- Casino Royale Review
- Carrie (1976)
- Two-Lane Blacktop (1971)
- Trainspotting (1996)
- Rain Man (1988)
- Fatal Attraction (1987)
- Targets (1968)
- An Education (2009)
- Mirror, The (1974)
- Fargo (1996)
- Fight Club (1999)
- Do The Right Thing (1989)
- Report (1967)
- Is "The Sting" The Best Gambling Film Ever Made?
- Pink Flamingos (1972)
- Ox-Bow Incident, The (1943), Or 28 Angry Men
- Rome, Open City (1945)
- Spring in a Small Town (1948)
- Drive (2011)
- Vinyl (1965)
- Seconds (1966)
- Rosemary's Baby (1968)
- A Hollywood Invasion of Casino Halls
- Thin Man, The (1934)
- In The Heat of the Night (1967)
- All In: The Poker Movie, Player’s Best Tricks
- Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
- 1001 Club - Skyfall (2012)
- 1001 Club - When Harry Met Sally... (1988)
- 1001 Club - Rain Man (1988)
Permanent Vacation (1980) * Worst Hit *
Oh it's special dancing alright
Genre: Drama
Starring: Chris Parker, John Lurie (Stranger Than Paradise • The Last Temptation of Christ)
Directed By: Jim Jarmusch (Broken Flowers • Down By Law)
Overview: The story of a young aimless man as he wanders New York city streets, passing the time.
There's nothing wrong with film school 'student films', not if you're ready for them, not if you understand that they have their own particular brand of mood... in short, not if you understand that they're boring as hell.
Going in, I thought to myself, "72 minutes" and bolstered myself for early non-ploted Jarmusch, with the expectation that 'nothingness' would again be the subject, yet this time without any of the experience and budget behind it compared to his other like-themed tales. I somehow knew that the short length of the film wasn't due to budgetary constraints, figuring that instead it was more like a 30-minute tale being stretched out twice as long as it should have just to become 'feature length'. I nailed it right on the head.
Permanent Vacation visits a subject that is rarely explored in film: commutes, encounters with strangers we quickly forget about, alone time spent talking to ourselves. Yet for as relatively unique as this is in film, I had Alfred Hitchcock's quote running through my head like a mantra: "What is Drama but life with the the dull bits cut out?" And for as interesting as it is to see someone dancing for five minutes straight (no not in a cool Napoleon Dynamite way), or sitting on a roof speaking frequently inaudible streams of consciousness to themselves, when you add painful acting, bland dialogue and overdubbed sound work that's all too obvious, then you're left with only cinematography to enjoy, and that consistently needed a nice juicy edit.
That being said, the entire film was not a loss. I did enjoy about half an hour of worthy experience in Permanent Vacation. In our explorations of our character, a boy who knows himself to be a cool hipster and aficionado of Charlie Parker, we do learn much about him. In his narration at least, he's eloquent.
It's films like these that make you have to ask, "What makes this work? What can I learn from this? What does this director's first independant film got that I can use?" And for me, sometimes learning what not to do is just as important.
And you're walking... just keep walking 'til I fall asleep... and... cut.
Performance: 4 Cinematography: 8 Script: 5 Plot: 2 Mood: 5
Overall Rating: 48% (You know, in the way Death is)
Aftertaste:
There's wit in student-feel films of this nature, because anyone who criticizes the boredom inherent in it quickly receives the retort of "well that was the point and if you didn't like it, you missed the point."
To them I reply, "You win. Your theme consumed me, and you bored the living shit out of me. Good job."
Thanks be to the Lord that Jarmusch's later career films are far more plot driven, because I wouldn't be able to take much more of nothing.
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