Category Archives: Biography

tick, tick…BOOM!

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tick, tick…BOOM!             4 ½ stars

tick,tick…BOOM! takes us into the world of Broadway musical theater in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s movie directorial debut. We are introduced to aspiring playwright Jonathan Larson played exuberantly by Andrew Garfield (who we just saw portray Jim Bakker in The Eyes of Tammy Faye). This musical was actually written by Larson about his own life when he was writing his first musical, Superbia, a futuristic never produced play he has been working on for eight years. Larson went on to write the musical Rent, the hugely successful production but unfortunately he died just before it was performed. tick,tick…BOOM! captures the ambition and desperation of Larson as he struggles to become a success at age 29, hoping not to be just a waiter with a music writing hobby. His behavior is so manic he puts off his girlfriend Susan (Alexandra Shipp) and alienates his childhood friend Michael (Robin de Jesus) who recently left the theater to pursue a successful career in advertising. The performances and music nearly rises to the level of In the Heights, the Miranda creation from last year. The joy and inspiration of the movie is balanced by the tragedy of many of Larson’s friends dying of AIDS. This is 1990, during the height of the epidemic, so there is plenty of sadness going around. There are some very well staged musical routines here with Andrew Garfield being worthy of his Academy Award nomination. I have enjoyed every role I have seen him in including the first film I remember him in, 2010’s Never Let Me Go.

The Catcher Was a Spy

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The Catcher Was a Spy   3 stars

The Catcher Was a Spy takes us back to the espionage days of World War II when men in trench coats and fedora hats met secretly at night to gather intelligence and plan strategic assassinations. Here director Ben Lewin tells the true story of professional baseball player Moses “Moe” Berg who volunteered for the OSS and was sent on a mission to find and assassinate nuclear physicist Werner Heisenberg who may or may not be working on a German atomic bomb. The usually comedic Paul Rudd steps into the dramatic role of Berg and does a decent job given the material. I wanted to like the movie more but there wasn’t enough to get excited about though the combination of sports hero, wartime intrigue and harrowing situations would seem to provide plenty of material. Berg is an interesting subject, given the facts that he was Jewish, studied at universities, spoke several foreign languages and was sometimes perceived as being gay. We don’t get a full picture of Berg and his motives making him a mysterious figure which may be a good thing for the movie. With hindsight we now know that Germany was not close to producing an atomic weapon though it was feared they might be. So perhaps the premise of tracking down a scientist who could be working on such a weapon during a war is not that interesting of a story after all despite the background of the baseball player turned spy. That’s just a thought.

The Duke

The Duke                             4 stars

If the bloody fighting of The Northman or the zany comedy of Everything Everywhere All at Once isn’t for you, perhaps you should try the British comedy, The Duke. Jim Broadbent, the character actor of so many fine films gets his chance at a starring role as Kempton Bunton, a friendly out spoken man who resents the fact that the government expects people to pay for their over the air TV shows and tells the TV police his views when they track him down in his rundown apartment. (I know that they do this in England as I heard about it from a British fellow once.) Kempton and his wife (Helen Mirren) are still aching from the death of their daughter many years earlier. We find out early in the light-hearted comedy that Bunton went on trial for theft. Eventually he concocts a bizarre plan to steal a famous painting of The Duke of Wellington from The British Art Gallery and hold it for ransom, demanding that the government make television free to the elderly. As if this isn’t bad enough, he involves his son in the half baked plot as well. This low key type of comedy with likeable characters should appeal to a wide range of audiences. Sadly, the director, Roger Michell, won’t be making anymore like this as he passed away last year. The movie was actually based on a true story that happened in 1961. It was the only successful robbery of the Art Gallery in history. If you enjoy British comedy you can’t go wrong with The Duke.

Elvis

Elvis                       4 ½ stars

The new movie Elvis promised to be a grand extravaganza about the legend, the King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley and in the hands of Baz Luhrmann, it is all that and so much more. Luhrmann has previously brought us visually stunning movies like Moulin Rouge and The Great Gatsby. He does it again in this biopic about Presley and his longtime manager Colonel Tom Parker, telling it in a very nonlinear style that highlights the triumphs and tragedy that this relationship brought to them both. Tom Hanks portrays Parker as the carnival promoter who is always looking for the next big act that will make him rich, and the man who would exercise power over Elvis through his entire career. The transformation of Hanks into this bloated master manipulator is amazing. Look for an Oscar for the Makeup category for this one. Austin Butler who has had several small movie roles takes on the challenging job of capturing the spirit and energy of Elvis’s performances and his inner conflicts and I would say he just about has it. The movie hits all the major points of Elvis’s life, his rise to stardom, the controversy over his hip wiggling performances, his stint in the army overseas, the Hollywood era, the Las Vegas Elvis and his addiction to barbiturates and alcohol that shortened his life. But it also effectively shows how he was influenced by the Black music that he was surrounded by growing up in Tupelo, Mississippi. His performances are interspersed with those of B. B. King, Rosetta Tharpe and Little Richard and many others, so we see that without these Black artists there would have been no Elvis as we remember him. But the main story of the film is of the ties between Elvis and Parker as told through Parker’s eyes starting with his memories commanding that “The only thing that matters is that that man gets on that stage tonight.” This one deserves to be seen on the big screen. Next year look for Austin Butler as the notorious villain Feyd-Rautha in the sequel to Dune!

Flee

Flee                       4 ½ stars

For a remarkable achievement in storytelling and animation you won’t do better than the documentary movie from Denmark, Flee. Released at Sundance in 2021, this film finally made it to theaters at the end of last year. It has been on my list for a long time and I just viewed it recently. It tells of the unlikely years long journey of a gay Afghan refugee, Amin, who was forced to leave Afghanistan as a child in the 1980’s with his family. His story is told by combining recordings of his voice with stark animated images of the pain and anguish he and his family had to go through. There is a certain amount of unraveling of a mystery as elements of the story slowly emerge over the course of the film. The family, including Amin’s brother, mother and two sisters try to make their way to Sweden after the father is detained by the Afghan government and disappears. Amin tells his story after keeping much of it secret after twenty plus years, one that is full of persecution and suffering at the hands of the powerful and greedy. Flee is notable for having received three Academy Award nominations this year, in Animated Feature, Documentary and International Film. It is one that is truly worth watching.

Till

Till           4 ½ stars

In this season of Halloween when children become little monsters begging for candy, a film has come along that reminds us there are real monsters in the world that bring terror greater than what we see portrayed in the movies. Till brings a retelling of the all too true and familiar story of the kidnapping and murder of teenager Emmett Till who was visiting cousins in 1955 Mississippi and made the mistake of whistling at a white woman in the Jim Crow south. The well-known crime and the trial of the men responsible is told primarily this time from the point of view of Mamie Till-Mobley (Danielle Deadwyler (from The Harder They Fall as a male character!)), the boy’s mother, who went from grieving the loss of her son to becoming an icon of the Civil Rights Movement of the fifties and sixties. The screenplay is a straight forward telling of the events that shows us her concern for her boy’s safety and her historic decision of putting Till’s battered body on display for the world to see. We are fortunately spared any scenes depicting the actual torture and murder, but do see the terror of the family when Till was kidnapped during the night by the two men who committed the act. The importance of the event becomes clear when the NAACP becomes involved and Mobley is encouraged to go to Mississippi to testify at the murder trial. The heartfelt performance of Deadwyler is absolutely engaging as she expresses the pain and resolve of dealing with the overwhelming situation. I definitely look for an Academy Award nomination for Deadwyler. Other than young Jalyn Hall as Emmett the rest of the cast is not nearly as memorable. The highly accurate sets and the use of the popular music of the time evokes the feeling of what fifties were like. As a reminder of where we have come as a country and where we are today, Till needs to be seen. Also, for a good documentary on the history of lynching in the US, I highly recommend Always in Season from 2019.

King Richard

King Richard       4 stars

If you want to see another inspirational sports movie then go see King Richard, directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green and written by Zach Baylin. But the movie is more than that as it is also about the unwavering belief and determination of Richard Williams, father of future tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams. Will Smith portrays Richard, the girls’ father who has a written plan for his two daughter’s success and will not accept defeat even in the face of the odds against them, coming from the streets of Compton in the early 1990’s. Even though we know what the eventual outcome is, stardom in the all-white tennis world for two young black women, the obstacles facing them appear all too real. Richard works with the young girls on run-down neighborhood tennis courts while having to fight off the young men of the streets threatening them and forces his way into meetings with the white coaches who are needed for the girls’ success. Richard tells a lot of stories of his growing up in a world of racial prejudice with a father who would not look out for him. (The movie does not even include the worst of it.) He is determined not to have this experience repeated on his daughters. Fortunately, there is also a mother, Brandy (Aunjanue Ellis) who looks out for their interests and calls out Richard when he tries to go too far without consulting her. The white coaches are perplexed at Richard’s insistence that the girls be pulled from the junior tournament circuit when he sees how the parents of the other girls are treating their daughters and the resulting behavior as spoiled brats. Of course the movie would not be the success it is without Will Smith’s convincing acting performance as the father who won’t take No for an answer. He is deserving of the acting Oscar he received (despite all the ceremony controversy). This sports movie delivers with the expected climactic competitive scene as is the tradition, but the focus shifts from the father to daughter Venus when she faces the best in the world. The movie is available on HBOMax.

Back to Black

Back to Black      2 stars

One genre of film that I really like is movies about the making of music. These are the ones where we see the process of coming up with and writing a good song. They can be either fictional or about a real artist. Unfortunately, we don’t get that in the new Sam Taylor-Johnson biopic called Back to Black, the movie about the rise and tragic end to British pop star Amy Winehouse (starring Marisa Abela) who died of alcohol poisoning back in 2011. Instead, the movie focuses mainly on her troubled romance to husband Blake (Jack O’Connell) who was addicted to drugs and alcohol and played a major part in allowing Winehouse to share in the addiction. We do get several stage performances of Winehouse and her disagreements with the record producers. (She could certainly stand up for herself.) But I didn’t see enough of her composing music and feeling it in the process, other than one scene early in the movie. Abela does a decent job portraying the singer, even using her own voice in some of the songs. (It’s unlike Elvis then where Austin Butler only did lip syncing.) Much better examples of artist biopics were Rocketman (Elton John), Bohemian Rhapsody (Freddy Mercury) and even Ray (Ray Charles). We also get too many scenes of her getting more tattoos, but we do see how that enormous signature beehive hairdo came to be. If you saw the documentary, Amy, from 2015 you would see some significant details that are left out of Back to Black. The movie treats her father, Mitch (Eddie Marsan) far too sympathetically as he in reality only returned to Amy’s life after she became famous and did little to help her out of her addiction. Her record producer and band members are treated as mere background characters, and her bodyguard is left out altogether, even though in the movie she is hounded by the paparazzi. In the end the movie is reduced to one about a bad romance and I think we already have plenty of those.

Navalny

Navalny                5 stars

If you are going to see one documentary from 2022, Navalny by Daniel Roher must be the one to choose. Alexei Navalny is the Russian dissident who challenged Russian President Vladimir Putin, calling out the brutal nature of the government and the lies he tells the people of Russia. The film follows Navalny and investigative journalist Christo Grozev starting from the attempted assassination of Navalny until he is arrested and put in prison upon his return to Russia. The film plays like a thriller as we see him suddenly fall ill on a flight to Moscow forcing the plane to land in Omsk to seek medical attention for him. There he is kept by the authorities, however his colleagues fearing the worst find a way to fly him to Berlin, Germany where it is determined he was poisoned, a sure sign that the Kremlin was involved. While in Berlin and on the path to recovery, Navalny and Grozev undertake an investigation using telephone records and flight records to find possible candidates for assassins with Kremlin ties. The rest is fascinating to watch as the truth is uncovered and the crime is broadcast around the world revealing the monstrous practices of Putin. All of this happened well before the invasion of Ukraine, thus we now know just how corrupt Putin is and what he thinks of the common people. The film also includes moments with Navalny’s family so we see what he is risking with his political moves. The film serves as an effective reminder of how bad things can be when living under an authoritative dictatorship. This is the film that won Best Documentary at the Academy Awards this year. If you are interested in documentaries that tell provocative stories as they happen, you should really see it.

Sound of Freedom

Sound of Freedom          no review

I have not seen the Jim Caviezel movie Sound of Freedom, nor will I ever see it. The ads for it have been appearing regularly on television. The movie has had some very high box office numbers and has created a stir in the right-wing world so I felt compelled to make a public service announcement and warn people about it. The thriller action movie appears to be part of a crusade against child trafficking and features Caviezel as a sort of one man super hero out to rescue the victims of the sex trade. (Caviezel is best known for his portrayal of Jesus Christ in the Mel Gibson movie The Passion of the Christ.) In reality, it is a propaganda piece put out by the people who adhere to QAnon fantasy conspiracy theories such as the traffickers are harvesting children’s organs and extracting adrenochrome before killing them. The movie appears to be appealing to a mostly older white audience who are there to reinforce their views of what is wrong with the government and the country. Based on what I have read of the movie it is full of implausibilities and condemnations of the government. The movie was reportedly made in 2018 and it took this long to find someone to distribute it as it was considered to be a money loser. I have a suspicion that certain churches and right-wing groups have been buying out theater tickets in order to inflate the numbers. This has been a practice for other such propaganda movies. If you have not seen the movie you are warned to stay away from it. If you have seen it then you have my sympathy for enduring the pain.