Habit of Vomit

Rating: Null/10 (20 July 2004)

Wants 'Raging Bull', gets 'Natural Born Killers'
This is your only spoiler warning...
I'll be honest here. Stone knows a few things about dialog that his successors don't. He's also proved himself a master of first-level narratives ('Born on the Fourth', 'Platoon') and even the second-level ('JFK'--where the film was_about_a film), but I think he's exhausted his cinematic juices. What we have is this...pretty depressing, ain't it?
Stone wants the 'Rollerball' concept of athletes-as-warriors, yet he insists on depicting the characters as people. Gladiator battles are focused on the movement and fluidity of combat, not single faces. Stone falls victim, again, to the same "commercial method" that he's satirizing, and we're stuck with Jamie Foxx's mug plastered onscreen.
I think, since 'JFK', Stone has been caught in a kind of visual angst. He isn't certain what he wants to see, so he throws every camera angle into his soup and prays for a miracle. It worked in 'JFK' in capturing the essence of the Kennedy conspiracy, here it just makes us think he's ADD. Compare this with Ridley Scott or even Steven Spielberg--who KNOW what they want to see.
Oh, yes, and there's his trademark misogyny.
Fortunately, all is not lost. Stone has three kinds of actors: real actors (here presented by James Woods), prop actors (LL Cool J), and dynamite sticks (Al Pacino). It seems in each of his projects he gets one of each. Furthermore, these characters are actors in the barest sense. They live and perform on camera. Stone even injects himself into the story as one of the narrators (also, I might add, the most worthless job in the profession).
Also, Stone works to create a universe (in this case a whole football league) since the Sport Nazis at the NFL wouldn't let him use their franchises. Sadly, despite this opportunity, Stone becomes more derivative rather than more original.
Still, I'll take this over any "feel good" Disney sport junk--the most recent being 'Miracle'.