For years now, motion picture opening credits have increasingly become a lost art form as filmmakers want to hit the ground running and leave all the credits to the very end. But while audience members are quick to exit the theater to take care of their ever-growing urine aches, it feels like increasingly shameful that filmmakers are less and less interested in giving their works a prologue which helps to illustrate the cinematic stories audiences are about to take in.
Now when it comes to my favorite opening titles, the first one which comes to mind is for “Seven,” David Fincher’s 1995 film which proved to be his true big breakthrough. Things start off with us being introduced to Detective William Somerset (Morgan Freeman), a veteran homicide detective on the verge of retirement, and his partner and eventual replacement David Mills (Brad Pitt). From there, we watch Somerset try to fall asleep in his bed to the sound of a metronome, and the sound of the metronome is constantly overwhelmed by the violent sounds coming from the streets outside of his apartment.
After this, the opening titles, which I did not expect “Seven” to have, began, and they were done to a remix of the Nine Inch Nails song “Closer” which was entitled “Precursor.” Right from the start, they serve as an introduction to the main antagonist known as John Doe who commits murders based on the seven deadly sins. The way Fincher saw it, these titles were a way of introducing the audience to this character’s perverted state of mind, and there was no forgetting this throughout the rest of the film.
I love the shakiness of the credits as they illustrate the deeply disturbed mindset of John Doe as he writes in his journals and attaches pictures of people who are either his intended victims, those he has already harmed in an inescapable way, or those young ones whom he would prefer not to witness the bloodiness of what he is doing.
These opening titles captivated me from the get-go as they were unlike any that I had ever previously seen in other motion pictures. They were designed by Kyle Cooper whose other credits include the titles to “Home Alone,” “Passenger 57,” “Carlito’s Way” and the acclaimed television series “Homicide: Life on the Street.” Cooper was assigned by Fincher to create a montage reflecting the disturbed perspective of John Doe. The images presented here hang over everything else we come to see in “Seven” as the film heads towards a climax which proves to be utterly devastating.
It should also be noted that the opening titles to “Seven” were filmed over the course of eight days and cost around $50,000 to complete.
Please feel free to check out the opening titles of “Seven” down below:
I remember when I first watched David Lynch’s film “Lost Highway” back in 1997. I saw it at a small theater in Newport Beach where the screen ratio was off by a bit, and the opening credits did not fit onto the silver screen as a result. I left the theater feeling a bit cold as I was not sure what to make of What I saw, and the ending seemed so absurdly abrupt to where I wonder if Lynch and co-writer Barry Gifford had simply run out of ideas and went down a rabbit hole they could not dig themselves out of. The way I saw it, this film was easily upstaged by its soundtrack which proved to be one of my favorites from the 1990’s with its music by Angelo Badalamenti, Nine Inch Nails. Barry Adamson, Smashing Pumpkins and Marilyn Manson.
A few days later, however, I found myself thinking about “Lost Highway” a lot to where I could not put it out of my head. I could not figure out why initially, but then I found the answer in a review of the movie I read in Video Watchdog. I cannot remember the critic’s name, but they wrote it’s not about how the film affects you while you watch it, but how it affects you after you have watched it. I could not agree with this more, and it made me watch “Lost Highway” again, but this time in a THX approved theater with better sights and sound.
I have since revisited “Lost Highway” again and again over the years, and I revisited it yet again at the Nuart Theatre which presented this Lynch cult classic in a 4K restoration personally supervised by the director. While it may not seem as brilliant as “Blue Velvet” or “Mulholland Drive,” it remains one of my favorite films of Lynch’s as it presents us with a puzzle of a story which might be easier to solve than at first glance.
We are introduced to the married couple of saxophonist Fred Madison (Bill Pullman) and his wife, Renee who live in the Hollywood Hills. Their marriage looks to be a cold one, lacking in passion. When it comes down it, Fred is far more able to get orgasms out of his saxophone solos than with Renee, and he becomes suspicious that she might be seeing someone behind his back.
Things get more unsettling for them when they discover someone has been leaving videotapes for them on their doorstep. The first one features a view of the outside of their house, but the second goes even further as it shows footage of them asleep in their bed. They call the police, but they are of little help in finding out who filmed them. Next thing you know, Fred finds and views another videotape which shows him hovering over Renee’s dismembered body, and from there he finds himself on death row for her murder.
Lynch has described “Lost Highway” as being a “psychogenic fugue,” a rare psychiatric phenomenon characterized by reversible amnesia for one’s identity. Others have compared the film to a Möbius strip, a non-orientable strip which one cannot consistently distinguish clockwise and counterclockwise turns. Both of these make sense as the beginning may very well be the end, and the end may very well be the beginning.
This is even further enhanced by Lynch saying he was partially inspired by the O.J. Simpson murder trial which came to dominate the early 1990’s. Indeed, I can see this inspiration all throughout “Lost Highway” as Simpson has not, nor will he ever, admit to committing any murders. For all we know, Simpson may still not know what he did as he has long since blacked it out of his mind. The same goes with Fred Madison as he cannot believe it when a certain video implies he murdered his wife in a most horrible way, but this doesn’t stop a jury of his peers from finding him guilty and putting him on death row.
There is a scene where the police visit Fred and Renee at their home after they received the second video, and Renee talks about how Fred hates video cameras and doesn’t want them in the house. His explanation is as follows:
“I like to remember things my own way.How I remembered them. Not necessarily the way they happened.”
I have come to refer to this dialogue as the Dinesh D’Souza line as he continues to sell anyone and everyone on a narrative which just isn’t the least bit true. But regardless of how you view this film, one thing should remain clear: videotapes do not lie. Just look at what Detective Mike Kellerman (played by Reed Diamond) said in one episode of “Homicide – Life on the Street:”
“Videotape, it’s the perfect witness. It can’t change its testimony, and it can’t forget what somebody looks like.”
Indeed, “Lost Highway” is all about Fred Madison trying to escape the truth of what he did or, perhaps, what everyone thinks he did. As a result, he goes through a rather grotesque transformation which ends up turning him into a young auto mechanic named Pete Dayton (played by Balthazar Getty), and he gets released from prison. But as he now experiences life as a free man, he comes to meet the gangster Mr. Eddy’s mistress, Alice Wakefield. The only thing is, she looks a lot like Fred’s late wife, Renee. Of course, a lot of that has to do with the fact Patricia Arquette is playing Alice as well as Renee.
“Lost Highway” has long since become one of my favorite David Lynch films, and while “Blue Velvet” and “Mulholland Drive” are regarded more highly, this one is so much fun to view again and again. The whole thing is a complex puzzle, and I am convinced I can still solve its mysteries in ways I cannot with Lynch’s other works. I am not even going to try and make sense of “Inland Empire.”
With Pullman’s character of Fred, he is trying to stay ahead many steps of his darkest memories and actions, assuming they are true. But the deeper he digs into his psyche to escape an especially harsh reality, the more memories and familiar faces keep coming up. I like how Pullman plays Fred as a suspicious man who finds himself caught up in a situation he does not understand but which leaves him with the worst headaches imaginable.
Patricia Arquette is a marvel here as both Renee and Alice as she opens herself up, literally and figuratively speaking. It’s great to watch her go from portraying a scared wife to a dominant seductress who holds Pete very tightly within her grasp. Seriously, watching this Oscar winning actress here should serve as reminder of just how much stronger women are than men, especially when men are led by certain parts of their bodies other than their brains.
Who could have known this would have been Robert Blake’s last performance ever in a motion picture before the whole… Well, you know. Still, his work here as the Mystery Man is wonderfully chilling as he clearly took joy in crafting a character unlike any he played previously. When he glares at you, there is no escape, and seeing him without eyebrows makes his presence all the more unnerving. It’s an original performance which people never give enough credit to.
There are many moments from “Lost Highway” which will forever stay with me like when Fred Madison walks into the darkness of his home and re-emerges as someone much different, Robert Loggia who, as Mr. Eddy, unleashes his rage at an ignorant motorist for tailgating him, seeing Alice and Pete have sex in front of a car’s headlights, and the final scene where a character transforms in a hideously angry fashion. All of them are aided by the haunting musical soundscapes created by Angelo Badalamenti and Trent Reznor, the cinematography of Peter Deming, and the strange appearances pf both Richard Pryor and Gary Busey which had me wondering if Lynch was using dream logic in the same way Darren Aronofsky did in “Mother.”
“Lost Highway” provided me with one of the most unique experiences I have ever had. It left me at odds upon the beginning of its end credits, but it stayed with me from there on out, and I constantly find myself returning to it and its awesome soundtrack. This truly is an art picture as it can be interpreted in many ways, and I know I will come back to it again before I know it. Just remember one thing, Dick Laurent is dead.
“The Hangover Part III” is a serious disappointment. I am not even sure it is meant to be comedy considering how dark and depressing the material is. After the spirited debauchery of the previous two films, and I have no problem defending the second, director Todd Phillips and company try to do something different instead of giving us the same old thing which is commendable, but what we get is a far too serious action movie, and not a very good one at either. While the previous two films were a lot of fun, this one is dark and largely depressing, and the laughs are few and far in between. What the hell went wrong here?
The movie starts with Alan (Zach Galifianakis) on a downward spiral as he ends up buying a giraffe for no reason other than he can, and it ends up getting accidentally decapitated while he drives it home. The stress of this crazy incident ends up leading Alan’s father, Sid (Jeffrey Tambor), to have a fatal heart attack, and at the funeral it is revealed that Alan has been off of his medication for a long time. This brings the “Wolfpack” of Phil (Bradley Cooper), Stu (Ed Helms) and Doug (Justin Bartha) back together as they stage an intervention and encourage Alan to go to a rehab facility in Arizona to get help. Alan agrees to go, but only if the Wolfpack will go with him.
But while on their drive to Arizona, they are captured and kidnapped by Black Doug (Mike Epps, reprising his role from the first film) and his boss, drug kingpin Marshall (John Goodman). It turns out Alan’s old friend Leslie Chow (Ken Jeong) has stolen $21 million in gold from Marshall, and he wants it back. Chow, at the movie’s start, has just escaped from prison and Alan, against his better judgment, has stayed in touch with him despite all the bad things he put him, Phil and Stu through. As a result, Marshall holds onto Doug and orders the three of them to find Chow and bring him back to him. If they fail to do so, he will kill Doug. Great setup for a comedy, huh?
The great thing about the two previous “Hangover” movies was how we were every bit as intrigued as the characters were in finding out what happened to them the night before, and we shared in their discoveries with a great, delirious glee. With this third movie, you get the sense none of them want to be dealing with anymore of these shenanigans and, as a result, neither do we. All the fun has gone out the window, and what we are left with is a dreary road movie which Phillips and his co-writer Craig Mazin were under the mistaken impression they could mine comedy out of.
One major mistake made in “The Hangover Part III” is the filmmakers give certain minor characters from the previous films get far too much screen time this time around. This is especially the case with Chow who we first see escaping a dark and grimy prison at the movie’s start. In small doses, Chow is a riot to watch and Jeong is a very gifted comedy actor, but this time the character overstays his welcome and quickly becomes an unlikable prick with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. There is nothing more to Chow than him raising hell, getting high on cocaine and deceiving everyone around him whether they are friend or foe, and he comes across as a needless irritation in this sequel. Just try to laugh when Chow smothers a cocaine-fed rooster to death, I dare you.
Galifianakis also gets more screen time in this one as Alan, and this proves to be another major mistake. As funny as he can be when given the right material, his shtick as Alan has now worn out its welcome. Even when he has moments of genuine sweetness, they are wrecked by the character’s obliviousness to proper human etiquette. When “The Hangover” first came out, Galifianakis came across as one of the more original comedic actors we had seen in a long time. How sad it is to see his talents squandered in his tepid reprisal of his most famous characters thus far.
As for Cooper and Helms, they just seem to be going through the motions here as their characters have little in the way of growth or depth. Cooper hit a career high with his brilliant performance in “Silver Linings Playbook” and an even bigger one with his remake of “A Star is Born,” and Helms has been endlessly hilarious in “The Office” and various other projects. But “The Hangover Part III” proves to be a big waste of their time and talents, and you get the feeling after a while they really don’t want to be in this sequel at all.
Was there anything funny going on in “The Hangover Part III” at all? Yeah, there were a few chuckles here and there. Comedic powerhouse Melissa McCarthy shows up in a cameo as pawn shop owner Cassie, and her scenes with Galifianakis succeeded in putting a smile on my face during a movie I found myself mostly frowning at. It is also great to see Heather Graham back as Jade, Stu’s escort-wife, and it allows Alan to have a sweet reunion with the baby he befriended in the first film. There is also a post-credits sequence which has the Wolfpack up to no good again, and it makes you believe Phillips and company would have been better off recycling the same old story for another movie like they did with “The Hangover Part II.”
I saw “The Hangover Part III” at an early morning screening where there were about five or six other people in the audience. I think I heard them laugh only once or twice. I shudder to think of what a sold out audience would have sounded like during this movie. There was a lot of talent involved in the making of this eagerly awaited sequel, but what we ended up with instead is an epic fail of a comedy. Seriously, few things in this life are more infinitely depressing than a comedy which does not make you laugh much, if at all.
By the way, the next time you are thinking of having a character sing Nine Inch Nail’s “Hurt” at a karaoke bar for comedic effect, don’t.
The Ultimate Rabbit 