BAKED ZITI MOVIE REVIEW #1

BAKED ZITI MOVIE REVIEW #1


So I won’t bore you with a long introductory This-Is-Who-I-Am-And-This-Is-What-I’m-All-About accompaniment to my first foray into the world of film, but I do think at least some background information is in order. No worries, as I have no intentions to break out the family vacation slides or tell you things that happened when you were just thiiiiiiiiis high. It’s just a little information that will hopefully help put these bad boys in context.

I was (Was? You don’t say …) a bit of an attention whore as a child. I always had to be going, doing, being the center of the universe, working overtime to have all eyes on me. For that reason, anything televised was never a big thing for me when I was younger, because it was pretty impossible to be interactive. Music videos were, of course, an awesome exception to the rule, because you could practice the dance moves and sing along, and they typically made great conversation pieces. Television shows? Not so much. While I occasionally enjoyed the Huxtable or Keaton crisis du jour, I still felt like a performer stuck in a spectator’s body.

I hated watching movies. I absolutely hated it. I don’t know that it had much to do with movies. I think it had a lot more to do with the fact that it was usually code for “sit down and be quiet, people are trying to watch something.” Being told to close my 8-year old eyes during some of the raunchier parts of Dirty Dancing frustrated me; watching some Sunday afternoon movie on TV with bad overdubbing and lots of commercial breaks just left me feeling like I wasted my time.

Somewhere along the way, my tastes changed, but it took a while. I grew accustomed to my cinematic deficiency and I’m not sure I realized what I was missing until I watched American Beauty. Now granted, it’s probably not anywhere near the best movie of all time (though it is the favorite of someone I love very, very much), and it’s probably a bit like saying Jessica Simpson is the greatest pop star of all time, but it was the first time I watched a movie where I really, honestly felt a connection to the characters and was shocked and laughed and thought and all of that great stuff. It was the first time I had seen any type of movie where I felt like it was something more than just an all right way to pass the time.

I’ve watched many other movies since then, most of which I plan to watch again so I can review them for this particular blog, but it was American Beauty that created a bit of a spark in me, and an interest in digging a little deeper and finding out what’s out there.

So, in typically obnoxious postmodern fashion, I decided to take you, the Interweb, on that journey with me. Without further ado, let’s get started.

TARNATION (2004)

I first heard about this actually just a few weeks ago. (I make no illusions of being a buff of any sort.) I was watching some feature on the history of gay cinema, and this was mentioned. It looked interesting, and I thought I would watch it.

So I’ve read a few Internet reviews of people saying this is a pretty self-obsessed film, but I’m not sure I see much particularly wrong with that. (Such a point of view coming from those who take the time to set up an account where they can wax poetic about what they like and what they don’t, not that there’s anything wrong with that, seems hypocritical, and maybe even a bit lower on the food chain in Generation Me.) For me, this totally worked. All I could think while watching this was that I wish I had some key moments in my life caught on film.

And maybe that’s a weird bit of … something. Yeah. I don’t want to call it a criticism of the film, but this is definitely something intended for a very specific audience. Actually, I’m not even totally comfortable saying that, because this feels like something that is more intended for the filmmaker than any audience. And more power to him. But it’s a different type of reaction this movie sparks than most other ones I’ve seen that I’ve loved - one where if you have any artistic leanings at all, you’ll be inspired to do something creative. If you don’t, I’m not sure what you’ll think of this or if you’ll like it, although you’re certainly entitled to your opinion.

Enough diplomacy. There is some engaging story here. Jonathan Carouette, the star of the show and the filmmaker, has quite the life. He doesn’t meet his father until he’s in his thirties, and his mother is in and out of mental institutions. He lives with his grandparents throughout his childhood -- his grandmother seems quite the toothless charm and his grandfather seems like a decent guy. Grandpa's scruples are questioned a little later, but it's ambiguous enough that I think most viewers will come away with varying opinions of him, both for better and for worse.

Jonathan is a hopelessly gay Boy Wonder, doing drag shows for his 8mm camera at a very young age, curiously pretending to be a woman suffering from domestic abuse. As he gets older, unlike most of us, the spirit of imagination and tireless creativity only magnifies, and carries him through some challenging times in his life. What starts as a healthy escape and a case of raw artistic expression eventually turns into what is described in the film as Dissociative Personality Disorder, where Jonathan sees himself in the same way he sees other people. It might be mistaken as referring to himself in the third person by a casual observer, but he's actually speaking of himself as if he's someone he knows, not as if he's speaking about himself. He seems to have high hopes for Jonathan, and by this point, I was starting to as well.

One aspect where I really think this film deserves so much credit is ironically the same area that seems to be getting the most criticism, and I think clarification is in order -- to judge Tarnation is not to judge Jonathan Carouette, but I think the line has become irreparably blurred. I'm tempted to credit that to some high-quality filmmaking myself, but let's look at this from all angles. It would be nary impossible to watch this and not make personal judgments about Jonathan. At times, he seemed a bit self-obsessed and unwilling to take responsibility for his own actions (I believe such creatures are typically referred to as teenagers), at times he seemed like he was exploiting his family's natural dysfunction by filming them in such smarmy fashion, at times he was disrespectful, and he was even violent at times. It's actually the violence that makes it so much easier to make my ultimate point, because it's not shown on camera and it's explained in clear, concise fashion anyway. Giving yourself a favorable edit would be the easy way out, but Carouette paints a pretty full picture and doesn't avoid the uncomfortable or the unflattering. Blowing off the message (the film) for the dislike of the messenger (the filmmaker) would be a colossal mistake.

With that said, there is a lack of moral center here at times, typically a crucial part of any storytelling. Relying on Jonathan to provide that will only leave you disappointed -- he is a child for most of this after all, and that's a pretty heavy burden to put on a kid's shoulders. In a world driven by competition, it's easy to be inclined to take sides, to declare someone here the villain and someone the hero. In truth, everyone involved is a different shade of gray.

The truly impressive part of this is obviously that it was made for a few hundred dollars with standard Mac software. It was a fearlessly unique combination of film, family photos and slides spanning Jonathan's entire life, and it appears to be one of the first of its kind. The story has plenty of text and does at times feel like a glorified Power Point presentation, but those moments are necessary to keep the narrative consistent, and to explain the gaps in time when the cameras were not rolling.

There also is no lack of relevance. You see how mental disorders and drug culture have warped a family, how body image, women's lib, desire for fame and an increasing divorce rate have affected a generation, and you see someone who knows he's gay from a pretty young age grow up, experiencing the same hopes and fears and break-ups and make-ups as anyone else.
Bottom line, this is enjoyable, provocative, and one of a kind -- and very much worth seeing.