Capitalism: A Love Story is typical Michael Moore fare: polarizing, manipulative, and an attempt to inspire people to get mad as hell and not take it anymore. Moore makes the film a lesson in presidential culpability, claiming that our current economic crisis is a direct result of Ronald Reagan's presidency, which blissfully shunned Jimmy Carter's pleas for a reduction in consumption. Reagan's sympathy for the rich was then aided later by the Clinton and Bush administrations' push for deregulation in banking, and now Obama is portrayed as the messiah who will make or break us as a nation.
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The Jordanian film Captain Abu Raed was well-received when it toured the festival circuit in 2008, winning the World Cinema Audience Award at Sundance that year among its several honors, but it never obtained wider distribution in theaters. Now that it's available on DVD, maybe it will finally get a broader audience it requires -- after all, you can't make a message film about helping others and changing young lives without wanting the world to see it.
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Welcome back to Moment of Truth, Movieline's new weekly spotlight on the best in nonfiction cinema. This week, we hear from the director of Believe: The Eddie Izzard Story, which was released this week on DVD.
The cross-dressing comic and actor Eddie Izzard wasn't always the "cross-dressing comic and actor Eddie Izzard." Sarah Townsend knew him back when he was just another struggling performer desperate for a break, working round the clock and riding a unicycle for whatever spare change passers-by on the street might have in their pockets. And since 2003, Townsend has been piecing those days -- and the rest in between -- together for her debut feature documentary Believe: The Eddie Izzard Story. I know, I know: "Why does Eddie Izzard need his own documentary?" You'd be surprised. It's quite the inspiration, really -- motivational substance for people who hate that kind of stuff. It's also a fascinating glimpse at just how comedy is conceived and delivered. Townsend talked to Movieline about this and much more for this week's Moment of Truth.
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Robin Wright gives a convincing performance in The Private Lives of Pippa Lee as a woman whose dysfunctional relationship with her mother led to unhealthy relationships with everyone around her -- including, and this is what the film wants to drive home hardest, herself. There are a lot of tears shed throughout the film. Other things there are a lot of: women in love with Alan Arkin, deaths, and shots of Blake Lively's enviable gams. Even though the sum of all those parts sounds promising, the film somehow still ends up being a drag. And don't get me started on the ending. Sure, I understand it's a journey through Pippa's life, but to end the film with -- spoiler alert! -- a road trip? Really? I never read the book, but it can't end with a pickup truck driving off into the sunset, can it?
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In the "Introduction to Ponyo" feature on the Ponyo Blu-ray and DVD, producer Kathleen Kennedy explains that every animation cell that filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki's creates is a painting worthy of a frame, and that's true. The art of Ponyo is gorgeous, especially any scene (that's to say 90% of them) involving water. Ponyo is a retelling of The Little Mermaid, but although it's a Walt Disney picture, it has nothing to do with Ariel, singing, or obese octopi. There is, however, a fascinating(ly bad) theme song at the end of the film that's sung by the film's American voice-over leads, Noah Cyrus and Frankie Jonas, that might be our new go-to whenever we need a laugh. We're talking AutoTune and remixes, people. If you don't believe us, it's on YouTube.
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Not having caught Cirque du Freak: Vampire's Assistant in the theater, I had high hopes for it based on the DVD menu and opening sequence. The title animation was spider-y and Coraline-y and left me optimistic that somehow the Buffy-shaped hole in our heart would be filled by this vampire comedy. Optimism quickly waned as soon as vampire John C. Reilly made his first appearance in a Little Orphan Annie wig. With terrible performances all around from each and every actor in it's decent cast (Reilly, Willem Defoe, Salma Hayek, Patrick Fugit), this Cirque was harder to stomach than the clown sequences in Kooza.
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Sorority Row targets that narrow cross section of the population who are both slasher film fans and people willing to watch Rumer Willis act. The film also is best seen by anyone not familiar with Scream, since the ruling principles of both films are the same: cozy, anonymous town terrorized by a killer, cameo by a celebrity (okay, in this case it's a reality show "celebrity") who gets offed in the first ten minutes, a series of creative slashings and gashings, and a heroine with a conscience trying to save her friends. Carrie Fisher's presence as the boozy house mother is also an unexplained phenomenon that is neither funny nor campy; I guess that just makes it just sort of sad. Help her, Obi Wan, she's accepting terrible roles.
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Would Up In The Air still be a Best Picture contender if Jason Reitman hadn't cut its original, dream-sequence ending featuring George Clooney in a spacesuit? We'll never know. But if you're curious, it shows up on the DVD and Blu-ray, out March 9. What we learned from that deleted scene -- plus several others included in the release -- is that Reitman smartly pruned his film down to only the material that stayed true to his characters. Always open to sharing the secrets of his craft, Reitman's commentary track is not surprisingly in-depth, and bridges the gaps between the Walter Kirn-penned book the film is based on, the deleted scenes, and the final cut.
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