An exercise in poor taste: sexy beast

[Guest evenflowDDT]

First off I’d like to say thanks to all 12 of you who read my earlier column about Blood Dolls (and if you haven’t seen it yet, it’s in the Smark Krew folder; go now and maybe it’ll make over 15 viewings!).  This time, I figured I’d do the smart thing and submit the review to the movie folder, since all people in Smark Krew want to talk about is each other’s wrestling columns… strange, I know…

 

I originally had this written a couple days ago to be a Ginger Snaps review.  However, I realized how dumb it would be to review the awful American edition of this disc.  So, to summarize (shortest review ever!), Ginger Snaps is the best horror movie in years, a new classic, all-around good movie, albeit with a crappy transfer on a bare-bones disc Stateside.  Whasupwidat? A good horror movie (let me repeat, a good horror movie) comes out and doesn’t get any of the features (not even chapter selection!) on the Canadian special edition, yet crap like Jeepers Creepers gets the deluxe treatment? There’s no justice in this world.  So be it.

 

For a more serious (spoiler-free!) review of the film, check IMDb (http://comments.imdb.com/CommentsShow?203119-127).  For a bonus serious (spoiler-free! Although I do come off as rather redundant) review of Ginger Snaps, also check IMDb (http://comments.imdb.com/CommentsShow?210070-76)

 

Sexy Beast (2000, DVD released 2001)

(She’s a…) 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment

 

Movie (complete with minor plot spoilers!):

A retired criminal, Gal lives in a beautiful Spanish with his loving wife Deedee and married friends Jackie and Aitch.  Totally happy for once in his life, he hasn’t a care in the world until a boulder quickly and suddenly comes rolling down from a hill, barely taking off his head, and crashing into his pool.  As miffed as he is about the boulder, he soon finds that to be the least of his problems when former partner Don Logan rolls into town.  Seems Logan wants Gal for a high-profile job, and refuses to take “no” for an answer.  When Gal tells Logan he’s retired, Logan, already a few clowns short of a circus, goes over the edge…

 

I feel cheated; there’s only one beast in the movie and it’s not very sexy at all (hmmm… I used that joke on IMDb, and it’s still not funny…).  This is still an excellent film, able to successfully blend elements of romance, suspense, and comedy into its rather basic crime drama story.  The performances are fantastic, particularly Ben Kingsley (truly Oscar-calibre), and Ray Winstone, who comes off as a truly nice guy and has chemistry with all his co-stars.  There is also some excellent direction; particularly cool shots involve an opening shot from the boulder’s-eye-view, and near the end, during an underwater drilling/heist.  The most interesting thing about the direction is that director Jonathan Glazer formerly worked only with commercials and music videos, and was able to adapt to feature film so easily.  Of course, this may not be so surprising, but the only other example I can think of with a music video director moving onto feature film was the dismal The Cell.  The only truly odd occasion in this film was the beast itself (remnant of a music video?).  It didn’t appear to be a strong enough symbol of anything in the film, and as such didn’t serve any real purpose other than to look really odd.  And unsexy.

 

Presentation:

The film is presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen.  Interestingly, the source has the most film specks that I have ever seen in a new film.  Thankfully though, the film specks are just minor ones, only really distracting if you really look for them.  Audio is a pretty standard/solid Dolby Surround 5.1.  English subtitles are available for those who have trouble with the accents.

 

Special Features:

Although Sexy Beast doesn’t suffer as much as Ginger Snaps, it sill has much less than it deserves in the features department.  There is a commentary track with Ben Kingsley and producer Jeremy Thomas (why only these two? Probably because it would make the most easily understandable commentary track), and a featurette (simply called that, “Featurette”).  The featurette is interesting because each crew member and actor, depending on who their character was, has a different idea of what type of movie Sexy Beast is.  There are also several trailers, two for Sexy Beast (its interesting to compare the U.S. and European trailers and see how films are advertised in different markets, in Europe it’s pushed as more of a pure crime drama, whereas the U.S. version pushes more of the conflict between Kingsley and Winstone), one a Sexy Beast European TV spot, one for Super Troopers, one for Waking Life (which actually looks like a rather interesting film, anyone seen it?), and one for Deep End.

 

Overall:

Sexy Beast has some Oscar-caliber performances (most other critics make a big deal about how different Kingsley’s Don is from his most famous role of Gandhi, but as a good actor, he is required to take vastly different characters and excel at them all, which he has done here), a good sense of combining multiple genres while maintaining a constant flow, and proves that not all ex-music video directors are all style, no substance.  It may require subtitles at some points when the accents are particularly thick, and sometimes Don’s hard-ass nature can lead to him cussing too much and being a bothersome, but it’s definitely one of the best films of last year.

 

I wanted to wait until a few more reviews to do this, but I went laser tag on Monday and didn’t get to put up as many as I want (I’ll definitely put up more this week though, probably on Friday).  I always said I’d never be one to shill a wishlist, but tomorrow (April 4) is my birthday, so if you have an extra $15 you’d like to spend on a complete stranger, buy me a book or David Bowie CD or something (www.amazon.com/o/registry/KMEWMDJOCS5V).  Since I’m turning 18, there are 18 items (OK, 19, but only because I don’t expect anyone to buy me the Queer as Folk DVDs, that’s just so when I have money I can remember they exist and can buy them for myself).  If you buy me anything, besides reviewing that, I’ll review any movie (on DVD or no) that is readily available at a retail rental place (I go to Hollywood Video) as request.  Not that I really expect anyone to, but people actually bought Scotsman and Scott Keith stuff, so who knows? Let me know if you liked this piece, and I hope the server and SmarksDVD come back soon.  Be back in a day or two, with some cheesier films; this is just to indulge my serious film-student side.  

 

Edward Robins

abba_owns_me at hotmail dot com

[Guest Lord of The Curry]

Agreed, homey. Kingsley played the supreme Brit-mafia dickhead to a tee. Spot on acting by our old pal Ghandi.

[Guest Red Hot Thumbtack In The Eye]

I just saw this movie the other day and all i can say is that its nice to see a movie that differs from the norm of garbago that we usually have to see. Kingsley was awesome.

[Guest evenflowDDT]

Actually it's really funny, whenever someone asked me what movie I had watched and I said Sexy Beast they were all, "What? Guess you didn't waste much time on getting porn..." and I said, "No it's not that, it has Ben Kingsley in it", to which they would reply, "Oh... Ghandi, right?"

 

Guess that stuff really does stick with you.