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In the Valley of Elah
(2007)
Written and directed by Paul Haggis, who has won two Oscars and has been
nominated for three others, In the Valley of Elah is a drama disguised as a
police procedural. Tommie Lee Jones plays a retired military investigator
whose son has disappeared shortly after returning from his own Army tour of
duty in Iraq. Tommie Lee knows enough about his son to know that he's not the
kind of guy to desert or go AWOL, so he becomes determined to get to the
bottom of the situation. He drives to the base and stars asking questions, but
gets very little co-operation from either the military or civilian authorities
in the area.
It is only a matter of a day or so before he finds out that his son's body
has been found in an open field, stabbed 42 times, burned beyond recognition,
and devoured by wild animals. Although he is overwhelmed by grief, he is
determined to follow the investigation through to the end. He gets no
co-operation from the military, but catches a break when a diligent civilian
cop (Charlize Theron) assumes control of the case when she determines that the
murder happened away from military jurisdiction. Theron and Tommie Lee follow
the case through a trail of lies and red herrings until they peel away every
layer and expose the real story.
Haggis has been nominated for Oscars for three different films, as a
director, as the producer of Crash, and as a writer, so this film comes with
an impeccable pedigree, and it has several strengths:
1. Tommie Lee Jones turns in a poignant, grief-laden performance as the
taciturn father. Although it's a one-note tune, he plays that tune effectively
and he's on screen just about every minute. He earned his Oscar nomination as
Best Actor.
2. The story is complex enough and interesting enough to sustain viewer
interest over a long running time (124 minutes). The drama alone might weigh
too heavily for such an extended length, but the film's thriller overlay keeps
the action intriguing and mysterious.
It also has some glaring weaknesses"
1. It is consistently guilty of "piling on" tragedy after tragedy in an
exploitative way. Don't you think a father's grief over his utterly mutilated
son would be enough to build to emotional crescendo, especially when the
father finds out that his son is very different from what he believed him to
be? Not for this script. The author gives Tommie Lee another son who also died
in military action, and forces poor ol' Tommy to deal with his grieving wife
at the same time. She, of course, blames her husband's military pride for
having caused both of her sons to lose their lives. Every character in the
film has a similar story. You get to the point where you long to meet a person
whose life wasn't plotted out by the writers of General Hospital.
2. The film's presentation of America's involvement in Iraq is strident and
one-dimensional, and follows the same path as the rest of the movie in
layering tragedy on top of tragedy in a simplistic manner, without balance or
perspective. The ending of the film is just ridiculous and cheesy
grandstanding, totally lacking in both artfulness and subtlety.
In both of those matters the film is so full of Henny-Penny dialogue ("the
sky is falling") as to make Ron Paul seem measured, optimistic and constructive.
There is quite a bit of nudity:
 
Carver
(2008)
This is yet another one of those films where
inbred rednecks torture, maim and kill city kids out for a camping trip. I am
too much of a pussy to watch torture porn, and I just hate this kind of stuff,
so I just fast-forwarded to the nudity, but while I was watching:
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one woman got her head sawed off while she was
still alive
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one woman got some nails driven into her forehead
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one guy got his testicles squeezed and ripped off
by a pair of pliers
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blood and limbs were flying everywhere.
So if you like really, really grisly material,
this may be your Citizen Kane.
The nudity comes from:
Update
French Cinema Nudity is updated
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OTHER CRAP:
Catch the deluxe
version of Other Crap in real time, with all the bells and whistles,
here.
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Klimt
(2006)
Interesting but sometimes draggy biography of the life of Austrian
artist Gustav Klimt has one outstanding feature: a bunch of full-frontal
nudity. Klimit lived from 1862 to 1918, and was well known for lavish and
erotic paintings that became known as the art nouveau style.
The picture starts with Klimt (John Malkovich) lying in a hospital
dying, and thinking back over events in his life, focusing on the early
1900s in Vienna and the World Exposition in Paris. It touches on his art
and his romances, which apparently were many.
This film is probably mostly for a lover of either art or the artist,
but the nudity is nice. Saffron Burrows did show nipple in a couple of
close-ups, but the full frontal nudity was apparently Georgia Reeve doing
the body double work.
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| Ariella Hirshfield |
Saffron Burrows |
Verena Mundhenke |
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| Veronica Ferres |
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Notes and collages
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"O drakoulas ton Exarheion"
(1983)
The Dracula of Eksarhia (IMDb) is a Greek
satire and black comedy.
The Dracula, down on his luck, having left his Carpathian home, now lives in
the Eksarhia area of Athens, Greece, and is working for multinational record
companies, trying to create a "new wave" super group that will top the charts.
He creates his band in Frankenstein-fashion, robbing graves and using the body
parts of famous dead musicians, like the arms of Jimmy Hendrix and the torso of
Manos Hadjidakis. Then he uses music hypno-pedia making them listen to new wave
rock 48 hours nonstop, but someone switches the tapes and the results are
disastrous. His daughter falls in love with the lead singer - and escapes with
him in a hearse. What follows is a series of jokes, gags, and cameos from famous
cult figures, ending with a concert from the band.
The film was written by and starring Tzimis Panoussis, a one-of-a-kind
figure, a singer, songwriter, musician, stand-up comic and performance
artist. He and his band, "Mousikes Taksiarhies" (musical brigades) play the
part of the band
created by Dracula. Their songs feature prominently during the whole movie. The director, Nikos Zervos, has been described as the Greek John Waters or
the Greek Alomodovar, and indeed this film has the punk aesthetics of some early
Almodovar films.
However all the jokes and ironies and swipes at –among others- Communism,
Anarchism, consumerism, the political parties of the time, “high art” directors
like Theo Angelopoulos etc., will almost certainly be lost on non-Greek-speaking
audiences, and it was not surprising when the Aurum horror encyclopedia book
wrote about this film: “besides the silly premise it is noted for its
unremitting ugliness”.
There’s nudity by Isavella Mavraki, playing Dracula’s daughter, and some
other women I could not identify.
Isavella Mavraki
Others
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An exploitation classic:
twin sisters Vicki
Michelle and Ann Michelle in Virgin Witch (many film clips, big download)
If anyone still cares, here's Paris
Hilton doing that burlesque number for her 27th birthday bash.
One of our regulars wrote in to say that we missed Episode 1 of this year's
series on The L-Word. Fair enough. I dug up Mkone's HD clips and his sample
captures. (There is no nudity in the one with Jennifer Beals and Marlee Matlin.)
Amber Smith in two different episodes
of Sin City Diaries
Mariah Carey on St Barts
How does she manage to run around topless and still keep her boobs covered?
If these were paparazzi shots, wouldn't she have at least one unguarded moment?
I'm guessing that she co-operated in producing these.
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