Drunk Parents (2019) 1/2 *

 

Directed by:  Fred Wolf

Starring:  Alec Baldwin, Salma Hayek, Colin Quinn, Will Ferrell, Jim Gaffigan, Joe Manganiello

Made in 2016, Drunk Parents is finally seeing the light of day thanks to Netflix' desperation to put ANY new content on its streaming service it could find.  Netflix should have waited longer.   Alec Baldwin and Salma Hayek would have been served better appearing in a documentary made by people who hated them.    Did they even read the script?   Or more to the point, was there even a filmable script ready when the shoot began?    Co-written and directed haplessly by Fred Wolf, an SNL writer, Drunk Parents is an unpleasant reminder that it's not always a good idea to blindly sign on to a project being made by a friend.

I can only speculate that is what happened here, because I'm at a loss to determine why Baldwin and Hayek, both very talented people, would appear in such dreck.   As the story churned along, as Baldwin's and Hayek's characters were dragged farther out into the deep ocean of poor taste that is Drunk Parents, did they ever question what the hell they were making here?   

The setup is intriguing.  Frank and Nancy Teagarten (Baldwin, Hayek) are seeing their only child off to college.   They appear affluent, but when they return home, they empty their living furniture onto the front lawn for an impromptu yard sale and their luxury car is nearly repossessed.    They are flat broke, and trying to ward off creditors who lurk around the corner for their money.   So far, not bad, but that's only the first five minutes or so.    Then, after Frank and Nancy scheme to rent the house next door whose owner is away, we meet Carl (Gaffigan), who pays the security deposit and moves in.   We find out soon enough he is a sex offender, and through developments far too contrived to recap, Frank and Nancy are kidnapped by masked men who mistake them for sex offenders.   Frank and Nancy escape the kidnappers and crash at Frank's brothers place for the night, where Frank's nephew accuses him of trying to rape him.   Ugh.    

If any of this sounds even remotely funny or appealing to you, then I'm failing at my duty as a film critic.   Soon, it becomes a battle to hang in there until the end, which I managed to do somehow.    Colin Quinn and Will Ferrell make cameo appearances as would-be thieves who somehow light themselves on fire twice each.    And despite being engulfed in flames for about thirty seconds each time, they appear no worse for wear once the fire is extinguished.    What's even more inexplicable is how the Teagartens drop their daughter off at college to begin the fall semester in what is supposed to be September, but the shoot clearly occurred in the middle of winter based on the barren landscape and the heavy coats Frank and Nancy wore.    

The movie begins and ends with winsome voice-over narration by Quinn, who suggest the drunk parents of the title weren't drunk from alcohol (although they clearly do imbibe), but from love of their daughter.    Where did that sentimental malarkey come from?    A pathetic attempt to put a happy face on the unpleasantness we witnessed for the previous ninety minutes?

Drunk Parents tries almost anything for a laugh, and the jokes are as dead as the mid-winter lawn where Frank and Nancy hold their yard sale.    If Drunk Parents starred less talented or known actors, then at least their appearance in this movie would've been somewhat understandable.   An actor has to act.   But Baldwin and Hayek I'm sure are financially stable, and they should've taken a pass instead of wasting time on this dreadful movie which they will never get back. 

Murder Mystery (2019) * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Kyle Newacheck

Starring:  Adam Sandler, Jennifer Aniston, Luke Evans, Terence Stamp, Gemma Arterton

Murder Mystery is a comedy with few laughs despite the best efforts of its cast, who really want to elevate this material into an elaborate spoof of Agatha Christie novels.   It isn't elaborate or much of a spoof.  In fact, it starts to feel like the real thing with a few one-liners thrown in as the walls close in on our heroes suspected of murdering a wealthy billionaire.   How did Nick (Sandler) and Audrey (Aniston) get into this pickle?    Married fifteen years, but with the spark not what it used to be, the couple take a long-awaited trip to Europe after Nick, a New York cop, failed his detective exam yet again.    He doesn't tell Audrey this, and leads people to believe he is actually a detective.    This isn't altogether relevant, but it's part of the backstory.

On the plane, while Nick is sleeping, Audrey has drinks in first class with the aristocratic Charles Cavendish (Evans), and with a name like that, I doubt he could be anything but an aristocrat.    Nick and Audrey are invited to Charles' father's yacht for the weekend, which is more desirable than the cramped sightseeing bus tour Nick had arranged.   The yacht owner, Malcolm Quince (Stamp) is stabbed in the heart soon after telling most of his family that they are no longer allowed to ride the Quince gravy train.  Knives Out had a similar plot line, but was a whole lot more successful in nearly every aspect.

Who committed the crime?   Audrey is a mystery novel enthusiast, and gleefully takes the lead along with Nick to find out whodunit.   Soon, the couple is suspected of the deed, and find themselves on the run from the Paris police, while trying to figure out the crime.    Other suspects wind up dead, narrowing the search and making it easier on us and the couple.    Nick and Audrey also predictably reignite their passion for each other.

Murder Mystery is forgettable fluff.   It has been a few days since I watched it and I hardly recall it. I wrote at the top of my review that Murder Mystery is a comedy with few laughs.   I must admit now that number is closer to zero. 

The Report (2019) * *

 

Directed by:  Scott Z. Burns

Starring:  Adam Driver, Annette Bening, Ted Levine, Douglas Hodge, Sarah Goldberg, Corey Stoll, Jon Hamm, Tim Blake Nelson

You have to feel for Daniel Jones, the lead investigator for the Senate Intelligence Committee who works for years painstakingly on a report exposing the CIA's use of torture on suspected terrorist prisoners in the years following 9/11.   He writes an unimpeachable 7,000 page report which may never see the light of day, except perhaps in heavily redacted form or as a 400-page summary after submitting it to the Senate Intelligence Committee.   Pushback from the CIA comes in the form of redaction and an attempt to frame Jones on a criminal charge of stealing CIA documents for his report (which he does not).   The opening scene has Jones meeting with a lawyer (Stoll), who details step-by-step what a trial will do to him financially and how it will irreparably harm his once impeccable reputation.

The Report, curiously, does not make us feel much of anything about its subject and its aftermath.   I know we are supposed to be outraged by the CIA's tactics with both the prisoners (some of whom are proven not to be terrorists at all) and by the CIA's attempt to bury the report, but the dryness in which The Report is told left me indifferent.    The film's performances are better than the material.   Jones is mostly a blank slate, but Driver tries his damndest to fill his role with passion and outrage over his findings.   He becomes consumed by what the discovers, even to the point of potentially alienating his boss, the senior California senator Dianne Feinstein (Bening), who is just as troubled by the findings but knows she must be tactful in how she presents it.   As her chief of staff tells Daniel, "You don't have to run for reelection, but she does,"

I have no doubt of the accuracy in which The Report depicts politics and the inner squabbling between agencies in Washington.    Contentious meetings are the norm, with veiled and not-so-veiled threats exchanged, policies discussed, and lawyers sidestepping potential land mines with semantics and legalese.   With the political landscape altered so drastically since our current president took office, maybe watching a movie about pre-Trump government shenanigans simply isn't timely anymore.   This not to suggest that torture is acceptable (especially as The Report depicts it in such stark images), but the landscape has changed now.   It is difficult to work up the same frothing outrage that Jones feels, mostly because The Report is told in a rather cold tone about the not-so-sexy process of gathering information and seeing a report created which no one has the time, patience, or energy to read in its entirety.  

The Laundromat (2019) * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Steven Soderbergh

Starring:  Meryl Streep, Gary Oldman, Antonio Banderas, James Cromwell, Robert Patrick, David Schwimmer, Jeffrey Wright, Nono Anonzie, Matthias Schoenaerts, Sharon Stone

The Laundromat wants the viewer to be outraged and spew venom at the screen because the wealthy hide their wealth in offshore accounts and shell corporations to avoid paying taxes.   The meek, as so often referred to in this film, cannot inherit the earth under this economic system, so they must sit and take it as the rich get exponentially richer.    This ground was adequately covered in The Big Short, but that doesn't mean there is still isn't room for another take on the subject.    The Laundromat squanders that opportunity.    It is a dramedy which trips over itself trying to be too clever.    We have too many tangents, distractions, and breaking the fourth wall moments to build any momentum.    In the end, we're left with Meryl Streep (as herself, not a character) expounding on what the movie was trying to say.    Why the explanation of the points the movie was trying to make in the previous ninety minutes?  Is it recapping in case we fell asleep, which is possible?  

The Laundromat begins with two men dressed impeccably in tuxedos (Oldman and Banderas) who speak about the history of trade and money.   They walk through various sets, including one of early man discovering fire and a nightclub in a cutesy setup which lets us know The Laundromat won't be too Serious.   Then, we meet a couple named Ellen (Streep) and Joe (Cromwell) taking a river cruise on a small boat which capsizes causing twenty people including Joe to drown.    The boat's owners (Patrick and Schwimmer) discover their insurance policy was bogus and Ellen is screwed out of any settlement she might otherwise be entitled to.   Ellen does some digging and discovers somehow that the insurance company itself is a company on paper only, as are many others headed ultimately by a Panama conglomerate led by, you guessed it, the two guys in the tuxedos from the opening scenes.   Oldman and Banderas play Mossack and Fonseca, who run a shady pyramid scheme of a company in which tax shelters are created for their ultra-rich clientele looking to hide their money.   

If The Laundromat followed Ellen's story all the way through, even in a comic way, we would have had something here, but then the movie splinters off into two other stories about two different wealthy clients who also invest with Mossack and Fonseca.   Both stories end as unhappily, albeit in different degrees, as Ellen's.   Even though The Laundromat casts Ellen aside, those who go through Meryl Streep withdrawal won't need to worry long.    She returns, inexplicably, as a cubicle worker in Mossack's firm who is "promoted" to running some shell corporations, at least on paper.   Streep dons a dark wig and a prosthetic nose while speaking her dialogue in a thick "hey look at my awesome Spanish accent."   We know Streep has mastered just about every accent you can think of, but it's a waste to see this one used here for such an obvious stunt.

Ninety minutes go by, and at that point we have long stopped caring because the movie doesn't seem to care much either.  It has something to say, to be sure, but chooses to spread its message in an off-putting way.   Director Steven Soderbergh usually makes better films than this, and the actors usually appear in better films than this.   We've amassed a group of big talents who ultimately languish in a product that wants to say something, but flubs when it comes time to say it.  

Crash (2005) * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Paul Haggis

Starring:  Don Cheadle, Brendan Fraser, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, Larenz Tate, Sandra Bullock, Matt Dillon, Michael Pena, Ryan Phillippe, Terrence Howard, Thandie Newton, Shaun Toub, Jennifer Esposito, William Fichtner

Crash wants to be, and thinks it is, a searing, deep examination of racism.   But its threading story lines unravel, and its moments of power disappear beneath some of those plots' unlikely and silly resolutions. There is a lot of hate, distrust, preaching, and cynicism between its characters, and Crash bashes us over the head with its ideas in case we weren't paying attention, which we possibly might not have been. 

I first saw Crash upon its release in 2005, and it would go on to win the Best Picture Oscar, beating out the heavy favorite (and far superior) Brokeback Mountain in one of the biggest head-scratchers in Oscar history.   I will speculate that Oscar voters wished they could have that one back.   This isn't to say Crash isn't a movie with good intentions, but it is all intentions.

Let's try and explore the morass of stories which make up Crash:  An affluent black couple (Howard and Newton) is pulled over by two cops (Dillon and Phillippe), one of which pats down Newton and sexually assaults her while her husband looks on helplessly.   Phillippe is a rookie cop torn between loyalty to his partner and intervening on her behalf.   A detective (Cheadle) investigates the murder of a fellow cop mixed up in drug dealing.   A Persian store owner (Toub) mistakes an honest, family man locksmith (Pena) for a gang member and holds him responsible when his store is robbed.   Two carjackers (Bridges and Tate) have a nasty habit of carjacking the other members of the cast, and the wife (Bullock) of the Los Angeles district attorney (Fraser) has a meltdown after being attacked by the carjackers one night.   

But there is more.   The cop who felt up Thandie Newton has a sick father who can't get proper medical insurance, the Cheadle character has a criminal for a brother, and Cheadle's girlfriend, a fellow detective, has romantic problems with her partner.    Crash has subplots for days, but is so intent on connecting them that we have to wonder if there are only fifteen people in all of Los Angeles.   These characters keep running into each other, and after a while, the plot mechanisms slow the movie to a halt.    One such coincidence involving a second run-in between Dillon and Newton is the movie's only genuinely powerful scene, as Dillon redeems himself in a way, but can we forgive him his earlier trespasses?   Hey, he attacked Newton, but he isn't such a bad guy after all, is he? 

The resolution of the store owner and locksmith has to be seen to be believed.   The store owner tracks the locksmith to his home.   He approaches the locksmith and pulls a gun on him, demanding the locksmith pay back the money the store owner believes the locksmith stole.    The locksmith's daughter runs out and jumps into her father's arms just as the store owner pulls the trigger.   There are tears and the sad music swells up.   We assume the daughter was shot and killed, but wouldn't you know it, the gun was loaded with blanks.   The locksmith takes his daughter into the house and the store owner stands outside dumbfounded by what just happened.   That's the end of the story.    Isn't it against the law to fire a gun at somebody, even if you didn't know it had blanks?   Shouldn't the cops be called and maybe even Dillon or Phillippe would show up because it's that kind of movie?   

Two other characters (Phillippe and Tate) meet when Phillippe picks up Tate in his civilian vehicle after Tate tried to carjack Howard's Lincoln Navigator earlier in the day.   Phillippe, of course, responded to the scene and talked Howard into not getting himself shot.   Tate fled the scene prior to Phillippe's arrival, so he doesn't know that we know he tried to carjack Howard.    Phillippe and Tate soon start to argue, and things end badly for Tate, with Phillippe perhaps discovering his inner racist after all.   Or was he just protecting himself?    We don't know because we don't see what happens, just its aftermath when Phillippe gets rid of the body and lights his car on fire in the middle of an empty lot.  

These are two examples of how insipidly constructed the screenplay (which won the Original Screenplay Oscar in another huh? moment) is, depending on implausible chance encounters to tie things together, especially in Los Angeles.  Would Crash have worked better if the plots didn't intertwine?   It's hard to argue against the possibility.     It's difficult to fault the performances.   Their characters are adrift, and Crash lacks the spontaneity of life.   All of these fates are tied together, bound by prejudice and racism.   It wants to be profound, but Crash collapses under the weight of its pretentiousness and its silliness.  

A Cry in the Dark (1988) * * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Fred Schepisi

Starring:  Meryl Streep, Sam Neill

"The dingo took my baby," screams Lindy Chamberlain (Streep) as she witnesses a dingo raid her camping tent in the dark of night and run off with her ten-week-old baby in its jaws.    The baby, Azaria, was never found, just her clothing in tatters were discovered nearby.   A matinee jacket which Lindy sewed herself was not found.   At first, the Australian press and public were sympathetic and supportive of Lindy and her husband Michael (Neill) over this sad turn of events, but then the Northwest Territory police begin a further investigation and suspect Lindy of murdering the baby.    Because Michael is a Seven Day Adventist pastor and the family belongs to the minority religion, the media and the public also turn on the Chamberlains, turning their lives into a nightmare.   

A Cry in the Dark is the depiction of this terrible period in the lives of the Chamberlains, beginning in August 1980 with the disappearance of Azaria and until September of 1988 when the Chamberlains were cleared of all wrongdoing.   In that stretch, Lindy was convicted of murder and served three plus years before the discovery of the matinee jacket and her subsequent release from prison.

Since the film's release, coroners confirmed the baby's death was caused by a dingo and not murder, and the Chamberlains were awarded $1.3 million in damages for wrongful imprisonment, which covered about one-third of their legal costs.    This does not, however, restore them.   Michael passed away in 2017 and Lindy is still known as the woman whose baby was taken by a dingo and whose trial was a media spectacle.   And they were innocent.   

Streep and Neill are sympathetic and human here, with foibles, imperfections, and bottled up anger over the circus that has become their lives.    Lindy's hostility comes pouring out on the witness stand, and jurors took that to mean she was guilty, but let's think about it:   If you were innocent and people were still accusing you of murdering your baby, wouldn't you be frustrated and bewildered that you have to go through a trial?   And deal with the public scrutinizing your every move?   

A Cry in the Dark cuts away numerous times to scenes of ordinary people debating or watching the trial and its inherent drama.    There are even fistfights over the argument of Lindy's guilt or innocence.  Meryl Streep was Oscar-nominated for her performance, as she was nineteen other times, and this performance is less flashy and all the more powerful for it.   She holds her emotions in, and keeps things tight to the vest.   She rarely has a scene in which she completely loses control, and it's a study in mannered anger.    It is quite effective.    Sam Neill is also compelling as a man whose complete trust in God is shaken by doubt over the events which unfold.   Like Lindy, he manages to maintain more composure than most would in his situation.   Michael is convicted of being an accessory to murder after the fact, but his sentence is suspended after Lindy was found guilty.   

Director and co-writer Fred Schepisi focuses his outrage on the Australian media sensationalism which fueled the case and even caused police to continue an investigation even when an initial inquest exonerated the Chamberlains.    We witness how media coverage can spark misinformation, and how people's already unfounded fears can be further inflamed.    Could this apply to all media all over the world?   Absolutely.   A Cry in the Dark feels as contemporary today as it did forty years ago, and that shows there hasn't been much progress.   In fact, with the advent of social media and the 24-hour news cycle, misinformation runs more rampant than ever before.   The irony is, we have such immediate access to real information, and yet we are still misinformed and prejudiced.    

The Other Guys (2010) *

 

Directed by:  Adam McKay

Starring:  Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, Michael Keaton, Eva Mendes, Steve Coogan, Rob Riggle, Anne Heche, Samuel L. Jackson, Dwayne Johnson

I walked out on The Other Guys when I saw it in theaters ten years ago.   I've only walked out on one other movie in my life, 2005's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and to date I haven't revisited it.  I chose to revisit The Other Guys, and I can say time has not altered my views on it.   Since I was watching it on television instead of the theater, I made a promise to myself to sit through this slog until the end, which I did.    

The Other Guys remains a comedy dead zone.   Efforts are expended to produce laughs, but none occur, and there are talented people associated with this movie.   Adam McKay went on to win an Oscar for his screenplay for 2015's The Big Short, as well as pick up nominations for Best Director for that movie and for 2018's Vice.   Will Ferrell's and Mark Walhberg's respective filmographies have been a mixed bag, but in the right circumstances, both can deliver.   

To refresh your memory, The Other Guys begins with the exploits of two hotshot, media celebrity cops (Johnson and Jackson) who have no qualms about destroying a city block (or Trump Tower) to apprehend a suspect carrying 1/4 of a pound of weed.    The hotshot cops, feeling invincible, decide to make an ill-advised jump from the roof of a building and die.   With the two super cops out of the picture, desk jockeys Terry Hoitz (Wahlberg) and Allen Gamble (Ferrell), seize an opportunity to make a name for themselves by investigating a possible embezzlement featuring a high-profile financier (Coogan).   The mismatched partners do not get along at first, but per the formula, they wind up getting along and solving the case.

The Other Guys loves to recycle its gags as if you will find them funnier the third or fourth time you hear them.  Such gags include the guys' captain Gene Mauch (Keaton) who unwittingly recites lines from TLC songs when giving orders.   And if the name of Gene Mauch tingles in your subconscious, he is the Philadelphia Phillies manager whose team infamously blew the National League pennant in the final games of the 1964 season.   There is another running gag about how Allen manages to attract hot women, including wife Sheila (Mendes), much to Terry's consternation.   Allen was once a pimp in college, although he won't cop to it, and occasionally slips into this persona.   Then, we have two other cops who bully Allen and as far I can recall, they don't receive any comeuppance.    

Walhberg and Ferrell would team up again some time later in 2015's Daddy's Home and 2017's Daddy's Home 2, which are slight improvements over The Other Guys, and that is indeed faint praise.  I reread my review from 2010 and found I wouldn't change too many words in it.   I gave it half a star then and I give it one star this time around.   I guess that means I liked it twice as much as before, but that may be even fainter praise than saying how the Daddy's Home movies are better than this one.   

 

 

Mad Men (2007-2015) * * * 1/2

 

Starring:  Jon Hamm, John Slattery, Christina Hendricks, Robert Morse, January Jones, Vincent Kartheiser, Joel Murray, Elisabeth Moss, Jessica Pare, Jared Harris

Spoilers abound!

The key to Mad Men's success is Jon Hamm, whose look and stature are tailor-made for a complex chameleon like Don Draper.   How many actors could have pulled off such a character whose dynamics change as often as Don's?   Hamm never reaches for effect as Don Draper evolves, or devolves, from chain-smoking, alcohol-guzzling ad man in early 1960's Madison Avenue to the psuedo-hippie practicing yoga in 1970 California who masterminds the iconic Coca-Cola ad featuring "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing".   One constant in Don Draper is his ability to adapt to overcome trauma, and he's had much trauma to deal with.  

Mad Men's exquisite production values make us think we've time traveled back to 1961 Madison Avenue, where big time advertising agency Sterling-Cooper is making its mark.   The partners are the womanizing Roger Sterling (Slattery), Draper's biggest ally in the firm and the eccentric Bert Cooper (Morse), who allows so few people in his office the employees have to break into it after hours just to allay their curiosity as to what's in there.   Sterling-Cooper has big-name clients, and are on the hunt for more.   Wining, dining, and arranging for strippers and hookers are common business practices.   Each office is equipped with its own minibar, which judging by how much these people drink must have to be restocked daily.   Most of the characters chain smoke in the first few seasons, with less emphasis on smoking in the later seasons, thank goodness.

Don has an artist girlfriend in Greenwich Village dipping her toe into the burgeoning hippie culture. With his clean-shaven face, pristine suit, and not a hair out of place, Don does not fit into this world. Much to our surprise, or maybe it shouldn't be, Don has a wife and two children waiting for him in the suburbs.   Betty (Jones) is a former beauty queen turned suburbanite housewife who remains blissfully unaware of Don's affair, or does she not want to interrupt her opulent lifestyle?   Don loves his children, and seems reluctant to use any sort of physical punishment, which was more accepted back then.  We soon learn why.

Big time spoiler here!  Don Draper, we learn early in the first season, is really Dick Whitman, who was raised by an abusive family and had a prostitute for a birth mother.   Dick enlisted in the army to fight in Korea, and when a fellow soldier is killed and burned beyond recognition after a bombing, Dick assumes the identity of the dead man and begins a new life elsewhere.    His cover is soon blown by the real Don Draper's widow, and they resolve this situation amicably and become partners in his deception.

As with anything, a lot changes in the ten years from the beginning to the end of Mad Men.   Some other key characters include Peggy Olson (Moss), who begins her career as a copywriter before being promoted to ad exec by her mentor Don, another ad exec Pete Campbell (Kartheiser), who discovers Don's secret and tries to use it to blackmail him for more money and a promotion.   How Don and the partners handle this is an unexpected masterstroke. And there's the busty redhead Joan Harris (Hendricks), who has an on-again, off-again relationship with Roger Sterling, and whose character arc rises to unexpected places.   The supporting performances are also fully realized.   This isn't simply Hamm's show. 

Don's story provides Mad Men's center of gravity.   He escaped one world only to inhabit the problems of another.   There are subtle nuances which Hamm nails between Don and Dick.   Don is more assured, colder, and worldly, while Dick is softer and gentler.   Both people exist in the same person, with neither one jockeying for his soul.   Again, thank goodness.   The last thing we need is a tortured Don Draper.   Mad Men lasted ninety-two episodes with Hamm at the epicenter of each one.   Over that many episodes, Mad Men's production design never falters, and the best episodes occur when the main players strike out on their own to form their own firm.   

Like most series that go on for longer than four or five seasons, Mad Men could have wrapped up successfully maybe two seasons before it did.   But it's quite riveting to watch these people change as the prim and proper early 1960's gives way to the more turbulent late 1960's following the Kennedy assassination and the escalation of the war in Vietnam.    Some characters can morph into newer personas, while others get swallowed whole due to their inability to adapt, which is one thing you can never say about Don Draper.  

The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) * * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Brad Furman

Starring:  Matthew McConaughey, Marisa Tomei, William H. Macy, Ryan Phillippe, John Leguizamo, Bryan Cranston, Frances Fisher, Laurence Mason, Josh Lucas, Shea Whigham, Michael Pena

Mick Haller (McConaughey) is a special type of ambulance chaser.   His office is the back seat of his Lincoln driven by his chauffeur (Mason), and he is street-smart, connected, and deals only in cash.   A motorcycle gang has him on retainer.   But he has a heart and a conscience on occasion, and he still feels guilty about a innocent client (Pena) he talked into a plea bargain for a murder he didn't commit.  Now comes along a client more affluent than he is used to: Louis Roulet (Phillippe), a young man from a wealthy Beverly Hills family accused of assaulting a prostitute.   Louis insists he is innocent, and Mick takes the case, much to his detriment later on.   Louis isn't what he seems, and may in some way be connected to the case which landed his former client in prison.    Could the normally smart and cynical Mick have been bamboozled?    One character tells Mick, "You have one client in prison for what your other client did."

The Lincoln Lawyer is a slick legal procedural with McConaughey in top form doing what he does best: Playing the oily, charming slickster who knows the angles and the score.   Mick can wheel and deal with the best of them and doesn't mind stomping on a few toes to get there.   But Louis soon presents a problem he can't simply talk his way out of, and he goes into high gear hatching a scheme to deal with Louis and his innocent former client in one fell swoop.    It won't be easy, because Louis is dastardly and heartless, and knows he has Mick by the balls.

The Lincoln Lawyer fills Mick's world with some top notch performances in memorable supporting roles, including William H. Macy as his investigator who can uncover things most can't, Marisa Tomei as Mick's ex-wife who works in the district attorney's office trying to send Louis to prison, and Bryan Cranston as a cop who doesn't much care for Mick.   The Lincoln Lawyer shows us the seedier side of L.A. law and for the most part it doesn't stop moving.    The ending may be a bit too neat, and one development comes out of nowhere, but that doesn't stop The Lincoln Lawyer from being fun.

There is one scene which encapsulates the type of guy Mick is, and tries hard to conceal.   His driver suggests (with dread) that Mick won't be needing him once his license is restored.   Mick's reply, "I got my license back three months ago,"   We see Mick will do the right thing by those loyal to him, but if you get on his wrong side, look out.   

Moonstruck (1987) * * * *

 

Directed by:  Norman Jewison

Starring:  Cher, Nicolas Cage, Vincent Gardenia, Olympia Dukakis, Danny Aiello, Anita Gillette, Julie Bovasso, John Mahoney

Moonstruck is a romantic comedy that is cynical about love.   "Love don't make things nice. It ruins everything. It breaks your heart. It makes things a mess. We aren't here to make things perfect. The snowflakes are perfect. The stars are perfect. Not us. Not us! We are here to ruin ourselves and to break our hearts and love the wrong people and die," says Ronnie (Cage) to Loretta (Cher), who have fallen for each other even though Loretta is engaged to Ronnie's estranged brother Johnny (Aiello).

This is one of the reasons Moonstruck resonates so well, it is not afraid to point out that love is more often than not messy and the idealism which accompanies falling in love usually does not stick around.  Because people are imperfect, so is love itself.   Loretta Castorini knows this all too well.   Her first husband died, and now as she is getting older, she is settling to marry the safe, but awkward Johnny Cammareri.   Because Johnny and Ronnie haven't spoken in years (for reasons which make Loretta and the audience do a double take), Johnny asks Loretta to invite him to the wedding.   Soon, Johnny is off to Sicily to tend to his dying mother, and Loretta is left to sort out the Cammareri family drama.

Ronnie is an angry young baker whose fiancee left him years ago (in part due to the result of what happened between he and Johnny) and is now convinced love is not in the cards for him...until he meets Loretta.    They seduce each other, because Loretta is turned on by Ronnie's outrageous anger, and Ronnie perhaps because this is a way for him to get back at Johnny.   But, Ronnie falls for Loretta, and when he tells her, she slaps him and says, "Snap out of it!"   He won't.   Even though Cage won the Oscar for 1995's Leaving Las Vegas, this remains his career-best performance, a study of a man who knows what losing love is like, and despite his misgivings about it, is willing to try again with a woman who is engaged to his brother.    The heart has its reasons.   Cher won the 1987 Best Actress Oscar for her role.   Loretta is lonely, willing to settle so she doesn't have to spend her days alone, and loves her wacky family.   We embrace her.  

Moonstruck populates its story with not just Loretta's dilemma, but her parents' as well.   Her mother Rose (Dukakis-in an Oscar-winning performance) has been faithfully married to plumber Cosmo (Gardenia-who should have won the Oscar) for many years.   Cosmo, however, cannot say the same, as he has an affair with a daffy woman (Gillette) who adores Cosmo, even when he freely admits to ripping off his customers by selling them copper pipes.   ("Copper costs money because it saves money")   Rose soon learns of the deception, but it is handled not with screaming or heavy drama, but with a deft touch and realism.   One night, Rose goes out to dinner by herself and finds herself dining with a middle-aged professor (Mahoney) whose younger date threw a drink in his face and stormed off.  They talk, and reveal truths about the other.   When the professor offers to take her home, she rejects his advances, because even though Cosmo has been unfaithful to her, she feels it doesn't give her the right to do the same.   This is a poignant scene which reveals all you need to know about Rose.

Another brilliant scene is when Rose asks Johnny why men cheat.  Not quite knowing how to answer, he replies, "Because they fear death,"   When Rose tells Cosmo that no matter what he will one day die, he doesn't know how to respond at first, but because he knows her so well, he suspects she knows the truth about him and loves him anyway.   The family's dilemmas, which are myriad, are all settled one morning at the Castorini breakfast table.   Moonstruck, written by John Patrick Shanley (who won the Oscar for Original Screenplay), does not take the easy way out with slapstick or madcap rushing between rooms so one party doesn't hide from the other.   It lays all of the wounds and troubles out on the table to be observed, reflected upon, and resolved in humorous fashion.   Moonstruck's big laughs and sentimentality are earned because we love these people and we want them to be happy, whatever happy might be.