Paranoid Park (Gus van Sant, 2007)

Les Cahiers du cinema, France's premiere film journal, named Gus van Sant's Paranoid Park their favorite film of 2007. It also won the 60th Anniversary Prize and was nominated for the Palme d'Or at Cannes last year. Those amount to a pretty darn good pedigree for this film, but I have a love-hate relationship with van Sant. At his best (Elephant, To Die For), he documents the dark side of the outsider; at his worst (Last Days, parts of Drugstore Cowboy and My Own Private Idaho), he's boring and pretentious. So where would Paranoid Park fit into this rubric? Thankfully, it's his best film ever. Like with Elephant, van Sant used almost all amateur actors to portray the inhabitants of this teenage world. Alex, played near-perfectly by Gabe Nevins, is a Portland high school skateboarder who is invited by his friend to Paranoid Park, a skateboard park where the punk kids, the homeless kids, the kids who are unwanted go (Alex has a wonderful interior monologue about however bad your family situation is, these kids have it worse). When he goes on his own one Saturday night, he decides to go freight train-riding with a guy he just met. When a security guard tries to stop them, Alex accidentally kills him, and then spends the rest of the movie trying to cope with his actions, accidental though they were. van Sant tells the story through the framework of Alex's writings about the event. He's not particularly brilliant, or eloquent, or even that good at showing his emotions. Alex is a normal teenage boy, and Nevins' lack of emoting is perfect for the role. When Alex does break down, then, it's even more devastating. The plot is thin, but not to the detriment of the movie. There are long, slow-motion, lyrical shots of skateboarding and kids walking down their school's hallways, among other things. Some have (perhaps rightfully so at times) called these boring; I think they were hypnotic and illuminating. van Sant has taken the exploration of one's interior life that he stalled with in Last Days, and perfected it here. All the teenagers are natural, even when they seem unnatural. The progression of guilt from Alex's insides to his relationships with his family and friends is devastating, and emotionally resonating. van Sant has made his best film 20 years into his career; I hope he keeps it up. But knowing him, he'll make a completely different film next time. I expect no less. 8.5/10

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Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (Gus van Sant, 1993)

Gus van Sant is a filmmaker I really have issues with. I respect him very much, I really like some of his movies (Elephant is probably my favorite), kind of like some others (My Own Private Idaho, which really thought it was way better than it actually was, although there are some amazing moments), and hated some more (Last Days was one of the most pretentious, boring films I saw this year). I was excited to watch this film, as it promised a great premise (I know a lot about Tom Robbins, although I haven't ever read him) and a pretty good cast - Uma Thurman (who is really hit and miss), along with smaller roles by Keanu Reeves (whom I adore, no matter what), Crispin Glover, and Lorraine Bracco, among many others. The first half of the film really impressed me, while the second left me a bit cold. However, the visuals really overrode any flaws in the script/acting, as has happened with other van Sant films, and really make this a film worth seeing. Uma Thurman plays Sissy, a lady blessed (or cursed?) with abnormally large thumbs that make her the best hitchhiker in history. She eventually joins up with the lesbian separatists at the Rubber Rose Ranch, who are protecting a group of herons they've given peyote. Yep. Lots of other stuff happens, but most of it is pretty inconsequential, if not entertaining. The performances are all pretty good, and right for the characters, save Rain Phoenix, who, in her first leading adult performance, is pretty stiff and uncharasmatic as the (supposedly) incredible cowgirl leader Bonanza Jellybean. Most of the critiques I have read of the film are critical of the film's "antiquated" view of feminism, but it seems that most of these critics forgot that this film takes place in the early 1970s, a time where separatist movements were just coming into vogue, and radical (lesbian) feminism was beginning. These cowgirls are really radical, whether they seem so anymore or not. As I said earlier, this film is definitely worth a view, if only for the incredibly visuals - the movie is oftentimes hallucinogenic and surreal, which is only fitting for the subject matter. It's not a great movie, but it certainly doesn't deserve its reputation as one of the worst films ever made, either. 6/10 RIYL: Gregg Araki (another queer filmmaker with a similarly outrageous aesthetic)

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