See Know Evil

New York attitude personified.

(2018) Documentary (Made to Measure) Davide Sorrenti, Milla Jovovich, Jamie King, Francesa Sorrenti, Chris Brenner, Richard Paradiscio, Mario Sorrenti, Alex Burns, Long Nguyen, David Lipman, Vanina Sorrenti, Justin Salguero, Mutale Kanyanta, Lola Schnabel, Anthony Ray, Steve Sutton, Shaun Regreto, Havana Laffitte, Danielle Zainich, Jade Barreau, Victoria Bartlett.  Directed by Charlie Curran

Some may remember the “heroin chic” fashion photography of the 90s. The ones where Kate Moss, Jamie King and other painfully thin looking models were made to look sunken-eyed and despondent, often photographed in grimy, dingy places that could well double as shooting galleries, often with vacant stares and other facial expressions associated with heroin use.

One photographer who was known for pioneering this style was Davide Sorrenti. A street-tough New York City kid (by way of Italy where he was born), he ran with the SKE crew tagging, smoking joints and skateboarding. While he took great pains to look gangsta-tough, his image was often sabotaged by his sweet nature. Like his older brother Mario, he discovered photography was something he had a talent for as well as a love for.

Although he would eventually make a living as a fashion photographer, he himself preferred a documentary-style realism that would inform his style in his chosen vocation. Starting out taking candid pictures of his crew, he moved on to taking pictures of models and the pretty girls he seemed to attract like moths to a flame.

In fact, many of his friends from that era characterize him as a shining personality whose charm endeared him to nearly everyone he met but he had a secret; he had been born with beta thalassemia, a blood disease that is terminal. He wasn’t expected to make it out of infancy but he beat the odds and grew up to be a young man. In doing so, he went through his life knowing that his time was more limited than others and that what he wanted to do with his life he needed to do immediately. It gave him a joie de vivre that was at once attractive and dangerous.
His mother blames King, his girlfriend at the time, for his eventual heroin addiction. Heroin became an “in” drug largely due to the grunge movement in music but also from edgy and dark independent films like Trainspotting and My Own Private Idaho. Ad campaigns for brands like Calvin Klein and magazines like Ray Gun and Interview further seemed to glamorize the drug.

Davide eventually died at age 20 although not from a drug overdose – renal failure was the culprit. While autopsy results were unclear as to the role both his disease and his drug use played in his death, because he was such a high profile member of the style he was rightly or wrongly the poster child for the backlash against it. President Bill Clinton at the time spoke out against it and the fashion industry as a whole turned their backs on the style and went back to using more traditional models and photographic styles in promoting fashion once again.

Curran’s documentary doesn’t pull any punches; it doesn’t shy away from the drug use aspect of his life nor does it excuse it. While much of the focus is on Sorrenti’s fight against his disease and the toll it took on the young boy, it also celebrates his courage in overcoming it to a degree. There seems to be two schools of thought from those who knew him; that his success came in spite of his illness, and those who believed that his success came because of it. That Sorrenti went to bed every night hooked up to a transfuser in order to survive day to day tells you the kind of life he led. The movie is anything but hagiographic though – Davide is depicted as occasionally being grumpy or out of sorts and who an blame him.

The problem with the movie is it’s devotion to a 90’s-like style, with random clips and images bombarding the screen in between home movies of Davide and talking head interviews of those who knew him or of him. The practice becomes annoying and then irritating as it is used constantly throughout the movie. It detracts from the story unfolding in front of you and seems to contradict the anti-drug message that his mom Francesca seems to be trying to send.

Davide had a lot of swagger – he had to in order to get where he did – which might be off-putting to some. He also had a whole lot of New York street kid in him from the white rap fashion to the antipathy for authority. His life was all too short and was always intended to be but perhaps the knowledge of his mortality helped him blaze all the brighter. While rightly or wrongly his contributions to heroin chic have made him something of a controversial figure, if you look at the images carefully as a whole he really seemed to be more interested in capturing what was real rather than what was manufactured. It wasn’t always pretty but at least it had the virtue of being honest.

REASONS TO GO: The portrait of Sorrenti is well-balanced.
REASONS TO STAY: The use of random images is overdone and annoying.
FAMILY VALUES: There is profanity as well as drug references.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT:  The Sorrenti family became known as “the Corleones of fashion photography” because so many of them became important in the industry.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 11/20/18: Rotten Tomatoes: No score yet. Metacritic: No score yet.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Larger than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story
FINAL RATING: 6/10
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Underworld: Blood Wars

Never tell Selene that her catsuit makes her look fat.

(2016) Action Horror (Screen Gems) Kate Beckinsale, Theo James, Tobias Menzies, Lara Pulver, Charles Dance, James Faulkner, Peter Andersson, Clementine Nicholson, Bradley James, Daisy Head, Oliver Stark, Zuzana Stivinova, Brian Caspe, Jan Nemejovsky, Sveta Driga, Dan Bradford, David Bowles, Rostislav Novak, Tomas Fisher, Eva Lavoire. Directed by Anna Foerster

 

Sometimes audiences don’t need a whole lot to be happy. They don’t need a coherent plot or character development. They just want to sit back, relax and shut their brains off for a couple of hours. It’s not much to ask. In other words, sometimes a concept is enough to satisfy an audience. This explains why the Underworld franchise has confounded critics by surviving 13 years and five movies without any letup in popularity.

A lot of the reason behind that is Kate Beckinsale. She plays Selene, a former member of the Death Dealers, an elite squad of vampires who exterminate their mortal enemies the Lycans (a.k.a. werewolves). These days, Selene is a renegade, on the run from both Lycans and vampires alike. She is aided only by David (T. James), son of Thomas (Dance) who at one time was Selene’s enemy but is now her only ally on the Eastern coven council.

The war isn’t going well for the vampires and in their dogged pursuit of Selene has led them to fighting a war on two fronts. Their Death Dealers have been depleted and while they are training new ones, the coven is vulnerable. Council member Semira (Pulver) realizes this and entreats Thomas to convince council leader Cassius (Faulkner) to revoke the exile of Selene and bring her back to train the Death Dealers.

Meanwhile, the Lycans have grown more powerful led by Marius (Menzies), their leader who has united the Lycan clans like nobody else ever has. They want Selene’s daughter Eve whose blood contains both Lycan and vampire elements along with human – she is the key to victory for both sides. Selene however doesn’t know where Eve is which is the way she wants it to protect her daughter. That doesn’t stop the machinations of various parties within both the Lycan and vampire communities who will betray anyone and stop and nothing to find Eve – and to do so they all believe they must control Selene. But can Selene be controlled?

As I said earlier, the plot is convoluted and often senseless but that’s unimportant; what matters is vampires vs. werewolves and there is plenty of that, plenty of carnage (including spines being ripped out and bodies being cleaved in half) and of course plenty of Beckinsale in skintight leather. Say what you want to about the franchise but there is no doubt that Beckinsale has made Selene one of the more formidable female action heroes of the 21^st century. Critics however lament that the extremely talented actress who showed her abilities in Love and Friendship last year has been slumming by appearing in these films. Paychecks like the ones she gets from the Underworld series are what allow her to appear in less lucrative but more substantial roles like the one mentioned.

Beckinsale is as always the best reason to see these movies and while she seems a little more restrained here than in previous incarnations of the franchise, she has a presence nonetheless that keeps the focus on her every time she’s on the screen. There are those who grouse that the catsuit she wears is demeaning to women but I hear nobody complain that the ripped shirts (and occasionally shirtless look) that male action stars often wear are demeaning to them. Sex appeal remains a big selling point for action movies.

Like most of the Underworld films the lighting is dim which looks cool enough but makes some of the action sequences hard to follow which becomes a particular problem given the accelerated reflexes of the two warring factions. Again, the vampires are portrayed as indolent Eurotrash while the Lycans come off as kind of grunge chic. Also as usual, other than Selene and maybe David there is little in the way of character development, leading to all the various supporting roles to kind of blend together.

Then again, that scarcely matters. What the audience for these films are looking for are right here in great quantities. First-time feature film director Foerster (who cut her teeth on the Starz Outlander series) clearly demonstrates an understanding of the wants and needs of the audience and if she doesn’t apply much of a stamp of her own to the franchise is more likely due to the producers wanting to keep thematic and tonal continuity between the various films more than anything. I’m actually interested in seeing how Foerster does with other action, adventure and genre films in the future; I suspect she would supply a much-needed female voice to what is largely a male-dominated profession. After all, women like a good brainless action and/or genre film just as much as the next guy.

REASONS TO GO: It’s really more of the same, so if you like the same…
REASONS TO STAY: …and if you don’t…
FAMILY VALUES: There’s a ton of violence, quite a bit of blood and some sexuality.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Although this was initially believed to be the final film in the series, producer Len Wiseman has confirmed that a sequel is in the planning stages with Beckinsale returning as Selene.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 2/2/17: Rotten Tomatoes: 17% positive reviews. Metacritic: 22/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: The Lost Boys
FINAL RATING: 5/10
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