Month: March 2022

ARRIVAL (2016)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

Director: Denis Villeneuve
Cast: Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker, Michael Stuhlbarg
My Rating: 9/10
Rotten Tomatometer: 94% Certified Fresh

PLOT: When 12 alien spacecraft descend to Earth at seemingly random points around the globe, a linguistics expert (Adams) is recruited to interpret the aliens’ speech in order to find out why they are here, among other things.


“If you could see your whole life from start to finish, would you change things?” – Louise Banks (Amy Adams), Arrival

That seemingly simple question lies at the heart of Denis Villeneuve’s sci-fi brainteaser, Arrival.  Surrounding it is a film of uncommon grace, beauty, and intellectual stimulation that deserves comparison to Kubrick’s 2001 or Tarkovsky’s Solaris.  When I first saw it in 2016, I’ll admit to some slight confusion at the end, but after many repeat viewings, I believe I understand it fully enough to call it a masterpiece.

After a prologue where we witness a montage of her losing a daughter to an unnamed but ravaging disease, we see Dr. Louise Banks (Amy Adams) teaching linguistics at a university.  Classes are interrupted when news breaks of not one, but TWELVE alien spacecraft suddenly appearing at random points around the globe.  Eventually, the military contacts her and reveals that contact has been made between us and the aliens, but to say we can’t comprehend their language is an understatement.  She and a top-notch mathematician, Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) are flown to the US sites in Montana and are given an impossible task: decipher the alien language and ask them why they’re here.

The design of the aliens and their ship are visual masterstrokes.  The ship, in fact, bears a striking resemblance to the famous Cloud Gate sculpture, aka “The Bean”, in downtown Chicago.  (Google it if you’re unfamiliar with it.)  But imagine it standing vertical on end, matte gray-black instead of chrome, and hundreds of feet tall.  Ominous and delicate at the same time.  The aliens themselves…well, I won’t spoil it for anyone who hasn’t seen it, but I will say they are called “heptapods” by the scientists.  Seven legs.  Cool.

The US researchers and military are connected via satellite to every other landing site around the globe, each attempting to make a communications breakthrough, but it’s Dr. Banks who realizes the aliens may have a form of written communication.  Using a whiteboard and simple words at first, she can have very limited conversations with the heptapods.  But when Banks is finally able to ask the all-important question, “Why are you here”, the answer she gets throws the military and government representatives into a tizzy and they cut off all communications to the other landing sites.

Meanwhile, Dr. Banks has periodically been having extremely vivid visions or memories of her daughter at random moments.  At one point, she is struggling to remember the scientific term for a “win-win” situation, and the memory comes back to her in a flash from a previous conversation with her daughter.  Although it is odd that we hear the term first in the present, and then she remembers it in the past…but enough about that.

Arrival may strike some as slow and plodding.  I suppose they’re right, in a sense.  It lacks any of the deliberately manipulative editing of, say, a Spielberg or a Scorsese film, where the cuts are specifically designed to grab the audience member by the collar and propel them to the film’s high and low points.  By contrast, Arrival takes its time.  It stands back and presents us with all the information we need to really, actively watch the film and work those brain cells.

[The score of Arrival deserves special mention.  In a film whose story arc involves linguistics and translations, it’s appropriate that, at key moments, the score includes multiple human voices harmonizing in ethereal chords or pulsing in a rhythm that sounds utterly alien, not just foreign.  A brilliant touch.]

What gives Arrival that extra push is that question Dr. Banks asks at one point in the film.  “If you could see your whole life from start to finish, would you change things?”  This question, when it comes, has poignant undertones that were not even hinted at in previous scenes.  And I find it to be incredibly moving, every time.  In fact, I wonder if I’m not really the prime target audience for this movie.  I wonder if it’s most effective for people who have lost loved ones to disease or accidents – untimely, unbearable deaths.  For those people, I cannot even begin to imagine how they would answer, or if they agree with Dr. Banks’s answer to her own question.

For myself, I have been blessed in this life, knock wood.  I have lost family members, but mostly to old age, although two uncles were taken by cancer in their fifties and sixties.  But I found myself thinking about this question today more than any other time, for some reason.  If I could magically go back in time, while retaining all my current knowledge, would I change things?

It’s deceptively easy to say “yes”, especially when it concerns the big things.  Sure, I would probably not stay as silent as I did when I learned a dear friend was being molested in high school and college.  No, I would probably not have gotten romantically involved that one time with the absolute wrong person.  No, I would most certainly not have skipped work that one day to see Spider-Man 3.  I would have remembered my driver’s license that one time I was pulled over.  I would have rearranged my schedule to go with my father and sister to Spain that one time.  And on and on.

But…if I hadn’t done some of those things…I may not be where I am now.  In a wonderful relationship with my best friend.  Working at a job that has its challenges but is rewarding and accommodating enough for me to do theater.  Surrounded by a support structure of friends that is second to none.  Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.  Just kidding.

Your answer may differ from mine, or from Dr. Banks’s answer in the film.  That’s fine.  We all have our own reasons for our own answers to that question.  What’s wonderful about Arrival is its ability to couch that existential question in a top-notch sci-fi drama that, in its own unflashy way, is every bit as exciting and though-provoking as ten Independence Days.  It looks great, sounds great, acted great…what more could I ask for?

THE BATMAN (2022)

By Marc S. Sanders

Another year at the movies, means another trip to see Batman on the big screen.  I think we are close to a dozen iterations, no?  Fortunately, the latest reinvention for March 2022, The Batman, is a refreshing interpretation that focuses on the detective skills of the masked vigilante hero who prowls from the rooftops of Gotham City.  Matt Reeves has written and directed a gripping and engaging film that doesn’t rely on simple paint by numbers.  He’s capitalized on using the mysterious Riddler (Paul Dano) as the main villain here, and Batman’s (Robert Pattinson) brains get more exercise than his brawn.   

It is the second year since Batman has introduced himself to the crime ridden city.  The man behind the mask, Bruce Wayne, keeps a journal of his exploits and observations, and through voiceover he questions if his actions have benefitted since it appears that crime has only increased since his first appearance.  A serial killer is taking responsibility for the grisly deaths of important people within the city and he’s leaving greeting cards for “The Batman” with a common scribble of “No More Lies,” along with a “?,” and a riddle for The Batman to solve.  Thanks to a strong partnership with Police Lt. Jim Gordon (Jeffrey Wright), Batman is given easy access to the crime scenes so he can attempt to reveal the mysterious villain and determine exactly what his endgame is. The Riddler doesn’t make it easy, though.

Mobsters like the Penguin (Colin Farrell) and Carmine Falcone (John Turturro) have a grip on the city, as well.  There’s also a possible lead from a woman (Zoe Kravitz) who’s managed to infiltrate the gangsters’ underground headquarters.  She also has the fighting skills and agility that’s comparable to the caped crusader, and maybe she’s a cat burglar as well.  Still, is she pertinent to Batman’s investigation or not?

It’s better not to spoil anything that occurs in Reeves’ film.  The mysteries that are uncovered are part of the fun, and it does take some time and exposition to get there, but I found it worth it.  Barring a few ingredients within the film that I recognized from the Christopher Nolan and Tim Burton films, the picture is worth seeing for a new formula on a character, that although is a favorite of mine, I feel has also been done to death on the big and small screens.  This is a Batman film where I appreciate the thinking approach of its craft, over the action.  When Batman is playing detective with Jim Gordon, it is much more enticing than just another Batmobile chase or another ham-handed fist fight.  This film is a test of Batman’s mental capacity and ability for analysis.

Reeves direction is also appreciated, though I’m expecting the naysayers.  The Batman is a very dark motion picture.  When it’s not dark, the photography is dim and blurred.  There’s lots of rain and dimly lit streets and garages.  There are strobe lit nightclubs.  Windows are blurred, so sometimes you can’t make out the image in front of you.  He makes the viewer work for the focus and that kept me alert.  I believe Matt Reeves was attempting to give the viewer the literal point of view of the characters.  It will not be a surprise, however, to find some movie watchers lose patience with the technique. 

The Riddler especially is most mysterious with a twisted and inspired Zodiac killer approach.  Often, Matt Reeves’ film feels especially reminiscent of David Fincher’s Seven.  I would not be surprised if Reeves wrote his script as a cop/detective story, and then added the Batman flavor to make his final draft.  This is not a picture of grand special effects or superpowers and gadgets. 

It’s definitely not the Batman film that everyone wants.  I foresee the response being very divisive.  Nonetheless, if you’re a Batman devotee like me who grew up on the character in the macabre storied comics (as well as the hammy tongue in cheek material), you’re going to be thankful for this “at last” interpretation.  I’ll definitely be seeing it again.

NOTE: The Batman is not a film for children under age 13. I truly believe that. There are disturbing images and threats within the story, and the violence depicted or left to the imagination is not for celebratory effect and amusement. This is definitely a film for mature audiences. Do not presume it’s meant for all ages based on its misleading marketing approach with companies like Legos and Little Caesars pizza.

THE QUIET MAN (1952)

by Miguel E. Rodriguez

Director: John Ford
Cast: John Wayne, Maureen O’Hara, Ward Bond, Victor McLaglen
My Rating: 6/10
Rotten Tomatometer: 91% Certified Fresh

PLOT: A retired American with a secret in his past returns to the village of his birth in 1920s Ireland, where he falls for a spirited redhead, whose brother is contemptuous of their union.


John Ford’s The Quiet Man won two Academy Awards, one of them for Ford himself as Best Director, his fourth Oscar in that category, a feat which has yet to be equaled by any other director since.  It is on the National Film Registry, on the AFI’s list of “100 Years, 100 Passions”, and is included in the invaluable annually updated book of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.  It currently carries a 91% Certified Fresh rating on the Rotten Tomatoes website and is JUST outside of the IMDb’s top 250 most highly rated films.

(And, as movie nuts will be happy to tell you, this is also the film E.T. is watching on TV when he’s drunk at home and Elliot is at school with the frogs…)

I mention all of this because I want to stress the amazing “pedigree” of The Quiet Man, a film which many have called John Wayne’s finest, one in which the familiar Wayne swagger is on display, but without the kind of Western bravado that was so integral to his success in the movies.  Yet, despite this rather impressive list of accomplishments, The Quiet Man is not quite as timeless as I hoped it would be.  It’s a relic of romantic attitudes that went out of style with the sexual revolution, the Me-Too movement, and – I’ll just say it – common sense.  It has its moments, of course, but aside from one genuine laugh-out-loud moment and a fistfight for the ages, it’s a bit of a chore.

John Wayne plays Sean Thornton, a man looking to escape his past by reconnecting with Ireland, the land of his birth, some time in the 1920s.  In the process, he falls madly in love with Mary Kate Danaher, a fiery-headed and fierce-tempered lass played by Maureen O’Hara.  Such is the chemistry between these two lovebirds that when they first lay eyes on each other, the normally stoic Mary Kate can barely walk ten feet before turning back to stare at Sean’s goofy grin…once, then twice, then THREE times.  Sean asks an old friend, “Hey, is that real?  She couldn’t be…!”  Yeah.  They talk like that all through the picture.

Anyway, one thing leads to another, and they start courting.  But Mary Kate’s elder brother, Will (played by Victor McLaglen with a face that looks like it was put together by a committee of blind men), is against their union because Sean plans to buy a parcel of land he’s been angling to get for himself.  And because this is the ‘20s, the elder brother’s word is law, so no romance for Sean and Mary Kate.  Until, that is, the townsfolk intercede on behalf of the lovebirds.  Small village, you know…the kind where everybody’s private business is an open secret.

The rest of the story is fairly predictable.  Marriage, Will still objects, a new home, the bride’s determination not to consummate the marriage until she gets her dowry, the false crisis, the big fight between Sean and Will at the climax, and so on.  The movie rises and falls on the chemistry between Sean and Mary Kate and the obstacles to their happiness.  Some formulas are old because they still work, and it is competently exploited in The Quiet Man.

For me, though, I must be honest and say that I was never quite engrossed in the story and atmosphere as I would have hoped.  For one thing, John Ford shot much of the film on location in Ireland, an extravagance not commonly indulged in during the 1950s.  However, there are insert shots here and there that were obviously staged and filmed on a studio set.  They are so obvious they became a distraction, something that has never really bothered me in other films of that era.

For another, the attitudes between men and women in The Quiet Man are hopelessly dated, so much so that I’m surprised this film still enjoys such a high rating on IMDb.  For example, there’s a famous scene where Sean intercepts Mary Kate as she’s about to leave on a train because Sean won’t ask her brother for her dowry.  Sean pulls her from the train and drags her home.  Literally drags her.  As they cross a green field, Mary Kate loses her balance and falls, but Sean barely breaks stride, and she is pulled along the grass like so much flour in a sack.  [The making-of documentary on the blu ray reveals the field was littered with sheep droppings which were not removed at Ford’s insistence.  Ah, showbiz.]  One of the female townsfolk witnesses the scene and yells to Sean: “Sir!  Sir! …here’s a good stick, to beat the lovely lady!”  Say what???

Now look: I’m not advocating for “cancellation” of The Quiet Man.  I’m just saying that you should be warned.  It’s a product of its time as much as Gone with the Wind or Some Like It Hot, full of attitudes and jokes that could never be filmed today except as parody or satire.  I get that, intellectually.  For the sake of this story (there’s a lot I’m leaving out), this scene was a necessary beat so Mary Kate could be finally convinced of Sean’s love and determination, equal to hers in every way.  But scenes like that are so glaring that they took me out of the story, and eventually all I saw was this bully who was pulling this poor woman across poop-littered grass.  What can I say.

Now.  Having said all that…I must admit there is one scene that had me laughing out loud at its daring.  It’s so forthright and downright bawdy, I’m frankly amazed it was allowed to make it into the film at all.  I was about to write a full description below with SPOILER ALERT at the beginning, but I won’t.  It involves a misunderstanding between the local matchmaker and broken furniture.  You’ll know it when you see it.  It was such a risqué joke that theaters in Boston edited it out of their film reels when it was released.  I laughed out loud pretty dang hard.

That brilliant joke aside, The Quiet Man is a serviceable film, showcasing two stars, Wayne and O’Hara, at or near the height of their powers, but who are at the mercy of a melodramatic script that is nearly a parody of itself.  I’m not sorry I watched it, you understand.  It’s a piece of Americana as ingrained in cinema history as Singin’ in the Rain.  But on the whole…I would rather watch Singin’ in the Rain for the fiftieth time than watch The Quiet Man again.  At least, not so soon.  Maybe in a few years.

MARGIN CALL

By Marc S. Sanders

Could it have been possible that a rocket scientist and a bridge engineer uncovered one of the biggest market crashes in American history?  Writer/Director J.C. Chandor’s first film, Margin Call, will have you believe that.  It makes sense when you think about it.  Numbers and bar graphs and pie charts and zig zagging lines become so complex with themselves that you have to wonder how people wearing $1500 designer suits and selling products over the phone could decipher such nonsense.  So, it would take a rocket scientist to unravel such an exceedingly large ball of rubber bands in only one night.  Yet, how does a rocket scientist and a bridge engineer come to encounter this predicament.  Easy.  It’s all about money.  You might be the greatest scientist in the world, but if the pay isn’t right, is the science really worth it? 

Zachary Quinto plays Peter Sullivan, the rocket scientist from MIT.  Stanley Tucci plays Eric Dale, the bridge engineer.  They abandoned their college majors and specialties to go where the earnings are much more lucrative.  They both work in the risk management department for a large, unnamed New York investment bank.  On a Thursday afternoon, along with a whole slew of other people, Eric is fired.  His company cell phone is immediately shut off and he’s escorted quickly out of the building along with his personal belongings.  Before he leaves, he’s able to pass off a computer file for Peter to have a look at.  Eric was close to completing something deeply impactful, but didn’t get a chance to finish.  When Peter stays late after work to download the file, a stunned look eventually appears across his face, and he’s quickly calling back his workmates at 10 o’clock at night.  Those guys were getting hammered at the nightclub downtown, celebrating that they were not on the chopping block earlier in the day.

The cataclysmic results of Peter’s discovery is first passed on to his buddy Seth (Penn Badgely), then to the next level up which is Will Emerson, supervisor of trading (Paul Bettany).  Will then tosses it over to the higher risk supervisor, Sam Rogers (Kevin Spacey), who then passes it on to the Jared Cohen (Simon Baker), maybe the company’s second in command.  Jared assembles the men to meet with Sarah Robinson and Ramesh Shah (Demi Moore and Aasif Mandvi), who compute risk at even high level. 

Chandor is so genuine with his script and characters that as the earth-shattering news gets shared and then shared again and again, each higher up the food chain demands that it be explained to them in simple English.  By the time, Jared passes on this news to the head, HEAD Honcho, John Fuld (Jeremy Irons in a thankfully scene stealing performance), it is being requested of Peter to speak to John as if he were a golden retriever.  I guess in the corporate world, the sharper your clothes and hairstyle are, as well as the more formal your position title is called, the simpler the explanations need to become.  The ones who earn the big bucks don’t sit on the top floor to be belabored with charts and graphs that lack prestige and personality.

I want to point out a symbolic sequence here as well.  Each higher up seems to work on a higher floor than the other.  So, Seth and Peter accompany Will and Sam up an elevator to where Sarah, Ramesh and Jared are located.  After this meeting, Seth, Peter and Will go up on the rooftop of the building to smoke and commiserate.  Will even considers jumping.  They are then interrupted from an even higher level beyond the pinnacle of the building.  A helicopter arrives with John in tow.  God has descended at this inconvenient hour to tend to his prophets and their disciples.

Margin Call might sound like a complex assembly of numbers and math.  It really isn’t though, because Chandor approaches his film without ever really giving away how complex the issue is.  Instead, he demonstrates how deep it is.  Sam focuses on a computer screen and asks “Wait, is that number right?”  Peter’s nervousness is enhanced with his hands laced behind his head as he paces back and forth.  Will has been chewing on Nicorette gum up to this point.  Midway through the film, he’s back to smoking.  Seth understands that the mass firing he just survived hours earlier will inevitably catch up to him and all he can do is cry on the toilet.  Sarah comforts herself by asking Peter if the report he’s laid out is his work.  She wants to be excluded from being a cause of the crisis.  The best indicator of how serious and intense this has become is when an ice cool looking and handsome Simon Baker (even the blue tie he wears says icy cool) as Jared asks for the time.  It’s 2:15am.  He mutters to himself “Fuck me,” and then asks again for the time.  It’s 2:16. “Fuck me,” with a leap off the chair and a distant stare out the window.

The nature of the problem isn’t so important to grasp.  What’s necessary to take away from Margin Call, is that the gods of currency have irresponsibly and deliberately neglected the warning signs.  The returns have just been too damn good.  Now the boat has taken on too much water to stay afloat, though.  Chandor opts to focus on the response and behavior to the dilemma at hand.  There’s whispered blame to be exchanged.  There’s the need to stay silent.  When Jeremy Irons eventually comes into the fold, he holds a board meeting and calmly asks for someone to explain the situation.  Chandor points his camera on concerned close ups of middle age men not willing to speak up; messengers who truly believe they’ll be killed for delivering the dire news.  Even Jared can’t speak.

The sad outcome of the film is actually how the crash of 2008 with Collateralized Debt Obligations and Sub Prime Mortgage Defaults (see Adam McKay’s The Big Short) played out on the eve of its first day.  The investment bank in the film opts to sell off its worthless assets that enormously exceed the entire net worth of the billion-dollar company.  Chandor’s film reminds us that it’s legal to do so, and the buyers of this “odorous bag of excrement,” are John and Jane Q. Public.  At 9:30am, these brokers will put on the charm and sell at a price of $100/share knowing that by 2:00pm, it’ll be worth .65 cents/share, if they’re lucky.  Their customers paid for porterhouse, but went home with a cold burger in a doggy bag.  It’s the only way to survive. 

There are no heroes in Margin Call.  There are only profit makers.  Profits that are earned at the expense of everyone else on the planet.

BATMAN: MASK OF THE PHANTASM

By Marc S. Sanders

Batman: The Animated Series from Warner Bros was a hallmark in telling more mature stories that could still appeal to kids, but adults as well for the superhero genre. Due to the show’s success, following the release of Tim Burton’s successful live action films, the animated series spun off a film of its own for the theatrical medium, and it works.

Subtitled Mask Of The Phantasm, Batman finds himself to be the blame for some vigilante murders of high-ranking mobsters in Gotham City. Turns out there’s another shadowy caped figure causing the mayhem.

At the same time, Bruce Wayne (Kevin Conroy) is reunited with an old flame (Dana Delany) who has returned. Their history is told in flashbacks, and it could pertain to the appearance of this Phantasm. The Joker (Mark Hamill) is causing interference as well.

The animators and writers for Batman: Mask Of The Phantasm take their film completely seriously. From a story perspective, there are plot developments at stake along with the colorful cast of characters. Batman especially looks great as does his cave, Batmobile, Bat Cycle and Bat Plane. The Art Deco settings of Gotham City’s skyscrapers, and broad angles that enhance the vastness of the city are completely immersive. The voices work too.

The movie certainly ranks better than the Joel Schumacher Batman films, and at least just as good as Tim Burton’s second effort with the Caped Crusader, Batman Returns.

Batman: Mask Of The Phantasm is a great adventure steeped in mystery and big surprises. I really liked it.

PHANTOM THREAD

By Marc S. Sanders

I remember how much I loved Anderson’s 90s films Boogie Nights and Magnolia as well as the hauntingly genuine There Will Be Blood. (Let’s not talk about Punch Drunk Love.) Still, I never expected to like Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread, but as soon as it began, I fell in love with it.

Daniel Day Lewis plays a perfectionist dressmaker adept at using women at his behest to sustain and elevate his craft. He’s a ruthless, maybe bipolar, villain and he will remain as one of cinema’s best actors for at least the next hundred years.

Anderson doesn’t just show his characters. He shows their specialties whether it’s dressmaking, porn, show biz or oil. The industry is its own character. Here he masterfully depicted the industry of clothes making.

Anderson offers a convincing education in dress design and fabric construction with the details and measurements it requires. Swatches of fabric never looked sexier amid a mid 20th century European backdrop. The dialogue is uncompromising in its humor, craft and cruelty both from and to its characters.

The ending was very obscure and strange though. Thankfully it happens quickly and is not dragged out, otherwise my opinion might be different.

This Best Picture nominee from 2017 is definitely worth a look.

THE SHAPE OF WATER

By Marc S. Sanders

I love fantasy and science fiction for one simple rule. A writer/director’s imagination can be limitless. Rules for a good fantasy are normally established in the exposition, and as long as those rules are not violated, a viewer will accept the narrative all the way to the end. The Shape Of Water is loyal to its set up.

Director/Co-Writer, Guillermo Del Toro continues his reputable streak of very adult (yet playful) fantasy. In 50 years, I would not be surprised if Disney/Pixar remade this film and Pan’s Labyrinth for younger PG audiences simply because the roots of the stories are so well played out.

Here is a Cold War love story between an alien and a good soul played by Sally Hawkins doing her best mute. Hawkins is bright eyed and wonderful. She’s a character that doesn’t judge and only recognizes despair for salvation. I thought she was great at conveying her performance through the limits of only facial expression, sign language, sex and self pleasure in a bathtub. Try to avoid snickers at that last description. It really is an honest, necessary reflection of a lonely innocent woman. I appreciated the writing and performance there.

Michael Shannon is back on screen playing a frightening villain…again. The reasons for his ruthless intentions were never clear to me, but either Shannon is that good an actor or he’s gotta be like this in real life. This is not a guy I’d ever want to cut in line at Starbucks, much less audit his books. He’s scary good.

Didn’t find much point to Richard Jenkins lonely neighbor except to drive a van, eat pie, be unemployed and be a token homosexual. Same with Octavia Spencer. Was she channeling a more subtle Whoopi Goldberg from Ghost? Don’t get me wrong. Jenkins and Spencer are fine actors here, and their characters are likable, but they don’t add much to the story except to be Hawkins’ sidekicks. Too much story was devoted to them though unnecessarily. Del Toro and his co-writer might have used them for too much filler.

Del Toro doesn’t stop with the new material as the two hours swim on by at a nice pace. We are treated to a wonderful Busby Berkeley song and dance moment that is just inviting to be spoofed by the Wayans or Zucker brothers, sensual nudity is there, not for perversion, but to send home the message that though this relationship is weird, it’s also the real deal. I bought it all the way through. Racism and gay prejudice are perhaps unnecessary in a film like this but there is key lime pie. Cats are consumed. Cold War espionage is on hand with Russian spies, dirty American government politics is there too, and oh yeah, there’s an amphibious alien who seems like any one of Spielberg’s extra-terrestrials we’ve seen before. Yet, I’ll take this one as well because he’s narrated into a very mature love story that is hard not to like.

As quick as the movie begins, you know how it is going to end. Again I don’t mind. Most of the execution rescues the story’s predictability.

Del Toro won Best Director and the film was awarded Best Picture at the Oscars. It’s not what I would pick, but there could be worse choices from that year’s selections.

I liked The Shape Of Water. Most of it at least.

MENACE II SOCIETY

By Marc S. Sanders

Sometimes I’ll come across a movie that I will not like until the very, very end; until literally the last 60 or 90 seconds. The Hughes Brothers’ film Menace II Society is one such movie.

There’s great skill at work here. I saw that from the film’s explosive beginning and then all the way through. This is a story centered in the California ghetto known as Watts, following the 1965 riots through the drug trafficking 70s and then quickly transitioning into present day 1993 when the film was originally made. Rodney King was fresh in the country’s psychosis.

A kid named Caine (Tyrin Turner at the adult stage) is the central character. We see him at age 10 witness his father murdering a friend by shooting him across the kitchen table. (If you’re keeping score, that’s another Samuel L Jackson cameo.) Caine’s mother eventually dies from an overdose; his father we are told dies in a deal gone wrong. Caine is blessed to move in with his grandparents. He befriends a young woman with a 5-year-old, along with another friend who tries to influence the teachings of Islam, as well as a kid with a football scholarship. Then there are those who see no other way to live except to always be strapped and ready for a drive by or to rip off a car. Caine’s closest friend, O-Dog (Larenz Tate) will be more than happy and carefree to fire his pistol at anyone who says something disagreeable.

So what didn’t I like? Well, maybe it’s me, but I normally look for a transition in a main character. That special moment where a kid’s life will change; where it will occur to him to make a change. That doesn’t happen for Caine, and it frustrated me. He is impulsive to beat up someone, steal a car, get a girl pregnant, continue to deal and continue to disregard those that try to rescue him from the threat of living in the hood. Opportunities are offered and yet Caine never considers them as better alternatives.

Maybe that’s how it is in the hood. I will not even presume to understand. My upbringing was more advantageous to me and I’m not an authority on the despair and violence that exists in that world. Sad that it still must persistently exist at all.

So the film is quickly approaching its end, and STILL I’m asking what is the point if Caine is the same here as he was in the beginning. He’s no better. He’s no worse. He’s just the same with no change.

But, then…THEN…Caine’s last voiceover kicks in with some telling words accompanied by The Hughes Brothers’ wise choice to accompany it with some quick flashbacks, and now I fully understand and realize that what I watched was an insightful piece of shoestring budget filmmaking that left me thinking.

Second chances are fleeting. Life can easily be taken for granted with no reason to hold any value for it. There will be casualties and collateral damage because of your recklessness. Yeah, it’s all a recognizable “After School Special” but it still holds power here.

Forget it!!!!! Don’t even ask me to spoil what that epilogue literally recited or its relevance. Come back to me after you’ve watched Menace II Society. Then we’ll talk.

UNCHARTED

By Marc S. Sanders

None of what is said in the film Uncharted matters.  The film opens in the middle of a death defying, albeit CGI, action scene with heartthrob Tom Holland dangling from a cargo net that’s hanging outside of a plane thirty thousand feet above the ground.  He apologizes as he kicks a couple of faceless thugs out into the great wide open, and he rolls his eyes at an oncoming sportscar driving off the plane’s ramp in his direction.   But it’s not like he’s worried that the car will mow him down and kill him before the fall would even do so.  That’s because even here he’s just charming Tom Holland who’s never afraid to die.  I guess that was my problem with this escapist film, based on a popular video game.  No one was ever afraid they’d die.  So, why should I be?  Excuse me while I refill my popcorn.  You don’t have to tell me what I miss.  I’m sure I’ll catch on.

Holland portrays treasure seeking adventurer Nathan Drake.  Early on, it is established that his brother is being held captive somewhere.  Nathan is receiving postcards from him, with statements written on them that seem more like riddles.  Hmmm!  Is his brother sending him clues, do you think?  One of their last conversations while they were living in an adoption house was something about gold hidden by Magellan.  The conversation went on longer than I cared, honestly.  I gave up on the details.  These scholars weren’t going to tell me anything intriguing.  That’s the best way to approach Uncharted.  Just watch for the CGI stunts, Holland’s agility on bannisters and bar counters, and see how all the secret doorways open. 

Soon after the exposition, Nathan is accompanied by a slightly older adventurer named Victor Sullivan, or Sully (Mark Wahlberg).  Holland and Wahlberg toss some smart alec zingers at one another.  See they’re only supposed to get along so much. 

The guys attend a black-tie auction where I knew Nathan was gonna be dangling from those hanging ceiling lamps somehow, and then they are on their way to Barcelona.  Oh yeah.  A diary helps them out as well with some clues that turn up only when they have to conveniently turn up.  A map will help them too, only when it’s conveniently there.  I’m not interested though in watching Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg trace their fingers across a map.  There’s also the beautiful adventurous girl, Chloe (Sophia Ali), who we are supposed to trust or maybe not trust.  The bad guys are Antonio Banderas, who’s really given nothing to do except have his name listed in the credits.  Look at that!  PlayStation Studios actually contracted Antonio Banderas to be in their movie!!!!!!  I did say bad guys, right?  Sorry.  The other one is an Asian woman named Braddock (Tati Gabrielle), who’s only interesting trait is the blade she carries is in the shape of a scythe.  It’s only held and hardly gets used.

Are you starting to recognize that all I’m describing is surface material here?  There’s no depth to anyone.  Uncharted is so afraid to swim in the deep end, that it doesn’t even connect our hero Nathan with his long-lost brother.  Like ever!!!!  The film acts like a video game and thinks like a video game.  So why not just leave it as a video game?  If you want to make a movie, then the filmmakers should have gone a lot deeper.

It’s easy to compare this modern update on the adventure film to Romancing The Stone or any of the Indiana Jones pictures.  What continues to set those forty-year-old movies ahead of this fare, is that we actually feared for the characters.  Kathleen Turner’s apprehensive motive for going from New York City to the rain swept jungles of Cartagena was to rescue her kidnapped sister while trying to uncover a priceless treasure along the way. Her sister could be fed to the alligators at any given moment, or worse Turner could be brutalized by vicious Columbians on her tail.  When the famed archeologist, Indiana Jones, gets trapped in an underground room full of snakes or is left dangling over a bottomless pit, he looks terrified.  He has no rope to hang from and there really is no way out, and he knows it.  This could be the end. 

Nathan Drake, however, knows it’s never the end for Nathan Drake, and that’s…well…that’s boring. 

What can I say?  I’ve always gotten bored quickly with video games.  I know.  I know.  You’re gonna debate with me that this is BASED ON A VIDEO GAME.  Fine.  I agree.  Yet, I paid for a movie.  At times Uncharted moves like a video game character that walks in place when confronted with a wall.  Your joystick can’t figure out how to turn the guy around so he can trot in another direction away from the edge of your flatscreen TV.  It just doesn’t go anywhere until, how do you like that, Sully and Nathan turn to the right page in the diary or read the right post card from the long-lost brother that we never get to see.  Wait!  Let’s look at the map!

I really like Tom Holland.  He’s charming and handsome and athletic.  Spider-Man has demonstrated that he’s a good actor too, beyond the comic book action.  He’s definitely cut out for a tongue and cheek action picture.  Mark Wahlberg is ready to be the mentor.  He’s fine as well.  He’s just done it better in a film like The Italian Job.  They look like a great pair of partners.  Unfortunately, they are given nothing to demonstrate how good a pair they really could be.  Put a little fear in these guys.  Make believe they’ll actually drown or fall to their death from a helicopter.  Put them at the wrong end of a gun or a sword.  Heck, when you give them a sword, allow me to believe they aren’t so proficient with it.  I mean Holland is only 25 or 26 here.  How much could he have learned already.  Let them get shot in the arm, and still carry on.  Give them a limp.  Cut their lip or bruise their temple.  Uncharted doesn’t do any of that.  It only jumps to the next level, and as soon as you dispose of a baddie, they fade away out of the scene…like in a video game.

It’s not terribly bad.  Uncharted is like going over to your friend’s house, though.  He shows off his PlayStation by popping in the game and he promises he’ll let you have a turn to play.  Only your turn never comes, and while you sit there gazing at the posters and trophies in his room, your friend thinks he’s entertaining you for hours as his game goes on and on and on.  So, uh…when’s it my turn to use the controller??????

REVERSAL OF FORTUNE

By Marc S. Sanders

Claus Von Bülow was not a well liked man. In the 1980s he was put on trial for the attempted murder of his wife Sunny Von Bülow and was found guilty in a courtroom within the state of Rhode Island. However, even guilty men need a lawyer. Alan Dershowitz accepted Claus’ invitation to be his appellate attorney and successfully won the case with the assistance of the best students to come out of his law school classes. Reversal Of Fortune directed by Barbet Schroeder documents the month and a half that Dershowitz had to make a case for overturning Claus’ conviction. The film is based on Dershowitz’ book Reversal Of Fortune: Inside The Von Bülow Case.

Jeremy Irons won the 1990 Best Actor Oscar for portraying the cold and cavalier Claus. He plays the part as if he looks so completely guilty that it’d be foolish to actually think he committed any sort of crime. It’s too obvious to seriously jump to that conclusion.

Glenn Close is Sunny, Claus’ wife. She serves as a narrator from her permanent, seemingly brain dead comatose state. She also appears in flashback moments that account for either her perspective, or Claus’, or the suppositions of Dershowitz (played very effectively by Ron Silver) and his young legal team. Sunny’s voiceover asks the viewer early on “What do you think?”

Sunny was hooked on various pills, chain smoked, ate an abundance of sweets and drank very heavily. She preferred to stay in bed for most of her days. One instance seems to show her in a comatose state lying next to an unalarmed Claus. The maid is disturbed by the nonchalance of the aristocratic husband. A doctor or the police have yet to be phoned. Sunny comes out of that episode but a year later falls into another comatose state. Flashbacks hint at the theory that perhaps Claus was poisoning Sunny to obtain her fortune and keep up with his extra marital affairs. Following her second coma, Sunny’s children hire a private investigator to obtain evidence that was eventually used against Claus in his trial. As an honorable servant of the law, this infuriated Alan Dershowitz who believed this private investigation was biased from the start. Schroeder uses a debate scene with a student (a young Felicity Huffman) for the lawyer to justify his choice to fight for such a hateful man’s appeal. Why were private investigators permitted in the trial? Where’s the public investigation? It also helps that Claus agrees to a large fee to help Dershowitz fund the defense of two brothers on death row for a crime they did not commit.

Schroeder’s film does not make its own claim on the case or the circumstances that accompany it. Rather, he shows you a process. Dershowitz knows that Claus Von Bülow is a “very strange man.” Claus responds to him by saying “You have no idea.” Yet, that doesn’t add up to guilt. A victim can be a victim by means of numerous possibilities and a court of law is fallible. Dershowitz wants to be sure.

Jeremy Irons’ performance is that of a gentleman of an aristocratic and well dressed nature. He finds the humor in being considered the villain. Irons plays the role with determined vagueness. Vague does not account for guilt.

Glenn Close is very good too. Her intoxicated episodes are so delirious that it seems to work in favor of Claus’ innocence. Yet her voiceover narration is sober and clear, but not necessarily accusatory. So it’s hard to know what to believe.

Ron Silver as Alan Dershowitz only focuses on the law and commanding a team of the best legal minds he ever taught. He turns his two story home into a headquarters where his students are compartmentalized into different aspects of the case from the drugs that Sunny took to the background of the Von Bulow’s turbulent marriage. As a means to keep them alert, the departments have basketball tournaments in his driveway. Dribbling the ball and slam dunking while still weighing evidence and legal precedents. Dershowitz is only interested in seeing if there is a case that shows Claus could have been innocent beyond a reasonable doubt. The case swept the nation and in the court of public opinion this creep was found guilty. Ironically, the one who is closest to him now is the one who does not see guilt, despite disturbances in his client.

Reversal Of Fortune is a different kind of mystery caught up in possible outcomes and nothing else. Barbet Schroeder with the help of Dershowitz’ case notes, book and public records made certain to offer all avenues for what really led to Sunny Von Bülow’s vegetative state.

The only concrete fact that this film does offer is that Claus Von Bülow was an untrustworthy creep draped in elegance and formality. There’s no crime in that. Is there?