Jane Fonda in Five Acts (2018) * * * 1/2

 Directed by:  Susan Lacy

Starring:  Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Ted Turner, Troy Garrity, Sam Waterston, Tom Hayden

The first four acts of Jane Fonda in Five Acts are named for the most influential men in certain period's of the actor/activist's life.   Act One is Henry (Jane's famous father), Act Two is Vadim (Director Roger Vadim, Jane's first husband), Act Three is Tom (Tom Hayden, Jane's second husband), Act Four is Ted (Ted Turner, Jane's third husband), and Act Five is finally Jane.   In this act, Jane Fonda lives on her own terms after decades of turmoil and introspection.    She is a beautiful, intelligent, fascinating subject; capable of self-criticism, regret, and reflection.   

Jane Fonda in Five Acts isn't hagiography.   She fearlessly revisits her tumultuous upbringing with a mentally ill mother who committed suicide when Jane was thirteen and her famous actor father who was beloved my millions of moviegoers but was cold, distant, and angry at home.   Henry's relationship with his children heavily influenced her decision to enter acting and move to France to forge her own path.   That is where she met, fell in love with, and married French director Roger Vadim (or Vadim as Jane calls him), who cast her in 1968's cult classic Barbarella.    Jane had one daughter with Vadim, named Vanessa, who does not appear in the documentary.    Jane encapsulates their troubled relationship near the end of the film, in which doubts and regrets are expressed over whether she was the best mother she could be.    Considering her role models, Jane never felt as if she was capable of the love and affection her daughter needed from her. 

After a divorce from Vadim, Jane marries activist Tom Hayden, who taught Jane to tap into her own well of discontent to rally against the Vietnam War (including the notorious "Hanoi Jane" photos taken with members of the Viet Cong) and numerous other equal rights and anti-big business causes.  Jane and Tom didn't live the opulent lifestyle befitting a Hollywood star.   They lived in a small house with no dishwasher or washing machine, almost in communal fashion with their neighbors.  They didn't just talk the talk.  The famed Jane Fonda Workout videos and books were created in order to fund a charity creating by Jane and Tom.    The book stayed on the New York Times bestseller list for two years.

The exhausting activist schedule soon took its toll on her marriage to Tom and they divorced, producing one son (actor Troy Garrity, who discusses what is was like to have parents so heavy into activism), and adopting another.    Not long after divorcing Tom Hayden, Jane is asked out by billionaire media mogul Ted Turner, who is the sort of person she and Tom were rallying against for years.    But, Turner was charismatic, charming, and shared Jane's love of nature.   They married, with Jane withdrawing from her acting career to be Mrs. Ted Turner.    It was Ted's neediness and desire to have Jane around him at all times which caused the marital troubles which ended in an amicable divorce.    A touching visit to Turner's Montana ranch is shown late in the film, in which Jane refers to him as "my favorite ex-husband,"

Jane Fonda in Five Acts doesn't simply focus on her personal life, but also about the genesis of roles which won her Oscars (Klute, Coming Home) and bringing On Golden Pond to the screen, in which she co-starred with her father (he won an Oscar for the film).    On Golden Pond acted as an onscreen reconciliation between Henry and Jane, which adds extra emotional depth to an extraordinary film. 
Other films such as The China Syndrome were made to warn of dangers involving unchecked nuclear power.   Weeks after The China Syndrome was released in 1979, the disaster at Three Mile Island occurred, proving the movie to be more prophetic than it ever expected to be.

Jane Fonda in Five Acts courageously gives us not only the Jane Fonda we thought we knew, but the one we didn't.    There were stories of Henry Fonda's lack of affection which belied some of his more famous roles in which he played compassionate protagonists, but until now, we gain the full scope of how it affected Jane's future relationships and her own self-esteem.    She laments losing a part of herself in each of her marriages, while at least learning enough lessons to present us all with an engaging and uplifting final act.    She now stars in Grace and Frankie, which will soon be delivering its seventh season on Netflix, and at age 82, Jane Fonda seems to have reconciled with her past and continues to act, speak out for causes, and even get arrested.    The 2010's are like the 1970's for Jane Fonda all over again, but without the self-doubt and ghosts haunting her. 

Schitt's Creek (2015-2020) * * * (showing on Netflix)

Starring:  Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, Dan Levy, Annie Murphy, Chris Elliott, Jennifer Robertson, Emily Hampshire, Sarah Levy, Dustin Milligan

As we view the mansion and vast surrounding acreage in the opening moments of Schitt's Creek, we see the Rose family, led by video store chain mogul Johnny Rose (Levy), living a life of filthy wealth and excess.   Then, the FBI crashes through the door seizing most of their property and belongings, thanks to the Rose's business manager's shady dealings.   Now nearly broke, the Roses' only saving grace is a small backwater town which Johnny once bought for his son as a gag gift.
The town:  Schitt's Creek (get it?).  Seems the feds can't seize the town, so the Roses move there to lick their wounds and figure out their next move.

The Rose family consists of Johnny's wife Moira (O'Hara), who behaves as if she is channeling Katharine Hepburn, Alexis (Murphy), who behaves as if she is channeling Paris Hilton or a Beverly Hills housewife, and David (Dan Levy), an overly stylized pansexual whose facial expression looks constantly like someone who just smelled a dirty diaper.   Owning the town does not invoke any special privileges for the Roses, as they are forced to live in a dumpy room in the town's lone motel and run up a tab at the local diner.    The Roses, dressed to the nines, stand out like a sore thumb and are resented at first by the town's locals, including the town mayor Roland N. Schitt (Elliott) (get it?)

Thankfully, the show manages to outgrow its juvenile title and its fish out of water setup to allow us to care about the Roses.   They grow as people, and in many ways shake loose from their initial personas to embrace their new town and their new lives.    Alexis and David have to, gasp, get jobs, while Johnny (always dressed in a suit) works at trying to latch on to a business opportunity which will return the family to its former glory.   Moira, meanwhile, dressed as if she is ready to walk the red carpet at any second, is simply trying to muddle through without collapsing under the weight of grief at the disappearance of her formerly privileged life.   Pills and alcohol tend to take the edge off for Moira.

The material is livened up by the performances.   I think the constructed town of Seahaven in The Truman Show is likely bigger than Schitt's Creek, and there are only so many laughs one can squeeze out of the limited locales.   Levy and O'Hara have excellent comic chemistry, which is to be expected and appreciated.    Annie Murphy's smile can light up a room, and Dan Levy undergoes subtle changes which his character fights every step of the way.    Chris Elliott, as the uncouth Roland, is a skilled comic foil who can leave the Roses aghast with his improper jokes and behavior.    I also admired Robertson, as Roland's folksy wife Jocelyn (who seems to barely be holding it together), and Hampshire as Stevie, the motel clerk who deadpans her way through everything.

Having watched five seasons of Schitt's Creek, with a sixth coming to Netflix in the fall, I will say it has heart and subtle humor.   However, it is a show which probably should've ended a season or two prior.    The natural ending occurred at the end of Season 3, in which Johnny and Moira are at dinner celebrating their anniversary with two friends they knew in their past.   Roland and Jocelyn soon join everyone unexpectedly.   The Roses' old friends bash Schitt's Creek, and soon Johnny defends his new home and his friendship with Roland and Jocelyn.    It is a sweet moment, and we know the Roses have fully embraced their new home and it has embraced them.   Would've been a perfect ending.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (2015-2019) * 1/2 (A Netflix original series)

Starring:  Ellie Kemper, Tituss Burgess, Carol Kane, Jane Krakowski, Jon Hamm

I read a review of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt which uses "hysterical" in the headline and spends the first paragraph clarifying how funny is a subjective term and what one person finds funny, another may not.   This isn't exactly a rousing approval of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, so the review may be more telling than we realize. 

I found Kimmy Schmidt's humor off-putting.   It rapidly fires one gag after another at you.    It is so busy trying to be FUNNY, that it forgot to be funny. 

The Kimmy Schmidt (Kemper) of the title is a survivor of an Indiana underground cult freed after fifteen years of captivity.   Her captor, mad preacher Richard Wayne Gary Wayne (Hamm), convinced gullible Kimmy and three other women that the outside world was destroyed and they were the only survivors left on the planet.   After a publicity spree, including a visit to NBC's Today Show, Kimmy decides not to return to Indiana, but instead strike out on her own in New York City.   She answers an ad for a roommate from Titus (Burgess), an aspiring, flamboyant actor who couldn't land a role in The Lion King despite twenty auditions.   Kimmy also lucks into a job as a nanny for Jacqueline (Krakowski), an aloof, wealthy wife of a businessman who hasn't been home in two months. 

All the while, Kimmy wears a smile of a naive, gentle soul who doesn't know enough to be crushed and beaten down by life in the Big Apple yet.   She moves forward with determination and pluck into situations which would cower a lesser person.   In some ways, her innocence may be an advantage.
She might be from Indiana, mind you, but she's not from Indiana, if you know what I mean.
There is surely an amusing comedy series to be made from this setup, but Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt doesn't allow for quiet observation or allowing the comedy any time to grow from such an absurd plot.   It is in too much of a rush to tickle your funny bone, as if the writers were being paid by the laugh, and throws any subtleties right out the window.

Truth in reviewing:  I only watched two plus episodes of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt before bailing on it.   Even in the time of COVID-19, my more abundant than usual leisure time is better spent on other shows. 

Total Recall (1990) * * *

Directed by:  Paul Verhoeven

Starring:  Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rachel Ticotin, Michael Ironside, Sharon Stone, Ronny Cox

Arnold Schwarzenegger is among the most distinct actors in movie history.   His size, accent, and sense of humor give him dimension, and he has carried movies with some of the wackiest plots in many a moon.    He loves what he does, and it shows, especially in Total Recall, in which Arnold plays a seemingly ordinary man caught up in an interplanetary scheme.   In this futuristic movie, Mars is colonized, although under the thumb of industrialist Cohagen (Cox), who controls the planet's oxygen supply.   Schwarzenegger is Doug Quaid, who lives high on the hog on Earth as a construction worker with a beautiful wife (Stone).   But, Quaid is haunted by memories of Mars, even though he has supposedly never set foot on the red planet. 

Quaid signs up for a virtual memory implant in which he is in control of his own fantasy adventure on Mars.   But the fantasy he installs clashes with the ones already in there, which sends Quaid on a mission to Mars to find out exactly who he is and what role he plays in all of this.   Oh, and he's being chased by Cohagen's stooges, so whatever is going on here is not ordinary.   I won't reveal any more,
except to say what's done here is done well.   Schwarzenegger is a sympathetic hero trapped in something he can't fully understand, and even when it's explained, he still can't quite believe it.
We probably can't either, but we go along with it because Total Recall is nothing if not goofy and entertaining.

The vision of Mars reminds me of the cantina in Star Wars where creative aliens pop up, including one with three breasts and another in which a tiny creature erupts from another's stomach a la Alien. 
The makers of Total Recall are optimistic about humankind's ability to build another civilization on another planet.    After all, has anyone witnessed how long it takes a construction crew to fix a road here on Earth? 

The Terminator (1984) * * *

Directed by:  James Cameron

Starring:  Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, Paul Winfield

Sarah Connor (Hamilton) is an ordinary Los Angeles woman with a job and an apartment with a roommate.   She seems nice enough, so why is a nearly indestructible cyborg killer from the future trying to kill her?    As it turns out, Sarah will one day the mother of the resistance leader in a future war against super computers who want to obliterate humankind.   A man named Kyle Reese (Biehn) is sent back to 1980's Los Angeles to protect Sarah from The Terminator, but that's an uphill battle considering The Terminator can absorb rounds of bullets and keeps coming.

Naturally, Sarah at first thinks Kyle is crazy, as would anyone else, but every word of the story is true, and soon a united Sarah and Kyle do their mightiest to outwit and destroy The Terminator.    Sarah can't believe this is happening to her.   "Do I look like a mother of the future?  I can't even balance a checkbook."   Not only is The Terminator physically indestructible, but he displays no emotion, so he can't be bargained with or feel any remorse or pity.    He is a robot under orders and he must complete his mission. 

The Terminator was the beginning of a franchise which really only needed this film and its amazing sequel Terminator II: Judgment Day (1991) to tell a satisfying story.   However, Hollywood couldn't leave well enough alone, and four more unnecessary Terminator movies followed.    The Terminator made Arnold Schwarzenegger a Hollywood box office juggernaut.    The movie itself succeeds on the level of a nightmare in which you can't escape someone who relentlessly stalks you.   With his immense size and cold demeanor, Schwarzenegger is the perfect Terminator.   Hamilton and Biehn are not pushovers, just determined to do the best they can in a terrifying situation against a seemingly unstoppable opponent.

James Cameron put himself on the map with The Terminator as a director of big budget spectacles which combined imagination and superior production values.   Even when some of his movies don't hit the mark, you still marvel at their scope and visual splendor.    Cameron is not afraid to swing for the fences, and the box office results landed him with the all-time box office champion (Avatar) and runner-up (Titanic) until Avatar was narrowly usurped by last year's Avengers: Endgame.  The Terminator works as a horror film in which you can't tell which is more horrifying:  the present day in which a Terminator is hunting you, or a war-torn, bleak future in which something like a Terminator can be spawned. 

The Two Popes (2019) * * *

 

Directed by: Fernando Meirelles

Starring:  Jonathan Pryce, Anthony Hopkins, Juan Minujin

One of the strengths of The Two Popes is how it rightfully treats its subjects as human beings first.  While treated as godlike, popes are indeed human and fallible.   Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio (Pryce), who would soon succeed the retiring Benedict XVI as Pope, finds himself sneaking out to a local Rome sports bar to see his beloved Argentina soccer team play on television.   Benedict (Hopkins) plays piano.   The men quickly discuss ABBA as Jorge whistles Dancing Queen while both stand next to each other at the men's room sink.   Among the most amusing sequences in The Two Popes is witnessing Pope Francis and former Pope Benedict watching the 2014 World Cup Final as Francis' Argentina took on Benedict's home country of Germany.   Germany won by the way.

The Two Popes, written by Anthony McCarten, documents a budding friendship between outgoing Pope Benedict XVI and Cardinal Begoglio, who is considered a shoo-in to be elected Pope upon Benedict's retirement.    But, a pope can't retire, right?   Not so, says Benedict, who says a pope once retired in the 1400's so such a move is not unprecedented.    Benedict's papacy was coming under intense scrutiny circa 2013 as a damaging book is released depicting the pope's alleged complicity in covering up pedophilia among priests in the Catholic Church.    Benedict is choosing to retire at age 86, instead handing off the papacy to the more progressive Bergoglio.   This isn't without issue, because the cardinal is submitting his resignation in person to Benedict.    Benedict tries to talk Bergoglio out of retirement and convince him that he is worthy of being the next pope at the same time.

The arc of their meeting at first is a clash between Benedict's more conservative, traditional ideas of the Catholic faith and Bergoglio's more liberal and forward thinking.   Then, there is the thaw as the two men have dinner together and share their more personal stories.    Bergoglio feels guilty about his past involvement with a late 1970's dictatorship.    He did not speak out against the government, but yet saved thousands of lives by staying alive to assume the role of leader of the nation's large Jesuit priest contingent.   He used his authority to save many, but he feels he did not do enough.    Benedict offers him figurative absolution by telling him "You're only human," but Bergoglio delivers actual absolution as Benedict confesses his sins.    What sins?   The movie never tells us, but we surely can speculate.

The Two Popes is elevated by the spectacular acting of Pryce and Hopkins, both nominated for Oscars for their work.    Each is willing to, at times, concede the spotlight and stand back to watch the other shine.    At first, you think The Two Popes will be a tiresome argument of old vs. new in Catholicism (I think back to 1984's little seen Mass Appeal starring Jack Lemmon), but instead we learn more about these two men and find they aren't all that dissimilar after all.    Both men treasure their faith while copping to the fact that they are mortal and capable of sin, and that maybe the church should ease up on its outdated restrictions in order to lure people back to the church.    The most effective moments of The Two Popes involve flashbacks to Bergoglio's life years earlier, in which he refused to marry his beloved in order to join the priesthood, and how his story takes a drastic turn when a violent dictatorship assumes control of Argentina. 

The Two Popes does overstay its welcome near the end.   It could've been more taut in some spots, and perhaps a bit angrier about the role the upper echelon of the Vatican played in the church's most heinous scandal in its history.    The Two Popes, instead, decides to be more personal and it is not an unworthy decision. 

Grace and Frankie (2015-present) * * * (showing on Netflix)

Starring:  Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Martin Sheen, Sam Waterston, June Diane Raphael, Baron Vaughn, Brooklyn Decker, Ethan Embry

Into the sixth season, Grace and Frankie has established its rhythm; truth and touching honesty mixed with lighter sitcom material.   Just when you think you're going to lose the show to the sitcom fluff, the clear moments of human nature swoop in to pull you back in.    The show not only allows us to watch the uneasy pairing of Grace (Fonda) and Frankie (Tomlin) to blossom into friendship and love, but also to see how Robert (Sheen) and Sol (Waterston) learn to finally be a couple after spending twenty years in the closet.    Grace and Frankie is balanced, and allows for the natural hiccups that occur in any relationship worth a damn.

The show begins with two long married couples splitting apart.   Grace and Frankie, whose husbands have been law partners for the past twenty years, sit at dinner uneasily shooting small talk while awaiting for their husbands to arrive.   Grace and Frankie know each other, but are not really friends.
Soon, Robert (Grace's husband) and Sol (Frankie's husband) sit down and deliver a whopper of a bulletin.   Both Robert and Sol want a divorce, because they are in love...with each other.    Frankie and Grace are naturally devastated.    Not only are their marriages ending, but their husbands have left them for each other.   It's a lot to process. 

Fortunately, this isn't the type of dramedy in which the jokes write themselves.   Grace and Frankie move out of their respective homes and into the beach house they co-own.    Grace is a type A businesswoman who recently bequeathed her successful cosmetics company to her cynical daughter Brionna (Raphael).   Frankie is a hippie to whom the 60's were just yesterday.    The jilted wives are forced to live together.    Grace's other daughter is Mallory (Decker), a doctor's wife, and Frankie's two children Bud (Vaughn) and Coyote (Embry) are both adopted.    The children are gobsmacked by these developments as well, except for Brionna, who watches with detached bemusement.

A lot happens to not just Grace and Frankie, but the other cast members as well.   It is refreshing to see that, even in a thirty-minute episode, plenty of quality time is donated to not just Grace and Frankie.    Plenty of guest stars drop by, some for just an episode, and others staking a larger claim in the lives of the regulars.    Grace and Frankie doesn't simply dwell on the changing lives of its main characters, but further delves into aging, being an older woman in today's technology-driven society, and the ever-shifting nature of their relationships with their children and their exes. 

Could I do without a scene in which Grace backs up a scooter into a pile of items in a home improvement store?   Or the numerous scenes of different characters getting high with each other?
Watching people get high is not funny, never was, and never will be.    Fonda and Tomlin, of course, were in 9 to 5 (1980) together, and they had a famous pot-smoking scene in which they fantasized about how they would punish their sexist, egomaniac jerk of a male chauvinist boss.   The fantasies themselves were fun, but not watching them inhale a joint.   But, Grace and Frankie provides enough heart to keep me glued to their lives. 

Ozark (2020) (Season 3 on Netflix) * * * *

Starring:  Jason Bateman, Laura Linney, Janet McTeer, Julia Garner, Sofia Hublitz, Skylar Gaetner, Charlie Tahan, Lisa Emery, Tom Pelphrey, Felix Solis

The full moral weight of Marty and Wendy Byrde's choices from the previous two seasons of Ozark come to grim fruition in season three.   Having been in survival mode since the opening minutes of season one, Marty and Wendy now have to consider what kind of life they are fighting to stay alive for.   The pressure cooker of stress and fear has now been cranked up to intolerable levels. 
Is all of this worth it?   I suppose when you're facing the prospect of death daily, then even this kind of life is better than pushing up daisies.   Or is it?

Marty and Wendy are now the high-profile owners of the Missouri Belle riverboat casino, which rakes in beaucoup bucks for Marty and Wendy, their silent partners, and of course the Mexican drug cartel for which the Byrdes launder money.    Things are going well, until they're not.   Obstacles and wild cards pop up which threaten to tear down the scheme and endanger the lives of Marty, Wendy, Helen Pierce (McTeer), who has now moved to the Ozarks to keep an eye on the Byrdes, Ruth Langmore, who runs the day-to-day operations of the Belle, and even the children of all involved. 
The most unpredictable wild card is Wendy's bipolar brother Ben (Pelphrey), who becomes dangerous and violent when he's not on his medications to control his disorder.    Ben tests Wendy's limits, forcing her to choose between keeping her increasingly risky brother alive or...

Another disruption which splinters the Byrdes is their marriage, which is coming apart as the stress to keep everything afloat ramps up.   They agree to couples counseling in order to pacify their daughter who attempted to emancipate herself in Season 2, but not only aren't the Byrdes working towards any reconciliation, they are undermining each other.   Wendy wants to expand the operation, Marty wants to hold on to what they have in order not to attract unwanted attention by the FBI.   Wendy's desire wins out, and then the feds set up shop in the casino tracking their daily cash flow.   One FBI agent offers Marty a deal to plead guilty to felony charges and then work for the FBI. 

It's too bad the Byrdes work for a drug lord whose cartel is in a deadly, bloody war with a vicious rival cartel.    Navarro (Solis) is becoming unhinged, and has no patience for errors or being unable to deliver the expected amount of laundered money.   His phone calls to Wendy take on a scary tone, even though he appears to be receptive to Wendy's ideas about expansion.   Or is he? 

Ozark Season 3 juggles a lot, but never loses its way.   It is darker, more pessimistic,than the previous two seasons, with the Byrdes understanding, if not aloud, that they will never be free of their situation.    In the previous two seasons, the Byrdes said they had lines they wouldn't cross.   In Season 3, they cross those very lines and the emotional heft of their actions weights heavily.   Jason Bateman and Laura Linney are excellent as always, and McTeer and Garner bring in different emotional dimensions to their characters than previously seen.    Ruth's burgeoning relationship with Ben presents a multitude of complications for each other and for everyone else.   Helen has child custody issues with her ex-husband, and her ability to keep her work a secret from her family can mean the difference between life and a bullet to the head.    This is pretty much what the rest of the people in Ozark have to live with every day.    But, remember, they chose this.   As each episode rivets the viewer and catapults its characters further into darkness, this is something we must realize.
It doesn't mean we can't pity them, because even after all that is done, we still do.   That's the beauty and the compelling nature of Ozark.