16 發光的城市 A R O U N D T O W N FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2009 • TAIPEI TIMES

Other releases It’s the age of a child Compiled by Martin Williams Frost/Nixon As Richard Nixon walked his long who grows from a man road toward hoped-for rehabilitation, he conducted In David Fincher’s hands, the incredible conceit of a man who ages a series of interviews in in reverse has been turned into a plausible love story 1977 with declining TV identity David Frost. This film by Ron Howard, based on Peter Morgan’s By A. O. SCOTT play, recreates and embellishes their crucial, NY Times News Service, New York revelatory exchanges and the maneuvering that surrounded them. Nominated for Oscars he Curious Case of Benjamin Button, a dimension of delicacy and grace to digital elusiveness, from one film to the next, is daughter (Julia Ormond) in a New Orleans including Best Picture, Frost/Nixon follows which occupies around 25 pages filmmaking. While it stands on the shoulders of starting to look more defensive than daring. His hospital room in 2005, just as Hurricane Katrina All the President’s Men in defying the foregone T in the collected works of F. Scott breakthroughs like Minority Report, The Lord recent performances have been devoted mainly is approaching the city. The imminence of the conclusions of historical events to deliver a Fitzgerald, is a slender piece of whimsy, a of the Rings and Forrest Gump (for which Roth to the study of his own magnetism, a quality storm is a superfluous and unduly portentous crackling drama. The widely praised Frank charming fantasy about a man who ages in wrote the screenplay), Benjamin Button may he earnestly explores in The Assassination of device, since Katrina brings to mind precisely Langella is Nixon and Michael Sheen is Frost. reverse, descending through the years from be the most dazzling such hybrid yet, precisely Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and the hard, real-life miseries the movie has done newborn senescence to terminal infancy. because it is the subtlest. While he does treat playfully subverts in Burn After Reading. It everything in its power to avoid. He’s Just Not That Into You As Fitzgerald unravels it, Benjamin’s story the audience to a few grand, special-effect goes without saying that Pitt has charisma to That power, though, is something to be serves as the pretext for some amusing, fairly showpieces, Fincher concentrates his ingenuity burn, and he is a capable and inventive actor, reckoned with, and it resides in Fincher’s A large superficial observations about child rearing, on the setting and the characters, in particular but he will only be a great one if he risks ability to use his unbelievable skills to turn an and breezy undergraduate behavior and courtship in the — and most arrestingly — on the faces of his breaking himself open on screen as he did, incredible conceit into a plausible love story. cast turns a late 19th and early 20th centuries. stars, Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt. briefly, in Babel. The romance between Daisy and Benjamin successful self- From this odd, somewhat unpromising Blanchett is Daisy, a dancer, bohemian And so, while Benjamin’s progress through begins when both are chronologically help book into kernel, the director David Fincher and the and all-around free spirit who ages gracefully, life drives the narrative of The Curious Case, pre-adolescents and Benjamin is, physically, a comedy in screenwriter Eric Roth have cultivated a lush, before our eyes, into a stately modern matron he is (as the title suggests) more an object a codger, but the initial element of pedophilic which a bunch romantic hothouse bloom, a film that shares and then into a wasted, breathless old woman. of contemplation than a flesh-and-blood (or creepiness in the relationship gives way to other of couples only a title and a basic premise with its literary Pitt, for the most part, plays Benjamin, who bit-and-byte) candidate for our empathy. His forms of awkwardness. Their love is uniquely and singles source. The Curious Case of Benjamin is born, looking like a man in his 70s, into a jaunt through the 20th century is certainly fun perfect and enduring. At the same time, like any agonize over their romantic shortcomings. Button, more than two and a half hours prominent New Orleans family in 1918. I say to watch, with an episodic rhythm that recalls other love — like any movie — it is shadowed Derided by some critics as dressing up the same long, sighs with longing and simmers with for the most part because near the end of the old movie serials or, even more, the endlessly by disappointment and fated to end. In the case old conservative formula of happy endings and intrigue while investigating the philosophical movie Pitt is replaced by younger and younger dilated adventures of newspaper comic-strip of Benjamin Button, I was sorry when it was character karma in modern clothes and fresh conundrums and emotional paradoxes of its children and also because, at the beginning, heroes. After some initiation into the pleasures over and happy to have seen it. faces, fans of the performers should still have protagonist’s condition in a spirit that owes he is evoked by an uncanny computer- of the flesh and the bottle in the city of his birth, a good time — and at least it’s not based on a more to Jorge Luis Borges than to Fitzgerald. generated confection that seems to have been Young Button (Old Button) hires onto a tramp cellphone serial. Stars Jennifer Aniston, Scarlett While the film’s plot progresses, with a distilled from his essence. This creature, tiny steamer. He tarries a while in Russia, sampling Johansson, Drew Barrymore, Ben Affleck, Justin few divagations, in a straight line through and wizened, is at once boy and man, but caviar and adultery (with a superbly soignee Long and the head-turning Ginnifer Goodwin, the decades of Benjamin Button’s life, the in every scene the ratio is readjusted, until Tilda Swinton) before World War II intrudes. among many others. backward vector of that biography turns the strapping figure of a familiar movie star Later there will be sailboats and motorcycles THE CURIOUS CASE OF this Curious Case into a genuine mystery. emerges, gradually and all but imperceptibly. as the ambient light turns gold along with Pitt’s Elsa and Fred And the puzzles it invites us to contemplate The inner life of Benjamin Button, hair. There will not be much in the way of BENJAMIN BUTTON — in consistently interesting, if not always abandoned at birth by his stricken father big events or public happenings — Benjamin This rather dramatically satisfying ways — are deep and (Jason Flemyng) and raised by the infinitely Button is, finally, no Forrest Gump — and Directed by: David Fincher melodramatic imposing, concerning the passage of time, the kind caretaker of a nursing home (Taraji P. though he is a white Southerner raised by a Spanish/ elusiveness of experience and the Janus-faced Henson), is harder to grasp than his outer black woman, he seems untouched by racial Starring: Brad Pitt (Benjamin Button), Cate Argentine nature of love. appearance, in part because Pitt seems more turmoil or by much of anything beyond the Blanchett (Daisy), Taraji P. Henson (Queenie), co-production Above all, though, The Curious Case of interested in the nuances of reticence than mysteries of his peculiar destiny. Julia Ormond (Caroline), Jason Flemyng from 2005 Benjamin Button is a triumph of technique. in the dynamics of expression. It’s true that But the movie’s emotional center of gravity (Thomas Button), Elias Koteas (Monsieur revisits the Building on the advances of pioneers like Steven Benjamin’s condition imposes a certain — the character who struggles and changes Gateau), Tilda Swinton (Elizabeth Abbott), late blooming Jared Harris (Captain Mike) Spielberg, Peter Jackson and Robert Zemeckis detachment: he is at once innocent and and feels — is Daisy, played by Blanchett from romance sub- genre as lonely new neighbors Fred (Manuel — and on his own previous work adapting ancient, almost never who he appears to be. impetuous ingenue to near ghost with an almost Running time: 167 minutes newfangled means to traditional cinematic ends But even though Pitt’s coolness is a perfectly otherworldly mixture of hauteur and heat. The Alexandre) and Elsa (China Zorrilla) strike up a — Fincher (Fight Club, Zodiac) has added defensible approach to this character, his story of Benjamin’s life is read to Daisy by her Taiwan release: Today relationship that ought to make the characters in He’s Just Not That Into You envious. Fred eventually fulfills Elsa’s dream of recreating the fountain scene from Fellini’s La Dolce Vita during a trip to Rome. Critics were not as impressed as might be expected with this one, though Roger Ebert thought the fountain climax was moving enough to warrant a spoiler.

Storm Rider: Clash of Evils An animated film from Hong Kong continues the saga of two young martial arts aces of The changing face of Benjamin Button, played predominantly by Brad Pitt, as he ages backwards over the course of the 20th century. Photos courtesy of Warner Bros lore who avenge their parents’ deaths before being separated and facing new challenges to survive. When they finally link up again they must deal Mission imperative: assassinate the Fuhrer with a new and more powerful enemy and difficult choices. Judging from the trailer, this Tom Cruise is too Tom Cruise — and too American —������� to �b����������������������������e a count and colonel in the �g������uise of ������������������Claus von Stauffen�b��er�g is manna from heaven for people who know the story or who play sword and sorcery computer games online, but of little interest for anyone expecting the depth and craftsmanship of Pixar. By MANOHLA DARGIS Christopher McQuarrie and Nathan image, can be agreeably pleasurable, Hitler but worshipped the Reich, NY Times News Service, New York Alexander, aren’t interested in he tends to gild every lily. Hitler sacrificed himself on the dual altar There are no discernibly nasty Nazis in delivering a history lesson. Slick, (David Bamber) doesn’t need spooky of nationalism and militarism, which The Dark Knight (IMAX version) Valkyrie, though Hitler and Goebbels facile entertainment is the name of music or low camera angles to be makes him a more ambiguous figure Just in time skulk about in a few scenes, shooting the game here, as it is in all Singer’s villainous: he just has to show up. than the one drawn in Valkyrie. He’s for the Oscars, dark, ominous looks at the heroic films, including Apt Pupil (about a Singer’s fondness for exaggeration can a complex character, too complex for the Miramar German Army officer played by Tom Nazi war criminal and the American even undercut his strongest scenes, this film, which like many stories of in Taipei is Cruise. Perhaps they’re wondering boy next door who outs him) and as when Stauffenberg visits Hitler this type, transforms World War II into re-releasing what this Hollywood megastar is doing The Usual Suspects, an intricately to secure approval for the rewritten a boy’s adventure with dashing heroes, this wonderful in their midst, a sentiment that you plotted story with men and guns, Valkyrie plan. If implemented, the miles of black leather and crane spectacle until may come to share while watching secrets and shadows that McQuarrie plan will bring down the Fuhrer shots of German troops in lockstep Watchmen Cruise — who gives a fine, typically wrote. The secrets have already who, for his part, seems intent on formation. It’s a war that offers starts on the energetic performance in a film that begun swirling by the time Valkyrie bringing down the house with leers moral absolutes (Nazis are evil) and very big screen on March 6. The IMAX theater requires nothing more of him than a opens with Stauffenberg, stationed and popping eyeballs. Singer appears narratives (Nazis are evil and should is where this brooding classic truly belongs, profile and vigor — strut about as one in North Africa, bitterly recording his to have taken cues here from Black die) that seem easier to grasp than any and those who haven’t seen the IMAX print now of history’s more enigmatic players. opposition to Hitler in a diary right Book, Paul Verhoeven’s World War II current conflict. Truly, World War II have another chance to pay slightly more for That enigma was Claus von before losing various body parts to the romp, but he’s too serious to make has become the moviemaker’s gift that a very big payoff. This Batman entry, the best Stauffenberg, a count and a colonel war. After his convalescence he meets such vaudeville work. keeps on giving, whether you want it of them all, starts with Heath Ledger’s criminal who, though he lost one eye, an entire Major General Henning von Tresckow Stauffenberg, who hated to or not. anarchy and ends with the battered, bereaved hand and several fingers while fighting (Kenneth Branagh), who, sometime hero fleeing from infamy into the unknown. on behalf of the Reich, made several earlier, tries to blow up Hitler with Brian Singer’s depiction of Claus von Stauffenberg, played by Tom Cruise, turns an ambiguous Brilliant, rousing stuff. attempts to assassinate Hitler and a bomb hidden in bottles of French historical figure into a dashing Hollywood hero. photo: courtesy of united artists seize control of the government. At the liqueur. (Russian vodka might have core of Stauffenberg’s spectacularly been more effective.) Stauffenberg Love Exposure ambitious plot was Valkyrie, Hitler’s soon joins the conspiratorial party eases into English, this international This South plan for the mobilization of the home that includes other British class acting community invokes an earlier Korean army that Stauffenberg hoped to acts brandishing high military rank studio age, when Peter Lorre and romantic hijack in order to quash the SS and and speaking in lightly accented or Claude Rains delivered their lines VALKYRIE yarn from its leaders. It didn’t work, of course, unaccented English: Bill Nighy as in exotically flavored English and 2007 about for complicated reasons, though also General Friedrich Olbricht, Tom everyone pretended that Rick’s Cafe Directed by: Bryan Singer the lives and because by 1944, as William L. Shirer Wilkinson as General Friedrich really was located in Casablanca and loves of two bluntly puts it in The Rise and Fall of Fromm, Terence Stamp as General not on a back lot. If Cruise doesn’t Starring: Tom Cruise (Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg), Kenneth female friends the Third Reich, the conspirators were Ludwig Beck and Eddie Izzard as work in Valkyrie, it’s partly because Branagh (Major General Henning von Tresckow), Bill Nighy is notable for “terribly late.” General Erich Fellgiebel. he’s too modern, too American and (General Friedrich Olbricht), Tom Wilkinson (General Friedrich Fromm), Carice van Houten (Nina von Stauffenberg), Thomas being made by women. Its English title suggests You don’t learn how belated Most of the crucial rebellious way too Tom Cruise to make sense in something rather lewd, but the package is the coup d’etat was in Valkyrie, officers are played by British actors, the role, but also because what passes Kretschmann (Major Otto Ernst Remer), Terence Stamp (General Ludwig Beck), Eddie Izzard (General Erich Fellgiebel), Kevin R. about much more than one-night stands and which might matter if this big-ticket while some of the Nazi diehards are for movie realism keeps changing, designer underwear as our heroines deal with production with Cruise in an eye played by Germans, which wouldn’t McNally (Doctor Carl Goerdeler), Jamie Parker (Lieutnant Werner sometimes faster than even a star can von Haeften), David Bamber (Adolf Hitler) infidelity and life choices. Likened to Sex and patch and shiny, shiny boots had be worth mentioning if this cacophony change his brand. the City, and also (unfortunately) known as something to do with reality. But of accents weren’t so distracting. Though Singer’s old-fashioned Running time: 120 minutes Lovers Behind, this hiChannel promotion is the director, Bryan Singer (of the But, as with the casting of Cruise, movie habits, his attention to the exposing itself at Ximending’s Baixue theater. X-Men franchise), and the writers, whose German voice-over quickly gloss, gleam and glamour of the Taiwan release: Today