I like what I see from Savages, if only because a fairly sophisticated crime thriller would be a step-up from the completely ignorable shit Stone has pumped out in my cinematic lifetime. Like Eddie Murphy, Stone is one of those guys that a person my age or younger has to have explained to them, “look, he didn’t always make shitty movies.”
Now granted, actually watching his classic work and even seeing Born On The Fourth Of July in a theater before hearing the guy talk about it and the world (as I was lucky enough to do at the SavFF last year), it’s clear there’s still a sharp, relevant person in there. It’s just got to come out again on film. I don’t know that Savages is where that will happen, but I dig the vaguely-restrained Tony Scott style on display here. A lot of actors doing fun roles, sun-scorched cinematography, some nasty drug-driven violence… It’s a simple formula for fun and much more interesting than the watered-down moralizing.
The film stars John Carter himself Taylor Kitsch, along with Blake Lively and Emile Hirsch. The roster of older actors surrounding the young upstarts include John Travolta, Benecio Del Toro, Salma Hayek, Uma Thurman, and recent Oscar-nominee Demián Bichir. It hits theaters on July 6th.
Just me, or is Del Toro looking a little Trejorrific in this one? Also, Affleck and his Town have definitely sealed funny-masks as a crime-thriller staple for the next decade.
(via BAD)
3 comments
I loved that, “people my age” comment. Ancient folks such as myself (40) remember the Oliver stone of the 80’s (Platoon, Wall Street) as a very compelling filmmaker. JFK was engaging enough to spark my interest in the JFK assassination to the point where I read several books on the subject (and it also gave us the magic loogie episode on Seinfeld). The Doors, flawed though it is, also makes for a highly compelling film, although when you watch it now you realize that Kilmer’s portrayal of Morrison has become a caricature with age.
I think things changed around Natural Born Killers, a film which I initially hated (but upon further review now appears to have been way ahead of its time). While Stone had always been interested in sending a message with his films, you got the sense that he was just more pissed off than usual. While I got the message, I found myself more interested in just seeing a high quality movie (I’m still mixed as to the overall effectiveness of NBK, since I think a good chunk of the populace who like it are just getting off on the violence).
Pretty much everything after NBK has not been something I’ve felt particularly compelled to see (I have yet to see World Trade Center or Alexander). Any Given Sunday was well made, but surprisingly straight-forward and formulaic. Based on the description for Savages, I’m actually quite interested. I hope it represents a return to form for Stone.
I will always love Stone for the fact he made fun of himself during a brief cameo in Kevin Kline’s “Dave,” anybody who can make fun of themselves in that way can’t be half bad.
Actually, Tony Scott stole this look from Oliver Stone. The /Film article yesterday did a great job describing the relationship between the two and where the style actually originated:
“Think back to the Oliver Stone films of the 1990s. Not so much JFK and Nixon; more like U-Turn, Natural Born Killers and Any Given Sunday. Those films had a stylized, hyper-saturated color palette that clearly gave Tony Scott some ideas. For instance, on U-Turn, Stone’s cinematographer Robert Richardson shot on reversal film stock — which becomes a transparent positive when developed, rather than a traditional negative — and then cross-processed it as negative film, increasing contrast and color saturation. Tony Scott and Daniel Mindel used the same technique for Domino almost a decade later.”
http://www.slashfilm.com/footage-oliver-stones-savages-colorful-90s-glow/
While I agree Stone’s recent work is nowhere near as good as his older work, I think it is a bit underrated. WTC, W and Alexander are actually quite good, and Any Given Sunday gets better every time I see it… after initially disliking it.
This looks like a movie about crime made by people who have never met a criminal.
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