Angels and Airwaves – Love

I had a chance to see this movie earlier this month during the One Night Only thing at movie theaters. I wasn’t sure what to expect when I went in to see it, I had only seen trailers and listened to the album but that doesn’t quite prepare you for the movie. If you’re a fan of Tom Delonge’s other other main band then you’ll probably want to see it, but be forewarned, it is not a standard “Hollywood” movie and Tom has no scenes in the movie and the only music in the movie is mostly mood music, similar to the long intro’s from Angels and Airwaves earlier work. Delonge mostly helped out in the story, financing and producing area. It’s more the directors work than it is Angels and Airwaves, so it’s slightly unfair that this movie gets attached to a band.

“Love” is mostly the work of a brilliant young director named William Eubank, you’ll know his work if you’ve seen any of AvA’s music videos. Will spent over five years working on this movie and makes every shot count. He built the sets in his parents yard, which knowing that made the movie seem much more spectacular. It’s evident that Eubank has watched ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ at least a few times, the similarities are there, though I think Eubank’s visual look is significantly better than Kubrick’s, but technology and time tend to do that. The movie is one of the most beautiful looking movies I’ve ever seen, every shot counts and every shot could easily be a still image and you could analyze it to death. I could go on gushing about the look of the film but let it be known that William Eubank is a fantastic director.

The story is pretty straight forward, if you’ve seen ‘Moon’ by Duncan Jones (which also reminds me a bit of ‘2001’, but a lot of “alone in space” movies will do that), then you’ve got the basic idea. Lee Miller is the lone member aboard the International Space Station at some point in the near future. While he’s on the station he looses contact with Earth after a worldwide catastrophic event. Lee begins to lose his mind and we watch him go crazy throughout the course of the film. The movie is bookended with scenes from the Civil War and the discovery of something completely fantastic, the soldier who we follow in the beginning writes a diary which Lee somehow finds on the space station, and every so often during the movie we’re granted more glimpses into the Civil War. I won’t tell you how it ends mostly because I don’t know, the projector seemed to die on us in the theater with about five minutes left to go. Through out the movie we see video diaries of average people discussing what the world would be like if they were alone, it strengthens what Lee is going through miles above the Earth.

I loved the movie, but it is certainly your average movie, most of it is watching Lee go crazy, which in turn puts the audience on edge. Some of the scenes feel really long and dragged out but again it emphasizes what Lee is going through. I don’t get a chance to see many indie movies before the rest of the world and this is a movie that many probably won’t see or ever hear about, but if you get a chance when it his Blu-Ray in November, I really recommend picking it up. I’m sure the DVD will look fine, but the higher resolution of the Blu-Ray will enhance the the quality of the film, it really is that beautiful of a film.

Top 10 Movie Directors

I stole this from Matt Cheney: “Apparently somewhere on facebook there’s a challenge to name your favorite ten movie directors off the top of your head, no research or googling,” adding: “It’s an interesting personality test.”

1. Steven Spielberg
2. Robert Rodriguez
3. Alfred Hitchcock
4. Martin Scorsese
5. Billy Wilder
6. Cameron Crowe
7. Michael Mann
8. Christopher Nolan
9. David Fincher
10. Michel Gondry

My list makes it clear I was born in the 80’s. I grew up with Spielberg’s “Peter Pan” phase, I came of age in the Kevin Smith/Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez/Richard Linklater – indie era, I decided to pursue filmmaking thanks to Hitchcock, which I feel is pretty normal, in my early 20’s found Scorsese much like one finds Jesus. I added Cameron Crowe, not so much for his camera work, but his writing and his personal convictions, he doesn’t just make a movie for the sake of making a movie, it has to be personal in some way and the amazing soundtracks*, anyway, through Crowe I found Billy Wilder, he was doing fantastic work that seems criminally underrated in today’s film society. Michael Mann was the first guy to use digital cameras to make a drama movie, for me anyway, and not just some action flick or Star Wars, I only had to see Collateral to be convinced of his true genius, thankfully he’s made plenty more fantastic movies. Nolan brings a great noir sense to his films that have been lost through time, Fincher is just a noir director living in the wrong era and Gondry is the most quirky of my bunch, while The Green Hornet isn’t an amazing movie, his other things have been fantastic, he could’ve only made Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and I’d forever be a fan; that and the “Around the World” Daft Punk video.

Sure I have other favorite directors; Rian Johnson, Matt Reeves, Darren Aronofsky, Mark Romanek, The Coppola family, George Lucas (a long time ago in a galaxy far far away he was a great director) and the list goes on. But apart from Johnson, who would get my nod for my unofficial 11th pick, these directors have made movies that I’ll go to at any time and be content watching, or study to learn how something was done. I’m forever watching old-yet-new-to-me movies, I collect movies (ask my poor girlfriend), so chances are this list could change by next year, heck five years ago it would’ve been a different list, I would’ve put Kevin Smith on there, these days he’s no where near my list. People might argue that I could’ve/should’ve put the Coen’s (whom apart from a few flicks, I don’t really care for), Kubrick (who’s movies literally bore me), and lastly Tarantino on the list. The argument for Tarantino though is that he channels all those old directors and makes something new, you can watch any movie he’s put out and be like; “Oh there’s Scorsese, or there’s Kurosawa, etc”, I love the man, he’s made some of my favorite movies so I’ll compromise, put him in with Rodriguez, because they’re brothers from another mother.

This is my list and it’s subjective and always changing, I could put Richard Lester in there for A Hard Day’s Night and that movie only, sadly he made Superman 2. I’m a huge JJ Abrams geek, but he hasn’t done enough to warrant an inclusion, though the same could be said for Matt Reeves, he really only has Cloverfield and Let Me In to his credits but they’re fantastic looking movies. I’m leaving out a lot of directors and most non-American, there are a lot of good directors coming out of Korea; Park Chan-wook and Bong Joon-ho that I know of right now, they’ve put out some great work. The great thing about movies is that there are so many and not just from America that trying to make a list of the most influential or a canon of the ones you should watch (Spielberg’s supposed list) is tricky, because much like literature, what is good to me, isn’t good for someone else. Just because Ebert is a “renowned” critic doesn’t mean he’s always right, he does have a lot of good insight though, even if you’re not in agreement with his overall review.

*If you get a chance I really recommend going and reading some of Cameron’s music reviews on his Official/Unofficial Site “The Uncool“. Much like Almost Famous, he really was a fifteen year old music journalist and even at fifteen he was a better writer than most of us will ever dream of being. I’m glad he’s making movies and intertwining them with music, he’s clearly passionate about music, even if he hasn’t been a “rock journalist” in over thirty years.