Mr. Brooks (2007)

There is so much going on in Mr. Brooks, so much plot, that I assumed that it must come from a book, most likely one in a series of books, and not necessarily the first one in that series. I was wrong, Mr. Brooks was written directly for the screen, though it was originally intended as the first in a trilogy, so the sense that what I was seeing was part of a larger story is legit. The story is of a self reflective serial killer (Kevin Costner) who communicates with an apparition of a middle man (William Hurt) who only he see, so this can't help but remind one of Dexter, which first came out about a year before this movie. Given that point of reference Mr. Brooks doesn't really do anything that new, but it does what it does well enough to be engaging, and again there is so much going on that you really don't have time to get bored.

There are subplots about Brook's daughter (a 19 year old Danielle Panabaker), the police detective trying to hunt him down (Demi Moore) who is also hunting for another serial killer, plus Dane Cook as a wood-be acolyte, blackmailing Mr. Brooks with incrementing photos in order to get a thrill out of watching him work. There are also sub plots on subplots, like Demi Moore's pending divorce. There is so much going on, yet somehow they can hardly find anything for poor Marg Helgenberger to do, perhaps they were saving that for the sequels. While the movie did well enough, making back around 2 1/2 times its budget, for some reasons a sequel just did not come together, and now enough time has passed that it probably wouldn't work to revive as franchise. Still I'd be curious to know where they planed to take this, though I suspect that Dexter probably ended up going there, that show ran too long and had a good amount of filler. Right now I'd give Mr. Brooks ***, though I have my doubts if this would hold up well on repeat viewing.

The Fall of the Ottoman Empire (2015)

The Fall of the Ottoman Empire is not really a movie, but rather a two part French language documentary that they showed on the big screen at the WWI marathon at the BYUIC. This was very informative I'm glad a saw it, it cleared up a number of things for me, including why the Ottomans allied with the Germans in The Great War, and why there was that railroad line in the desert that gets attacked in Lawrence of Arabia (it had been build to carry pilgrims to Mecca). Not exceptional as a film, but for me very much worth seeing. ***

Wooden Crosses (1932)

In conjunction with the 100 anniversary of the Armistice the BYU International Cinema had a marathon of World War I movies last week, I went on Saturday and caught a couple. Wooden Crosses is a French film that follows a group of solders through The Great War, almost all of the characters we follow in the film die. It's a very nicely made film, however I could just never really bond with any of the characters. I think All Quite on the Western Front is a better movie that is going for basically the same kind of thing that the French are in this. The visual composition here is really quite sophisticated for an early sound film, in fact it is more reminiscent of late silent films in its look then it is of the "talkie" American counterparts of its time.

There are two shots that I want to make brief reference to as they are memorable. One opens on a Catholic mass in a beautiful old church sanctuary, the audience at first are not sure why they are seeing this and then the camera pans over to a barrier constructed on the side of the chapel, basically a fence, and then over the barrier to show an amputee ward making use of space in the church. The other is of French solders parading through a town after a battle, the men are shouting about how they "won the village" and in the sky behind them is superimposed another line of solders marching heaven word, they too one the village. There are certainly things in this film to recommend it, I just wish I'd been able to like it more. ***

In This Corner of the World (2016)

Based on the Japanese manga of the same name the animated film In This Corner of the World shows us something American audiences seldom if ever get to see, a depiction of daily civilian life in World War II era Japan. It is the story of Suzu, a young woman growing in Hiroshima in the 30's and 40's, so we know at the outset what all of this is building to. Suzu is a very sincere and sympathetic lead character, it's hard not to love her, and the supporting characters are a nice patch work portrait of her time and place. Beautifully and simply animated, at times very moving, In This Corner of the World shows what can be done with dramatic animated storytelling, something that seems to be done better overseas then in the states, sees also Persepolis and Mary and Max.  This film is so impressive that I watched it two nights in a row, something I almost never do. ****

 

The Old Man and the Gun (2018)

Based on true story the new film The Old Man and the Gun is set (mostly) in the year 1981, and it plays like a move from 1981, which is one of its chief pleasures. The movie is not rushed, it plays slower and is less interested in action then it is in character study, even the film stock has a dated look to it. If this movie had been made in 1981 Burt Lancaster would have played bank robber Forrest Tucker, and Ava Gardner the widow farm lady he falls for. Today we have Robert Redford as Tucker and Sissy Spacek as his love interest Jewel, it's nice to see them. Casey Affleck is John Hunt, the Texas cop who is leading the investigation into the series of bank robberies committed by a group of old men dubbed by the media "The Over-the-Hill Gang". Who would have played detective Hunt in the 1981 version of this story? Well Robert Redford would have been a good candidate. ***

The Patriot (2000)

There is a scene fairly early in the movie The Patriot where British officers are trying to dragoon some of the black men on Mel Gibson's plantation into military service by promising them their freedom. One of the black men informs the British that they are already free and just work for Mr. Gibson's character. At that moment the movie had lost me, you just know some Hollywood suit was like "If the audience knows Gibson's character owns slave, it won't be as fun to root for him so let's make the blacks on the plantation free". I'm sorry Mel is playing a plantation owner in 1770's South Carolina, that man would own slaves, there is no getting around it. A short time later there is a scene, were needing to rescue his oldest son Heath Ledger, Gibson instructs his younger sons to start shooting the officers and work their way down. At that moment the movie won me back.

The Patriot is not an exercise in historical authenticity, rather it is rousing adventure tell to pump American audiences up and make then feel extra good about our revolutionary war. Their are two principle British villains in this, Tom Wilkinson as a slightly buffoonish Charles Cornwallis, all ego and fancy duds, while Jason Isaacs is Colonel William Tavington, who is basically Lucius Malfoy. They are fun to watch, Gibson is fun to watch, as is Ledger, Rene' Auberjonois and the others. This is the kind of spectacle Gibson did well at the height of prowess, box office and social acceptability. A fun movie, expertly handled, probably Roland Emmerich's best directorial work.***1/2

Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter (1966)

This strange, low budget western/horror hybrid was the final film helmed by the prolific William Beaudine, a man who has 372 listed directing credits on his IMDb page, some dating back to the silent era. Double billed with the similarly themed Billy the Kid Versus Dracula, Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter was filmed fast and cheap at the Corrigan Ranch, a well known shooting location for B- westerns. The plot is about what you'd expect only it isn't actually Frankenstein's daughter that Jesse James meets, rather it is his granddaughter, carrying on the family tradition of experiments in a Spanish mission style villa. This film is bad, while only 83 minutes long it might have been near unwatchable were it not for the entertaining audio commentary from TV's Joe Bob Briggs. Estelita Rodriquez, who plays the love interest for John Lupton's Jessie James, died from the flu the same year this movie was released, she was only 37. ** (rating pumped up some do to the commentary).