Gil Mansergh's Cinema Toast
NEW RELEASES 7/28/06
2 pieces of neon-lighted toast
Miami Vice (R)
Jamie Foxx, Colin Farrell, Naomi Harris, Gong Li
Directed by: Michael Mann
Crockett and Tubbs are back, brought to you by the same guy who did the TV series, only in an R-rated flick, he can show more skin in the shower scenes, more sleeze in the street scenes, and more blood and intense violence in the battle scenes. Foxx is cool, but Farrell misses and Gong Li is often unitelligable as the Chinese femme fatale.

pieces of animated, moral-fibered toast
Ant Bully (PG)
Voices of Nicolas Cage, Julia Roberts, Meryl Streep, Paul; Giamatti
Directed by: John Davis
A little nerd-bully, is miraculously turned into a little ant for a little while to learn a big lesson in a little film only worth a little of your time.

No toast unavailable for preview
John Tucker Must Die (PG-13)
Jesse Metcalf, Ashanti, Britany Snow, Sophia Bush
Directed by Betty Thomas
I have no idea what demographic the makers of this "Heathers" wannabe are after. When it is discovered that the high school jock is dating three girls at the same time, the irrate females (plus a few casual observers) decide to make him undatable, but all the tricks backfire and the young man becomes more popular than ever.

3 and 1/2 pieces of front-line toast
The War Tapes (NR)
Stephen Pink, Michael Moriarty, Zack Bazzi, Lindsay Coletti, Randi Moriarty
DIRECTED BY: Deborah Scranton
In the first documentary to be filmed by soldiers themselves, several members of Charlie Company, 3rd of the 172nd Infantry (MOUNTAIN) Regiment, were armed with digital cameras as well as conventional weapons when they were deployed into the Sunni triangle. Politics don't count when it's "my guys versus them." Quieter, funnier and more poignant and profound than anything Hollywood has made, this is the real thing.

2 pieces of Allenesque toast
Scoop (PG-13)
Scarlett Johansson, Ian McShane, Hugh Jackman, Woody Allen, Jim Dunk
DIRECTED By :Woody Allen
Scarlett Johansson, who reportedly sipped coffee in several meetings to help design her new, branded line of athletic wear for Reebock, stars in this pastiche of Woody Allenesque scenes we swear we have seen and heard before. Johansson plays the Diane Keaton-type character, Hugh Jackman is a millionaire murder suspect and Woody Allen plays Woody Allen only instead of New York, it all happens in England.

1 piece of avoid by any means necessary toast
Shadowboxer (R)
Cuba Gooding Jr, Helen Mirren, Vanessa Ferlito, Stephen Dorff, Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Directed By: Lee Daniels
In this confusing and disjointed waste of film stock, nothing is simple. For example, Mirrin and Gooding Jr. are expert assassins, stepmother and son, and lovers. Both are hired by a crime boss to kill his pregnant wife in a house with a zebra grazing on the lawn. Since Mirren is dying of cancer (while chin-smoking and downing Wild Tukey by the gallon), she feels maternal, so when the victim goes into labor, she leans over the frightened mother-to-be and hisses "He wants you dead...now push."
Starts Friday, July 28st at the Rialto in Santa Rosa


NEW on VIDEO & DVD
This wasn't available for review and I still haven't seen it
The Benchwarmers (PG)
David Spade, Jon Heder, Rob Schneider, Jon Lovitz, Tim Meadows
Directed by Dennis Dugan
The press notes read: "Gus and his nerdy buddies, Richie and Clark, are scouted by a millionaire nerd, Mel, who wants to form a baseball team and compete with the meanest Little League teams in the state. A stellar ballplayer, Gus becomes a role model for nerds and outcasts everywhere. But when his fans learn that Gus, himself, was once a school bully, they feel outraged and betrayed." Aw shucks.

1 and 1/2 pieces of not really new toast
Final Destination 3 (2006)
Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Ryan Merriman, Texas Battle
Directed by James Wong
What is there about a movie franchise that kills off the teen cast one-by-one and then repeatedly lies to us. Doesn't the word "FINAL" mean anything!!!!!


3 and 1/2 pieces of Aussie adolesence toast
Somersault (NR)
Abbie Cornish, Sam Worthington
Directed by Cate Shortland
With numerous scenes involving nudity, sex, drugs and teenage angst, this tale of a wistfully beautiful teen runaway's search for identity has not been rated by the MPAA. Filmed with an award-winning Australian honesty and echoing earlier Aussie coming-of-age films like Bruce Beresford's "Puberty Blues," (1981) and John Dulgin's "Flirting" (1991), this is definately not a Disney-movie-of-the-week. Branded as artsy pornograpy by some critics and hailed by others as mesmerizingly real, all praise the breakout lead performance by Abbie Cornish. This is a film to watch with someone else so you can talk about it afterwords.

Gil Mansergh's Cinema Toast
NEW RELEASES 7/21/06
3 pieces of Mooby toast
Clerks II (R)
Jason Mewes, Kevin Smith, Brian O'Halloran, Jeff Anderson
Directed by: Kevin Smith
When the Quick Stop burns to the ground, the fondly remembered slackers Dante and Randall are forced to flip burgers at Mooby's to gather some minimum wages (especially since Dante plans to marry soon). Nonplused, Jay and Silent Bob offer commentary using language which would make bikers and stand-up-comics blush.

2 and 1/2 pieces of haunted-house toast
Monster House (PG-13)
Voices of Steve Buscemi, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Nick Cannon
Directed by: Gil Keenan
With producers Steven Spielberg and Robert Zemeckis on board, this movie has great potential. But after flirting with Hitchcockian themes and true horror, it quickly retreats, quaking before the PG-13 icon. Unlike the latest "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie, you know that none of the animated characters in "Monster House" are really in peril.


No toast unavailable for preview
My Super ex-girlfriend (PG-13)
Uma Thurman, Luke Wilson, Anna Faris, Eddie Izzard, Wanda Sykes
directed by Ivan Reitman
The moral of this film seems to be "When a mere mortal falls for beautiful super hero, he better not break up with her....or else." For example, after she trashes his car and thows a live shark through his window, the super powered girl whispers sweetly: "I knew you'd come back to me...that's why I didn't kill you." Seemingly unsure how to market the film, the press release from the studio spends three paragraphs telling us about the director's past successes ("Ghostbusters," "Old School," etc.), while this newest film may harken back to the heroines in his early works like "Cannibal Girls" or "Ilsa, the Tigress of Siberia".

Who Killed the Electric Car
With gasoline prices approaching $4/gallon, fossil fuel shortages, unrest in oil producing regions around the globe and mainstream consumer adoption and adoption of the hybrid electric car (more than 140,000 Prius' sold this year), this story couldn't be more relevant or important.
Starts Friday, July 21st at the Rialto in Santa Rosa


NEW on VIDEO & DVD
3 pieces of South African toast
Tsotsi (R)
Presley Chweneyagae, Mothusi Magano
Directed by Gavin Hood
Box Office: $2,753,840
When a brutal, cold-hearted thug car-jacks a BMW, the unexpected infant in the car seat changes Tsotsi's future. If you believe in the redemptive power of a child's innocence and the love of a strong woman, then this Academy Award-winning version of Athol Fugard's story of sorrow and joy is for you.

2 pieces of "no she ain't" toast
She's the Man (PG-13)
Amanda Bynes, Channing Tatum, Julie Hagerty
Directed by Andy Fickman
Box Office: $33,687,63
The plot of Twelfth Night is kicked into a private high school where a soccer-loving kid played by Amanda Bynes poses as her twin brother in order to defeat her old high school (which prevented her from joining the boys' team when the girls' team shut down). One big problem is that Byne's interpretation of teenage manhood, involves talking like an effeminate good-old-boy from Hazard County.

TRULY CANADIAN
by
Gil Mansergh

As I write this, the peaks of the rugged Kootenays are at my back, the headwaters of the
Columbia River flow leisurely at my feet, and the Christmas tree covered mountains of the Purcell Range are in the distance. A horn-blowing, lumber-laden freight train winds through the valley, pairs of bald eagles soar on the hot afternoon breeze, and bicyclists, hikers, rafters, tennis players, sunbathers, swimmers, hot spring soakers, photographers and golfers traverse the roadways, riverbeds, hiking paths and fairways in every direction. This is Canada.

I wrote last time that most of the scenic wonders I would visit I have already seen on the movie screen. This is mostly true, but also very, very wrong. My own list of never seen treasures is topped by a mountain lake that was originally named the HeeJee by its British discoverer, but now goes by the moniker "Lake Moraine." Formed by glacial runoff when a rock slide (called the rockpile) stopped up a small valley, the crystalline turquoise water is so clear that canoes seem to float in the air. The moderate hike following the northern lakeshore was made ten times more delightful with my young granddaughters in tow. Strategically located rocks must be climbed, tiny streams crossing the path must be splashed through, and when I joke that we have to travel over the imposing glacial-covered mountain ahead of us to get home, the three year old says "OK. We can slide back down on skates (skis)." What I don't share with her is the sign warning that the hike is only suggested for groups of six or more people closely clumped together "since that magic number seems to keep the grizzly bears away.

I stumbled upon a mystery (still unsolved) in my resort's lobby. A shelf held DVDs available for rent, and on the top left corner was the movie "Water," (the story of a young Indian girl sold into marriage and then abandoned by her families when her much older husband dies suddenly). The week before I left on vacation, this film was still being shown in theaters at home so I asked how it came to be on the shelf. "They just arrive from the distributor," the desk clerk told me. But the owner of the local video rental store in the nearby town was very surprised when I told her about the DVD. "I haven't heard of the film," she admitted, "but it wouldn't be the first time the resort puts a movie on the shelf before the release date." Then she looked up the official date in her distributors guide. "It appeared in theaters on May 14th," she said. "Not too long ago...The DVD release is marked 'Not Announced.' They shouldn't have that film at all. I'll have to head over there and check it out."

The desk clerk, the video store owner and almost every Canadian I have talked with speaks in a distinctive manner. Sounding like a cross between Sheriff Marge Gunderson in "Fargo," and Gary Cooper in "Sergeant York," they often add an "eh?" at the end of a sentence. This leaves me with the feeling I've just been asked a question even when I haven't. They also sound apologetic somehow, as if the drop-dead-gorgeous surroundings and weather, or the polite drivers, or the two nights of brilliant fireworks displays for Canada Day July 1st, or the craggy mountain tops painted Technicolor orange and pink and purple by sunsets which last an hour or more were sub-par. This same feeling of "We're number two," is evident in TV shows and the press. For example, when the Calgary Herald ran an interview with Jacqueline Dupuis, the new director of the Calgary Film Festival , they asked for comment about the criticism that past festivals had falsely promised appearances by noted Hollywood stars. (Not only did William H. Macy and Naomi Watts not make an appearance, they were apparently unaware they had even been invited.) Ms. Dupuis offered the following defense: "You have to understand, stars go where they need to go to sell films...therefore stars won't be coming here. If they do come, it will only be out of the goodness of their heart." Eh?

Instead of apologizing, Canadians should be boasting about their film industry. The National Film Board of Canada has a long-standing tradition of underwriting daringly innovative movies and some of them are on my list of all-time favorites:

Writer/director Denys Arcand won the foreign-language Oscar for his poetic tale of an egoist's last days in "The Barbarian Invasions" (2003), but we first met all of these richly faceted characters twenty years earlier in his "The Decline of the American Empire" (1986)
Writer/director Atom Egoyan has created two masterful films dealing with the loss of children. Ian Holm is the insurance adjuster who arrives in a snow-shrouded Canadian village after a tragic school bus accident in in "The Sweet Hereafter" (1997). And Egoyan offers the following comments about "Exotica," his most successful film: "It was a hard sell...turned down by people who really should have known better, because, in retrospect, the movie's called 'Exotica,' it's set in a strip club, and it's a thriller."
Two films from the activist 80's offer beautifully sympathetic portrayals of dramatically different individuals. The wistful female protagonist in the avowedly feminist film "I've Heard the Mermaids Singing" (1987) is truly memorable and the movie's musical theme still haunts my mind. In contrast, stuntman-turned-actor Richard Farnsworth embraces the role of a septuagenarian train robberwith great gusto in "The Grey Fox" (1983).

Comments? E-mail gilmansergh@comcast.net
Hear Gil's Cinema Toast radio show 7:35 Thurs. AM KRSH-FM 95.9

Gil Mansergh's Cinema Toast
Note: Here is my response to a reader concerned that a movie I gave 3 and 1/2 pieces of toast was not yet available locally:
Dear Disappointed Reader,
I feature new releases based upon the dates provided to me by movie distributors for the "North Bay." Independent films often have a limited number of prints in distribution, and when a movie gets strong audiences in other parts of the country, theaters will "hold over" that particular film and the print will not be a available for local theaters. Interest generated by the World Cup matches resulted in dozens of "held over" situations for "Once in a Lifetime." I'l let you know when it 's nearby.
Gil

NEW RELEASES 7/14/06
1 piece of tacky toast
You, Me and Dupree (PG-13)
Owen Wilson, Kate Hudson, Matt Dillon
Directed by: Anthony Russo
Newlyweds return home to find their best man has lost his job, car, girl friend, and sense of humor because he went to Hawaii for their wedding. Talent is wasted on too many bathroom jokes, domestic mishaps, and scenes of interrupted lovemaking. Movie then tries to tack on a moral to this seemingly endless series of pratfalls.

1/2 piece of shuck-and-jive toast
Little Man (R)
Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, Kerry Washington
Directed by: Keenan Ivory Wayans
A tiny jewel thief disguises himself as a baby to retrieve a hidden diamond from a suburban couple. The studio calls it "HILARIOUS," which is always a bad sign. It's a shame the Wayans keep squandering their talent on this racist, sexist, ageist, (and heightist ?) drivel.

2 1/2 pieces of rotoscoped toast
A Scanner Darkly (R)
Keeanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, Woody Harrelson, Robert Downey Jr.
Directed by: Richard Linklater
"A Waking Life," Richard Linklater's 2001, masterpiece of animation, set a high standard that his newest film just doesn't reach. Based on a Philip K. Dick sci/fi story, the movie is set in a future Orange County where big-brother watches 24 hours a day and addictive designer drugs are legal. Despite (or because) of the identifiable actors rotoscoped into animated figures, the surreal effects get in the way of telling a good story.
Opens Friday at Boulevard Arts in Petaluma
2 1/2 pieces of many-bits-go-on-too-long toast
Strangers With Candy(R)
Amy Sedaris, Stephen Colbert, Matthew Brodrick, Allison Janney, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ian Holm, Sarah Jessica Parker, Dan Hedaya, Kristen Johnston
Directed by: Paul Danillo
Expanded from a Comedy Central parody of After-School Specials in which a 47-year-old is sent back to high school after a long stint in jail, this movie has bits of brilliance buried within a series of embarrassing situations. Not for everyone - those who love sophomoric humor and dozens of topnotch cameos will be delighted.
Exclusively at the Rialto in Santa Rosa


NEW on VIDEO & DVD
1 and 1/2 pieces of furry toast
Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction (R)
Sharon Stone, David Morrissey, Charlotte Rampling
Directed by Michael Caton-Jones
Box Office: $5,851,188
This movie had a lot of bad press even before people saw it. At least a dozen male stars (among them, Robert Downey Jr., Benjamin Bratt, Kurt Russell, Pierce Brosnan, Bruce Greenwood, and Viggo Mortensen) came and went. At one point, Stone threatened legal action to get back into production, but it hardly seems worth the effort. It's not really bad, just boring.

2 and 1/2 pieces of Foggy Toast
On A Clear Day (PG-13)
Peter Mullan, Brenda Blethyn
Directed by: Gaby Dellal
Box Office: $90,663
The latest feel-good dramady from the British Isles (this time it's Glasgow and Dover) where a redundant shipbuilder with time on his hands takes a notion to swim the English Channel (Is it called the French Channel on the other side?)

Gil Mansergh's
Cinema Toast

NEW RELEASES 7/7/06

3 pieces of yo-ho, yo-ho toast
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (PG-13)
Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley, Jack Davenport, Bill Nighy, Jonathan Pryce, Kevin R. McNally, Stellan Skarsgård.
Directed by: Gore Verbinski
Disney fashioned his popular amusement park ride on the exploits of the dastardly, but likable pirates found in the pages of Treasure Island and Peter Pan. But in real life, the skull and cross bones was a vivid warning that the skeletons of pirate victims littered the Caribbean. This movie is "more real" than its predecessor. Depp is great again, but over all "The Curse of The Sequel" comes true.
Grandpa's warning: Some of these pirates are nasty, and because of the clammy, slimy, evil that invades some intense, nightmare-inducing scenes, this film should really have an R-rating
3 and 1/2 pieces of well kicked toast
Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos (Not Rated)
Matt Dillon (narrator),Giorgio Chinaglia Shep Messing, Johan Cruyff, Carlos Alberto, Mia Hamm, Pelé
Directed by: Paul Crowder and John Dower
In case you haven't noticed, the rest of the world loves professional soccer. In 1975, with millions of dollars to spend, the New York Cosmos tried to catch America's interest by signing the incomparable Brazilian soccer hero Pelé to its very expensive roster. To the delight of the paparazzi, other Cosmos superstars lived every minute of life in the fast lane. Stacy Peralta's favorite film editor, Paul Crowder, keeps things interesting and the soundtrack of eclectic 70's hits compliments every shot.

2 1/2 pieces of rotoscoped toast
A Scanner Darkly (R)
Keeanu Reeves, Winnona Ryder,
Directed by: Richard Linklater
"A Waking Life," Richard Linklater's 2001, masterpiece of animation, set a high standard that his newest film just doesn't reach. Based on a Philip K. Dick sci/fi story, the movie is set in a future Orange County where big-brother watches 24 hours a day and addictive designer drugs are legal. Despite (or because) of the identifiable actors rotoscoped into animated figures, the surreal effects get in the way of telling a good story.


NEW on VIDEO & DVD
The Matador (R)
Pierce Brosnan, Greg Kinnear, Hope Davis
Directed by Richard Shepard
Box Office: $12,449,517
Danny Wright (Greg Kinnear) is in Mexico City for a very important deal. He strikes up some idle bar talk with Julian Noble (Pierce Brosnan) a self described facilitator of fatalities who hasn't time for friends, unless they are of the one-night variety (of either or both sexes).

The Libertine (Not Rated)
Johnny Depp, John Malkovich, Samantha Morton
Directed by: Laurence Dunmore
Box Office: $4,756,532
The sordid underbelly of 17th century British aristocracy is presented in close-up scenes of profligate licentiousness, debauchery, royal scandal and the grotesque results of using arsenic, cyanide, mercury, and other poisons to slow the deformities madness, and eventual death brought on by the final stages of syphilis. Not for the squeamish, Depp's nose falls off because of the disease.

OFF TO CANADA
by
Gil Mansergh


Like pebbles thrown into a pond, movies often make waves. One of the side effects of the success of last summer's "Brokeback Mountain," is that Rodrigo Prieto's luscious color photography has lured thousands of visitors to the snow-kissed peaks, green meadows and the crisply clear streams of Wyoming's wilderness.

Where's Brokeback Mountain?" tourists repeatedly ask Wyoming's park rangers. "That mountain doesn't exist in real life," the weary rangers answer. "Annie Proulx just created a mythical place for the setting in her book."

"I know that," says the tourist, "but where is the mountain they filmed for the movie?" In answer, the ranger diplomatically explains how that particular mountain and, in fact, the meadows, streams, sunsets and all the other outdoor film images in "Brokeback Mountain" were actually shot using a stand-in named the Canadian Rockies.

This is not a new phenomenon. Movie makers have used Canadian locations as stand-ins for hundreds of iconic settings. Often, like the "Brokeback Mountain" switch, it is because the the script calls for a ruggedly authentic landscape in a country where production costs are often a third less than they would be in the good old USA. Examples include acting like the Dakota plains for Kevin Costner's Oscar-winning culture-clash western "Dances With Wolves" (1990) or scenic Montana for a story of love, brotherhood and betrayal in "Legends of the Fall" (1994). Other outdoor adventures with Canadian backdrops standing in for American locations include Robert Altman's realistically muddy western "McCabe and Mrs. Miller," (1971), where Warren Beatty builds a "fancy house" for profession madam Julie Christie, or Otto Preminger's roaring gold rush days adventure with Marilyn Monroe and Robert Mitchum rafting down "The River of No Return" (1954), or John Cusak's star-making role as the young man who befriends a train-traveling runaway and her dog in Disney's "The Journey of Natty Gann," (1985).

I hope I'm not giving away a Santa Claus-type secret, but the snowy scenes in both "It's A Very Muppet Christmas" (2002), and Will Farrell's cute and cuddly holiday movie "Elf" (2003) were shot in British Columbia instead of the North Pole.

A consummate professional, Western Canada refuses to be type cast. She has played Siberia in John Le Carre's spy thriller "The Russia House, (1990), Antarctica for the heart-tugging tale of cross-species friendship and survival in "Eight Below" (2005), and Cro-Magnon Europe for the Darryl Hannah in animal skins epic "The Clan of the Cave Bear" (1986). Other roles have been as the frigid North Atlanticr in James Cameron's Oscar-winning "Titanic" (1997), the Peruvian Andes in a true tale of airplane crash survival entitled "Alive" (1993), and even Christopher Reeve's Fortress of Solitude in "Superman" (1978).

But why, you may ask, am I writing about Canadian film locations. The answer is quite simple. I am writing this column in a hotel room on my way to a two week family vacation in the Canadian Rockies. But have no fear. Despite any movie images you may recall of the Rockies as craggy and windswept blocks of ice, the resort brochures tell me something quite different. You see, the Rockies are of volcanic origin and one of the side effects of this type of geological birthing, is that a series of bucolic hot springs are nestled among the valleys which form the source of the Columbia River.

The only Ice I plan to actually touch, will be in the glass I hold in my hand as I watch my two granddaughters swoosh down the waterpark slide into the warm, spring-fed swimming pool for the 57th time. "Watch me," they yell to capture my attention. "Great one, "I yell back at them as I return to work on my next column...the one comparing the "real" Canada to all those movie images of singing Mounties, or hockey obsessed fans or overly polite people who say "abooot." Stay tuned.

Comments? E-mail gilmansergh@comcast.net
Hear Gil's Cinema Toast radio show 7:35 Thursday mornings on KRSH-FM 95.9