Pick Of The Week: New
Paul Williams Still Alive (Virgil Films)
Let’s get one big fat caveat out of the way first: Stephen Kessler, the director of Paul Williams Still Alive, goes the Michael Moore/Morgan Spurlock route and inserts himself into this otherwise inspiring documentary about songwriter/actor/professional celebrity Paul Williams. Kessler is a huge distraction, hectoring his subject relentlessly when he isn’t manufacturing drama where it doesn’t exist. But Williams is a gem of a human being, sweet and self-deprecating, and Kessler succeeds in piecing together a life lived in the spotlight. Williams’ inability to say “no” to anything leads to some wild revelations, like how readily he could go from the career highlight of collecting an Oscar with Barbra Streisand for “Evergreen,” the love theme from A Star Is Born, to jumping out of an airplane for Circus Of The Stars. The DVD extras are skimpy, however, with five brief song clips from concerts Kessler photographed on the road.
Pick Of The Week: Retro
The Ballad Of Narayama (Criterion)
Not to be confused with the (also excellent) 1983 version by Shohei Imamura, Keisuke Kinoshita’s 1958 drama The Ballad Of Narayama plays on the same popular Japanese folk tale about a village that takes drastic measures to manage its scarce resources. When its residents reach their 70th birthday, they’re carried to the top of Mount Narayama and left there to die. The Ballad Of Narayama follows an aging woman (Kinuyo Tanaka) who spends her final days setting her affairs in order, including pairing her widowed son with a new wife. Kinoshita shoots the film kabuki-style, on sets that make no pretense to naturalism, and the effect is strikingly colorful and vivid. The sparse extras include trailers and a helpful liner-notes essay by Philip Kemp.
Don’t Break The Seal
Alex Cross (Lionsgate)
The film adaptations of Kiss The Girls and Along Came A Spider, based on James Patterson’s Alex Cross books, were no great shakes, but Morgan Freeman’s presence as Cross at least lent them some air of dignity. Casting a non-drag Tyler Perry in the Freeman role represents a fatally steep drop for Alex Cross, a ludicrous cat-and-mouse thriller torpedoed by some of the most unfortunate casting decisions in recent memory. Perry actually fares better than Lost’s Matthew Fox, who wildly overplays his serial-killer adversary, and Edward Burns, who sleepwalks his way through yet another supporting role as Perry’s partner. Extras include a commentary track by director Rob Cohen, deleted scenes, and a making-of documentary.
What else?