Balls of Fury (2007)

• A "comedy" about competitive table tennis clearly attempting to piggy back off the success of 'Dodge Ball' three years earlier.  
• This was the star launch vehicle that wasn't for Dan Fogler, who is really close to neutral here, I didn't hate him but he seemed to lack any real spark. He did later find success in the 'Fantastic Beasts' films and I liked him there. 
• Randomish cast includes George Lopez, Maggie Q, and Christopher Walken, whose the most memorable thing about it. 
• The occasional lite laugh but it's really pretty flat, none of 'the set pieces' are very good, and the whole film is consistently in mediocre gear. 
• Contains jokes about sex slaves. 
• *

The Benny Goodman Story (1956)

• Certainly watchable, but not deep. It's a showcase for the music more then anything even approaching a character study. 
• Steve Allen plays big band legend Benny Goodman (who dubs his own clarinet playing). Allen was host of 'The Tonight Show' at the time this was made, I imagine he had to take months off to make this. 
• Donna Reed plays the love interest, and it occurs to me that I'm not sure I have ever seen her in color. She photographs very well in it, she's in her mid 30's here. 
• Bio pics of musicians generally follow a rather rout course, the long struggle to eventually success. Later films in this genera would almost inevitably explore substance abuse and infidelity, though I don't think that was ever a problem for Goodman. However the film does take the most interesting aspects of his life, such as the fact that his wife was married before to a British politician and had three daughters by him, and completely ignores it. 
• The conflict of Benny's being Jewish and his wife from a WASPy family somehow completely steps around the Jewish part and focuses on class distinctions for conflict. I don't think the word 'Jew' is ever even mentioned in the film, though Goodman's mother is doing the classic to stereotypical Jewish mother act to the hilt. 
• Don't even get me started on the scene where an older black musician laments his never making it, but he's glade Benny did because he had something the old man lacked. Very clearly what he lacked was being white, but this is not something this major studio felt like saying out loud to 50's audiences. I on the other hand was shouting it at the screen. 
• *1/2

Wildfire (2019)

• Based on the novel of the same name by Richard Ford. 
• The Directorial debut of actor Paul Dano, he does a great job, the script was adapted by the director and his long time partner Zoe Kazan. 
• \Set in the Great Falls Montana area in 1960, it's a gift to a filmmaker to have a period setting in a place like small town Montana, it makes location scouting easier as so much of that area still looks like it might have 60 years ago. 
• This is the story of the break up of blue collar marriage told through the eyes of the 14 year old son, played by Ex Oxenbould who does a great, understated job. You really get the sense of the emotional sensitivity of this kid, how he has grown up with these antenna always on, ever alert to the mood in his parents relationships. He wants more then anything to keep stability and piece. 
• Jack Gyllenhaal is great as usual as the dad, but this is Cary Mulligan's film. Mulligan's always great to begin with but here she is Oscar caliber. As she comes apart, and makes reckless decisions in the absence of her husband, who has gone away to fight forest fires, her performance is at times almost hypnotizing, you can't keep your eyes off  her and impending disaster. 
• Excellent. ****

1941 (1979): Directors Cut

The black sheep of the Spielberg cannon, '1941' is often thought of as the directors first big flop. But it wasn't really, made for $35 million it brought in $95 at the world wide box office (perhaps surprisingly most of it from overseas). However compared to the $306 million 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' made from it's $19.4 million dollar budget, or the $472 million 'Jaws' got off a $9 million budget, '1941' was a disappointment. 

Not just finically but critically '1941' underwhelmed, it rates 42% on Rotten Tomatoes. That of course is principally based on the original theatrical cut, I saw the directors cut so this is more of what Spielberg apparently wanted on the screen, but even then.... This movie feels overlong, so maybe the shorter cut works better? This is a big budget screwball comedy, with a massive cast, including many up and comers, as well as a few in major parts who I don't think I've ever seen in anything else. 

Built around a war time scare regarding a possible Japanese attack on the California coast the week after Pearl Harbor, the scale of the thing really surprised me. Now a good deal of the effects were done by  miniature work, but this movie is all about large scale destruction. The film takes a long while to get going, I think much of the the first hour would be safe on the cutting room floor, but the last hour is just manic. It reminded me some of Billy Wilder's 'One, Two, Three'. It also reminded me of later films by Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale, who wrote the screenplay, which even contains a sort of proto- Biff Tannen character played by Treat Williams. 

Very uneven, and fascinating for being so. Going in you might note that this picture contains some racial humor that Steven Spielberg would not do if the movie were made today. An interesting failure, I think I do get what it was going for, and the good film in their occasionally gets out. I certainly admire the risk taken with the whole endeavor, Spielberg seemed desperate to try his hand at something different. I suspect I'd have really liked this film if I'd seen it when I was eight. I'm gonna be a little generous, **1/2. 

Beauty and the Beast (2017)

'Beauty and the Beast', Disney's 2017 live action remake and expansion on their classic 1991 animated feature at least made me want to re-watch the original. While it's hard to argue with the casting of Emma Watson as Bell, and the film does come alive in some of the revived musical numbers form the original, the movie is over long, dull, and extremely self conscious in it's metatextual commentary on the original film. I watched Lindsey Ellis's video on this years ago, shortly after this film came out I think, and I didn't think I remembered much from it but it must have really soaked in because I'd echo much of what she said in video essay. This is an awkward, kind of cynical film, a slog where the original was brisk and joyful. *1/2 

Alone in the Dark (2005)

 'Alone in the Dark' is bad, but I'd be dishonest if I didn't cop to the fact that I really enjoyed watching it. This Uwe Boll directed mess is all over the place, the plot concerns a vanished race of ancient Native American's, a portal to another dimension, shadow monsters, experiments on orphans, and a supposedly secret though well maned and hardly subtle organization called Bureau 731, which is like a cross between The X-Files and CTU. Oh and it's got Tara Reid in it. You can get what Boll is reaching for here, but it's simply beyond his abilities and budget, and watching him grasp is surprisingly entertaining. It's hard to rate this one but I'm gonna go with **.

The Rainmaker (1956)

 'The Rainmaker' a 1956 feature film adaption of the hit 1954 N. Richard Nash play of the same name doesn't work for several reasons. One is it feels way too stage bound, hardly opened up at all. Perhaps this is because N. Richard Nash adapted his own work for the screen, and also because the films director Joseph Anthony comes from the world of the stage not film. The story is extremely dated, set in the 30's it's very 50's, and this tale of a spinsters late in life yet rather quick (within a matter of hours) acquisitions of two potential suiters, well it doesn't convincingly transcend the 20th Century. Also Katharine Hepburn is way to old for this part, 49 at the time of release she should really be 35ish at the most, judging by the ages of her supposed siblings. Burt Lancaster foreshadows some of his later 'Elmer Gantry' schtick as a con man, but it's paltry compensation for two hours. *1/2

Soul (2020)

I have heard the new Pixar movie 'Soul' described as more of a film for grown-ups then children. Now children will likely enjoy it, its colorful and funny, but speaks to subject matter more relevant to adults then children. It is in effect an animated movie about a mid life crises, leader character Joe is a middle aged man, single, no kids, whose life and career have not gone the way he had hoped (I can relate). It seems like that may be about to change when this middle school music teacher (voiced by Jamie Foxx) gets a chance to perform with a respected jazz quartet. In his delirium of excitement at nailing his audition, Joe absently mindedly walks into an open man hole.

Joe awakens as a spirt on an escalator to heaven, quickly realizing what has happened he attempts to escape, and finds himself in 'The Great Before', a pre-earth exitance in which young souls are given personalities and character traits, seek to find the spark that will bring focus to their lives, and earn an Earth pass that will allow them to be born. Mistaken as a mentor assigned to help spirits find this spark Joe get's assigned soul 22 (voice of Tina Fey) an extremely reluctant and difficult spirt who has been finding ways of avoiding being born since near the dawn of time. Joe and 22 hatch a plan where he will help her find her spark, then use her Earth pass to get back to his own body, though complication inevitably ensue. 

Not the emotional gut punch I had hopped it be, along the lines of 'Wall-E', 'Up' or 'Toy Story 3', it is still a fine film with some moving moments and some great looking animation, including supernatural bureaucrats who take their look form mid 20th century modern art. It is tempting to find hints of Mormon theology in the films pre-mortal world, but I suspect there is more of Dr. Seuss's 'The Hoober-Bloob Highway' here then Joseph Smith and The Book of Abraham. Smart and reflective and most of the jokes land.***1/2 

 

Katie Says Goodbye (2016)

Writer/director Wayne Roberts debut feature 'Katie Says Goodbye' is rough, really too rough. Olivia Cook's performance as Katie is always sympathetic, she is sweet, but too sweet and the world eats her alive. That is the point I suppose, that bad things happen to good people, but why so many, and why does she seemingly bring them on herself, she may be well intentioned but she is a walking doormat. 

A recent high school drop out, the determinedly sweet (I'm sorry but there is not better word for her) Katie lives with her ungrateful mother (Mireille Enos) in a little trailer park off of seemingly the only road in her small Arizona town. Katie works at a truck stop dinner where she has a nice boss played by Mary Steenburgen, who turns a blind eye to her side hustle as a prostitute. Strangely it is one of her sexual regulars, a truck driver played by Jim Belushi in one of his best performances, who after Steenburgen is the only old character who doesn't do Katie wrong in this picture. 

Stupidly the naive Katie falls for a local mechanic (Christopher Abbott) who is recently out of prison for theft, and who hardly says a word. Katie projects all the intensity of her first love onto this unworthy vessel, a sypher who generally treats her decently, but you know from the start that won't last. The worst things happen to Katie throughout this movie, betrayed in various ways by almost everyone she knows, there is a rape scene, very unpleasant, and the cumulative effect of the film is of torture porn.

While ostensibly a character piece the film crosses a line to where it feels like it wants us to kind of get off on watching Katie suffer. A solid looking film, it is well produced, has a strong sense of place and some solid performances, but it just feels wrong. To good for me to dismiss outright, but I'd be hard pressed to recommend. **

The Bling Ring (2013)

Sofia Coppola's 'The Bling Ring' is possibly one of the best movies ever made about 'shallowness'. Fictionalized, I think for partially legal and partially creative reasons, the movie is based on the true story of a group of young people in the L.A. area, who broke into and robbed celebrity homes when they read that they were out of town. The group got away with this for almost a year before being brought in after a massive investigation, I think in all they go away with something like four million dollars worth of merchandise. 

The young cast in anchored by Emma Watson, cast against type, and also features Katie Change, Taissa Farmiga, and Israel Brossard. The movie also contains cameos of the very celebrities the group stole from, including Paris Hilton, and Coppola muse Kristin Dunst. These robberies took place in 2008-2009 so it looks even more shallow in hindsight, seeing no longer that relevant stars like Lindsey Lohan and Rachel Bilsson gushed over by these hollow, hollow kids, so shallow and self absorbed it's like they hadn't really considered that what they were doing was wrong, or that by posting it all over social media they was gonna get caught. 

Can't think of anything else quite like this movie, it's a picture of a very specific type of person at a very specific time and place. More interesting then I expected it would be. ***

Ranking the films of 2020 from Best to Worst, version 1.1

 Mank 

The Trial of the Chicago 7

(The Godfather Coda - This is a re-edit of 1990's The Godfather Part III)

Tenet 

Soul 

The Dissident 

John Lewis: Good Trouble

Horse Girl

Borat 2 

The Christmas Chronicles 2 

Jasper Mall

Greyhound

Tied for worst: The New Mutants/Wonder Woman 1984 

Shalom Bollywood: The Untold Story of Indian Cinema (2017)

 'Shalom Bollywood: The Untold Story of Indian Cinema' tells of how Jewish actress were among the first big stars of the subcontinents film industry. In those early days woman acting on film was considered largely taboo in both the Hindu and Muslim communities, so some early Indian silent films had to go the 'Shakespeare' rout and have men in drag play the women. This wasn't a very tenable situation and one of the few groups in which Indian film makers could find actress, before the taboos in the Muslim and Hindu communities began to give way in the 1940's, was amongst the small native Jewish population. 

Jews have lived in India for around 2,000 years, the first came fleeing the Roman occupation of Israel. There was intermarrying of course but in the 20th Century amongst the Jewish women of India, could be found a high cheekbone look that conformed more with the beauty standards found in Hollywood films, which was considered a major selling point. This documentary tells stories of major Jewish stars in Hindi film of the 30's, 40's, and 50's including Primala, Arati Dev, Sulochana, and even a man, David Abraham. There are some great stories about these stars of yesteryear, and even some time spent with Jews still working in India's massive film industry today. A really pleasant surprise to stumble on this stuff. ***

Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)

 'Young Mr. Lincoln' was the first of a half dozen or so films that director John Ford made with the actor Henry Fonda. Indeed it could be said that it was John Ford, more then anyone save Fonda himself, that was responsible for the actors image as the quintessential American man of integrity. That integrity is on full display here, and some pretty solid make up work makes Fonda look even more like honest Abe. 

The story is based on an actual case that Lincoln took as a lawyer in the 1830's, with plot elements combined with another trial that took place in I think Pennsylvania decades later, a trial that screen writer Lamar Trotti (nominated three times, including for this film, and winning an Oscar for the script of the bio-pic 'Wilson' in 1944) I think attended. Long story short Lincoln ends up saving a couple of innocent lives, does some country lawyer stick and ends up slipping the real murder up in cross examination, Perry Mason style. 

It's kind of hokey, boarding on hagiography, but good natured and intended to inspire. Alice Brady who plays the mother of the accused murders was dying from cancer when she played this part, giving her a slightly gaunt look and enhancing her performance with a sense of quite desperation that is real. I couldn't call this one of Ford's great films, but a good one, and I think sincere. ***

 Best of 2019 version 2.0

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Little Women

1917

Parasite

The Irishmen

Marriage Story

The Two Popes

Bombshell

Apollo II

Jojo Rabbit

 Ranking every 2020 release I saw in 2020 in order from best to worst. 

Mank 

The Trial of the Chicago 7

(The Godfather Coda - This is a re-edit of 1990's The Godfather Part III)

Tenet 

The Dissident 

John Lewis: Good Trouble

Horse Girl

Borat 2 

The Christmas Chronicles 2 

Jasper Mall

Greyhound

Tied for worst: The New Mutants/Wonder Woman 1984