Beyond the Multiplex

With the tide of public opinion running strongly against the Bush administration on so many issues, it seems likely that the next president, whether Republican or Democratic, will seek to dissociate himself (or herself) from the Bush-Cheney mode of autocratic secrecy. But if we've already swallowed the central Bushian premise that anything goes in the so-called war against so-called terror, that the president has limitless power to decide who our enemies are and how they will be treated, and that all that high-sounding language in the Constitution and Declaration of Independence is full of asterisks and loopholes when it comes to Dilawar from Whereveristan -- well, then we'll have lost something much bigger than an election.

Gibney never pretends that his work is apolitical or neutral in tone. This is a contentious and angry film, designed to drag one of the most pressing and distressing issues facing this country before the widest possible audience. (Sidney Blumenthal, a Salon columnist and former editor, was one of the film's executive producers, but Salon itself was not involved.) I can only hope that right-wingers spend as much time attacking and debunking "Taxi to the Dark Side" as they did "Fahrenheit 9/11"; that would mean that it has found something like the attention it deserves.

As I've complained repeatedly in this space, Americans don't seem interested in films about the Iraq conflict. This one may be an exception, because "Taxi to the Dark Side" is not after all about America at war in Iraq or Afghanistan but America at war with itself; it's about what we have done (or at least allowed to be done in our name), why we should be ashamed and angry, and whether we have the honor and decency to stop it. If America still has a soul, Alex Gibney is trying to save it. ("Taxi to the Dark Side" has no distribution in place at the moment; stay tuned for more news.)

Moving from the soul of America to the soul of Alec Baldwin, we come to Marc Klein's directing debut, "Suburban Girl," adapted from Melissa Bank's chick-lit classic, "The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing." To absolutely no one's surprise, Baldwin didn't show on Friday night for the premiere of this uneven but pleasantly acrid romantic comedy, in which he stars opposite Sarah Michelle Gellar. Before the film started, Klein was clearly nervous about the possibility that his entire movie was about to become a tabloid footnote. "Anything I say here is likely to end up on Page Six," he told the audience, thanking Baldwin in absentia for his willingness "to go somewhere very personal" in the role of Archie Knox, a 50-ish New York publishing lion who romances Brett (Gellar), a junior editor half his age.

Personal how? Does Alec, like the sleazy but oddly appealing Archie, like 'em ever younger? Not quite -- Klein was preparing us for the film's series of unfortunate laugh lines. (She: "Did you call your daughter?" He: "I left her a message.") You see, Archie the character has an embittered ex-wife and an estranged daughter who doesn't talk to him, and he feels as if he's probably a crappy father. I don't imagine this material was meant to be funny, and when we weren't all howling at the cosmic synchronicities, "Suburban Girl" tasted like a moderately sophisticated, not-too-sweet cocktail.

If the coupling of Baldwin and Gellar seems startling at first, it's meant to be. Baldwin actually does take the dry, self-mocking manner of his recent career into more dangerous territory; Archie is a frustrated author, a supercilious drunk and an incurable philanderer. Since he's Alec Baldwin, he's also a calming and charming presence, and we can see why straightforward, ambitious Brett is intrigued by everything he represents. The film is visually undistinguished but played with delicacy by both actors, and the chemistry that eventually develops between the young striver and the aging Lothario leads to some surprisingly affecting moments.

Another oddly spicy romantic pairing appears in the enjoyable low-budget black comedy "You Kill Me," by John Dahl, director of "Rounders," "The Last Seduction" and various other off-kilter genre movies. Ben Kingsley plays Frank, a monosyllabic Polish-American hit man from Buffalo, N.Y., whose boss (Philip Baker Hall) ships him to San Francisco to get him off the bottle. Not exactly the city I would choose for that purpose, but never mind. Frank hooks up with Lauren (hilarious work from Téa Leoni), an acid-tongued saleslady he meets at a funeral parlor, and befriends Tom (Luke Wilson), a gay Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor who collects tolls on the Golden Gate Bridge.

"You Kill Me" is defiantly inappropriate, totally unapologetic about it, and pretty much fake in what I assume to be deliberate and self-aware fashion. (Virtually the whole film was shot in Winnipeg, Manitoba, which does not resemble either Buffalo or San Francisco.) I'd need a Buffalonian to judge the authenticity of Kingsley's accent here, but Frank is such an uncommunicative guy the role is more about his oddly frozen body language than his accent. There's no psychological back story about Frank or Lauren whatever, no monologues about their childhoods or previous bad marriages. When Lauren and Tom figure out what Frank's job is back home, it's no big deal. He teaches Lauren to kill, using a watermelon and a kitchen knife, in what would be the intimate ballroom-dancing scene of an ordinary love story. I guess when your older boyfriend is a hit man, you come away from the relationship with some real-world skills.

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