Blood Work (2002)

Based on the novel of the same name by Michael Connelly, Blood Work is essentially Clint Eastwood's rough equivalent to the previous years Jack Nicholson film The Pledge. Instead of a cop, who on the day before his retirement promises a grieving mother he would find the man who killed her daughter, it's an FBI profiler, forced to retire do to a heart condition, who promises the sister of the woman whose heart he received as a transplant, that he would find the man who killed her. Both films involve the protagonist getting romantically involved with a much younger woman who is a raising a young child on her own. The cast here are basically unknowns, with a few notable exceptions (Eastwood, Jeff Daniels, and Anjelica Huston, the latter in a smallish part) which I think really helps the film seem more 'real'. The central mystery is fairly easy to figure out, I did about half way through, but its well acted, enjoyable, more a procedural mystery then thriller. A logical extension on Eastwood's earlier work, maturely handled. I seemed to have liked it better then most critics. ***1/2

Inferno (2016)

By far the weakest of the Ron Howard/ Tom Hanks, Robert Langdon films. Skipping The Lost Symbol and heading straight to the most recent book in the series, this time Langdon most prevent the release of a deadly plague designed to kill off half the people of the world as a quick remedy to overpopulation. Of course to do so Langdon must solve archaic riddles and wade through Renaissance trivium, as always in the company of an attractive, European, brunette woman (in this case Felicity Jones, an actress who I really want to like, but so far find myself a little underwhelmed by). Warmed over cinematic leftovers not even Ben Foster or Sidse Babett Knudsen can redeem. **

Dr. No (1962)

Dr. No was the first James Bond film, and that is what I liked most about it. Bond had been a successful book series, but it was not yet a proven quantity in film, though even then the odds looked promising. So this movie wasn't given the tremendous budget that would become standard for later outings, and many of the conventions that would come to define the franchise were still being formed. For example this is not a gadgetie film, there is no Q, or at least no character referred to by that name. There are Bond girls yes, three of them in fact, but Bond himself is not perfect, he even falls for a fairly obvious drugged beverage, which I liked because it made him seem more human and fallible then he typically does. Also later Bond films had this propensity to globe trot for no real reason beyond increasing the number of exotic locals in the picture, in this movie the case that Bond is sent to investigate is in Jamaica, so he goes to Jamaica, London to Jamaica, no where else, just Jamaica, that's it, kind of retroactively refreshing. Sean Connery is of course definitive in the role, and I look forward to see him reprise it many times as I attempt to make it through the theatrical Bond movies over the course of 2017. ****

Jackie (2016)

In Jackie actress Natalie Portman announces to the world that yes, she would indeed like a second Oscar. In many ways her choice to portray Jackie Kennedy seemed a little too on the noise, a little obvious, perhaps even a little lazy. Here is a glamorous, sympathetic historical figure, well known, classy, a made to order part for Ms. Portman. Despite this heads up Natalie doesn't glide through the role, she gives it her all in what must have been a very draining shoot.

The story of Jackie focuses primarily on the immediate aftermath of the JFK assassination up through the funeral, with a few flashbacks thrown in, and a framing story set a short while later, where the widowed Mrs. Kennedy is interviewed by political journalist and historian Theodore H. White (Billy Crudup, capturing just the right note). As a result Portman's Jackie is walking an emotional tight rope through pretty much the whole picture, and while she is inherently sympathetic, what makes the performance shine is the layers she brings to it. Jackie is flawed, wracked by internal conflict, unsure where to vent her anger and to channel her energies, and as a result she is erratic, but also too disciplined to ever go over the top.

That conflict between appearances and her true self is at the heart of the Jackie Kennedy story. The film does a good job of setting this up early in flashback sequences around the first lady's famed 1962 televised tour of the White House. She is jittery, a smart woman feeling obligated to play the dumbed down, and extremely deferential trophy wife. You can sense her internal self humiliation in these scenes, and this makes the forceful, assertive Jackie who emerges in the aftermath of her husbands death all the more compelling.

There is a good supporting cast here as well, with Peter Sargaard fitting as Robert Kennedy, the aforementioned Billy Crudup, and John Hurt as Jaqueline's priest confessor. Beth Grant and John Carroll Lynch are the Johnson's, and an actress I'm beginning to take note of, Greta Gerwig, is quite good as Jackie's friend and white house social secretary Nancy Tuckerman. Caspar Phillipson plays Jack, and while he has very few lines, he looks more creepily like the late president then anyone I've ever seen before. This in the end is not the kind of film one typically needs to see on the big screen for full visual effect, but I would still recommend doing so, given the nature of the story it just seems right to see it large. ****

Passengers (2016)

Intended (and mostly successful) sci-fi crowed pleaser stars Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence as passengers on an interstellar settlement ship bound for the colony world of Homestead II, only they awake from their suspended animation slumber 90 years too early, and their seems to be growing technical problems with the ship. You've kind of seen this movie before, there is some Wall-E here, some Silent Running, and Duncan Jones Moon. The plot is maybe a little thin, but it looks beautiful (love the design on that ship) and the leads are charismatic, including Michael Sheen as a wall mounted android bartender. That being said, and not to spoil too much because its worth it going in for the most part unawares, but its kind of a creepy movie, but not in the sense you may be anticipating. To the films credit they do deal with the gorilla in the room element of the film, how successfully they do so is up to the viewer to decide. I thought they did an okay job of handling it, but still... ***

A Most Violent Year (2014)

Writer/director J. C. Chandor is a relative newcomer on the film scene whose work I hadn't really been paying any attention to, and now I think I should. Winner of The National Board of Reviews best picture award for 2014, A Most Violent Year is a period crime drama that came about because of Chandor's interest in doing a film about violence, and it propensity to spread. Set in and around New York City in the year 1981, statistically the most violent year in the cities history, the movie chronicles the husband (Oscar Isaac) and wife (Jessica Chastain) owners of a growing heating oil business, as they attempt to extract it from its (implied to be mob related) past under the previous owner (Chastain's father), and see it grow, while simultaneously dealing with a series of a truck hijackings that seem to be targeting their business, and fending off the criminal investigation against them by an ambitious young ADA (David Oyelowo). Albert Brooks plays Isaac's lawyer and right hand man.

The movie which this film reminds me of the most is probably There Will Be Blood, not in terms of plot line or setting but in terms of its relentless building to what forebodes to be a violent conclusion. Isaac is trying his hardest to keep his head above water as the outside pressure keeps mounting, it's a heck of a performance, and Chastain keeps pace with him all the way. Evocative of seventies crime dramas, particularly The French Connection, this move has remarkable restraint and seriousness to it, it never seems overplayed. A real achievement of a film. ****

Keeping Up with the Jones (2016)

Zack Galifianakis works in HR for a large military contractor, his wife Isla Fisher is an interior decorator and homemaker, they consider themselves a boring couple; but the summer glamorous new neighbors the Jones (Jon Hamm, Gal Gadot) movie onto their cul-de-sac, well life doesn't stay boring for long. Despite its generally poor reviews I thought that Keeping Up with the Jones was a perfectly good comedy, in fact a better then average entry in the 'there is something odd about the new neighbors' subgenera. The cast is game, they're not breaking any new ground but they are giving the proceedings just the right amount of energy. Galifianakis even gets to play a relatively competent character for a change. The revel of the big bad guy at the end is the request gage, but it works, as does the whole film because it doesn't make the mistake of thinking itself any smarter or more clever then it actually is. ***

Rouge One (2016)

Rouge One, sometimes subtitled A Star Wars Story, is certainly a different type of Star Wars movie. Billed as a stand alone and not part of the three currently existing or in progress trilogies, Rouge One is a sort of prequel to the first Star Wars movie A New Hope, and in fact takes events up until just a matter of hours before the start of that movies narrative. The story here is about how the Rebel Alliance got the plans to The Death Star that Luke would exploit to great success at the end of Episode IV. The plot is in effect much like that of a World War II secret mission film, and in fact near the ending their is even the storming of a beach. Felicity Jones is pretty but disappointingly bland as the main protagonist of the story Jyn Erso, Alan Tudyk is the comic relief droid K-2SO. There are a goodly number of other characters of various degrees of interest, but what will probably always stick with me most is the almost photo real recreation of the late actor Peter Cushing, reprising as it were his role as Grand Moff Tarkin, super imposed over the actor Guy Henry.


The film does what it sets out to do, which is to tell a Star Wars story in a very different way then we've seen on a big screen before. Technically it is very competent, and I love the way the film invokes the 1970's look and production design of the original film, even down to imperial offices sporting 70's style mustaches and sideburns. While there are good action sequences here and the last third of the film is very well handled, this movie sure plays it safe, though not as much as The Force Awakens. This outing further drives home that the new Star Wars films are more focused on recapturing what made Episode IV work, then on taking risks, for good or for ill. ***

An Honest Liar (2014)

Bio-doc about James Randi, otherwise known as 'The Amazing Randi', a Canadian born magician and escape artist and hero of the skeptic movement. Born in 1928 Randi began his career as an escape artist and magician in 1946, and became something of a Television regular by the mid 1950's, he was a favorite guest and personal friend of Johnny Carson's, collaborated with Alice Cooper of all people, appeared as himself on an episode of Happy Days, and did a lot of children's television and talk shows. After more or less retiring from serious escape work, though he will still perform some of his magic tricks, Randi became a kind of investigative journalist in the debunking of fantastical claims. Randi wrote books and appeared on television in this capacity, and is noted for the debunking of then claimed psychic Uri Geller, and the faith healer Peter Popoff, among others. James Randi is also a homosexual, and kept this as something of an open secret until officially coming out of the closet in 2010. Randi married his long time partner the artist Jose Alvarez in 2013, and that relationship, well you need to watch the movie on that. A very strong production about a very interesting man, which will probably surprise you in ways you are not expecting. ***1/2

A Summer Place (1959)

Based on a book by Sloan Wilson, who had authorized the definitive 50's novel The Man in the Gray Flannel Suite, A Summer Place is a lesser Payton Place, a trashy, multi generational New England soap opera. The things these characters talk about, in public and mixed company, well they are not appropriate. Something is rather off about the dynamic between father Richard Egan and daughter Sandra Dee, why does she tell him these things? At least he doesn't make it more awkward but just brushes it aside, a parenting win for Egan. Troy Donahue and Dee ain't great decision makers as a couple, but then neither are Egan and Dorothy McGuire. Arthur Kennedy gets the best part in the film, scene chewing as a drunk son of fading aristocracy. This film will always be better remembered for its beautiful theme music then for its story. ***

Inside Job (2010)

Winner of the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Inside Job tells the story of the late 2000's fiscal crises that in 2008 resulted in The Great Recession. Narrated by Matt Damon the film is well made and very informative, yet do to its inherently dry subject matter wears a bit and I wish it had been about 20 minutes shorter. Still this movie should be mandatory viewing for congress immediately before taking a vote to roll back what few, admittedly anemic and wanting fiscal reforms the Obama administration managed to get through. With the incoming administration we seem to be on track to replicate the circumstances that brought economic disaster upon us not even a decade ago. Sadly we don't seem to learn. ***

See also: The Big Short

This 1951 British film adaptation of Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol, simply titled Scrooge, contains the most Ebenezer backstory of an version I am familiar with. Now I had first seen this version more then 10 years ago, but watching it again I was reminded of just how strong its presentation truly is. Here you see how Ebenezer's life took the course it did based largely on fear and a recurring sense of personal rejection and abandonment. He made his money by very shrewdly divining changing economic conditions in early 19th century England, and in this version he and Marley help put Scrooge's good natured former employer Fizziwig out of business. Alastair Sim's performance as  Scrooge may well be my favorite, there is a subtlety here that is often lacking form the part. Scrooge's change doesn't happen all at once at the end, but rather you really do see it slowly building as the sprits words gradually work to convince him of the error of his ways, though it is the brute fear engendered by the Ghost of Christmas Futures warning that finally pushes him over the edge into acting on his new convictions. Also Sims does something with his eyes at the end that convey a penitence seldom if ever matched on screen. So this is all a long way of saying that if your looking for a version of the classic story you've probably never seen before, might be worth giving this one a view. ****

Watch it free and legal here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urdJOySUOzE

Mistress America (2015)

A quirky comedy about youth and directionlessness by Noah Baumbach (The Squid and the Whale). 19 year old Columbia freshman Tracy Fishko (Lola Kirke) befriends 30 year old Manhattan gadfly Brooke Cardinas (Greta Gerwig) after their parents get engaged. Tracy is charmed by Brooke, and some hero worship results, yet one that is infused with a skepticism that later gives birth to a massive plot point. This is probably my favorite movie about Millennials, and one that does not spare in its criticism of the generation. Yet it's also an empathetic film, and with its dry-ish sense of humor, largely New York City setting, and being built around the Thanksgiving holiday, the movie it reminds me the most of is Pieces of April (2003), to which this flick can be considered a thematic cousin (even down to quirky apartment neighbors who can be imposed on at Thanksgiving). There is a protracted set of sequences in the later half of the film, set at the Connecticut home of Brooke's wealthy frienemie Mimi-Claire (Heather Lind), in which the film becomes essentially an 1930's screwball comedy with a contemporary setting. Also the parts about college freshman's mixing of a proto world wariness with naiveté I think really hit the mark. Plus this whole thing is just quite funny. ***

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (2016)

Tim Burton's answer to Harry Potter and The X-Men is based on the first of a series of novels by the author Ransom Riggs (great name). Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children tells a story about a group of "Peculiar's", a stand in for mutants or magical folk, housed in a school located on a small island off the coast of Wales. The story principally concerns the grandson (Asa Butterfield, Hugo and Ender's Game) of a alumni of the school (the ordinal General Zod, Terrance Stamp), who after his grandfathers death tries to figure out where the fantastic stories he was told as a child end, and where the truth begins, and sets off in search of granddads reportedly still living former headmistress Miss Peregrine (Eva Green at her warmest). A charming family adventure film this really won me over, the best Tim Burton film in a long, long time (maybe since Big Fish). Not to spoil too much this movie plays with time in a way I really liked, it's quite creative. A capable ensemble cast, including newish comer Ella Purnell, who I am confident we will be seeing much more of in the future. ***

Wonder Woman (2009)

Fairly straight forward presentation of the Wonder Woman origin story (which I don't think I had ever really heard before) from the Warner Brothers animation department. I suspect we will get a rather similar rendering of this tale in the upcoming DCU version due out next year. This telling is set largely in the present day and features the voice of Keri Russell as Wonder Woman and Nathan Fillion as the American pilot she falls for, and there is something oddly un-feminist about this plot element for such a feminist icon. On the whole pretty engaging, and I liked not knowing exactly where it was going. ***

Francofonia (2015)

The most obvious film to compare Francofonia with is The Russian Ark (2002, which Aleksandr Sokurov also directed) in that they are both films about a museum, The Russian Ark being a sort of film essay on The Hermitage in St. Petersburg, while Francofonia is along similar lines about the Lourve in Paris. Where The Russian Ark is a magnificent extended shot within The Hermitage, with a vast cast in various periods costume, Francofonia is more cut up in its collage, there are some nice shots of various pieces on display in the museum, as well as a slightly odd framing story about the documentary film maker having Skype conversations with an associate on a cargo ship loaded with art in danger of being lost in a massive storm. That framing story I suppose is meant to counter point the other narrative this film keeps going back to, namely the unlikely partnership between the then director of the Lourve and the Nazi officer put in charge of it during the occupation, and how they together managed to protect most of the artwork from being destroyed or removed from the country. I can't help but wonder how that story might have worked as a more traditional narrative film, but the telling here still manages to get the point across. Not like most films you'll ever see in its presentation, which at times seems surprisingly casual. ***1/2

The Battle of the Somme (1916)

Propaganda documentary film about the titular WWI battle released by the British government later that same year. I saw this at the International Cinema at BYU, liking the idea of seeing a 100 year old film on the big screen. While it was interesting to see this kind of footage writ large (some of which I had already seen) on the whole it was kind of a dull presentation. Do both to the desires of the British government who released it, and the technological constraints of filming in a war zone at the time, there's not really any battle footage here, save maybe one or two shots at a great distance, and people going over the trench or firing one of the big guns. Mostly its before and after footage of skirmishes, but even those are selected in a way meant to under play the carnage. Still interesting as a historically artifact, though it feels long at a little more then an hour running time. **1/2

America America (1963)

Director Elia Kazan's film tells the true story of how his uncle first came to America. The plot is essentially three hours of trying to get to this country from Ottoman era Turkey and all the obstacles Stavros Topouzoglou encountered in that quest. It's a strong film and a good reminder of the monumental efforts and sacrifices some will go through to be able to call this U.S. home. ***1/2

Best movies of 2006

15.Jesus Camp
14.United 93
13.Pans Labyrinth
12.Marie Antoinette
11.The Last King of Scotland
10.Apocalypto
9.Brick
8.Joyeux Noel
7.Little Children
6.Away From Her
5.The Queen
4.Letters From Iwo Jima/ Flags of Our Fathers
3.The Departed
2.Children of Men
1.The Lives of Others

Best movies of 2007

15.Stardust
14.Persepolis
13.Hot Fuzz
12. Death Proof
11.Amazing Grace
10.The Assassination of Jessie James by the Coward Robert Ford
9.Enchanted
8.Lars and the Real Girl
7.Gone Baby Gone
6.Once
5.No Country for Old Men
4.Michael Clayton
3.Atonement
2.There Will Be Blood
1.Into The Wild

Best movies of 2008 (Probably the strongest movie year of recent memory)

15.The Visitor
14.Gran Torino
13.Happy -Go- Lucky
12.Revolutionary Road
11.The Reader
10.Let The Right One In
9.The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
8.Milk
7.Frozen River
6.Wall-E (probably my favorite Pixar)
5.Doubt
4.Dear Zachery
3.The Wrester
2.The Dark Knight (probably the best super hero movie ever)
1.Synecdoche, New York

Best movies of 2009

15.The Informant!
14.Funny People
13.Glorious 39
12.Up
11.Collapse

10.A Serious Man
9.The Cove
8.Brothers
7.Watchman
6.The White Ribbon
5.Inglorious Basterds
4.Up in the Air
3.The Road
2.An Education
1.The Hurt Locker

Best movies of 2010

Honorable mention

15.The Illusionist
14.The Kids Are All Right
13.She's Out of My League
12.The Town
11.127 Hours



10.The Cave of Forgotten Dreams
9.The Ghost Writer
8.Black Swan
7.The Social Network
6.Toy Story 3
5.True Grit
4.The Messenger
3.Another Year
2.Inception
1.The Kings Speech

Best movies of 2011

Honorable mention

15.Bernie
14.Young Adult
13. The Muppets
12. The Help
11.The Sunset Limited

10. The Debt
9. Another Earth
8.A Dangerous Method
7.Melancholia
6.Captain America
5.Mary Martha Marcy Marlene
4.Drive
3.Super 8
2.Tree of Life
1.The Descendants

Best Movies of 2012

Honorable Mention

14.Game Change
13.Looper
12.Seeking a Friend for the End of the World
11. Life of Pie

10.The Avengers
9.Django Unchained
8.Moonrise Kingdom
7.Argo
6.The Dark Knight Rises
5.The Place Beyond The Pines
4.Lincoln
3.The Master
2.Zero Dark Thirty
1.Silver Linings Playbook

Best Movies of 2013 (Kind of a weak year)

10.The Unknown Known
9.Begin Again
8.Frozen (I don't have kids, I only had to see it once)
7.White House Down (guilty pleasure)
6.Clear History (TV movie, but funniest movie of the year)
5.Gravity
4.Inside Llewyn Davis
3.American Hustle
2.12 Years A Slave
1.Nebraska

Best Movies of 2014

Honorable Mention

13.The Fault in Our Stars
12.Captain America: The Winter Solder
11.Fury

10. Noah
9.Inherent Vice
8.Guardians of the Galaxy
7.The Grand Budapest Hotel
6.American Sniper
5.Interstellar
4.Gone Girl
3.Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
2.The Imitation Game
1.Into The Woods

I've been movie blogging since 2005 but have a hard time putting together best of the year lists because I often don't see many of a given years most promising films until later. So I've decided to put together some belated best of lists.

Honorable Mention:

15.Tomorrowland
14.Sleeping With Other People
13.Hail Caesar!
12.Creed
11.The Witch: A New England Folktale

10.April and the Extraordinary World
9. Mad Max: Fury Road
8.Trumbo
7.The Walk
6.Steve Jobs
5.The Revenant
4.Brooklyn
3.The Measure of A Man
2.The Big Short
1.Spotlight

My Top 10 Favorite TV Shows of All Time (yep they are all hour long drama's)

10. Police Woman
9. Babylon 5
8. Boston Legal
7. Boardwalk Empire
6. The West Wing (seasons 1-4)
5. Marcus Welby M.D.
4. Mad Men
3. Six Feet Under
2. Twin Peaks
1. Homicide: Life on the Street

Rules Don't Apply (2016)

Rules Don't Apply is Warren Beatty's first film role since Town & Country in 2001, and the first feature film he's directed since Bulworth in 1998. Once one of Hollywood's biggest stars and a noted playboy, Beatty might now be principally noted for his left wing politics (and the fact that he's married to Annette Bening) but Rules Don't Apply isn't much of a political movie, instead it is to my reading the kind of movie you make when you want to make one last movie.

The prospect of playing Howard Hughes has got to have been something that had been percolating in Beatty's mind for some time, he co-wrote the story on which this movie is based and adapted it into a screenplay. Beatty seems to be having a ball playing the part which seems like a mixture of Joe Biden and Garry Shandling getting stoned. While Hughes is a major player in the story its not principally about him, instead its a rather old fashioned romance between Hughes employee Frank Forbes (Alden Ehrenreich) and young starlet Marla Mabrey (Lily Collins). The two meet when Forbes is assigned to be Mabrey's driver when she first comes to Hollywood in the late 1950's, right around the same time Beatty first came there in real life. The two leads have a surprisingly strong chemistry together, and while there is the request misunderstandings inherent to this type of picture, it's played with a nice old fashioned subtlety and class which is refreshing at the same time its being nostalgic.

Beatty loads the film with big names in small parts, including Matthew Broderick, Alec Baldwin, Candice Bergen, Dabney Coleman, Ed Harris, Amy Madigan, Steve Coogan, Oliver Platt, Paul Sorvino, Martin Sheen and of course Annette Bening. The film is very lose with the real Howard Hughes time line, moving the whole Clifford Irving fake memories affair up about eight years and having him still signing starlets in 1959, two years after he started selling RKO for parts. This is a pleasurable eccentric meander of a film, the kind we don't get enough of and a vanity project in the best sense of the term. ***1/2

The Baader Meinhof Complex (2008)

I did not know this story, and its quite gripping. Based on the 1985 best selling German book of the same name by Stefan Aust, The Baader Menhof Complex tells the true story of a far left West German terrorist group known as The Red Army Faction from 1967-1977 and its best known  members Andreas Baader and the former reporter Ulrike Meinhof. The group was responsible for a series of bombings at U.S. military installations and the bank robbery's they used to finance them. After the groups ringleaders were captured and put on trail a series of additional terrorist actions were undertaken by their followers with the intent to free this leadership. These actions including a plane hijacking with 86 people on board (sub-contracted to sympathetic middle-easterners), an attack on the German embassy in Stockholm, and the murder of the West German Attorney General. A story of maniacal obsession Meinhof started out as a reasonable enough person principally opposed to the American war in Vietnam who got seduced by evil, while Baader started off pretty much an asshole. Lots of twists in this made all the more intriguing by the fact that they really happened. The protest turned riot scene near the beginning of the film is by its self worth seeing. ****

Bad Santa (2003)

I believe this is the film that inaugurated the "Bad" sequences of films which has since encompassed grandpa's, mom's, and teachers. The "Bad Santa" of the title is Willie T. Soke (played perfectly by Billy Bob Thorton) an oft drunk and perpetually ornery mall Santa who along with his elf Marcus Skidmore (Tony Cox) have for years been running a scam where they travel around the country and rob the malls they work at on Christmas Eve. This time in Arizona Willie is good naturedly stocked by a rather awkward and odd fat kid named Thurman Merman (Brett Kelley) who he reluctantly ends up befriending and who might just rekindle what good is left in the old grump. It took me awhile to get into this one but in the end it won me over, its strangely sweet in it's own way. Bernie Mac, Ethan Phillips, Octavia Spencer and Cloris Leachman have small rolls, and this was John Ritter's last live action film. Lauren Graham plays Willie's love interest, and I'd forgotten just how beautiful she looked in her mid 30's, I'm not saying she doesn't still look great, but in her mid 30's, wow. ***

The Evil of Frankenstein (1964)

Cinematic hit-piece from Hammer films choses to focus only on Frankenstein's evil qualities and ignore the good. That's a joke of course but it kind of works because this is not a good movie, mostly it feels lazy and cheap. This lackluster and belated follow up to 1957's The Curse of Frankenstein and 1958's The Revenge of Frankenstein has Peter Cushing again playing Dr. F, this time returning to his home castle roughly 10 years after the events of the first two films to resume is research, and like previously things don't work out that well for him. Though generally unimpressive perhaps the most memorably bad thing about this film is the monster itself, very different from the innovative look of Christopher Lee as the creature in the first film, this time the ghoul (played by New Zealander wrestler Kiwi Kingston) is a kind of puddy variation on the classic Boris Karloff take and looks plan terrible. Lame. **

Night Creatures (1962)

Can the local legend of mysterious "Marsh Riders" help kindly vicar Peter Cushing keep safe his charity driven wine smuggling operation, now that The Kingsmen have come to town looking for tariff avoiders? Or are people of the 1790's too sophisticated to fall for that kind of thing? And what of Captain Clegg, the mysterious pirate buried in the church yard? Or rakish Oliver Reed, the squires son and his love for the busty serving wench Imogene (Yvonne Romain, whose accent was such that I surprised to learn that she was born in England)? This Hammer Studios production struck me a bit for its relative originality and complexity of plot. **1/2

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016)

A satisfying expansion on the Harry Potter cinematic universe, based loosely on an early faux text book by Potter creator J. K. Rowling, the film follows eccentric English wizard Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne, perfectly cast) on a 1926 visit to New York City with a suitcase full of magical creatures, some of whom inevitably escape. Scamander stumbles upon some darker, ominous goings on while in New York and assembles a small group of friends, Hermione-esque Porpentina "Tina" Goldstein (Katherine Waterston, daughter of Sam Waterston), a No-Maj (American slang for Muggle) Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler) as Ron-like comic relief, and Tina's Luna Lovegoodian sister Queenie (Alison Sudol). Those four seem set to make up the casting base for what apparently will be a trilogy of films. The movie is fun and exquisitely well constructed, with a screenplay written by Rowling herself. While there is a lot new in Fantastic Beasts, there really isn't a lot "new" to it. Rowling plays it safe setting up an archetype heavy story arc, but frankly its what we want to see from her and as long as she keeps filling it with interesting people, places and things, this series will prove excellent cinematic comfort food. ***

Boy and the World (2013)

Oscar nominated Brazilian animated film is not what I expected it to be. Here is the films summery from Wikipedia : "Cuca is a boy who lives in a distant world, in a small village in the interior of his mythical country. One day, he sees his father leaving in search of work, embarking on a train towards an unknown capital. The weeks that follow are of anguish and confusing memories. Until then, one night, a breath of wind breaks into the bedroom window and takes the boy to a distant and magical place." This story about a young boys search for his father is rendered as a small child might depict his first outing into the larger world, with an animation style that often looks of crayon, pencil and collage, but is also very interested in patterns. I thought I was going into a very simple, heartwarming, child like story but this film has a surprisingly darker edge, but presented in a muted and indirect way that will come up and surprise an adult viewer, but whose implications might not fully register in younger children. Boy and the World is in fact a work of South American leftist social/economic critique, and a powerful one. Maybe not quite a children's story by Che, but one by Chomsky. I must confess I was moved by the ending. ***1/2

Nightmare (1964)

Blah Hammer film about gaslighting. **

Arrival (2016)

Contact meets Interstellar meets Gravity. I wish I could have cared more. ***

Sleep with Other People (2015)

Smarter then average, likely the only time the phrase "Malcom Gladwellian" will ever be used in a romantic comedy. Alison Brie and Jason Sudeikis have strong chemistry. ***

Dr. Strange (2016)

Basically its Dr. House goes to Hogwarts. Or if you prefer, Iron Man with magic. ***

Inherent Vice (2014)

Director Paul Thomas Anderson reteams with his The Master lead Joaquin Phoenix in this sprawling 70's noir based on the novel of the same name by Thomas Pynchon. Inherent Vice is a rambling comedy drama with a winding plot concerning among other things drug smuggling and real estate development, it's massive largely name cast boasts the desired norish mix of odd ball characters. Not the emotional gut punch of The Master or There Will Be Blood, I'm not sure what if anything the film is trying to say on a subtextual level, it seems to be mainly about homage and playing in genre form. But its finely crafted and intriguing. and at 2 1/2 hours in length it only occasionally drags. This movie also makes me want to give The Nice Guys another viewing. *** 1/2

Snowden (2016)

Oliver Stone's biopic of Edward Snowden, the private intelligence contractor who at age 29 infamously leaked a treasure trove of classified American intelligence data to British journalist Glenn Greenwald and others before fleeing ultimately to Russia. The film follows the gradual political disillusionment of Snowden from a conservative training for special forces in 2004, to a disgruntled intelligence analysis who in 2013 committed what, slice it whichever way you like, was one of the larger acts of treason in U.S. history. The film is sympathetic to Snowden as you might expect from the politics of its famously liberal director, and I for one do not doubt that Snowden's actions came from a sincere place, and I suspect were ultimately for the long term benefit of the United States. But  I also think he still needs to go to prison. The film is well written and even restrained in its presentation, and its nice to see Stone again do a political film that's not about a politician. The cast is good, including small roles for Melissa Leo, Tom Wilkinson, Timothy Olyphant and Scott Eastwood. Shailene Woodly plays Snowden's long time girlfriend Lindsay Mills. Joseph Gordon-Levitt is quite good as Snowden as well, though I have mixed feelings about the way he does peoples voices. Really though, best Stone film in some time. ***1/2

One Bright Shining Moment: The Forgotten Summer of George McGovern (2005)

Documentary on Democratic South Dakota Senator George McGovern and his famously failed 1972 bid for the presidency, in which he lost all but one state (Massachusetts) and the District of Columbia to Richard Nixon. McGovern, a famously decent man of true conviction and sincerity, who I had the privilege to briefly meet at a speaking engagement at Boise State University in 2004, is the chief but far from the only taking head in this film which also features the likes of Dick Gregory, Gary Hart, Gloria Steinem, and Gore Vidal among others, and is narrated by Democracy Now's Amy Goodman. The movie covers pretty much all of McGovern's life and carrier up through the 72 campaign, but really doesn't go into his life after that, in which he still had a lot to accomplish (and in fact would live another 40 years). Released in 2005 this film has a lot of the anti George W. Bush / Iraq War background feeding into it, and very near the surface, yet the movie also struck me with its weird inverse parallels to the current presidential campaign, with a corruption plagued establishment figure on one side (Richard Nixon, Hillary Clinton), and a populist who energized a 'forgotten base' and took on his party establishment on the other (McGovern, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump). ***

Kiss of the Vampire (1963)

Kiss of the Vampire is a Hammer Horror film about a newlywed English couple on their honeymoon in Germany circa 1905, and the vampire cult that attempts to recruit the misses. Nominal lead Edward de Souza looks remarkably like Raul Julia. A few elements in this, like how the vampires operate as a cult, and the way in which the film ends feel a little fresher then most Hammer vampire movies. It also feels perhaps the closet to The Devil Rides Out, my favorite Hammer film, of any of the studios other product which I have seen. ***

Targets (1968)

Ironically one of the last movies to feature "Old Hollywood" horror icon Boris Karloff, was also the first movie to be directed by "New Hollywood" wunderkind Peter Bogdanovich. The genesis of  what would become Targets comes from Karloff owing B movie producing legend Roger Corman a few days work, and the desire to reuse some footage from his 1963 horror film The Terror, featuring a young Jack Nicholson. Writer/director Bogdanovich took these two directives and built a rather effective and original story around them. The film itself is really two narratives which come together in the end, the first being Karloff playing essentially himself, an aging horror movie veteran named Byron Orlok, seriously considering retiring from film because the movies he's being asked to make just aren't that scary anymore. The second narrative was inspired by the then recent case of University of Texas tower sniper Charles Whitman. In this narrative the largely forgotten actor Tim O'Kelly nicely underplays a seemingly all American type young man who comes unhinged, kills his wife and his mother, and then goes on a shooting spree culminating in a very well staged sequence at the end, were from a small hole in a drive in movie screen he starts picking off movie goers in their cars who have come for a movie showing/ meet and great with Orlok. Though not a big success at the time Targets has since become something of a cult classic and impressed enough people in the film industry to help Bogdanovich secure financing for more personal projects and launch his film carrier. A good and unusual piece of horror filmmaking that showcases what a lot of creativity and talent can do on a shoestring budget. ***1/2

The Light Between Oceans (2016)

Film adaptation of the generally well received 2012 novel of the same name by Australian writer M. L. Stedman. The Light Between Oceans concerns Tom Sherbourne (Michael Fassbender) a traumatized veteran of the First World War who in the 1920's becomes the light house keeper on an isolated island, falls in a love and marries a girl named Isabel (Alicia Vikander) whose courtship occurs largely through letters, and takes her to live with him on the island. Shortly after Isabel's second miscarriage the couple rescue a baby girl they find in a small boat floating near the island in the company of her dead father. Rather then report this, and after much pleading from his wife, Tom agrees to pass the child off as their own. Some months later while visiting the mainland and Isabel's family to have baby Lucy christened, Tom spots a woman in mourning in the church yard cemetery (Rachel Weisz) and from the date and inscription on the tombstone she was crying at quickly puts together that Lucy is actually her baby. This puts Tom in a pretty obvious moral quandary and it is an agonizing one. This a hole in the pit of your stomach movie, and I will confess that I cried a little in the theater. Thought slow to get going, and entering Lifetime movie territory by way of style of R. F. Delderfield, this is an effective 'woman's weepy' of the old school, anchored by three strong lead performances. Not the kind of film I would usually go out of my way to see, but my mother loved the book and wanted me to get to know the story, and I'm glad I did. ***1/2

Inside Out (2015)

Disney Pixar film about an 11 year old girl named Riley coping with a family move from Minnesota to San Francisco, and seen largely through the perspective of the five personified emotions living in her head. Disney did an animated short along similar lines back in the 1940's, only there I think it was the Ego and the Id at the drivers seat, rather then Joy, Fear, Disgust, Anger and Sadness in the control room. (Also as a point of reference there is the early 90's Fox sitcom Herman's Head). The movie is likable, charming and creative, though not on the level of many of Pixar's more iconic works. Still a strong animated film. I had been suspecting it was going to deal with clinical depression, instead it was a more straight forward case of the 'I miss my old home blues', which is fine because the other could have been rather dark for Pixar. ***1/2

Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979)

Wikipida describes the Werner Herzog directed Nosferatu the Vampyre as a West German art house vampire horror film, and there can't be many of those. In truth this film is basically a remake of the better known 1922 silent German expressionist classic Nosferatu, which itself was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stokers novel Dracula. This film takes some visual cues from the original, particularly in the look of Nosferatu, here played by Herzogs best fiend Klaus Kinski. It also largely follows the plot of the original film but I think the ending is a bit different, though is been around five years since I saw that movie so I could be misremembering. Part of me wonders why Herzog chose to remake a film already so well known and innovative, but the picture works well as mood piece, and particularly the sequences near the end, as the town is overrun by rats and descends into plague, is a great example of the directors stylized fatalism. The title sequence of the film, which features the actual mummified corpses of the victims of an 1833 cholera epidemic is also very Herzogian.  If your looking for something both familiar and odd to watch this Halloween I'd recommend it. ***1/2

The Gambler (2014)

The summation that kept running through my mind as I watched this film is that it was smarter then it needed to be but less smart then it thought it was. The Gambler stars Mark Wahlberg as a college literature professor who comes from a wealthy family and has a major gambling addiction. Films about addiction, and I'm thinking particularly of Preminger's The Man with the Gold Arm, can some times come across as kind of full of themselves, and I'm afraid this one did to an extent. Wahlberg's character makes a lot of really stupid decisions and it can be hard to like him, which is not a great problem to have with your movies protagonist. Interestingly this movie is based on another movie also called The Gambler, but not Kenny Roger's The Gambler, James Caan's The Gambler. The supporting cast here is quite strong, with Jessica Lange, John Goodman, and (briefly) George Kennedy in his final film role. A pre-Room Brie Larsen is also in this. **1/2

Never Let Me Go (2010)

In the tradition of The Island and The Clonus Horror comes Never Let Me Go, a movie about cloned children raised from birth for the purpose of harvesting their matured organs later in life for the benefit of others. Based on a well regarded 2005 novel of the same name by Kazuo Ishiguro, the story is lent an extra level of the surreal by setting it in an alternate England of the 1970's through 1990's, where raising children for the purpose of later killing them is surprisingly accepted. The story is basically an ill fated love triangle between Keira Knightley, Andrew Garfield, and Carey Mulligan, as well as the actors who play them as children. Charlotte Rampling and Sally Hawkins have nice but small supporting parts. I'm sure this worked much better as a novel, its a very internal monologue type of story, and while the actors do a fine job, I had a hard time connecting with their characters. A worthy effort though. **1/2

Housemaids (2013)

A really fascinating documentary in which seven adolescents each spend a week documenting and interviewing their long time house maid. In Brazil having a housemaid is apparently a lot more common then in the United States, and not something confined just to the wealthier classes. One of the maids in the film works for a woman who also works as a maid, with a housemaids role in this society often more a combination of nanny and housekeeper then just cleaning lady. The housemaids documented in this film often blur the lines between employee and family member, with two of them being more then the first generation in employ to the same family. The six women and one man documented all have fascinating, varied, and often tragic personal stories, with the death of children featuring prominently in two of them. I really didn't expect this to be as entrancing as it was, a work subtly genius in conception and execution. Worthy your time. ****

The Measure of a Man (2015)

French film about a laid off, middle aged factory worker, trying to keep his family afloat and maintain his personal dignity under very trying circumstances. Star Vincent Lindon deservedly won the best actor award at Cannes playing Thierry Taugourdeau, a man of few words but a lot of personal integrity. Though I could talk about this movie at length I think it is best approached with little foreknowledge about the plot. Retroactively I'd say this is one of the 3 best movies of last year. I would strongly recommend you seeing it. ****

Deepwater Horizon (2016)

Movie about the notorious April 2010 explosion on the titular semi-submersible offshore drilling rig, whose resultant Gulf of Mexico oil spill proved the worst such disaster in U.S. history. The middle chapter in director Peter Berg's apparent 'Mark Wahlberg Does Recent Perilous Events' trilogy, after Lone Survivor and before the forth coming Patriots Day, Deepwater Horizon is a $150 million dollar cinematic indictment of BP Oil. British Petroleum comes off appropriately horrible in this, the accident could have been easily prevented had one of the worlds largest corporations spent a little more time and money to ensure operational safety.

The Deepwater Horizon disaster occurred a few days after I got out of the hospital following a prolonged stay after a major car accident, so that oil seeping up from the ocean floor for weeks upon week will forever be associated in mind as an oddly appropriate counterpoint in what would prove to be some of the worst months of my life. That being said I was surprised by how much of the story I had misremembered, I though everybody on the thing had died, when in fact all but 11 of the 126 on board surived. A straight forward, docudrama type presentation, with few flourishes, because few are needed. Sufficient to good acting all around, with John Malkovich the standout out as a short sighted oil company exec. I also quite liked Kurt Russell's casting as the wells foreman. The movie does a really good job of brining home just how giant this thing was, that burning behemoth awes on the big screen. A very well executed real life disaster film, and an interesting counter point to the recently released Sully. My disaster movie loving dad would have really appreciated this movie. ****

Dracula Untold (2014)

Dracula Untold doesn't so much seek to tell the story of the real life historical figure Vlad the Impaler, upon home Count Dracula is based, but rather just to fictionalize Vlad differently then Bram Stoker did. Here the 15th century Prince of Wallachia (part of modern day Romania) is not the famously cruel tyrant of history, but as played by Luke Evans a generous, sensitive ruler. In fact Vlad loves his family and people so much, that it is for them that he risks his very soul to be transformed into a powerful vampire, this in order to better defend against heartless Ottoman Turks who seek to conscript the kingdoms children to fight in their armies. The movie is a weird blend of elements, and its hard to figure out what kind of movie the filmmakers really were going for. There's everything from The Lord of Rings, to Underworld, to The Book of Exodus in here. It's a less a traditional horror movie and more like a riff on Frank Millers 300. The main reason I even saw the movie was the presence of my latest film crush Sarah Gadon as the female lead, she was fine in this, but the part could have been played by most any pretty actress. Ironically the little coda at the end, which hints at a possible sequel, looks more interesting then this film was. Still with its limited 1 hour 32 minute running time Dracula Untold makes for passable, if at times perplexing, entertainment. **

Nerve (2016)

Based on the 2012 young adult thriller of the same name by Jessica Sharzer, Nerve stars Emma Roberts as Statin Island high school senior Venus "Vee" Delmonico, a girl with a reputation as being boring and extremely risk averse (and for reasons that the film does get into). After an unintentional  humiliation at the hands of her best friend Sydney (Emily Meade), Vee decides to prove her reputation wrong by participating in an online reality game called "Nerve", which she had learned about from Sydney who is also a participate in the game. Nerve consists of  "Players" who accept dares from "Watchers", receiving money rewards that increase with the danger of the dare completed. Vee's "hacker" best guy friend Tommy (Miles Heizer) tries to talk her out of participating in the questionable game, not least because he nurses a not so secret crush on her. Vee choses to participate anyway and eventually ends up in Manhattan in the company of a mysterious fellow player named Ian (Dave Franco). The dares get increasingly risky and before long Vee finds she has become a virtual "prisoner" of the game, her very life in danger. It then becomes the requisite race against time as Vee's friends try to save her while the game moves toward its final round, where the two top players compete directly, and only one can make it out alive. Though very much a YA story, and with the associated clichés and types that go with that, the premise is still novel enough to be engaging and at times exciting. If I had to describe the film in one word that word would have to be "Millennial", owing to both the subject matter and the young cast. Just this side of too hokey I give it  *** 

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The Bible Reloaded: Movie Reviews

Trekspertise

Atari: Game Over (2014)

Super hero movie screen writer Zak Penn directs and appears in this documentary about a 2014 landfill dig in Alamogordo, New Mexico, which unearthed the contents of a long rumored 1983 cartridge dump by the Atari corporation, one which had reached the status of an urban legend. The movie chronicles the dig, the people involved in planning and carrying it out, as well as a few of the people who traveled, sometimes from great distances, to see a bunch of old Atari game cartridges dug out of the New Mexico desert. Alternating with the story of the dig is a brief history of the rise and fall of the Atari cooperation, the company that essentially created the home video game industry, and how the failure of its 1982 release E.T. The Game, now regarded as legendarily bad, factored into the cartridge dump and eventual death of the company. Best of all this movie is only about an hour long, the perfect length for what it has to say. **1/2

Ted 2 (2015)

Sequel to director/writer/voice actor Seth McFarlane's 2012 adult comedy about a talking teddy bear, Ted 2 is more of the same, and ironically its that lack of ambition that I think makes the movie work. A casually paced outing loaded with pop culture references and non-squitter humor, the stakes are just high enough to keep a keep a plot moving and the characters, well at times they are strangely endearing. There is brief cameo appearance by Liam Nesson which is so funny that it had me nearly in tears. Better then it should have been. ***

Aguirre, the Wrath of God (1972)

Probably writer/director Werner Herzog's most famous film, and certainly the one that first brought him wide fame, Aguirre, The Wrath of God still shows up with some frequency in 100 greatest film lists. Inspired by the story of Lope de Aguirre, a Spanish conquistador who died on an expedition looking for El Dorado, the legendary city of gold, in South America during the 1560's. It is hard to know much for certain about Aguirre, given the time and place he lived and its limits in record keeping, as well as all the mythology and legend that has grown up around this historical figure. Herzog would be one of the first to admit the films story is largely speculative, historically accurate  in only the most general sense. Still it is a riveting story of madness in the vain of Conrad's Heart of Darkness, with star and Herzog frenamie Klaus Kinski giving a power house, often unpredictable performance as a megalomaniac slowly loosing his mind.  It's a great looking film as well, shot in a near documentary style in the Peruvian wildness, which has the effect of making the viewer feel very present in the story. A great, haunting piecing of filmmaking that really earns its reputation . ****

Rock: It's Your Decision (1982)

Fundamentalist style Christian propaganda movie about the evils of rock music. I think it would be fair to say the movie overshoots a little, as our lead character (even IMDb can't be bothered with his name) becomes a religious fanatic and loses all his friends after being challenged by his youth pastor (following a prompting by his mom and dad) to give up rock music for two weeks and investigate if it's really compatible with a Christian life style. This movie is interesting as both a bad movie, and in a vaguely anthropological sense. You can see the whole 52 minutes for free online, or watch any numbers of videos of people ripping into it. To me the movies chief virtue is probably that part of it was filmed inside a mall, and I find 1980's malls nostalgically quite satisfying. More watchable then it has any right to be. **

Singles (1992)

Though some people absolutely love his work, there is something about Cameron Crowe and his movies that, on the whole, is just too preening and self satisfied for me. That being said I did like Singles, an extremely Gen X movie (though Crowe is actually a Boomer) set amidst the grunge music scene of early 1990's Seattle. This thankfully episodic and loosely structured movie winds back and forth through the lives an loves of a half dozen 20 something's, chiefly those living in a single apartment structure. Matt Dillon, Campbell Scott, Kyra Sedgwick and Bridget Fonda are all good to satisfactory as the principal players. This movie raised in me two chief questions: 1) Whatever happened to Bridget Fonda? (Turns out she married composer Danny Elfman and quite acting.) & 2) Am I Gen X or a Millennial? (According to Wikipedia I'm at the tale end of Gen X.) ***

Hostage (2005)

Perhaps the laziest, most cliché Bruce Willis film yet. When a hostage situation LA cop Willis is negotiating goes awry, and three people die, he decides to start over and takes the job of sheriff in a small, peaceful California town. But to no one's surprise Bruce soon finds himself in the middle of another hostage situation, and to make matters even worse bad guys have taken Willis's family hostage until he successfully resolves the first hostage situation, as one of those hostages is an important mob accountant. Though at first a little painful to watch, once the set up is more or less complete the film manages to run pretty well on genera momentum. I watched this because it seemed like the kind of movie my dad would have enjoyed, after I finished it I learned that in fact had seen it and apparently quite liked the movie. I love my dad, but I can only give this **

Truth (2015)

Film about the Killian documents controversy and producer Mary Mapes September 2004 Sixty Minutes II story, which accused then president George W. Bush of going AWOL from the Air National Guard during the Vietnam War era, this during a presidential election which had also seen charges calling into question the war record of Bush's general election opponent Massachusetts Senator John Kerry. Certainly a competently made movie, I had a little trouble seeing its point. Why make this movie? There are certainly better films about investigative reporting, in fact Cate Blanchet, who plays Mapes in this film, also stared in the 2003 journalism movie Veronica Gurein, which is arguably a more engaging film. This film is based on Mapes own book about the controversy Truth and Duty: The Press, the President and the Privilege of Power, and leaves the impression that the authenticity of the Killian documents is at worst uncertain, though I had been under the impression they had pretty well been proved forgeries. In fact one of this films problems is that it was not able to install desire in me to investigate its claims much further. The cast is good but largely wasted, with Blanchet giving it her all, Topher Grace giving it some, and Dennis Quaid, Elisabeth Moss, and Bruce Greenwood collecting paychecks. Robert Redford is good as Dan Rather, who must have been just thrilled about the casting. For those who don't know the story depicted in this movie is what ultimately costs Rather his position as anchor of the CBS Evening News. See Spotlight instead. **1/2

Infamous (2006)

That other mid 2000's Truman Capote movie. Infamous is based George Plimpton's 1997 book Truman Capote: In Which Various Friends, Enemies, Acquaintances, and Detractors Recall His Turbulent Career. Like the better know Capote, Infamous focuses on Truman's life during the late 1950's and 1960's when he was working on what would becomes his most famous and successful book In Cold Blood. What I found most remarkable after watching this film is that we now have (at least) three movies focusing on the now 'infamous' 1959 Clutter family murders, and each of them is an excellent film. In Cold Blood (1967), Capote (2005), and Infamous (2006) are all great movies, and each of them feel fresh and distinct from each other. Of the two that really incorporate the author in the story Capote will always be the better known, given Philip Seymour Hoffman's Oscar winning performance in the title role. Yet Toby Jones, who plays Capote in Infamous, is the more obvious casting, he naturally looks more like Capote, and his performance is strong, maybe just slightly weaker then Hoffman's.

Film critic Jack Matthews said of this film that its "certainly as good (as Capote) and a lot more fun." I think he's right, it's been nearly 10 years since I saw Hoffman's film but I still recall its consistently grim tone. Infamous is serious for good stretches, but on the whole more playful. I think you get a good sense of Capote the public personality and how his time investing the Clutter murders and getting to know the perpetrators, particularly Perry Smith, here played by Daniel Craig, affected him. The film has a very impressive cast including Sandra Bullock as Harper Lee, and Jeff Daniels as the sheriff of Holcomb, Kansas, with Peter Bogdanovich, Hope Davis, Isabella Rossellini, and Sigourney Weaver playing Capote's New York society friends. The now much more well know Lee Pace plays the other killer. Particularly near the beginning of the film various character's give talking head 'The Office' like commentary on what's going on, which given the nature of the books source material works better then you might suspect it would. Again even if you've seen the other films about this story, Infamous is probably worth your time. ****

Sully (2016)

Film about Captain Chelsey "Sully" Sullenberger and the 2009 "Miracle on the Hudson" passenger jet water landing from which all 155 people on board survived. In a compact 1 hour 36 minute running time 86 year old director Clint Eastwood manages to convey everything you need to know about this story in a more then satisfying manner. The film starts with a nice misdirect and then holds back some, gradually giving you the downing of US Airways Flight 1549, not all at once, but letting it build. However as well rendered as the "crash" is, that was not the most interesting part of the movie, rather the lesser known controversy about how "Sully" and his co-pilot Jeff Skiles handled the situation after both engines became disabled following a collision with a flock of birds, well that is worth the price of admission and not to be spoiled. Tom Hanks plays "Sully" as a straight forward stand up guy, he does that well as you'd expect him to, and as a friend of mine pointed out Hanks probably more or less directs himself at this point. Aaron Eckhart does a good job as co-pilot Skiles, as does Laura Linney as "Sully's" wife  Lorraine, though to be honest none of the supporting parts are all the demanding. "Sully" is that rare inspirational movie that is well written, directed, and acted and doesn't talk down to you, and is thusly kind of a gem.****

Me Before You (2016)

Jojo Moyes adapted her own popular novel and first time film director Thea Sharrock helmed this romantic piece about a quirky working class girl (Emilia Clarke) whose life is forever changed by the time she spends as the hired care taker and companion of a recently paralyzed executive and son of Britain's ruling class (Sam Claflin). The maudlin premise could have been too much had the leads not been likable and pored on the charm so heavy, Clarke in particular has gone all in on the quirky and adorable, with the film makers deciding the only why to make her look more average is to put her in ridicules clothing and cast Jenna Colman as her sister. A surprisingly thin Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom from the Harry Potter series) plays Clarke's running obsessed, take her for granted, long time boyfriend, who really doesn't deserve her anyway. As corny as it is when I first saw the previews for this it actually looked like something I would be interested in seeing, which is more then I can say for most of the romantic Hollywood dreck I see advertised. ***

High-Rise (2015)

J. G. Ballard's 1975 novel High-Rise had been long regarded as unfilmable, and maybe it really is unfilmable and that's why I had a hard time determining how I felt about its film version. This dystopian film whose general aura and production design make it look like a lost Stanley Kubrick work, is the story of a young Dr. Robert Laing (Tom Hiddleston) who moves into a new 40 story luxury apartment tower on the outskirts of London in the mid 1970's. Shortly after moving into the tower conditions start to deteriorate, power and other supplies become increasingly unreliable and the residents start to faction off based largely on class lines, with the poorer residents already living near the bottom of the tower and the wealthier near the top, Dr. Laing lives on the 25th floor and is something of a bridge between these two camps. The story is essentially a metaphor for both the breakdown of a society and the persistence of the mundane. While the high-rise essentially becomes a third world failed state, a decadent place full of both orgies and murder with residents living in barbarous conditions, Dr. Laing and many of the other residents continue to commute to work each morning as if nothing has happened, refusing to move out of their homes while their brains become increasingly unhinged and life increasingly more precarious. This is not a pleasant film, I mostly did not enjoy watching it, but that feeling of unease and sometimes even disgust is what the story intends to communicate.  The film has a strong cast including Jeremy Irons, Sienna Miller and Elisabeth Moss and is capably directed by Ben Wheatley, a man whose done a lot of his work in advertising, internet clips and television, but is also in development on a new sci-fi series for HBO which I am sure at the very least will look amazing. This is certainly not a film for everybody. ***

Pete's Dragon (2016)

Disney's 2016 Pete's Dragon hardly even warrants the term 'lose remake', its relationship to the 1977 film of the same name could best be described as a variation on a theme. Indeed the carry over elements from the first film are simply 1) an orphaned boy named Pete who befriends a good natured dragon name Elliott who can turn himself invisible and 2) a sympathetic female character who both leads Pete toward a more sustainable living situation and has an eccentric father who, to the amusement of locals, claims to have seen a dragon. This film also leaves behind the circa 1900 fishing village setting of its predecessor in favor of a lumber town in what appears to be the Pacific Northwest of the 1980's.

When his parents are killed in a car accident in the remote woods a five year old Pete is rescued and raised by a kind hearted Dragon he names Elliot. Around six year later a logging operation ran by brothers Wes Bentley and Karl Urban begins to encroach upon Pete (Oakes Fegley) and Elliot's isolated home, in course of the story Pete ends up being 'rescued' by Bentley's kind hearted fiancé, a forest ranger played endearing by Bryce Dallas Howard. Pete's unexplained wilderness survival for six years perplexes the adults, while the civilized world frightens Pete who attempts to run away back to Elliot who is searching for him as well.

What Pete's Dragon seeks to evoke is not so much the original movie as it is the family adventure films of my childhood, I don't think its an accident that Elliot is so reminiscent of Falcor from The Never Ending Story. This nostalgic trend, which can also be seen in movies like Super 8, or the Netflix series Stranger Things, is one I can whole heartily get behind. There is a sense of childhood wonder and discovery in the film, as well as a good natured Pixarian warmness. The movie is also not manically paced like most contemporary children's films, it's refreshing slow, though maybe too much so for some younger viewers. Fine performances all around, including that of Robert Redford, who remarkably just turned 80. The visual effects and look of the film are great and the soundtrack here is certainly worth praising, it boasts both a Williamsian type score and some pretty nice folk music. While this Pete's Dragon is not the odd yet charming original that the first movie was, it is a comfortingly timeless family film that can stake its own sentimental claim to the hearts of viewers. ***

The Legend of Billie Jean (1985)

I first became aware that this film existed from the below video about the Sunrise Mall in Texas where part of this movie was shot, and which remarkably looks almost exactly the same as it did more then 30 years ago, minus most of the stores and people. The Legend of Billie Jean is about siblings played by Helen and Christian Slater, who surprisingly are not actually related, who become outlaws after a series of incidents steaming from the wanton destruction of Christens prized motor scooter by the son of a local businessman. Billie Jean ends up becoming something of a folk hero and the nexus for a loosely defined youth movement who respond to her cry of 'Fair is Fair' and her sexy short haircut. The movies kind of ridiculous and extremely 80's, but might be worth checking out if you enjoy that type of thing. This is also the movie that the Pat Benatar song Invincible comes from. **1/2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIx_YM5ER5Q

41 (2012)

Say what you will about George H.W. Bush, but the man was sane and not a security risk. Our candidates today could sure do with a dose of his prudence. A fine documentary about a fine man. ***1/2

Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World (2016)

While previous Warner Herzog documenters have focused on a single person (Grizzly Man) or place (Cave of Forgotten Dreams) this newest doc from the eccentric German autor is much more wide ranging.  Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World is a series of ruminations on the good, the bad and the ugly of our technologically dependent age. To name just a few topics this film covers, interviews with the white hared old men who started the internet with a single remote connection between UCLA and the Stanford Research Institute in 1969, how a crowd sourced video game helped scientists uncover new ways of folding molecules, victims of internet harassment, denizens of a treatment camp for gaming addicts, people who are apparently allergic to wireless technology, soccer playing robots, and the fact that a sufficiently severe solar flair could fry all our electronic infrastructure and result in the deaths of billions. So like any good Herzog movie it leaves you with a lot to think about. ***1/2.

Herzog is a film maker whose fictional work I have long been dancing around, but after seeing this film and the numerous Herzog references in Me and Earl and the Dying Girl I've decided to finally take on his dramatic film making and added 10 Herzog features to my Netflix queue, be prepared for more Herzog Reviews in the near future.

Ayn Rand fans, now I've never read Atlas Shrugged but I do know the gist of the plot and its general reputation. Anyway I started watching the movie version and... It. Is. Bad. Like real bad. If I start watching a movie its almost unheard of for me not to finish it. Even if its bad I like to be able to complain about it in detail, but this was just so awful, I couldn't do it. I planed on watching the whole trilogy this weekend but I didn't even get through part I. Bad acting, very limited budget, the dialogue and plot are just eek. I get what its trying to say, that the job creators and innovators are important, we take them for granted, big government bad, personal sovereignty good, you can't tell us what to do, we don't owe you anything, etc. But this story just felt like a pity party for the one percent, and the one percent can afford better. I'm guessing the book must be better then this. Anybody see this movie? Anyone like it? Is it faithful to the book and if so how is the book better? Thoughts? It's 10% rating on Rotten Tomato's seems kind of generous.

Indignation (2016)

I'm a big fan of the novels of Philip Roth, though I (and I think he) would freely admit the man and his work can have their excess. Though when Roth is at his best he really hits it out of the park. His 2000 novel The Human Stain was one such, to mix sports metaphors, 'slam dunk', however its 2003 film adaptation was not.  That movie was disappointing, but I don't think it had to be. A large part of the problem was the abbreviated 1 hour 46 minute running time, under the right hands and with say 2 1/2 hours to tell the story I think the movie could have been quite good, HBO should have done it. So I had some cause for trepidation when I heard that another great Roth novel, Indignation was to be made into a film. Though Indignation I felt also had the more potential for a movie adaptation in that the book is shorter, more of a novella, and its story more concentrated, whereas the side stories in The Human Stain, which added a lot to that novel, were largely dropped from its screen treatment.

Indignation, Roth's 29th book, came out in 2008. It along with Everyman (2006), The Humbling (2009) and the now retired authors last novel Nemesis (2010) (which I think has the most movie potential out of the four), are sometimes referred to as Roth's 'Indignation Quadrilogy', as these four short novels are all about a characters taking a real or perceived slight and letting it destroy him. (On a side note one wonders if this theme is at least in part a response to the nasty things Roth's ex wife the actress Clair Bloom said about him in her memories, but that also gets us into his 1998 novel I Married a Communist and is a digression I won't peruse further her)..

Indignation's story is (like many a Roth book) about a bright young Jewish boy of the authors generation from New Jersey, in this case Marcus Messner, the son of a kosher butcher who in the early 1950's gets to become the first member of his family to go to college when he gets awarded a scholarship to Winesburg, a (fictional) small but prestigious private college in Ohio. Logan Lerman, a relative unknown like all of the cast, is excellent as Messner, really capturing the characters mix of naiveté, defensiveness and pride. Plucked into this new world Messner is an awkward fit who seems unconsciously bent on making things worse for himself through a seemingly chronic inability to just let anything go. At Winseburg Marcus falls for fellow student Olivia Hutton (Sarah Gadon, luminous), a pretty but troubled girl who comes from a rich background. That relationship, which is central to the book, is central here, it is what the story is built on, and it is ultimately what will lead Marcus to his doom.

The films strong focus on this central story, as well as the fact that its an adaptation and can't help but drop some things, inevitably leads to some minor changes from the novel. Some of the side characters and subplots, like Marcus's conflicts with his roommates (one of which is played by Ben Rosenfield, who had been a supporting character on Boardwalk Empire and the only actor in this film that I immediately recognized), are truncated, and other things such as the campus wide riot that plays a large part in the ending of the novel, are completely left out (I had been excited to see the riot on screen, but ultimately it was not necessary for the movie and would have taken too much time to set up and been a distraction from the main story). Yet none of these changes really mattered, this film was true to the spirit of Roth's book in a way that The Human Stain movie never was. Beautiful to look at and excellently handled by first time director James Schamus, this understated little film is easily one of the best movies of the year so far. Schamus even manages to work in, and pretty close to word for word, an awkward, confrontational conversation between Marcus and his schools dean Hawes D. Caudwell (Tony Award winner Tracy Letts), which has got to run around 10 minutes and is probably the most glorious thing I've seen on screen all year. There is some sexual content so its not for everyone, but I loved this movie. ****

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Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (2015)

The Fault in Our Stars meets Be Kind Rewind. ***

Suicide Squad (2016)

Suicide Squad is the first film in the DC cinematic universe not to feature Superman or be directed by Zack Snyder. There is, in theory at least, a lot ridding on this film in terms of opening up said universe. In terms of box office success as of this writing the film has made more then $570 Million box office on a $175 Million budget. So its doing good financially thought critically its scored a mere 26% positive reviews on Rotten Tomato's, on par with Batman v Superman which came out earlier this year and has a 27% fresh rating on the same site. DC is just not getting the critical love that Marvel has, and I think at least part of that is critics not knowing what to make of it.

It's been the better part of two weeks since I saw Suicide Squad and I'm not fully sure that I know what I think of it either. It's hard to point out specific flaws, the nominal villain of the piece is kind of weak, the stakes never fully seem earned, and ultimately I'm not really sure what then whole point of this exercise was, beyond making money. At the same time I can't say that I've ever seen anything quite like this before, a team of villains assembled to combat a larger threat, but one that maybe wouldn't have even existed had this group not been formed. The films pretty well put together, I didn't have any major problems with the structure, though I had a hard time connecting with the piece. Part of that is that I'm just not that familiar with who most of these characters are, I don't have a history with them, I'd only even heard of three or four of them before. One of those of course was the Joker, and I must say I did not care of Jared Leto's take on the character, though apparently most of his scenes were cut so maybe the performance would play better in a longer cut.

So after thinking about it for awhile I've decided to give Suicide Squad *** because I'm not sure what I even wanted out of it in the first place, and at the very least it was something that I hadn't seen in a super hero movie before, namely one largely devoid of super hero's. Will Smith is likable even when he's playing a hired assassin, and the rest of the ensemble cast is given pretty balanced screen time and are largely fleshed out. Joel Kinnaman gives probably the strongest performance out of the lesser known actors in the film, and Viola Davis is great as always. Margot Robbie will certainly sell tickets though I liked her a lot more in Whisky Tango Foxtrot.

House (1986), House II: The Second Story (1987)

While I never saw it in its entirety I saw portions of the movie House II many times when it was in regular rotation on the USA Network circa 1990, so in deciding to revisit House II I figured why not see the original as well. Turns out the House films are not really that related to each other, besides the title, some names behind the camera, roughly the look of the special effects, and they each concern a home that is something of an inter-dimensional gateway, though its actually a different house in each of these two films.

The original House is closer to a conventional horror movie. Greatest American Hero star William Kitt is Roger Cobb, a Steven King like horror author who moves back into the home where his aunt raised him after her apparent suicide. This is also the house that his only son disappeared from, an event that ultimately resulted in the breakup of his marriage to (Miss world 1977 Mary Stavin) a successful actress on a prime time soap opera called Missouri. Add to this that Cobb is working on a book about his traumatic experiences in the Vietnam War, and the guy is under a lot stress. The movie really could have gone in an ambiguous direction as it relates to its lead characters sanity, though it largely abandons this sense of uncertainty around half way through. There are a number of rubbery looking  caricature-like monster people in this who torment Roger. Cobb also has a somewhat intrusive neighbor played by Cheers star George Wendt, which is a perfect segway into House II, which features another Cheers star.

John Ratzenberger's performance as Bill, a guy whose business card lists him as an Electrician/Adventurer is the element of this film that I always most remembered. When called to the  titular house to investigate an electrical issues he quickly a finds a portal behind a wall, 'Yeah that seems to be your problem here, you've got some kind of alternate universe back there. Don't worry I've dealt with this kind of thing before'.  House II has a lighter tone then the original, it barley keeps up even a pretense to being a horror movie, its more of a comic/adventure movie. A man inherits the ancestral home of his family he never knew, and in short order unearths the reanimated corpse of his cowboy great grandfather who is kept alive by a ancient Crystal Skull, that the business partner he killed has also returned from the dead to collect. Our lead Arye Gross and his best friend Jonathan Stark end up traveling to alternate dimensions accessible within the house in efforts to retrieve and protect the skull after it is captured, more then once. Bill Maher and Amy Yasbeck are also in this, veteran character actor Royal Dano plays great grandpa Jessie. Its an odd yet enjoyable film that despite its off the wall premise seemed more coherent then the original House, which often felt like it was an assemblage of plot elements from various other movies. House II is probably something you can show the kids, but I don't think I'd let little ones see the original.

House (1986) **
House II: The Second Story (1987) **1/2

Sex Madness (1938)

A sibling of sorts to the much better known Reefer Madness, Sex Madness is an exploitation film in the guise of a public service morality tale about the dangers of syphilis. Less then an hour in length the film is watchable as a curio, it is on the whole much blander then Reefer Madness but there is some strongly implied lesbianism in the film. This movie has fallen into the public domain and is freely available in multiple places on the internet. **

The Conformist (1970)

The only film by Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci that I had seen before this one was The Last Emperor, 1987's Academy Award winner for Best Picture. Well now I know that I really need to see more Bertolucci movies because he's hit the two that I've seen out of the park. The Conformist is based on the 1951 novel of the same name by Alberto Moravia whose work has provided the source material for other notable foreign films like Jean-Luc Godard's Contempt (1963) and Vittorio De Sica's Two Women (1960). So The Conformist is a very literary work and one I must surely see again because its so rich and textured you wouldn't be able to pick up on everything in it in one viewing, for days after I saw the picture I was making new connections in my mind about various scenes and themes in the movie.

The bulk of the story is set in 1938 and concerns Marcello Clerici (Jean-Louis Trintignant) an operative of the fascist government in Italy who is assigned, while on his honeymoon in Paris with his much younger wife (Stefania Sandrelli), to murder his old college professor and mentor Enzo Tarascio, who in exile has been publishing things Mussolini's government doesn't much care for. This sets up Clerici's main internal conflict, he is a conformist, always willing to go along with the prevailing winds in order to survive and prosper, but he also has a deep love and respect for his old professor who has shown an ability to standard for principal that Clerici envies though can never quite muster himself. This of course is just the main story, there are number of sub plots and digressions, all of which are interesting. Perhaps the most intriguing of these however is Clerici's ultimately complicated relationship with his best friend Italo (Jose Quaglio) who quite fascinatingly is a blind man who write propaganda for the Italian government. This is an ambiguous yet powerful film which doesn't spell everything out for you, and features a deeply flawed protagonist who even a week after viewing the film I'm not sure how I feel about. Be aware it has some sexual content but I highly recommend. ****

Star Trek: Beyound (2016)

The third entry in J.J. Abrams reboot of the Star Trek franchise may well be the film in which this new series comes into its own, and as much as I like Abrams part of the reason for that is because he didn't direct it, Abrams tends to be too loyal to source material sometimes i.e.Star Wars Episode VII. Star Trek: Beyond while produced by Abrams is instead directed by Justin Lin, best known for directing four of The Fast and the Furious movies. There is an expected kinetic energy to the film, which the previous two films had in parts, but this movie also feels loser, freer then the others, more like the original Star Trek TV series then the movies (though honestly part of that is do to the bright color scheme of much of the film). That is not to say that the film doesn't include a heavy dose of Abramsesique homage, there are scenes or story elements taken directly from Star Trek's II, III, IV, V and surprisingly Insurrection. Also there are plot elements that tie the story into the era depicted in the prequel series Enterprise. The story itself though is a new one, not a lose remake, and is better because of it. The stakes also feel refreshingly refrained, the Earth doesn't have to be in immediate peril in all of these movies.

To me the most enjoyable scenes in the film are when the crew is split up into small groups while stranded on the planet after the destruction of the Enterprise, which is not a spoiler as it is highlighted in the movies trailer. Spock and McCoy stuck together and good naturedly sparing, one of the more fondly remembered dynamics of the original series is highlighted here, and I liked Scotty's scenes with the new alien character Jaylah. The climax is also good, with some nifty visuals, and the villain of the piece, played by Idris Elba, is also quite good, which is not always the case with Star Trek villains. This is a fun and good looking movie which I would recommend seeing on the big screen, as well as the entry in this reboot I think most likely to be well received by hard core Star Trek fans and the general public alike. ***

Ghostbusters (2016)

It has been reported that the trailer for the 2016 version of Ghostbusters is the most "unliked" video in the history of YouTube. Indeed there has been a lot of backlash against this remake/reboot, part of which is rooted in a juvenile misogyny against the female cast, part out of the reverential place the original 1984 film occupies in the minds of many (mostly men) of a certain age, and partially because honestly the first couple of trailers for the film didn't look all that good. I came into this film a little skeptical but willing to be won over, what I got was a film that wasn't great, wasn't terrible, but rather a mixed bag.

I quite liked the first half of this film, less so the second, and did not care for the ending. There will be some spoilers here. I thought the cast worked, there was good chemistry there, and the plot was significantly enough different from the original film to be its own thing. The early sequences with the Ghostbusters first getting together were by far the most entreating, later sequences with their interacting with the mayor and his staff less so. The filmmakers evidently thought Chris Hemsworth as the Busters himbo secretary was comic gold, I thought it wore pretty thin after awhile. There are a lot of cameos in this film, including most of the living main cast of the original film, these worked unevenly. There was a strong emphasis on hitting cues and motifs from the original film, I think they tried overheard on this front including the incorporation of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. This film also channeled a surprising amount of Jim Carey's The Mask.

The movie in too many instances tried to one up the original film or "take it to 11". The end of the film was hyperactive, too much going on and not enough of it sufficiently grounded or earned. There are new Ghostbuster weapons which I thought were quite gimmicky, you have scenes where there are ghost corpses littering the ground, I mean what does that even mean, how do you kill a ghost? I did not like the look of the special effects, far too cartoony, one the things that worked so well in the original film is the degree to which they played the ghost characters more or less straight.

Paul Feig, who co-wrote and directed the film and whose previous work pretty much made Melissa McCarthy a star has an excellent understanding of pace and film structure, and on the whole I can't really fault this film on that front. Everything here is in its place and there is a place for everything, plot points are introduced when they should be and sufficiently developed to make sense, characters are given sufficient backstory and motivation so the character development is good, and the screen time for the members of the ensemble cast is pretty well balanced. Structurally things worked, with the arguable exception of the ending, the film was often funny, again more so towards the beginning, but ironically for a film about ghost catching this whole thing lacked soul. I felt like I was watching a movie from a parallel universe, all the parts where there but the sum total was lacking. You can't just reverse engineer a hit like 1984's Ghostbusters and expect it to not come off as merely the knock off it is, however fine a knockoff that may be. **1/2

Zombies on Broadway (1945), Neighbors (2014)

Zombies on Broadway (1945)

Zombies on Broadway is not what you might be hoping for from its title, rather its a vehicle for the largely forgotten RKO comedy team of Wally Brown and Alan Carney. The film casts the two as Broadway press agents who are tasked with securing "a real zombie" for a zombie themed night club their gangster boss Ace Miller (future 1960's sitcom impresario Sheldon Leonard) is opening. Zombie in this context does not refer to the flesh or brain eating incarnation of the undead, but rather the somnambulate slave variety of Caribbean legend. So its off to a small Caribbean island for the pair, where the meet a beautiful night club singer (Annie Jeffreys, still with us at 93), a mad doctor (Dracula himself Bela Lugosi), and of course some zombies. Amusing enough in a low rent Abbott and Costello type way, if anything the movie was better then I thought it would be. Still this is a zombie movie that hard core zombie fans can probably feel safe skipping. **1/2

Neighbors (2014)

New parents Seth Rogan and Rose Byrne are understandably concerned when a fraternity helmed by Zack Efron moves into the house next door. At first the members of both residences attempt to make nice with each other but it eventually turns into an escalating war of pranks which ends with all parties having learned something about themselves. Satisfying comedy of the Apatowian school is well cast and has the requisite number of comic moments, yet is also not all that memorable. I never would have thought of casting Lisa Kudrow as a college Dean. ***

The Shallows (2016), Brooklyn (2015), The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), Five Graves to Cairo (1943)

The Shallows (2016)

Think of it as a sexier version of Jaws. Blake Lively is a med student (that comes in handy) on a surfing vacation in Mexico as she attempts to deal with the recent death of her mother (who was also and avid surfer) from cancer and decide if she wants to go back to med school. A particularly dickish shark kills a number of people in an isolated cove leaving a wounded Lively marooned on a small rock outcropping with only the companionship of an also wounded seagull. The ending strains credulity some but one the whole this was an excellent woman vs nature picture, and Lively proves she can hold the screen pretty much by her self, and of course looks great doing so. ***1/2

Brooklyn (2015)

Based on the 2009 novel of the same name by Irish writer Colm Tóibín, Brooklyn is the story of a young woman (Saoirse Ronan, excellent) who in 1952 moves from her small Irish town to Brooklyn, New York for work. Free and independent for the first time in her life Eilis Lacey (Ronan) comes into herself, starts taking night classes in accounting and enters into a romantic relationship with a charming young Italian American man (Emory Cohen). However her new life is put in jeopardy when a death in the family back home prompts a return to Ireland and a personal crises of identity. Smarter and more complex then I had anticipated, the film delves into some moral gray areas and questions about judgment and judgmentailism. The acting is good and there are some memorable characterizations, I particularly liked the woman who ran the women's boarding house. I also loved the costumes, set designs, and color palate of this movie, the latter being rather evocative of the era, kind of faded but with strong blotches of color, particularly in the scenes in America. ****

The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

Based on a Roald Dahl novel and done in a sort of taxidermy-esque stop motion style, its remarkable how well this film works both as children's entertainment (my niece and nephew seemed to enjoy what they saw of it), and as a legitimate Wes Anderson movie. Mr. Fox (George Clooney) an anthropomorphic Vulpes vulpes has promised his wife Mrs. Fox (Meryl Streep) that he will stop stealing chickens and such from local farmers and settle down as a newspaper columnist, but he just can't resist the temptation of one last big score, the results of which could threaten the lives and safety of his son (Anderson muse Jason Schwartzman) and various animal contemporaries. Wonderfully dry and low key the film seems to keep the original novels 1970's setting ,which fits perfectly into Mr. Andersons retro aesthetic, as does the unique looking stop motion work. Domestic drama and existential frustrations charmingly channeled into a family friendly talking animal tale. I love that this movie exists. ***

Five Graves to Cairo (1943)

Billy Wilder's second American directorial outing, and one of his least known films, Five Graves to Cairo updates a World War I era play by the Austro-Hungarian writer Lajos Bíró to Egypt in the Second World War and inserts real world figure German Field Marshall Erwin Rommel as the villain. British Corporal John Bramble (Franchot Tone) is the lone survivor of his tank crew after a battle with Rommel's Afrika Korps, lost in the desert to the point of delirium he luckily stumbles upon a hotel in a small sea side town just recently retreated from by the British. When the Germans arrive and make the hotel their local headquarters, Bramble with the aid of the hotels owner (Akim Tamiroff) and his sole remaining employee a French maid (Anne Baxter) takes on the identity of a limp footed waiter who was killed in a recent air raid. From this position Bramble quickly comes into the confidence of Rommel (Erich von Stroheim, perfectly cast as an arrogant German militarist, even though his and this characters resemblance to the real Rommel aren't particularly strong). You see the dead waiter Davos was actually a German advance spy, this could help Bramble as he attempts to unlock the mystery of hidden German supply depots (the five graves) they intend to use to help them quickly overtake Egypt's capital (Cairo). However with the real Davos corpse in danger of being uncovered in the rubble its a race against time to learn the Germans secrets The film is well enough made, but outside of von Stroheim's performance, not really that memorable. There are better films of a similar type made throughout this era, particular by the British, and other then it being one of the few Billy Wilder directed films I had yet to see (the only one's remaining on my list now are his last move, the ill regarded 1981 comedy Buddy Buddy, and his holocaust documentary from 1945 Death Mills) there was little reason to bother with this movie. **1/2