Bryce Zabel's MOVIE SMACKDOWN!

Twilight (2008) -vs- Edward Scissorhands (1990)

Edwardian Romance

The Smackdown. Teenaged girls are a force to be reckoned with. Like tsunamis and hurricanes. Oh sure, industry wisdom has it that teenaged boys go to the movies; they're the prime target audience. Anyone who ventures into the multiplex in the heat of summer knows that. But never underestimate the awesome power that is a teenaged girl with a crush...for that crush can easily become an obsession...and that obsession can turn into some serious cash. Witness last weekend's seventy million dollar box office take for the eminently crushworthy vampire teen romance, "Twilight."  For almost twenty years, "Edward Scissorhands" has been my uncontested poster boy for doomed Gothic-tinged star-crossed romance. Can Edward Cullen, Twilight's fangless undead hunk unseat Tim Burton's most memorable creation? It's the Battle of the Edwards...a Battle to the Death. And beyond.

The Challenger. Well, she was just seventeen. You know what I mean. Bella Swan. Barely enough blood in her brooding body to bring a blush to those perfectly smooth cheeks. Listless. Lifeless. Secretive. So deeply sensitive that the slightest of smiles might overstate any case for happiness. A child of divorce shuttled between dry hot Arizona and cold damp Washington State. Phoenix to Forks. Frying pan into the fire.

"Twilight" is the blue-hued film that perfectly captures all the angst, ennui and bliss of being a teenager in love. Based on the incredibly hot series of novels by Stephenie Meyer and brought to the big screen by director Catherine ("Thirteen") Hardwicke and screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg, what we have here is a chick-let flick of impeccable pedigree. 

Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008) -vs- The Amateurs (2007)

Decent Hard-Working Americans Who Play By The Rules

The Smackdown.  When the economy gets tough, the tough make porno.  That's the big "high concept" of our two films in the ring today.  Based on the news from Wall Street, better brace for an avalanche of nudity and meaningless sex.  Oh, well...

Popular culture and the movies give form to our preoccupations and anxieties. Okay, there's no explanation for "The Love Guru" and "Beverly Hills Chihuahua." Other movies effectively connect the dots on themes like politics ("W," "Syriana") and human foibles ("Forgetting Sarah Marshall," "Knocked Up"). The newest release from Kevin Smith fits the formula in combining SEX with THE RECESSION for laughs.  "Zack and Miri Make a Porno" started a buzz with a trailer that doesn't contain a single frame from the film. It promises the sort of movie Smith produced over seven earlier features: engaging, funny and potty-mouthed. In this regard it echoes the spirit of writer / director Michael Traeger's well-regarded, but little-seen "The Amateurs."  It sets up a natural SMACKDOWN!: Which movie best captures the funny side of economic uncertainty?

The Challenger. Zack (Seth Rogan) works at a coffee shop, Miri (Elizabeth Banks) at a mall. By their own estimate, these platonic friends in Pittsburgh haven't set the world on fire. They can't meet the rent on the modest house they share and the utilities have been turned off. Over beers they brainstorm a turnaround: Let's make a porno movie! Their project gets off the ground, as Zack puts the touch on a co-worker for production money and they recruit talent for the shoot. "Star Whores" is about to begin production when wreckers flatten their makeshift "studio" for new condos. No problem: They move the production to Zack's coffee shop and rename the flick "Swallow my Cockaccino."
Along the way, a movie gets made. Zack and Miri learn about film making, and themselves. Kevin Smith wrote the script he directed.

The Women (2008) -vs- Sex And The City (2008)

Women with Shoes

The Smackdown. After fifteen years in development, TV comedy queen Diane English ("Murphy Brown") has finally completed her Magnum Opus: a star-spangled remake of 1939’s "The Women."  Sixty-nine years after that classic film’s original release, the remake of "The Women" follows in the high-heeled footsteps and huge box office wake of this summer’s earlier "Sex And The City."  The two movies are remarkably similar, sharing an unapologetic chickflick sensibility and Ladies Only appeal. 

Both films claim to reflect a kind of reality and instead mirror an uppercrust New York City where money is never an issue, a New York City where walking a mile even in your own shoes is unthinkable.  Shoes aren’t for walking; they’re for collecting, and they render their owners hobbled Geisha girls suited only to taking tiny baby steps on pristine boulevards, linking arms for balance, in search of more shoes and more men.  Freud suggests that shoes are a symbol for female genitalia.  Movies suggest they are no longer symbolic at all, but replacements.

So it’s a catfight to the finish.  Or wait.  Could "The Women" be just a pale imitation of an imitation arriving a little too late to cash in to the zeitgeist?  Timing (and those shoes) are everything.

The Challenger.  Everyone in "The Women" goes to Saks! Everyone in the movie is a woman! Society woman Mary Haines discovers her husband is having an illicit affair. Her group of friends stick their noses in her business. Somebody has a baby. Nobody worries about money. They live in New York City and Connecticut, but most of the people are white and rich. We learn early on that several characters are very witty, but we never actually hear anything that convinces us of this. They change clothes a lot.

Bottle Shock (2008) -vs- Sideways (2004)

The Wrath of Grapes

The Smackdown.  With this year's "Bottle Shock" and 2004's indie darling "Sideways," we have two films that put their respective audiences smack into the middle of the California wine growing scene.  One is more about making wine and the other is more about drinking wine and it's not a small difference.  Obviously, making wine requires more commitment and a great deal more knowledge than actually pouring yourself a glass and kicking back.  But to those who are serious about it, drinking wine forces its own commitments in time and knowledge.  Picking a winner here may be like forcing a decision on whether red or white wine is best.  On the other hand, maybe we still can decide which one is a full-bodied experience with clarity and a spicy aroma and which one may be too hollow or flabby to spend time with.  Let's pop the cork and get to work...

The Challenger.  Cultivating grapes and making wine involves the hard work and honest tilling of the earth that makes farming such emotionally satisfying work.  It has the added bonus of creating an end product that isn't considered a staple but is to many people the epitome of sophistication.  It exerts a real pull or otherwise Francis Ford Coppola wouldn't have decided he liked that job as much as directing movies. 

"Bottle Shock" takes us back over three decades to the year of the American bicentennial of 1976 when California's Napa Valley put the world on notice that it was a force to be recognized by beating the best French wines in a blind taste test conducted with French judges.  The whole idea was the brainchild of a British wine seller living in Paris by the name of Steven Spurrier (Alan Rickman) who needs to do something to actually drive some business into his "Academie du Vin."

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) -vs- Lost in Translation (2003)

Foreign Affairs

The Smackdown.  There must be something about Scarlett Johansson in a foreign land getting mixed up in love, sex and forbidden romance that is like catnip to directors.  So far it's inspired two of them to deliver extremely solid films built around the concept: Woody Allen in the current "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" and Sofia Coppola earlier in "Lost in Translation."  Let's go lookin' for some love in a couple of the wrong places with our dueling Scarletts and see what turns up...

The Challenger.  In order to truly enjoy a Woody Allen film these days you need to be capable of two things:  1) you must divorce yourself of all thoughts about his miserable personal life and 2) you must not dwell on his past triumphs.  Instead, the best way to see one of his current films like "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" is to view it as an oasis of thought and adult intelligence in a desert of "tentpole" films and superhero sequels. 

Two best friends, Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) decide to spend the summer in the Barcelona home of Vicky's relatives.  Vicky is engaged and Cristina is looking for something that will make the whole escapade seem special.  They find it (or, rather, he finds them) in the form of abstract artist Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem) who, in the first words he speaks, manages to proposition both of them into bed.  By the end of the film, that's exactly what he gets (at different times) and, by way of complications, we meet Vicky's fiance from America and Juan's ex-wife (Penelope Cruz) and sparks fly.  And some of the sparks are literally from the point of a gun.  Any more than that would spoil the fun.