88th Annual Academy Awards Predictions- How I Did

I made the following predictions in the major Oscar categories.  

Best Picture:  The Revenant       Winner:   Spotlight

The Revenant appeared to be rolling toward a Best Picture win after winning Best Director and Best Actor late.    Not to be.     Spotlight won two awards all night including the big one.     This has not happened to a Best Picture winner since 1952's The Greatest Show on Earth.    I thought Spotlight was dead in the water.

Best Actor:   Leonardo DiCaprio      Winner:   Leonardo DiCaprio

This was a foregone conclusion in this category.    DiCaprio won every major acting award since awards season started.    

Best Actress:  Brie Larson       Winner:  Brie Larson.

See Leonardo DiCaprio, only substitute Larson for DiCaprio


Best Supporting Actor:   Mark Rylance       Winner:   Mark Rylance

Sylvester Stallone was a sentimental favorite, but let's face it Rocky Balboa is a role he has played in seven films.     (Soon to be eight, maybe nine).     Stallone's early Golden Globe and Critics Choice wins were not chosen by peers.     These actors did not square off against each other in any peer-voted awards until this one.       All the performances were strong in this category, including Stallone's, but an ostensible lifetime achievement award wasn't to be.    Rylance was a deserving winner. 


Best Supporting Actress:    Kate Winslet       Winner:  Alicia Vikander

Winslet had the early lead with a Golden Globe win, while Vikander won a SAG award for her role in The Danish Girl.     I'm sure it was a tight race, but we don't know who finished second.


Best Director:   George Miller         Winner:  Alejandro G. Inarritu

Mad Max: Fury Road went on a tear in the technical categories.     However, Inarritu won his second consecutive Director's Guild Award two weeks ago and now has his second straight Oscar.     This is the first time since 1950 a director has won back-to-back Oscars and only the third time ever overall.    The Director's Guild Award is about as close as you can get to predicting an Oscar win in this category.


Best Adapted Screenplay:   The Big Short      Winner:    The Big Short

The screenplay based on Michael Lewis' book used plenty of originality in explaining what and how the characters were trying to make money off of a potential housing market crisis in the mid-2000s.    

Best Original Screenplay:    Straight Outta Compton     Winner:   Spotlight

I predicted this win for Straight Outta Compton as a way for the writers' branch to reflect diversity that wasn't present in the acting branches this year.     Spotlight proved to be too much to overcome with its powerful subject matter.    

Manhattan (1979) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Woody Allen

Starring:  Woody Allen, Diane Keaton, Mariel Hemingway, Meryl Streep, Michael Murphy

Manhattan itself is as much a co-star in Woody Allen's 1979 black and white comedy as any of the actors.     It is the backdrop of Allen's romantic comedy, which covers the romantic tribulations of Isaac Davis (Allen).     The city is vibrant, alive, and scenic, yet it does not overtake the human comedy Allen evokes.     His Isaac Davis is not a million miles removed from his screen persona, but in each film he manages to tweak it enough to make it unique and special.     He is forever at war with himself over what his heart wants vs. what his head tells him to do.    The heart usually wins, but the head doesn't go down without a fight.    Not in Woody Allen's world.

Isaac is a 42- year-old divorced comedy writer who hates his job, but hey it pays the bills.     He has two alimonies and child support payments.     One of his alimony checks goes to his lesbian ex-wife Jill (Streep), who is writing a tell-all book about her life with Isaac.     It is not flattering.     She even promises to bring up the time when Isaac nearly ran over her lover with his car.     He insists it was accidental.    Jill retorts, "What would Freud say?"

Isaac's relationship with a 17-year old student named Tracy (Hemingway-in an Oscar-nominated role) foreshadows Allen's own headline-grabbing controversy involving his now-wife Soon-Yi Previn.     Tracy is at least not the daughter of Isaac's girlfriend, but still 17 is 17.      

Tracy innocently and sweetly idealizes Isaac, who enjoys spending time with her but wonders aloud why he is in the relationship.     He slowly tries to exit it by telling her to go to London when she is awarded a scholarship there.     ("You will think of me as a fond memory.")     His head tells him to let her go, but his heart may feel differently.   

Further complicating Isaac's troubled love life is his friendship with his best friend's mistress which turns into a sexual one.    She is Mary (Keaton), an intellectual who at first infuriates Isaac with her observations.    ("I'm from Philadelphia, we don't cheat on each other there.")     Soon he finds himself drawn to her, despite her relationship with his married best friend Yale (Murphy).     Perhaps he likes her because she isn't Tracy and doesn't cause him much internal conflict.   

Yale and Mary soon split up, but Yale soon finds he misses Mary, much like Isaac soon realizes he misses Tracy.     It is a classic case of wanting someone more after she's gone.    Isaac achieves clarity once Tracy has moved on with her life and he is left to yearn once more.     Maybe he likes it that way.    He can not see a conceivable future with Tracy because he's 42 and she is jailbait.    He is correct to think that, but he can not stop himself from feeling for her anyway.    

Manhattan expounds on themes which Allen masterfully handled in Annie Hall (1977), which won Allen two of his four Oscars over his long career.     There are plenty of wonderful Allen-isms thrown in for good measure.     When he hears a mysterious loud noise in his apartment, he says, "I'm living with rats with bongos and a giant frog."     This line reminds me of his classic line in Annie Hall when he describes a "lobster as big as a Buick".     The dialogue veers too often early on into intellectual-speak in which one needs a degree in philosophy to understand, but Allen soon brings the material to where it is most comfortable for us.     We have all felt that way Allen does about our relationships.     He is simply able to communicate them in a funnier way.     If he didn't, some of his comedies would be borderline tragedies.     










 

88th Oscars Wrap-Up

The 88th Academy Awards is in the books.    I finished 4 for 8 (50%) on my picks in major categories.     I fared much better in the technical categories.     I went 15 for 23 overall.     The show itself managed to be over by midnight, which is in itself a feat.     Here are my observations from the broadcast:

*    Chris Rock was at ease as host, with material that was more in his wheelhouse than in 2005 when he last hosted.     The material focused heavily on diversity (i.e. lack of minority actors nominated in the acting categories).     Rock's monologue was hit and miss with the controversial topic.   Sometimes things went too far and made the audience wince, but other jokes were spot on.    Why did they have to go to jokes involving lynching though?    And did the audience really need to be hit with a barrage of jokes after everyone got the point? 

*    I laughed at the "Black History Month Minute", in which Angela Bassett paid tribute to an actor "who starred in the Enemy of the State, who starred in the animated comedy 'Shark Tale', and was one half of a fresh singing duo."     We all assumed Bassett was talking about Will Smith, but the tribute was for Jack Black instead.     It was a funny swerve.   

*    With all of the discussion about diversity, what will happen in the future?     Did Will Smith practically guarantee himself a nomination next year because of the uproar surrounding him this year?    This is a slippery slope the Academy must negotiate, especially with something as subjective and sometimes political as Oscar voting is already.  

*     Rock's monologue focused exclusively on the absence of black nominees, but what about other minority groups?     My belief is that the issue is not as much the absence of minority nominees, but the absence of minorities in major roles in studio films.     2015 was a year in which very few minority actors starred in juicy roles that anybody saw.     The studios' output is dictated by box office.     If a black actor can bring in the same money that Leonardo DiCaprio could, then that actor would star in the bigger films.       It's an economic thing more than it is implied racism.    

*    I liked how the broadcast handled acceptance speeches.     Winners had their lists of people to thank on a scroll at the bottom of the screen, which is supposed to keep their speeches shorter.     It worked better, but some speeches still ran a bit too long.    Still, it is a good first step to limit the thanking of agents and people no one knows.  

*    Mad Max: Fury Road led the night with 6 Oscars, all in technical categories.    What the hell was that outfit worn by Costume Design winner Jenny Beavan?    She looked like she arrived at the ceremony as a member of the Hell's Angels.     It is ironic the winner of the Best Costume Design Oscar was dressed the worst.     Just because she designed the costumes for Mad Max doesn't mean she had to dress like a cast member.

*    Only 3 of the 5 Original Song nominees were performed.     Lady Gaga's angry, emotional performance of her song, "'Til It Happens to You/" was moving.     The song lost, however, to Writing's on the Wall" from Spectre.    This is the second straight Bond film to win Best Original Song.

*    There were only 5 standing ovations vs. 11 last year and the absurd 12 the year before.     If the crowd gives a standing ovation for everything, then that devalues the impact of the standing ovation.   The crowd picked its spots this year, making the ovations more meaningful.

*    Spotlight won Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay.    It won the first award of the night and the last.     The last movie to win Best Picture and only one other award during a ceremony was The Greatest Show on Earth (1952).      The Revenant appeared to have snatched the momentum from Mad Max: Fury Road with Best Director and Best Actor wins, but Spotlight took home the big prize.     The Revenant finished with three awards. including a second consecutive Best Director win for Alejandro G. Inarritu.     This feat last occurred in 1949 and 1950, when Joseph L. Mankiewicz won for A Letter to Three Wives and All About Eve respectively.

*    Dave Grohl's subtle, gentle version of Blackbird sung during the In Memoriam tribute was well done.     The tone was just right.    It was just Grohl singing with an acoustic guitar.    He wasn't delivering vocal exercises.   

*    This was the first year in quite a while in which the four acting category winners were not foregone conclusions.      DiCaprio and Larson's wins were expected since they swept all of the other pre-Oscar awards, but Alicia Vikander had to battle with Kate Winslet for Best Supporting Actress while Mark Rylance had to overcome sentimental favorite Sylvester Stallone to earn his Best Supporting Actor win.     Rylance's role was less flashy than the other nominees', but he was powerfully subdued and observant as Rudolph Abel in Bridge of Spies.    He played a man who was a master of keeping to himself and seeing all since he spent his life as a spy.     Because of this, he was a sympathetic political football kicked back and forth between the Americans and the Soviets in a time when one-upmanship was the norm.

*    DiCaprio was well-prepared with a speech that focused not just on The Revenant, but his parents and the ongoing issue of climate change.     He pointed out that the crew had to travel to the southernmost point on the planet to find snow since 2015 was the warmest year on record to date.   

*     Overall, the telecast was better than in the last few years, which were slowly paced and painfully unfunny.    This was one was actually over while it was still Sunday night, so that represents progress.     I still believe the broadcast could be over just in time for the 11:00 news, but this will never happen.     People tune in to see the celebrities, even if they are presenting a category which many don't really care about.      An observation:   Kerry Washington presents annually at the Oscars for various categories.      What movie of consequence has she appeared in within the last half decade?     She has primarily been on TV.   

The Prestige (2006) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Christopher Nolan

Starring:  Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Scarlett Johansson, Rebecca Hall, David Bowie, Andy Serkis, Piper Perabo

The Prestige is the story of two rival magicians' escalating, dangerous game of one-upmanship which has terrible residual effects on their loved ones and themselves.     They are not so much concerned about the collateral damage as they are about finding the secrets to each other's tricks.     The one that truly has Robert Angier (Jackman) stumped is Alfred Borden's (Bale) Transporting Man illusion, or is it one?    Angier can not fathom how Alfred can enter a device no deeper than a picture frame and reappear somewhere else in the theater instantaneously.      His obsession leads him to Colorado to seek out Nikola Tesla (Bowie), who may hold the secret to the device and may or may not have designed it for Borden already.   

Make no mistake.    Both Angier and Borden are selfish, obsessed, and myopic in their quest to become the most famous magician in Victorian London.     They have tunnel vision which eschews ordinary decency to others.     We could almost pity them if their rivalry did not turn deadly.     As the film opens, both are apprentices under the tutelage of a veteran stage magician.     They act as volunteers from the audience to assist in a Houdini-like act in which Angier's wife (Perabo) is tied up and immersed in a tank of water.    She normally frees herself before drowning, but one night Alfred inexplicably ties her too tight and she drowns.     Angier and Borden become enemies right then and there as Borden can not explain why or if he tied the rope too tight.    

Time passes.    Borden's act becomes the most famous in London, while Angier's career sinks.    The Transporting Man illusion fuels nightly sellouts, while Angier tries any means necessary to determine how the trick is pulled off.     Is it even a trick?     Angier hires an assistant (Johansson), whose job is to spy on Borden and gain access to any information he may have.     Her involvement only muddies the waters further.

Both Borden and Angier utilize the services of veteran stage manager John Cutter (Caine), who finds himself in the middle of their feud and doesn't have the stomach for it.    "Obsession is a younger man's game," he tells Angier.     I enjoyed Caine immensely (I rarely don't) here as someone who spent his whole life around the magic business and knows it in his bones.     He also knows the game between Alfred and Angier will lead to a tragic finish.    

I approach this review as a magician would.     I don't want to reveal secrets.     There are many.    Events and whole identities seem to be one thing, but truly another.     The women in Angier and Borden's lives are sad pawns.     Alfred's wife (Hall) can not understand why Alfred seemingly loves her intently one day and is cold and distant the next.     "You love me today," she says on Alfred's good days.    Soon, she finds this duality a living hell.     Both men make their women's lives miserable, which is of little consequence to them.

It takes nerve to play unsympathetic people like Angier and Borden.     Bale has played insufferable creeps before (American Psycho).     His Borden is not without his own secrets, which seem extreme in retrospect, but maybe fits right in with his pathology.      Jackman's Angier seems more refined of the two men and indeed has reason to be so, but he no less obsessive nor destructive.     What he does when he discovers the payoff to Tesla's machine represents his cold tunnel vision.   

Director Nolan is a master of noir.    Memento, Insomnia, and the Dark Knight trilogy are all great films which explore dark, tortured characters.     These are not fun people to watch, but are no less fascinating.     They are almost to be pitied.    Almost.

The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Anthony Minghella

Starring:   Matt Damon, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, James Rebhorn, Cate Blanchett, Jack Davenport

Watching this film again for the first time since its initial release in 1999, I find myself feeling so dreadfully sorry for Tom Ripley, an opportunist who stoops to murder and deception because "I would rather be a fake somebody than a real nobody."   He is intelligent and good-looking, but he is like wallpaper.   We see it's there, we may even admire it for a second, but then it is quickly forgotten as we move on to other things.  When an opportunity falls into his lap to get a taste of the life which has eluded him, he does what is necessary to hold on to it.

We do not know who Tom Ripley (Damon) really is, but we see glimpses of why he is "talented."    When he is asked what he is good at, he replies matter-of-factly, "Forging signatures, telling lies, and impersonating almost anyone."  We see how well he does these things soon enough.  All of these skills are honed to perfection by the film's end, along with murder. The Talented Mr. Ripley is based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith.  It was the first in a series about the Ripley character, who in future books found himself living the high life he craved, but always with the sense that it may all be snatched away at any moment.  Ripley finds he can live with that paranoia.  

As the film opens, Tom is playing piano for a soprano at a party with affluent guests.  He is wearing a suit jacket with the Princeton emblem emblazoned on it, which draws the attention of Herbert Greenleaf (Rebhorn).   Herbert assumes Ripley went to Princeton and therefore must know his son Dickie (Law).    Tom says nothing to dissuade his incorrect assumption.  We learn Dickie is living off of his family allowance in Italy and his father wants him to return home.  He offers to pay for Tom's expenses in exchange for attempting to lure Dickie home.

Tom spots Dickie and his girlfriend Marge (Paltrow) on a beach and pretends to stumble across them.     Tom looks completely out of place on the beach.  "You're gray almost," Dickie says in reference to Tom's ghastly lack of color.  Tom keeps up the façade of being a Princeton grad.  Dickie soon invites him to lunch while confessing to Marge he doesn't remember him.   No matter.  Dickie, Marge, and Tom become instant friends.   

Tom is enraptured by the opulent lifestyle that Dickie takes for granted.  When he fails to bring Dickie home, Herbert releases him from his obligation but does not pay him anymore, which causes Tom distress.  His dream of living this life will soon be snatched away.  There are other matters that further complicate things, including the arrival of Freddie Miles (Hoffman), an old friend of Dickie's who steals away his attention from Tom.   Marge senses Tom's disappointment.  "When Dickie is focused on you, you feel like the sun is shining only on you.  But when Dickie moves on, it's cold in the shadows."  She has long resigned herself to this truth about him.

Tom's sexuality is part of the undertone in his scenes with Dickie.  We sense Tom is likely homosexual and in love with Dickie, but we also see him hooking up with women when the need arises.  Tom may not even see the world in such terms.  He just latches on to whomever can help him the most.  At some points, Dickie, Freddie, and Marge all suspect that Tom is not who he seems to be.  They nurture their suspicions, but Tom is so charming and endlessly obliging that they are disarmed.   

I will not go further into the plot except to say there are numerous opportunities in which Tom is nearly exposed, but he manages to avoid this through quick thinking and ingenuity.   It is a shame someone as intelligent and resourceful as Tom is saddled with such low self-esteem.  Damon masterfully handles the various moving parts that make up Tom Ripley.  As the real Tom, he is great at just being forgettable.   As the Tom that Dickie and Marge grow to confide in, he learns to inhabit their world like a social chameleon.       

Jude Law was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar as Dickie.  We see why people would be drawn to him and we see why people would be so disappointed when he shuns them.  Friendship to him is cyclical.  You are his best friend until you're not.  He is a charismatic guy capable of dumping old friends and gathering up new ones with cold efficiency.  He may not even realize how much he affects others.  It is just his misfortune that he learns it too late. 

The only quibble I have with the film is that the story does get drawn out to preposterous lengths.  At two hours, 19 minutes, it easily could have been tightened up.   We see Tom get away with so much and such escalating, ludicrous fashion that we go from being co-conspirators to simply hoping he'd either get caught or get away with it.  The Talented Mr. Ripley exists almost masterfully in the performances and the nature of its protagonist.  It is rare we see someone so uncomfortable in his own skin and the darkness it invites.  







 

The Devil's Advocate (1997) * * *

Directed by:  Taylor Hackford

Starring:  Keanu Reeves, Al Pacino, Charlize Theron, Tamara Tunie, Jeffrey Jones, Connie Nielsen, Judith Ivey, Craig T. Nelson

I'm sure many employees have referred to their boss as Satan, but perhaps Kevin Lomax is one person who actually has Satan as a boss.     Lomax (Reeves) is a Florida attorney who has never lost a case.    He is wooed by a powerful New York firm run by John Milton (Pacino) and lures him with the promise of riches, privileges, and an apartment his wife Mary Ann (Theron) adores.     Milton refers to Kevin as "the one they don't see coming."     He may even be talking about himself.  

I apologize if I revealed that Milton is indeed the devil, but this was revealed during trailers before its 1997 release.     There are more secrets to be revealed which shifts everything into focus.     Why does Milton want Kevin to work for him so bad?     What does he see in Kevin besides Kevin's ability to win cases and choose sympathetic juries?     We find out.     There are also supernatural occurrences which Mary Ann witnesses and but can not convince her husband of their veracity.     He dismisses the occurrences as a product of nerves or the stress of moving to an unfamiliar environment.      Kevin is too tied up with a headline-grabbing murder case involving a rich real estate mogul (Nelson) to be overly concerned with his wife's mental health.    Or maybe it is a seductive co-worker (Nielsen) who is holding his attention.  

The Devil's Advocate was directed by Taylor Hackford, who creates an eerie, unsettling atmosphere complete with paintings and sculptures in Milton's office that truly come alive.     Reeves is consistently plausible as the slick, vain Kevin, whose greatest strengths may be what appeals to Milton the most.     Pacino wisely does not play Milton/Satan as so thoroughly evil that no one would want to get within 10 miles of him.     He is well-groomed, charismatic, powerful, and above all, a salesman.     He can sell ice to eskimos, which is good for business if you know what I mean.   

The Devil's Advocate moves easily between the law and the supernatural.    This may seem an ungainly combination, but as Milton himself explains when asked why he chose to get into law, "the law is what sets everything in motion."     He has plans for Kevin which Kevin does not fully understand until the climactic scene, which is both the strongest and weakest part of the movie.    

While sidestepping spoilers, I must say the ending cheats.    What should be the actual ending is replaced by a tacked-on happy ending of sorts.     I was intrigued by the choice Kevin seemingly made only to have it snatched from him.     The true ending is the natural one.    The ending that follows feels phony.     You will see what I mean.     Up until that moment, I enjoyed The Devil's Advocate and all of its sly, schlocky fun.     Yes, a movie about Satan is somehow fun and not an overblown morality tale.   

Kill The Messenger (2014) * * *

Directed by:  Michael Cuesta

Starring:  Jeremy Renner, Rosemarie De Witt, Oliver Platt, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Ray Liotta, Andy Garcia

If you watch the "Breaking News" coverage of mass shootings or other terrible events on network or cable news channels, new developments flash on screen instantaneously whether the development is actually true or not.    Some are debunked.    Some are outright fabrications.     Some are partially true.   Some are totally true.     In the race to beat the competition, the actual fact checking and journalistic integrity suffers.      Does anyone even bat an eye anymore when a "fact" is proven to be fiction?     This is why Kill The Messenger evokes anger and frustration.     It is based on true events (which of course means there will be factual inaccuracies and scenes pumped up for dramatic purposes), but the overall message is what hits home.      It is sad that the reporter here is vilified, exiled, and soon an outcast in his profession for writing a story that was completely true.     Kill The Messenger shows how this is possible.

The reporter is Gary Webb (Renner), a reporter for the San Jose Mercury News circa 1995 who stumbles across a story involving known drug dealers possibly working in tandem with the CIA.     After further digging, Webb discovers the CIA worked with drug cartels in Nicaragua in the mid-1980s to secretly fund their war against uprising Communist forces.     The CIA could not gain funding through the normal channels, so they cut a deal to use the drug money to fund the secret war.    Webb uses anonymous sources, not an uncommon practice, to gain information.    There are also discoveries that the CIA allowed the drug dealers to infiltrate major cities with their product, such as Los Angeles and New York.  

This is certainly a game-changing story which the paper publishes early in 1996.    Circulation rises, profits rise, and everyone is happy.     The CIA issues denials.    The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times, upset that the smaller newspaper scooped them on the story, perform de facto smear campaigns against Webb himself.     They dig up his past, which includes an adulterous affair with a reporter at his previous paper that led to tragic consequences.     He goes from journalistic hero to persona non grata quickly.     How did this happen to a reporter who wrote a true story?

Webb's own paper exiles him to a small town writing stories on police horse deaths.     His marriage, already on tenuous ground due to his previous affair, begins to crumble.    Mysterious men in suits may or not be following him.     Why did this happen?     Why did these larger reputable newspapers ostensibly take the side of the government instead of possibly investigating further?    Were they afraid of drawing the ire of the CIA?    Isn't the press' function to ensure that they keep the government in check?

In this case, freedom of the press takes a holiday and Webb is left holding the bag.     My questions reflect pie-in-the-sky thinking in a world with numerous shades of gray, but they are still legitimate.     We learn that Webb later submitted his resignation due to his disillusionment with the journalism business and never worked again as a reporter.     His own paper hired an investigator to check up on each of his sources, all of whom denied their involvement.     The corporation running the paper accepted this explanation instead of backing up their reporter or checking further.     They bought into the smear campaign.

It is of little comfort to Webb that the story was proven to be true in 1998 after a government investigation.    The CIA made false promises to communities like South Central LA to investigate, but nothing was ever done.     As all of this plays out, Kill The Messenger becomes a story about what happens when controversy threatens corporate profits.      Webb's paper runs for cover.    They would sacrifice him rather than stand by him.      Jeremy Renner's performance is at the heart of the film.    He is a guy who loves his job and does it diligently, but is ill-equipped to handle the shit storm that followed.     He gains our sympathy without any speeches or begging us to do so.   

Kill The Messenger is less about the art of journalism than say, All The President's Men (1976), which depicted Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's merciless uncovering of the Watergate scandal which ultimately brought down a presidency.     Gary Webb may have been ok if he had an editor like Ben Bradlee, who delivered the best line in All The President's Men:  "Fuck it, let's stand by the boys."   

Instead, Webb committed suicide in 2004.  

Hail, Caesar! (2016) * * *

Directed by:  Joel Coen and Ethan Coen

Starring:  Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Channing Tatum, Tilda Swinton, Ralph Fiennes, Alden Ehrenreich, Scarlett Johannson, Jonah Hill

Eddie Mannix has a job I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.    In just the one day in which Hail, Caesar! takes place, he must deal with the kidnapping of the star of his new biblical epic, two nosey gossip columnists threatening to take a long-rumored piece of dirt public, a director pleading with him not to cast a singing cowboy in his new movie, a pregnant starlet with no marriage prospects in sight, and a job offer from Lockheed Martin promising more money and shorter hours.    Plus, he keeps taking up smoking and hiding it from his wife.  

Eddie is a movie studio chief in 1950's Hollywood, when times were seemingly more innocent, although you wouldn't know that from the behind the scenes issues in this movie.     Hollywood was every bit as cutthroat then and scandals were just waiting to explode from just under the surface.     Eddie's job is to keep a lid on things while somehow maintaining his sanity.     If anyone could be up to this task, it is the unflappable Josh Brolin, who plunges headlong into these messes and provides a solid counterpoint to the craziness surrounding him.   

Hail, Caesar! is the first pure comedy from the Coen Brothers in quite a while, since the unsuccessful The Ladykillers (2004).     They have made some pretty damn good movies since then, including No Country For Old Men (2007) and A Serious Man (2009).    I wasn't a big fan of True Grit (2010), mostly because remaking other people's movies just isn't their thing.     The Ladykillers falls into this same category.    

I have pretty much described all of the subplots that are to be tidied up in the movie.    I sincerely hope Eddie has easier days ahead, in which he only has to deal with maybe one potential scandal for the day.     The Coens clearly have a love for this period in Hollywood, when musicals were full of dance numbers and Communists were lurking just around the corner waiting to take over.     They kidnap Baird Whitlock (Clooney) in hopes of earning a large ransom to finance their cause.     A funny development is how much Whitlock is impressed by the Communists' pitch.     Who knows if he even wants to be rescued?

Also enjoyable is Lawrence Laurenz (Fiennes), who is forced to cast a singing cowboy with zero acting ability in his new movie about high society.    We see Fiennes master the slow burn as he tries in vain to turn the cowboy into a legitimate actor.    All the while, Lockheed Martin continues to entice Eddie by raising their starting salary and offering numerous bells and whistles.     How Eddie doesn't leap at the chance is beyond me, but I suppose then there wouldn't be a movie.  

Hail, Caesar! does not rank among the great Coen Brothers films like Fargo, No Country For Old Men, or A Serious Man, but it is light comic entertainment that delivers.    After some of the heavier fare they have made recently, Hail, Caesar! plays like a holiday for them.   

Pixels (2015) * *

Directed by:  Chris Columbus

Starring:  Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Peter Dinklage, Josh Gad, Michelle Monaghan, Lainie Kazan


There are plenty of comedic possibilities with Pixels' premise.     The trouble is, Pixels starts with the premise and figures it is enough to keep the laughs going, so it becomes more of a routine comic action thriller.      There are skilled actors in it who gamely participate, but we're left with a premise without a good enough movie to surround it.     I have some affection for the nostalgia involved.    It is great to see Pac Man, Donkey Kong, and Q-Bert, even though they are trying to annihilate the planet.  

Pixels begins in 1982.    Best friends Sam and Will go to the newly opened local arcade (remember those?) and Sam discovers his natural knack for beating games like Donkey Kong and Pac Man.     He soon enters the World Championship and battles the cocky Eddie Plant for the title.     The emcee (Dan Aykroyd) announces that the championships are being filmed and sent into space as part of a time capsule for possible alien worlds to discover.    Sam loses to the arrogant Eddie and things are never the same for him after.  

Fast forward to present day.    Sam (Sandler) is now a hapless video technician while Will is President of the United States.     They maintain a close friendship despite the discrepancies in fame and government clearance.     Once you get past the idea of Kevin James being President then you can move on to the rest of the plot.  

It turns out an alien world discovered the time capsule and mistook it for a declaration of war.    They sent gigantic versions of Galaga, Pac Man, Centipede, and Donkey Kong (among others) to invade Earth.     We never see the aliens because they are disguised as either video game characters, Ronald Reagan, or pop music stars of the day.    Will assembles the team of Sam, Eddie (who is now in jail, but as boastful as ever), and Ludlow Lamonsoff (Gad), an old friend of Sam's turned conspiracy theorist.    ("I can prove JFK shot first.").    They will battle the video game aliens with weapons designed by Violet (who turns out to be a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff).    

The thought of a giant Pac Man or Donkey Kong wreaking havoc on Earth is funnier in theory than in practice.     There are sparse laughs, but Pixels resembles Independence Day more than anything else.     Adam Sandler has starred in some stinkers (Billy Madison, The Waterboy, Just Go With It, etc.) and some pretty good films (The Wedding Singer, You Don't Mess With The Zohan, and 50 First Dates).     They all follow the same tempo involving numerous Sandler wisecracks, characters screaming at each other, and cameos by Sandler's buddies.      Sandler is pushing 50.    We have seen him branch out and challenge himself before.    Isn't it time to leave the lame comedies behind?

I admired Peter Dinklage, who continues to impress as a terrific character actor.    He jumps headlong into Eddie Plant, who offers to help destroy the aliens with the stipulation that he has a threesome with Martha Stewart and Serena Williams in the Lincoln Bedroom.     Pretty inspired, although Serena Williams shows up in a cameo and does her persona no favors.     She acts as if she were appearing under threat of deportation.     Can't she at least pretend to have a good time?    The other actors do at least.

Oh and yes there are anachronisms abound in the film, which pop culture geeks like me recognized immediately.     For instance, Madonna is featured prominently in the time capsule even though she was not famous in 1982 and certainly not appearing on MTV.     Samantha Fox is also mentioned, but I don't recall her coming on to the scene until about five years later.    How did Max Headroom figure into the equation when he didn't show up until 1985?     I could go on, but it would just be showing off at this point.

Deadpool (2016) * *

Directed by:  Tim Miller

Starring:  Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, TJ Miller, Ed Skrein

If nothing else, Deadpool is the first movie I've ever seen in which the opening credits labels the producers as "asshats" and its star as "God's Perfect Idiot."    This is extreme self-deprecation which I hope does not become a trend in movies.     I have heard of movies poking fun at themselves, but not beating you to the punch to tell you they're bad.     I'm reminded of the 2014 Lifetime Grumpy Cat Christmas movie which all but pleaded with the viewer to change the channel and watch something more worthwhile.     I know, I know, it's ironic and snarky and we're supposed to laugh, but if the filmmakers think so little of their film, what are we to think?    

Deadpool is not awful.     It has its moments of humor which work and Ryan Reynolds does a competent job as the forever wisecracking hero.     But, the self-deprecating humor and the bludgeoning violence becomes tiresome.     Deadpool tells us it is a different type of superhero movie, but still feels like one, and not necessarily the good kind.     Many comic book hero movies these days have become mind-numbing.    They assault the viewer with so much action, fighting, and chases that we just don't care anymore.     They overpopulate the movies with so many characters that there isn't enough screen time to fit them all.    The exceptions are the Captain America series and Ant-Man, which actually had stories to care about.     Deadpool falls in the former category and no amount of Deadpool breaking the fourth wall can save it.   

I do not see the appeal in seeing a bullet blow three baddies' brains out in succession, or cars flipping over, or bone crunching fistfights.     How many sickening thuds can we hear when one guy is punching another one in the face?     Blood flies everywhere.     This is where Deadpool doesn't feel like a unique action film, despite its desperate attempts to make you think otherwise, but follows in lockstep with the recent trends.   

Reynolds plays Wade Wilson, an ethically-challenged mercenary who falls in love with a tattooed hottie named Vanessa (Baccarin), only to have his romantic bliss interrupted by news that he has terminal cancer.     He is soon approached by a government agent type who offers to help him get rid of his cancer and develop superpowers.      If it sounds too good to be true, well, that's because it is.    Wade agrees to the treatment, but soon finds he is injected with a mutant gene that will cure his cancer and give him superpowers, with the caveat that his body and face will be hideously scarred.     Why exactly the lab rats are doing what they're doing is murky.     They say they are not creating superheroes, but "super slaves" who I suppose will carry out the orders of the powers that be (whoever they are).     But is torturing subjects and making them look like burn victims the best way to earn loyalty?

After the lab explodes and Wilson escapes, he goes on a mission to find the sufficiently evil head lab rat named Francis (Skrein).     He designs a superhero costume that looks like Spider-Man's (if Spidey forgot to take it to the cleaners for the past year) and knocks off one baddie at a time until he finds Francis.     He also wants desperately to tell Vanessa that he is alive and still loves her, but with such a hideous face, he is afraid she will reject him.     This is the one time where Wilson/Deadpool stops wisecracking enough to be human.     Their relationship is poignant and presents some interesting moments.  

Deadpool swears more than your average superhero (although he says he is not a hero at all).     That and the violence earned it an R rating, which is unusual for comic book films.     Usually, movies like the Avengers like to show bad guys getting maimed and killed but in a PG-13, acceptable way.    Deadpool shows brains flying out of people's heads and bad guys skewered on swords.     It's gratuitously bloody.     Deadpool wants to be DIFFERENT.    It tells you it is.    But is it really?    

D.C. Cab (1983) * * *

Directed by:  Joel Schumacher

Starring:  Adam Baldwin, Mr. T, Max Gail, Anne De Salvo, Whitman Mayo, Charlie Barnett, Bill Maher, The Barbarian Brothers, Irene Cara, Gary Busey

I don't know what got me thinking about this movie.     It's remarkable how the mind works.    I was thinking that Real Time With Bill Maher is on tonight and I'll watch it.    Maher co-starred in this film and here we are with a review.      D.C. Cab is a goofy comedy with a lot of energy.     It is pretty funny too in its unpredictable, lowbrow way.     Sometimes lowbrow can be very entertaining.

Mr. T's picture was all over the posters and print ads for the film when it was released.      Mr. T was fresh off Rocky III and the A-Team was just taking off.     He was a megastar who was popular with adults and kids.     In D.C. Cab, he has a supporting role as Samson, a Mohawk-sporting cab driver whose personality is not a million miles removed from his real one.     Say what you will about Mr. T's acting ability, but he is one of a kind.   

Adam Baldwin stars as Albert Hockenberry, a young man who moves to Washington, DC and goes to work for the cab company belonging to his late father's army buddy, Harold (Gail).     Harold's cab company is in shambles financially and physically.    He can not compete with the competition and the cabs look like crap.     His drivers are a bunch of goofballs killing time between weekends.     Harold's wife Myrna (De Salvo) is an unsympathetic money-grubber with little regard for the work force.     She tells Harold, "You have faith in God, you have faith in your country.    You do not have faith in the eight Stooges!"

Things begin to turn around for D.C. Cab when the crew finds a violin left behind in a cab and earns a $10,000 reward.     Harold wants to share the reward and bring his drivers in as partners.   Myrna steals the reward and throws Harold out of the house.    No worries.    Albert puts up his life savings and the cab company begins to transform into a respectable business.     Sort of.    One of the drivers, a burnout named Del (Busey) proclaims, "I don't work on January 8, because that's Elvis' birthday."   To be truthful, whenever Elvis' birthday comes up every year, I think of that scene.

There is another subplot involving two kidnapped children and the cab company's attempts to rescue them and the driver.     This leads to a scene in which Mr. T and The Barbarian Brothers (two huge muscleman drivers) crash a quiet family dinner in a moment of hilarious physical comedy.    You'll have to see it to truly admire its timing and its payoff.     I also couldn't help but admire the manic energy of Tyrone (Barnett), who trains Albert in the ways of cab driving and other assorted stunts.    Baldwin's laid-back style provides a balance to all of the lunacy.

D.C. Cab was but a small footnote in movie history because it capitalized on Mr. T's incredible popularity at the time.      I still admire its comic style and the willingness of the actors to take the goofiness to another level.     There are times when comedy can be elevated with energy and a little bit of nerve. with D.C. Cab as a prime example. 

Midnight Cowboy (1969) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  John Schlesinger

Starring:  Jon Voight, Dustin Hoffman, Sylvia Miles, Brenda Vaccaro, John McIver, Barnard Hughes, Bob Balaban

As Midnight Cowboy opens, Joe Buck (Voight) quits his dishwashing job at a dive in Texas and hops on a bus to New York City.   He dreams of becoming a rich gigolo with a huge clientele of rich women begging to be seduced.   Joe is naïve and has no concept of how to accomplish this goal, but does get lucky with a bored, rich, middle-aged woman (Miles) who has no clue that Buck only wants to lay her for money.   She assumed he thought she was pretty.  He winds up giving her money for a cab after she cries.  Deuce Bigelow could give Joe some pointers.

Joe soon crosses paths with Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo (Hoffman), a local con man with a nasty cough who promises Joe "representation" with a finder's fee for himself.      Ratso promises to hook Joe up with a pimp, who turns out not to be a pimp.   Joe then searches for Ratso looking to get his money back...as if someone like Ratso wouldn't immediately spend it.    

Joe and Ratso soon cross paths again and we get to the crux of what Midnight Cowboy is about, which is the unusual, touching friendship between these two men.   Watch Ratso's eyes when he first sees Joe again.  He looks overjoyed, until he realizes that Joe is looking to kick his ass.  Ratso no longer has the money, but he offers Joe some shelter in a condemned building with no electricity and just enough gas to make a cup of coffee.    Joe continues to dream of becoming a rich male prostitute, while Ratso wants to move to Miami.   Both are a million miles away from those dreams, so they spend each day conning and hustling just survive for another day of conning and hustling.

Both men are lonely and pathetic, but they find each other at just the right time.  Ratso, whose teeth and disheveled appearance make him appear more rat-like, is frightened and lonesome.     His famous "I'm WALKING here" scene is more of a declaration that he is still a human being for God's sake.     Joe is more clean cut and with less of an edge, but is no less alone in a world he never thought would be so cold.     Voight and Hoffman, both nominated for Best Actor Oscars for this film, deliver powerful, poignant portrayals of these men on the fringes of society.

The strength of the film is Joe and Ratso's budding friendship.    There is also a subtext of each man's latent homosexuality.   Ratso may be more in love with Joe than he lets on.  Joe is not above receiving blow jobs from male strangers in movie theaters.   One such customer (Balaban) reveals he has no money.   Joe does not have it in him to shake the guy down, but later, he is able to beat up a potential john in a critical scene. But Joe soon finds he is unable to perform with a woman he picks up at an Andy Warhol-like party.  She gently suggests he may be gay.  There are vibes.

There are curious flashbacks to Joe's past involving his absent grandmother who raised him and a young woman's false rape allegations against him.     Did these shape Joe?    What effect did they have on him?    The movie does not make it clear and, to me, it is unnecessary information anyway.    Joe's actions do not need a backstory.    We know Ratso is from the Bronx and visits his dead father's grave, but we know without being shown that he had a rough life.  

The ending, as the two friends travel by bus to Miami, is touching and sad.     Ratso's cough has blown into a full illness.    Joe explains his future plans of getting a job and going legit.    He is figuring his life out just as Ratso's quietly ends.     It is sad because Voight and Hoffman were able to make us care.     They made these men special to us and that is no small feat.  

    

Bernie (2012) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Richard Linklater

Starring:  Jack Black, Shirley MacLaine, Matthew McConaughey

Bernie is based on true events.    It is about a funeral director in Carthage, Texas named Bernie Tiede (Black) who is so beloved by his community that, when he is accused of murdering a nasty widow, they urge the District Attorney to go easy on him.    The trial required a change of venue, not because the potential jurors believed he was guilty, but because they likely would have acquitted him.    It is certainly one of the strangest stories I've seen in quite a while, and Richard Linklater adapted it into his best work to date.

Jack Black's Bernie is one of those people that gives everyone a warm and fuzzy feeling.    He knows just the right thing to do or say to comfort the bereaved.     He even goes the extra mile and drops in on elderly widows after the funeral to see how they are doing.     One of those visits to Marjorie Nugent (MacLaine) blossoms into a friendship that eventually goes south thanks to Marjorie's manipulative nastiness and possessiveness.     Bernie benefits financially from this friendship.    They travel the world together and Bernie gains control over her finances.    One day, after Bernie can stands no more, he shoots Marjorie in the back and stuffs her in a freezer.   

Rather than inform the police, Bernie keeps up the façade that Marjorie is alive.   Not like Weekend At Bernie's mind you (what a coincidence), but by keeping her stockbroker at bay by assuring him that "he just missed her."    Since Marjorie is estranged from her family and the townsfolk because of her wicked ways, Bernie figures no one would miss her.    He is right, until the stockbroker convinces DA Danny Buck Davidson (McConaughey) that something is afoot, and Bernie's delicate plan crashes down.

Bernie indeed spends Marjorie's money after her death, but he mostly betters his community, which further endears him to the folks of Carthage.     He maintains his humble home while showering the community with gifts.     Combine that with Bernie's likability and it is little wonder the people do not want to see him convicted of Marjorie's murder.    

What makes Black's Bernie Tiede so fascinating is he is an enigma to most people, but wins them over with his sweetness and generosity.    He does not seem to want anything in return.     He lives to see other people happy.    Is this the result of a psychological need to be loved or is he just that good of a guy?   Bernie does not bother to delve too deep into his motives, possibly because he may not even have any.    He could be a viable candidate for sainthood.

Bernie's relationship with Marjorie is not sexual.    It is hotly debated whether Bernie is gay or just asexual.     He does not appear to list sex on his priority list at all.     Because he is human, he does eventually reach the end of his rope with Marjorie, who turns demanding and possessive at the drop of a hat.    It is so out of character for him to murder her, but perhaps he killed her because she did not respond to his generosity with any sort of gratitude.     He may live to see others happy, but I would think he would like to be recognized too.     No one is that altruistic.

This is unlike any performance Jack Black has ever given.    He creates a person based on a real person, but allows us to see why a community would rally around him despite overwhelming evidence of his guilt.     Most accused murderers would become pariahs.    In Carthage, the DA becomes the bad guy.     If Black is not up to the task of convincing us to love him, then the movie falls apart.     What a true balancing act he displays.  

Linklater wisely paces and presents Bernie in almost comic fashion.    It is bright and sunny every day and the film has a sunny quality to it despite material that would not call for it.     Like Pain and Gain (2013), we have to remind ourselves that what we are seeing here is mostly true.     Mostly because it is so bizarre that you would initially believe it has to be fiction. 

Spy (2015) * *

Directed by:  Paul Feig

Starring:   Melissa McCarthy, Rose Byrne, Jude Law, Jason Statham, Miranda Hart, Bobby Cannavale

Spy is an improvement over recent Melissa McCarthy vehicles.    I grant you that it is not difficult to improve on dreck like Identity Thief, The Heat, and the woeful Tammy, but Spy has some funny moments before succumbing to its desire to appeal to the lowest common denominator.     The supporting cast creates some genuine laughs with their personalities and Spy almost threatened to work, but it fell short.    

Why did it fall short of becoming a comic diamond in the rough?    Director Feig has directed McCarthy in Bridesmaids and The Heat, two movies in which McCarthy played a vulgar, uncouth character with a sailor's mouth.     In Spy, she plays CIA analyst Susan Cooper, who is the right-hand of debonair superspy Bradley Fine (Law).     She works with him from the comfy confines of CIA headquarters while he battles the bad guys.     She also has an unrequited crush on him, which becomes seemingly forever so after he is killed by the movie's villain Rayna Boyanov (Byrne).   

The CIA's agent list soon becomes compromised and Susan is put to work in the field because she would not be recognized as a spy.    Her mission is to track down Rayna and retrieve the list.   How many movies will it take before the CIA catches on that leaving a list on a hard drive somewhere is not the most secure way to maintain its roster?     Susan is a fish out of water with little experience.     This rankles veteran spy Rick Ford (Statham), a macho braggart who tells Susan how he was able to stitch on his torn off arm one time in a pinch.     Statham is funny while poking fun at his rugged screen persona.     He is the opposite of Bradley in every way.

Susan is aided by her own analyst, the awkward, very tall Nancy (Hart).    Hart nearly steals the movie with her giraffe-like height and her social ineptitude.     But she is loyal, sweet, and likable.  
Byrne has fun with her Eastern European accent and general bitchiness.     The parts are in place for Spy to deliver the goods, but then it missteps almost fatally and doesn't recover.

McCarthy is at first appealing as Susan, but then there comes a point where she poses as Rayna's bodyguard and becomes the foul-mouthed insult comic she played in The Heat and Tammy.     It grinds the movie to a halt and gobbles up goodwill like Pac Man gobbles up pellets.     Susan swears left and right and smacks people around, including Rayna, who seems to admire her new bodyguard's attitude.     This smacks of Feig and McCarthy reverting back to form instead of daring to try something new with McCarthy.     She can play sweet and likable, so why turn her into a vulgarian?     What exactly is funny about swearing every other word and slapping people?     The Three Stooges would find this excessive.

After that, Spy falls apart.     It focuses on a plot we truly could not care less about and forgets why it is funny.     Austin Powers it isn't.    I wish McCarthy would dare to continue venturing out and playing down-to-earth characters like she did in St. Vincent.     She has a genuine likability to her, if only she would play to it more.     It is time for her to move on.  

Vinyl (2016) * * * (series premiered on HBO)

Directed by:  Martin Scorsese (premiere episode)

Starring:  Bobby Cannavale, Ray Romano, Olivia Wilde, Andrew Dice Clay, Juno Temple, Ato Essendoh, Paul Ben-Victor

Vinyl is a show about one man's love of music and the troubled career he created due to it.     He is Richie Finestra (Cannavale), a guy who worked his way from a bartender in a blues club to manager of one of the club's acts to founder of American Century Records.     Vinyl beings in 1973 New York.    His world is crumbling just as he is prepared to sell the company to German conglomerate Polygram Records.     The sale is contingent upon the label signing Led Zeppelin, which is near impossible since Richie tried to screw them out of royalties and the band's manager hates Germans.   

That is not the only trouble plaguing Richie, who as the story opens is buying cocaine and mulling over calling a detective.    He then sees a commotion at a club down the street and goes in.    What he sees and hears is a band not unlike The New York Dolls.     They may even be the Dolls, but whoever they are, the music and atmosphere invigorates Richie.     It reminds him why he is in the music business in the first place.     The payoff to this, however, is ludicrous beyond measure.     It is one of those payoffs you don't see coming, but then again, how could you?     I won't spoil it for you, so you can see how ridiculous and unnecessary it is for yourself.    I understand it is based on truth, but still. 

Until that point, Vinyl covers familiar territory but does it very well.      Richie is not unlike many Scorsese protagonists whose ambitions and need lead to self-destruction.     Like Henry Hill in Goodfellas, though, we see how much he loves the life he leads.     Richie's gift is his ear for music.    He has the knack to determine what will sell.    In one of the most entertaining scenes in the premiere episode, Richie lays into his A & R team for mocking ABBA as it plays on the record player.     ("All I need to hear his three bars and I know they will be playing to football stadiums,")

Richie's family life is in tatters also.    His marriage is on the rocks and family functions are interrupted by emergencies.     A big one involves DJ Buck Rogers (Clay), who threatens to boycott playing the entire American Century catalog over a snub by Donnie Osmond.     A two-day coke binge by Buck and Richie's representative ends very, very badly for all involved.     The payoff here veers into Goodfellas territory also.     We also see flashbacks of Richie's relationship with blues singer Lester Grimes (Essendoh), who is coerced into performing pop hits like "Cha Cha Twist" while held at bay by Richie's false promises that he will be able to play "his music".     This also ends badly for Lester, who crosses paths with Richie which causes the haunting flashbacks.

Richie has all of the bells and whistles of wealth and power, including a big house, a swanky apartment in the city, and a new car with an early model car phone.     However, he is unable to enjoy any of it.     He is constantly putting out fires, most of which are his own doing.     His partners are nowhere near as adept at worming out of bad situations.     The company's lawyer has a knack for saying more than he should at the worst possible times.

Cannavale was hypnotically watchable as psychotic gangster Gyp Rossetti in Boardwalk Empire (executive produced by Scorsese).     He was a guy, who could "find an insult in a bouquet of roses," as one character put it.    In Vinyl, he is equally engrossing.     Cannavale exudes power, ambition, greed, need, and a desperate physical and mental juggling act to keep it all going with help from booze and cocaine.     He is so many balls in the air to concentrate on, we wonder when he will trip over his own feet for the last time.    

Vinyl has a true sense of time and place.    The show transports us to the early 1970s to a world where record companies actually held an artist's future in their hands.     Acts were forever looking to be discovered as the next big thing.    They toiled in the clubs and endured highs and lows before being discovered.     When they become the next big thing, they have to put up with guys like Richie who see contracts as mere guidelines instead of legal documents.     Nowadays, record stores are rare and most music is downloaded instead of bought in stores.     Records have been replaced by CD's and computer files.     New acts are discovered on YouTube and musical contest shows like American Idol and The Voice.    The people in Vinyl are years away from seeing such a shift in the music paradigm.     Like anything, they think it will last forever.     We know differently.

Note:   This is a review of the premiere episode of the HBO series.    I am intrigued to see what happens next.  

The Truman Show (1998) * * * *

Directed by:  Peter Weir

Starring:  Jim Carrey, Ed Harris, Noah Emmerich, Laura Linney, Holland Taylor, Natascha McElhone


The Truman Show was made back in 1998 when reality TV was still in its infancy.    MTV had The Real World, but they knew they were being filmed.   The subject of The Truman Show, Truman Burbank (Carrey), is unaware that his entire life is a television show watched by millions.    Every person in his life is an actor playing a role, from his wife Meryl (Linney) to his best friend Marlon (Emmerich).   This is deception on an unheard-of scale, with the audience as willing participants in it.  

Every day of his thirty years or so of age, Truman has lived a relatively peaceful, safe life in the town of Seahaven, which is one large, ingenious set.    He recently has developed wanderlust, though, and desires to travel outside of Seahaven for the first time.    He wants to go to Fiji, which is where a girl named Sylvia (McElhone) he fell for in high school allegedly moved.    Sylvia is a character like the rest, but she was thrown off the show because she developed an unscripted relationship with Truman.   Through a series of contrivances, his travel dreams are squashed temporarily, but the show's creator Christof (Harris) realizes that there will come a time when Truman will discover the truth of his existence.   

Since the show generates millions in merchandise sales from product placements and memorabilia, this will not sit well with Christof or the network.  They see no cruelty in their treatment of Truman.  All they see is profits and good television.  They scheme in every way to keep this massive secret from him, but his natural curiosity and intelligence keep getting in the way.  Questions nag at him, like why does Meryl decide to hold up a box of cereal and discuss it during the middle of an argument?  Or why is it there are sudden traffic jams whenever he attempts to drive out of Seahaven?   Or why do people seem not to react to anything spontaneous Truman may do?

There are other unanswered questions we have, such as how exactly is Truman and Meryl's sex life handled?    Or what does Christof do when he takes a vacation?    Do the other actors ever work on other projects?    Has any of them ever been nominated for an Emmy?   These remain left to our imaginations, but what happens in The Truman Show is handled well logistically.    The film is less about the plot than it is about the questions we must answer as viewers.  

The story of Truman's existence is answered in an interview with Christof, who ironically guards his privacy jealously.    We learn Truman was the first (and only baby we hope) ever adopted by a corporation.    He grows up with a mother who isn't his real mother, a father who abandoned him (otherwise known as written off the show), and a wife and best friend who are not real either.     The only person who truly seems to care for Truman is Sylvia, who realized a long time ago how wrong it was to keep Truman in the dark and yearns for him to break free from his TV life to start a real one. 

Jim Carrey drops his obnoxious, high-wattage comic persona to create a down-to-earth, simple person whom we grow to care about and root for him to figure things out.     When Jim Carrey is not playing "Jim Carrey", he is an effective performer.    This was the first film to show he didn't have to play Ace Ventura for the rest of his career.     Ed Harris (Oscar-nominated for his role as Christof), is able to coldly justify to himself and the world that Truman is serving the greater good as an unwitting participant in the show.     He can not afford to have a conscience, not that he seems to have much of one.     Linney's Meryl has the most difficult role on the show and she is a trooper, but how heartless does she have to be to play such a role given what is required of it?

The Truman Show is a moving indictment of a culture that will gleefully watch real people put themselves on display for our amusement.     Who is more to blame?    The viewers or the people who decide for a few bucks that they should forgo their privacy and humanity for the sake of fifteen minutes of fame.   If you consider how the TV landscape has shifted from episodic programs to reality-based ones, you will see there are more reality show fans out there than ever before.     

Like Network (1976), The Truman Show created a satirical extreme that years later seemed more like prophecy than satire.    Did Andrew Niccol, the writer of this film, see television going in its current direction?    The screenplay is perceptive and poses questions the viewer must reflect on honestly.    It does not turn into a film with a great concept and goes nowhere with it.    It not only grabs you, but it forces reflection and thought.     I love movies where there are no easy answers.    Andy Warhol once said, "Everyone will be world famous for fifteen minutes."    It was seen as a prediction, but it was actually a lament.     If he lived to see that his lament is closer to the truth than he realized, I wonder how he would have reacted.  




    

Tomorrowland (2015) * *

Directed by:  Brad Bird

Starring:  George Clooney, Britt Robertson, Hugh Laurie, Raffey Cassidy

Tomorrowland begins with an idealistic young woman named Casey (Robertson) who picks up a special pin and is transported into a futuristic utopia called Tomorrowland.     We assume it is a utopia of the future, but whether it's here on Earth remains to be seen.      It has the feel of a futuristic amusement park Walt Disney could have dreamed up (and probably did), but the future as dreamed up back in the 1960s.     Tomorrowland, the vision, seems futuristic yet nostalgic all at the same time.     My interest was piqued, but not for much longer.     Once Casey begins the search for the source of the pin, then Tomorrowland becomes mundane.     

Casey hooks up with an alien being named Athena and then a gruff older man named Frank Walker, who knows plenty about Tomorrowland in theory and experience.      The trio finds themselves on the run from bad guy aliens whose reasons for chasing them are confusing.      I will not spoil anything for you, mostly because I am not entirely certain what the bad aliens want to do.      I think they want to take over the planet once civilization destroys itself.      Or maybe not.

Tomorrowland falls back on car chases, fistfights, and things blowing up.     It is odd that the same movie shows us Tomorrowland and then George Clooney duking it out with an alien.     Could the fate of life on Earth truly come down to who wins a fistfight?     The park, or vision, or whatever it may be is cool, but it seems to be an oasis in the middle of a gigantic cornfield.     I thought I was watching outtakes of Interstellar.     Tomorrowland could be a futuristic Disney World in the middle of nowhere.     At least it didn't place its park in the middle of the Costa Rican jungle like Jurassic World.  

The actors are game for the material, but it is weak material.    Robertson must have at least four scenes in which she enters a room or sees a neat-o device and looks astonished.     Being transported through other dimensions to wind up on a rocket that launches from the Eiffel Tower is more worthy of astonishment than wax figures of Thomas Edison, Jules Verne, and Nikola Tesla, but her reaction is the same for both.     Clooney is introduced as a jaded person who was "expelled" from Tomorrowland back in the day, or is it in the future?     The movie doesn't make it clear whether Tomorrowland ever existed in the past or even as a vision.     There are plenty of explanations and secrets revealed, but they don't add up to anything sensible.   

The movie begins with a premise that at least earns enough interest to keep us hooked, but once it became clear that Clooney and company had to outwit and outduel the bad guys then I was disappointed.     The scene in which Casey enters a nostalgia store and is threatened to be vaporized by aliens disguised as shop owners, I could not help but think this was something out of Men In Black.    

10 (1979) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Blake Edwards

Starring:  Dudley Moore, Julie Andrews, Bo Derek, Robert Webber, Brian Dennehy, Dee Wallace, Don Calfa, Sam J. Jones

George Webber (Moore) has a life most would envy.    He is a four-time Oscar winning songwriter, rich, famous, and lives comfortably in the Hollywood Hills.    Yet, he is bored and can't seem to find his happy.   His girlfriend Sam (Andrews) doesn't seem to be the answer.    Then one day, he is driving around and pulls up next to a limo with a vision inside of it.    He sees a beautiful young woman wearing a wedding dress and he is smitten.   Maybe not smitten, but definitely obsessed.    She is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen.   Can she be the one to lift him out of the doldrums?

Blake Edwards' 10 is a comedy about mid-life angst and the pursuit of perfection.    George follows the limo to the church and, after being stung by a bee, finds out she is Jenny Miles (Derek).   After some more detective work, including meeting with the priest that performed the service, he finds out she is on her way to Mexico on her honeymoon.     He is compelled by an unquenchable desire to find her.    What would he do with her when he finds her?     I suppose lustfully gaze at her some more.    He fantasizes (in the iconic scene well known even to those who haven't seen the movie) that he and Jenny will run towards each other through the surf and into each other's arms.     

10 is most famous for presenting Bo Derek to the world.     She became an iconic figure for a time, although these days she is more well known for being that girl in 10.     But 10 is much more than an observation of her beautiful physique.   It is a comedy which understands obsession and the pursuit of happiness, no matter how out of reach it may seem.   George has everything, but finds it isn't the everything he really wants.   Pursuing Jenny gives him purpose in life again.    Poor Sam is left sitting idly waiting for George to come to his senses, although she has no real idea of the depths of George's desires.

Dudley Moore is just the right choice for this material.   He is likable and funny.  He looks rather pathetic walking on the hot Mexican beach in his gray sweat suit.   Did he ever hear of swim trunks?    Just like many characters in Blake Edwards comedies, he may be one drink shy of becoming a full-fledged alcoholic.   There is a sequence in 10 in which he saves Jenny's husband's life and is able to take her to dinner while he recuperates in the hospital.   He ts to meet his vision in the flesh.    The one knock I have against 10 is how this subplot plays out.     He actually gets her into bed and does the rumpy-pumpy to Ravel's Bolero, but then expresses disappointment that she is not as perfect as he envisioned her.   This is forced and unconvincing, as if he had to find a reason to dump Jenny and return to Sam.   Would he honestly kick her out of bed so fast?    Would anyone reading this review?  

Despite that, 10 is one of Edwards best films.    He directed the Pink Panther series, which were exercises in high energy slapstick.   But films like 10, Skin Deep, and Micki & Maude were wonderful looks into human nature.   These were about people who desperately wanted to be happy, but didn't know how to go about getting there.   I'm not just talking about the male leads, but this applies to Sam and Jenny to an extent as well.   

Pawn Sacrifice (2015) * * *

 

 

Directed by:  Edward Zwick

 

Starring:  Tobey Maguire, Michael Stuhlbarg, Peter Sarsgaard, Liev Schrieber

 

I know next to nothing about chess and, after watching Pawn Sacrifice, I still know next to nothing about it.     Chess is not a cinematic game.     Most people watching the final showdown between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky will not have any clue what is happening, unless you are a chess grandmaster.     Pawn Sacrifice is not really about Bobby Fischer's 1972 World Chess Championship win over Spassky, which made Fischer a national hero.     Instead, it focuses on Fischer's ever declining mental health.     His paranoid delusions took hold early.     Chess was his only way to concentrate on something else.     He happened to be a genius at it, which was both a blessing and a curse.     Mostly a curse.

Fischer's bizarre behavior was in full bloom during his match with Spassky, which occurred during the Cold War and was seen as an opportunity for an American to prove superiority in a game the Soviets previously dominated.      The match was nearly called off because of Fischer's increasingly odd demands, which included moving the game to a recreation room with no audience.     Most people thought this was gamesmanship, but those in Fischer's inner circle knew otherwise.     Fischer's mentor turned Catholic priest Bill Lombardy (Sarsgaard) recognized Bobby's need for treatment.     Fischer's lawyer/manager Paul Marshall (Stuhlbarg) turned a blind eye, instead focusing on the big payday the match will inevitably bring.

For Fischer, paranoia was a family trait.    His mother was a Communist party member and may or may not have been under surveillance by some agency.     It is not clear whether this was real or part of Bobby's delusions.     He was forever suspicious that he was being watched and would take apart telephones to see if they were bugged.      He took up chess and excelled at it, becoming the world's youngest grandmaster and the first significant American threat to Soviet dominance in chess.     However, he did not make things easy on himself or those who loved him, which was a number that was constantly dwindling.     He was hostile, petulant, and demanding; forever threatening to pull out of tournaments over the slightest perceived infraction.     

Father Bill suspected this behavior masked a greater fear.      ("He is not afraid of losing.    He is afraid of what will happen if he wins")     This is perceptive thinking from a chess player who was trained to continually see one or two moves ahead.     If Bobby wins the World Championship, there are no worlds left to conquer and he will be alone with his scary thoughts and even scarier behavior.     Without a goal, where would this leave him?

Pawn Sacrifice indeed shows chess being played and strategies being implemented.     Fischer would play games thousands of times over in his head to prepare for anything, but finds this still may not be enough.     Unless you play chess, Pawn Sacrifice is not likely to convert you into a chess lover.     The moves described by Fischer to Lombardy as preparation may as well be in Klingon to me, but the movie wisely focuses on its strengths, which are the performances and seeing Fischer's true nature.    Fischer was anti-Communist and anti-Semitic, which is odd considering his Jewish heritage which he denounced.     

Maguire, who also served as producer, thankfully does not attempt to turn Fischer into a misunderstood or sympathetic hero.     He shows Fischer warts and all.     We are not expected to like him or understand him.     We are expected to see him from the outside and shake our heads as we see his mental health deteriorating before our eyes.     After his celebrated win, Fischer's mental faculties only got worse.     He would abandon his championship and wander Europe nearly penniless.     This was a man who was briefly a national hero, but it wasn't because he was beloved.     He was indeed a pawn in America's game of one-upmanship over the Soviets.     The public was so desperate to gain a small victory over the Soviets that they ignored the fact that Fischer should not have been lauded as a hero.     He never saw himself as one.   

Fischer died in 2008 in Iceland, which was where he won the World Championship from Spassky and was the only country that would grant him citizenship.     He was a fugitive in his home country for violating international sanctions by playing Spassky in a 1992 rematch in war-torn Yugoslavia.     He was booted out of other countries due to his financial and legal troubles.      He looked unkempt and wild-eyed, even arrested for vagrancy at one time and lived out his life in relative seclusion.      Upon settling in Iceland, he held a press conference attended by ESPN reporter Jeremy Schaap, son of the legendary sportswriter Dick Schaap.  

During the press conference, Fischer chided Jeremy about an article Dick Schaap wrote in which he stated allegedly, "Bobby Fischer doesn't have a sane bone in his body."     Jeremy replied, "Frankly, nothing here today would disprove anything he said."