Change Your Image
greglagreg
Reviews
You Go to My Head (2017)
Poetry in Motion
A compelling poem will seduce you. You're not sure where the poet is taking you, but you travel the path of images--the colors, the atmosphere, the rhythm of the words--until you discover beat-by-beat the heart of the poem. You Go To My Head is visual poetry. The film seduces you with its imagery; angels sing. The actress seduces you as she herself is being seduced. Note the reds of her dress, her swimsuit, the blanket she wraps herself in, the robe, the handbag she tosses away. Note the ripples of the aqua water as she swims. Note the stark white structures, the house, the columns, the walls. Can a nightmare, in the end, be beautiful? Maybe so. As one character says: everything happens for a reason. A stunning film. Two characters trapped in a nightmare. But maybe for a beautiful reason.
The Last Whistle (2019)
Winning at what cost?
I played football for two years in high school, as a freshman and a sophomore, way back in 1965 and 1966. I remember the coaches names and each had different peculiarities, different tactics, to spur the players on to win games.
I was 135 pound guard. Yeah, I know. A little guy. I remember the first day of practice. During the exercises, this particular coach made each player carry another player on his back (chicken-fight style) and run across the field over and over. The guy on my back, Dave T., weighed180 pounds, no joke.
That day I did what I was told for as long as I was told to do it, then I threw up. We practiced twice a day beneath a hot August sun---first at 8 in the morning, then again at 3 in the afternoon. This went on for the last two weeks of August until classes started in September.
Why am I writing this? Because the same fate that befell the young football player in this film could have happened to just about any player on our team. It was a sort of Basic Training for the players, and I get that--but coaches and egos and power and competition can lead people to the brink of lunacy.
I would never suggest that building a team is easy--but it takes intelligence as well, of course. Commanders on a battlefield, teachers in a classroom, wherever leadership is necessary, requires prudence. If you will: it takes practice to learn how to lead a practice effectively. It takes practice to build a team. Leaders, as we know--in any field--can be led astray by their own power trips, their own psychological issues.
I should say that I am half Texan, meaning my mother was from Texas. In Texas, football is serious business. Bragging rights are paramount.
THE LAST WHISTLE offers insight into the quest to win at all costs; you may win the game on the field, but in the end you may lose the respect of your team, your community, and yourself.
These young film makers knew what they were doing when they struggled to get this feature made. They were trying to make a difference--and they have.
It takes teamwork to make a good football team, and it takes teamwork to make a good film-- to make either, you need to make a lot of hard choices and hope that the egos and power trips that might erupt during the process are first recognized for what they are and then corrected, so the team can get back on course. Winning at life is sometimes more important than winning the game; and sometimes that's a hard lesson.
Nice job.
Being Awesome (2014)
Value your friendships...
There is a charm to how this acting ensemble tells the story--the story of how friends relate to each other ten years down the road--after the hills, the valleys, the twists, the turns, the curves, the fender-benders, the collisions, the stuck-in-traffic for days, weeks, months or years. A unique sense of humor can bond people, can make or break a friendship. Humor is a coping mechanism we all depend on, like it or not, and Gardner, well aware of this, tells our stories as he tells his own (and those of the other characters.) This pays off in a total lack of pretentiousness, which is why we love these people.