|
 The World's Fastest Indian
In The World's Fastest Indian, the title character is a
1920s motorcycle owned by Burt Munro, a Kiwi who's yearned
to race at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah.¹ In the
late 1960s, the elderly man leaves New Zealand to begin an
odyssey through the United States to realize his dream, with
its attendant host of elements to overcome: the incredulity
of his cronies; the heart-trouble that could shorten his
journey; the fish-out-of-water difficulties he faces in the
United States.
It's an old-fashioned Rocky-style story; and that's not
faint praise. The World's Fastest Indian is a beautifully
calibrated work -- the best movie Roger Donaldson's directed
(and written) since his 1981 breakthrough Smash Palace (also
a New Zealand story). Though the outcome is a fait accompli,
the director keeps us entertained by the journey.
He's aided by a stellar cast. Great as he is, Anthony Hopkins
often overshoots for his effects; in Legends of the Fall,
he practically turned into Popeye. Yet here he's nearly perfect,
light on his feet. Munro's a ham, but Hopkins roots him in
his dream to race. He never lets us forget the sheer childish
thrill at the heart of his sport. And he meets some colorful
characters along the way: Tina (Chris Williams), the tranny
proprietor of a Hollywood motel; Ada (Diane Ladd), a desert
widow who helps him patch up his ride and takes him into
her bed; and the host of racers who mistake his passion for
an old man's folly before he earns their respect.
Munro ultimately set the land-speed record in 1967 for
his class of motorcycle. The old codger gets bragging rights
and the last laugh -- his record has never been bettered.
The World's Fastest Indian does him proud. -- Dan Loughry
Tristram Shandy: A Cock & Bull Story
Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy,
Gentleman is considered the first meta-fiction novel.
Written in the 1700s, before the phrase or even concept
of Òmeta-fictionÓ was born, it's the story -- or,
rather, Shandy's attempt to tell the story -- of
his life. But as all readers know, it's a work of epic
digression, the tale of nearly everything else but the
life of its title character.
It's also considered the most unfilmable work in the English
canon. So give the restless director Michael Winterbottom
respect for his ingenious attempt in Tristram Shandy: A
Cock & Bull Story that, while not perfect, is true
to its source material in the most important ways.
With invaluable assistance from his leads, Steve Coogan
and Rob Brydon, Winterbottom has created a meta-film: a
meditation on the novel that plays as a movie-within-a-movie.
After setting up the conceit with a scene of the actors
in makeup discussing the subtleties of billing, and the
color of Brydon's teeth, we're cast into Sterne's knotty
and bawdy world, brought to vivid life with all the technical
sleight-of-hand film can offer. Coogan, as both Shandy
and his father, narrates the story of his birth, popping
in and out of scenes as character and actor, commenting
on the proceedings, interrupting them, revising them. The
backstory of the drama between the actors parallels that
of the movie, especially the growing competition between
Coogan and Brydon, and the numerous deviations of the director,
the other actors, and the crew.
Winterbottom's film is a stunt that doesn't fully succeed
-- the last third, especially, fails to contextualize the
detours of the filmic narrative and the filmmaker's dilemmas.
It simply dead ends. But it's a wildly inventive, honest
crack at an impossible novel. -- Dan Loughry
Tsotsi
SouthAfrican filmmakerGavin Hood (One of Variety's Directors
to Watch in 2000) has recast Athol Fugard's(Master Harold
... and the Boys) novel, Tsotsi, from the dire Apartheid-ridden
'50s to modern day. It has the effect of giving the gritty
bleakness of gang life in Johannesberg's outlying townships
a sense of flux: Post-Apartheid, he says through the
images he expertly captures on screen, the country's
in the midst of transition. It can -- and will -- get
better. After all, the African faces here are uniquely
beautiful and the skies above the shantytowns are the
most lovely blue (the sky seems so much bigger in Africa).
If only kids like 19-year-old Tsotsi would look up. Instead,
he leads a pack of lost boys on a pointless rampage of
juvenile delinquency. In a spontaneous moment, apart
from his friends, Tsotsi carjacks a running BMW but quickly
discovers he's got a passenger -- a baby in the backseat.
After a second (and third) thought, he decides to keep
him and almost immediately he begins to see the world
differently: A crippled man catches his eye, he spies
on a young mother getting water (who will come in handy
soon), he touches handmade wind chimes of broken glass.
He doesn't shake his gangster ways, however, and uses
his street smarts to provide for his adopted kid. Tsotsi's
heart -- it's grown three sizes -- longs for
a family that was fractured by sickness and cruelty.
Although the festival favorite and now Academy Award-nominated
(Best Foreign Film) Tsotsi is soaked in sorrow, writer-director
Hood's work also reaffirms the soul. He directs with
the seasoned, keen eye of a director who's made many
more than two films. Already, he's a brilliant, promising
artist. Imagine his take on our urban landscapes! One
look and you, too, will be anxiously awaiting his English-language
debut. We need him now. -- Anderson Jones
|
