Review: Don't Look Up

Image courtesy of Netflix.

Adam Mckay's star-studded disaster comedy "Don't Look Up" boasts a roster of extremely talented actors and says a lot of things about the current stupid state of our nation with which I agree — but it, unfortunately, doesn't do so in a manner that's particularly engaging or, for a comedy, particularly funny. It's righteously angry, but the jokes never land because, well, most of them are so obvious and aren't exactly played with humor in mind.

The film's premise is that two low-level astronomers (played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence) discover the presence of a comet that is several kilometers wide and barreling toward Earth. They figure if they alert the president of the United States (Meryl Streep), a Donald Trump-type of figure who only cares about their poll numbers, then a mission can be sent to destroy the comet before it reaches the planet.

But their message falls on deaf ears as President Orlean and her obnoxious spokesman/son (Jonah Hill) try to think how they can use the comet to help the president's reelection campaign. Meanwhile, a billionaire Elon Musk type (Mark Rylance) is devising ways to monetize the comet and use it to sell products. At the same time, the two astronomers attempt to go to the media with the story — and the two empty headed talk show hosts (Cate Blanchett and Tyler Perry) they speak to gloss over the story because it's not a cheerful one.

As expected, large segments of the U.S. population don't believe the comet is real, and against their best interests the president convinces some of them that it hitting part of Earth would be good for the economy. The story doesn't take off in the press because most viewers are more interested in a story involving a vapid pop singer's (Ariana Grande) engagement.

As I'd mentioned, all of the things that "Don't Look Up" points out — Americans' refusal to believe what's proven by scientists and right in front of their eyes, the vapidity of the modern media and how stupid stories are what resonate with the general population, and the use of information as warfare in the two-party political system — are all valid, and appear ripe for lampooning.

But McKay's recent films are instructive as to why this film doesn't work. "The Big Short" was a, for lack of a better phrase, smarty pants approach to explaining the 2008 economic downturn. I don't use that phrase pejoratively — the style that McKay employed for that film (big stars explaining esoteric Wall Street jargon, etc.) worked to the film's benefit. When he tried this style again several years later with "Vice," which chronicled former VP Dick Cheney's life, it didn't work quite as well.

"Don't Look Up" feels like his angriest politically-charged comedy to date, but the anger — though well deserved — overshadows the comedy. It's just not that funny. There's a scene in which DiCaprio blows up at the talk show hosts, and it seems as if the filmmakers wanted it to feel like that pivotal moment of being mad as hell in "Network." But despite DiCaprio's efforts, it feels too obvious. A later moment in which he shouts "we're all going to die" on a "Sesame Street"-like show is much funnier.

The film — which runs nearly two hours and 20 minutes, which would be long for any comedy — feels less like a satire than a harangue. It has a cast full of marvelously talented people, and in our current age of climate change denial, stupidity among large sectors of the American populace in dealing with COVID-19 and anti-vaxxers, "Don't Look Up" seems like it should get some easy laughs out of its premise. But it just meanders by saying the same obvious thing over and over again without being particularly funny or insightful.

Review: Red Rocket

Image courtesy of A21.

Sean Baker's latest film, "Red Rocket," is another addition to his oeuvre depicting those living on the margins, although the lead character of this picture is one who previously found success, but has fallen on hard times and is living on the down-and-out. That character is Mikey (a very good Simon Rex), a former porn star pushing 50 years old who has returned to his Texas hometown to crash with his former wife and porn co-star, Lexi (Bree Elrod), and her mother (Brenda Deiss), both of whom are skeptical about his intentions and with good reason.

Set against the backdrop of the 2016 presidential election - another story involving a sleazy grifter who shows up to make life hell for everyone he comes across - Mikey's foibles at first involve his trying to scrounge together enough money to give to Lexi and her mother, so that he'll have a place to crash. To be fair, he attempts to find work as a waiter and other assorted jobs, but when it comes up that he's Mikey Saber, who has starred in thousands of adult films and won an AVN award for the best blowjob received in a movie, well, let's just say the job offers don't come pouring in.

Pretty much everything Mikey touches turns to shit, whether it's denying Lexi a simple favor that could help her overcome custody issues with her child, who is not Mikey's, or leading astray Lonnie (Ethan Darbone), a next door neighbor who is obviously impressed by Mikey's lies - which include everything from his prowess (he takes pills to gain an erection) to his "81 percent click-through rate" online. For work, he begins selling weed supplied by an older woman named Leondria (Judy Hill) and her hot-tempered daughter, June (Brittney Rodriguez).

But the worst of Mikey's sins is getting involved with a donut shop clerk named Strawberry (Suzanna Son), who - cringe - "turns 18 in three weeks." Mikey sees something in Strawberry, and by that I mean her ability to possibly become a porn star and, in turn, help his star to rise once again as a scouter of talent. The two begin an affair, and Mikey egregiously first tells her that he works in Hollywood, until she finds out he is Mikey Saber, and then he tries to sell her on that industry.

Baker's films - which include the remarkable "The Florida Project," but also "Tangerine" and "Starlet" - are often about people living at the edges of society, and many of the characters in his films are involved in some type of sex work. He revisits that milieu here - Lexi, we are told, turns tricks to pay rent - but Mikey is viewed as less of a sex worker and more of, as another character calls him, a "suitcase pimp."

It's become de rigueur for a film to follow a character who is of little redeeming value as a person, but that doesn't make "Red Rocket" any less entertaining or compelling. Often quite funny, but just as often disturbing, the film isn't as much of a downer as it might sound. In fact, the manner in which Mikey's lies finally catch up to him result in a hilarious comeuppance of the type that, in real life, often evades sleaze artist con men.

While "The Florida Project" remains Baker's masterpiece, "Red Rocket" is a very well made and acted - Rex especially - film about a man so completely lacking self awareness that when he finally finds himself facing the consequences of his actions, he seems utterly dumbstruck. Although occasionally queasy - as such a story demands - "Red Rocket" is another strong entry into Baker's filmography, and a likely vehicle for Rex's career reboot. It's well worth seeing.

Review: Licorice Pizza

Image courtesy of MGM.

During the course of its shaggy narrative, Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman, son of Philip Seymour Hoffman) and Alana (Alana Haim, of the band HAIM) spend a fair amount of time running. Occasionally it's toward each other, at other times in different directions, but their mode of travel is often on foot at a high sprint. 

This almost becomes a - for lack of a better word - running theme in Paul Thomas Anderson's funny and shimmering nostalgia piece "Licorice Pizza, which is apparently based on a set of stories and memories, albeit not Anderson's, but rather Gary Goetzman's, a former TV waterbed salesman, child actor and current producing partner of Tom Hanks. He passed his stories of 1970s Hollywood to Jonathan Demme, with whom he worked, and they made their way to Anderson, a Demme aficionado.

Not only are Gary, a precocious 15-year-old with a man's confidence, and Alana - an occasionally frustrated and aimless 25-year-old who meets Gary during school picture day as she helps with the photo setups - often literally running, but also frequently fleeing from scheme to scheme. After he hits on her and fails to woo her - but manages to pique her interest - during the school photo day, they become friends, sort of. She acts as his chaperone on a trip to New York for a film-related gig, and then follows him into a semi-lucrative business selling waterbeds out of a storefront in Encino.

Later, Gary hears word that pinball will once again become legal in Los Angeles, and being the schemer he is, decides to next go all in on an arcade, while Alana attempts to take up acting - and lies her way through a hilarious interview with a casting director played with insane verve by Harriet Sansom Harris - and then finds herself behind a telephone volunteering for L.A. mayor hopeful Joel Wachs (director Benny Safdie), the former president of the L.A. City Council.

It might seem unrealistic that a 25-year-old woman would want to spend so much time around a 15-year-old boy - and no, the relationship is not sexual; he clearly likes her, and she's more intrigued than aroused by him and sees a kindred spirit - and she even questions what she's doing spending so much time around Gary, but it's clear that their need to constantly break free from one moneymaking endeavor and transfer to another draws them together. The film includes gorgeous sunsets and swirling camerawork that add to the sense of possibility for both of these characters.

But also lurking around every corner is a sense of danger, whether it's a sequence during which Gary is mistaken by police for a murder suspect, a gas shortage that gives off an end-of-the-world vibe - during one lovely and surreal moment, Gary runs alongside a massive line of cars waiting for gas to the tune of David Bowie's "Life on Mars?," just one of many well-used musical cues in the picture - or the numerous lechers whom Gary and Alana stumble upon.

During the school photo day, Alana grimaces when the head photographer slaps her on the bottom, and most of the other grown-up men we meet aren't much better, whether it's the aging actor obviously based on William Holden (portrayed with a comedic touch by Sean Penn) who has come to believe his own legend; Wachs, who lets both Alana and another individual down during a crushing moment late in the picture; or the completely insane Jon Peters (Bradley Cooper in a delirious supporting role), the actual hairdresser-turned-Hollywood producer who once dated Barbra Streisand, and who sort of terrorizes Gary and pretty much anyone he comes across during an odyssey through L.A.

But the most dangerous moment - and the film's greatest set piece - involves a truck without gas slowly rolling down L.A. hills carrying our two leads and a group of youngsters while attempting to make a getaway following an act of vandalism on Gary's part. Anderson displays great talent in this scene by balancing tension, some belly laughs and a final cut to a character's face who has come to a realization.

Gary - and Alana, who gets roped into Gary's schemes - fits in with the hucksters, dreamers and schemers who Anderson loves to portray, such as Tom Cruise's Frank TJ Mackey in "Magnolia," Daniel Day Lewis's Daniel Plainview in "There Will Be Blood," Adam Sandler's Barry Egan in "Punch Drunk Love" and Hoffman's Lancaster Dodd in "The Master."

But "Licorice Pizza" has more of a sunnier vibe - and a "Boogie Nights" atmosphere - than some of the director's more brooding and brilliant work of recent years, and its kooky not-quite-romance at its center feels more in line with "Punch Drunk Love." Much like his previous work, it's not always clear which direction an Anderson film might head - and this one's shaggy nature gives it a freewheeling picaresque structure - but it's almost certainly always somewhere interesting. 

Also, it's rare that I can give a film this particular compliment, but in this case it applies: I've barely sifted through everything I saw in "Licorice Pizza," but I can't wait to give the picture - which is named after a 1970s-era chain of record stores and refers specifically to records themselves - another spin. 

Review: The Matrix Resurrections

Image courtesy of Warner Bros.

A series that has gone from "whoa" to "wha?," the fourth "Matrix" film is both a welcome return for a Hollywood blockbuster and a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand, it's good to see a thinking person's tentpole film after reboots every few years of every comic book series imaginable, and every franchise of years past being dredged up to provide nostalgia porn. 

In fact, the first third of "The Matrix Resurrections" engages in an extended meta joke about the nature of milking nostalgia for financial gain and how boring the concept of rebooting actually is. More on that in a bit.

On the other, the elements of the "Matrix" sequels that didn't quite work remain. In fact, as the plot involving the different realities in which Neo (Keanu Reeves), Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) and their cohorts navigate goes further and further down the rabbit hole - Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit" even plays on the soundtrack in what might count as a nod and a wink - the harder it is to actually follow what the hell is going on. This is useful for the filmmakers in that no one will be able to figure out whether the damn thing actually makes sense or not.

The film is at its best in the first third when it focuses on Neo, once again going by the name Thomas Anderson as a successful video game creator, working on his latest update to a popular video game he created called, you guessed it, "The Matrix." The game includes segments from all of the "Matrix" movies, which gives the filmmakers license to utilize shots from previous films, so we see a younger Reeves, Moss and Laurence Fishburne, who has been replaced by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Morpheus.

During meetings, Neo and his fellow video game collaborators discuss the "reboot" of the video game, and whether such a thing is advised. The concept of "Matrix 4" is discussed and whether that's an advisable thing. All in good fun, but also a little creepy when you consider how Warner Bros., which produced the film, released "Space Jam: A New Legacy" earlier this year. 

In that film, a variety of characters from Warner Bros. properties - "The Matrix" included - popped up. While director Lana Wachowski may be parodying the concept, the company producing the film might just be taking stock and thinking how to combine "Matrix" storylines with, say, DC Comics characters or some other "property."

Anyway, the second best thing about the new "Matrix" film is the romance between Neo and Trinity, who is living as a woman named Tiffany in some simulation, and has a husband and two children. She occasionally runs into Neo in a coffee shop, and the two could swear they've met before. As the film's plot becomes more and more labyrinthine and involves Neo breaking free from a simulated prison designed by a nefarious shrink played by Neil Patrick Harris to save Trinity, who's in a similar prison, it becomes more confusing.

There are some impressive action sequences, although they're fairly similar to the ones you've already seen in the previous "Matrix" films. Agent Smith is back, but is this time played by "Mindhunter" star Jonathan Groff, and some other minor characters from the original series make cameos. From a visual standpoint, the film is impressive, and despite its jokes about nostalgia, that is a factor that makes returning to this world pleasant.

So, no, "The Matrix Resurrections" isn't going to change the genre of which it is a part as the first in the series did. It's often fun, and audiences will get a fair amount of mileage from the reunion of Reeves and Moss, both of whom are quite good here. It's an occasionally successful sequel that pokes fun at its reason for existing, but also caves in and gives the goods that audiences are likely expecting. It has its cake and eats it too. Often enough, that's amusing, even if you have no idea what's going on from one scene to the next.

Review: Nightmare Alley

Image courtesy of Fox Searchlight Pictures.

A stylish noir epic with a humdinger of an ending, Guillermo del Toro's "Nightmare Alley" is one of the darkest Hollywood films I've seen in some time. Based on the 1947 film of the same name starring Tyrone Power, the picture is oozing with atmosphere, features a number of great actors in supporting performances and is often terrifying as to how far into the depths of human depravity it is willing to plunge.

The film stars Bradley Cooper as Stanton Carlisle, a con man whom we first see burning a body in an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere and then catching a bus to a small town, where he stumbles upon a carnival and finds employment. We're pretty far well into the film when Cooper actually speaks his first line of dialogue, and it's when his attention has been caught by one of the carnival's performers - the geek, a haggard man kept in a cage who bites the heads off chickens.

Cooper is hired to do odd jobs at the carnival by Clem (Willem Dafoe), an unscrupulous man who tells Stanton that the way he finds his geeks is seeking out desperate drunks whom he slowly feeds opium in the rations of booze he doles out and gets them hooked. At that point, they will do anything - including biting the heads off chickens - for that next sip.

Stanton finds success in the carnival and a new group of friends - including Molly (Rooney Mara), a shy girl he woos whose acts involves being shocked with electricity, and Zeena and Pete (Toni Collette and David Strathairn), a pair whose mind reading act intrigues Stanton. Under Pete's tutelage, Stanton gets incorporated into the act, and eventually plans to break out on his own by using the tricks of the trade. He convinces Molly to run away with him - much to the chagrin of Bruno (Ron Perlman), a burly carnie who acts as her guardian - and the two find success as stage mystics.

It's during one of their shows at a venue populated by rich people that Stanton meets Dr. Lilith Ritter (Cate Blanchett), a psychiatrist whose very presence screams "femme fatale." She agrees to divulge the secrets of some of her wealthy clients - which Stanton will use when summoning the dead to allow them to speak to those they've lost - in exchange for him allowing her to analyze him.

Molly is uncomfortable with Stanton's new racket, and during a visit from some of their old carnival friends, Zeena warns that Stanton is getting in over his head, especially after Ritter introduces him to a man named Grindle (Richard Jenkins), a seemingly dangerous individual who wants to be put in touch with a former flame who died. Grindle's right-hand man, the burly Anderson (Holt McCallany, of "Mindhunter"), tells Stanton that he will do anything to protect Grindle and, if Stanton is smart, that should scare him.

On the one hand, it's pretty easy to see where "Nightmare Alley" is going, right down to the disturbing and horrifying twist of fate in the finale, but it's the manner in which the film gets there that makes it work so well. I guessed correctly at what the final scene would be, but the way in which Cooper - and Tim Blake Nelson, in a cameo - play it was still a punch in the gut.

Del Toro's films often involve fantastical characters and stories - such as the remarkable "Pan's Labyrinth" and the offbeat fairy tale Oscar winner "The Shape of Water" - but his foray into noir feels like the work of a pro. "Nightmare Alley" is an unsettling, but visually sumptuous, and unrepentantly dark chronicle about how the horrors of one man's past lead him down the wrong path. This being a noir, there are - of course - some thuggish henchmen, a femme fatale and an ironic twist of fate. 

"Nightmare Alley" is one of two - the other being Steven Spielberg's "West Side Story" - recent remakes that work surprisingly well because rather than paying slavish homage, their creators often take their updates in directions that are different from the originals. As such, "Nightmare Alley" turns a classic noir into an epic of one man's descent and downfall. It's a good one.

Review: The Hand Of God

Image courtesy of Netflix.

 Paolo Sorrentino's "The Hand of God" may draw some comparisons to the great Federico Fellini - whose work likely inspired some of Sorrentino's films, such as "The Great Beauty" - in the somewhat vulgar caricatures portrayed by the film's cast and the fixation of his lead character on what he perceives to be the mysteries of women. But this film - which includes a scene in which Fellini's presence becomes more literal than in Sorrentino's other movies - feels more personal and autobiographic that some of his previous work.

The film is set in the 1980s and follows the travails of Fabietto (Filippo Scotti), a virgin who must navigate life with a bawdy extended family that's often squabbling, taking part in provocative gestures or playing pranks on each other. The picture opens with a curious scene in which a favorite aunt - and a favorite due to her attractiveness and penchant for nude sunbathing - gets stopped on the street and taken by an old man to meet a child in a robe who's referred to as the Little Monk. It's a surreal sequence that nicely sets up the shifts in mood and tone throughout the film.

We then cut to Fabietto, his parents and several other relatives visiting this aunt, Patrizia (Luisa Ranieri), who's been once again beaten up by her husband. Fabietto is transfixed as his aunt's breast has slipped out of her dress as she talks to the family. We later learn of her troubled mental state - which leads to a stay in a psychiatric ward - but to Fabietto, she's an object of fixation.

In terms of a plot, you could argue that "The Hand of God" is somewhat aimless - and I don't mean this as a dig - but rather a series of scenes that involve Fabietto and his family - which include his brother, Marchino (Marlon Joubert), who like his brother is obsessed with Italian soccer, as well as his eccentric parents, Saverio and Maria (Toni Servillo and Teresa Saponangelo). Fabietto's father likes to crack jokes - often at the expense of his extended family - while Maria is a lover of pranks. One of those pranks involves her tricking a relative into thinking they've got the part they auditioned for in a Fellini movie.

But while the first half of "The Hand of God" is light in tone, raunchy and often funny, there's a shocking twist of events about halfway through that send the film into an entirely different direction. It's difficult to discuss the twist without giving it away, but suffice it to say that something awful involving Fabietto's family occurs, and the rest of the film involves the young man thinking about what he wants for his future - and a run-in with a cranky movie director pushes him in the direction of being a filmmaker.

Viewers might get a little whiplashed by the drastic change in tone from the film's first and second halves, but "The Hand of God" is mostly a winsome and ultimately moving coming-of-age tale. Some scenes border on the ridiculous - the voicebox of a relative's boyfriend and a sex scene between a young character and an old woman are among the many sequences that keep the absurdist surreal vibe alive throughout the film - but it's a picture with a genuine emotional pull. It may not be Sorrentino's best film, but I prefer it slightly over some of his more acclaimed films that, perhaps, took themselves a little more seriously. Regardless, it's a colorful and enjoyable watch.

Review: West Side Story

Image courtesy of 20th Century Fox.

Steven Spielberg's "West Side Story" remake is a good cover of a classic. It makes some stylistic choices that weren't available to the 1961 Robert Wise film and includes some story rearrangement - the kindly Doc in the original is replaced by Rita Moreno's Valentina, who acts as a mentor and employer of Tony (Ansel Elgort) - that often works well enough.

Spielberg has tackled so many genres - from horror ("Jaws") and science fiction ("Close Encounters of the Third Kind") to adventure films ("Raiders of the Lost Ark"), war movies ("Saving Private Ryan") and serious-minded historical epics ("Schindler's List" and "Munich") - that it comes less of a surprise that he's trying his hand at a musical than that he's only getting around to it now.

And there's no question about it: He's got a knack for it. The new "West Side Story" is a triumph of camera placement, staging and movement. The film looks great, and the dance numbers have a vitality to them that's often missing in modern movie musicals. The iconic opening number, "Jet Song" (you probably know it from the lyrics "when you're a Jet" and the snapping fingers) displays a real sense of menace and is performed, much like many of the film's musical numbers, almost to perfection.

The film, for those unfamiliar with "West Side Story," is an adaptation of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet," so an outline of the plot is unlikely necessary, although some changes have been made from the original "West Side Story" - such as the Moreno character, the movement of one of the film's iconic tunes toward the end of the picture and more attention paid to the theme of prejudice (the white Jets wanting the Puerto Rican Sharks to move off their territory, which they see as threatened by the increase of nonwhites moving into their neighborhood).

Elgort is fine as Tony, while Rachel Zegler is very good as Maria. But one of the small issues with the couple's love story - Maria's overprotective brother and Sharks leader Bernardo (David Alvarez) doesn't want her mixed up with the white Tony, a former leader of the Jets - is that the central two characters are often overshadowed by the supporting ones.

The two characters in the film who easily steal the show are Anita (Ariana DeBose), Bernardo's girlfriend, and Riff (Mike Faist), the de facto leader of the Jets since Tony is staying out of the public eye after having nearly beaten a rival gang member to death some time before the story starts. DeBose's performance during the show stopping "America" is breathtaking as she and a crew of seemingly hundreds sing and dance in the streets of New York in a moment that rivals some of the best in "In the Heights," which was also set amid a Latino community in New York City and made use of that city's streets for dance numbers.

Faist exudes both charm and menace as the Jets leader, especially during the opening number as he and his fellow gang members prowl their territory. Moreno (who won an Oscar for playing Anita in the original film), at age 89, is also good as Valentina, who was once married to a white man and understands Tony's predicament, but is also afraid about him getting mixed up in a violent situation - Bernardo is a fighter who is gunning for Tony after the latter danced with his sister at a community mixer. Speaking of which, the scene in which Tony and Maria eye each other across the gymnasium during that mixer is one of the key scenes in the film that exhibit what one might call that "Spielberg magic."

So, while "West Side Story" is, obviously, a little short on originality due to the fact that it's a remake of an old film and musical that was itself an adaptation of one of the stage's most iconic plays, it makes up for it in execution. Despite being familiar with the story, the dance numbers and singing are strong, there are more than a few gripping moments and the camerawork is often intoxicating. And it's further proof that Spielberg can work in pretty much any genre and make it his own.

Review: C'mon C'mon

Image courtesy of A24.

Mike Mills' "C'mon C'mon" starts out as a stylish black and white film that appears simplistic in concept and more concerned with mood and tone before gradually developing into something a little deeper and what one might expect from the director, whose previous film, "20th Century Women," was a woefully underrated film of great insight and warmth.

Looking like a Woody Allen movie from the early 1980s, but starting off with a vibe that feels more in line with a Mumblecore film, "C'mon C'mon" follows the exploits of Johnny (Joaquin Phoenix), an audio journalist of some type - it's never quite established who he's working for - who is working on a project in which he interviews children around the nation about their hopes, dreams and visions of the future as if he's producing some sort of American "Up" series.

He's somewhat estranged from his sister, Viv (Gaby Hoffmann), who has her hands full with an imaginative, but often hyper, 9-year-old boy named Jesse (Woody Norman) and a mentally ill husband named Paul (Scott McNairy). The siblings had somewhat of a falling out after their mother's death. The two manage to reconnect, and Johnny suggests taking Jesse off Viv's hands for a while as she tries to get Paul the help he needs.

This begins as somewhat of an extended babysitting gig, but eventually turns into a series of road trips for Johnny's work - first to New York, and then to New Orleans. I must note here that Mills and his crew do a smashing job of photographing Los Angeles (where the story begins), New York City and New Orleans in beautiful black and white photography, often capturing the wonder and loneliness of those great cities. I felt like I could just sit and watch the gorgeous New York skyline and L.A. traffic shots for two hours.

Jesse obviously endears himself to Johnny, but he's also a handful. He occasionally runs off, leaving Johnny frantic to find him, and insists on role playing games in which he's either an orphan or some other character, which appears to be his manner of expressing his feelings. A significant part of the film involves Johnny and Jesse just wandering through cities, parks, beaches and cafes, while the other half is often Johnny on the phone with his sister, reporting his challenges of taking care of a child (he's childless and the mention of a breakup occurs more than once).

As I'd mentioned, Mills' film at first appears to emphasize style over all else, but once it settles in it's the type of picture that sneaks up on you. You suddenly realize you're emotionally invested in Johnny and Jesse's dramas, and you're moved by the testimonies of the children who speak to Johnny and sound hopeful, despite being aware that previous generations have left them with a horrendous mess. 

There are numerous scenes in the film in which Johnny reads from various texts (all of which are cited) and we see how they apply to the story. The most effective example is his reading a children's story in which a star child comes to Earth, grows up and learns about the loneliness, emptiness, joy, suffering, heartbreak, beauty and all other wonders of the planet. Jesse calls out Johnny for getting a tear in his eye while reading, but this moment also encapsulates what this film's all about: making yourself vulnerable.

During the course of the movie, Johnny tries to get Jesse to describe the emotions he feels from having a mentally ill father and how he feels as if his mother has pawned him off on Johnny while she cares for Paul. But unlike the other child subjects whom Johnny interviews, Jesse isn't one to openly discuss his problems - at least, not until late in the film, when he doesn't so much discuss them as he does express them.

Mills writes and directs dramas that are overflowing with humanity - from the Oscar-nominated "Beginners" to "20th Century Women," which should have gotten a lot more attention than it did when it was released several years ago (seriously, check it out). His latest is a charming film that takes a formula that's been done many a time - relatives bonding on a road trip, although the driving part is fairly minimal here - and gives it a unique vibe. It's well worth seeing.