Making movies is a tough racket. The lengths filmmakers go to get the idea up on the screen-- the cajoling, the fundraising, the compromise and the drudgery-- is exhaustive. Orson Welles, arguably the greatest American of the film auteurs, lamented late in life that most of his time had been spent attempting to finance his movies, not making them. While movies sometimes make money, they always take money to be made. Kevin Smith maxed out credit cards to make Clerks. Francis Coppola mortgaged his home after blowing the budget for Apocalypse Now. James McElwee survived a car crash to get the money for Ignomoney, his punk rock musical currently being shot here in Denver.

"I was hit by a drunk driver in December of 1998 who was going the wrong way down Logan and hit me smack in front of the Governor's Mansion," McElwee said. "It broke my jaw in two places and really fucked me up for a while. Once the movie is done, the settlement and my savings will be pretty much gone." McElwee plans to submit his film to a variety of festivals, including Sundance, in the fall.

In making Ignomoney, McElwee has had to tap more than just financial reserves.

A 1995 graduate of the film school at the University of Colorado at Boulder, he worked extensively as a sound engineer for music shows at venues such as the Boulder Theater, the Ogden and the now-defunct Club 156. Dissatisfied with the exclusively technical nature of the CU film program (" No training on directing theory or how to communicate with actors."), McElwee enrolled in theater courses. Upon graduation, he began writing Ignomoney as musical theater in the tradition of The Who's Tommy, Jesus Christ Superstar and "The Muppet Show," with the latter two given vigorous nods on the Ignomoney soundtrack. In May of 2000, McElwee directed his opus for the New Plays Festival at the Denver Civic Theatre.

May also brought the release of Mike Figgis' Time Code, an innovative film shot with continuous footage from four handheld digital video cameras. McElwee, who was frustrated with the shortfall of Ignomoney's theatrical production and his original vision as a writer, saw in Time Code a new approach. "It kind of set me back on my heels," he said. "Here's how to maintain the spontaneity and overall flow of the piece and not have to worry about setting up the camera." Auditions and preparations for production began this January.

The evening of August 8, inside a large bungalow off of Colorado Boulevard, a rehearsal is underway. Ignomoney is a dialogue-driven script interspersed with songs played by a punk band made for the movie called Pontius Pilate & The Nail-Driving Five. John Brown fills the lead role of Jason, the conflicted lead singer of Pontius Pilate. Brown is an actor in the process of editing his own film with one of the cameramen of Ignomoney, Erin Mischker. Ignomoney follows the course of a practice session that turns volatile with the conflict between Jason and his ex-girlfriend, Kate, played by Heidi Hammill.

Luke Schmaltz, lead singer and guitarist in the local punk bank King Rat, aptly plays Johnny, the guitarist for Pontius Pilate. McElwee wanted Schmaltz to sing on the film's soundtrack, a plan that fell through when Schmaltz was stabbed in the back during a brawl at Cricket On The Hill. Now recovered, he is splitting his time between his band and drama before the camera. "Acting kind of found me," said Schmaltz, who has growing list of commercials and independent films to his credit.

The ventilation in the room is poor, and even without supplemental lighting the temperature climbs as shooting progresses. The DV cameras are set on slats of wood which are mounted on inverted bicycle forks. McElwee created these devices to give the cameras some stability, which he felt was lacking in other low-budget efforts like Blair Witch Project. These makeshift Steadicams resemble inverted steel wishbones, and soon the cameramen found they have a second use; grasped by the fork steering tube, the contraptions also serve as cranes which can be raised to the ceiling for overhead shots.

In the script, lack of stability is sought after. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was one of the films that McElwee gave to the cast to view as a template and it shows. Verbal barbs and sparks of dysfunction characterize much of the strife between the characters. Little wonder that in the beginning of the film, Jason lapses into a fantasy sequence of playing before packed club. This scene is shot the next night at 15th Street Tavern, with much of crowd comprised of extras aspiring to some Hollywood in downtown Denver.

The tavern fantasy sequence, like the rest of Ignomoney, relies as much on the dedication of the cast and crew as it does on money. Probably more so ... no one is getting paid. Besides, affluent punk rock just sounds bad.

--Andrew Wells movies

photo by sean hartgrove

MOVIE REVIEW

AMERICAN PIE 2

There's something about Steve Stifler (Sean William Scott), that brings a smile to most people's faces subconsciously. Maybe it's the ridiculous way he talks to his friends, or maybe it's the fact that he thinks with his penis. I think it's the latter. In American Pie 2, he breaks into a girl's house to search for evidence to prove to his buddies that she is indeed a lesbian. At the end of his rainbow he finds a dildo, but its rightful owner has returned home and he forgot where he found it. What is he gonna do? It's gags like this that make up the majority of AP2, a funny yet sometimes redundant comedy that makes good on its promise to continue with gross out gags and sexual humor, trademarks that made the first film a success.

Jim (Jason Biggs) has just completed his first year of college and has returned home for the summer like the rest of his clan from the first film. These guys very quickly realize that living with their parents is probably why they left for school in the first place, so they move in together, relocating to a beach house on Lake Michigan.

After being a year apart, some of the guys have changed (Finch has been brainwashed by a Japanese woman), and some haven't (Jim is still a novice when it comes to women). Despite the changes or the similarities, one thing is certain: these guys are gonna have a wicked party to celebrate the end of the movie, I mean summer.

Director J. B. Rogers has done a good deed by bringing back all the original cast members. And when I say everyone, I do mean everyone, including the likes of "The Shermanator" to the two guys who were screaming MILF at Stifler's mom from the first film.

Making AP2 must have been similar to brewing a cup of coffee; it's impossible to screw up. Having all the right ingredients from the first film, and already having mastered the recipe on a successful funny movie, AP2 delivers exactly what you anticipate-- laugh-out-loud, id-related humor with dashes of nudity for show. What else would you expect from a movie where one of the main characters introduces himself to women as "The StifMeister"? B --Neal James

Movie Review

RAT RACE

Walking out of the theater after seeing Rat Race, I overheard a young girl, probably seven or eight years old, tell her mother it was the funniest movie she had ever seen. I can't make the same claim, but I have probably seen more movies than the average eight-year-old. It is, however, the most enjoyable comedy I have seen this summer. I doubt five minutes went by in that theater that I didn't laugh, and I kept chuckling after leaving the theater. Rat Race is quite simply a very funny movie.

What works most for this film is the cast. Most of the people in this movie are playing characters perfectly suited to their talent. John Cleese is a dry, smug eccentric; Rowan Atkinson utilizes physical humor and a funny voice; Seth Green is bitterly sarcastic, etc. Even Whoopi Goldberg and Lanei Chapman, who have two of the least entertaining characters, get in occasional moments of amusement.

The movie's best performances come from Jon Lovitz as a self-centered family man and Vince Vieluf as the mumbling half of a pair of would-be con artist brothers. Lovitz is the best he's been in any live action role since his "Saturday Night Live" days, taking some of the best lines in the movie and making them even better with his delivery. Vieluf, on the other hand, plays his part nearly mute, relying on facial expressions and physical reactions for the roll.

The script is really little more than a series of road trip scenes, but that's all it needs to be; for the most part the individual scenes are strong enough to carry themselves. The writing is good, the jokes work, and the situations are unbelievable enough to make you stop worrying about realism. The story that is used to tie these jokes together involves six people chosen at random to race from Las Vegas to Silver City, New Mexico, for $2 million. It is done for the amusement of a group of millionaires who will bet on absolutely anything (which makes for one of the movie's better running gags).

Because the contestants are given no rules other than first one there gets the cash; every possible mode of transportation is used. Because the vehicles are often chosen out of desperation, the most bizarre and outlandish ones possible are used. After all, where is the fun in watching people have uneventful drives through Arizona? Trust me; in this movie they are better off in hot air balloons, busses full of "I Love Lucy" fans, and Nazi towncars. The only real flaw in Rat Race is the length. Pushing the two hour mark, the final scenes start to feel like they are being dragged out a little longer than necessary.

However, it is great ending-- an unexpected one, but it fits perfectly with the rest of the film-- and had 10 or 15 minutes been cut elsewhere in the movie it would have seemed just right. When all is said and done, Rat Race is everything it should be. It is entertaining, enjoyable, and the funniest movie to hit theaters in a long while. B+ --Chris Ward

DVD REPORT

UNBREAKABLE

David Dunn (Bruce Willis), the sole survivor of a train derailment that killed more than a hundred people, soon finds his miraculously spared life haunted by the intense Elijah Price (Samuel L. Jackson), a dealer in comic book art. Price was born with a genetic defect that curses him with brittle, easily broken bones; he feels that if he is on one end of the human spectrum, David must be on the other -- nearly invulnerable to harm, immune to disease, seemingly possessed of a sixth sense that alerts him to trouble on his job as a security guard ... in short, Elijah is convinced that David is a bona fide superhero.

Unbreakable is a two-disc set: the feature itself on disc one, all extras on disc two. Loaded with not only two foreign language tracks but a DTS soundtrack, there is sadly no room on disc one for a director commentary. I especially say "sadly" because Shyamalan is so articulate about his process in the "Deleted Scenes" feature, in which he introduces each deletion with the reasons why they were ultimately excised. It's a tribute to Shyamalan's craft that had any of these scenes remained in the released version, I would not have blinked. They're that good. But their running time (including Night's intros) add up to nearly 30 minutes, so his decision to cut them seems quite correct.

There is also a somewhat unsatisfying 15 minute "Making Of" feature which relies mainly on interviews with Willis and various crew members, and (more interesting) a 20 minute featurette titled "Comic Books and Superheroes with Samuel L. Jackson." This weaves together interviews with Jackson and several of the brighter lights in the comics firmament.

Shyamalan also includes an excerpt from one of his movie projects shot when only a teen -- "Night's First Fight Scene" -- and it's about as convincing as you could expect from a bunch of kids messing around with a video camera.

One strange omission: no theatrical trailers. Yes, yes, you can call me spoiled all you want, but I'm always interested in observing how films like this are marketed, and when presented with a deluxe package like this -- well, even the barebones MGM genre discs give me at least a trailer. Very odd. B+ --Dr. Freex

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