Review: Eternity

Image courtesy of A24.

People might debate over what the most consequential decision one is likely to make during one's lifetime, but "Eternity," a new romantic dramedy, explores what the most important choice is in the afterlife. 

The film feels like a more lightweight, albeit amusing, version of Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda's "After Life," in which people could decide what they wanted their own personal heaven to look like. In the opening scene, an elderly couple heads to a gender reveal party for a baby. Moments after arriving, the crotchety husband, Larry, chokes on a pretzel.

Larry (now played by Miles Teller) awakens in the afterlife and is escorted around by an agent, Anna (Da'Vine Joy Randolph), who tends to his needs and discusses with him how he'd like to spend eternity. His answer is with his wife, Joan, who in her old age was dying from cancer but who has not yet arrived in the same place where he is.

But soon enough, she does in a younger version of herself played by Elizabeth Olsen. All seems good until Larry realizes that Joan's first husband, Luke (Callum Turner), who had died in the Korean War, is also there and has been waiting 60 years for her to arrive, so that he and she could spend eternity together. 

The film poses the question: Should you spend your afterlife with the spouse with whom you built a life, had kids, and shared most of the important moments or instead with the one who got away, giving yourself a chance to experience a romance that was cut short by circumstances?

"Eternity," which was directed by David Freyne, is often a comedy but occasionally a drama as Joan faces the very real conundrum of which husband she'll spend the rest of her afterlife with and which one she'll cut loose. It doesn't go anywhere particularly surprising - it's easy to see early on which one she should choose - but it does so in an agreeable manner and the cast - especially Teller - is good.

There have been numerous other films about the afterlife and the choices that those who find themselves in it must make, from the aforementioned Kore-eda picture to "Defending Your Life" and the classic "Stairway to Heaven/A Matter of Life and Death." "Eternity" doesn't have a lot to say about what's awaiting us at the end. The film is a fantasy and one that is more on the absurd side - there are themed eternities that the dead can choose, from Paris World or Queer World to the more ridiculous (and creepy), such as Clown World.

Randolph is funny as Larry's agent and Turner does a solid job as the (mostly) stoic soldier who has been waiting for Joan for years. But it's Teller, who does a great job of a young man playing an old one at heart, and Olsen as the conflicted Joan who are the heart and soul of "Eternity." The film might be considered somewhat light fare, but it's an overall enjoyable time at the movies.

Review: It Was Just An Accident

Image courtesy of Neon.

Director Jafar Panahi is one of modern cinema’s greatest heroes. Arrested in 2010 on accusations that his work was propaganda against the Iranian regime, his family has since been threatened, he has been kept on house arrest and not allowed to leave the country, and banned from making movies for 20 years.

Regardless, he has continued to make films – one was even smuggled out of Iran on a thumb drive – and, for several years, the docu-dramas he made argued that since they were not exactly the types of narratives you’d expect in feature films, they didn’t count as movies. One was even called “This is Not a Film.”

Panahi won the Palm d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for “It Was Just an Accident,” a film that marks a return to narrative filmmaking and is possibly his most straightforward picture to date. It’s also likely his best.

The film opens on a desolate highway in Iran where a family of three – father, mother, and cute young daughter with a stuffed dog in tow and a love for the dance music on the radio – are making their way home. The car runs over a dog and the father (Ebrahim Azizi) gets out to check on the situation. He looks pained, but his wife tells him that “it was just an accident.” Moments later, the car begins having problems and he pulls over to a station to have it fixed.

At this point, the film switches from his point of view to that of Vahid (Vahid Mobasseri), a worker at the station who pokes around in the shadows looking at the man who has just arrived. It appears that he recognizes him. Sure enough, he follows the man home and notes his address.

The next day, Vahid follows the man around in a van he is using from the station where he works. He strikes the man with the door of the van, knocks him unconscious, and throws him in the back of the van. When the man awakens, he and Vahid are in a desert area, where Vahid is digging a grave. The man is thrown in the grave and Vahid begins pouring dirt down on him.

The man, whom Vahid calls “Eghbal,” is accused of being a fierce torturer from the Iranian regime who tormented Vahid following his arrest for protesting working conditions. The man claims that he is not Eghbal and adds that the prosthetic leg he is wearing – Vahid says he’d never forget the squeak of Eghbal’s peg leg – was from a recent injury.

To be sure that he doesn’t have the wrong man, Vahid travels to see a friend who was also tortured by the regime. This man sends him to find a photographer, Shiva (Mariam Afshari), who was also a victim. She seems unwilling to talk to Vahid, especially after learning that he has Peg Leg stuffed in the back of his van.

As it turns out, she’s taking photos for the wedding of Golrokh (Hadis Pakbaten), another Peg Leg victim, and her fiancé, Ali (Majid Panahi). Golrokh drags Shiva into the van and they all set out to find yet another victim, a hothead named Hamid (Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr). A complication ensues from a phone call to the kidnapped man’s phone and the films takes some surprising turns.

For a movie about such heavy subject matter, it might surprise the viewer to find that “It Was Just an Accident” is often quite humorous. A detour to the hospital for unforeseen circumstances leads to a very funny series of moments in which Vahid must pay officials, nurses, and even the police, all of whom have credit card machines at the ready, and even buy a box of donuts for those tending to the surprise guest they pick up in the van. There’s also some humor to be found in a van full of people – including a bride-to-be in her wedding dress – driving around with a guy kept prisoner in a large box in the back of the van.

“It Was Just an Accident” is clearly a personal movie for Panahi, a victim himself of Iran’s regime, and Vahid – or any of the film’s characters for that matter, other than Peg Leg – often appears to be a stand-in for him. Iranian cinema is known for its slow pacing and dialogue-heavy scenes and Panahi’s latest fits into that mold. It takes some patience, but it pays off.

The film ends on a note that is both haunting and ambiguous. It’s up to the viewer whether it’s meant to be taken literally or instead merely a metaphor for what it feels like to be a victim who is forever haunted by something, in this case a sound not easily forgotten. Panahi has struggled against the Iranian regime for about a decade and a half, and his latest film is his most daring response and his best film to date.

Review: Wicked For Good

Image courtesy of Universal Pictures.

It might seem a strange comparison, but "Wicked for Good" - the second half of director John M. Chu's cinematic adaptation of the blockbuster Broadway musical "Wicked" - reminded me a bit of the second half of the adaptation of Stephen King's "It" from several years back. The first half of "It" was surprisingly good and did a nice job of setting the scene and introducing the characters, while the second half just felt loaded down with set pieces and the mechanics of plot (yes, I know that it followed the novel pretty closely).

So, splitting "Wicked" into two films - as they did "It" - was probably a good financial decision as this second film is likely to break box office records this weekend. It was, perhaps, not as a good of a creative decision.

Like that King adaptation, the first half of "Wicked" did a great job of introducing us to the characters - Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo), Glinda (Ariana Grande), Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey), the Wizard (Jeff Goldblum), and various others. Watching the progression of Elphaba and Glinda's relationship was enjoyable and the actresses portraying them were very good.

There are several problems with this sequel, and one is that while the first half involved a lot of characterization and development of relationships and setting, this second film is almost all forward motion. One action follows another, which follows another. If "Wicked' had been one longer film, all of the action toward the end would have instead felt like the denouement after all of the aforementioned development in the first half of the movie.

Instead, we have one film full of development (the more interesting stuff) and one full of nonstop action. Also, the second act of the stage production - which is what encompasses "Wicked for Good" - was about 75 minutes, while this film is 137 minutes, and a decent amount of it feels like filler.

Another problem is that the first film got most of the best songs - especially "Defying Gravity" and "Popular," while the ones in this film just aren't as memorable. "There's No Place Like Home" and "For Good" are among the better selections.

Lastly, "Wicked" is all about Elphaba and her journey, but Erivo is mostly sidelined in this picture, while more attention is paid to Grande's Glinda. It helps that both actresses are just as good here as they were in the original, which makes the film an easier sit.

None of this is to say that I thought that "Wicked for Good" was bad or that I didn't like it. It's just that the first film did a solid job of adapting the musical to the screen, while the second film feels more like a sequel with a padded running time, the disappearance of its main attraction (Erivo) for large chunks of time, musical numbers that don't compare to the first outing, and an emphasis on exposition over character development or storytelling.

"Wicked for Good" will likely make a killing at the box office and fans of the first may well be as smitten with its second half. I thought the first film was a success, and its second half only successful in spurts. It's not bad overall, but had this been one long movie, it might have worked better.

Review: Sentimental Value

Image courtesy of MUBI.

Two things can simultaneously be true: Great art can make life more bearable and, to make great art, it helps to have lived experience. In other words, it sometimes takes some suffering to be able to produce the thing that makes suffering more endurable.

This concept is just one sliver of Joachim Trier's "Sentimental Value," which marks a high point in this director's career following "The Worst Person in the World," previously considered his high watermark. The picture is at once a dysfunctional family saga; a story obsessed with time, history, and place; a movie about making movies; a story about how art can possibly save your life - or, in this case, relationships; and how finding the truth in your art often comes from lived experience.

The film starts on a curious note as one of its lead characters, Nora (Renate Reinsve), narrates how when she was young a teacher asked her to imagine her self as an object and she chose her childhood home - which almost becomes one of the film's characters. 

The narration goes on to describe the changes in time to the house and its inhabitants, and throughout the course of the movie we learn of the tragedies and history that took place in that house when different generations of Nora's family lived there. This history contains an arrest by the Nazis, a suicide, a divorce, and a bond formed between two sisters - Nora and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas).

Shortly after this narration, we witness Nora, who's an actress, go through a complete freakout in which her stage fright - or possibly something else - prevents her from going on stage on the opening night of the play in which she's starring. After many uncomfortable minutes - and some assistance by other cast members, including her current lover, a married man named Jakob (Trier favorite Anders Danielsen Lie) - she manages to make it on stage.

Although neither Nora nor Agnes currently live there, they make their way to their childhood home for the funeral of their mother, a former psychiatrist. Out of the blue, their estranged father, Gustav (Stellan Skarsgard), a movie director who hasn't made a film in nearly 15 years, shows up. Neither of the sisters are particularly pleased to see him, but Nora especially takes every opportunity to avoid him.

But she agrees to have lunch with Gustav, who shocks her when he tells her that he has written a screenplay for a new film that he believes to be his best work. It's autobiographical, he plans to shoot it in their childhood home, and he offers the lead role to Nora. While he tries to downplay any similarities, it's clear that the character is based on his mother, who lived a somewhat tragic existence. However, Nora wants nothing to do with the project.

At a screening for one of his old films, a Hollywood starlet named Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning) is deeply moved and she introduces herself to Gustav. They spend a night wandering the beach and realize they are kindred spirits. Shortly thereafter, she is cast in the role that was originally written for Nora. Regardless of Nora's refusal to participate in the film, Gustav begins to maintain more of a presence - which it is noted was mostly missing from her and Agnes' childhood - in his daughter's lives.

The film is shot in such a way that it plays like a great work of literature. At the end of most scenes, there is a quick cut to black as if a chapter has ended. "Sentimental Value" seems to draw some obvious inspiration from the works of Ingmar Bergman, but while the film is melancholic, it is also often quite humorous. A joke involving the misrepresentation of the age of a chair in Gustav's house got a solid laugh during the screening I attended, but the inappropriate DVDs he purchases for Agnes' young son's birthday resulted in more than a few howls.

A film that is as talky as this one might seem to draw attention away from its impeccable craft, but Kasper Tuxen's lovely cinematography did not go unnoticed by me. The writing in the picture is strong and this is a film loaded with superb performances. Reinsve has been the lead in Trier's two most recent films and has knocked it out of the park both times, while Ibsdotter Lilleaas is wonderful as Agnes. Some of the film's best and most moving sequences involve the two sisters.

Fanning is very good as the American actress who tries - but can't quite seem to nail - the role that Gustav has written for his movie. Her scenes with Skarsgard are the other great pairing in the picture. And Skarsgard gives one of his finest performances as a man who has alienated most of those closest to him - watch him uncomfortably describe ad nauseam to his daughter why he can't stand going to the theater, her profession of choice, without groaning - but is still a person, like many of this film's characters, who is trying to do better.

"Sentimental Value" was one of the most acclaimed films of this year's Cannes Film Festival and it's easy to see why. This is an intelligent, complex, and beautifully shot and acted film about heartbreak, trauma, failure, forgiveness, and artistic expression. It's a film that is dialogue heavy but ends on a sequence in which no words are spoken, and yet so much is said. It's one of the year's best.

Review: Train Dreams

Image courtesy of Netflix.

Clint Bentley's "Train Dreams" is the best Terrence Malick movie not actually made by that director during the past however many years. It's a studied, patient film that observes nature and man's role in it - in this case, the story of a man who lived a quiet simple life as we watch from childhood to death and as he figures out how he is connected to the earth, which both gives to him and takes away.

It's easy to compare to a Malick film because of its dreamy nature and the way it observes landscapes and trees swaying in the wind and considers them just as important as the narrative. There's some voice over narration and a lot of quiet moments in which people wander the land and seem in awe and overwhelmed by its beauty and horror.

The film, which is the director's debut and is based on a Denis Johnson novella, follows the story of Robert Grainier (an excellent Joel Edgerton), who works as a train laborer in the early part of the 20th century, chopping down trees and helping to make way for the growing rail lines. Early in the film, he watches and probably doesn't do quite enough to prevent the murder of an Asian man by a group of whites. That man is one of the many things that haunts Grainier as we watch him move across the earth over the years.

In happier times, he marries a woman (Felicity Jones) and has a cute little daughter. His only true friends are a Native American man who runs a general store and shows him kindness, a fellow laborer (William H. Macy) who provides counsel on their chosen line of work, and a woman (Kerry Condon) who has been sent to his neck of the woods to study the land. Otherwise, Robert spends much of his time alone, especially after a tragedy occurs.

The film spans decades but, due to the solitary location where Grainier lives, we only figure out what era we're in when, at one point, a person watching a TV in the window of a store comments on an iconic moment of American history during the century's latter half. All the while, Grainier questions his place in the world, his relationship to the land, and how he is connected to it all.

The film ends with a sequence in which he finally begins to understand that connection in his older age. It's a lovely moment representing freedom for a character who has spent much of the time we're with him blaming himself for past tragedies and trying to find meaning in an existence in which much is decided by what amounts to a roll of the dice. 

People are lost to a horrific forest fire, while another just happens to be walking at the wrong time under a branch that is not sturdy. The Asian man is shockingly murdered in a scene that comes almost out of nowhere. During another, a man approaches a worksite and shoots another man who had been prattling on about religion just moments before. The beauty of the world that Grainier inhabits is often balanced by inexplicable moments of horror, brutality, or unfairness - kind of like the one in which we live now.

This is an impressive debut film with a visual style and overall tone that feels something like a poem - much like the work of Malick, whose "Days of Heaven" is an obvious reference point and inspiration. "Train Dreams" is the work of a confident filmmaker and it includes a number of strong performances, especially Edgerton in what is likely a career best. I'm anxious to see what Bentley does next behind the camera.

Review: Sirat

Image courtesy of Neon.

Oliver Laxe's "Sirat" was one of this year's surprise hits at the Cannes Film Festival and it's easy to see why. From its entrancing opening, set to throbbing techno music, the movie sets an ominous tone and rarely lets up for two hours.

The film's title takes its name from an Islamic bridge that separates hell from paradise and its story leads a group of characters from a place that all but two of them consider paradise to a road trip into hell. As the picture opens, a Spaniard named Luis (Sergi Lopez) and his young son, Esteban (Bruno Nunez), have wandered into a rave being held in the Moroccan desert to search for their daughter and sister who has been missing for months. They have intel that she might be attending the rave.

The opening scenes of the picture are hypnotic as the rave's organizers set up speakers in the desert and attendees began to trance out, most likely enhanced by drugs, to the pulsating music. Meanwhile, Luis and Esteban make their way among the crowd showing the picture of the missing girl to whomever is willing to talk to them.

They meet a group of misfits who have traveled to the rave by trailer and tell Luis of another rave in another part of the desert that they will later attend. They suggest that his daughter might be at that one if they don't see her at the current one. Shortly thereafter, the Moroccan military shows up to escort all of the partygoers out of there. We hear news reports of what might be a civil war breaking out nearby or even an international incident (one raver suggests they are on the verge of World War III).

But the band of misfits breaks away from the line of vehicles being escorted by the military and into the desert. Luis instinctively follows them and the two groups begin to rely on each other in the desert, even though it's never clear whether they should actually trust each other.

Halfway through the picture, something horrific occurs that is likely to scar viewers for life, not because it is graphic in its depiction but simply due to the horror of the moment. Other horrors will follow when the caravan of ravers and Luis find themselves in the midst of a minefield. This is a film that sets the tone early on through its haunting sound design and imagery as well as the sinister beat of the rave music and then halfway through becomes one of the year's tensest movies.

Laxe plays it close to the vest as to what it all means, but there's a scene later in the picture in which Luis and one of the misfits, Jade (Jade Oukid), listen to techno music and she explains to him the possible beauty to be found in hearing the music through damaged speakers. When he questions her love for the music, she tells him that "it's not for listening, it's for dancing." As the world seemingly erodes around us as it does for the characters in "Sirat" and they face their own personal horrors, one must keep dancing. What other choice is there?

"Sirat" is one of the year's unique moviegoing experiences - its breathtaking desert vistas and nightmarish sonic interludes make it feel like a party at the end of the world. While the film might occasionally give off the vibe of an Antonioni or Claire Denis picture, it also has a visual and storytelling style all its own. 

It's occasionally shocking and tense in a manner that recalls the classic "The Wages of Fear" and its excellent remake, "Sorcerer." And the little acts of kindness among its characters while facing horrific scenarios suggests a way forward when living through hell on earth. Moviegoers looking for something unique and memorable will likely be blown away by "Sirat."

Review: Nouvelle Vague

Image courtesy of Netflix.

Richard Linklater has recently released two movies about (predominately) 20th century artists - the first, "Blue Moon," was about the tragic life of American lyricist Lorenz Hart, while the other, "Nouvelle Vague," is about the exhilarating freedom of expression involved in the production of French New Wave director Jean-Luc Godard's debut, "Breathless."

The picture, shot in gorgeous black and white and a 4:3 aspect ratio, depicts Godard (Guillaume Marbeck) as one might expect - much like Bob Dylan, a cypher who only gives away what he wants others to know about him and nothing more. 

At the film's beginning, Godard is the last of the Cahiers du Cinema critics - who would go on to change French cinema forever as they became directors - to make a feature film. When the picture opens, he is attending the Cannes debut of pal Francois Truffaut's (Adrien Rouyard) classic "The 400 Blows." 

The picture is populated with New Wave icons and actors in their orbit, including Eric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette, Claude Chabrol, Jean-Pierre Melville, Agnes Varda, Jacques Demy, and Robert Bresson as well as legends Roberto Rossellini and Jean Cocteau. The actors portraying the leads of "Breathless" - Aubry Dullin as Jean-Paul Belmondo (he's a dead ringer) and Zoey Deutch as Jean Seberg - are particularly good.

Unlike "Blue Moon," Linklater's latest doesn't dig too deep into its lead character or prioritize thematic elements, but it's a charming and engaging film nonetheless. Much of this stems from Godard's refusal to play by the rules - ironically, "Breathless" would go on to be one of cinema's most cherished rule breakers, a film that challenged film's conventional modes of narrative, jump cuts and all.

The film shoot is planned for 20 days and its producer, Georges de Beauregard (Bruno Dreyfurst), and cast (especially Sebert) are put off by Godard's methods. He mostly works without a script and comes up with scenes for the film on a day-to-day basis. Rather than shoot all day like most films, he'll call in the cast to work for a few hours in the morning, decide that he's run out of inspiration for the day, and send everyone home. Of course, we all know that his film - and many of his other works - are expressions of genius, but those working with him at this moment consider him a madman.

"Nouvelle Vague" is Linklater expressing his love for the iconoclastic director and the French New Wave and it's the sort of picture that aims to interest viewers in the numerous great works of all of those depicted in the film. 

Viewers might not learn much about Godard in the process and the film follows the mantra of "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance": "When it comes to telling the truth or printing the legend, print the legend." So, yes, we see Godard in his trademark glasses, spouting off famous quotes for which he was known ("all you need for a movie is a girl and a gun") and speaking in cryptic quotes from others. But it's no matter: "Nouvelle Vague" is a highly enjoyable slice of cinema history and a love letter to the film movement that has inspired and influenced many of the greatest working directors today.

Review: The Running Man

Image courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

Director Edgar Wright's new version of "The Running Man" - which was previously adapted from the Richard Bachman, nee Stephen King, novella of the same name by Paul Michael Glaser and starred Arnold Schwarzenegger - is slightly better than his previous picture, the good-looking misfire "Last Night in Soho," but still a far cry from his best work.

Glen Powell takes over the lead duties as Ben Richards, a down-on-his-luck worker in a dystopian America who lives in a slum known as Co-Op City and can barely take care of his wife, who moonlights as stripper, and baby daughter. After he is fired for insubordination for taking on management over unsafe working conditions, he is desperate.

As a last-ditch strategy, Ben signs up to take part in "The Running Man," a violent reality show run by a corrupt, government-run TV network that provides shows in which the poor put themselves in peril for the entertainment of the city's rich denizens. In the titular program, three people - who are unfairly deemed as criminals by the network - must outrun a group of network assassins for 30 days to win the grand prize of $1 billion. Needless to say, no one has ever won it.

Network bigwig and lead villain Dan Killian (Josh Brolin) recognizes that Ben's anger - not to mention his superlative audition tapes - could be a great selling point for audiences and chooses him for the show. He and two others are set free and they make a go of it (separately) on the lam, while the networks goons chase them down.

Ben relies on an old friend (William H. Macy) and a connection with a history of a hostility against the police force (Michael Cera) to elude the goons, but he must eventually rely on his own wits to continue surviving. 

Much of Wright's early work was in the realm of parody of other genres - the popular "Shaun of the Dead" and, my personal favorite, the buddy-cop satire "Hot Fuzz" - while his work in recent years has moved to more serious fare. The action film "Baby Driver" represented a high point in his directorial work, but his recent two films - "Last Night in Soho" and this one - are missing his trademark flourishes.

Similar to many a remake, "The Running Man" was not necessary for a reboot, although paired with the recent (and better) "The Long Walk," the two Bachman books make for a dystopian double feature that feel timely in a disturbing way. 

There's a lot going on here that feels relevant - the poor struggling to get by while the opulent throw their wealth around and a public that doesn't even realize that those oppressing them are the bad guys - but the film leans more into wall-to-wall action than social commentary. All in all, this isn't a bad movie, just one that could have been more based on the source material (King's novella), the cast, and the director. 

Review: Die My Love

Image courtesy of MUBI.

Lynne Ramsay's "Die My Love" is an hallucinatory story about a woman with postpartum depression and psychosis that features a bold turn from star Jennifer Lawrence and is sure to alienate audiences nearly as much as Darren Aronofsky's "Mother!," a previous dark turn by the actress that left viewers scratching their heads.

Ramsay's film is an uncomfortable viewing experience and, for many, not what they'd describe as enjoyable. The closest example of another film that comes to mind would be John Cassavetes' landmark "A Woman Under the Influence," but imagine adding photography and a mood that feels closer to the horror genre.

We first see Grace (Lawrence) crawling through the grass near her secluded home - which I believe is somewhere in New York State - with a knife as her newborn sits in a baby chair. Her husband, Jackson (Robert Pattinson), comes outside looking for his wife and takes the baby indoors. The reason for Grace's behavior is never explained but it's all of a piece - whether she's spending time with Jackson's mother (Sissy Spacek) or acquaintances during a baby shower, she's doing something confrontational that is sure to make others uncomfortable.

During the aforementioned baby shower, she peels off everything but her bra and underwear in front of the guests and jumps into the swimming pool with the children. When one mother says to her that people never talk about how hard it is to be a parent, she retorts with, "That's all anyone ever talks about." During a scene at a convenience store, she is shockingly rude to a young woman who comments on her baby.

Ramsay's work has long focused on troubled minds going through some sort of psychosis, from the marvelous "Morvern Callar," which followed a young woman's journey after her boyfriend's death, to the school shooting drama "We Need to Talk About Kevin," and the unsettling hitman thriller "You Were Never Really Here."

Her latest is, perhaps, the one that most fixates on the psychosis itself. This is a film about a woman's unraveling. It's bleak, dark, sometimes complex, and often provides little in the way of answers - for example, there's a subplot in which Grace obsesses about a motorcyclist (LaKeith Stanfield) that feels dreamlike all the way through - or catharsis.

But what ultimately grounds all of this is Lawrence's performance, which is one that I'd categorize as a risk taker. Although one feels sympathetic toward Grace during the course of the film, she's also polarizing and, at times, unkind toward those around her. Her character is equally interesting and off-putting. 

As I'd mentioned before, this film will not likely be an easy sit for many audience members. It takes work and there's little light at the end of the tunnel. It's not one of my favorite Ramsay movies, but it is well made, challenging, and well acted. It's also not easy to shake.

Review: Frankenstein

Image courtesy of Netflix.

There have been many well-known directors who have struggled or longed to make their dream project, only to have it fall apart or, in more recent cases, end up on the screen with modest results. Recent examples have been Ridley Scott's "Napoleon"- which began as Stanley Kubrick's dream - or Francis Ford Coppola's "Megalopolis." Both of those films were worth seeing and had their merits, even if they weren't quite the visionary works that had been imagined.

I'm pleased to say that Guillermo Del Toro's long-gestating "Frankenstein" adaptation fares better than those and other dream projects of recent years. The film takes some liberties with Mary Shelley's classic novel but the storytelling, visuals, set design, and performances here make for one of the more unique and memorable tellings of this story of recent memory.

This new version of "Frankenstein" is set in the Victorian era, rather than 30-some years prior when the novel was set, and as such it gives doctor Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) more access to electricity when he brings his creature to life. In this story, the creature itself isn't brought in from the gallows as in the novel, but is instead reconstructed from bodies fallen on the battlefield.

Much like in the novel, both the doctor and his creation (Jacob Elordi) end up in Antarctica. In this film, the picture's narrative device is Victor stumbling upon a ship full of Danish sailors who give him protection as he tells his tale. The first half of the film is focused on Victor, who became obsessed with defeating death after losing his mother to scarlet fever, and eventually loses his scruples as he constructs the creature.

The film's second half is told from the perspective of the creature, who is fearsome due to his strength but gentle and curious. He hides out in the barn of a family where he becomes friends with an old blind man whom he keeps company during the winter. Similarly, Mia Goth's Elizabeth, the fiancee of Victor's brother, shows kindness toward the creature when she discovers it in Victor's underground dwelling.

In his portrayal of the man who becomes a mad scientist, Isaac gives a strong performance as a man whose desire to cure man's ills started from a place of goodness, but eventually devolved into a god complex. His callousness toward the creature leads to some of the film's more emotionally horrific moments. Elordi is a scene stealer as the massive-in-size, but sympathetic and vulnerable, creature and Goth and Christoph Waltz, who plays a benefactor, deliver strong supporting work.

Del Toro has long been a creator of fantastical horror-drama hybrids, from his masterpiece "Pan's Labyrinth" to the underrated "The Devil's Backbone" and the Oscar winner "The Shape of Water." Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" certainly is a film that fits into his wheelhouse - it could make a great double feature with "The Shape of Water," both films about misunderstood creatures - and this is one of the more memorable adaptations of the story. It is also one of the better realized dream projects of the modern era from a major filmmaker.

Review: Bugonia

Image courtesy of United International Pictures.

Despite his high profile in the world of cinema, Yorgos Lanthimos' films are still somewhat of an acquired taste. For me, there are some in which the brilliant madness results in something special - "Poor Things," "The Favourite," or "Dogtooth" - and other times, not so much ("The Killing of a Sacred Deer" and the second two-thirds of "Kinds of Kindness").

His latest, "Bugonia" is just as deranged as some of his best-known work and it's the first time the director is working with source material - in other words, it's a remake. The film from which it is adapted is the zany 2005 picture "Save the Green Planet" by Korean director Jang Joon-hwan. 

In the film, Jesse Plemons is Teddy, a conspiracy theorist whose mother (Alicia Silverstone) was left in a coma by tests run by a medical company. He lives in solitude with only his impressionable younger cousin, Donny (Aidan Delbis), and has become obsessed with the idea that aliens from the Andromeda Galaxy have taken over Earth. He believes that a particularly unpleasant CEO, Michelle (Emma Stone), who runs a company that I won't describe too much for fear of giving something away, is among the aliens and he concocts a dopey plot to kidnap her.

Despite the fact that I liked "Bugonia," for the most part, this is not a film with many people to root for, other than Donny, who has an innocence that doesn't allow him to see his cousin's plan for being as batshit as it is. Teddy seems to want to save the planet, but his views are nebulous and he has a violent streak that is only fully revealed until later, when another character surprisingly becomes the second sympathetic one in the film.

After kidnapping her, the two men shave Michelle's head and interrogate her during a series of scenes that start out ridiculous but become increasingly unsettling. Meanwhile, Michelle seems to be trying to play her own game, occasionally admitting that she is an alien and at other times calling out the insanity of it all. She clearly didn't climb the corporate ladder without some survival techniques.

Some might be put off by the film's mostly solitary location and the fact that much of it is conversational. Eventually, it all comes to a head and goes to some outrageous places and has a few surprises in store - that is, for those who haven't seen the original Korean film. The ending is among the most bleak I've seen in some time, but it has an anarchic sense of humor, much like Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove," albeit gorier.

This has been a year with movies that have something to say about where we are heading as a society - some rank among the best of the year ("One Battle After Another"), while others deserve credit for the attempt even if they don't completely work ("Eddington"). 

Lanthimos' latest ranks second in that crowd. It's not among my favorite of his works, but it's well acted (Plemons is very good and Stone is fantastic) and it's a movie that is unafraid of going there. And it's at least as good as - if not slightly better than the original - which is a mostly rare thing.

Review: Blue Moon

Image courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

 

A film about Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart might on the surface seem a peculiar choice of subject matter for director Richard Linklater, but the manner in which the story is told is certainly within his wheelhouse. Set on one night - March 31, 1943 - against the backdrop of the premiere of "Oklahoma!," which was written by Hart's former working partner, Richard Rodgers, with Oscar Hammerstein, the film finds Hart at that moment when opportunity and love close the door in your face.

"Blue Moon" is quintessentially Linklater in that it is a hangout film that is primarily dialogue-driven and, in this case, takes place one on set - the bar where Hart is bemoaning his career fade-out as the party is just about to begin on the other side of the room once his former partner and that guy's entourage arrive. Meanwhile, Hart - who is gay - is curiously also fussing over a young woman, Elizabeth (Margaret Qualley), whom he refers to as his protege. His attentions toward her surprise the bartender, Eddie (Bobby Cannavale), who seemingly knows Hart well enough to find it strange that he's interested in a woman.

Much of the film is driven by Ethan Hawke's monologuing as Hart, a brash and talkative fellow who probably drives everyone at the bar - which includes a pianist (Jonah Lees) and E.B. White (Patrick Kennedy) - a little nuts. But Hart, we learn through his conversations with Elizabeth and Rodgers (Andrew Scott), is a person who gives - perhaps too much for his own good. He's also a person who can't keep his opinions to himself and can, at times, be his own worst enemy.

The film is often funny, mostly due to Hart's ability to be outrageous in all company. But he's also a tragic figure. As the film opens, we learn of his fate, which occurs just months before the picture is set, and much of the movie involves him coming to grips with the fact that his time has passed. There's an interesting moment early in the film in which Hart, Eddie, and the piano player discuss the ending of "Casablanca," in which the guy doesn't get the girl, and it acts as a metaphor of what's to come.

Hawke and Linklater have one of the most interesting working relationships in the movies - yielding such great works as the "Before" series, "Waking Life," and the remarkable "Boyhood." "Blue Moon" might seem like a minor entry - it has the feel of a play due to its one location and emphasis on dialogue - but it's a small film that hits its marks.

In the song that gives the film its title, one of the lyrics goes, "Blue moon, you saw me standing alone, without a dream in my heart, without a love of my own," and then later, "I heard somebody whisper, 'Please adore me.'" During the film's second half, Hart watches Rodgers receive that adoration - of which he and Hammerstein would get an abundance over the years - while he finds himself, as the song says, standing alone. This is a small film that often packs a big punch.

Review: Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere

Image courtesy of 20th Century Fox.

It's funny that in the past year there has been a movie about Bob Dylan going electric, while hiding behind the mask of the persona Bob Dylan as he releases his most commercial - and among his best - work, and another about Bruce Springsteen going acoustic while laying himself bare as he composes his least commercial - and one of his best - works to date.

Jeremy Allen White digs deep as The Boss and delivers a strong performance in a biopic that does what many of the best of the genre do: Rather than being an all-encompassing film about a musician, it picks a particular moment in their life that acts as a lens through which we can consider their entire career or mythos.

In the case of Cooper's film, the period in which we find Springsteen is the early 1980s following his commercial success with "The River" record and his first top 10 hit ("Hungry Heart"). Seemingly nervous about the stardom that seems sure to come his way - and will two years later with his blockbuster "Born in the U.S.A" record - Springsteen, possibly led by depression, barricades himself in a room and records the spare, haunting "Nebraska" album.

Surely the only record ever to be inspired by the killing spree of Charles Starkweather - we see Bruce watching Terence Malick's classic "Badlands," which stars Martin Sheen as that notorious criminal - "Nebraska" was an album with only Springsteen on the guitar, no backup band, and captured on a four-track TEAC 144 Portastudio recorder that results in an echoey haunted sound as if it were an object out of time. 

Springsteen was apparently inspired by Suicide's self-titled underground record for the album's overall vibe and, sure enough, there's a moment in which a friend (Paul Walter Hauser) seems alarmed when Bruce is lying on the floor and listening to that record's most harrowing track, "Frankie Teardrop."

All the while, Springsteen strikes up a relationship with a single mother, Faye (Odessa Young), that seems doomed from the start and is haunted by memories of his childhood - rendered in black and white - during which his father (Stephen Graham) was abusive toward him and his mother (Gaby Hoffman). 

The songs written in that solitary New Jersey room - "Nebraska," "Mansion on the Hill," "State Trooper" and the all-timer "Atlantic City" - are all bleak stories of criminals, killers, and people living on the edge. There's a powerful moment in which we see Springsteen writing the lyrics to "Nebraska," thinking back on his troubled childhood, and then changing the "he" in the song - which refers to Starkweather - to "I" or "me."

Two of the most compelling threads in the film are Springsteen's depression, which is hinted at during the film's earlier moments before exploding into the foreground late in the picture, and his friendship with manager and producer Jon Landau (an excellent Jeremy Strong), who comes armed with support and great Flannery O'Connor quotes. Unlike so many other biopics, "Deliver Me from Nowhere" finds the most interesting angles of this story and focuses on them, rather than all the typical stuff you'd expect.

Lastly, this is a biopic that actually provides some insight into its subject. In case you hadn't noticed, Springsteen has been routinely criticizing our Dear Leader during recent concerts and the sequences in this film in which he confronts his father during childhood provide a window into the soul of a man who doesn't like bullying. It's also curious when the film that his father takes him to as a child is the likely scarring "The Night of the Hunter," in which a sinister Robert Mitchum terrorizes a family. 

I stand by my assertion that Todd Haynes' Dylan fantasmagoria "I'm Not There" remains the all-time champ for music biopics - and, hell, the Chalamet Dylan picture was good as well. "Deliver Me from Nowhere" might not be quite on that level, but it's an engaging film about a beloved musician that isn't a hagiography, nor a rousing success story, but rather an introspective view into a period in which the artist was struggling emotionally, but soaring creatively.

Review: The Mastermind

Image courtesy of Mubi.

Kelly Reichardt brings her trademark brand of minimalism to “The Mastermind,” a film set in the early 1970s that adopts that era’s stylings and follows the story of a minor criminal who holds himself in great regard, despite his complete disregard for others and the knack for screwing up.

Set in Framingham, Mass., the story opens observing James Blaine Mooney (Josh O’Connor) with his wife, Terri (Alana Haim), and children looking at objects in a museum. He appears to be scoping the museum’s security and the art on its walls and, before leaving, surreptitiously steals a small figurine from an exhibit.

Shortly thereafter, he plots with a few bumbling friends to steal four paintings by Arthur Dove, considered one of America’s first abstract painters, and take them to a fence with whom he regularly works.

From the start, his plot falters. One of his co-conspirators drops out at the last minute, despite finding a getaway car for James and his other friends to use. During the robbery, a few small girls witness the theft, and are briefly held against their will. On the way out, a struggle ensues with a cop. After the police quickly figure out whom they believe to be involved, the criminals quickly rat each other out.

We learn that James’ father (Bill Camp) is a judge and I wondered whether his clumsy forays into crime are a means of rebellion. His mother (Hope Davis), on the other hand, continually folds by loaning him money that she says she wants him to pay back, but must know that he won’t.

After a visit by the police, James goes on the lam and his plans for remaining undetected are just as poorly plotted. First, he stays with a couple – Fred (John Magaro) and Maude (Gaby Hoffman) – whom he believes will allow him to crash there for a while. The problem is that while the former idolizes him, the latter observes him with a wary eye from the moment he walks in the door. His next stop is even less successful.

Reichardt’s films are often observational dramas that could be described as low key – in other words, understated works in which body language often tells us more than the characters’ words. Her best films – “Poor Cow,” “Wendy and Lucy,” and “Night Moves” – all incorporate this type of vibe, while being wildly different in terms of content.

While “The Mastermind” doesn’t rank among my favorite Reichardt films, it’s still a good one and the type of film that grows on you once you settle into its rhythm. There are few big moments here and why Reichardt chooses to incorporate news coverage of the Vietnam War droning in the background is left up to the viewer; personally, I think the connection is that much like James’ heist, the war was a mistake made with little thought of the consequences.

The film ends on a sardonic note in which James’ careless recklessness takes a significant step forward and he is swept up in a moment that relates to the war in a humorous manner. Much of what makes “The Mastermind” work is O’Connor’s understated performance and its 1970s-style visuals and tone. It’s the type of movie that grows on you.

Review: Black Phone 2

Image courtesy of Universal Pictures.

So many horror movie sequels exist to simply make more money, often overstaying their welcome and continuing stories that could have ended after the first entry, so it's refreshing that Scott Derrickson's "Black Phone 2" mostly avoids those pitfalls. Those who have seen the trailer might wonder why the sequel is set in wintry environs and why the sinister Grabber (Ethan Hawke) appears to be skating around with a hatchet like he just finished watching the forgotten '80s horror movie "Curtains."

The film is set in 1982 - four years after the original - and Finney (Mason Thames) is still obviously struggling after having survived The Grabber's killing spree of young boys in suburban Colorado. Finney's sister, Gwen (Madeleine McGraw), takes center stage in this sequel after visions she has in her dreams involve phone calls placed to her from the 1950s from a secluded church camp. The girl who she speaks to during these calls ends up having a close personal connection to her.

Once The Grabber begins taunting Gwen in her dreams - the film unapologetically riffs on "A Nightmare on Elm Street" without the picture ever feeling like a ripoff - she convinces Finney and a young man who is interested in her romantically, Ernesto (Miguel Mora), to pose as counselors-in-training at the camp, located in the snowy mountains of Colorado, to investigate.

Not surprisingly, the camp's history and The Grabber's own backstory are to be discovered by the trio, who learn of the violent deaths of three young boys at the site in the 1950s. While the first "Black Phone" movie was atmospheric and creepy, it wasn't particularly violent. Although the body count in this film is surprisingly low for an R-rated horror movie, there are a few gruesome moments, all involving children, that might catch fans of the original by surprise.

Speaking of atmosphere, Derrickson and company have made interesting stylistic choices for this sequel. The picture has a low budget, grainy visual style that makes the movie look as if it's a bootleg you might have discovered of something horrific at your favorite video store in the mid-1980s. Rather than be distracting, the film's look and feel gives it the vibe of a spooky artifact.

Once the film kicks into gear, there's not much in the way of surprises - you'll likely see some of the plot twists coming - but it's a solid sequel to a very good horror film that probably would have been just fine as a standalone. So, no, "Black Phone 2" might not have needed to exist - but it does and it's mostly an enjoyably eerie film for the Halloween season.

Review: After The Hunt

Image courtesy of MGM.

Here is an example of a film that should work so much better than it does. "After the Hunt" is the latest from director Luca Guadagnino, who is responsible for the great "Call Me By Your Name" and has been on a mostly solid spree for the past few years - last year's "Challengers" was especially good, while his adaptation of William Boroughs' "Queer" was overall pretty interesting. His latest is also stacked with talent - Julia Roberts, Andrew Garfield, Michael Stuhlbarg, Ayo Edibiri, and Chloe Sevigny - and covers the timely and weighty subject of cancel culture.

And yet, the picture comes off as facile and self congratulatory for its clear intentions to rock the boat, when in fact it doesn't have much to say about its controversial topic and, instead, plays like a faux provocation. One of its biggest grievances is to exaggerate both sides of the particular scenario in the film to the point that it's challenging to spend close to two hours and 20 minutes with such obnoxious characters.

The film opens at a faculty party for Yale philosophy professors and some of their favorite students at the house of professor Alma Olsson (Roberts) and her husband, Frederick (Stuhlbarg), who's a psychiatrist. Among those in attendance are Hank (Garfield), a professor who has been known to get involved romantically with students, and Maggie (Ebiri), a student working on her doctoral thesis who appears to be fixated on Alma in some form or fashion.

As the party breaks up, Hank offers to walk Maggie - who is gay - home. The next day, Alma is confronted at her apartment by a distraught Maggie, who claims that Hank invited himself in for a nightcap at her apartment and, she suggests, sexually assaulted her. Alma's instant reaction leaves something to be desired and she suddenly finds herself mixed up in a classic he-said-she-said situation after Maggie goes to school authorities and then the media with her story.

One of the film's biggest misfires is its portrayal of - and seeming disdain for - its characters. Nearly all of the professor characters come off as smug and arrogant, while the students are portrayed as overly sensitive and entitled (much is made of Maggie's parents having been big donors to the school). The word woke is never used, but it feels as if the screenplay wants to invoke it. Meanwhile, Stuhlbarg, a wonderful actor, has seemingly been instructed to portray Frederick as aggressively awkward, especially during one WTF sequence in which he barges in and out of a kitchen, blaring loud music, while Alma and Maggie attempt to have a serious conversation.

Despite some serious problems with the script, Roberts manages to shine as Alma, a character who clearly has some baggage but is attempting to figure out how to navigate her way through the sticky situation. One of the mistakes the film makes is to ask us to sympathize with her character. On the one hand, it's not difficult to agree with her during a tense conversation with Maggie that she doesn't owe anyone her story - clearly, she has her own history that seems to haunt her - but on the other, makes excuses for a likely rape scenario and uses the word they to taunt a non-binary student.

During one of the film's more uncomfortable sequences, she dresses down an Asian American student who doesn't understand the context of the word other in a philosophy text they're discussing. This scene reminded me of a similar one in Todd Fields' remarkable "TAR," but the scene in that picture is provocative because it left just enough room for both sides of its tense discussion to not land on easy answers, whereas in Guadagnino's film it comes off more as just ugly.

There's a scene late in the film in which Alma does in fact tell her story from a hospital bed. It involves a past indiscretion that is significantly more compelling than most of the rest of the movie. Had this angle been the focus of "After the Hunt," a much better film might have been the result. Instead, it follows that scene with a vague, open-ended one in which two characters chat at a coffee shop some years later. 

Guadagnino is a very talented director and this film's cast have all been great in better movies. But this is an example of a good director utilizing weak material - the script is its greatest hurdle - and not doing much more with it than to provoke. If you don't believe me, watch the film and tell me what you think the opening credits are meant to invoke, especially considering the subject matter at hand. Only a talented group of people could make a movie that falls this flat.

Review: A House of Dynamite

Image courtesy of Netflix.

In case anyone needs to add more to their anxiety in our perilously fraught moment, Kathryn Bigelow's "A House of Dynamite" is hear to shatter your nerves and keep you up nights. Her latest film details how the United States might respond during an emergency involving nuclear weapons. You won't find any comfort here.

The picture is broken up into three parts, all of which basically show how a variety of characters react during a 19-minute window in which they find out that what appears to be a nuclear weapon has been launched and en route to a major American city. There are subtle hints as to what is going on in each of their lives - a man trying to reconnect with an estranged daughter, a man whose wife is pregnant, another who wants to pop the question, etc.

Other than that, we mostly observe these people in the moment. Some of them are top military brass, one is a FEMA call center worker, and another is the president of the United States (Idris Elba). All of the characters try to comfort themselves that the launched weapon isn't what they think it is, that the U.S. military will be able to shoot it down, or that it might end up being a dud, as some missiles can be.

Regardless, "A House of Dynamite" examines what happens when the experts are put to the test in a scenario that one describes as a "coin flip" in terms of how things might turn out. There's no guarantee that a response will have its intended effect. Even more chilling is the fact that no one seems to have any idea who fired the missile and, as a result, any retaliation could lead to an unnecessary war that - in this case - would result in nuclear annihilation.

Another of the film's unsettling concepts is how various individuals involved in the situation - a top military general played by Tracy Letts and a person in charge in the Situation Room (Rebecca Ferguson) - appear to be highly competent at their jobs, and yet even that is not enough to get the horrific scenario under control. No amount of competency might be enough in a Defcon 1 situation, and many of those trained to handle such a scenario fall apart when actually faced with it.

Bigelow has long been one of the best at delivering muscular military dramas - "The Hurt Locker" won her the Best Director Oscar and "Zero Dark Thirty" was one of my top 10 of the previous decade. Her previous film, "Detroit," was liked by me but received otherwise mixed reviews. "A House of Dynamite" is being hailed as a comeback.

This is a tense, very well made, and disturbingly timely picture. Two years ago, "Oppenheimer" told the story of how the nuclear age was born, but Bigelow's film presents a frighteningly real enactment of what it might look like if such an event landed on our shores. Anyone with nerves not yet shredded by the nightly news will likely not want to miss this engrossing and nerve-wracking picture.

Review: Roofman

Image courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

Derek Cianfrance's "Roofman" is a completely different vibe than the director's bleak dramas "Blue Valentine" and "The Place Beyond the Pines." Based on a true story about a criminal with a penchant for breaking into fast food chains and other stores through the roof, the picture comes close to being a romantic comedy but is just serious enough to avoid that categorization.

In the picture, Channing Tatum plays Jeffrey Manchester, a former U.S. Army Reserve officer who was known during his overseas missions to have had a good eye for scouting things. When he can barely afford to pay for his young daughter's birthday gifts, a stray comment from a friend (LaKeith Stanfield) gives him the idea to start robbing McDonald's in the Charlotte area in the early 2000s.

But during the robberies - which are just enough to buy him a large house and some gifts for his daughter as well as a Mariachi band for her birthday - Jeffrey isn't particularly fearsome. During one job, he feels sympathy for the McDonald's crew that he locks in the store refrigerator and gives his jacket to an employee who doesn't have one.

He's soon busted and lands in prison for a 45-year stint, a sentence that's a tad egregious. He comes up with a plan to escape, pulls it off, and ends up in a small North Carolina community, where he hides out in a Toys "R" Us and eventually ingratiates himself to the community after dropping off some toys he stole from the store to a toy drive. He also catches the eye of the woman, Leigh (Kirsten Dunst), running the toy drive, who also happens to be a Toys "R" Us employee.

Much like "Breaking Bad" or "The Americans," the film is one of those scenarios that we know can't last forever, so it seems like much of the suspense revolves around whether Jeffrey will get recognized by someone, whether Leigh will discover who he is, or whether he'll jeopardize the escape he's planning to see her one last time.

Tatum, a likable actor, is a good choice for the role. Although a criminal, Jeffrey is affable and affectionate toward Leigh and her two daughters. There's a funny scene in which he charms a group of women at a singles event sponsored by Leigh's church. During his robberies, he seems to feel guilty about scaring the people working in the stores he robs.

While "Roofman" might not be on par with Cianfrance's earliest films - "Blue Valentine" was a powerful albeit depressing love story and "The Place Beyond the Pines" was an ambitious crime epic - the picture is somewhat of a comeback after 2016's "The Light Between Oceans" fell flat and the director disappeared for almost a decade. "Roofman" isn't a grand statement - but rather an amusing true crime drama with comedic and romantic elements - but it's enjoyable nonetheless. 

Review: The Smashing Machine

Image courtesy of A24.

 
The Ultimate Fighting Championship is not a topic that particularly captures my interest - in other words, I'm not that intrigued by the sport - but Benny Safdie's "The Smashing Machine" compelled me due to its performances and the fact that it doesn't take the typical sports biopic approach.

Sports-themed films are often framed around a particular moment of success for an athlete. We watch them in their early days and are privy to numerous training sessions until they finally arrive at a particular challenge and, typically, rise above it to achieve some form of glory. Safdie's film isn't interested in that, although the picture is seemingly compelled by the UFC and its violent form of fighting.

In an attention-seeking move, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has been cast as mixed martial artist Mark Kerr who, along with friend and fellow fighter Mark Coleman (portrayed by mixed martial artist Ryan Bader), apparently made a big impact on the sport. Of course, The Rock started his career in the wrestling world and this film is one of the rare chances of watching him take on a more dramatic role, rather than the blockbuster type of action movies in which he typically stars.

And without a doubt, Johnson impresses in this film, while costar Emily Blunt is equally strong in her portrayal of Kerr's wife, Dawn. Yes, there are numerous scenes of people being beaten to a pulp while participating in this violent sport, but the goings-on behind the scenes in the Kerr household were just as brutal, albeit of a psychological nature.

In the beginning, Kerr is undefeated, but suffers a bruise to his ego after losing a match that he believes was the result of a bad call by a referee. The combination of the steroids he's taking along with opioids for pain relief lead to a struggle with addiction. Added to the mix is his volatile relationship with Dawn. During the first half of the picture, it's easier to sympathize with Dawn, who seemingly gives up many things in life for Kerr's sport, while later in the picture he becomes more the voice of reason.

So, when I describe "The Smashing Machine" as sort of an anti-sports biopic, it's because there's an equal amount of attention paid to the domestic drama and drug abuse as there is the training for and participation in the sport. In many ways, this makes the film unique to its genre. 

It also helps that the leads are strong. Johnson proves that he is more than stunt casting in the role, portraying Kerr as a soft spoken guy who occasionally bursts into episodes of violence - ripping a door off its hinges during one scene - when frustrated. Blunt portrays Dawn as quasi-sympathetic and reasonable but, at other times, high maintenance. Bader also acquits himself well as Coleman, who starts as Kerr's trainer but eventually makes a successful return to the ring.

The Safdie Brothers often make gritty films about characters on the edge - the Robert Pattinson vehicle "Good Times" and the bleak "Uncut Gems," which is the brothers' most successful venture - and "The Smashing Machine" (directed by Benny, while Josh has "Marty Supreme" releasing later this year) is certainly in that wheelhouse. On the whole, it's a solid sports drama bolstered by impressive performances.

Review: One Battle After Another

Image courtesy of Warner Bros.

Paul Thomas Anderson is not only a great filmmaker, but also seemingly a magician: He somehow convinced a major movie studio (Warner Bros.) to fund a $150 million Thomas Pynchon adaptation that involves modern revolutionaries battling a fascist U.S. government in which a select group of racist white men belong to a Santa Claus-worshipping cult.

On the one hand, the plot of "One Battle After Another," based somewhat on Pynchon's "Vineland," might sound presciently bleak with its ICE detention centers, violent government-led raids on sanctuary cities, and white supremacists in high positions, but the picture is also hopeful in its depiction of what could be our way through this madness.

Anderson's 21st century films have mostly dwelt in the past and told stories about the birth of capitalism ("There Will Be Blood"), post WWII America and Britain ("The Master" and "Phantom Thread"), Hollywood against the backdrop of the 1970s oil crisis ("Licorice Pizza"), and the lost dream of the 1960s counterculture ("Inherent Vice"). Only one other film - 2002's "Punch Drunk Love" - has been set in the current century.

That being said, I cannot think of any other film that captures our present moment of anxiety better than this one. The film's title is spoken at one point in the picture regarding a specific action taken by the French 75, the revolutionary group that features many of the film's lead characters, but it also speaks to the moment we're living in - keeping alive the dream of a country that favors freedom of speech and expression literally requires one battle after another.

The film opens with a tense mission in which the French 75 infiltrates an ICE detention center and frees its captives. Perfidia Beverly Hills (a fierce Teyana Taylor) takes Col. Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn, whose monster of a character provokes much laughter due to his utter humorlessness) captive and sexually humiliates him, while her paramour, "Ghetto Pat" (Leonardo DiCaprio), sets off bombs. Other members of the group are portrayed by Wood Harris, Alana Haim, Regina Hall, and Shayna McHayle.

But when Perfidia is busted by Lockjaw, she rats out her fellow 75'ers, leaving Pat and her newborn daughter to go underground. Some 16 years later, the father and daughter are living as Bob and Willa Ferguson in the fictional California town of Baktan Cross. Willa takes karate lessons from Sensei (Benicio Del Toro), a smooth revolutionary who helps to smuggle illegal immigrants, while Bob is mostly stoned out of his gourd. He still believes in the revolution, but has become paranoid and somewhat useless.

However, Lockjaw finds himself moving up the ranks of the military and is invited to join an elite cabal of white supremacists known as the Christmas Adventurers Club. To be inducted, however, he must wipe clean his past, which includes his coerced liaison with Perfidia. Although she has been missing for years, Lockjaw tracks down some of the former French 75 members and uses them to try to get close to Bob and Willa. During one harrowing scene, Hall's Deandra helps Willa to flee a high school dance, while Bob is amusingly left fumbling through phone calls in which he has forgotten the requisite revolution passwords.

From this point on, "One Battle After Another" becomes a relentlessly propulsive chase movie in which Bob and Willa (newcomer Chase Infiniti), now separated, must stay one step ahead of Lockjaw and his goons. Willa and Deandra make their way to a desert enclave of revolutionary nuns, while Bob hides out with Sensei, who leads an escape of Latino immigrants as jack-booted ICE types attack their sanctuary city. There's an incredibly shot sequence in which Bob and a group of skateboarding associates of Sensei make a run for it.

The film's final scenes involve a series of car chases that culminate with a spellbinding pursuit along Borrego Springs' blind humps of Highway 78 that recalls the 1971 cult classic "Vanishing Point." At this point, the paranoid stoner comedy and revolutionary thriller modes of the picture seamlessly transition into a breathless action film. This is a movie that juggles numerous tones and set pieces of various genres, all deftly.

It is also a film chock full of superb performances, from supporting roles that pack a punch such as Taylor, Hall, or Del Toro to remarkable leading turns - DiCaprio expertly juggles hilarity with pathos as the burnout father whose dedication to the revolution often butts heads with his ability to protect his daughter, while Penn gives what must be his most frightening portrayal. Also, Infiniti is a real find.

"We've been laid siege for hundreds of years," Del Toro's Sensei calmly remarks during one of the film's tenser moments regarding how communities of color have long struggled against hateful forces in the United States. In the context of this movie and the country in which we live, it has indeed been one battle after another to prevent those forces from overpowering the struggle for liberty. 

Anderson's incredible film is a clarion call for keeping up the fight in the face of overwhelming odds, a concept that really hits home at the moment. The film's defiant final scene of multi-generational determination powerfully drives home the old adage that the "only way out is through." This is unquestionably the movie for this moment - and a great one at that.

Review: A Big Bold Beautiful Journey

Image courtesy of Columbia Pictures.

 

Director Kogonada's third feature, "A Big Bold Beautiful Journey," is the first of his films that didn't quite work for me. Its two leads - Colin Farrell and Margot Robbie - help to make the picture watchable and there are some amusing moments, but the film feels like a Charlie Kaufman movie if you stripped away some of the darker elements and deep thematic resonance and just went straight for the quirky and, in this case, the neuroses.

The film is a romantic comedy, of sorts, about two people who are commitment-phobes for various reasons. When we first meet Farrell's David, he is mourning the death of his father (Hamish Linklater) and has recently called it quits with his girlfriend. Robbie's Sarah is a version of the Manic Pixie Dreamgirl trope that appeared more in movies about a decade or so ago. She makes it clear that she intentionally sabotages relationships, especially when they seem to be going well.

The duo meet at a wedding where they flirt but resist the temptation to take it any further. David has rented a car with a GPS that seems to be sending him on some sort of spiritual journey. Sarah gets mixed up in the journey and has some moments of her own.

It all starts when they come upon a door in the middle of a forest that leads them back to previous points in their lives - a lighthouse where David spent a reflective moment in the past is one, while a visit to Sarah's mother is another. The longest sequence involves David traveling back to his high school, where he takes part in the school production of "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying" and again makes the mistake of declaring his feelings to a girl who wasn't interested.

One of the issues with the film is that other than the somewhat forced quirkiness - the scene where he picks up the car with the magical GPS strains under the weight of trying to be funny - the picture doesn't really tell us too much about the characters before it immediately throws us head-first into their neuroses. 

We have a scene where David sees his father waiting to learn about his newborn son, the one involving his high school heartbreak, and another having to do with his parents' relationship. Then, we have Sarah's visit with her mother, which draws attention to the strained relationship she has with her father. There's another scene in which both of them meet their recent exes at a coffee shop and they dish out all of their problems. At times, the film feels like an expensive therapy session.

A movie that the film attempts to be emulating is Michel Gondry's wonderful "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," in which a couple whose relationship has failed gets the chance to renew the evidence as they plan to have their minds wiped clean. That film too was offbeat and featured a setup that was beyond the realm of the likely, all the while being emotionally resonant. "A Big Bold Beautiful Journey" appears to want to be a film in that register, but it feels more one-dimensional.

I'm perhaps making the film sound worse than it is. The picture is often visually stimulating and the two leads are, not surprisingly, good despite the material. Kogonada's first two features - "Columbus" and "After Yang" - were also offbeat indie movies with a distinctive vibe, but I found them to be a bit weightier and more compelling than this one. The film has its moments, but it feels as if it's missing something.

Review: The Long Walk

Image courtesy of Lionsgate

It looks like we're in the mist of what could be one of the best years for Stephen King adaptations, first with Mike Flanagan's superb "The Life of Chuck" and, later this year, a new version of "The Running Man" by Edgar Wright. This week, Francis Lawrence's film "The Long Walk," based on a novella during King's Richard Bachman years, finally sees the light of day.

The film, which was apparently in development hell for a long time, is a solid picture in the King tradition of male bonding exercises such as "Stand By Me" and the mostly all-male "It." Much like some of King's other "Bachman" works - including "The Running Man" - this story is set in a dystopian future in which a dictatorship keeps the public at bay through bloody spectacle.

We don't get much in the way of explanation for why the country has turned out this way - although a quick glance at the evening news these days is probably good foreshadowing - but we learn that a great war has led to an extended period of joblessness and poverty among the populace. 

A cruel man known as The Major (Mark Hamill, who I didn't even realize was in the film until I saw his name in the credits) leads the titular stroll in which one young man from each state in the union is picked via a lottery to take part in a grueling walk in which there can only be one winner. Those who can go no further are given warnings and then shot.

Although there are memorable characters among the participants - wisecracking Olson (Ben Wang) or the unruly Barkovitch (Charlie Plummer) - the film mostly focuses on the friendship between Garraty (Cooper Hoffman) and McVries (David Jonsson), who along with Olson and a young southern man named Arthur (Tut Nyuot) make up the self-proclaimed "musketeers," although there are four of them.

Garraty has a secret reason for taking part in the contest - and he's the only one to volunteer - that is only gradually revealed, while optimist McVries wants to use the prize money to do something good. The yin and yang of these characters makes for a compelling partnership and it helps that both actors are so good in the roles.

While "The Long Walk" doesn't exactly go places that you won't expect, it's a solid example of how the success of a film often depends less on what it's about than it does how it goes about it. This film succeeds because of its strong performances, imaginative camerawork that prevents a scenario that could become visually boring from becoming so, and some interesting back and forth between the characters about what it means to be a friend and to put others before oneself. It's a solid little genre picture with heart.