On the Daywatch

What are the odds? On Sunday, one day after we went with friends from out of town to watch PAPRIKA at the new Landmark theater, another friend called us from out of the blue asking us to come watch DAYWATCH with him at the selfsame theater. And once called, how can we help but respond?

Responding was actually a bit of an adventure. We had said goodbye to our Utah friends a little after noon; and a couple hours later I took a bike ride south. I was hanging around a store in Fox Hills (about 4.5 miles from home) when I got a call from Amy at around 3:15 telling me the movie would be at 4:10. I hopped on my bike and navigated the oft-treacherous street and sidewalks of Sawtelle (why do so many people park their SUVs in driveways, blocking the sidewalk?) and managed to make it to the Westside Pavilion at about 4:05.

DAYWATCH is the sequel to NIGHTWATCH, the hyperkinetic anything-goes urban fantasy from Russia, in which good and evil "Others" (witches, vampires, shapechangers, etc.) are engaged in a millenium-long cold war with each other -- the truce being kept by sets of cops on each side, the Daywatch for the evil folk and the Nightwatch for the good. Of course, the whole apple cart gets massively upset (otherwise you wouldn't have a story). As with the first film, DAYWATCH throws all sorts of concepts at you without much concern over whether you'll understand it -- you have to just grab what you can and hang on. It's an exhilarating and exhausting experience.

After the movie, our friend asked about one of the high-end goodies at the concession stand -- coconut candy bars dipped in dark chocolate. He wondered how it compared to a Mounds bar. I said that if it saw a Mounds bar in the street, it might toss a dollar at it. He bought his wife one of the high-end bars.

When Everything Seems Like the Movies

Have movies shaped our dreams as much as dreams have shaped the movies? Before movies came out, did people dream as cinematically as they do now?

Satoshi Kon's new film, Paprika, brings these questions to mind. In this science fiction movie, researchers have developed psychotherapy machines, the most advanced of which enables them to not only visually record dreams, but to enter them. The repressed scientist Dr. Atsko dives into other people's dreams, where she becomes her alter ego, Paprika, who is as adventurous, uninhibited and flirtatious as Atsko is reserved. The problems start when the technology is misused -- threatening reality itself.






Among the many themes this smart movie explores is the connection between movies and dreams -- particularly for one of Dr. Atsko's clients, a police detective who professes to hate movies, yet has recurring dreams that conjure images from "Roman Holiday," "The Greatest Show on Earth," "Tarzan," and "From Russia With Love." It's an apt subject for Kon, who showed his fascination for movies in the Hitchcockian psychological thriller "Perfect Blue" and the John Ford tribute "Tokyo Godfathers," among other movies.

The art style of the lush animation also played into the theme. The characters were rendered in a stylized-realism form, incorporating slight caricature, reminiscent of American comic books -- themselves highly influenced by (and in turn influencing) cinematic storytelling.

The Internet also plays a strong part in the movie. The film points out that the Web often serves the same purposes as dreams -- providing us with an emotional outlet, or a place where we can become other people in a dreamscape.

I don't want to give the impression that "Paprika" is a philosophical snore-fest. Instead, it's a fast-paced action film, which uses animation to play with shifting perspectives and fantastic visuals, to illustrate dreams and what happens when dreams and reality collide.

We saw "Paprika" with friends in the new Landmark cinema, which had just opened the day before. It turned out an apt venue. Several of the scenes in "Paprika" take place in movie theatres, and the characters are often shown in darkened theatres watching other scenes unfolding on the screen. At moments like those, the line between reality and the animated world on the other side of the screen seemed to blur.

"Paprika," like several of Kon's films, is a perfect answer to those who believe that intelligent, mature stories cannot be told in animation -- or that Japanese anime consists solely of game merchandising, giant robots and porn.

A Landmark in My Backyard

Today's LA Times featured this article about the new 12-screen Landmark Theater that's being built at the intersection of Pico and Westwood, replacing the former "Westside Two" section of the Westside Pavillion. (Angelinos might recall that the Pickwood theater used to be approximately at that point.) The theater is not literally in my backyard, but it's close enough that I can see the parking lot from my front porch.

When I heard that it would be running "independent films" only, I wondered how it could possibly find enough current indies to fill 12 screens. (I thought that it might end up with "Umbrellas of Cherbourg" running on 4 screens every month.) Apparently, I'm not the only one wondering about the programming. "Exactly what kind of movies the Landmark will play is in dispute," the article notes. The Chief Operating Officer states that, were the venue open today, "Spider-Man 3" might be playing on as many as three Landmark screens. But as the article notes, the company has repeatedly told the theater's neighbors (i.e., us) that it would not run big, wide-distribution movies like that.

The article comments that the success of theaters in Century City has threatened those in Westwood, traditionally a mecca for those who want to see movies on big screens that dwarf those in multiplexes. (Of course, there's just one theater in Century City now, the AMC Century 15 -- the theater at the former ABC Entertainment Center died with the Entertainment Center a few years ago.) Now the Landmark will have to contend with the Century 15 for bookings in the area -- a daunting prospect, given that AMC is a national chain with tremendous clout; and given that the Century 15 has a screen set aside for independent movies.

I will welcome a luxury theater (with a lower ticket price than The Bridge and the Arclight, my current favorite movie venues) within walking distance of my house. But I will not welcome it so much if it draws loud, rowdy crowds. Or if it goes out of business, leaving a multi-story abandoned hulk a couple of blocks away.