New York, New York (1977)

Overblown, but handsome musical by Martin Scorcese about two post-war lovebirds trying to make it in the music business, one as a musician, the other a singer, while struggling to maintain their own tumultuous relationship. The films first half-hour is the best, with the slow romantic build up between Robert DeNiro's criminally arrogant saxophonist, Jimmy, and Liza Minelli's guarded USO crooner, Francine. Once their career's begin to soar and the film begins to find its groove, the suspense is kind of deflated; we know these two have problems, and they hooked up despite them, so watching them bend and squirm at each other's mercies (particularly DeNiro, whose nearly sociopathic character is the most magnetic in the film) becomes pretty tasking by the end of the 160 minute running time. The music, mostly big band and jazz, is great, as are the period elements of the piece; the sets, costumes, and hairstyles are all very evocative of a dreamy, blissful vision of post-war America. Scorcese's framing is inventive and lively, and is only restricted by the repetitive quality of the film's script; the greatest success of the film is that, due to Scorcese and DeNiro, the inherently destructive and anti-social Jimmy ends up coming off as likable. Minelli is, surprisingly, stronger off-stage than on; she has an endearing, haunting openness in her acting that does not come through in her comfortable, exuberant stage performances.

Recommended for fans of Scorcese or DeNiro (all 4 of you out there) and really glitzy, old-school musicals with an edge; I'm really thinking of Pennies from Heaven, which this film roughly equals in quality. This is not the bane on Scorcese's filmography that I was let to believe, but rather an interesting experiment (far superior and more inventive than his worst work) that gives DeNiro yet another opportunity to display his mastery of acting for the screen.

Talking Heads: Stop Making Sense (1984)

Tremendously and successfully ambitious concert film that is fun and exciting for the duration of the running time. David Byrne received a credit for conceiving the staging of the concert, which is quite entertaining. As opposed to opening with a large number with the full band, he opens with only himself and a boombox, playing "Psycho Killer" with full impact sans the backup. From then on, as each song progresses, another member of the band appears onstage; it is a truly original presentation that keeps the momentum building for a good amount of the film. David Byrne's stage persona is wonderfully idiosyncratic, filled with twitches, quirks, and risks that play as simultaneously comic and appropriate to the music. The musical performances themselves are out of this world for Talking Heads fans; the rearrangements of many of the songs are far larger, and more fully realized than the original studio cuts. Jonathan Demme's direction is surprisingly low-key, providing long, unbroken takes of Byrne and the crew doing their thing instead of opting for then-chic MTV style cutting. Even though I adored most of the film, I did feel it was a little long; I would've cut one or two of the final numbers to ensure the Heads didn't outstay their welcome. But nonetheless, I was so entranced by the energy of the show that I watched the two deleted numbers on the Blu-Ray immediately after the film's conclusion.

Highly Recommended for fans of the Talking Heads, new wave, or well-made concert films. This is actually one awesome show that I don't regret not being able to have gone to; I feel like I got the idea, and it was great.

Happiness of the Katakuris a.k.a. Katakuri-ke no kôfuku (2001)

Funny, but batshit Takashi Miike musical about a family dealing with house-guests repeatedly dying while under their care. The story is light and unchallenging, and provides enough humor and interest to (barely) sustain ones interest. More notable are the directorial touches, such as the musical numbers, which punch up self-consciously corny and cliched scenarios. They are occupied by smoke machines, goofy lyrics, and borderline-slapstick choreography. These scenes are the liveliest in the film, and give the film a subversive edge that rises it above a simple family comedy.

However, the best scene in the film is the opening, a claymation introduction to a weird kind of creature that eats a woman's uvula, and flies away before spawning itself. The spawn, however, does not make a significant appearance in the rest of the film, and I was hoping that this completely fantastical element to the plot would interrupt the relatively mundane proceedings that follow. Even though the cool-ass monster sequence is self-contained, the family plot does pick up once the guests start biting it, and the movie develops its own charming brand of humor. Still, I kept hoping the monster would reveal himself as being the cause of all the deaths, and the film would take a more traditionally Miike turn. Alas...

Recommended for fans of subversive, goofy cinema (John Waters, etc.) and patronizing Japanese humor.