New Release! Juliet, Naked (2018) [No spoilers]

No Spoilers! Read Away!!

Director: Jesse Peretz

Another well-done and more unique rom-com based on a novel by British writer Nick Hornby.

Juliet, Naked focuses on Annie Platt (Rose Byrne), a semi-reluctant museum curator in a small town on the coast of England. Annie's longtime boyfriend Duncan (Chris O'Dowd) is an local college professor who has a strong obsession with obscure 1990s rock musician Tucker Crowe. Crowe had one particularly critical hit album 25 years prior but vanished into obscurity for unknown reasons. Duncan is part of a small group of obsessive fans who pore over the minutiae of Tucker's life and rather small body of musical work with almost every spare moment. After a previously-unheard demo copy of Tucker's hit album mysteriously appears, Rose accidentally finds herself in contact with Crowe himself (Ethan Hawke). This forces her to begin rethinking her own life, from her relationship with Duncan to her job and continuing to live in her sleepy hometown.

I'm not a particular fan of romantic comedies, but I can enjoy ones that don't fall into the sappier tropes of the genre. Fortunately, Juliet, Naked avoids nearly all of them. There are certainly a few familiar elements to fans of rom-coms: a woman dissatisfied with her love life. A connection with a new man that forces her to reexamine her own life. Cute and humorously awkward moments. This movie contains all of those. Where it exceeds most of its brethren is in the execution, which is pleasantly organic and genuinely funny most of the time. I truly knew nothing about the plot going into this movie, so I can't speak to how someone might feel if they've read Nick Hornby's novel first, but the movie went in a few directions which I honestly didn't see coming. Though it didn't take any massive risks with the ending, it also avoided many of the tropes and familiar beats popularized by earlier romantic comedies.

A big reason the movie rises above other rom-coms is that it does focus on slightly older people. Crazy Rich Asians, as different as it was in many ways, still focused on a woman in her late-twenties/early thirties and just on the cusp of taking the first big step of getting engaged. Juliet, Naked looks at a woman and peers who are further along in life. Annie is much closer to forty and has been in a relationship so settled that she's barely noticed how stale it's become. The "new man" in her life, Tucker, is not some dashing knight in shining armor but rather a faded musician who clearly has serious problems with relationships, and not just with women. He also has multiple children from multiple mothers, each of whom he has complicated histories with. And for most of the movie, it's not even clear if Annie looks at Tucker as a potential love interest, but perhaps simply as an unexpected sympathetic ear - the stranger to whom she feels comfortable airing her discontent with her life. It all makes for a story that is a bit tougher to predict.

In quite a turn from his role in the hard-hitting First Reformed,
Ethan Hawke expertly plays the overly laid back, messy former
star musician Tucker Crowe. His emergence into Annie's (left)
life sends them both into reexamining their lives.

The movie also uses as one of its themes a topic that Hornby has always incorporated well in many of his stories - the topic of obsessions. Whether obsessions with music in High Fidelity, with a sports team in Fever Pitch, and now with a particular musician in Juliet, Naked, it is a subject that has stronger and stronger resonance in a time when the pool of information at our disposal deepens and creates the potential to drown in our own recreational hobbies. This movie runs with the amusing question, "What if the object of one's unhealthy obsession quite literally shows up on their doorstep?"

The cast helps things immensely. The three main actors, Byrne, O'Dowd, and Hawke, couldn't have been cast more perfectly. All three - especially Byrne and O'Dowd - have serious comedic chops to go along with their solid acting skills, which the script demands. They feel very much as authentic as such characters can, and the little seaside town is a perfectly quaint setting for such a tale.

My wife and I saw this movie only a few days after this summer's monster rom-com hit Crazy Rich Asians. I certainly enjoyed that movie, but I honestly thought Juliet, Naked to be an overall more touching and consistently strong film. This is likely because its characters are much closer to my own age in my early forties, versus the relative freshness and youth of Crazy Rich Asians. For anyone who likes the genre but wasn't aware of this under-the-radar gem, I highly recommend it. 

New Release! Phantom Thread (2018)

Director: Paul Thomas Anderson

A beautifully-constructed and acted film, though one that seemed to be missing one or two essential ingredients to fully resonate with me.

The movie follows the romance between Stevens Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) and Alma (Vicky Krieps). Woodcock is a 60-something-year-old fashion designer of the highest order in 1950s England, catering to artistocrats and royalty both local and international. A quirky, finicky sort, Woodcock has never been married and tends to only maintain brief relationships with an cycle of ever-changing young muses. When he attracts what is likely to be the latest object of his peculiarly self-absorbed affections, Alma, he soon learns that she has more of an individual will than his past loves. Alma's independent spirit begins to play havok with Woodcock's guarded emotions, eventually affecting his ability to maintain his intense focus on his fashion design business, which he runs with his stern elder sister, the business-savvy Cyril (Lesley Manville).

As I write this, it has been about a week since I saw the movie, and I am still processing the film and deciding exactly how much I liked it. And I did like it. Yet, it still has not completely grabbed hold of my imagination or spirit in the way that other Anderson movies have, such as There Will Be Blood or even Boogie Nights, in its way. P. T. Anderson loves immersing himself and us viewers into worlds which we are unlikely to have seen before - whether the world of the changing 1970s pornography business, the ruthless world of big oil around the turn of the 20th century, or the world of aristocratic fashion in 1950s England. And like those earlier films, Phantom Thread  presents that last world in a highly engaging way, even for someone like me who knows and cares very little about it. By constructing setting and characters so skillfully, we are drawn into just what makes the highly prickly Woodcock and his exquisite work so very attractive to those around him.

A large part of the setting's appeal is the lush and lavish sets and costumes on dislpay throughout the picture. Again, I am one who cares little about fashion, but it is hard not to enjoy the visual splendor of this movie, at least on a purely aesthetic level.

Alma (left) jabs back after Woodcock suggests that she she
"has no taste." The emotional tug-of-war is at the heart of
this film, though it is a relatively measured battle described
with the same calm pace as Woodcock's design process.

Of course, the visuals are merely the shallowest aspect of this movie. Anderson's best movies have always been about the interactions between interesting characters. With Phantom Thread, I felt that this was almost accomplished, but fell just short of completely arresting me. Woodcock's genius, eccentricities, and difficult nature are fairly fascinating. And there is an intellectual appeal to the way that Alma becomes what seems to be the first real challenge to his carefully-constructed world and identity. But it is mostly an intellectual appeal, rather than an emotional one. This is partly due to the calm, often cold and detached way that the story is told and the characters often behave. Alma is clearly meant to be the more grounded, no-nonsense, open character here, yet we only ever learn so much about her. The story does get into Woodcock's family background and we get some important bits about his childhood, but Alma? We never learn so much as which country she is from, anything about her family, or much else. She almost serves purely as a bizarre balm to Woodcock's closed-off inner soul - a sort of uber-British version of the "manic pixie dreamgirl" type - whose sole purpose in the story is to "fix" the broken genius.

This is, obviously, just my current read on the movie. Even now I feel that other interpretations can be made; I'm likely to rethink my own feelings about this movie, even if I don't bother to see it again any time soon. It is one, however, which I would recommend to most people. Provided that you don't grow bored with very "British" movies that tend to move with a very measured pace and focus on rather subtle interactions between oft-uptight characters, then you're likely to find something to like in this one. 

New Release! Darkest Hour (2017)

Director: Joe Wright

A very solid dramatization of a key two weeks in the history of Britain and the world, although one that I found a bit slow and perhaps geared more towards Anglophiles.

The movie covers the historically important two-week period in early 1940 when England is on the brink of being defeated by the Nazis. Back on its heels, the English Parliament has booted Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain out of office and elected controversial figure Winston Churchill (Gary Oldman) to the position. With the fate of his country in the balance, the pugnacious and oft-divisive Churchill is forced to marshal enough support from the quixotic Parliament to enact his plans. The real crux comes with the Dunkirk dilemma, when the entire British ground army of 300,000 men is stranded on the Belgian beach with no obvious escape from the rapidly-approaching German forces. Churchill must decide whether to surrender to the Nazis and prevent potentially further loss of life or to refuse and resist Hitler's demands at the possible cost of hundreds of thousands of soldiers' lives.

I found this movie similar to other well-made historical dramas. High quality work, though one that simply made me more interested in a well-done documentary or even book on the same subject. I am far from an expert of that time period in British history, but I knew enough about Churchill in general and the state of World War II at the time to know the basic outcome of the story. I also knew enough to not see anything overly revelatory about Churchill, the British Parliament, and even the British people. And this is the one thing that I wish to gain from any piece of history, be is dramatization or documentary - the revelation of new facts and overlooked, important pieces to the overall puzzle. I honestly can't say that Darkest Hour gave me enough of these things to feel completely satisfying.

That said, the movie is done exceptionally well. Unsurprisingly, Gary Oldman is phenomenal as Winston Churchill, and the rest of the cast is as first-rate as one would expect from such an accomplished group of professional British actors. I was particularly impressed with Australian genius Ben Mendelsohn's turn as King George VI. Beyond the acting, the other technical aspects of the movie are top-notch, with the costumes and set designs offering a cohesively dark and shadowy version of 1940 London. There is also some creative cinematography, including a few well-placed "bird's eye" shots, looking down on the denizens below and panning down or up, depending on the scene's requirements. These offered some welcome visual dynamism in what is often a very literally dark film, filled with shadows and the blacks, browns, and grey tweeds associated with London's buildings and its people's fashions.

The meant-to-be-rousing, climactic "subway scene." This is
when a doubtful Churchill finds support among the commoners
through uplifting exchanges. It never really happened.

This was easily one of the most "British" movies I've seen in some time. Obviously, the subject matter makes it such, but it goes a bit beyond simply taking place in England and focusing on one of that country's most famous people of the last 100 years. Darkest Hour is also packed with figures who embody some of the most "English" mannerisms, with plenty of stuffy aristocrats and royalty hemming and hawing about, hands openly clutching their jacket lapels as a show of displeasure at the rather uncouth Winston Churchill (though his brand of "uncouth" is rather tame by most modern standards). And nearly all the women in the picture are rather typically prim and proper types, sporting stiff backs and polished accents.

Then there's the climactic "subway ride" scene towards the end, which a bit of research has told me was completely fictional. In this scene, a tortured Churchill condescends to ride the subway and do an informal poll of "real" Londoners about the possibility of surrender. As one can imagine, the entire car responds in the universal and rousing negative, which the films presents as the final push that Churchill needs to refuse the Nazis demands that he and Britain surrender. This is clearly meant to be this movie's William Wallace, Braveheart "Freedom!" moment. In other words, crowd-pleasing propaganda which makes up an entire sequence and is suggesting that it might be factual. Such sneakiness bothers me, especially when it is as heavy-handed as the subway scene was here.

This movie is likely to end up in the same place as 2010's The King's Speech - a well-made, well-acted British historical drama that garners plenty of well-earned praise in its year of release, but ultimately one which will be relatively forgotten within a few years. Worth seeing, but not necessarily one which will be repeatedly studied or enjoyed upon multiple viewings.

In terms of its chances at Best Picture, I would be absolutely stunned if it won. Several other contenders were more daring, if not as refined as Darkest Hour. 

Before I Die #589: The Great White Silence (1924)

This was the 589th movie I've seen from the 1,187 films on the "Before You Die" list that I'm gradually working through.

Director: Herbert G. Ponting

Full disclosure right off the bat - technically, I didn't exactly watch the original 1924 version of this film, since I really couldn't track down a copy of it. The explanation is folded into the basic summary:

Way back in 1910 and 1911, famed English explorer Sir Walter Scott set out to lead the first team of humans to reach the South Pole. To document it, he hired film director Herbert G. Ponting to join the arduous journey, filming as much as he could for posterity. He tagged along with the team right from their departure from the shores of England, right on down to Antarctica and even a fair way into the mainland. During the final days, though, it was only six of the most seasoned explorers who would travel to the actual pole. Ponting and the rest of the support team saw them off and then returned to their headquarters on the Antarctic coast. They would later find out just how doomed Scott and his team were. While they did reach the pole, they discovered that they had been beaten by a Norwegian team led by Roald Amundsen. Adding the ultimate injury to this insult, Scott's entire team was overtaken by the elements and all died on their return trip to their base camp.

When Ponting and the remainder of the failed expedition team returned to England, Ponting spent a few years editing all of the footage he had shot during the long and arduous journey. He first released his edits as short films to the British public. Then, in 1924, he released a 112-minute single silent film. After the advent of sound came around several years later, Ponting returned to the movie and added his voice-over narration. It is this latter version which I saw.

While the documentary can be a tad dry from time to time, it is fascinating as extant proof of one of the most daring and tragic attempts in human exploration history. Being able to see the men who tried, failed, and some of whom even died, has a power that no book or article can provide. For that alone, the film still has and will likely always have an irrevocable strength. And when the narration turns to reading Scott's final words, written in the journal he was keeping right up until his death, it has an effect which no dramatization could match.

That said, the dry or dull portions can tax one's patience. Having been released in a time when moving pictures still were relatively fresh, many scenes are merely of the crew doing mundane chores. I imagine that in the 1920s and '30s, the viewing public was still gripped by these, as they had never been seen before. For those of us in the 21st century now, in the wake of the amazing advances in nature and exploration cinematography, the images and scenes in The Great White Silence are unlikely to excite. As an example, there's a good five minutes spent just on showing penguins waddling around, with the narration adding very little to spice things up.

Hardly the most comfortable of conditions, to be sure. Such a
trek would be arduous with even 21st century equipment. I can
only imagine how tough and driven these guys were to try it
with the rudimentary tools they had.

I can't write about this film without bringing up a major point of discomfort of the type which is often a possibility with older films. During one scene, showing a few of the crewmen playing with their "mascot" black cat, Ponting's narration tells us the cat's name: Nigger, which Ponting himself cheerfully announces a couple of times. Ouch. It's never fun to get a full-on racist punch to the gut like that. Reminding yourself that "those were different times" really does nothing to take the sting out of hearing such backwards thinking about race. Blessedly, this is really the only instance of this in the film, and it is over very quickly.

This film was obviously a great step forward from films like Nanook of the North, which would later be discredited for manipulating the actions in ways that disqualify it from being considered a truthful "documentary." Ponting's film seemed to stay truer to a historian's goal of capturing rather than creating significant events. It's a worthwhile watch for anyone with a bit of interest in the history of documentaries or the history of exploration.

That's 589 movies down. Only 598 to go before I can die. 

Gangster Flick 3-Pack: The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973); The Long Good Friday (1980); American Gangster (2007)

The taglines on the original movie poster say it all.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973)

Director: Peter Yates

A curious movie which oozes despair and fatalism like only 1970s movies can.

Acting legend Robert Mitchum, no stranger to great noir films, plays Eddie Coyle, a mafia middle-man of the lowest-rent variety. Coyle dabbles steadily enough in the purchase and exchange of guns, but he barely manages to eke out a meager existence by which he lives in an uninspiring home with his wife and three children. Eddie is not even particularly great at what he does. As penance for flubbing a job earlier in life, he had his fingers broken in a drawer, earning the nickname "Eddie Fingers". As this movie begins, he has already been collared for illegally transporting stolen goods, and is only free on bail until he can be tried and locked away. That is, unless he turns evidence on some of his more powerful bosses.

The movie isn't always as tight as it could be. A fair amount of time is spent showing how an arms dealer whom Eddie knows goes about the dangerous work of selling guns to criminals of both the professional and amateur variety. While much of this isn't necessary to the central tale of Coyle, it is actually done well enough to remain intriguing. Many of these scenes actually exhibit much that other filmmakers could learn about how to execute tense and suspenseful scenes which still feel fairly organic.

In spite of these mildly tangential moments, the movie coheres at the end, without leaving any dangling elements. Thanks to the generally sordid nature of his business and a horribly unfortunate mix-up, Coyle is targeted for assassination. I couldn't help but think that this movie is essentially the third act of Goodfellas, when Henry Hill sees all of his past glories and successes fall away as he becomes severed from the life of crime which had nurtured him for so long. The difference with Eddie Coyle, however, is that we have no sense that Coyle ever had a "heyday" when he lived the high life and rubbed elbows with mafia big shots. For this reason, Eddie Coyle feels more sadly authentic, and of course far less entertaining, than a Scorsese or Coppola gangster movie.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle is probably too dreary for me to watch again. Still, I have to admit that it is extremely well done and still shows why it is, to this day, considered among the best gangster movies.

Harold Shand - a man who wants profitable peace but has
a frightening violent streak dragged out over the course
of this tense film.

The Long Good Friday (1980)

Director: John Mackenzie

This was the second time I've seen this one. I found it excellent the first time, and it only improved.

The only difficulty I can point out has nothing to do with the film itself. It is merely that there is an abundance of cockney crime slang, which can be tough to decipher, even for one who is familiar with it through movies and novels, like me.

Foreign phrases aside, this movie is an all-time great. Even more than 1971's Get Carter, The Long Good Friday paints a portrait of a British gangster that is as compelling as it is creative. Bob Hoskins plays Harold Shand, a London-based gangster who has overseen nearly a decade of peace and prosperity in the organized crime world. With the 1980s freshly underway, Harold has big plans for massive, mostly-legitimate expansion, and he is about to host a representative of the Sicilian-American mafia in order to forge a partnership. Just as the visit is about to begin, though, some very bad things start happening. A few of Harold's top lieutenants are killed. One of his pubs is bombed. Another bomb is found in one of his casinos. Somebody clearly has it in for him.

The movie follows Harold as he tries to figure out first what is going on, and then who is responsible, so that he knows where to aim his murderous rage. The details of the plot can be rather difficult to follow at times, due in part to the heavy accents and regional slang, but the gist is quite clear: someone is out to get Harold, and Harold is not a man who takes kindly to being gotten. It's the stuff of some of the very best gangster tales, be they in literature or film. There is an almost noir-like impenetrability to the plot, so that it is much easier to feel Harold's disorientation. It's easy to see why he makes several missteps, and its also easy to see why he reacts so violently when certain details are revealed. With each new piece of information he discovers or weeds out through beatings and torture, either the mystery deepens or the scope grows to frightening proportions. This movie is very clearly where plenty of modern British crime movies like those of Guy Ritchie took many of their cues. While the more recent movies exaggerate the entertaining aspects of hard-boiled criminals and their exploits, though, The Long Good Friday keeps the tone far darker and more menacing.

Harold Shand (middle), showing some creativity with his
methods of information extraction.

The performances by the stars of the movie are phenomenal. The secondary characters are played by many faces familiar to those who have seen some of the more popular British crime movies, and a few were even used by Guy Ritchie later in Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. We also get a rather young Helen Mirren as Harold's sophisticated, modern gun moll, and Mirren predictably nails the role. Most amazing of all of the strong performances, though, is that of Bob Hoskins. His turn as besieged crime lord Harold Shand is one that is arguably unmatched in British crime movies. His shifts in personality, from gregariously charismatic optimist to snarling, vengeful, and brutal thug are completely natural and captivating. His is one of those performances that draws the eye to his character in virtually every scene, and even warrants multiple viewings.

This was the second time that I've watched this movie, and I'm quite likely to watch it again. Anyone who has ever enjoyed British gangster movies owes it to themselves to watch this touchstone film in the genre.

American Gangster (2007)

Director: Ridley Scott

A solid offering of a Scarface-style, making-of-a-gangster movie of a different breed, if not exactly a modern classic.

Based on real events, American Gangster follows the rise of Frank Lucas, the very real drug kingpin who rose to power in Harlem in the 1960s and 1970s. Prior to his climb to crime-lord, Lucas (Denzel Washington) had been an associate of the powerful and influential boss Bumpy Johnson. When Johnson dies, Lucas sees the opportunity to place himself in the gap left by Johnson's death, a gap left mostly in the heroin market. Knowing the landscape of the local illegal drug trade, Lucas knows that he can't compete with the already-entrenched forces of smaller local drug lords and the corrupt police force. He therefore goes directly to a major source of heroin - Vietnam. Using a few old neighborhood friends, the enterprising Lucas cuts a deal with a Vietnamese opium grower and purveyor to sell to him directly. Lucas also organizes a method for getting the opium into the U.S. on board military planes making regular trips between Vietnam and the U.S.

While Lucas's power begins to grow, New Jersey police officer Richie Roberts (Russel Crowe) is fighting the good fight. In ways very reminiscent of Serpico - another story based on true events - Roberts is one of the very few clean cops on the force, which alienates him from nearly all of his fellow officers. It is, however, his incorruptibility that brings him to the eye of state officials who make him head of a force tasked with bringing down the ever-growing illegal drug trade in the greater New York City area. This sets Roberts on the path to tracking down Frank Lucas and attempting to put together a case that will bring down the cautious and savvy criminal and his organization.

The movie bears plenty of familiar elements, the most obvious being the two well-known crime movies already mentioned. But while there may not be much that is exactly novel about the basic elements of the story, director Ridley Scott spins the tale out in entertaining and engaging ways. Richie Roberts's detective work is not unlike what we see in the first season of The Wire, with a small crew of dedicated cops using all of their wits to grasp the scope and details of a massive illegal operation and bring down those in control. The cast does plenty to elevate many of the confrontations and exchanges above their occasional mediocrity, and watching the inevitable collision between Lucas and Roberts slowly develop is engaging. The resolution of the movie is a bit atypical of such movies, and it provides a really solid scene between Washington and Crowe.

As with most movies based on real events, I did a bit of informal research to see just how close to reality the events in the film came. The short answer is: not very close. By most accounts, the real Lucas was not nearly as suave or endearing as the on-screen version, and Roberts is actually portrayed in a slightly less appealing light than the real man. This is another case in which I feel that I would almost prefer to watch a well-done documentary on this topic, even when the dramatized version is of high quality. 

Retro Trio: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014); Win Win (2012); Kung-Fu Panda (2008)

Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014)

Director: Matthew Vaughn

I just watched this movie for the second time. The first time, I absolutely loved it. The second time, I really enjoyed it, but I noticed a very unfortunate and nasty blemish that I hadn't seen the first time.

Kingsman is essentially a clever modernization of the entire James Bond mythos, told with a dizzying amount of joy. It centers on Gary "Eggsy" Unwin, a very intelligent and gifted young man who lives the life of a punk in a downtrodden neighborhood. He unexpectedly becomes a part of a group called "The Kingsman," a secret society created by wealthy British aristocrats wanting to protect the world with the freedom and anonymity that national governments do not possess. Eggsy quickly learns that his father was an agent in Kingsman, in which his moniker was "Lancelot," as Kingsman all adopt names taken from the Knights of the Round Table from British history. Eggsy himself is given a chance to become a Kingsman by going through a grueling training/tryout with other candidates. While this is occurring, the brilliant computer programmer Valentine (Samuel L. Jackson) is plotting to kill nearly all of humanity in an insane attempt to save the planet from human contamination.

The movie is very self-aware in its over-the-top plot, action, and its use of the James Bond template for an epic tale of world-saving. Two of the main characters even get meta during a conversation about their love of old Bond movie villains and their megalomaniacal schemes. This element of the movie could have become a tiresome crutch, but it merely served as a solid springboard into some highly amusing and creative alterations to the familiar Bond tropes. Where Bond has Q, the Kingsman have Merlin. Where Bond was a polished metrosexual who studied at Eton, Eggsy is a diamond in the rough of a neighborhood full of thugs and punks. Where Bond villains have nearly always been icy cold in their attitude towards death and brutal violence, Valentine becomes nauseated at the sight of blood. The differences are all overtly intentional and wonderfully entertaining.

You might not have guessed it, but Colin Firth makes an
excellent gentleman of lethal action. 

As an action film, Kingsman is brilliant. Director Matthew Vaughn, known for directing Layer Cake and for producing Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, keeps the tempo fast and furious. There are plenty of brutal fights, daredevil escapes, and lively chase scenes, all presented with no end of effective verve. Though I am not a fan of most action movies, per se, I found the controlled insanity of Kingsman a pleasure to take in.

All of the above are fantastic, and they hold up on repeated viewing. On my second watch, though, a nasty element of the film became glaring. The attitude towards female characters is conservative at best and downright insulting at worst. The only "strong" female character is Valentine's henchwoman, Gazelle, who is a bloodthirsty killer in the mold of classic Bond villains like Oddjob. The few other females are painfully weak. Eggsy's mother is a pathetic victim. A Danish princess is initially presented as intelligent, but then becomes a mere sex object. Even Eggsy's fellow Kingsman recruit, Roxy, needs constant encouragement from Eggsy, despite her clear merits as a tough potential agent. I found this gender imbalance a bit callous for the modern age of storytelling.

This is still a really fun movie. A sequel is planned, and I'll gladly go see it. My only hope is that we can see some movement towards giving us at least one or two respectable, strong, and fully-formed female characters to go along with the excellent male ones.

Win Win (2012)

Director: Tom McCarthy

Another great indie film from Tom McCarthy.

McCarthy has been and will continue to be a buzz-worthy name right up to and through the Oscars next year, since he is the screenwriter and director of the amazing Spotlight. However, film fans will likely already know him for his earlier films The Station Agent or maybe even The Visitor. Like those earlier works, Win Win manages to hit on the themes of people's relationships to one another, primarily when one of them is an unintentional misfit within his or her context.

Win Win focuses mostly on small-town, New Jersey lawyer Mike Flaherty (Paul Giamatti). Mike has a very modest practice which is falling on hard times. His looming financial straits inspire Mike's morally dubious decision to become a state-appointed guardian for a modestly wealthy client, Leo Poplar. Instead of actually taking care of Leo, however, Mike leaves him at a retirement home and collects his guardian checks. This seems to be working fine, until Leo's grandson Kyle shows up from Ohio, mostly to get away from his addict mother. The rather quiet but self-possessed Kyle eventually comes to live with Mike, his wife and daughter. Kyle becomes an even larger part of their lives when Mike, the high school wrestling coach, discovers that Kyle is a top-flight wrestler.

Very much like McCarthy's other movies, Win Win is all about personal relationships and how they shift and change under various pressures. The balance between organic drama and humor is impeccable. In lesser hands, this movie could easily have become a sentimental bore or a more light-hearted, quirky comedy in the vein of Wes Anderson. As it is, though, it has legitimate emotional heft to go with its considerable entertainment value. There are so many great moments of revelation, particularly with Kyle, that prove that stories can be engaging and fulfilling without being sensational.

I am now officially a Mike McCarthy fan. All four of his films which I have seen have been nothing short of excellent, and I eagerly await his next work.

Kung-Fu Panda (2008)

Directors: Mark Osborn and John Stevenson

I was pleasantly surprised with my first viewing of this modern popular animated movie. It showed far more skill and age-spanning humor than I was expecting.

The movie is set in a world modelled after medieval China, and where there are no humans. Rather, it is populated by all forms of animals that walk, talk and move around like humans. In this world, the kindly panda Po (voiced by Jack Black) is a noodle cook who idolizes the "Kung Fu" legends of the land, most specifically the "Furious Five" who fight evil and are headquartered close to Po's village. When word arrives that the villainous Tai Lung (Ian McShane) is about to return and exact vengeance on the Furious Five, a prophesied "Dragon Warrior" is selected to defend the temple. Surprisingly, it is Po who is chosen as the Dragon Warrior. Surprising in that Po is overweight, undisciplined, and completely unschooled in martial arts.

My expectations were not terribly high for this movie, and I mostly watched it because my wife is a fan of the it (and pandas, in general). Much to my delight, the movie is fun, clever, and amazingly vibrant. In both the visual humor and spoken gags, there are plenty of creative and comedic twists on well-known tropes. Young kids surely love the sillier slapstick and goofy, energetic deliveries of Jack Black, but older viewers like me can find plenty of laughs as well. Playing on many of the stereotypes laid out in popular kung-fu movies, the story and script take plenty of left turns to keep things fresh and interesting. It helps that there are some phenomenal voice actors, including Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman, and James Hong, among several others.

The characters and settings are as colorful as anything
you've seen in an animated movie. The grade-A voice acting
enhances the energy even more.

The animation and visuals are dazzling. This movie is as colorful and eye-popping as any animated films that you are likely to see. The animators clearly drew from the wide color palate of classic Chinese culture and crafted a movie that is simply a joy to look at. Enhancing all of this are action sequences that are fun but not dizzying, as one may find in more hyper-kinetic anime films or cartoons aimed at very young children.

While I cannot quite put this film on the same level as some of the best Pixar movies, it is as close as I've seen from a rival animation studio. I would gladly return to this one in the future, as it's an entertaining way to feel like a kid again, without feeling as if my intelligence were being insulted. 

Gangster Flick 3-Pack: Let Him Have It (1991); Layer Cake (2004); State of Grace (1990)

Let Him Have It (1991)

Director: Peter Medak

A harrowing drama about one of the most personal tragedies in criminal and judicial history.

Let Him Have It is a documdrama about the life of Derek Bentley, a mentally inferior young man who, in London of 1953, falls in with the wrong people and pays the ultimate price. Derek is a young, impressionable 19-year-old who is lured into a small gang of wanna-be criminals made up of boys still in secondary school. The leader is Chris Craig, an especially loud-mouthed lad who works hard to look and sound like the crooks glamorized in Hollywood gangster movies. He and three of his cohorts walk around town dressed in dark trenchcoats and black fedoras, trying as hard as possible to imitate Chris's authentically criminal older brother. Derek, an otherwise gentle soul, is taken in by the strong attitude and image of Chris's gang, and he begins to sneak away from his parents' home to hang out with them.

On the most fateful of nights, Derek finds himself on a warehouse rooftop with Chris, both of them playfully looking for a way to break in. The police arrive, however, and when one of them apprehends Derek, Chris pulls a gun. As the police officer demands that Chris turn over the weapon, a frightened Derek calls out "Let him have it, Chris," which Chris misunderstands as a prompt to shoot the officer. A firefight and standoff ensue, ending with Chris injured from a long fall, one officer wounded, and another dead by Chris's hand. The real tragedy begins when Derek and Chris are brought to court, where the penalty for their crimes is execution.

The movie is a strong one, and the tragedy of the situation is palpable. Thanks to very strong acting and pacing, what could have been a depressing slog is actually a sad but compelling account. Very much in the vein of Kieslowski's 1990 film Decalogue Five: Thou Shalt Not Kill and the 1995 movie Dead Man Walking, with their the juxtaposition of illegal murder with legal execution, Let Him Have It forces viewers to think long and hard about capital punishment.

As with any film which depicts a tragedy which happened in reality, the dramatization offers a buffer which a documentary would not. However, for cases which happened longer in past, such as this one, I feel that a well-crafted and respectful docudrama is the closest we can get to truly feeling the loss the the Bentley family did at the end of this affair. Let Him Have It is not a movie which needs to be seen more than once, but once is all but mandatory.

Layer Cake (2004)

Director: Matthew Vaughn

An entertaining British gangster flick, adding depth to the Guy Ritchie brand of films which preceded and obviously influenced it.

Layer Cake tells the story of a highly intelligent, never-named drug dealer (Daniel Craig) who is on the cusp of sealing a final "big deal" in London which will allow him to retire from the sordid, dangerous world of crime. As such stories go, though, things get extremely complicated, extremely quickly.

Up to the point of the tale's beginning, "Mr. X" has been expert at keeping his head down and remaining under the radar of more powerful or more volatile criminals in his industry. However, once the wrinkles start to pop up, X must navigate lethally treacherous waters infested with British gang lords, headstrong power-grabbers, and his own conscience. Following the actions and reactions of X certainly makes for a sometimes fun, sometimes harrowing, and often violent tale.

The style and construction of the movie is quite familiar to any who have watched 1998's Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels or 2000's Snatch, the two seminal modern British gangster movies by Guy Ritchie. There's a dizzying array of shadowy, vicious characters, and more than a little gallows humor sprinkled throughout. Compared to those earlier movies, though, Layer Cake ratchets down the insanity and overt comedy in favor of taut suspense. This is carried through with great performances all around by the brilliant cast, spearheaded by a pre-James Bond Daniel Craig.

One could criticize the movie for borrowing too heavily from Ritchie's hyperspeed style of storytelling (director Matthew Vaughn was, in fact, a producer of Ritchie's films), but this was easy for me to forgive. While there is nothing of great ingenuity here in terms of subject matter or methodology, Layer Cake feels enough like its own movie not to be overly harsh with any critique. It goes deeper into the protagonist's psyche than any Ritchie film ever dared, which prevents it from being a mere clone.

State of Grace (1990)

Director: Phil Joanou

If timing is everything, then State of Grace had nothing going for it from the jump. This is a shame, as it is a great gangster movie.

I had never even heard of this movie before I came across it on a "best gangster films" list. When I saw the cast list, I was further amazed that it was never on my radar. The movie follows young undercover police officer Terry Noonan (Sean Penn), who has returned to his old neighborhood in the Irish section of New York's Hell's Kitchen. Under the guise of a drifter looking to get back into the criminal lifestyle, he reunites with old friend Mickey Flannery (Gary Oldman), and the two soon begin cracking jokes and skulls, alike. Terry's ultimate plan is to obtain incriminating evidence on Mickey's older brother, Frankie (Ed Harris), who has become the boss of the local Irish mob. However, doing the right thing as a cop becomes far more difficult for Terry as he becomes further entrenched in his old environment.

The characters, plot, acting, and general direction of State of Grace are excellent. The drama between Noonan and the Flannerys is organic and tense, with a palpable emotional depth. The story unfolds and intensifies as well as the very best crime dramas. In addition to the great actors mentioned above, several supporting roles are played expertly by great talents like Robin Wright, John C. Reilly, and John Turturro.

At this point, you many be wondering how a high-quality movie, with such an outstanding cast, is not better-known. I wondered the same thing until I discovered that State of Grace was released on September 14, 1990. For those without a photographic memory for film release dates, this is the exact same day that Goodfellas was released. Yikes. When forced to go head-to-head against one of the absolute greatest gangster movies in the history of cinema, anything less than The Godfather would pale in comparison. Such was the fate of State of Grace. It could not have helped that, by this time, Martin Scorsese was well-established as a brilliant director, so that his return to New York crime tales was bound to drown out even an outstanding effort by a relative newcomer like State of Grace director Phil Joanou. No, Joanou's movie is not as great as Goodfellas, but it is one of the best of its kind.

The commercial and historical fate of State of Grace is rather sad. However, I highly recommend the movie to anyone who loves the gangster genre. 

Before I Die # 552: The Ladykillers (1955)

This is the 552nd of the 1,162 films on the "Before You Die" list that I'm gradually working my way through.

Director: Alexander Mackendrick

A fairly amusing dark comedy, though not as thoroughly entertaining as I had hoped.

I had seen the misguided 2004 Coen Brothers remake, so I knew the basic story. The original is set in 1950s London, England, where a group of thieves pose as musicians who practice their string quartet in the home of the elderly and somewhat loopy Mrs. Wilberforce. They are led by the abundantly sinister Professor Marcus (Alec Guinness), whose master plan involves using Mrs. Wilberforce's home, conveniently situated just above the train station, as a headquarters for a daring robbery of an incoming delivery of cash. The heist initially goes as planned, but things go awry when Mrs. Wilberforce learns of the larceny before the crooks can get the money away from the house. This forces the thieves into the grim conclusoin that Mrs. Wilberforce must be eliminated, permanently. The rest of the movie is comprised of the group deciding who will kill her and how the dark deed will be done.

While that description may sound like a horribly macabre story, rest assured that it is merely the stuff of black humor. This is a great concept, and it is not difficult to see why the Coen Brothers decided to try their hand at updating it. Alas, though the original is certainly far better than the 2004 remake, I did find it a chore to watch much of the time. Many of the scenes and situations smack of a comedy sketch that goes on a bit longer than necessary, and most of the characters, while amusing in theory and stature, lack enough memorable dialogue to make a real mark.

This crew had a lot more potential than was met, especially
given the acting talents involved.

The movie was even more of a disappointment after I had seen the name Peter Sellers in the opening credits. Though quite young at the time, he would go on to become an absolute legend of comedy, so I was hoping for an early look at this budding genius. Alas, there was nothing in the performance that demanded any of Sellers's prodigious comic talents. His character, Harry, was only mildly amusing, and it could have been played by any one of countless other actors. With so much hindsight, it seems to be one of the most obvious wastes of talent that one is likely to find. While the other characters were more interesting in theory, they were never given the script to bring the humor to life.

Now having seen them both, it seems like the original and remake were two parts of a potentially greater whole. The original had the set-up and casting right, whereas the 2004 version misfired on setting and some casting. Conversely, the 2004 version understood how to punch up the dark humor, especially when the bodies start piling up, while the original couldn't maintain the comedic element consistently. An even better comparison lies in the 1949 movie Kind Hearts and Coronets, which also starred Alec Guinnes in a variety of roles. That earlier movie is a case study in dark humor, and The Ladykillers of 1955 might have been better had it taken a few lessons from it.

For those who like dark British humor, this is worth a watch, though I would advise tempered expectations.

That's 552 movies down. Only 610 to go before I can die. 

Before I Die #549: Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)

This is the 549th film of the 1,160 films on the "Before You Die" list that I'm gradually working my way through.

Director: Mike Newell

 This one has not held up at all well. If you saw this movie back in the 1990s and fell in love with it, as many did, then you probably still love it. If, like me, you never saw it, then I suggest that you not even bother.

From the title, you can imagine the general settings of Four Weddings and a Funeral. Traipsing about all of these services is a gaggle of friends, most in their late twenties or early thirties. The protagonist is Charles (Hugh Grant), a handsome fellow who has been somewhat unlucky in love, though occasionally by his own fumbling and immaturity. At the first wedding we witness, where Charles is the best man, he falls for Carrie, a beautiful American with a reputation for being "easy" with men. Charles does, indeed, sleep with Carrie. This sets up an on-again/off-again affair over the course of the next several months and titular weddings and funeral.

My introduction surely makes it clear that I did not care for this movie. However, I was quite glad to have watched it with my wife, who was one of this film's many original fans. Even she, after this recent viewing, had to admit that the movie has some obvious weaknesses. All the same, she confirmed my suspicions about the monumental impact it had on dozens of romantic comedies that followed in its wake. It is a classic case of something becoming so influential and imitated, that it almost becomes a parody of itself, through no fault of its own. There are almost too many aped elements to count: the charming but insecure lead man, played in definitive form by a nascent and ever-stuttering Hugh Grant and his magic eyebrows; the group of quirky friends from various walks of life; the one or two moments of touching gravity (the funeral, in this case); the gregarious gay friend who makes inappropriate comments. It goes on. This movie is to romantic comedies what Alien is to science-fiction horror.

All of that being recognized, the movie had lost much of its luster. Admittedly, I am not a tremendous fan of rom coms. However, there are certain ones which I have found entertaining enough: When Harry Met Sally; Love, Actually; Bridesmaids. Though the overt sentimentality does nothing for me, the humor and tone are consistent enough that I enjoyed these movies. With Four Weddings and a Funeral, the jokes were, quite frankly, flat. I recall chuckling a few times, and perhaps my mouth broke into a wry grin a handful of times as well. Maybe my tepid response is because gags and ideas that were fresh in 1994 have lost their punch from over-emulation. Either way, I simply didn't find it all that funny.

I found only one of this troop genuinely likable. The others
inspired less admirable emotions. 

The bigger problems are things that, no matter when you were looking at them, simply exhibit bad execution. The character Carrie is horrible. Whether from poor writing, poor acting, or both, she comes off as an enigmatic sex android which occasionally shows some imperfect facsimile of human emotion. It's impossible to see exactly what Charles finds so entrancing about her. Aside from Carrie, other characters make some pretty horrendous decisions. The one which comes to mind is when the boisterous Gareth passes away at one of the weddings, Charles makes the baffling decision to march right up to Gareth's life partner, Matthew, and inform him of his partner's death right in the middle of the wedding toast. Both my wife and I went cross-eyed at that, asking "What the hell are you doing, man?! Take the poor bastard to a side room, for Chrissakes!!" There are other examples of such choppy writing and editing, all of which amount to a weaker film.

An interesting aside which my wife and I agreed on: the scene at Gareth's funeral when Matthew reads the W.H. Auden poem "Funeral Blues" is by far the greatest moment in the movie. It has a sincerity and depth that is timeless. My wife put it best when she said that it felt as if the far more interesting story was Gareth and Matthew's. All of the other stuff should have been pushed to the periphery, and a better movie could have been the result.

My guess is that, when it was released, the weaknesses of the film were made less obvious by the innovations the movie made to the genre. Now that those innovations have become the norm, though, the blemishes are far more glaring. Hugh Grant and his Charlie character aren't as charming anymore. Nearly every rom com since has featured a group of friends who seem to be in a sort of arms race of "quirk" with every rom com that came before it. The tragic moment which is meant to add poignancy feels more forced these days.

Like many seminal movies, Four Weddings will probably always be endearing to those who enjoyed it back in the 1990's. It is not likely, however, to win over anyone unfamiliar or uninterested in the romantic comedy genre.

That's 549 films down. Only 611 to go before I can die...

New(ish) Releases: The Theory of Everything (2014); Mr. Turner (2014); Bad Words (2014)

The Theory of Everything (2014)

Director: James Marsh

A decent movie, but one that I found to be a bit over-hyped by the Oscar attention that it garnered.

As you likely know, the movie follows the life of Stephen Hawking, easily the most famous astrophysicist of the last half century. Almost everyone on the planet, if not exactly familiar with Hawking's scientific theories, is familiar with the iconic image of the genius who has been confined to a wheelchair by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) since he was in his early 20s. There have been more than a few books and documentary films which have covered the man's theories on time and space. The Theory of Everything, however, focuses on the relatively little-known ground of his personal relationship with his first wife.

Most of the film tells the story of Hawking's meeting and marriage to his first wife, Jane Wilde. The two met while Hawking was a doctoral student at Cambridge, and they fell in love shortly before his diagnosis with ALS. The movie covers the roughly two decades that follow, focusing much on Jane's struggle to care for her brilliant but incapacitated husband through his growing fame and success. Theirs was an alternately touching, sad, and complex relationship, made no less difficult by the intelligent Jane's own trouble balancing her own ambitions and desires. There is certainly enough material for drama.

I must admit, though, that the film didn't capture me as much as it perhaps could have. There is nothing that I can say is "weak" about it. The acting is excellent, spearheaded by Eddie Redmayne's Oscar-winning performance as Hawking. The sets and costumes are brilliant, and the general direction is strong. However, I felt that the overall impact of Hawking's theories on humanitys' body of knowledge was not emphasized enough. We can see that he becomes a celebrity, but the gravity of his scientific contributions felt conspicuously absent. The love story also seemed to lack a bit of punch, to the point that I found myself only marginally engaged in the entire story.

If you're interested in Stephen Hawking, the better approach is probably just to read one of the biographies on him, read his A Brief History of Time, and then watch Terry Zwigoff's brilliant biopic/documentary of the same name. It will be far more fulfilling and informative.

Just one of the many, many beautiful shots which are worth taking in.

Mr. Turner (2014)

Director: Mike Leigh

When I checked this out from Viva Video!, the proprietor Miguel stated that this was a movie that he was a bit reluctant to watch, fearing that it might be "too British."

His fears were well-founded.

Mr. Turner is, indeed, one of the most "British" movies you are likely to see. There are stuffy old white guys, highly polished accents, and a several drawing room discussions. For much of it's running time, though, there is no real problem with this. By its end, though, it all felt rather long in the tooth and bloated.

If you've heard anyone talk about the movie, they have probably mentioned the visuals. They are, indeed, stunning. The colors of Turner's landscape paintings are dazzling, as are many of the shots of actual landscapes in England and Holland. Add in the meticulously designed and constructed costumes and sets, and you have a film that is visually entrancing.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the portrayal of Turner himself. For about half of the movie, it is interesting to watch this bulbous, grunting, artistic genius go about his life. It doesn't take terribly long to see that he is a hefty bag of contradictions wearing a stovepipe hat. He's a quietly profound and brilliant artist with a keen eye for rendering landscapes in novel and beautiful ways. At the same time, he has no idea how to communicate with people about his emotions towards them, including his wife and children, from whom he is estranged. He is also locked in a bizarre sexual relationship with his maid, whereby he treats her with the same consideration he offers a piece of furniture, despite their physical intimacy.

These things are interesting to learn about this enigmatic and supremely talented man. The problem is that we learn all of these things by the one-hour mark. After that, it takes another 70-plus minutes to watch him slowly become marginalized, artistically, and then die. Granted, the film is polished enough that it doesn't really feel like a chore until the final 20 to 30 minutes a clicking along. Up until that point, the visual skill and the performance of Timothy Spall as J.M.W. Turner are reason enough to watch. Still, it lost enough steam by its end that I would never feel the need to watch it again.

You can be sure that Trilby either just said, or is about to say, something that
no kid should hear. You can also be sure that it's pretty funny.

Bad Words (2014)

Director: Jason Bateman

Just what I expected - a decent comedy with some good, hearty laughs laid over the top of a very shaky premise that simply exists to set up the jokes.

Jason Bateman, in his directorial debut, plays Guy Trilby, a bitter 40-year old who, through a loophole, competes in a prominent national spelling bee meant for children. Already, I'm sure you can imagine the holes in this fragile premise. All the same, the movie marches on with just enough energy and humor to keep one from analyzing its flaws too closely.

Essentially, the story serves as an excuse to have Jason Bateman say a lot of foul things to and around young children. For my part, I think it's rather funny. Sometimes it's hilarious. It is very much in the vein of Bad Santa, that raunchy classic in which Billy Bob Thornton is a pitch-perfect degenerate with an unfiltered, X-rated mind and mouth. Bateman's Trilby character never approaches the grand levels of depravity that we got from Thornton, but the wry verbal filth which he unleashes has some solid, adult humor value. His interactions with the oh-so-cute little spelling whiz, Chaitanya, provide more than a few laughs.

The details of the plot are hardly worth remembering. It does involve the mystery of Trilby's odd vendetta against the spelling bee, which is mildly intriguing. The payoff offers little more than simple closure, though, rather than anything particularly creative.

It is certainly not a comedy classic, but Bad Words is worth the 90 minutes.

Retro Trio: A Fish Called Wanda (1988); The Man Who Knew Too Little (1997); Killing Them Softly (2012)

A Fish Called Wanda (1988)

Director: Charles Chrichton & John Cleese

A 1980s classic comedy that still has it.

I watched this movie plenty of times as a kid, but it had been at least 10 years since I last saw it. Though there are a few dated elements, in terms of the visuals, the dash of sappiness, and even a bit of the acting, A Fish Called Wanda is still a brilliant blend of British and U.S. humor.

For those who may not have seen it, the story mostly follows Wanda Gershwitz (Jamie Lee Curtis), a con woman who uses her beauty and wiles to horn in on a bank heist, with the intention of stealing the prized diamonds from the primary thieves. Using sex and emotional manipulation, she coldly plays every man involved - the mastermind George, the weapons man Otto (Kevin Kline), the stuttering henchman Ken (Michael Palin), and the repressed and unwitting lawyer Archie (John Cleese).

What allows the movie to stand the test of time rests on the script and the performances. The interactions between the more liberal and maverick Americans - Wanda and Otto - and their British cohorts are hilarious and eminently quotable. The standout scenes are typically between Otto and any of the English characters, whom he despises out of his own small-minded xenophobia and latent inferiority complex. Otto's supremely "ugly American" personifies every laughably obnoxious trait of U.S. travellers that has been the butt of jokes for decades, right up to the present.

Otto may not have been as memorable had it not been for an Academy Award-winning performance by Kevin Kline, which is a rare feat for a comedy film, but completely worthy. He often makes the movie, and his stand-offs with John Cleese's barrister Archie Leach and Michael Palin's Ken are perfection.

Great movie that is still great 25 years later, and will likely be great for decades to come.

The Man Who Knew Too Little (1997)

Director: Jon Amiel

A pretty fun, if not outstanding, little comedy.

I had never seen this one before, and I must admit that I could see why it was never hailed as a "great" comedy, despite having a great cast. The movie is a spoof on the spy thriller genre, following goofy American tourist Wallace Ritchie (Bill Murray) who goes to London and is unwittingly pulled into a plot between English and Russian forces to resurrect the Cold War status quo. Ritchie, however, is sucked into the entire affair, believing that he is the center of a popular television show on which the central "actor" is an average person who must play along with the professional actors around him, ad libbing along the way.

This premise isn't a bad one, as far as spoofs go, though the political elements do seem a few years too late for a film made in 1997. Even still, there was plenty of fodder for better political satire which went unused. That aside, there are plenty of solid setups for the comedic misunderstandings that drive the movie.

Instead of focusing more on the political humor, the film focused almost solely on its star, and one could do far worse than Bill Murray. Even when the dialogue or set-ups fall flat, Murray can carry a scene or an exchange with his hilarious deliveries, reactions, and physical comedy. It's easy to forget, given Murray's strengths with extremely dry and deadpan humor, that he can act the oblivious fool extremely well.

As a whole, though, the humor and goofiness wore thin by the third act. Despite being an obvious parody, the silliness level ramped up a little too high to remain effective. The grand finale scene consists of an overly long dance routine that borders on feeling interminable. And instead of leaving well enough alone and having Wally go on his merry way, we're left with him being recruited by the C.I.A. It was a bit too juvenile for my liking.

Had the script been a bit more clever and abandoned the more slapstick elements, this movie could very well have been a classic. As it is, it offers a few laughs, but doesn't warrant multiple viewings for me.

The social commentary is clumsy, but it
is curious enough to provoke thought.

Killing Them Softly (2012)

Director: Andrew Dominik

I was disappointed, but not necessarily because the movie is bad.

Killing Them Softly was released in 2012 and had a short and quiet run in theaters, despite solid critical acclaim. By the time of its video release, it had attained status as an "underrated film" and "sleeper pick" by critics in many quarters. With all of this "in the know" hype, I had very high hopes. The movie is quite good, but not without its flaws.

I will admit that the movie is fairly original, in terms of its grittiness and willingness to look at the more unglamorous aspects of criminality. The story takes place in a horribly bleak part of Boston, where a couple of dim, low rent street guys rob a high stakes poker game which includes members of the local mob. This sets off a chaotic attempt to assess blame and levy punishment, with noted hitman Jackie Cogan (Brad Pitt) brought in to sort the entire mess out.

The novelty of the story is that it does look at the disorganization and brutality of "organized" crime. The characters come off as extremely authentic, with all of their weaknesses on full display. Whether it's simple base greed, lust, or substance addiction, a viewer gets the sense that the grim and nasty picture painted for us is far closer to the reality than the more palatable portraits given us by more mainstream gangster movies. Instead of the ultra-slick, hyper-intelligent criminals, we see the sad, flawed, and ultimately doomed thugs and lowlifes who stand no real chance at getting what they want. Easily the most poised character is Jackie, who spends far more energy battling his disgust for the stupidity and indecision around him than on actually cleaning up the various messes created by foolish thugs and Jackie's waffling employers.

Jackie spends an awful lot of time in this kind of situation -
explaining a lot of harsh realities to dim or weak wanna-be
criminals. They provide much of the movie's power.

As far as the cleaning up of those messes, they do provide some excellent on-screen suspense and power. There are more than a few scenes that can effectively stun you with their impact. Unfortunately, there are also a few plot lines and scenes that seem to drag endlessly. The main one is the entire character Mickey, played by James Gandolfini in one of his final roles before his death. Mickey is an aging hitman who Jackie brings in to help him, but it soon becomes apparent that Mickey is a broken shell of what he once was. The point of Mickey's descent, though, is belabored so much that it is taxing to watch, and it almost resulted in my completely checking out of the film. Blessedly, it does end, and the main story picks back up in the movie's final 20 minutes.

A greater enigma hanging over the entire movie is the completely unsubtle social commentary. Right from the jump, we see dashes of political posters with Obama and Romney on them, in the throes of the 2008 presidential race. The blatantly obvious message is that the United States is in a state of free-for-all chaos, with our little crime story meant as a microcosm of the entire quagmire. It's not a terrible suggestion, but it could have been handled with far more deftness. It does, however, set up an absolutely classic final line to the movie, which may be one of the most memorable in all of crime cinema.

Killing Them Softly is, despite its weaknesses, a nice addition to the genre of crime films. It does stand apart from most of its ilk, and the performances are more than strong enough to carry a viewer through it. Definitely recommended to any fan of gangster movies. 

The Trip to Italy (2014)

Director: Stephen Winterbottom

Hilarious. Though I can't say everyone would love it.

If you saw The Trip, by the same director, featuring the same pair of actors, with exactly the same premise, then you know almost exactly what you're in for. With a little role reversal and a completely new setting, you get the same semi-scripted banter that Coogan and Brydon delivered in the first one. While I thought that this recent show is actually a bit tighter and funnier, it's not markedly so. Either way, if you laughed at the first, you'll laugh at the second.

If you haven't seen the first one, here's how they both go: Well-known British funnymen Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon hit the road to sample the food at several noted restaurants. While both successful comedians, their styles are rather different from one another, with Coogan seeing himself as a tad more sophisticated and Brydon sometimes aiming for a lower common denominator. They do, however, riff off of each other exceptionally well. Whether it's dreaming up and living out silly scenarios through dialogue or battling each other with dueling celebrity impersonations, their two-man improvisational skills are hard to beat.

As often as not, it's when Coogan and Brydon are kicked  back,
nattering back and forth that the film is most amusing.

Of course, this type of humor isn't for everyone. The movie has no "main story," other than Coogan and Brydon trying to live their lives as long-distance fathers, while being aging and well-known comedians. The inversion from the first film is that, while in the first it was Coogan who was portrayed as the self-absorbed, sex- and career-driven one, in Italy, Brydon seems to be going through his own mid-life crisis of self indulgence.

Interestingly, the elements of the more personal lives of the characters are perfectly balanced: they are given just enough time to add a touch of substance to the film, while never detracting from the main purpose of the film, which is to let these two guys make us laugh. No written description can do justice to the magic at play when Coogan and Brydon are in their comedic "zones," but I do offer this one clip from the first film, which I think perfectly displays their chops. For those unfamiliar, just use this as a litmus test as to whether you would care for either film.

For those who enjoyed the first and are wondering if this one hold up to it, I say unequivocally, "Yes."

Before I Die #516: A Room with a View (1985)

This is the 516th of 1,149 films on the "Before You Die" lists that I've watched. 

Director: James Ivory

Not exactly my kind of movie, but it does what it sets out to do very well.

Based on the 1908 novel by E.M. Forester, A Room With a View is a well-done adaptation that hits all its marks. It tells the story of Lucy Middlechurch (Helena Bonham Carter), a young, English middle-class woman who becomes embroiled in a classic "which man should I marry?" quandry. The opposing forces are what any fan of such period English tales would expect: marry for love or to meet social expectations and find financial security? For Lucy, these two sides are represented by the free-spirited and exuberant George Emerson (Julian Sands) and the priggish, upper-class Cecil Vyse (Daniel Day-Lewis).

Just from the artful composition of this scene, I don't even
need to tell you which is the uptight Cecil and which is the
self-assured George.

The pieces are set into place over the course of an initial trip to Florence, where Lucy meets George. When she returns to England, she starts to weigh her feelings for George against the pressure of marrying Cecil. What follows is the typical tap dance through social propriety and class-conscious protocols with which any reader of Jane Austen is familiar. Lucy is pulled one way and then another by various friends and family members, culminating in the rejection of one hopeful suitor in favor of the other.

Again, it's not exactly my cup of tea, but the film does a good job of telling the story. The acting is superb. In addition to the talents listed above, the film also includes Judy Dench, Maggie Smith, Denholm Eliot, and basically any English actor worth his or her salt who was alive in 1985. They all nail it.

Though I may have found the themes of class consciousness a bit dull, there is enough humor to pull through a more cynical viewer like myself. I may have found Maggie Smith's "poor cousin Charlotte" character annoying, but that's easily balanced by the more biting humor of other characters like George and his father. Even Lucy herself has grit, which is nice to see.

It's easy to recommend this to those who love this kind of movie, and in fact, I'm sure that any fan of Pride and Prejudice and its ilk has probably already seen this one several times. If you haven't, then I'm confident that you'll love it (my wife does, and she's a tremendous appreciator of such films). If you're more like me, don't be surprised if you enjoy it a little more than you expect. You can think of it as a sophisticated "date movie," if  it helps.

So, 516 films seen. Only 633 to go before I die...

Film #85: The Singing Detective (1986)

Director: John Amiel 

Initial Release Country: United Kingdom

Times Previously Seen: none

Rapid-Fire Summary:

In the mid-1980’s, detective crime fiction writer Philip Marlow is in a hospital ward, crippled by debilitating condition resulting in severe arthritis and massively inflamed and flaky skin. Surrounded by fellow invalids, Marlow fights his way through the pain and frustration by losing himself in his own mind, mostly in his own history and his own detective stories.

As he slips in and out of bouts of pain, three distinct aspects of Marlow’s life come to the fore. The earliest is his childhood in a small village in the English countryside. Though a clever young child, Philip has to deal with his parents’ marital strife, including witnessing his mother’s infidelity with one of his father’s friends.

The second aspect is once of Marlow’s detective novels, The Singing Detective. Though the plot is never completely spelled out from start to finish, it involves World War II espionage and intrigue. Shady characters drift around a dark and foggy London, and an inevitable mysterious death is involved. The primary villain looks exactly the same as Marlow’s mother’s lover, while Marlow himself is the suave private detective who is trying to solve the case.

The hero of his own detective novels, Marlow sees himself as far more dashing and heroic than the crippled figure that he throughout most of the "real" story.

The third aspect is in the modern world. As his illness first worsens and then dissipates, Marlow begins to imagine a nefarious plot involving his semi-estranged wife. He imagines that she is working with a rogue film producer, a man who also looks like the villain from the other two elements from his life that Marlow focuses on. The two are trying to steal a film script of Marlow’s and sell it to Hollywood.

In the end, we see that the Singing Detective novel and the modern tale of the backstabbing wife are all the stuff of a fiction writer’s imagination. However, Marlow’s troubled childhood is clearly very real, and has had a profound effect on his mind and imagination. He leaves the hospital under his own power and with his wife, seemingly not too worse for wear in the end.

My Take on the Film:

This is another one of those shows where no summary can really do it justice. The Singing Detective asks a lot of its audience, to the point that I’m surprised that it was no network television.

First off, patience is a must with this story. The summary I gave above may seem rather straightforward, and perhaps even boring. I assure you, though, that it takes most of the series’ six-and-a-half hours for all of the plot points and connections to become at all clear. Once you get to around the third episode, though, you can see that the show was put together very carefully, and you start to build faith in where it is taking you. Initially, though, you have to have a strong stomach.

A stark contrast to the stylish hero of his own novels, the real Marlow is a physically hideous shell. His illness drives him to hallucinate and verbally lash out at most of the people around him. If you can take it, though, there is far more to him than his repulsive exterior would suggest.

The show certainly wasn’t what I expected, based on the standard summary on the DVDs. I expected far more of the noir elements, which had me rather excited. (Anyone who’s read my reviews of other noir films, like Double Indemnity or Out of the Past can see why). Therefore, it was initially a bit of a letdown to see that a great part of this show is given over to seeing Philip Marlow suffer in a hospital ward. His dreadfully horrid skin condition and his visible anguish over his arthritis is difficult to stomach at times. It actually works well, in that it gives a sense of relief when Marlow retreats into his own head.

These meanderings into his own mind are, of course, what set this show apart from other films and shows that attempt to tap into the psychology of the writer. The Singing Detective seems to get it dead on, in so many ways. Anyone who has ever tried any form of creative storytelling knows that the creative process often involves blurring the lines between fantasy and reality. This is sometimes intentional, but often is deeply subconscious. We can see this happen over and over as the various aspects of Marlow’s life and mind bleed into one another and begin to shift and change upon each interaction. It’s pretty fascinating to watch it unfold over the course of the series.

These shifts do result in some rather surrealistic scenes. This may not be every person’s bag, and it’s not necessarily mine, but it fits the tone of the show extremely well. Seeing a couple of standard 1940s noir goons, complete with trench coats and fedora hats, barge into a 1980s hospital ward and start shooting up the place, is plain bizarre on the surface. But when you realize that it’s the culmination of all of Marlow’s frustrations at his surroundings, then it takes on a different meaning. The series has innumerable examples of this, and attempting to explain them all would take far more words that you want to read or I want to write. Suffice it to say that it is a highly effective way of conveying a complex mental state.

I should mention that the series is far from some gloomy sludge through one man’s torment and misery. There is a very healthy dose of humor throughout the story. Sometimes it’s in the form of songs that break out in the middle of nowhere, and often it is in Marlow’s pitch-black sardonic humor. Whatever the case, there is plenty in the show to prevent it from becoming too depressing.

One of Marlow's many fever dreams, in which he envisions the hospital's often detached staff doing song-and-dance numbers in the ward. These scenes are almost reminiscent of Monty Python, but not nearly as heavy on the zaniness. 

Even more than the humor is the very genuine humanity behind it all. Between the many strange hallucinations and disorienting splicing of elements are the very real and powerful emotions of the characters. Whether it is the young Marlow's sorrow at his disintegrating family or the spiteful adult Marlow's attempts avoid embarrassing himself to the people around him, there are several highly memorable and ground-breakingly earnest moments. Along with the humor, these things contribute to an amazing balance to the entire show.

The acting is incredible. The title role is done great service by Michael Gambon, now a staple British actor with many a feather in his cap. Virtually all of the other actors do great work, especially considering the range of grave, bizarre, and outright goofy performances that their parts often required.

The visuals are nothing to speak about. As with a lot of great BBC shows in the past, the crew seemed to be working with a very limited budget, but they made the absolute most of it. The show has a grainy, sometimes washed-out look to it, which can add to the sense of despair in a lot of places. Still, it is not the visuals whereby this show finds its strengths.

Would I watch this show again? Probably not. Even though I think it is an excellent piece of work, and exceptionally unique in its boldness, I don’t know that repeated viewings would offer me much. Once is probably enough for me to appreciate it and agree with its place as an all-time great.

That’s a wrap. 85 shows down. 20 to go.

Coming Soon: Wings of Desire (1987):

 I saw this German flick a number of years ago. It’s about a love-struck angel, and it’s got Peter Falk and Nick Cave in it. What more do you need to know?

Please be sure to pick up all empties on the way out.