Broadcast News (James L. Brooks, 1987)

None of James L. Brooks' films condense his sitcom sensibilities better than Broadcast News. Where so many of his movies feel treacly and thin, Broadcast News offers a well-rounded portrait of fully realized characters whose story does not overstay its welcome. That's the other thing: were it any longer, or were it a television series instead of a one-off movie, the archetypes Holly Hunter, William Hurt and Albert Brooks embody might have consumed them and left only two-dimensional cut-outs for easy humor that turned stale in short order. Somehow, Brooks positions the film perfectly in the middle, clearly drawing upon his television outlook but making something uniquely filmic out of the material.

Using his stint as an CBS News writer as the basis for the film, Brooks casts a spotlight on the news industry in flux. Television has become the dominant means of news communication, and Brooks looks into the medium shortly before the likes of CNN completely altered the format from individual news programs to a 24-hour machine. At times, though, one can hardly tell that the characters only produce news for an hour-long (if that) block of programming, as the Washington newsroom bustles at all times with people desperately trying to get segments finished on-time and watching playbacks with fervent hope that the lead anchor up in New York, a godly presence appropriately played by Jack Nicholson, will give even the slightest indication of approval.

For cynical journalism majors like myself, Broadcast News offers not just an accurate view of TV news in the '80s but a disturbingly prescient view of the ethical shift in journalism in the modern age. Or perhaps that's the wrong way to put it: as the jumpy Blair (Joan Cusack) tells the network's news president, newspapers hunt readers as viciously as TV seeks viewers. Two of the three main characters, the gifted but overly acerbic reporter Aaron (Albert Brooks) and the blunt producer Jane (Holly Hunter), constantly rail against TV news, though they not only work in the profession but even cut video segments for calculated impact.

It's better, then, to say that Broadcast News shows the changing face of that ratings grab, moving away from unique story ideas, exclusive interviews and more appealing writing to mere flash. The papers might have their fluff stories, but they'd at least try to have good writers pen them. Now, TV simply requires shiny images to win over the public. At a conference on the state of TV news, Jane rants about the dangers of the modern approach to news as an assembly of colleagues yawn, chatter amongst themselves and even walk out en masse. Flailing, Jane makes one last attempt to prove her point by showing a tape of a meaningless domino display that every network ran instead of covering something serious like nuclear treaty talks. The audience of adults who supposedly entered journalism to spread truth suddenly turn back in delight and even applaud the video of cascading, colorful dominoes.

Now, any idiot can tell the news, a change in broadcasting personified by Tom (William Hurt), a sports anchor looking to make it big despite his lack of education, experience or even basic intelligence. Hurt's performance is perhaps his finest: from the second he walks up admiringly to Jane in the aftermath of her disastrous address, he communicates utter stupidity in his eyes. Before he even opens his mouth, his beaming, empty smile gives him away, and sure enough, he soon proves himself an idiot, albeit one with as much ambition as either Jane or Aaron. Crucially, however, Tom knows he's a dolt with no understanding of news, and Hurt plays him with an earnest desire to learn and get ahead that gives dimension to what might otherwise have been a one-trick prop. That complexity also allows the audience to buy, however reluctantly, that Jane would so quickly fall in love with him though she knows he represents everything she hates.

Brilliantly, Brooks weaves together two distinct threads, the love triangle between Jane, Tom and Aaron (who's been Jane's best friend for years but cannot come out and say how much he loves her) and the workplace satire of the newsroom, into one unified narrative. The professional mixes with the political: Tom's rapid ascension within the network mirroring Jane's conflicting feelings of love and repulsion, while that personal turmoil tugging at Jane fleshes out her professional behavior as a blunt, almost aggressive ringleader. Some of the film's finest scenes perfectly encapsulate Brooks' deft handling of the two plots; Tom's first time in the anchor's chair necessitates complete planning by Jane to prevent his inanity from slipping out, and Brooks films the resulting broadcast from behind the scenes, showing how Tom's charisma filters Jane's instructions, most of which come from Aaron's wide base of knowledge on key news topics. In essence, we see the triangle played out through a completely professional prism: Aaron, unable not to help and support his friend and love, assists her in making Tom look good, which only makes him more attractive to her, and Tom's own elation at succeeding draws him closer to Jane.

At every turn, this feels like a James L. Brooks film, but at times I wondered if the other Brooks involved did some punch-up. Albert Brooks gives such an impeccable, completely A. Brooksian performance as Aaron that part of me refused to believe he was reading someone else's lines. Albert Brooks directs the comedian's own cynicism against himself, positioning Aaron's hostile wit as an outgrowth of his pain over Jane's strictly Platonic view of him. Anyone who has ever been in the "friend zone" with a pal you'd give anything to be more than a friend will find Brooks' performance acutely, almost unwatchably real. He tries to drop hints to Jane, asking with wistful neurosis, "Wouldn't this be a great world if insecurity and desperation made us more attractive? If needy were a turn-on?" Aaron makes one final, desperate appeal for Jane with a monologue that mixes the best of both Brookses: in a fit of pique, Aaron unleashes a half-series rant on how Tom is the devil, expounding on the idea that Satan is always attractive, kind and unassuming, but that he subtly tears down everything until all that's left is misery and chaos. It's a hilarious outburst, but also one that mingles not only the same personal and professional concerns simultaneously weighing on these characters but Aaron's biting sarcasm and genuine agony over losing Jane. And when, after so much waffling, Aaron finally admits his love for Jane, I was so happy Albert Brooks got the part, as no one else could have sold the line, "How do ya like that? I buried the lead" with infinite heartbreak and bitter resignation instead of snappy punnery.

But no one compares to Hunter. Jonathan Rosenbaum said Jane was "the most intricately layered portrait of a career woman that contemporary Hollywood has given us," and that seems the best summary of her character. Hunter has to walk a fine line, portraying a career-driven woman who also longs for a relationship without falling into the numerous stereotypical pitfalls that await nearly all depictions of such characters in Hollywood. But Hunter pulls it off; rather than play Jane as bitchy, Hunter brings out the social awkwardness and stress of Jane and how her work is both the cause and product of these traits. Hunter is a hilarious crier—she pulls her whole face back as if trying to squeeze her tear ducts shut, afraid that tears might give her away only to end up a moaning, warped wreck who looks like she's having a seizure—but her comically exaggerated sobs belie a wracked misery of the incessant demands of her job and the feelings for Tom she wishes to suppress and further explore. Brooks didn't write Jane to be simply the opposite of the stereotypes but to delve into the complex emotions that ultimately settle into broad types.

For all its written and even physical comedy, Broadcast News hits hardest when it lets its triumvirate subsume the commentary into their deeply felt drama. A journalistic strand of pessimism hangs over the whole affair—when a professionally and personally satisfied Tom good-naturedly asks Aaron "What do you do when real life exceeds your wildest dreams?" Aaron hisses back "Keep it to yourself." Some might consider that dour view to extend to the coda, placed seven years into the future and settling the love triangle in a way sure to please no one. Yet the ending deals with the very cinematic construction of the rom-com love triangle in a very earthly, relatable way: love doesn't exist in a vacuum, and the same careers that help and hinder the advances of the three continue to affect their personal lives. Admittedly, I wanted the pat ending, if only because Albert Brooks reminded so much of a personal crush I had on a friend that years later I'd still settle for a facile vicarious victory. But the real, human conclusion to the film only cements it as Brooks' best, funniest yet most poignant movie, and the best journalism movie to say something about more than just the occupation.

The Incredibles (Brad Bird, 2004)

One of the stranger aspects of animation is how production studios tend to be viewed in auteurist terms. Mention Disney, Studio Ghibli or Pixar and people can get an instant image in their heads despite the disparities of style and content between movies produced by various directors and various animation teams all getting their paycheck at the same place. Brad Bird, however, is one of the few animators who enjoys any singular auterist cred, carrying pet themes across projects and displaying a love for a chic past with styles based off old advertisements.

Following the release of his magnificent retro sci-fi picture The Iron Giant, Bird hooked up with old pal and Pixar head John Lasseter and pitched a superhero movie for the studio. Yet despite the swap from traditional animation (with some digital elements) to 3-D CGI, The Incredibles looks like a logical stylistic continuation of Bird's retro style and love of isolated heroes. When I first saw it as a 15-year-old, The Incredibles instantly became my favorite Pixar movie, only to go years without watching it. Using the new Blu-Ray release as an excuse to rediscover the film, I approached it with nostalgia, but also reminders of some of the criticisms I'd read since I last watched it a few years ago.

Brad Bird loves stories about unique, gifted individuals persecuted for being different. Whether it's the kind robot with enough arsenal to take out the planet if angered or a rat with impeccable culinary prowess, Bird's protagonists must always suffer the constraints of a society that refuses to acknowledge them as anything but freaks. The same is true of The Incredibles: Bird slyly posits a society in which the common people take legal action against superheroes over the collateral damage they cause. He kicks off the idea with an absurdity, a suicidal man suing the main character, Mr. Incredible, for preventing his death and injuring him, only for the passengers of a train that almost derailed because of his mistake to also sue for damages. Cops used to chase Batman and Spider-Man to make them stop, but all that really needed to be done was for a lawyer to get involved.

Some, though, have interpreted Bird's views as Randian, of the special individual held back by the collective. To be sure, Bird clearly has a bone to pick with standout members of society being ostracized. "Everybody's special," says exasperated super-mom Helen to her lightning fast son Dash when he begs to show off his skills on the running track. "Which is another way of saying no one is," he grumbles in response. He's right, though: one doesn't need to be conservative to agree that too much effort is wasted making everyone feel special these days and that groups of people celebrate mediocrity because they see themselves in it. Why else would anyone allow an idiot like Sarah Palin to hold any office while high school dropouts have the temerity to call Barack Obama, who received a doctorate from Harvard, an idiot?

Besides, Bird does not celebrate the individual so much as show how the individual can find his place among society. His standout characters never succeed without help, be it physical or emotional. More than any of his other movies, The Incredibles demonstrates the necessity of teamwork and family, downplaying Randian individualism for a more holistic integration of the average and the exceptional without ceding all control to either side.

In the opening scene, structured as a TV interview, Mr. Incredible and other heroes talk about their lives and future paths. Mr. Incredible (Craig T. Nelson) thinks of settling down while Elastigirl (Holly Hunter) defiantly insists upon staying in the game where she can continue to work outside of gender limitations. Yet soon the two marry and the roles reverse, trapping Bob in an office job and Helen at home cleaning and caring for the kids. Helen adjusts to the life and the superhero ban enacted in part because of Bob, who looks for any chance he can get to flex the muscles under his growing belly. The early-'60s aesthetic around them suggests lingering '50s conformity caging them in this banal life and creating internal strife within the family -- between spouses and with their children -- so outward appearances can be maintained.

A great deal of dark irony runs through the early sections of the film, from the suicidal man suing Mr. Incredible for making him live to the superhero's out-of-hand rejection of an eager fan, Buddy, despite the fact that the boy displays an impressive intelligence by inventing working jet boots before he hits middle school. The grimmest (but funniest) joke, puts Bob in an insurance office, where the man who wants to help people is tasking with finding ways to denying money to even the most airtight claims as an avaricious imp (Wallace Shawn) threatens to fire him for helping little old ladies get payments.

After establishing this stifling scenario, Bird suddenly pulls back and dramatically widens the scope, sending Mr. Incredible a mysterious job offer playing to his desire to get back in his suit. He arrives at an island complex that would make Ernst Stavro Blofeld green with envy, complete with volcano lair and advanced weapon facilities that bombastically mix epic-size superhero tropes with Connery-era Bond movies, complete with a wonderfully brassy score by Michael Giacchino that combines the work of John Barry and Lalo Schifrin. Compared to the limited sets of previous Pixar movies -- animators would make digital sets and then structure their shots and characters within those environments -- The Incredibles relies upon far more locations. Instead of scenes occurring entirely within one area, shots move across jungle and through compounds, necessitating potential weeks of animation for a few seconds of connecting action.

Eventually, Bob learns that the island is run by his old fan Buddy (Jason Lee), now calling himself Syndrome. Destroyed by Mr. Incredible's rejection, Syndrome vowed to get his revenge, and he hatches a Watchmen-esque plan to make himself a hero in the public eye while rubbing out all those born special to ensure his supremacy. Syndrome, I think, stands as a response to those who would fault Bird for elevating the privileged few over the sneering masses: the villain is far more a Randian ideal, someone who actually did work to get what he did instead of being inherently different. There's a tragedy to Buddy, the kid ignored by those who would not acknowledge his abilities, only to return and stamp them all out and assert his own dominance.

And yet, you have to hate him. The animators must have had a hell of a time avoiding the Uncanny Valley with this film, but the character models manage to ape human behavior and body language while containing enough exaggerations and suggestive properties that one does not feel uncomfortable with them. Syndrome, funnily enough based on Bird's likeness, oozes scheming, cowardly evil, showing off powers that give him an advantage over heroes but leave him defenseless when someone disarms him. Helen is elastic and pliant, a visual metaphor for her flexibility as a mother and housewife. Dash's slicked-back hair and Violet's shyness (hiding behind her hair even when she's not using her powers of invisibility) also make for expressive characterization.

When Peter Travers listed the film as one of his favorites of the last decade, he characteristically included his usual round of quote-whoring blurbs but rightly noted the sheer range of issues covered in the movie, such as "midlife crisis, marital dysfunction, child neglect, impotence fears, fashion faux pas and existential angst." Mr. Incredible most visibly struggles with his dissatisfaction, but all these characters to some degree feel alienated, to the point that they can't even find comfort in each other.

Not that the film isn't great entertainment. Its action scenes are so grandiose that the makers of Fantastic Four added more special effects to make their movie comparable (it didn't help), while its humor displays the classic Pixar reliance on situation over reference. Aesthetically, the film may be pastiche, but its dialogue is all its own: one of the film's most memorable moments is the rant on capes by Edna (Bird), the fashion designer to the gods, which cuts through any romantic view of superhero costumes with a hilarious list of mishaps that cost supers their lives.

In the end, though, what stands out is Bird's mature view of such adult issues of emotionally distant parenthood and marital discord, which he handles with such aplomb Steven Spielberg could even learn a few things about putting such themes in mainstream populist entertainment. Along with Don Hertzfeldt, Bird is my favorite contemporary American animator, and while I can understand the criticisms against this movie, I love it now more than I ever did. I don't even realize how cramped and centralized so many Pixar films are until I watch this, and its satire represented a new level of sophistication in the writing. Seven years on, it still deserves serious consideration as Pixar's best movie, or at least the studio's most entertaining outing.

Steven Spielberg: Always

Considering what an omnipresent force Steven Spielberg has been in the cinema since he broke through with Jaws in 1975, the relative anonymity of his 1989 romance Always engenders concern before one even pops it in the DVD player. There are underrated Spielberg films, sure, but unseen ones? The only Spielberg movie post-Jaws that I had not seen before this retrospective, Always was both my most eagerly anticipated watched and my most feared.

The film itself deserves neither reaction. Though my initial response in the film's early minutes bordered on total revulsion with its sub-1941 humor, Always pulls itself out of its tailspin ironically as its protagonist dies in a plane crash of his own. The pilot, Pete (Richard Dreyfuss), flies a converted A-26 bomber designed hold water for putting out forest fires that seem to rage every day in the same area. He's the best, and most reckless, flier in the squad, and invariably he returns to base to find his pilot wife, Dorinda (Holly Hunter), thrilled that he made it back alive and pissed that he seemingly does his best to do the opposite.

Their relationship is playful but deep, like two best friends who finally realized how right they were for each other. Pete constantly cracks funny jokes to make up for his somewhat boorish nature, while Dorinda's endless stream of corny one-liners balance a tough but bubbly personality. Pete can make a big show of her birthday despite getting the day wrong, mounting an increasingly impressive set of gestures that would only piss Dorinda off more. And then she can turn around and forgive him when he gets her a sparkling white dress -- "Girl clothes!" she says with her mouth so wide open in joy that whatever dirt she might have had left on her from the day rolls off her face. While much of the quasi-slapstick of the first act falls flat, Dreyfuss and Hunter convey such chemistry that they distract from a number of huge flaws around them. They're just so damn goofy that their adorable quality wins out.

A harrowing crash-landing that opens the film -- a misplaced scene that generates no tension -- Dorinda and the couple's friend Al (John Goodman, who inexplicably serves as a pilot of a plane with a cockpit he could never fit into) encourage Pete to give up this dangerous gig and take up a cozy position over in Flat Rock teaching the pilots who will eventually be sent to put out this incessant conflagration. The moment Dorinda, back home with Pete, launches into a monologue so intense and prophetic it may as well be a soliloquy delivered past her husband instead of to him, the film turns from its weak comedy to something more serious. So sudden is her change that Pete looked as stunned as I felt, and his cavalier attitude breaks in the face of her overwhelming fear. Then, of course, comes one last run, an emergency situation that requires Pete's skill.

For all the pyrotechnics involved, Pete's last flight feels oddly serene, an initially incongruous mood that works when Pete dives his plane over Al's to drop his payload on Al's burning engine and winds up setting his own plane on fire. Pete's last look is, as ever, lighthearted, a "What, me worry?" grin that disappears in a fireball. In a flash, Pete is gone, cutting his life short just as he was getting worthy of the audience's attention.

Ah, but when Pete shuffled off his mortal coil, it appears to have stuck to the bottom of his shoe like a rogue strand of toilet paper. He comes to in a strangely lush and untouched area of the charred forest where a old but beautiful woman (Audrey Hepburn, in her final big-screen part) waits and even cuts Pete's hair -- his first words after he fully comes to terms with his death are "Keep the sideburns." The woman, Hap, informs Pete that she was his guardian angel, and that he shall now counsel others, speaking around the next generation of pilots as the nagging voice in the back of their heads that advises them. Turns out he's going to be that instructor after all.

Here, Always fully picks up. Pete, rascal that he is, heads to Little Rock to guide the pilots, discovering Al has taken the open slot he wanted Pete to fill. He proves as impish in death as he was in life, shouting suggestions for pranks into the ears of those in his vicinity. At last, the comedy in this movie becomes funny, and even if the film suddenly suffers a severe lack of direction, the performances and dialogue ramps up and makes the proceedings tolerable.

To quickly bring together the various plot elements so as to avoid further summary and simply to cut through the meandering, the rest of the film plays thusly: Pete settles on being the angel for an ambitious young stud, Ted (Brad Johnson, who looks a bit like Josh Brolin only without that pesky talent), who appeared earlier in the film when all the pilots wanted to dance with Dorinda and he stared with that lovesick look in his eyes. Dorinda, Ted and Al end up in the same place, and Dorinda slowly starts a relationship with Ted. Pete has to watch this, because apparently one must be tortured into giving up one's vestiges of life before entering heaven. Or maybe God just likes cuckold porn.

OK, OK, I'm simplifying, but Always is such a vexing film. For everything it does right, something else drags, misfires or fails to find any concrete tone. Certain touches have a cleverness, even grace to them -- Pete and Dorinda classing it up by drinking their beer from champagne glasses, incorporeal Pete tricking Al into smearing his face with oil, Dorinda starting to write a "d" at the end of "Peter" so Ted's name appears in her husband's -- and the earnestness of both its romances are touching. But it's trying to be so many movies Spielberg loved as a kid that Always has all the structure of Jell-O. By the same token, Jell-O never falls apart, and the same holds true for the film.

If any one aspect of Spielberg's filmmaking has most caught my eye in this retrospective, it's the director's gift for lighting. When Dorinda jolts awake after having a nightmare of Pete dying, Spielberg cuts to Pete standing by a window in the pale moonlight, his bouncy countenance grows cold and distant. Compare that to the overwhelming orange that engulfs the frame when Pete, Al and, in the end, Dorinda, fly into the forest fires. Always is loosely based on the wartime melodrama A Guy Named Joe, and the explosions of cracking, spitting wood and sudden gush of heat allow the characters to feel like war heroes even when Al tries to get it through Pete's skull that what he's doing is not the same as charging into battle.

My favorite shot of the film captures Pete's attempt to let his wife move on as Dorinda sits in a crash-landed plane having stolen Ted's plane not only to prevent harm from coming to the second man she's loved but in a subconscious effort to kill herself in the same manner that took her husband. As Pete, finally matured through death, urges her to continue living and to find love again, Spielberg places Dorinda in the foreground with normal flesh tones and Pete just behind her. Yet the blackness that dominates the surrounding frame and the colder light on Pete alters the perspective, distancing Pete even as he sits right behind her, as if the director placed Dreyfuss in the background and used a telephoto lens to crush him against Hunter, emphasizing how close the couple are even in death but also Pete's decision to at last leave this world and free his wife. Always itself may be a mixed bag, but this is one of my favorite moments in any Spielberg film.

As a throwback to the melodramas of his youth, Always never manages to tie together its clashing moods of high romance, farce and intense longing, attitudes that those films could inexplicably contain. Though he fills the first act with broad sights such as the men on-base clamoring to wash their hands to dance with Dorinda in her beautiful dress, Spielberg cannot commit to the full spectrum of emotions expressed in a melodrama, afraid to go that far in a time when big and bold acting had long ago fallen out of style. Still, there's something to be said about the quiet delivery of a sappy line like "It's not the dress. It's the way you see me," a decision that makes the corniness of puppy-dog love into something deeper. Always features Spielberg's most subdued direction to this point, but here's a film that could have used his bombast. He was on the cusp on launching into his biggest attempt to be considered a serious filmmaker, but Always marks the first of a handful of entertainment features that exponentially grew in size as he temporarily purged himself of his desire to show people a good time. For that reason, Always marks yet another pendulum swing in the career of a director who could only oscillate so frantically between serious and lightweight because he's so good at both.