Boogie Nights
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Movie Reviews of Boogie Nights
Movie Review: Behind the Scenes of a Different Family
Summary: 4 Stars
Boogie Nights is probably one of the most alive, sympathetic and good natured movies I've ever seen, and given the content of the movie, Paul Thomas Anderson delivers in creating a story that is actually heartwarming. Sometimes I feel like this movie was made especially for me. Even if the pornographic and drug content doesn't sound like an interesting topic to begin with, Boogie Nights is about much more than that. This movie combines a suberb story, an alternativly good natured and bleak atmosphere, drama, tragedy, and potrays $#% as natural and good when used right but drugs the exactly opposite (the way I feel about partying). The end result is a dazzlingly good drama, that's both fun and tragic, with good natured, charismatic, and real characters. Don't be fooled into thinking they are characters who you would just not care about. There is no absolutely no third person syndrome here. This is Dazed and Confused as a drama.
For any filmmaker who wants to know some nifty ways of using the camera, watch this movie. Paul Thomas Anderson directing is dazzling to watch; it's hard to believe this guy had no formal training like Tarantino, Linklater, and Smith (though I think Smith has no interesting techniques, it's just his writing that stands out). It's frantic, all seeing eye is all over the place, tons of techniqes and different kinds of shots all over the ________ place to go with it. Long shots, tracking shots, Iris In/Out shots, dissolving cuts, slowmotion, underwater shots, techniques that you feel that you are in some cheap 70's film, those shots that give the feeling of flashbulbs, and even proto-hip hop montages (Most famously used during the drug depiction scenes in Requiem For a Dream). His directing is so meticulous and skilled that he must have had EVERY single camera angle and shot written down in the script. It's right next to Goodfellas regarding directing.
Boogie Nights has an actual story, but it's still far from a classic three act movie. It has an episodic nature and often switches between characters, but it still feels like it has a story. The characters are hilarious, quirky, and much different from the real world. From Eddie's love of kung fu, Buck's love of country music, and even Scotty's desite to just be himself (despite some of the abuse), all of these things make em' stand out, and when watching it, you are definitely not wasting your time like you do with the average joe portrayed in the typical disaster or action movie. Jack Horner in particular is so hard not to love for his desire to make pornography actual art, same goes for Amber Waves, who justs wants to see her kid and be a genuine mother despite her background. The cast is strong, with Burt Reynolds, Juliane Moore, Heather Graham, John C. Reiley, Mark Whalberg, and others, all of them giving out strong performances and using their real life charisma of sorts (really, how could you hate John C. Reiley?) to bring the character to life on the screen, and you love every moment of it.
So why Do I think this movie was sometimes written for people exactly like me? First off, it's perhaps one of the greatest movies to show $#% in a positive light. These people have $#% because they know that it's a great thing of human nature. It shows that $#% can be good. Then again, it shows that it has some negative aspects, such as what happens with Little Bill and his wife, as $#% can hurt others if used in a negative way. Showing these characters as people in good light, with hopes and dreams to go along with a great aspect of life, and who are actually better than the many people outside their family. And so the movie boils down to family in it's essence. These people are great people, but it's just too bad that the outside world doesn't think so. The only "outside" character I felt something positive for was Eddie's father.
On top of that, Anderson does a great job of making this movie a pop culture lense of the 70's like Dazed, only a lense on the disco scene and the early 80's (whatever that was). The soundtrack is terrific, and there are A LOT of songs, and pretty much all of them are great to listen to, quite a feat regarding their genre (no That's the way and Lady's Night!). He also picks out good songs instead of the retarded, overplayed disco crap that most people think of. He makes the disco scene seem better than it really was. Not quite a time I care about, but it's done tastefully (well, some of the clothes are stupid, but very little of them are stupid to look at) and doesn't feel kitschy and cheesy a la Saturday Night Fever.
One caveat I have to warn some people regarding the hideosly overpriced DVD. This movie has good special features, with 30 minutes of deleted scenes, 2 commentaries, The John C Reiley Files, and character biographies (the ACTUAL characters). But seriously, you could have put this all onto on DVD. The total running time of the features on disc two is less than an hour (just like the also overpriced Goodfellas DVD). This wouldn't be that bad if the movie was less than half the price of this DVD, but the actual price is just too expensive for what you get. Get this fine movie on sale, please.
Being one who realized the benefits of a second viewing, I certainly got it, and once I thought about what was truly going on, I just got lost. This is a great film, the messages work well, and it's also a fun movie, as it never stops being either entertaining or enmotional the whole way through. One of the best movies of one of my favorite decades of film.
A-
Movie Review: Terrific satire of late-'70s
Summary: 4 Stars
I complained a lot about films in the '80s which were too stiff and self-conscious to pull off a period piece attempting to portray another decade.
So what a relief it was when the '90s started and it was apparent the new decade wouldn't have the same problem.
1997's BOOGIE NIGHTS, about the porn industry of the late-'70s, is terrific fun for any number of reasons: the casting, the production design, the "period" style of the thing... Burt Reynolds plays a slightly pathetic porno-director at the end of the grainy, earthy sex-on-celluloid era which is about to be overtaken by the videotaped, sanitized, twinky zone of the '80s... Other actors are noteable, including Heather Graham, Don Cheadle, Julianne Moore, etc. Oh, and how could one forget Philip Seymour Hoffman and his quivering boom-mike??
But Mark Wahlberg's casting makes the thing work, not simply because of his build (a lot of buff actors exist out there) but his demeanor--- his relaxed, lost, slightly forlorn, semi-arrogantly knuckle-headed vulnerability... he absolutely SCREAMS late-'70s teenager. (I'm not sure if Mr. Wahlberg has ever understood how "right" he got it with his performance).
The movie, naturally, is a bit of a parody of the time, yet within that spirit of parody, gets the disco era much, much more right than it does wrong. Period zeitgeist is always made up of more than just mere physicality, and BOOGIE NIGHTS, through whatever method, manages to convince you that 1977 is actually 1977. And that's no small praise.
There are some elements the film probably misses. When one recalls the late-'70s --- especially as it might relate to the sex/porn industry --- it's might be easy to ignore or forget its aspect of superlative sleaze; it was the time of early-Sex Pistols (before "real" punk got cleaned up in the '80s), CALIGULA, CRUISING, Studio 54 (no, not that terribly watered-down film with Ryan Phillippe years later) when a certain sexuality of degradation seemed to reach its apotheosis... If you side-step or miss that "sick" note of that time, you've almost missed the time... Admittedly, BOOGIE NIGHTS, deliberately or not, doesn't "get" that element; it's all a bit too giddy and innocent to do so (although that rings true, too). And yet I'm kind of glad it didn't go into that gutter; otherwise, the film would have likely slid into something else too unseemly, and the things it got right might have run the risk of being negated or overshadowed.
A good, delightfully silly picture. And it's pretty impressive that PT Anderson, so young at the time, could pull this off so correctly.
Movie Review: Great movie...not a great DVD.
Summary: 4 Stars
This is the new July 2007 release. It's the third release that I know of besides the European versions. Now for a 2007 release of a tne year old film you would expect them to have come a long way since the original release on DVD. Not so in my opinion as the only bonus here is the second DVD with all the extras. The film itself is amazing and the actors are superb. The dialogue is clear but everything seems muffled and coming through the same channels. The only surround is when hearing music. The picture is a little soft as well. There does not seem to be a great improvement, if any, to the encoding from the original DVD to this one. It would have been great to have a Blu-ray version of this film...especially in 2007! If they do, hopefully they can remix the sound while they are at it.
In the end, I'm not sure why they chose to re-release this film for a third time. Aside from the extras, nothing is worth running to the store for. But if you haven't picked up this film before, it is really a great film that deserves all the credit and rants that it got. Make sure that you pick up this version of it, if anything, just for the extras.
Movie Review: I heart Paul Thomas Anderson
Summary: 4 Stars
I have been quite a fan of Paul Thomas Anderson since this film originally came out. That being said, if you did not like his other films, this may not be to your liking either.
Unlike what most people may think about this film, it is not pornography. But it does examine characters in the context of the porn industry of the late 1970s, early 1980s. The characters are interesting and their stories allow you to see them as more than mere stars in Horner's productions.
A great soundtrack and the adorable Polly Anna-esque "Dirk Diggler" played by Mark Wahlberg make this movie entertaining and heart-wrenching.
Movie Review: a great ensemble film
Summary: 4 Stars
A fascinating study of the human character, an interplay of a thousand stories, that's really one story, a portrayal of an industry and a parody of the said industry at the same time - this is P>T. Anderson's best movie. Mark Wahlberg is remarkable in it, but so is the rest of the cast. Julianne Moore, Burt Reynolds, John C. Reilly, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Heather Graham all give outstanding performances.