, starring Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson, Blake Lively, John Travolta, Salma Hayek, and Benicio Del Toro - Rated R

Oliver Stone is back, even if he never really left...

Oliver Stone has gone missing in the eyes of many film fanatics.  His latest work, such as Alexander, World Trade Center, and Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, has failed to impress many fans of his earlier, amazing work.  As a fan of Stone, I tend to give him a break.  I thought the final director’s cut of Alexander was great (even if it is over four hours long), and W. felt very much like a return to his old style, though he never went all the way with it.  (To clarify, “all the way” means making a movie in the vein of Natural Born Killers, which is one of my favorite Stone films.)  I was less enthused with his film about the 9/11 attacks, which was well-made, but too plain for me and I couldn’t find much to like about his Wall Street sequel.  With Savages, though, Stone has made a film that deserves to be talked about along with Killers, U Turn, and Any Given Sunday, among others.

Perhaps it’s the plot of “Savages” that brought out the best in Stone.  Based on the very stylistic novel of the same name by Don Winslow, Savages is about drugs, corruption, love, and violence.  This is Oliver Stone territory.  The story follows Ben (Aaron Johnson) and Chon (Taylor Kitsch), two masterful California marijuana farmers who attract the attention of the Mexican drug cartels once their business starts to boom.  Ben is a peace-loving charitable type, while Chon is a hardened ex-Navy SEAL who is willing to do anything for the people he loves; which is where O (Blake Lively) comes into play.  O, short for Ophelia, is the mutual girlfriend of Ben and Chon.  Theirs isn’t so much a love triangle as it is an extended relationship.  There is no rivalry or anything like that to clog the story up.  O propels the story because she is kidnapped by the cartel and Ben and Chon must rescue her. 

That’s enough story spoiling for you, but the story is more complicated than it might seem as there are a lot of characters and things move very quickly despite the 131 minute running time.  What’s important is that the three leads feel like real characters and their relationship seems plausible even though it is certainly different.  The three leads are likable and they are the glue of the film.  Actually wanting the main characters to get what they want is a key issue too many films fail at these days but Savages gets the job done.

It’s a good thing the leads are likable because the supporting players all try their best to steal the show.  First is Salma Hayek as the leader of a cartel.  Hayek has played tough, no-nonsense roles before, but never too great effect.  (I have just never really bought her as a tough lady.)  In Savages, however, she does much better.  Maybe it was how the character was written, with her cold-hearted threats and whatnot.  Whatever it was, it worked and I almost wanted things to work out for her, even though she is one of the “villains” of the film.

Maybe it’s Hayek’s right hand man, Lado (Benicio Del Toro), who makes her character work.  Lado is easily the most despicable character in the film, but Del Toro brings a strange likability to Lado.  He is detestably likable, if that’s possible.  Del Toro just has a way of speaking and griming up the screen that makes you want to see more of him.  He helps Hayek’s performance by being so malicious.  If she is able to stand up to him and even discipline a guy like Lado, who could even think to cross her?

The last supporting role worth mentioning is John Travolta as Dennis, a corrupt DEA agent.  Travolta isn’t breaking new ground here or anything.  He’s played plenty of slimy, double-crossing characters.  It’s just so much fun to watch him do his thing.

This is still an Oliver Stone movie, though, and it’s fairly obvious that he directed this.  He uses a lot of different film stock (or he digitally altered a lot of scenes to appear that way), the music factors in multiple times and does a great job of setting up the mood, and the camera kind meanders wherever in his frenetic, but not too chaotic, style.  And while Stone has never been labeled an action director, Savages has plenty of great action beats that don’t skimp on the blood.  This film doesn’t have the fingerprint that “Killers” has, but it’s certainly more of a Stone film than, say, World Trade Center.

Savages is arguably a return to form for Stone (I write “arguably” because I don’t think he ever really lost it or anything).  But this is still not an upper tier Stone film.  I really enjoyed and will eventually buy this film, but compared to the director’s other classics, this one doesn’t crack the top five.  That’s a very hard top five to crack, though.  If there is one thing that really keeps Savages out of the upper echelon, it is the ending.  I can’t go into it here (check the spoilers section below), but the ending of this film is questionable at best.  It certainly raises a debate and at the moment, I lean towards the negative on it, mainly because I found it to be deceiving and unjustified.  Aside from that potentially major issue, Savages is one of the better films to come out this year. 

Random Thoughts (SPOILERS)

Okay, that ridiculous rewind ending.  As a fan of the book, I was quite shocked when they showed the book ending, only to rewind and give some overly happy ending.  I really couldn't believe after I saw that Winslow was a screenwriter.  Some have mentioned that Stone did this to get political with the corrupt DEA and all that stuff and I guess that's slightly understandable, but I didn't think it fit with the rest of the film.  It really took me out of the entire experience.  I liked the treatment of the DEA agent in the novel much better, with his suicide when he realizes how much he has messed up.  But Stone had to keep him alive just so he could say, "Look at your corrupt government!"  I know Stone is political, but enough statements about corrupt governments can be, and are, made within the regular plot.  I only slightly forgive it because I didn't mind seeing the three leads survive, because I liked them.  But it seemed better for them to die together at the end rather than go to Indonesia and shop at the farmer's market.