Them Bones

Thanks to the mysteries of Netflix, it's double feature week. Occasionally, the movies available for instant streaming have an expiration date added to them for reasons I do not know. This week, 10 of the movies on our watch instantly list were stamped with a "Must Watch By 1/1/10" date so I've got my homework cut out for me.

We started it off with Tim Burton's Corpse Bride. A gorgeous, gorgeous movie that was pretty meh when it comes to the storyline. It's your typical arranged marriage gone wrong film with a twist. Somehow, the protagonist of this movie ends up accidentally getting hitched to a dead girl. Let the hijinx begin.

Boo. Hiss. A rotting, bloated cadaver of a film. The plot was ludicrous, the voodoo jazz band atrocious and the songs were...what is the opposite of catchy?

As in The Nightmare Before Christmas, the songs are subpar and not the kind of toe tappers that will have you leaving the theater humming the tunes but the visuals in the movie are so stunning I was able to forgive the lame soundtrack and boring plot.

I found myself yawning and checking the clock far too much to say I even semi-enjoyed the film. It gets a 2. The beautiful animation was certainly a plus but the hideous, big lipped Peter Lorre worm knocked off 3 full points all by itself. It tried too hard to be goth and odd when it should have focused more on being clever and interesting.

Next up was New York Doll, a film as different from Corpse Bride as possible. It's a documentary about the legendary Arthur "Killer" Kane, the bass player for the short lived but highly influential New York Dolls. The story is absolutely fascinating and is a perfect example of how truth is often much, much stranger than fiction. Arthur spent the 25+ years since the band's dissolution chasing fame but never achieving it at the same level ever again. He got his taste of the spotlight and the rock and roll world and always wanted to get back into it, even after joining the LDS Church and devoting himself to their teachings.

And once again, Morrissey comes to the rescue. In 2004 he curated a music festival in London and asked the three remaining Dolls to reunite for the show. New York Doll documents the weeks leading up to the big show. You can't help fall in love with Arthur Kane in this film whether he's bragging to the ladies at the Mormon Family Library about how his bass playing laid the foundation for the raucous rock of the Dolls or briefing David "Buster Poindexter" Johansen on the tenets of the Mormon lifestyle. His childlike joy at the prospect of getting the band back together is impossible to deny and what at first seems like just an interesting documentary becomes a poignant love story of a man and music. I give it a 9.

It's somehow both heartwarming and heartbreaking. An unexpected joy and one of the more unique documentaries I've seen in awhile. It has specific appeal for Dolls fans but transcends simple music biography to become an artful homage to a rock maniac and a gentle soul.