Monster in Law

The only thing notable about Monster in Law, which just came out on DVD, is that it features Jane Fonda's first performance on film in fifteen years. She, and Jennifer Lopez, don't pull any punches, literally, on film, and the result is hysterical. It's sort of a younger/older female vibe, pass the torch stuff, or whatever. I remember the atmosphere on another classic in this genre, Terms of Endearment, was pretty bad because Shirley MacLaine and Debra Winger sort of took their characters a bit too much to heart, off screen, and the fur flew.

But, apparently, Jane is the real deal. At the first meeting with Jennifer, and the director, Jane kicked off her shoes and sat on the floor... obviously to cut the intimidation factor. The woman is a living legend, from her in your face Hanoi Jane, to China Syndrome, Coming Home, Barefoot in the Park to Golden Pond, two Oscars, Hayden, Turner, aerobics queen... open about all her foibles and weaknesses. She's lived quite a life. For a woman in her seventies, she looks fabulous. There is a dignity but a real flexibility of mind and emotion that seems to characterize all actors, even as they age. So many people get rigid but artists seem to keep expanding.

You hear so many actresses complain about what happens to them as they go past forty. Even la creme de la creme find themselves lacking for juicy roles. I look around at my own peers. The women my age when I was in my twenties were idealistic and vibrant, in my thirties they had careers and/or young babies... meaningful, somewhat exciting, at least interesting. Now my peers talk about their kids, their friends, their husbands... like the moons of the world. People don't write stories about moons, except Forrest Gump, who revolved around some interesting orbits. Writers write about stars.

Jane Fonda is a star of the highest magnitude and is very much worth watching in this film. She had been offered many good scripts during her retirement, but turned them down. As a result, she comes back, not as some washed up has been, given some second chance, but with confidence that exudes on screen and it's uplifting to watch a woman in this position.

Off The Map

Off The Map came out on DVD recently with a great commentary track and a Sundance Anatomy of a Scene feature. The story is from a play by Joan Ackerman and she also wrote the screenplay. This gives the film a grounded, real feel, instead of story by committee, as we see so often these days. Although I thought the director made a very apt comment on that; there is the story you write, the story you film and the story you edit.

This story is pretty simple on some levels, it's about a man, a woman and their twelve year old daughter living off the land in northern New Mexico in the late 70's. They decided to follow Joni Mitchell's advice and get themselves back to the garden. This is where IRS agent, William Gibbs finds Joan Allen's character, Arlene, nude. It's Adam and Eve all over again, if Adam was a lost and damaged soul trying hard to fit into "the system". Instead he ends up in love with Arlene, and in love with the incredible landscape... so much so that he ends up there for all time, chalk pastel in hand. Whatever he couldn't find with the IRS, he found in the desert, with a man, a woman and a child.

Living a lifestyle of ultimate simplicity, they have no iPods, no iBooks, no cell phones, no phone at all, no TV, no movies, no internet, no electricity, no plumbing, no music... sounds pretty sparse huh? I don't think I could do it, and I've lived in a car for months at a time, just to be in that kind of landscape.

Yet, halfway through the film, William tells the depressed Sam Elliot character, Charlie, that he's the luckiest, most brilliant man he's ever met. He owns his own home, has years worth of firewood, food and clothes, a beautiful wife and daughter, and all the freedom in the world. And, it's true, Charlie has opportunities for happiness that few urban, or even rural Americans have. Moreover, he has his freedom, which very few Americans have, at least in this way, true self sufficiency.

Although, hmmm, lots of folks all over the world have it. Many call it poverty. And the "free, self-sufficient" people of the world survive at God's pleasure. They live a drought or locust away from starvation. Anyway, Charlie doesn't feel like the luckiest genius in the world during this film. I guess some people are depressed and you don't know it unless you really get to know them. With Charlie, it's pretty obvious, he just sits around in the outhouse all day. That's depressed. No wonder his wife, luscious angel that she is, gets pretty peeved when it's time to go... did she not notice all that open desert out there?

I did. The director, Campbell Scott, who also directed and starred in The Secret Life of Dentists, was inspired by some of the incredible landscape photography in classics such as Terrence Mallick's in Days of Heaven. New Mexico has long inspired artists such as Georgia O'Keefe and the fictional William Gibbs, who exhibits his work in Santa Fe, an incredible art community.

Artists do tend to congregate where there is "good light", which often translates, to me, as clear air and gorgeous vistas. Maui, Carmel and Sedona all have active local art communities. But truly, Santa Fe pales them. So I applaud this film for its incredibly inspiring panoramas and the attention it pays to art and Santa Fe and a lifestyle few dare to lead.

Anyway, the twelve year old girl grows up to be Amy Brenneman, who, as a pensive adult Bo, looks out of her corporate job window to think about her carefree, if quiet, childhood, and the summer her usually powerful Dad was so under-stimulated he decided not to talk for six months... till he got some antidepressants that made him attack his friends.

I wonder what she's thinking there. Where's my iPod? How did I handle a childhood so boring that the only entertainment we had was listening to Mom read a book? Thank God my life was so empty because now I'm the only Gen-Xer in my whole company without ADD? I miss a life that was real and free and filled with love and adventure? Who knows, but this DVD should get you thinking.