Category Archives: Biography

Operation Finale

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Operation Finale                               3 ½ stars

Operation Finale is the newly released film by director Chris Weitz that tells the true story of the capture of Adolf Eichmann, the mastermind of the final solution by Nazi Germany, the killing of the Jewish population in Europe during World War II.  Eichmann had fled to Argentina after the war along with many other German Nazis where he started a new life with a new Spanish name and family.  The agents of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency have been tirelessly hunting down these former Nazis since the war and in 1960 believe they may have located the long sought after Eichmann in Buenos Aires.  Eichmann, masterfully portrayed by Ben Kingsley maintains that eternal defense that he was merely “following orders” and was but “a cog in a machine”.  Oscar Isaac is Malkin, one of the agents of Mossad who manages to connect with the captured Eichmann in the many conversations with him as the agents are awaiting their opportunity to smuggle him out of the country back to Israel where he is to stand trial.  Isaac does his usual creditable acting performance as the Israeli agent.  Most of the movie focusses on the time that the Israelis have Eichmann in captivity where they attempt to get him to confess his role in the killing of the Jews.  Only in the first part of the movie do we see how the agents find and suspect they may have found the elusive Eichmann.  This part of the film seems unconvincing to me as they seem to have only the thinnest of evidence that they have found the right man.  (Early in the film we see Malkin involved in the killing of a man mistakenly thought to be Eichmann.)  Also, there are flashbacks to scenes of mass killings during the war that are shown as memories of what happened that may or may not be accurate.  What is interesting is Kingsley’s portrayal of the way Eichmann goes from admitting little of his involvement to outright pride of what he accomplished in the face of his captors.  By the end of the film there is no doubt that the agents have found a true psychopath who embodies the phrase “the banality of evil”.  Director Chris Weitz has had a hit and miss career as director, giving us hits About a Boy and A Better Life, while also delivering disappointments like The Golden Compass and the Twilight Saga: New Moon.  Operation Finale was good but not the greatest of his work.

Victoria & Abdul

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Victoria & Abdul                               3 stars

Victoria & Abdul brings actress Judi Dench and director Stephen Frears together again for the telling of the story of Queen Victoria, who in her later years develops an attachment to a young Indian clerk named Abdul Karim.  Abdul has been summoned from India to participate in the Queen’s Golden Jubilee where he finds the old queen seeks to consult with him on a variety of matters and he becomes a teacher of sorts.  All of this is very troubling to the Queen’s staff and in particular, her son Bertie, the Prince of Wales.  They consider it demeaning that a man from a poor family of color could find his way to a position of honor among the royal family.  We are told that this is all based on a true story, but it is one that has gone largely untold. Presumably the family at the time had tried to keep it hidden.  The film is based on a book that was recently published.  Much of the film is done in a comic fashion as it finds comedy in how differently the cultures involved find one another.  Therefore, I have to wonder just how much of the story is true.  But putting all that aside, the film is still quite enjoyable and gives us two fine performances from Judy Dench and Ali Fazal.  Victoria & Abdul was nominated for two Academy Awards, Best Costume Design and Best Make up.  Stephen Frears is a very prolific director in Hollywood having directed such outstanding works as Florence Foster Jenkins, Philomena, The Queen, Mrs. Henderson Presents and Dirty Pretty Things.

The Post

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The Post              5 stars

In my quest to see all Oscar nominated movies of last year I watched The Post, the Spielberg directed thriller drama about the Washington Post struggle to stay relevant in 1971 by reporting on the secrets revealed in the Pentagon Papers.  In this true story, the first woman major newspaper publisher Kay Graham (Meryl Streep) and the Post’s editor Ben Bradlee (Tom Hanks) must make the critical decisions about whether to publish the government secrets about the failures of the Vietnam War, risking the very future of the newspaper business.  This film was put together in near record time as the producers including Steven Spielberg wanted to make a movie that was very relevant to the relationship between Washington and the press of today.  The film pays great attention to detail and gets the feel of the newspaper business of the early seventies.  The newsrooms and printing press equipment are very authentic down to the metal desks and loud typewriters.  The drama brought to us by the acting skills of Streep and Hanks as well as the excellent supporting cast is compelling and will keep your attention throughout the movie’s run time.  The movie was written based on the memoirs of Graham, Bradlee and Daniel Ellsberg, thus it is very close to a representation of the true story.  It’s hard to imagine putting together a team of filmmakers more talented this this crew.  The Post may not have won best picture last year but it had to be in the running.  One interesting piece of trivia about the movie is that it took only nine months from putting the screenplay together until completion of the editing, which is close to a miracle in Hollywood.

The Old Man & the Gun

The Old Man & the Gun                 4 ½ stars

There is yet another fine movie showing in the theaters now. That is The Old Man & the Gun featuring two long time legends of Hollywood, Robert Redford and Sissy Spacek.  It is a movie driven by the two main characters that really doesn’t have a lot going on.  It is based on the true story of Forrest Tucker, a convict who in the early eighties escaped from prison and carried out a string of bank robberies at age seventy that confounded the police.  What really drives the movie is Redford’s charm and his smile.  The most enjoyable parts are when he is talking with or charming Jewel (Spacek) while she thoroughly enjoys his company while believing little of what he tells her about himself.  Casey Affleck contributes to rounding out the film as he portrays the Texas lawman trying to track down Tucker and his Over the Hill gang as the crime spree spreads from one state after another.  Redford has said that this is his last picture as an actor.  I don’t know if that is true, but The Old Man & the Gun is a brilliant send off in any case.

The Favourite

The Favourite                    4 ½ stars

The Favourite is the latest film from director Yorgos Lanthismos who famously brought us The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer. The film is an unusual costume drama to say the least that covers part of the reign of Queen Anne of England in the early Eighteenth century when England was at war with France in the War of Spanish Succession.  The English forces under the command of the Duke of Marlborough were victorious over the French.  The great cost of the war created a division in policy between the war hungry Whigs and Tories who pushed for a peace settlement.  None of the above matters much in the course of the movie as it is mainly concerned with the relationships between the Queen (Olivia Colman) and her close friend Lady Sarah Churchill (Rachel Wiesz) who is the wife of the Duke of Marlborough, and a new arrival at the palace, a lowly maid formerly from an aristocratic family, Abigail (Emma Stone).  This is no ordinary period costume film.  It is a roudy and uproarious comedy full of sharp wit and sexual innuendo.  The movie never leaves the setting of the palace and we only hear about the war through the reports that some English nobles provide.  In fact, all but the main three women in the cast fulfil fairly minor roles.  The movie is completely carried by Colman, as the ailing Queen who requires constant attention from the staff, Wiesz, who constantly manipulates the Queen to get what she wants and Stone, as she apples her womanly charms to gain favor in the Queen’s eyes.  Sarah and Abigail spend most of the film finding ways to better one another and become the Queen’s favourite friend and advisor.  I would say the movie portrays a completely irreverent depiction of English royalty which contributes to its success.  I believe the movie will be rewarded when awards time comes around and thoroughly recommend it.  Also, the movie reveals a little known fact, that there were plenty of lesbian love affairs going on in the English palace in this period, something I had not heard in any history courses.

Boy Erased

Boy Erased          4 stars

Writer-Director-Actor Joel Edgerton brings to film the true story of Jared (Lucas Hedges), an eighteen year old boy who is outed as gay to the shock and disapproval of his parents.  In order to get over the shame felt by his father (Russel Crowe) young Jared is convinced he should undergo gay conversion therapy and be sent away to a camp for an undetermined period of time where little is known of the practices there.  The movie gives us a peek into the world of Conversion Therapy, as it is usually carried out on underage children, where they are to be converted into heterosexuals.  This practice is nearly unanimously condemned by psychologists as ineffective and harmful, but it still exists in most states.  The leader of the therapy sessions is Victor Sykes (Joel Edgerton) who employs techniques that can only be described as cruel and disturbing.  The methods used only seem to instill a sense of self-loathing in the young subjects.  The movie also shows us the attitudes toward homosexuality held by most in certain religious institutions, in the case, Southern Baptist and the weight of guilt that can be placed on young people.  Despite the dark material of this movie there is eventually an uplifting feel to it by the time the credits role.  Last year’s “Call Me by Your Name” gives a sharp contrast of a parent’s reaction to realizing they have a gay son.  In that movie, the father had an accepting and even loving treatment toward his son.  In “Boy Erased”, there is the threat of being expelled from the family if the gayness is not removed.  I found all of the performances in the film to be first rate, especially that of young Hedges who is building a long resume of significant dramatic roles.

Welcome to Marwen

Welcome to Marwen                     4 stars

Welcome to Marwen from director Robert Zemeckis employs some very imaginative techniques to tell the story of Mark Hogencamp (Steve Carell), an illustrator who lost his memory after being beaten by some local thugs.  Having lost his drawing talent Mark has created a fantasy world made up of miniatures dolls and models in an imaginary town in Brussels during World War II.  Mark has an alter ego named Hoagie represented by an American airman doll who frequently takes on Nazi soldiers aided by some very courageous women who make up the town’s population.  Each of the women figures represents a woman who plays a part in Mark’s life.  Mark lives alone outside of town and seems to be a broken man, but he manages to stay connected to people through his town called Marwen which he photographs creating intricate stories about his characters.  I found the movie quite engaging with the way it moves from the fantasy world to reality and how the events in Marwen are related to things going on in Mark’s real world.  The special effects are well done using stop action photography and animation to create some great action sequences.  The story is based on the actual true events of Mark Hogencamp who created this imaginary world and became famous through exhibitions of his photography.  I found the movie uplifting and entertaining which apparently most movie critics don’t see based on the mostly negative reviews it has been getting.  Robert Zemeckis has been making movies for ages and I am sure most viewers have seen some which includes Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Cast Away and Forrest Gump.  In my opinion he has another winner that more people should be seeing.

Golda

Golda                    2 stars

If you are as old as me, you can remember the days in 1973 when there was a war raging when Israel was attacked by the armies of Syria and Egypt that was called the Yom Kippur War. This was the fourth of the Arab-Israeli wars and a very closely fought one that lasted for 19 days. The outcome was uncertain until Israel succeeded in trapping and isolating an Egyptian army forcing a cease fire. The movie Golda tells that story, but mainly from the perspective of Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir with an unrecognizable Hellen Mirren buried in makeup in the role of Meir. The movie focuses primarily on her interactions with the cabinet and the generals as they struggle to make the best decisions to save Israel and her conversations with US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (Liev Schrieber of Asteroid City and Ray Donovan: The Movie). There are also frequent scenes of Meir, who is suffering from lymphoma, being cared for by her personal assistant (Camille Cottin of A Haunting in Venice and House of Gucci). What’s missing are any battle scenes showing what is going on in the field. Instead, we have the generals discussing the situation over battle maps and radio transmissions from commanders and soldiers yelling of how they are being swarmed and killed by the Egyptians. We get no background of what led to the war or even much about the general international situation. While Mirren’s acting talents are on full display here, showing Meir’s pain over the casualties suffered by the Israeli troops, we don’t get much in the way of her own background. Golda is mainly a history lesson about this war of long ago and not a very good one.

Stieg Larsson: The Man Who Played With Fire

Stieg Larsson: The Man Who Played With Fire.  4 1/2 stars

This documentary by Henrik Georgsson tells us much of the life story of the renowned author Stieg Larsson who wrote The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Before he died in 2004 he worked tirelessly as a journalist dedicated to exposing the right wing racist groups who were and continue to become a stronger political force in Sweden. This he did despite the attacks and death threats against the small group of reporters working at his publication. The movies follows him from the time he was a small boy until his death. It shows the rise of the hate groups in the nineties after nobody in the seventies imagined that Nazi type organizations could resurface again. The director used his access to those close to the subject and his materials to give us a vivid picture of this man who believed in Democracy and that it is necessary to defend it from those who would undermine it because of their fear of those who look different from them. The movie serves a warning to those in many other countries as well that fascism is not yet defeated. In that respect it has much in common with The Edge of Democracy which I viewed earlier. Both are my highest rated documentaries.

Society of the Snow

Society of the Snow        4 ½ stars

You have probably heard the story before. I know I have a few times. In 1972 a plane carrying a Uruguayan rugby team and friends and family crashed in the snow-covered Andes mountains while on their flight to Chile. The plane had 40 passengers. Several of the passengers survived the crash. Weeks later after the search was abandoned two members of the team crossed the Andes on foot and told the world that they were alive. 16 people were still alive having survived in part by resorting to cannibalism on the bodies of those who died. The incredible story was previously made into the English language movie Alive in 1993. Society of the Snow is a Spanish language telling, made by J. A. Bayona, who previously made The Impossible, the story of a family caught in the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004. The new film depicts the events of the tragedy including acts of heroism performed by several of the young victims who were mostly young men in their twenties. It shows the initial crash that most of the passengers somehow survived, the hope for a rescue that didn’t come, and an avalanche hitting the fuselage taking more lives. The movie shows how they were forced to choose to use the dead as nourishment and how a select few had the task of retrieving the food so that the rest would not know who it was they were consuming. The film also focuses on the emotional aspects of the ordeal and the members’ devotion to one another. Bayona and the actors have made the film one about survivalist adventure but also about spirituality. At times it is a tough one to watch but is certainly worth it. It was nominated for two Academy Awards in 2024. The film is available on Netflix. If you see it be sure to check out the How the movie was made, video. The roles were all filled with non-actors, and they had to do the scenes chronologically so they could lose weight progressively during the filming.