The Hours (2002) * * *

Directed by:  Stephen Daldry

Starring:  Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Julianne Moore, Ed Harris, John C. Reilly, Claire Danes, Stephen Dillane, Allison Janney, Jeff Daniels

The main characters in The Hours are connected by the Virginia Woolf novel, Mrs. Dalloway.   One is Woolf (Kidman) herself, another is 1950's discontented housewife Laura Brown (Moore) who reads the novel while contemplating suicide, and a third is Clarissa (Streep), a modern-day woman who shares the same first name as the heroine of the Woolf novel and like Mrs. Dalloway is attempting to cater a party.   Virginia and Laura are closeted lesbians, while Clarissa lives with her partner (Janney) and raising a daughter (Danes) while checking in on close friend; Clarrisa's ex-husband Richard (Harris), who is dying from AIDS. 

There is a lot to digest in The Hours and occasionally this moves slowly, but the impact of several story arcs packs an emotional wallop.   All three characters are tended to by loving spouses to whom they can't or won't always allow themselves to connect.   Virginia's husband Leonard (Dillane) moved themselves to the London suburbs in hopes of quieting the angst within Virginia, but it only made Virginia more dispirited and depressed.   Laura has a husband and son who both love her, but she finds she cannot respond in kind, which makes her want to rent a hotel room, take pills, and never wake up again.   Clarissa is not suicidal, just torn between her duty to her family and her love for Richard, who is supposed to be the guest of honor at Clarissa's party, but we find he may not be in the partying mood.

Kidman is nearly unrecognizable thanks to makeup and a prosthetic nose, but she is brilliant here as the intelligent, haunted, and troubled writer who can't shake free of her demons.   Moore gives us a dichotomy of someone we should despise, but we end up understanding her motives.   Our version of what should make us happy doesn't always coincide with others' ideas.   Streep is harried and confused, trying to hold it together for everyone while she suffers.   Harris' Richard, we learn, is someone trapped in a world he no longer wishes to stay in, much like another person close to him a long time ago.   The Hours is a unique perspective on love, loss, and those who find they can't love no matter how hard they try.   This could be the most profound definition of tragedy I think of, one which The Hours explores in depth.  

The Score (2001) * * *

Directed by:  Frank Oz

Starring:  Robert DeNiro, Edward Norton, Marlon Brando, Angela Bassett

The Score is a heist movie which heeds to traditions of the genre skillfully and with suspense.   The participants are Nick Wells (DeNiro), a Montreal jazz club owner who moonlights as a master thief.  He has never been caught, mostly because he doesn't believe in stealing in the area where he lives, and he is a criminal with uncommonly good instincts who is ready to retire.   He is soon asked by mob boss Max (Brando) to work one more score with newcomer Jack (Norton), who has been working undercover as a janitor scouting the Montreal Customs House where a priceless scepter is being stored.   Jack poses as Brian, who walks and speaks like someone with special needs.   

Nick doesn't trust Jack at first, but slowly learns to work with the cocky upstart.   Nick examines the blueprints, gathers his equipment, and hatches the plan to break into the safe while disabling cameras and keeping the security guards from being too suspicious.   Nick is breaking his own rule by committing a theft in his backyard, but the score will allow him to quit for good and spend more time with his fiancee Diana (Bassett), who has the obligatory role of the romantic partner/spouse who urges the hero to spend more time at home. 

DeNiro is an intriguing protagonist; slow to trust and even slower to assume nothing can go wrong.  He knows the angles and while Jack thinks he has all the answers, that's when Nick changes the questions.  Observing all is the slovenly Max who needs the score himself in order to get out of a potentially deadly debt.   The uneasiness between Nick and Jack provide ample fireworks and the theft itself is one of ingenuity mixed with some twists you may not see coming.   The closing scene in which one character asks another, "What have you got?" makes the entire movie worth it.  

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022) * * *

Directed by:  Edward Berger

Starring:  Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch, Aaron Hilmer, Daniel Bruhl, Sebastian Hulk

Erich Maria Remarque's 1928 novel which was made into the 1929 Oscar winner for Best Picture has now been made by a German director and cast for the first time.   The Lewis Milestone-directed original focused more on the bill of goods the young men were sold when asked to fight a war to save the Fatherland.   The boys, led by naive Paul Baumer, bought the rhetoric hook, line, and sinker.  Some lived to regret it while others died wondering what they got themselves into.

The 2022 version of the story is fixated more on the violence, blood, and warfare; a mixture of 1917 and Saving Private Ryan realism which is done well and I suppose is action the original film couldn't depict so thoroughly and accurately.   What the original film couldn't foresee, which this version can understand, is that not even a quarter of a century after the end of World War I, German men were asked to save the Fatherland again, only by an evil monster named Adolf Hitler and not Kaiser Wilhelm II.  Maybe the Nazi war machine lifted passages from the book to recite to their eager recruits.   Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it, but it is telling how quickly the Germans forgot what just happened two decades earlier.   War is like that.

Aside from the older illiterate soldier Kat (Schuch), who mentors and befriends Paul as his school friends are ground up and spit out by the war, the characters are hardly memorable (even Paul, who is more acted upon than anything else).   What makes All Quiet on the Western Front effective is the universal fear experienced by the soldiers who had no idea what awaited on the battlefields and in the trenches.   Soon enough, fighting wasn't about Kaiser Wilhelm or for God or country, it was about saving your neck.   A parallel story (not written in Remarque's book but added specifically for this movie) is the German high command working out the terms of capitulation when they realize 40,000 Germans are dying daily for a lost cause.   The terms of surrender are hardly beneficial to the Germans, but what else is left to do?   As it turns out, fight another war.  History is repeated, with many innocent bystanders as part of the carnage.   

All Quiet on the Western Front's earlier power is diminished somewhat by the brutality of the battle scenes, which take on the formula of attack, bludgeon, repeat.   After a while, they all blend into each other, but it must be said the scenes are produced skillfully.  We just need so many of them to get the point, but perhaps it's being faithful to the novel in a more precise way. 

The Fabelmans (2022) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Steven Spielberg

Starring:  Gabriel Labelle, Michelle Williams, Paul Dano, Seth Rogen, Mateo Francis Deford, Judd Hirsch, David Lynch

Steven Spielberg's autobiographical The Fabelmans, like its hero Sammy Fabelman (played as an eight-year-old by Mateo Deford and as teenager by Gabriel Labelle), straddles the line between art and family in a funny, heartbreaking, and human way.   The Fabelmans are a family we grow to care about.  Spielberg continues his mastery of the craft of filmmaking by telling a story of sometimes brutal honesty which must hurt him to his core.  With that being said, it does drag in spots, taking on a "you had to be there" quality which removes a half-star from the rating, but The Fabelmans is still very good.  

The Fabelmans begins in Ohio, where patriarch Burt (Dano) is a scientist and engineer with big ideas that could change the world.   He shows love to his family tentatively and awkwardly, while matriarch Mitzi (Williams) gives her affection expansively and passionately, but we sense she may be battling her own demons.   Also part of the family is Benny (Rogen), Burt's best friend and co-worker who plays the part of the fun uncle who is always ready with a joke.   As time progresses, Benny's role in the family becomes clearer and hastens its demise.  In the middle of it all is Sammy, who watches The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and becomes hooked on movies.   He receives a camera and learns how to not only shoot footage, but edit and craft a narrative.   

As a teenager, Sammy and his family move to Arizona and then California as Burt's career escalates.  Sammy shoots classroom project films with this friends, showcasing a filmmaking knowledge far beyond his years and experience.   It is here Sammy's love of filmmaking grows from a hobby to a passion he will never relinquish.   His passion is furthered along by a visit from Uncle Boris (Hirsch), who stays at the house and one night and tells Sammy a story detailing a choice he once had between his art (he was once a circus performer) and his family.   Hirsch handles the scene masterfully, providing Sammy with a scenario he will one day (and many more times) have to face himself.   A later meeting chance meeting with his curmudgeonly idol John Ford (Lynch) solidifies his aim to become a movie director.   The rest belongs to cinema history.

The Fabelmans is naturally about Spielberg's own family, but it could stand on its own as an absorbing family drama even if it had nothing to do with him.   The characters are lovingly and clearly drawn and acted, occupying most scenes with quiet power.   Working with his usual crew of superior artists like cinematographer Janusz Kaminski and a powerful score by the now ninety-year-old master John Williams, The Fabelmans shows us conflicts which hurt and feel so real, because in many cases, they were.   

A Christmas Story Christmas (2022) * * *

Directed by:  Clay Kaytis

Starring:  Peter Billingsley, Ian Petrella, Julie Hagerty, Erinn Hayes, Scott Schwartz, R.D. Robb, Zack Ward

A Christmas Story Christmas is the direct sequel to the 1983 classic A Christmas Story and it aims its sights on nostalgia and sentimentality.   It succeeds at delivering both, albeit nearly forty years after the original's release.    A Christmas Story Christmas naturally can't match the original in terms of charm and legacy, but it's still fun to see Ralphie Parker (Billingsley) visit his childhood home on Cleveland Street around Christmas time 1973 in order to mourn the loss of his father and console his mother (Hagerty-replacing Melinda Dillon from the original film).   There is no funeral for the father for the week or so in which the movie takes place, but that's because mother only wants the focus to be on Christmas and not the funeral. Fair enough, if not wholly realistic.  Where's the father's body being stored while the Parkers are celebrating Christmas?

As A Christmas Story Christmas opens, Ralphie is struggling to sell the science fiction novel he wrote.  He took a year off from work to write the novel and if he doesn't sell it by his self-imposed December 31 deadline, he promises his patient, loving wife Sandy (Hayes) he will find a job.   Then, the phone rings and his mother breaks the news of The Old Man's passing (Darren McGavin actually died in 2006, but the film strings together clips of him in the original film to produce a sweet tribute).  Ralphie meets up with old pals Flick (Schwartz) and Schwartz (Robb), now a bar owner and his most prolific customer respectively.   If you think they've abandoned their childhood antics of upmanship, then you would be wrong.   Other issues ensue, including buying a skimpy Christmas tree and other hijinks which further tests Sandy's everlasting patience.  

These are hijinks of the innocent kind and in the spirit of the original film.  Most of A Christmas Story Christmas is pleasant and innocuous, and we mostly care about the people in it because of the expansive goodwill set forth in A Christmas Story, plus plenty of nostalgia thrown in for good measure.  We also anticipate the appearance of Ralphie's former bully (who he beat the crap out of) Scut Farkus, and the payoff is surprisingly sweet.   Even with A Christmas Story director Bob Clark, McGavin, and Jean Shepherd no longer with us, A Christmas Story Christmas still delivers with a charm of its own.

Violent Night (2022) * * *

 

Directed by:  Tommy Wirkola

Starring:  David Harbour, Beverly D'Angelo, Alex Hassell, Alexis Lauder, John Leguizamo, Leah Brady

Violent Night treads early with Bad Santa vibes, only the Santa (Harbour) in question is the real thing.  On Christmas Eve, Santa is weary of traveling the globe delivering presents and drinks away his sorrows in a London bar.   After proclaiming this may be his last year as Kris Kringle, Santa summons his reindeer and flies away while vomiting on the hapless bartender who follows him up to the roof. 

This Santa is profane, unkempt, and sick of being Santa, but once he receives communication from a young girl (Brady) who still believes in him that her family is being held hostage by a man known as Scrooge (Leguizamo), then it's Santa to the rescue.  Not only can St. Nick deliver packages to the world's children in one night, but he can kick some butt.   It turns out Santa is a Norse god or something close to it, although when he wields a hammer it doesn't cause the damage Thor's does, but he throws a mean haymaker. 

When Santa tells Scrooge, "Santa Claus is coming to town", you either go with Violent Night or you don't.  What happens with the dysfuctional family Santa is trying to save or anything from that point on is surely predictable, but the story isn't exactly meant to be anything but a clothesline to which to hang sufficiently enjoyable (albeit bloody) action scenes.   Harbour is a burly Santa with a heart of gold buried under the cynicism.   His performance carries the movie, plus the unusual idea of the real Santa playing action movie star.   You have to wonder, however, if Santa's shenanigans with these terrorists throw off his schedule at all.   

Death Wish (1974) * * *

 

Directed by:  Michael Winner

Starring:  Charles Bronson, Stuart Margolin, Vincent Gardenia, William Redfield

Paul Kersey (Bronson) leads an ordinary life as a New York architect with a loving family.  He served as a medic in the Korean War and classified himself as a "conscientious objector."   He doesn't own a gun.  All of that changes when his wife is murdered and his daughter made comatose by home invaders posing as supermarket delivery persons.   Paul grieves (as much as Charles Bronson would allow us to see anyway) and soon accepts an assignment in Tucson hoping to get away from New York for a while.   In Tucson, Paul is given a gun by the property owner overseeing Paul's housing development design and is taken to a gun range, where he shows an aptitude for accuracy.  

Paul decides to use his newfound gun skills on would-be muggers and assailants.   He walks alone at night in the park or subway, luring attackers, and then killing them.   At first, this causes Paul to vomit, but then he gains a rhythm for it.   The police are ambivalent towards the vigilante whose killings are causing a steep drop in crime.   On one hand, they don't mind someone doing their dirty work, but on the other they wonder if vigilantism won't lead to a whole city of one-man judge, jury, and executioners.   A haggard detective (Gardenia-who is seemingly battling a constant cold throughout the film) suspects Paul, follows him, but not to arrest him, but to make him a deal to get out of town and stay there.

Bronson made a career after Death Wish playing a vigilante in one form or another.   He was quite good at it.   Director Winner once said of Bronson that although he never saw Bronson explode at a co-star or crew member, it wouldn't surprise him if he did.   He just seemed capable of violence and that makes it all the more realistic when he snaps.   In Death Wish, the morphing is slower and more deliberate, showing us that Paul is indeed an ordinary man driven to extreme lengths in his quest for vengeance.  The movie spawned four inferior sequels in which Bronson became a one-dimensional killing machine. Not to spoil the ending of Death Wish, but it's a shame he never catches up to the guys who attacked his family.  

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022) * *

Directed by: Ryan Coogler

Starring:  Letitia Wright, Angela Bassett, Winston Duke, Lupita Nyong'o, Tenoch Huerta, Martin Freeman, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Danai Gurira

The opening of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever pays a stirring tribute to the late T'Challa (and by extension the late Chadwick Boseman, who passed away from colorectal cancer two years ago) who has passed on and is being mourned by the people and royal family of Wakanda.   T'Challa's mother Queen Ramonda (Bassett) has now assumed the role reluctantly as Wakanda's leader and meets with the United Nations (I think), which is harassing Wakanda to share its exclusive rights to vibranium to the rest of the world.   Funny, I assumed that Stark Industries was already using it, as well as Captain America, but no matter.  

Following the funeral of T'Challa, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever mires in another two-and-a-half hours with a plot which is way too thin to spread over the bloated running time.   It appears deep in the ocean is another source of vibranium, protected by the underwater kingdom of Talokan, led by its amphibious king Namor (Huerta), who wants to destroy the surface world and wants to ally himself with Wakanda for reasons mentioned and maybe even fully explained, but I missed it.   Namor is a Conflicted Villain, who is never vicious enough for us to root for his demise, so we wind up ambivalent towards him.   Ramonda's daughter Shuri (Wright) is angry enough at the death of her brother to want the world to burn, but soon she dons the vacant Black Panther costume to lead Wakanda against Talokan. 

I praised the original Black Panther's technical qualities (for which it won three Oscars in 2018) while giving less than stellar grades to its story, which seemed typical of many movies made before it.   Black Panther: Wakanda Forever looks good to be sure, but its plot is far less riveting than its predecessor and moves without much forward momentum or direction.   Other than the tributes to Boseman which are peppered in throughout the film, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever doesn't carry much emotional heft.   Shuri dons the Black Panther suit, but not T'Challa's mystique, and we are left with a movie which at its heart didn't need to be made.  

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022) * * *

Directed by:  Rian Johnson

Starring:  Daniel Craig, Janelle Monae, Edward Norton, Dave Bautista, Kate Hudson, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom, Jr., Madelyn Cline

Glass Onion contains the same qualities which made its predecessor Knives Out (2019) successful.  It follows the rules of whodunits with the super-intelligent, offbeat detective Benoit Blanc (Craig) at its center unraveling not one, but possibly two murders on a remote Greek island owned by zillionaire Miles Bron (Norton).   

During the height of the 2020 COVID pandemic, Miles invites several of his closest friends (or are they frenemies?) to a weekend at his mansion on the island where he will host a murder mystery party in which he will be the victim.   Somehow, Blanc is invited even though he has never met Miles, and this amps up the intrigue in Miles' eyes.   The party guests are:  Controversial fashion model Birdie Jay (Hudson) who can't stop posting racist tweets, Connecticut governor Claire Debella (Hahn) who is in the middle of a Senate race, muscled influencer Duke Cody (Bautista) who boasts about male superiority, his girlfriend Whiskey (Cline) who may have eyes for Miles, scientist Lionel Touissant (Odom, Jr.) who receives round-the-clock faxes from his employer, who happens to be Miles, and Cassandra Brand (Monae), who was once Miles' business partner but was pushed out after a series of legal wranglings by Miles and left nearly broke.

Each of these people (with the exception of Blanc) has a reason to want Miles dead and also a reason to ensure he stays alive.   The mansion itself is a triumph of wretched excess with Miles presenting it to his guests with part braggadocio and part "look how much better I am than you are" snobbery.   Blanc's arrival on the island is met with as much welcomeness as when Hercule Poirot boarded the Orient Express.   What I enjoy about writing reviews like this one is that I don't have to expound on the plot too much because of potential spoilers.   Everything could be construed as one, but I will say Glass Onion, like the title reveals (and inspired heavily by the Beatles song), has more than one layer to peel back to reveal the truth.   The ending and resolution is not quite as successful as the buildup, but like Knives Out, Glass Onion is a lot of fun.   

Cruel Intentions (1999) * * *

 

Directed by:  Roger Kumble

Starring:  Ryan Phillippe, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Resse Witherspoon, Selma Blair, Christine Baranski, Louise Fletcher, Eric Mabius, Sean Patrick Thomas, Joshua Jackson

You could dismiss Cruel Intentions as a young adult version of Dangerous Liaisons, or you can admire the film's style and performances like I did, especially Phillippe's since his character, the contemptible  Sebastian Valmont, undergoes the most changes.   Cruel Intentions moves the action from 19th century Paris to late 20th century New York with the wealthy and privileged playing people like chess pieces. 

Two such creeps are Kathryn Merteuil (Gellar) and her stepbrother Sebastian who lusts for her.  Kathryn plays Sebastian's feelings to her advantage, forever dangling her body like a carrot while tasking Sebastian to ruin the people's lives who recently ran afoul of her.   Sebastian's job is to seduce the new girlfriend (Blair) of the guy who jilted her and then deflower the virgin Annette (Witherspoon), the new school headmaster's daughter who exalted her chaste lifestyle in a recent magazine article.  Annette's wholesomeness is offensive to Kathryn apparently and it would do hear heart good to see her taken down a peg. 

Kathryn and Sebastian are loathsome, but while Kathryn spends her time manipulating others for her own enjoyment, Sebastian gradually grows to love Annette, who has heard things about Sebastian's past but chooses to believe in the good in him.   Phillippe convincingly handles his personality transformation in subtle ways which makes it all the more effective.  He isn't big on declarations of love, but we see the change in his eyes and expressions.  It's a nuanced piece of acting.   We can also see why he would fall for Annette, whose purity and gentleness win over Sebastian, which naturally pisses off Kathryn.   She doesn't love Sebastian, mind you, but Sebastian falling for Annette is a loss for Kathryn in her quest to ruin lives.

Cruel Intentions is faithful to the story with a few twists of its own.  It's a well-done remake with Gellar in the Glenn Close role, Phillippe in the John Malkovich role, and Witherspoon in the Michelle Pfeiffer role from the 1988 film.   They live up to their predecessors and we find history repeating itself in this manner:  Malkovich and Pfeiffer wound up falling in love during filming of Dangerous Liaisons.  One year later, Colin Firth and Meg Tilly occupied the same roles in Valmont and fell in love and had a child together.   Phillippe and Witherspoon married soon after this film was released.   There must be something about these roles which cause the actors to fall for each other.  

She Said (2022) * * *

 

Directed by: Maria Schrader

Starring:  Carey Mulligan, Zoe Kazan, Patricia Clarkson, Andre Braugher, Samantha Morton, Jennifer Ehle, Angela Yeoh, Peter Friedman

Months after Donald Trump was elected president despite accusations against him of sexual assault, harassment, and possibly rape, The New York Times began investigating claims from as far back as the 1990's against Hollywood movie mogul Harvey Weinstein.   Weinstein's behavior towards women was not exactly a secret in Hollywood circles, but since he could destroy careers with the snap of his fingers, who would have the courage to rein him in?  

She Said presents to us not only how New York Times reporters Megan Twohey (Mulligan) and Jodi Kantor (Kazan) painstakingly put the story together, but how Hollywood (and especially the board of Weinstein's company Miramax) enabled Weinstein's predatory behavior with settlements and non-disclosure agreements.  And lastly how this isn't simply a male thing but a money thing.   Weinstein's movies made money for Miramax and won numerous accolades.  They had no desire to kill the golden goose, even though he was committing crimes against women.  The jarring opening scene of She Said sets the tone:  A young woman in Ireland in 1992 stumbles across a movie set and is soon made part of the crew.  She enjoys her job and it lights her up inside, but soon the movie cuts to a scene in which the woman frantically runs down the street disheveled and frightened.   We don't have to ask what happened.  The monster has struck again.

Weinstein's behavior was only curtailed once the Times published its articles about the decades of his abuse.   The victims were not only terrified to speak out, but were silenced by payouts and NDA's.  Famous actresses like Ashley Judd, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Rose McGowan (whose accusations started the ball rolling) discussed their ordeals with the reporters, but still feared going on the record because they were afraid Weinstein's power and reach.   Megan's and Jodi's editors wanted an iron-clad story before they published.   It wasn't enough to name names.   They needed corroboration.   Like Ben Bradlee in All the President's Men and Marty Baron in Spotlight, editors Rebecca Corbett (Clarkson) and Dean Baquet (Braughter) are supportive of their reporters and do not cower in fear of the Weinstein machine.   Some of the movie's best scenes involve Dean having the gall to tell Weinstein and his lawyers what's what without fear of retribution. 

We are treated to the obligatory scenes in which Megan and Jodi are lightly chastised by their husbands and families for not being home enough.   Whether such conversations actually took place is up for debate.  What isn't up for debate is that we've seen these scenes before.   Even with minor quibbles, She Said takes us on a powerful journey which shows us the painful nature of investigative reporting in which dead ends, hostile or intimidated witnesses, rejection, and a paper reluctant to publish without all of its ducks in a row are the norm.   I think Spotlight and All the President's Men are better films, but She Said contains its own moments of power in breaking a story which sprung the #metoo movement. 

The Menu (2022) * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Mark Mylod

Starring:  Ralph Fiennes, Anya Taylor-Joy, Nicholas Hoult, John Leguizamo, Judith Light, Janet McTeer, Reed Birney, Paul Adelstein, Rob Yang, Arturo Castro, Mark St. Cyr, Hong Chau

The Menu begins intriguingly enough.  A group of wealthy people are taken by boat to an exclusive island to indulge in a $1200 per plate meal prepared by Chef Julian Slovik (Fiennes) and his loyal staff which unfailingly responds to his commands like privates would to a drill sergeant.   Chef Slovik's reputation is such that people would pay obscene amounts of money to attend his dinners, but his speeches before each course begin to sound more ominous as the night progresses.   The Fiennes performance is the most fascinating in The Menu.  We are never sure what's inside him or even what he's planning, but he remains a dense mystery.  

Very little is known about the dinner guests, except to say they all have either met or hoped to meet Chef Slovik previously.   One is Tyler (Hoult), an enthusiastic foodie who gobbles up Chef Slovik's words as quickly as he does the food.   In his mind, Chef Slovik can say or do no wrong.   His date Margot (Taylor-Joy), is not nearly as impressed with the chef or the meal.   She is looking for a quiet place to light up a cigarette, a move discouraged by Tyler because it would ruin her palate, as if that's the worst thing smoking could do to a person. 

The first hour or so of The Menu keeps our attention.  We think we know what Chef Slovik is up to, but we don't know why.  When we find out the why, we are not exactly overwhelmed with joy in its discovery.   The characters, with the possible exception of Margot, who Chef Slovik observes, "doesn't belong here,"  We figure out what he means later on, and Margot's identity reveal is not the stuff of cinematic legend. 

What we have with The Menu is neither fish nor fowl.  It is part black comedy skewering the food world where someone stares in awe of the supposed brilliance of a "breadless bread plate" (which is really just sauces) and waxes poetic after tasting some of the food as if a thesaurus has exploded from his lips.   The other part moves uneasily into horror and gore, which makes The Menu an odd combination which ultimately doesn't fit together.  Kind of like some of the items at Chef Slovik's dinner. 

Changeling (2008) * * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Clint Eastwood

Starring:  Angelina Jolie, Jeffrey Donovan, Jason Butler Harner, Michael Kelly, John Malkovich, Geoff Pierson

Nine-year-old Walter Collins disappeared from his Los Angeles neighborhood in March 1928.   Months later, the beleaguered LAPD proclaims great news.   The boy was found in rural Illinois and will be returned home to his relieved mother Christine (Jolie), who waited patiently and with bated breath for months for any news of his whereabouts.   One hitch:  The boy who returns is not Walter, despite the department's assertion that he is.   "A mother knows," says Christine, who is nonetheless forced to take the boy home to "try him out for a few weeks," as if he's a new toy.   This boy is four inches shorter than Walter and has dental and medical records which don't match Walter's.   When Christine relays this information to Captain J. J. Jones (Donovan), he has her committed to a psychiatric ward.  

Why would the LAPD try and pass off this boy as Walter Collins?   One reason is because they needed any kind of public relations win they could muster after a series of scandals and the daily radio broadcasts of crusading Rev. Gustav Briegleb (Malkovich), who makes it his daily mission to criticize the corrupt department.  With men like Jones on the force, who could blame him?   The department's attempt to strongarm Christine into accepting that his boy is indeed her son is only one reason Changeling promotes anger and outrage in the viewer.   The movie is based on a true story, and from what I've read about the case, the movie is mostly faithful to the original story.

A subplot, which almost feels like another movie, is soon introduced in the form of Gordon Stewart Northcott (Harner), a Canadian man who kidnaps and kills young boys.   LAPD detective Lester Ybarra (Kelly) arrests a teenager who is in the country illegally and stumbles across Northcott's crimes.   Was Walter among the kidnapped and possibly killed by Northcott?   It's possible, and with the time the department wasted trying to convince Christine that the boy they found was her son, they could've been searching for the real Walter.   

What director Clint Eastwood projects in his inimitable way is the sense of hopelessness ordinary people like Christine face when going up against the machine that is the LAPD.   Christine has a good job as a supervisor at the telephone company and a nice bungalow in a quiet neighborhood, but her world is naturally flipped upside-down forever with the loss of her child.   A crayon drawing by Walter hangs in his room, even as the phony Walter sleeps in his bed.   When Northcott (played by oozing creepiness and smarminess by Jason Butler Harner) enters the picture, Changeling adds another nightmarish dimension because we don't know exactly how many others are suffering the same fate as Walter and his mother.  Jolie's performance is all the more powerful because it doesn't contain flourishes or reach for effect.   At times, Jolie presents uncommon restraint with her character even if the face of obvious police misconduct.   She only wants her son found and still has misplaced faith that the LAPD will do the right thing.

Eastwood hammers home a consistent point with a precise attention to detail:  The LAPD had earned its reputation from which it took years to recover, so much so that a seemingly open and shut case against O.J. Simpson could be tainted by it.  

The Banshees of Inisherin (2022) * * *

Directed by:  Martin McDonagh

Starring:  Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon, Barry Keoghan

The world must not want Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson to be friends, or at least Martin McDonagh's world.   In 2008's In Bruges and now 2022's The Banshees of Inisherin, Farrell and Gleeson start out as friends but end up as enemies.   Farrell and Gleeson have remarkable comic chemistry and can elicit laughs by staring at each other.   Both of these films contain brilliant performances and one hell of a setup which is let down by an unsure third act.   In Banshees, maybe the setup is so strong that there isn't a proper way to wrap things up.   

Banshees opens in 1923 on the island of Inisherin, off the West Coast of Ireland.   The mainland is close enough for the residents of Inisherin to hear the bombs and gunfire exploding on it courtesy of the Irish civil war.   A cold war followed by an uncivil one will soon take place between friends Padraic (Farrell) and Colm (Gleeson) who would normally meet every day at 2pm at the local pub to drink and chat.  One day, Colm does what passes in 1923 for ghosting his old friend and advises him that he no longer wants his company.   What did Padraic do to deserve this treatment?   Colm explains that Padraic's conversation is dull and he wants to concentrate on writing songs for his fiddle.   No matter the reason, Colm wants nothing to do with Padraic, which naturally Padraic doesn't accept.   Colm makes matters crystal clear by warning Padraic if that he attempts to speak to him, he will cut off one of his own fingers and deliver it to Padraic's cottage which he shares with his sister Siobhan (Condon).   

That should make Padraic think twice about engaging Colm in conversation, but he's as hard-headed as he is simple and amiable.   Colm has simply outgrown him, in his own mind anyway.   Or maybe Colm is suffering through trauma unbeknownst to his friend, and to us.   The Banshees of Inisherin, however, isn't simply the Farrell/Gleeson show.  Kerry Condon, as Padraic's sister, and Barry Keoghan, as Inisherin's version of the village idiot, stand on their own with hilarious supporting work.   They can't make much sense of things, but each has his/her own goals to strive for without getting in the middle of Padraic and Colm.  Siobhan wants to take a job on the mainland while Dominic (Keoghan) sets his eyes on Siobhan.   The fact that Siobhan would move to a place where a bloody, violent war is breaking out tells you all you need to know about how she feels about Inisherin.  

Armageddon Time (2022) * * *

Directed by:  James Gray

Starring:  Banks Repeta, Anthony Hopkins, Anne Hathaway, Jeremy Strong, Jaylin Webb, Jessica Chastain

Set in 1980 Queens in the weeks leading to Ronald Reagan's presidential election victory (met with a "there goes the neighborhood" type of response by Anne Hathaway's Esther), Armageddon Time moves with unease and untidiness for Paul Graff (Repeta), a sixth grader moving towards art as his passion and his future.   Aramageddon Time has autobiographical meaning for its writer/director James Gray (We Own The Night, Ad Astra) and it doesn't always present its subject cleanly or move in one direction.   The characters are drawn in broad strokes, allowing them to be imperfect and human.  The only person who approaches sainthood is Paul's grandfather Aaron (Hopkins), who is his biggest supporter and wants only one thing for him:  Be a mensch.  In life, if you're a mensch (Yiddish for a good person), everything else falls into place.  

Paul is far from a mensch as Armageddon Time begins.  He gets on the wrong side of this sixth grade teacher by aligning himself with the held back black student Johnny Davis (Webb).   They strike up a friendship which isn't exactly supported by most people Paul knows.   There isn't heavy symbolism here, just two unlikely friends in a world prepared to crush that friendship.   Johnny is troubled.   Paul does his best to connect with him, but once Paul is transferred to a private school, he treats Johnny as persona non grata due to peer pressure.   This leads the sick Aaron to lecture Paul about what it means to stand up for friends and yourself.   

Armageddon Time has a strong sense of time and place with Fred Trump and daughter Maryanne (Chastain) playing a small role in shaping Paul's path.  Yes, Donald's father and sister.  If you think the final scene in which Paul walks out on a Fred Trump speech espousing students to become future business leaders and politicians is not meant to be symbolic, then you're watching a different movie than I am.   It may not be Donald Trump whom Paul is walking out on, but the guy speaking is also named Trump and that's close enough for Gray.   

Black Adam (2022) * *

 

Directed by:  Jaume Collet-Serra

Starring:  Dwayne Johnson, Pierce Brosnan, Aldis Hodge, Viola Davis, Noah Centineo, Sarah Shahi, Marwan Kenzari, Quintessa Swindell, Mo Amer, Bodhi Sabongui

Black Adam doesn't do much to distinguish itself from other superhero movies, either of the DC or Marvel Brand.   Buildings are blown up, bodies fly around, and a backstory dating back thousands of years.   The story is of Teth Adam (Johnson), who supposedly led a revolt circa 2600 BCE against a despot in a fictional Middle Eastern nation and was then buried for 5,000 years in a desert tomb.   The word "SHAZAM" is used to grant him superpowers (a tie-in to the Shazam! series seems inevitable) and 
Teth Adam can just as easily give up his powers by shouting the same word.  

When Teth Adam is awoken by those who wish to utilize him to rid the nation of a drug gang which has enslaved it, while others such as the Justice Society headed by Amanda Waller (Davis-in a cameo featuring her Suicide Squad character) are dispatched to imprison him for reasons never made fully clear. The Society is headed by Carter Hall/Hawkman (Hodge), whose team consists of Atom Smasher (Centineo) who can grow to the size of Godzilla, Cyclone (Swindell) who can harness the wind, and Dr. Fate (Brosnan), who can occupy multiple spaces and is clairvoyant.   Only Brosnan generates any interest, and as I've stated in a previous review of a forgettable Brosnan movie, he could read the phonebook and still sound cool. 

Even after being buried for 5,000 years and originating in a land in which English wasn't spoken, Teth Adam can helpfully speak English perfectly and goes on to annihilate bad guys while not worrying about property damage or innocent civilians meeting untimely deaths.   The Justice Society acts as Adam's frenemies, while Adam's real friends emerge (the woman who dug him up and her son) and his enemy is determined to sit on the throne and rule the world.   And yes I mean an actual throne.

Johnson has charisma to spare in normal circumstances.  In Black Adam, that charisma is used sparingly.  He, of course, looks the part of a superhero (or antihero), but there isn't much character there.   We witness him morph from anithero to hero and we're not much moved.   Confusing CGI-inflated action scenes rule the day and the plot is too thin to support a nearly two-hour, overly bloated film.   As is custom with DC or MCU movies, there is a post-credit sequence in which Black Adam's next potential opponent is revealed.  That is more compelling than anything in the movie.   Maybe we should just skip to the post-credits scene and save ourselves two hours. 

Ticket to Paradise (2022) * *

 

Directed by:  Ol Parker

Starring:  George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Kaitlyn Dever, Billie Lourd, Maxime Bouttier, Lucas Bravo

Romantic comedies tend to fall into patterns which can either work smoothly or make events deadly predictable.   Ticket to Paradise has several romcom standards at play: (feuding ex-spouses, insults, deception, and of course the ex-spouses falling in love again).   None of these are surprises nor are they meant to be.   There is a comfort level in that, so it comes down to execution.   Ticket to Paradise is graced with two megastars in the title roles who could do this material in their sleep, but thankfully choose not to.

Clooney and Roberts are engaged and engaging as the feuding exes David and Georgia Cotton who can't stand to be in the same room together following their divorce years ago.   When they occupy the same vicinity, they exchange quips, putdowns, and battle in verbal volleyball.   They first are forced to sit next to each other during their daughter Lily's (Dever) graduation from law school.   Lily then takes a vacation with her best friend Wren (Lourd) in Bali, a tropical paradise where she meets and falls immediately in love with local boy Gede (Bouttier).   Thirty days later, Lily and Gede are engaged and Lily is looking to eschew a law career to seaweed farm in Bali with Gede.   David and Georgia are horrified.   After all, they just dropped a fortune on law school and now Lily doesn't even want to be a lawyer.   They travel to Bali, uniting forces to undermine Lily's upcoming wedding so she doesn't make the same mistake her parents did.   You know, getting married?

David and Georgia are intelligent people who resort to sophomoric behavior in order to cause Lily and Gede to doubt themselves and each other.   Even though they are rough on each other, we know David and Georgia will call a truce, talk, laugh, and fall in love again.   They will also think twice about trying to destroy their daughter's nuptials, which of course they do because they never come across as anything but mostly nice people.   The material is light and slight, to the point that we wonder why Clooney and Roberts needed to star in it.  Because it was filming in a tropical haven, maybe?   It is to Roberts' and Clooney's credit that they put as much energy into Ticket to Paradise as they do.  They could've just phoned it in.   Now my last question:  When you have a wedding in Bali, where do you go for a honeymoon?

Crimson Tide (1995) * * * 1/2

Directed by:  Tony Scott

Starring:  Gene Hackman, Denzel Washington, James Gandolfini, Viggo Mortensen, Lillo Brancato, Jr., George Dzundza, Jason Robards, Matt Craven, Danny Nucci

Crimson Tide is a story of clashing ideals and old school vs. new school which permeates even the vast military-industrial complex.   Capt. Ramsey (Hackman) is in charge of the Alabama, a nuclear submarine bound for Russia on the eve of potential nuclear war with Russian rebels looking to start World War III.  His new executive officer Lt. Commander Hunter (Washington) joins the mission with an impeccable reputation and a lack of battle experience which concerns the outwardly polite and welcoming Ramsey.  

An undercurrent of tension infuses the opening moments of Crimson Tide and rarely defuses it.   The threat of war lingers over everything.   Ramsey and Hunter approach their jobs differently, which is evident when Ramsey decides to hold a launch drill while Hunter is helping to battle a galley fire which could endanger the sub.   Hunter expresses his disagreement with his captain for choosing to hold a drill during the emergency, but Ramsey explains that the Russians don't care if an American sub is battling a fire when it decides to launch missiles at the United States.   Another telling scene is when Ramsey and Hunter are sharing a meal with the other officers and their philosophies become crystal clear.   Ramsey was trained in a different Navy than Hunter.   "I was trained in the when and how, you were trained to ask why," says Ramsey.   He is correct and his disdain for the "new Navy" is palpable.

Neither Ramsey or Hunter is a villain, but at a crucial moment, their idealogies come full circle when, during a torpedo attack, the sub's communications system is compromised and an incomplete order comes through from the Pentagon.   Since moments before, a complete order to ready to launch the sub's missiles is authenticated, Ramsey assumes those to be the standing orders.   Hunter wants to authenticate the orders first, thinking they may contradict the initial orders.   Ramsey and Hunter vehemently argue, causing Hunter to seize control of the captaincy from Ramsey under Navy regulations.   Is it as easy to overthrow a captain as Crimson Tide makes it out to be?   I don't know, but it effectively sets up the crew taking sides with Ramsey or Hunter later.

As one character bluntly explains, "You are both right and you are both wrong,"   Such a sentiment underlines each disagreement Ramsey and Hunter have.   Hackman and Washington, of course, are superb, but Crimson Tide also foments excellent supporting work from Mortensen, Craven, and Dzundza, all of whom have their own opinions as to who is correct in this argument.   Because of the looming threat of nuclear holocaust, Crimson Tide becomes a movie that is relentless, tense, and efficient as the crew and officers try and determine where they stand and why their stance may either start a war or prevent it.   

Till (2022) * * *

Directed by:  Chinonye Chukwu

Starring:  Danielle Deadwyler, Jayln Hall, Whoopi Goldberg, Frankie Faison, Haley Bennett, Tosin Cole, Jayme Lawson, Sean Patrick Thomas

Till exists in the powerful moments its story must show us.  Emmett Till (Hall) was a fourteen-year-old brutally murdered in 1955 Mississippi.   The movie's opening scenes show Emmett as a loving boy with an affinity for music and dancing; a born entertainer.   His mother Mamie (Deadwyler) adores him and is terrified of his upcoming visit with family in Mississippi.   Emmett and his family live in Chicago, where Mamie holds down a good job with the Air Force and the threat of lynching isn't a way of life.   Emmett travels to Mississippi, encounters white shopowner Carolyn Bryant (Bennett) while buying candy in her store, and soon two white men (one of whom is Carolyn's husband) kidnap Emmett at gunpoint from his uncle's home in the middle of the night.   Emmett's crime?   Complimenting Mrs. Bryant and whistling at her.   

Mamie is alerted to the kidnapping and holds out hope, but reacts as any mother would when word of Emmett's murder makes it way to Chicago.   The local NAACP (and soon the national one) wants Mamie to utilize this opportunity to speak in favor of a federal anti-lynching law (which finally came to fruition in March 2022 under President Joe Biden).   Mamie, upon seeing Emmett's mutilated, almost unrecognizable body, tries to process her grief and anger while understanding she also must do right by others in hopes of them avoiding her son's fate.   Danielle Deadwyler's multi-faceted performance is one of sheer power and restraint.   Watch her as she answers questions in Emmett's murder trial, knowing that in a way she and Emmett are on trial as much as, or more so, than Emmett's accused killers.   Even if you don't know the eventual verdict, you sense the gears grinding in motion towards injustice. 

Some time later, following their acquittals, Emmett's killers admitted to their crimes in a magazine interview and received $4,000 for the story.   Meanwhile, Emmett's life was sadly snuffed out.   Upon leaving Till, I noticed the story didn't propel the outrage it should have, but then I reflected on its overall theme and placed things in perspective.   The story compels outrage, but it also seems to understand its people contemporaneously.   Mamie and the NAACP are resigned to the likelihood that Emmett's killer will go free and that Carolyn would not be punished for her part in the crime.   Till itself takes on the same feel, and in that manner it is effective, and it also baffles us how lynching only became a federal crime a mere seven months ago.   With Dr. Martin Luther King waiting in the wings, Emmett Till became a symbol of how civil rights legislation was not only essential, but inevitable.   

Halloween Ends (2022) * *

Directed by: David Gordon Green

Starring:  Jamie Lee Curtis, Rohan Campbell, Will Patton, Andi Matichak, James Jude Courtney

Michael Myers is barely seen for the first hour of Halloween Ends and I didn't miss him,  Over the course of forty-plus years and way too many sequels and reboots, Michael Myers has grown tiresome.   He is a killing machine who can't be killed himself no matter what you do to him.   If a guy can survive an incinerator with only a few small burns, then how would anyone reasonably expect to subdue him with a baseball bat?

The first hour of Halloween Ends, once you get past Laurie Strode's excessive voiceover narration of a book she is writing of her experiences with Myers, focuses mostly on the troubled Corey Cunningham (Campbell), who was accused of killing a young boy he was babysitting on Halloween night a few years ago.   The boy's death was indeed an accident, but that doesn't Corey from becoming a pariah in Haddonfield, Illinois, a town which should bypass Halloween or simply erase it from the calendar.   Corey makes for a sympathetic figure and this portion of Halloween Ends had me holding out hope for a new direction.   But it wasn't to be.  

Corey falls in love with Laurie's granddaughter Allyson (Matichak), who lives with Laurie and as they grieve the death of Allyson's mother from the previous film, Halloween Kills.   Corey is soon terrorized by a small group of bullies who throw him over a bridge and to the ground below.   Demonstrating recuperative powers rivaling Michael's, Corey recovers to find Michael hiding in a sewer pipe and soon becomes his apprentice in becoming a serial killer.   How did Michael survive in the pipe in the time since the last Halloween movie?   This isn't the movie where you should ask. 

Michael Myers is soon reintroduced and assists Corey in brutal murders which are par for this rebooted franchise.   The inevitable showdown which turns out to be underwhelming at best with Laurie Strode is still delivered on cue.   Laurie must have some of Michael Myers' genes in her, because she can take a beating and keep on coming.    By now, I'm Halloweened out.   Everything you can conceive happening to Michael Myers has come to fruition, and now it's high time to move on.  

Some Kind of Hero (1982) * * *

 

Directed by:  Michael Pressman

Starring:  Richard Pryor, Margot Kidder, Ray Sharkey, Lynne Moody, Ronny Cox, Paul Benjamin, Olivia Cole

Corporal Eddie Keller (Pryor) spent five years in a Vietnamese POW camp only to return home to be initially hailed as a hero, but then is screwed over by bureaucratic red tape and that he signed a "confession" to the Viet Cong in an attempt to save his cellmate's life.   Upon his return to the States, and all during his romantic reunion with his wife, Keller learns his wife has fallen in love with someone else, has a child he never met, his business is bankrupt, and his mother had a stroke and is about to thrown out of the assisted-living facility where she stays if her medical bills aren't paid within a week.

Keller is soon forgotten after the cameras stop documenting his return and now he must adjust to real life again.   He befriends and soon falls in love with an expensive Beverly Hills hooker (Kidder) and plots a robbery to pay off his mother's bills and get out from under.   Pryor is, of course, a legendary comedian, but his stand-up act which plays to his personal pain makes him a natural dramatic actor.   In Some Kind of Hero, he plays both comedy and drama with equal adeptness, which carries the movie and its frequent tone switches. 

Some Kind of Hero also captures an era in history in which Vietnam veterans weren't treated as heroes or even decently.   People tended to forget that most soldiers were drafted and did not ask to be part of such an unpopular war.   Eddie Keller sure didn't wish to be a POW and further didn't desire to be put into a position where he must to sign a confession denouncing his country.  Some Kind of Hero may not always see through, but it sees enough and understands what it's seeing, and it rings with a certain truth. 

Smile (2022) * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Parker Finn

Starring:  Sosie Bacon, Jessie T. Usher, Kal Penn, Robin Weigert, Gillian Zinzer, Caitlin Stasey

Any mystery Smile contains is soon wiped away in a depressing slog of a plot in which there is no villain or any tangible evil which can be defeated.   The antagonistic force which is causing people enormous trauma followed by a brief, malicious smile which is the precursor to their suicide is like a virus which feeds off of personal trauma and pain.  When it becomes obvious the force is unstoppable, then what is the point?  Smile crawls to its inevitable conclusion which doesn't thrill or shock, but simply reiterates what happened before to another poor victim.   

Smile takes place over the course of four gray days in the life of emergency trauma psychologist Dr. Rose Cotter (Bacon), who just finished working an overnight shift when a troubled young woman named Laura (Stasey) is referred to her.   Laura is in sheer terror when she confides in Rose about her professor who emitted a creepy smile shortly before committing suicide right in front of her eyes.  Moments later, Laura develops the same smile and cuts her own throat.   The shaken Rose now begins to hallucinate and drops not one but two glasses on her floor (on consecutive evenings) when something frightens her.   Her fiance is naturally concerned with Rose's behavior, especially when it seems she wrapped her dead cat as a birthday gift for her nephew and has no recollection of how it occurred.

Dr. Cotter is able to decipher what happened to Laura and why and there is mumbo-jumbo about Rose's own mother's suicide which somehow may be the key to avoiding Laura's fate.  This brings Rose to abandoned childhood home which is not only miraculously still standing, but still has the bed inside on which her mother died.   Plus, there are items in the garage as well.  I suppose the local authorities never condemned the property nor did any realtor have any interest in selling it.   I don't know.  The land looks pretty plentiful and a real estate agent could have made a pretty penny off of the sale.  Sure, you don't want to mention the suicide that happened there many years back, but you do what you must to make some money in this economy.  

Amsterdam (2022) * 1/2

 

Directed by:  David O. Russell

Starring: Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Robert De Niro, Michael Shannon, Taylor Swift, Mike Myers, Andrea Risborough, Rami Malek, Anya Taylor-Joy, Alessandro Nivola, Matthias Schoenaerts, Chris Rock

Amsterdam's cast is top-heavy with A-List and award-winning talent stuck in a story which doesn't deserve their talents.  The actors are to be credited for their efforts to make Amsterdam palatable, but they wind up just behaving bizarrely.  David O. Russell has, of course, made some great movies in the past with large casts, but the stories behind The Fighter, Silver Linings Playbook, American Hustle, and Joy were compelling.   Amsterdam begins as a murder mystery which veers into different waters when it introduces a conspiracy (based on fact...maybe) which resonates with today's political climate.   Russell himself introduces Amsterdam with the disclaimer: "Some of this actually happened", similar to American Hustle, a movie no one would confuse Amsterdam with.

Christian Bale stars as Dr. Burt Berendsen, who as the story opens in 1930's New York City works with wounded and maimed World War I veterans, mostly dispensing illegal drugs to ease their suffering.  Dr. Burt (a veteran himself) has a glass eye (which frequently pops out as a running gag), scars all over his body, and faints whenever administering new, homemade drugs on himself.   He is best friends since the war with attorney Harold Woodman (Washington), with whom he served.   Both were seriously wounded in battle and treated by Valerie Voze (Robbie) in Belgium.   The three form a friendship and move to Amsterdam following the war to live a bohemian lifestyle.   There is no menage-a-trois, however, as Harold and Valerie fall in love and Dr. Burt (a married man) longs to return to his wife in New York even though her family has disowned him.

Fast forward to the 1930's, as Burt and Harold are called in by the daughter of their commanding officer to investigate his suspicious death aboard a ship.   They discover he was poisoned, but soon are suspects in the death of the daughter and on the run.   They find themselves enveloped in a darker plot involving assassinating President Franklin D. Roosevelt and installing a military leader to run the country.   This is based in part on truth and links to January 6 are entirely intentional, but Amsterdam is paced oddly and erratically, with the actors trying to keep up in drawn-out scenes which we grow tired of quickly.  Entire monologues are dedicated to keeping us (and the other characters) up to date on what's happening, which slows things down even further.   

There are other characters involved in this messy film, all of which tie into the plot at different angles.  I'm generally suspicious of the quality of a movie needing this many top-notch actors to star in it.  With Amsterdam, I know why.  

Hostage (2005) * * *

 

Directed by:  Florent Emilio Siri

Starring:  Bruce Willis, Kevin Pollak, Ben Foster, Jonathan Tucker, Jimmy Bennett, Michelle Horn, Marshall Allman

Bruce Willis is more vulnerable in Hostage than in any movie he starred in previously.  Those expecting another Die Hard will be disappointed, or maybe pleasantly surprised by his role of a former hostage negotiator who finds himself in the middle of another hostage situation.   As Hostage opens, Jeff Talley (Willis) attempts to control a violent domestic in which a father is holding his wife and son prisoner in a barricaded house.   The father kills his family and himself.  Talley is devastated and one year later he is the chief of police in a small Northern California town in which crime is low and the only drama Talley faces is from his estranged wife and daughter.  

That changes when three criminals in a pickup truck target a fancy SUV driven by accountant Walter Smith (Pollak) to steal.  They follow the vehicle to his home in the hills, break in to the house, and soon take the family hostage.   Talley arrives at the scene, but after one of his deputies is killed, he turns the situation over to the country sheriff and washes his hands of the whole thing.   Not so fast.  Walter cooks the books and launders money for a criminal organization, keeping the records on DVD's.   A hooded man and his associates kidnap Jeff's family and force Jeff to enter the house and retrieve the disk or else.   Matters have just become doubly complicated. 

Jeff now has to take over the hostage negotiations as well as keep his real objective secret from everyone.  He receives assistance from Walter's son (Bennett), who is hiding in the house's roomy air ducts.  Are home air ducts usually wide enough to allow people to crawl through them or hole up in there as long as the plot requires?  In movies, yes.  Willis' John McClane can attest to that, but at least he was trapped in a high-rise office building's ventilation system.

What separates Hostage from other action movies of this type is Willis' vulnerability and allowing him to not have all the answers.   He is as uncertain and scared as others might be in his circumstances, which transforms Hostage into a movie with a mind.  

 

The Good House (2022) * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Maya Forbes & Wallace Wolodarsky

Starring:  Sigourney Weaver, Kevin Kline, Morena Baccarin, Rob Delaney, Beverly D'Angelo, 
David Rasche, Rebecca Henderson, Molly Brown

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.  Such is the case with The Good House, a likable film which earns points strictly because no one is hacked to death in it.   I've grown weary of thrillers that don't thrill and horror films where the victims are killed in increasingly gruesome, bloody ways.  The movie landscape these days isn't providing us with much theatrical joy, so movies like The Good House stand out just by being simple family dramas.  

Sigourney Weaver is Hildy Good, once the most successful realtor in the seaside town of Wendover (in I think Massachusetts), but whose alcoholism has only grown more alarming and has caused a dip in her business.   She is losing top prospects to her former mentee turned rival and eighteen months ago, following a family intervention, Hildy reluctantly enters rehab and goes through the motions there.   She isn't the one with the problem, of course, all of her family and friends are to blame for noticing her increasing alcohol use and daring to care about her.   

Hildy was married once and has two grown daughters, but her husband (Rasche) left her for another man and remains a friend.  Other small-town business is at play, including Hildy's therapist friend fooling around with a pretty patient who is new in town (Baccarin-from Deadpool) and Hildy's one-time flame Frank Gechell (Kline) possibly re-entering her love life.   Frank is a gruff man with a perpetual stubble who owns many businesses but is referred to as "the contractor" or "the garbage man".  He is probably the richest man in town, but doesn't look or act the part.   Weaver and Kline starred together in Dave (1993) and The Ice Storm (1997) and just as in those films, they have a natural, unforced chemistry.  

The Good House perks up when Weaver and Kline take the screen together.   The rest of the time is spent with Hildy quietly breaking the fourth wall to introduce the players and deny her issues to us all and the soap opera which is Wendover.   The final act involves not one, but two missing townspeople, and one of which is an autistic child.   If you believe this story will end with the child dead in a forest somewhere, you are surely watching the wrong movie.   The subplots are tied up, if not necessarily neatly and Weaver delivers a cry for help which serves as a suitable, powerful payoff to her story arc. 

Samaritan (2022) * *

 

Directed by:  Julius Avery

Starring:  Sylvester Stallone, Javon Walton, Pilou Asbaek, Dascha Polanco, Martin Starr

I was late writing this review.   I saw it on the weekend it premiered on Amazon Prime (August 27 to be precise) and one month later I remember Samaritan faintly.   I recall how trashed Granite City, where the past and current action of the film takes place, looked.   I remember how sunny days were hard to come by and the grayness casts a pall over everything.   There is an origin story in which twins with superpowers Samaritan and Nemesis begin feuding and their fight escalates into a battle for control of the city.   Legend has it that Samaritan killed Nemesis during their epic confrontation and Samaritan hasn't been seen since.

A youngster named Sam (Walton) lives in a run-down apartment complex (well, what isn't run down in Granite City?) and discovers an older man in the same complex who he believes is Samaritan.   Joe Smith (Stallone) works as a garbage man, but after Joe dispatches the guys who are beating up on Sam (Karate Kid style), then Sam is utterly convinced that Joe is Samaritan.   "Samaritan is dead, kid," Joe tells Sam without equivocation.   Sam isn't buying it and begs Joe to come out of retirement and rid the world of Cyrus, who is attempting to resurrect Nemesis in spirit by forming a criminal organization.  

Samaritan is an anti-superhero story featuring a reluctant superhero played with a touch of melancholy by Stallone.   He has his reasons for being down in the dumps, which is revealed later at a crucial time.  The fight sequences featuring Stallone Joe, Nemesis, or Samaritan are hugely CGI-aided, but what isn't in superhero movies?   Samaritan, even when there is action on the screen, feels deflated and defeated.   It isn't terrible nor is it anything special, neither fish nor fowl.   Even the villain is one which we won't soon remember anytime soon. 

Barbarian (2022) * *

Directed by: Zach Cregger

Starring:  Georgina Thompson, Bill Skarsgard, Justin Long

The initial scenes of Barbarian inspire appropriate creepy dread.   Tess (Thompson) arrives at a house in a run-down, abandoned Detroit suburb she reserved on Airbnb only to find it double booked with a young man named Keith (Skarsgard) who seems understanding, caring, and friendly enough for Tess to feel comfortable enough to share the same place with until morning.   Because Keith is played by Bill Skarsgard, who was Pennywise in IT, we are never fully convinced that he is this nice of a guy, which I'm sure is the intent.   

Instead of a horror version of The Goodbye Girl, Barbarian devolves into typical gruesome business involving long dark hallways under the house which house disgusting secrets.   There are so many rooms, halls, and caverns below that you wonder how they were built without anyone knowing and certainly no construction permits.   Other than to be discovered later on and to provide enough darkness for someone to jump out at you and kill you or take you prisoner, why are these hallways even necessary?  

No matter.  Barbarian soon features a third character in the form of actor AJ Gilbride (Long), who is enjoying the good life in sunny California until he is accused of raping a former co-star and his career screeches to a halt.   Desperate to roust up cash for his legal defense, AJ returns to Detroit to stay in the very house where Tess and Keith once occupied.   He owns the place, you see, and discovers that all of the halls and space below equals more square footage which then equals more money when he sells the place.   AJ has such tunnel vision he doesn't see all of these unlit, cavernous halls as horrifying, but as dollars and cents when he cheerfully uses a tape measure and calculate the profits in his head.   

I won't reveal who or what lurks below the house except to say it is unworthy of the effective buildup to it.  Thompson and Skarsgard give us grounded characters caught in a terrifying nightmare, while Long teeters on the edge between selfishness and, gulp, morals with a character whose only purpose is to discover what happened to Tess and Keith.   Elements of #MeToo are introduced when Tess briefly escapes from the house only to find the local police don't believe her story of the murderous goings-on from which she fled.

The final act is an elongated chase scene featuring the standard Unkillable Killer and a backstory which makes you cringe.   When you take into account the quiet eeriness of the opening scenes, you come to realize Barbarian is two movies fighting for the same screen.  

See How They Run (2022) * * 1/2

 

Directed by:  Tom George

Starring:  Sam Rockwell, Saorise Ronan, David Oyelowo, Adrien Brody, Ruth Wilson, Reece Shearsmith

See How They Run is a lightweight murder mystery centered around Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap, which has been running in London's West End since circa 1953 and is the world's longest running play.  As See How They run opens in 1953, sleazy Hollywood director Leo Kopernick (Brody) is working at adapting the play to the big screen and making enemy after enemy in the process with his obnoxiousness and alienating personality.   Leo narrates the first few minutes of the film describing the setup in which he would eventually become a murder victim.   He is clearly not a fan of Agatha Christie's work: ("There are no dead bodies in the first ten minutes")

Leo is killed in brutal fashion and his body placed on a couch in the middle of the stage.  Inexperienced Constable Stalker (Ronan) and drunken Inspector Stoppard (Rockwell) are assigned to the case.    Ronan is a lovable, plucky Irish cop and Stoppard speaks and behaves as if he is channeling Captain Jack Sparrow.   Rockwell and Ronan are incredibly accomplished actors, of course, and we wonder why See How They Run requires their services.   But they are in See How They Run all the same and it is always fun to see them.  

There is no dearth of suspects in Leo's murder.   Everyone he ever came in contact with has a reason to want to kill him.   This includes screenwriter Mervyn Cocker-Norris, whose every draft is met with disdain by Leo, producer John Woolf (Shearsmith) who is hiding an affair he is having with his assistant which Leo discovers and uses to his advantage, and at one point even Stoppard himself is a suspect.   See How They Run is amusing for a while, with an ending in which the group of suspects (and Agatha Christie herself) are gathered in a room together Christie-style.   Following the movie, I found myself not thinking much about it, which can be a positive or a negative depending on your worldview. 

Don't Worry Darling (2022) * 1/2

Directed by:  Olivia Wilde

Starring:  Florence Pugh, Harry Styles, Nick Kroll, Chris Pine, Olivia Wilde, Gemma Chan

I am not revealing a spoiler by suggesting that Don't Worry Darling is all spoiler.   It is so blatantly obvious from the first frame that Something Is Wrong that the movie is just a slog of a waiting game until the Big Reveal is inexorably revealed.   And when it's revealed, it isn't anything special.   I was able to ascertain the twist because I've seen The Truman Show and The Village. 

I won't be a churl and uncover anything further.   Don't Worry Darling seemingly takes place in the 1950's in a sun-drenched suburban paradise where the men drive off to work every day and the women perform their daily tasks and find ways to kill time until their husbands arrive home and service them on the dinner table.  That is at least the case with Jack (Styles) and Alice (Pugh), who appear to be the perfect couple in this Shangri-La in the middle of the American desert.   The streets and homes look like leftover sets from The Truman Show, but hey you can't have everything.   With that being said, Don't Worry Darling looks gorgeous.   Its production values and performances far exceed the material they are saddled with.

All is not right in this utopia run by Frank (Pine), who is Jack's boss and the leader of The Victory Project, the shadowy company in the middle of the desert where the men work and are forbidden to discuss with their spouses.   While Alice tends to the household chores, Frank's voice penetrates the soundtrack sounding like someone reading from a self-help guide to living up to your potential.   Nameless men dressed in all red lurk in the vicinity as security guards.   A distressed neighbor slits her own throat while standing on her roof.  Yep, nothing suspicious to see here.   Frank may as well be wearing a t-shirt signaling his villainy or perhaps his cult leadership.   The mysterious goings-on which cause Alice to question her reality are as subtle as a sledgehammer to the face. 

No one believes Alice, naturally, crediting her suspicions to anxiety or exhaustion.   Frank, however, seems to relish the challenge Alice provides him.   When she accuses Frank of being an evil manipulator who is controlling lives in front of all their friends at a dinner party, Frank can hardly contain his self-satisfied smirk.   Pugh gives us as sympathetic a protagonist as one could expect.   Harry Styles has been criticized for not being up to Pugh's skill level, but if you think about the nature of their relationship, it makes sense for Styles to take a back seat, even in the town of Victory. 

Don't Worry Darling is Olivia Wilde's second feature, after the overrated Booksmart (2019).  Wilde exhibits the appropriate technical skills to be a big-time director, but even she needs better material to work from.  Don't Worry Darling is so excited to show us its secrets that it never builds suspense by attempting to hide them.  

Confess, Fletch (2022) * *

 

Directed by: Greg Mottola

Starring:  Jon Hamm, Roy Wood Jr., Marcia Gay Harden, Lorenza Izzo, Kyle MacLachlan, Annie Mumolo, Ayden Mayeri, John Slattery

Confess, Fletch might not have ever had a chance of working because we identify so vividly with Chevy Chase from the 1985 film and its 1989 sequel.   Chase handled the role of investigative reporter "of some repute" I. M. Fletcher with wry cynicism and droll voiceover narration.   The screenplays played to Chase's strengths and although he was a wiseacre, on occasion things did bother him like his ex-wife and getting shot at, and he was funny.  Confess, Fletch and Jon Hamm's characterization sadly are not.   Hamm tries, but never finds his rhythm with the role.   He plays Fletch as detached, so much so that it seems like he was flown in from another film... a better one hopefully.   The jokes fall flat and there is no voiceover narration.  Confess, Fletch plays like a routine, low energy whodunit.   

We have a sense Hamm was trying too hard to make us forget about Chase and the movie wasn't trying hard enough.   The plot, involving Fletch's girlfriend's father's missing paintings and Fletch himself being framed for a murder, almost dares us to care about it.   Fletch is a murder suspect but he hardly seems to notice.   He playfully deals with the detectives on the case (Wood Jr. and Mayeri) while also trying to solve the crime.   Nothing seems to faze this version of Fletch.   If he doesn't give a hoot, why should we?   Confess, Fletch is the textbook definition of "meh".  

The best scenes involve Fletch and his former newspaper boss (Slattery) meeting up and trying to top one another in the deadpan cynicism department.   Slattery and Hamm were, of course, former co-stars of Mad Men so it's great to seem them together again.   They have strong chemistry, which can't be said for Hamm and the rest of the actors.   There are some great character actors (including Oscar winner Marcia Gay Harden) present in the movie, but they don't say or do anything memorable.   I don't know if Hamm's characterization is closer to what MacDonald intended, but Chevy Chase casts a shadow far too large for Hamm to escape it.