Mark Waters' Mean Girls (2004)

The best villains in film do not believe that they are evil. A movie’s “good” and “bad” sides that create conflict are often relative, a complexity that makes both the characters and the movie more enjoyable. Imagine taking on the role of a villain. You can’t think: “My character knows what he (or she) is doing is bad but does it anyway.” That’s not real. The villainous characters must truly think that their side or course of action is the right way.

In Joss Whedon’s film, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-long Blog (2008), for example, the main character (played by Neil Patrick Harris) has a goal; he wants to make it into the Evil League of Evil, and he must commit murder for his application to be successful. But watching him, understanding his motives and his goals and his life, the viewer ends up rooting for him. Really. You root for the villain, instead of the hero, because even when he’s doing bad, he believes it’s for the best. And because in understanding that, you have sympathy for him.

In other films, the ones that take a more two-dimensional approach to heroism, villains still exist, but they are not presented in the in-depth way that Dr. Horrible does. We here at Film Club like complex villains. And we think this accounts for some of the most truly evil, but also most amazing, characters of all time: Heath Ledger’s Joker from The Dark Knight; Anthony Perkins’ Norman Bates from Psycho; Edith Hamilton’s Wicked Witch of the West from The Wizard of Oz; and finally, Rachel McAdams’ Regina George from Mean Girls.

But the beauty of Mean Girls is not just in the way that it avoids the cliché “good girl” vs. “mean girl, or the way that the obvious villain, Regina, is portrayed. It’s the way that the true villain is brought out of hiding. Cady, the main character played by Lindsay Lohan, is a perfectly clean slate, a character who the way evil might develop in all of us. Throughout the film,  Cady may start out pure and honest, but as the film progresses she loses her moral balance and an imperfect sense of the line between right and wrong.

At the beginning of the film, Cady doesn’t even know there is a line. As time goes on, she sees where it is, but afterwards, as mean girl events spiral out of control, her view is distorted. Why does this happen? Because the film’s true villain, Regina, distorts Cady’s perception of the world. That’s how evil she is. And Cady’s naiveté and innocence work against her. Yet at no time does Regina throw back her head and laugh evilly – moo-hoo-ha-ha-ha-haaaa! – because she’s not a caricaturish villain; she’s just a girl in high school who likes to be in charge and get others to do things her way.

Cady’s “fall” in her conflict with Regina, doesn’t make her completely evil either. But no longer is she spotless. And, in fact we can see that very few of the characters in Mean Girls are perfect heroes in the madness of high school. And many have mean streaks. Fortunately, there’s no one like that at SPA. Just keep telling yourself: “It’s only a movie!”

Kaia Findlay
Film Club Publicist

Henry Selick's James and the Giant Peach (1996)

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George Dunning's Yellow Submarine (1968)

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Robert Siodmak's The Killers (1946)

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Disney's Fantasia (1940)

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Robert Weine's The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920)

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Michel Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

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Brad Bird's The Iron Giant (1999)

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Ang Lee's The Wedding Banquet (1993)

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Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

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Dave Fleischer's Mr. Bug Goes to Town (1941)

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Josef von Sternberg's The Blue Angel (1930)

The Blue Angel, directed by Josef von Sternberg in 1930, is an adaptation of Heinrich Mann’s novel Professor Unrat. It stars the iconic Marlene Dietrich as Lola Lola, a cabaret singer, and Emil Jannings, as Immanuel Rath, a teacher at a boy’s Gymnasium.

This film is known for marking the start of the historical Dietrich-Sternberg collaboration, and also being one of the first German films to employ sound. But, this film provides more than just these two milestones.

Lola and Rath are two drastically different characters. Rath embodies austerity while Lola epitomizes liberation. The narration follows the authoritative Rath down his path of self-destruction. The film begins with Rath catching his students looking at risqué photos of Lola Lola, the headliner at the local cabaret The Blue Angel. Rath then goes to the club, in attempt to stop them in the act. Much to his demise, there he meets Lola, the infatuation begins, and his integrity crumbles.

Many look at this film as an allegory for the state of Germany before the first World War – Rath symbolizing Germany’s peremptory disposition and Lola representing the countering force. Rath’s downfall, then, would represent Germany’s ruin. Whether or not this was Sternberg’s intention, The Blue Angel captures the sentiment of the time and the downtroddeness that defeat yields.

Cinematically the dark shadows render a sinister effect, and the characters always seem at the edge of danger. Lola personifies this mood. She embodies a dark exoticism not seen in prior films, an unbridled sexuality not present prior in the cinematic world. Her sexuality, however, is not what makes Lola a compelling character; it is her inaccessibility. She possesses both masculine and feminine traits, passivity and muscle, and her fluctuation between these traits give her power and depth. This energy inspired the femme fatales of the later film noir movement.

Looming danger, sexuality, cultural revival, and the emancipation of women were prevalent in the Weimar Republic, and this film provides a window into the condition of the German state.

This film’s significance, however, does not solely lie in its historical context. It is also an examination of the human psyche. Stemberg uses the relationship between Rath and Lola, and their fluctuating dependence on themselves and society, to question man’s self-reliance. Ultimately he questions whether or not satisfaction can be derived from others, and from the self.

Although this film possesses many cinematographic conventions of the time it still holds poignancy. Stemberg’s use of imagery, jest, and character interplay provide a palpable gateway to the past and a connection to the current cinema

Ella Coon
Film Club Co-President

Jim Sharman's The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

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Sylvain Chomet's The Triplets of Belleville (2003)

Your Humble Commentator wants to talk about something fairly peripheral to tonight’s film, but the gist will be that you want to watch one of Sylvain Chomet’s films in a particular way, and it may be slightly different from how you expect to be watching The Triplets of Belleville. Let’s begin with a little story.

This summer I took daughter #3 to see Disney’s Tangled at the Riverview Theater. A impressive show, Tangled provides the usual well-drawn storybook characters – repressed but plucky heroine, roguish but vulnerable hero, cute animal sidekick (a chameleon), exasperated animal sidekick (Flynn’s horse), and a witchy villain. And the plot moves along with deftly handled comic and tragic turns. The laughs come easily and so do tears. Watching Tangled, one is reminded why Disney has been the best at providing animated features since Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937; honorary Oscar for innovation in 1939). I walked out of the theater thinking, “it’s hard to make an animated feature more polished than that.”

And I drove home, dropped off daughter #3 and picked up daughter #1, and drove back to the Riverview to see Sylvain Chomet’s most recent animated feature, The Illusionist (2010). In it, a down-on-his-luck vaudeville prestidigitator travels around Europe performing in run-down theaters to nearly non-existent crowds. In one inn, he meets and befriends a waifish girl, who decides to travel with him to the big city where he is trying to survive on what engagements he can scare up. They live together, she explores the big city, dreams about a better life, finds it, and that’s about it. It may not seem like much, but it is an undeniably beautiful film. I found myself as impressed by what it didn’t do as by what it did. And I found myself comparing the two films, struck by how different they were, and how much that revealed about what our culture has come to expect of the animated feature film.

For one, where Tangled was polished, The Illusionist was rough. One feels free to follow where it leads, to peer into its nooks and crannies, to ponder its suggestions. Nathan Greno and Byron Howard’s film (the Disney film) leads you to clear, familiar places. It’s hard to watch Tangled and not see reflections of earlier Disney movies, subtly shifted to give the impression of newness. Likewise, the Disney film controls your emotions, giving you big laugh gags followed by tear-jerking melodrama (the hero dies! after sacrificing first his selfishness, then himself for the heroine! then – get another handkerchief – he comes back to life!). Chomet paints a more muted, bittersweet picture – you may chuckle but at moments that are slightly disturbing, and you may be disturbed at moments that are darkly funny. But what emerges from the Chomet experience is a sense that you’ve encountered a true portrait of what life is like. And that it has been presented to you with a simple charm, like a small gift hand-wrapped in yesterday’s giftwrap.

Yes, Disney’s Tangled is presenting a fairytale, not at all the same thing. We want romance, intrepid heroes overcoming adversity, and neat conclusions from those movies. And Disney gives that to us with panache and professionalism. That’s expected.

From Chomet, though, Your Humble Commentator wants you to relish the unexpected, the magic of depicting human life in all its quirkiness. The Triplets of Belleville has an awkward narrative, not easy to follow at first. But the story in not the priority. Watch the characters. Watch the magic. Watch the life.

R. Findlay
Film Club Adviser

Peter Weir's The Truman Show (1993)

The Truman Show is that rare triumph of family filmmaking that introduces its viewers to something bigger than children’s movies. It is made with perfect Hollywood ease, an easy-to-follow plot, and somewhat exaggerated acting. Still, that it pushes its viewer to think is undeniable.

I remember watching the film in elementary school and having a discussion about it afterward. Up until then, my movie-watching had consisted mostly of cartoons and musicals, repeated about ten times each thanks to the wonder of VHS. It was then that I discovered a movie that genuinely gripped and confused me, with a shocking twist two-thirds of the way through. Even more shocking than the twist of plotline was the presence of anything unpredictable at all in a storyline.

The initial appeal has faded, but I’ve watched Peter Weir’s The Truman Show several times since and I keep finding new questions. What does Truman tell us about human consciousness? How does the rubber idiot of Dumb and Dumber transform into a transfixing, thoughtful actor? (This is a question that comes up again in Jim Carrey’s best movie, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.) Is the movie responsible for those people who schizophrenically believed that they were in a television show – dubbed “Truman Syndrome” by the Institute of Psychiatry in London?

Still, the biggest question is: How did Weir know? Just a decade into the future, Americans are fascinated by televised private lives, from Octomom to Jersey Shore. Not since Network has a movie so accurately predicted the future of popular culture.

Noah Shavit-Lonstein
Film Club

The Evolution of Jim Carrey, Actor

It’s worth considering Noah’s question regarding Jim Carrey’s transformation from elastic clown to amiable naif in his career. He approaches his early movies, driven by a kind of manic hyperactivity, as if his goal were to become a Tex Avery cartoon character (which he pretty much does in Chuck Russell’s The Mask). But in The Truman Show and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (which Film Club will screen in February), he’s more human, more a part of the film, more consistently someone to whom life-changing events happen, and, in the end, more watchable.

It’s also worth noting that Carrey is not the first late-night sketch comedian to make this transition. Watch Bill Murray mug and smirk his way through early films like Stripes, Ghostbusters, Meatballs, and Caddyshack, then note the mellower, wryer, more bittersweet characters that he plays in Rushmore or Lost in Translation. Will Ferrell, too, relied on his ironic clueless, self-absorbed jerk act through movies like Anchorman and Talladega Nights, but turned to a more serious, three-dimensional role in Stranger Than Fiction. Heck, even Adam Sandler, after a number of screechy steroidal arrested-adolescence films like Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison (and Little Nicky, which we’d rather scrub our eyeballs with cleanser on a wire toothbrush than have to watch again), tried to move from the look-at-me medium of feature length sketch comedy to true movie acting in Spanglish. Not successfully, mind you, but he tried.

What we learn, perhaps, is that while "Saturday Night Live" and "MADtv" and "In Living Color," post-prime time sketch comedy series, may boost an actor to popularity (especially if the opportunistic comedian comes up with a memorable catch-phrase), it’s still a long way to serious acting. In fact, said comedian may be hampered by the kind of characters one develops in those kind of shows – they tend to be one-dimensional, built on a idiosyncratic characteristic, and a bit improvisational. As you watch Truman, take note of Carrey’s ability to blend himself into the texture of the film and to use his usually plastic face more subtly, showing Truman’s struggle with confusion, alienation, and adversity. Compared to Fire Marshall Bill, he’s almost a different species.

R. Findlay
Film Club Adviser