The Long and Winding Road to Perdition

There are huge benefits to being an overworked, underpaid teacher of ungrateful learners--not the least of which is summer vacation!

I took full advantage today, leaping from my bed at the ungodly hour of 10:30, and cruising down to the Dole Cannery Theaters to catch whatever movie struck my fancy.

The new Paul Newman & Tom Hanks film, Road to Perdition, opened today, so I eagerly plunked down my five bucks and slid into my space in the sparsely-populated movie theater.

David Letterman had Hanks and Newman both on his show this past week, and Letterman couldn't stop raving. Not my usual source for a good flick tip, but with these two guys, how bad could it be?

There are many things about this film that give me moral pause--movies where the main characters are basically reprehensible always do--but I was mostly able to get past that and accept the characters on their own terms, in their own worlds, just as I mostly could with The Godfather and with Goodfellas.

More than anything else, this movie looked great. Sam Mendes, whose American Beauty left me with the same impression, did a terrific job with colors, shading, sounds, framing, and direction. Mendes is doing more than his share to keep me from dismissing nearly all big-budget Hollywood blockbuster releases as not worth my time and money. Set in the 1930s, everything from the buildings to the automobiles and costumes was completely convincing.

As for Hanks and Newman, their respective roles didn't give much room for them to flex their acting muscles, but they both--and Newman especially--gave solid performances, often saying more with a look or a pause than with the text of their dialogue. Newman benefits from the same phenomenon that gives guys like Donald Sutherland, Robert Duvall, and Peter Fonda more depth than perhaps they earn--the camera loves these old guys, whose eyes seem to communicate a real-life, seen-it-all complexity that just seems to come with older actors.

Or perhaps they're just great actors.

In any case, for visuals alone, the movie gets my recommendation. 8.5, for good direction, solid acting, and an intriguing story (which I have carefully not summarized here for you).

To the very large man who brought the five-year-old-boy into a movie where children clearly do not belong, 2 out of 10 for irresponsible parenting.

Comments

I was going to go see this, if only for Paul Newman and Jude Law. Hubba hubba.

(Then again, I'm the kind of person who'll still do Jude Law even if he actually sported those bad teeth in real life.)

I've noticed that Sam Mendes has always been a highly visual director, not just with his work in film but also with his work on stage. I think that's what he shares with Baz Luhrmann (who also got his start in the theah-tuh), except that Mendes gravitates more towards classy, post-modern reinterpretations than flashy camp spectacles.

Give the cinematographer some credit; every review I've read talks about the work he did.

I'm going to see Reign of Fire this weekend and I expect the performances of the dragons to be fiery!

Oh yeah ... "Reign of Fire" is the hottest ticket of the summer, no doubt.

Wait... we went on this long with no mention of CROCODILE HUNTER? Lemme tell ya, folks, I'm smelling an award-winning performance here.

Actually, I'd think there'd be biting performances with a lot of snappy dialogue in "Crocodile Hunter".

Okay, I just saw Reign of Fire. The dragons were neat but by the end, the whole movie pretty much burned out.

OMG, what horrid puns, you guys!

Considering that I found myself walking out of Crocodile Hunter last night, at least I can say that something did bite.

Umm, topic... does anyone here know where I could get the original Road to Perdition graphic novel - or at least translations of the manga series (Lone Wolf and Cub) on which it's supposed to be based?

My mom and I (on her visit to Las Vegas over the weekend) went to see Road to Perdition. We both enjoyed the movie thoroughly though commented that it wasn't Tom Hank's usual role. I think that people tend to feel uncomfortable when actors, especially good ones, play roles outside their usual ones. My feeling is that Tom Hanks is such a good actor that taking this chance to play the "bad guy" worked out great for him. I'm sure that as people really take the time to watch the movie, they will realize that he is such a flexible actor.

The boy that plays his son did an awesome job in the movie. I think that between Newman, Hanks, Tucci, Law and the boy that plays his son, it is a great movie. Unfortunately Jennifer Jason Leigh who plays Hank's wife in the movie doesn't have a role that would have utilized her talents as much.

Stella, Lone Wolf and Cub is a fairly popular series (as well as long!), and should be available even at your local Borders or whatnot. You can also order them from Amazon or directly from Dark Horse. There are lots of them! 27 volumes planned, 22 released, with the remaining 5 due out by the end of the year. Lots of good stuff. :) (If you sign up for the Borders newsletter, they tend to send a middling about of email, but the email they do send includes 20%-off coupons on a regular basis, which helps defray the cost of buying all these comics! Of course, if you can support a local comics shop (I used to shop at Geckos, but then, I lived in Kailua), all the better!) (I swear, I'll stop talking now.)

Meri, now that you mention it - I almost forgot about Gecko's and Collector Maniacs out at Waialae Avenue, which is a quick bus ride away from where I live! One of these days I ought to pay 'em a visit just to see if they'll have the books. :)

And, yes, I always get those Borders 20% off coupons every time in my email, too. Hmmm... come to think of it, that coupon for the $0.25 mocha freeze has been burning a hole in my pocket...

Okay, I'm coming into this a bit late, blame the fact that I'm sharing online access with 4 other people, but I'd like to point out that Collector Maniacs has a great deal on all sorts of comics. 25% off all comics, whether they be the regular books, manga, the graphic novels, backissues, or just even comic-related magazines.

And to bring this back ontopic, I did see Road to Perdition last night. It was good movie, but just seemed to be heading in one direction throughout. Ebert compared it to a classic Greek tragedy (where the hero is inevitably doomed to fall) and I'd have to agree.

An update: Borders, Barnes, and Walden's - as well as Gecko Books - all carry the Lone Wolf and Cub series (in the traditional manga format) for $9.95 per book. (The artwork is gorgeous, and the plots are quite engaging - it's one of those books where you can almost quite get the action even if the dialogue isn't in English.) However, when I went to the same stores looking for the original graphic novel by Max Allan Collins, no copies turned up - apparently because they were all sold out of it.

In the meantime, here's the repackaged version of the book. (Note the new cover; I hear Collins is also working on a novelization of the movie, as well.)

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