How to Blow Up a Pipeline
Based on the non-fiction book by Andreas Malm, How to Blow Up a Pipeline shows what can happen when a group of people with little to lose and just enough self-righteousness are pushed to the brink. Eight young people come together in Texas to collaborate on building bombs to blow up an unguarded section of an oil pipeline with the goal of 1) spiking oil prices and 2) sending a message to the powers that be. They have no interest in hurting anyone with this bomb; they simply want to take radical action to fight back against the capitalist systems that propel climate destruction forward. This is a very timely movie and it captures the desperation many people feel about climate change.
The film delves into the background of all eight people so that we understand their motivations. Every character is fully three-dimensional, even if their reasons for participating in a project that could get them arrested or killed seem a little foolish. We understand how they got to this point, as well as the connections between them. We are invested in their success at building a bomb and blowing up property--the movie presents them as doing the right thing, but it does not turn them into superheroes who are morally pure. In fact, I wish the movie had spent a little more time dwelling on how their actions will bring real harm not just to the corporate fat cats, but to the average Joe trying to survive. It touches on this dilemma but then moves right past it.
While watching How to Blow Up a Pipeline, I felt acutely aware of how short I fall of true radicalism, which is almost certainly a good thing for me personally. However, the movie can't help but inspire me to look into ways I can help fight climate change. It's a problem that is so enormous, so global, that it feels like anything you do will have no impact, so why bother? To be honest, I still mostly feel that way...but How to Blow Up a Pipeline is really good fodder for inspiration, passion, and curiosity. Highly recommended.
Grade: A-
***
Cruising
Directed by the recently deceased William Friedkin, Cruising is a thriller starring Al Pacino as a heterosexual undercover cop who dives into the world of gay leather and BDSM in 1980 New York City to find a serial killer. I first heard about this film in the documentary The Celluloid Closet, which presents it as a homophobic film. However, a lot of gay people seem to love it! I think it's a gritty, sexual movie that is iconic to the people who, you know, actually have gay sex, and gross to the hets. I watched it and was pleasantly surprised to discover that given the time period during which the movie was filmed, it's actually pretty respectful (or at least not too judgy) of gay S&M subculture. The hets are the ones who judge.
Cruising captures a very specific time and place: this is a pre-AIDS New York City with adult bookstores, people getting straight-up fisted in bars, people doing poppers left and right. This is not the Disney-ified New York City of Rudy Giuliani. This is some nasty, dirty shit and I am here for it! Despite being a straight guy, Al Pacino's character, Steve Burns, dives right into this world, doing poppers and letting men tie him up in cheap motel rooms. But the killer, who preys on gay men who happen to look a lot like Al Pacino, eludes him.
Cruising is definitely a tad "problematic" as the kids say, specifically when it comes to the killer's motivations. But for a movie about gay S&M that came out 43 years ago, I'd say it does a pretty fucking good job of not making gay men in general and gay men into leather specifically into freaks. Hell, there are even some trans women who get hassled by the cops and they are treated as actual human beings by the movie! So yeah, I totally recommend this iconic film!
Grade: B+
***
From Dusk Till Dawn
Given how much I love Quentin Tarantino's work, I am surprised it took me this long to watch From Dusk Till Dawn, which was written by QT and directed by Robert Rodriguez. If you haven't seen this 1996 film, stop reading now and go watch it. I'll wait...
Ok, so if you're still reading, you know that the big twist of this movie is that it starts off as a crime thriller and turns into a vampire movie halfway through. Brothers Seth and Richie Gecko (a baby George Clooney and an appropriately creepy, foot-obsessed Quentin Tarantino) are on the run from the law. They force a family of three at gunpoint to drive them over the Mexican border in the family's RV and head out to a bar called The Titty Twister to meet up with a guy who will provide sanctuary for the fugitives. The family consists of ex-pastor Jacob Fuller (Harvey Keitel), daughter Kate (Juliette Lewis) and son Scott (Ernest Liu).
But once they're at the Titty Twister, shit hits the fan when all the people who work there--the bartenders, the bouncers, the strippers, the band, etc--turn into very weird-looking vampires and try to kill everyone. The Fuller family, the Gecko brothers, and a couple other patrons of the bar, Frost (Fred Williamson) and Sex Machine (a wonderful Tom Savini), have to team up to fight back. With Jacob's knowledge from his years as a pastor, they have tactics to kill the vamps if they can all learn to work together.
From Dusk Till Dawn is a hoot. I love how half the movie has QT's signature smart, funny dialogue while the other half of the movie is just constant vampire puns ("I really...suck!"). Also, the film is surprisingly spiritual. Jacob (Keitel is great, as he always is) has to reconnect with his faith under extreme duress to protect his children. The reason he lost his faith in the first place is because his wife died in a senseless accident. Can he forgive God in order to fight off the vampires from Hell? That was a subplot I didn't expect.
I definitely recommend this movie if you're a fan of irreverent comedy-horror. It's also a fairly safe movie for horror-babies. The special effects are straight-up goofy, which makes the film more comedic than scary.
Grade: A-
***
Red, White & Royal Blue
Based on what I gather is a far superior book by Casey McQuiston, Red, White & Royal Blue is a safe, perfectly fine gay romantic comedy. While you might not want to watch it with Grandma, it's probably safe to watch with your 16 year old kid sister. There are sex scenes, but they are--sadly--in good taste. Almost too good of taste. When people fuck in a movie, they should make you believe it. That said, perhaps one measure of acceptance of LGBTQ relationships is if they make movies about said relationships that are just as boring and tasteful as movies about straight relationships.
The plot concerns Prince Henry (Nicholas Galitzine), the fictional spare to the British throne, and Alex Claremont-Diaz (Taylor Zakhar Perez), the son of Ellen Claremont, the first female President of the United States. These two young men are forced into each others' company for various political events even though they can't stand each other. Henry thinks Alex is an annoying clown and Alex thinks Henry is an elitist snob.
So, obviously, they fall in love.
One nice thing about RW&RB is that they don't spend too long on the "we hate each other" part, and pretty much get right to the "flirting wildly over text" part. I really struggle with romcoms for various reasons, one of which is that romantic conflict makes upsets me. Like, I'll watch a movie where cannibals eat a live baby, but if someone makes their romantic partner cry, I can't take it. Welcome to the world of anxious attachment!
However, this movie is way too long. It's two hours long and could easily have been 90-100 minutes. Especially since Alex and Henry get past the initial "ick" very quickly. It felt a bit draggy in the second half. RW&RB is very cute and pleasant. There really isn't that undeniable heat I like to see in romantic movies, but I feel that, sadly, it's par for the course for romcoms to not have a lot of heat. Please, I'm begging you: name me a romantic comedy (not just a romantic movie, but a romcom specifically) where the leads look like they want to eat each other's faces off. PLEASE. I want to give this genre a chance, but all I'm finding are boring, trope-filled movies that are the equivalent of a dry peck on the lips. RW&RB is a smidge more interesting since the fact that the lovers are both male and in the public spotlight adds an element of angst and vulnerability that most romcoms don't have. But at the end of the day, that peck is still pretty dry.
Grade: B-
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