Leaving Las Vegas

Since Bugsy Siegel imagined it (see our review of "Bugsy") Sin City has been known to contain all the forms of excess within it's limits, from the psychadelia of a Hunter Thompson to the crooning of Sinatra and the Rat Pack, to Pharaonic projects by Winn and his likes, yet on the outskirts of Vegas exists another limit, the place where dreams and illusions die, and the doomy question comes knocking "what remains when everything is gone ?" .

Ben Sanderson(Nicholas Cage) is a Hollywood agent who has hit rock bottom due to alcoholism, under the California Sun he manages to trash a beautiful existence the whole world creams about and throw it all at the foot of his mistress, the bottle, and since late alcoholism is full of unfunny ideas, Ben has the best of them all "Going to Vegas to drink himself to death".

After burning the remainder of his LA life, and since his firing from his last job got him a nice severance package, he puts his plan to work and goes to Vegas, checks in a motel, and on the Strip he accidentally meets Sara () a beautiful hooker, between the two, an odd relationship forms, based on "mutual understanding", he doesnet criticize her occupation, she doesnt criticize his "mission", but Sara is just his perfect match, she seen it all, she is more disillusioned then him, if that's possible, this relationship is deep and doomed, with and end that will surprise you, this is really a Hunter Thompson vision of vegas, the place where the American Dream dies.

The movie has a melancolic tone, it's similar to a free fall to the abyss of human misery, but with a shining light at the bottom, at the end Ben and Sara are metaphors of the successful and beautiful who are too odd to live, and too cool to die, and are stuck in this big mirage in the desert, a hole they can't, and don't want to get out of.

The chimestry between the two lead actors is a rare thing on movie screens, because they hit bottom , they are at the edge of honesty, the rest of the cast is for plot purpouses, this movie is about Ben and Sara and and that's it.

Mike Figgis makes a great tale of Vegas and despair, the city lights are filmed in a beautiful cinematography, and the fragility of Elisabeth Shue is not something you will forget soon, and anyways, if Vegas is the tomb of the American dream, then leaving Las Vegas.... a surrender to nothingness, and seening such a high concept within the limits of moviemaking is great by itself.

Lord Of War

« All the truth in the world adds up to one big lie » these were the words that came to my mind as the end credits of « Lord of War » were rolling on the screen, these words are from a Bob Dylan song, and granted, there always were a great deal of truth in his words, truth is so obvious that it makes you instantly recognize, half truths, instant truths, baked truths, bikini truths, anyways, this movie deals with the arms business and has the effect of a bullet that rips your consciousness in two.

Yuri Orlov (Nicholas Cage) is the son of Ukrainian immigrants, his parents run a small restaurant in Little Odessa NY, his younger brother Vitali (Jared Leto) is the lousy chef and he is the bum of the family, well at least until he has a revelation, an abstract one, every precious thing needs a safe, and every safe needs a gun, every interest engenders a conflict, and every conflict needs guns, and since the big five of the security council are also the big producers of arms, then granted that there will always be a war to use them, I mean what would Coca Cola do without thirsty people to sum it up, Yuri ends up becoming an arms dealer, a lord of war.

And as we follow Yuri throughout his story it's also the whole history of the twenty plus last years unfolding before our eyes, the Lebanese war, the Balkans war, the fall of Berlin's wall, the ill fate of the Soviet empire, and the huge gun heritage it left, the African conflicts, and every trigger needs a bullet, and Yuri provides them all, with an interesting point of view on things, to him he is just meeting the demand, he is just an observer, and trust me, he could convince you in five minutes that he is similar to the dude who sold you your vacuum cleaner, only he does it more efficiently and with an observer point of view.

Blood money can buy things also, and it buys Yuri his trophy wife Ava (Bridjet Moynahan), it buys him the fifth avenue apartment, and everything else money can buy, and Yuri is even smart enough to hide everything from his beloved wife and cute kid, but his brother can't take it, and becomes a rehab candidate, the dangerous path of Yuri leads him to cross the paths of a rival arms merchant (Ian Holm) a sadistic African president André Baptiste Sr (Eamonn Walker) with his crazy son André Jr (Sammi Rotibi), while being chased by the Elliot Ness like agent Valentine (Ethan Hawke) when money is not available deals are closed with other means, but that's another story, and the movie comes to a surprising conclusion, colder then a mid winter shower in Siberia.

Well, let's roll the superlatives, Andrew Niccol is a genius, Nicholas Cage, and Ethan Hawke and everybody else deliver Oscar worthy performances, the art direction is awesome, this move should be the one people would walk out as they did with «The Matrix» with a feeling that they have another perspective on things, an eye opening experience, surely we are not slaves of some machines, but the truths in this movie are very contemporary, and very disturbing, the worst being that it even has the «based on true events» story.

Not only do you need to watch this movie, you need to watch it twice, one for the story and another for the details, and then you might find yourself in an urgent desire of a drink, or two or six, anyways, it's one of the best movies we reviewed in here, and interestingly enough it's an independent one, Hollywood can't make a movie like that, matter of facts people who make trigger happy movies, are the public opinion shapers, and these same people are the ones who did market all the wars where Orlov did business, and if you can't see the connection, then go watch «lord of war» a third time, and wonder how many real life Orlovs are out there, some of them are people you and I respect, boy are we dumb !