Tights, Capes, and ABBA Tunes:
Two Films for Toe-Tapping Gay Geeks
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For musical loving, comic book fanboy, homos (here!), it was a date to remember (bonus points if you are an ABBA super-trouper, er, fan, and extra credit it you adore Meryl Streep and/or Heath Ledger...again here, here, and here!). Of course, I'm speaking of Friday, July 18, that beautiful day on which the new Batman film, The Dark Knight, and the ABBA musical, Mamma Mia!, starring (as Stephanie Sinclair would say) the incomparable Meryl Streep, were released into theaters across the country.
You could almost feel it in the air (or at least, smell the moist undies): the rapturous joy of thousands and billions of toe-tapping, gay geeks, who love films that feature either characters in tights and a cape or characters who spontaneously burst into song...because that's the way the world should really be, ya know? Thank God for the movies. Just imagine the fortune to be made by some clever Hollywood producer who combines the two (think: Batman-the Musical…featuring the songs of the Bee Gees…or probably, hopefully, NOT!).
Actually, July 18 was also a lucky day for plain old movie fans, as we were treated to two fine, though wildly different, films. And that was good news for a summer movie season that hasn't been so memorable. Let's see, there was Iron Man (decent comic book movie highlighted by great Robert Downey, Jr. star turn), Sex and the City (great, I loved it...oh, shut up!). Indiana Jones (not sure if it was the movie I liked or the memories it brought back), and Wall-e (that kid's flick that’s supposed to be great but I haven't seen yet), and that was about it thus far. Thank goodness, then, for a grim Caped Crusader and an Oscar-winner belting out ABBA tunes!
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By now, what more can be said about the super-blockbuster, critically adored Dark Knight, except that it's all true. The Dark Knight is a great movie, maybe the best movie made yet about a comic book super hero. Writer/director Christopher Nolan follows up his superb Batman Begins with a darker, deeper, and more densely layered thrill ride that never lets up in the chills and spills department and is not without some shocking twists and turns; it's The Godfather Part II of comic book movie sequels (meaning it improves upon an already superlative original).
Christian Bale returns as Bruce Wayne/Batman, and he's in fine from again for this second go-round that finds the Dark Knight up against his greatest adversary, the malevolent Joker (the late, great Heath Ledger), a maniacal killer out to push Bat's beloved Gotham City to the edge of chaos with a purposeful crime spree.
Nolan and co-screen writing brother Jonathan keep the film rooted in the grim reality of today's real world as they portray the Joker as a terrorist out to see just how far he can push a man, be it Bat or Gotham's good guy district attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), into a corner before they lash out with the same vicious violence the Joker enjoys to employ. How far would you go to save yourself, the Joker asks Gotham's finest and its people, and the film asks us in the audience to ponder that question as well, be it as a person or as a country. The Dark Knight is really a big, tense morality tale dressed up in latex, smeared grease paint, and thrilling action set pieces.
Batman is the yin to the Joker's yang ("You complete me," he teases Batman in one of many genuinely startling face-offs between the two in the film, their relationship steeped in latent homo-eroticism), but the Joker finds a "do-gooder" he can screw with in Dent, the up-standing citizen he pushes to the edge of sanity and then into the deep end with his corrupting evil, creating a horror show as disturbing as himself.
Nolan has crafted a smart and compelling comic book film epic full of spectacular visuals with The Dark Knight, and comic book fans will delight in how perfectly Nolan captures the iconic spirit and imagery of the original comic book character and his clash with his most demonic foe; this is the Batman movie real fans have longed for. The cast of the film--Bale (best movie Batman, ever), Eckhart, Gary Oldman as police officer James Gordon, Michael Caine as loyal Alfred, Morgan Freeman as Batman's right hand man Lucious Fox, and Maggie Gyllenhaal, replacing Batman Begins' Katie Holmes, as Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent's love interest Rachel Dawes is impeccable (quick movie factoid: Maggie's brother Jake played Ledger's cowboy lover in Brokeback Mountain), and especially (most especially!) Ledger as the Joker. His performance permeates the film with a real sense of dread, menace, and blood-lusting evil.
Deranged and scary, Ledger's performance turns a classic comic book villain into a classic movie villain, making you almost forget that a guy named Jack Nicholson once played the same part. I know, they're different movies, but Nolan's vision of the Batman mythology and Ledger's instantly legendary performance make director Tim Burton's 1989 Batman and Nicholson's Joker seem as campy today as the cheesy, but fun, original 1960's Batman TV series. Believe the hype, kids, about Ledger's performance, which is seriously Oscar-worthy, and the film itself…it's that good.
Speaking of Oscars, no actor in the history of movies has won more Academy Award nominations (14!!) than Meryl Streep. With two wins (really, just two?) to her credit, magical Meryl has proven time and again just how great an actress she really is. Arguably, perhaps, she is the greatest movie actor, male or female, ever. Comedy, drama, epics, thrillers, all those accents; there's absolutely nothing Streep can't do.
And she isn't done yet, my friends. Streep sings, and sings well...incredibly well...beautifully even, in her new movie Mamma Mia!, the adaptation of the hit Broadway musical featuring the deliriously infectious music of ABBA, those spandex clad, glitterific pop music masters of the '70s and '80s (go ahead, try and tell me you haven't given in to the pleasures of Sweden's bubbly sweet super group at some point in your life. "Dancing Queen?" You know you have!) With Mamma Mia!, Streep proves once and for all that there actually is no end to her limitless talents. She can do anything. Bitch! Ok, I'm envious...perhaps, jealous even...but in a good way! Streep is without a doubt a miraculous talent.
That said, I gotta say that Mamma Mia! is a true guilty pleasure and an instant camp classic. The film is over-the-top, semi-cheesy, and a whole lot of corn ball, but also a whole lot of fun. Don't go to Mamma Mia! Expecting to see art; you won't find it (though in the pantheon of pop music, ABBA produced some deliciously sensational songs; aural art that was hard to resist). But if you're looking for a good time, a silly, fun movie to make you forget your troubles and all the insanity of the world...well, Mamma Mia! is your ticket. Give in. Just try not to think.
If you do, and this is what bothered me, you'll notice that the chronology of the story doesn't make sense. In the movie, wondrous, marvelous (blah, blah, blah, oh, excuse me...) Meryl plays a lusty, free-spirited, former pop singer named Donna, who owns a rundown villa on a gorgeous island in Greece (When the locals start bursting into song, the film gives new meaning to the phrase "greek chorus." Loved it!). She has a sweet, gorgeous daughter named Sophie (adorable Amanda Seyfried), who, on the eve of her wedding to young, hunky Sky (Dominic West), longs to discover who her father is, since her mother was something of a tramp, and slept with three different guys the year she was conceived. Sophie invites all three men to her wedding, behind her Mamma's back, in hopes of solving her patriarchal misery, er, mystery.
Here's where the movie makes no sense: Sophie is 20 years old, but her mother's affairs were with a punk rocker (Colin Firth) and two hippies (Stellan Skarsgard and the still hot, but not such a great singer, Pierce Brosnan. Think Kris Kristofferson in Barbra's A Star is Born remake). Ok, so 20 years ago minus 2008 would be 1988, long after the time of hippies and punk rockers. There's no reason to believe that the movie couldn't be taking place in 1998, which could work with the numbers (there were hippies and punks peacefully coexisting in 1978), except that the youngsters in the movie seem modern--2008 kids--not 1998 young, if you know what I mean (it's the clothes, guys!).
Not to mention that Streep, Brosnan, and Skarsgard are all pushing into their late fifties in real time (Firth is 47), and they all seem a little too old to be playing 40-ish adults. A-ha, there's something Streep can't do: be younger than she really is (sorry Meryl, I love you!). It doesn't help that her hair and make-up in the film are not particularly well done (J. Roy Helland…you're fired!) or that novice director Phyllida Lloyd, who directed the original stage show, doesn't particularly photograph Meryl Streep in a very flattering way (think Lucille Ball in Mame; lots of diffused lighting).
But, and it's a big but (not Meryl's), Streep makes it work with fierce flair. She sings, she dances, she prances, and she makes us believe (and sinfully enjoy), through the sheer force of her awesome talent, the whole sugary confection. She's the light of Mamma Mia! (though, she gets some grand comic support from Christine Baranski and Julie Walters as Donna's best friends), and when she sings ABBA classics like Dancing Queen or The Winner Takes It All, I defy you to not be entertained, moved even. Streep is so damn wonderful in Mamma Mia!, you can almost envision Oscar nomination number 15! She is a true force of nature in entertainment. God, I love her...and hate her…in a totally envious way, of course.