Over at the Washington Post I have a rather lengthy interview with Matt Zoller Seitz about his new book, The Oliver Stone Experience. Part one is here, part two is here. Please go read it!
If you dig film books or if you just like Oliver Stone or if you have enjoyed Matt Zoller Seitz's work at Vulture and RogerEbert.com, you should buy this book. It's really, truly marvelous: big and bold and filled with stills and letters and photos and other ephemera, not to mention the interview with Stone that spans his life and critical essays from Seitz and a roster of writers. It's a reminder of why the codex is still a long way from being replaced by the .mobi, and well worth the $35 or so it'll cost you at Amazon.
Anyway, I spent a lot of the last few weeks reading and watching and thinking about Oliver Stone films. Here are my five favorite.
5. Salvador (1986)
It's an interesting flick: rough (both stylistically and thematically) and piercing, an examination of what it means—what it looks like on the ground, as bodies pile up—for the United States to prop up a regime utilizing death squads because you're afraid of the alternative. It's also one of the more sneakily nuanced Stone films, as we see the results of letting the leftist guerrillas get their way: executions of prisoners commence almost immediately, and combat photographer Richard Boyle (James Woods) shouts with horror "You've become just like them! You've become just like them!" Woods excels in the role, and it's a handy reminder of why he's one of America's most interesting, underrated actors. I mean, this scene is just about perfect:
Woods and Stone have remained friends despite the fact that the actor is a raving rightwing maniac* and the director is a dirty, dirty leftwing agitator. As Stone puts it in Seitz's book, "Jimmy is great. I'd rather talk to Jimmy than some leftwing bore." The world needs more bipartisan friendships like theirs.
4. Alexander (2004)
I graduated from college with a degree in history and a concentration in ancient history right about the time this was hitting theaters, so I'm biased. But I love its scope and scale. The hawk's eye view of Gaugamela, for instance, is a reminder of just how enormous these bloody skirmishes were. And I know some were bored by the amount of time spent on Alexander's (Colin Farrell) personal life, but I don't see how you can understand the myth without experiencing the man.
3. Platoon (1986)
Stone's 1986 is comparable to Spielberg's 1993 (Schindler's List and Jurassic Park) or Coppola's 1974 (The Conversation and The Godfather Part II) insofar as he released two Oscar-worthy films in the same year. I'm more than happy to admit the film's politics are atrocious as long you're willing to admit it's a fine bit of filmmaking, propulsively told, impressively acted, and compellingly shot.
2. Nixon (1995)
Surprisingly sympathetic toward the disgraced president. Unsurprisingly unsympathetic toward the Military-Industrial Complex. The best film about an American president ever made.
1. JFK (1991)
JFK's most notable cinematic feature is its hectic editing—the mixing of film stocks, the cutting to other POVs, the chronological jumpiness. It serves an important function: Watching JFK is the cinematic equivalent of talking to a conspiracy theorist. If you've ever chatted with a JFK obsessive or a 9/11 Truther, the rhythm of the film quickly becomes very familiar. What these people do is pile "facts" one on top of the other until your head is swimming and you're questioning everything you thought you knew. Similarly, Stone piles images on top of one another, never giving you time to breathe, never giving your brain a moment to process what's being said or what's being shown. As such, you eventually become overwhelmed and start wondering just how much you really know about Oswald (a communist who defected to Russia and tried to murder a rightwing general before JFK rolled into Dealey Plaza) and Kennedy (a Cold Warrior through and through who took us to the brink of nuclear war).
Look, I think JFK is bunk as history. It's a prime example of the phenomenon detailed in James Piereson's excellent Camelot and Cultural Revolution, a book about how the left went a little nuts after JFK was killed. However, I also think it's a stunning piece of filmmaking, one of the best flicks of the 1990s, and one of the most strikingly edited pictures in the history of American cinema. One can hold both of those thoughts in one's head at the same time.
*Who reads the Free Beacon occasionally! Hi Mr. Woods! As a fellow rightwing maniac I assure you I meant that in the most polite way possible.