Category Archives: Drama

A Quiet Place

A Quiet Place                     2 ½ stars

Last year’s hit monster movie, A Quiet Place, was a type of post-apocalyptic movie in which humanity has been nearly wiped out by ravenous creatures that have ultra-sensitive hearing, but are completely blind.  Thus, the remaining humans can only survive by remaining absolutely quiet in all that they do.  The story focuses on one family living in a house in the woods who have learned to live without talking and raising food without making any sound.  This movie was well received by critics and audiences, but there was too much for me to get over.  There were good performances I am sure, but the holes in the plot were obvious, like how could they possibly raise a field of corn without making any noise.  And there is no real background about how this all came about.  Any good horror movie has to provide some explanation for how the disaster came to be.  I actually enjoyed this year’s Bird Box more than A Quiet Place.  The movie earned an Oscar Nomination for Sound Editing, presumably for the sounds that the monster makes, but I feel like I’ve seen this before in horror movies.  It may have been the best horror movie of 2018, but then I couldn’t find one from last year that I really liked.

Bombshell

Bombshell                           4 stars

My first reaction to Bombshell is that any movie that features Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman and Margot Robbie deserves some major attention.  And for the most part it delivers.  It tells the story of a small group of women at Fox News endured years of abuse at the hands of the CEO, Roger Ailes and finally banded together to bring him down in 2016. The performances by Theron as Megyn Kelly, Nicole Kidman as Gretchen Carlson and Margot Robbie as a fictional character, Kayla are all first rate.  John Lithgow does a convincing job as Ailes, the perv who controls the lives of these women and treats them like his personal playthings.  The film stops short of indicting the entire network of Fox for its corporate culture that allows this behavior to take place.  You certainly don’t get the feeling that Rupert Murdoch (Malcolm McDowell) really cares about these women.  He is only too eager to put all the blame on Ailes and put his name in all the headlines.  One very memorable part of the movie are the interchanges between Kayla and Kate McKinnon’s character, Jess Karr who is a closeted Democrat and lesbian working at Fox and knows what has been going on for years.  The movie doesn’t tell us much about what happened to these people beyond 2016, but it is certainly worth seeing.  Look for a few Oscar nominations to come from Bombshell.

Ella McCay

Ella McCay          1 star

I was looking for a movie one afternoon, so I was limited to matinees in nearby theaters. I settled on the new comedy Ella McCay by writer/director James Brooks. Brooks is known for such classic comedies as Broadcast News, Terms of Endearment and As Good As It Gets. Ella McCay includes some top actors like Jamie Lee Curtis, Woody Harrelson and Ayo Edebiri, so that seemed promising. Oh, how wrong that is! Most of the characters are one dimensional and involved in one ridiculous subplot after that are disconnected and go nowhere. The idea is that Ella McCay (Emma Mackey, who is the only mildly interesting character in the movie) is the youngest Lieutenant Governor ever in the state and she is about to get promoted to Interim Governor when the Governor (Albert Brooks) is tapped to become a member of the new administration’s cabinet. Ella has a passion for improvement of many issues that the state is facing and has some big plans. The problem is that she is a lousy campaigner and gives boring speeches. Her biggest problem is her messed up family that interferes in her life at the worst moments. Her father (Woody Harrelson) was fired over some sexual harassment claims (while he was married to Ella’s mother). Harrelson is not very funny and doesn’t appear in many scenes. Her husband (Jack Lowden) is a moron, and it has taken sixteen years of marriage for Ella to figure that out. Her younger brother, Casey (Spike Fearn) is agoraphobic, but is a sports betting genius and rich, but is afraid of how to approach his girlfriend (Ayo Edebiri, one bright spot in the whole mess). Lucky for Ella she has Aunt Helen (Jaimie Lee Curtis, in a wasted role) who always has good advice, if only Ella would listen. Rebecca Hall shows up only briefly as Ella’s mother before she quickly dies and disappears. Then there are the brief scenes with Kumail Nanjiani who is on Ella’s state police security detail. That’s another wasted talent. So poor Ella must deal with each crisis while she is supposed to be governing. It doesn’t take long before a scandal erupts. A nosey reporter is threatening to reveal that she has been having trysts with her husband on state property if she doesn’t give him what he wants. How scandalous! I found the whole thing to be boring and was hoping it would soon be over. There is also the matter of aging in the movie or lack of it. Mackey looks virtually the same when her character is sixteen as when she is thirty-four. Obviously, the budget didn’t allow much in the way of makeup or CGI effects. James Brooks has clearly not given this movie the effort he put into his earlier projects in the eighties and nineties. It looks like it is time for him to retire. Let’s hope that Emma Mackey finds some better roles soon. This is easily the worst movie I have seen this year.

Monsters and Men

Monsters and Men          4 stars

Monsters and Men is one of a string of recent movies addressing police brutality against unarmed black men.  This one takes an approach similar to Crash where separate independent lives intersect around a common event, here the killing of a young black man at the hands of a white police officer.  Each of the three young men have their own way of dealing with the tragedy.  Manny, a hustler has just started a new job in security when he happens to be at the scene of the shooting capturing it all on video.  Now he must decide whether to release the video and subject himself to retaliation or keep quiet and be complicit in the crime.  Black police officer Dennis knows what the offending police officer is like and must decide how to respond to the ensuing investigation.  And young star athlete, Zyrick has to decide if he should participate in the resistance against the police which may jeopardize his chances at becoming a pro athlete.  These are situations that have been portrayed in many crime dramas, but it feels like a fresh approach here.  The director/writer, Reinaldo Marcus Green is completely new to the industry.  I hope we see more from him.  This film received much praise at Sundance two years ago as it took on this very hot topic.  I missed it back then but am glad I finally had the chance to see it. 

Cats

Cats                                       1 ½ stars

I am sure that everyone has heard about the screen adaptation of the Broadway musical Cats that recently hit theaters.  There has been plenty of controversy about it mainly about the CGI effects making the cast look like some sort of human-cat hybrids.  So I had to see it for myself and it was something of a shock.  There are plenty of stars on the screen in a story that is confusing at best.  I will try to give some description of what is going on.  The story concerns a tribe of cats called the Jellicles that hang out around an abandoned theater in London.  One night a new cat called Victoria portrayed by ballerina Francesca Hayward, is tossed on the street where she is introduced to an array of felines that all have their own stories.  It happens to be the annual night of the Jellicle Ball when the old cat Deuteronomy (Dame Judy Dench) makes the choice of which of the eligible cats is worthy to be chosen to ascend into the Heaviside Layer and be rewarded with a new life.  Each of the possible choices gets a featured performance involving music and dance which includes Rebel Wilson’s fat and comical Jennyanydots, James Cordon’s Bustopher Jones, Jason Derulo’s Rum Tum Tugger, Ian McKellen’s Gus the Theater Cat (in one of the best performances), Jennifer Hudson’s Grizabella, who sings the powerful “Memory” and Laurie Davidson as the classic Mr. Mistoffelees, the mysterious magical cat.  Unfortunately, there is a scheming villain, the evil Macavity (Idres Elba) who uses his magic powers to exile each of the felines onto a boat in the Thames where his henchman Growitiger (Ray Winstone) holds them all prisoner.  This way Macavity plans to be the one to achieve the coveted Heaviside Layer for himself.  Macavity is enabled by his associate, Bombalurina, a wily cat played by Taylor Swift who puts her own spell on the Jellicles using her own brand of catnip.  Can the Jellicles overcome these magic spells and defeat Macavity?  By this time does anybody care?  The CGI costumes are very distracting with the cat ears, cat tails and other features applied to the cast.  And then there are the miniature creatures featuring dancers representing the mice and cockroaches that the cats are hungry for.  I felt the film may have had more success if it was just treated as a stage production on film without all the special effects.  They could have saved themselves a lot of money besides.  So now you know what Cats is all about.  Now you will be able to save yourselves the torture of enduring this mad spectacle.

Wendy

Wendy  5 Suns 

Wendy is a reimagining of the J. M. Barrie Peter Pan story this time in a modern setting and told through the eyes of Wendy.  Wendy and her brothers are raised by their working class mother who works in a diner.  One day the three children sneak onto a passing train where they meet a strange headstrong boy named Peter.  He brings them to his island hideaway where he and the other children have their own world free of grownups.  Peter seems to have his own magic that originates from the island’s volcano and a mysterious sea creature.  But soon trouble finds them in the form of several older adults who gain control of an old ship and then try to capture the children,  leaving it up to Peter and Wendy to come to the rescue.  The imagery of the island environment is breathtaking and the performances of the children are impressive.  The director,  Benh Zeitlin previously made Beasts of the Southern Wild.  He was present for Q & A and spoke of the challenges of working on the island with an active volcano as well as what it was like working with children of ages 6 to 9. He said the key to succeeding with children was to make sure it was a fun experience for them.  Children are not in it for the money or the fame. Wendy is currently in the theaters so be sure to see it and you can bring some kids with you. 

Promising Young Woman

Promising Young Woman   4 Suns

Promising Young Woman is about a young woman,  Cassie (Carey Mulligan) who seems unambitious working as a coffee barista and living with her parents.  She is a drop out from medical school,  but now she spends her nights going to clubs where she plays out a scheme against any men who would seek to take advantage of women who are no longer in control of their senses.  It turns out that her best friend was a victim of such a circumstance and died as a result,  so this is Cassie’s way of seeking revenge against predatory men.  Along the way she learns new information about those involved in her friend’s case,  and the stakes of her vendetta reach a higher level.  The story is a fascinating one that brings some surprising twists along the way and I must say I did not see where it was going.  Carey Mulligan,  one of my favorite young actresses gives a superb performance.  I first saw her in An Education back in 2009 when she was nominated for the Best Actress Academy Award.  I also thought the choice of songs used in the story telling was especially effective. If you are a frequent viewer of tv sitcoms, you will probably recognize several of the supporting cast. 

Lost Girls

Lost Girls  4 1/2 Suns 

Lost Girls is a true crime drama based on a novel by the same name.  Murder stories seem to be a theme this year as this is the third film I’ve seen involving the murder of a young woman.  When her adult daughter goes missing Mari Gilbert (Amy Ryan) must take matters into her own hands because of a lack of action on the part of the local police.  She traces her movements and last contacts of her daughter to an exclusive Long Island neighborhood where the neighbors seem to all protect one another.  Her daughter’s actions indicate that she was a prostitute getting clients online. The stakes increase dramatically when the police discover an area near this neighborhood is being used as a dumping ground for bodies of prostitutes which becomes the case of the Long Island Killer.  The police continue to mishandle the case causing endless frustration for Mari, her two younger daughters and families of the other dead girls in the case. They appear to be less interested in a case involving dead and missing prostitutes than they would with more important victims. It is only through the constant efforts of Mari to get answers that any real progress is made in the case.  I found it to be a powerful police drama because of a good script and a strong performance by Ryan as the girl’s determined mother. There are also fine performances from Thomasin McKenzie as Mari’s second daughter and Gabriel Byrne as the police commissioner. Sadly,  the real Mari Gilbert died shortly after production on the movie started and did not get to see the result.

Boogie Nights

Boogie Nights    5 stars

A few months ago, I saw Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest movie, One Battle After Another, and realized I had seen almost all of his movies. One that I missed was Boogie Nights from 1997, his second film and arguably one of his best. It follows several characters involved in the porn movie industry starting in 1977 through 1983 and shows each as having very human qualities, including their faults and how they have dreams for the future. Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds in one of his best performances) is the director who makes his films at his luxury home (where he also has large pool parties for his guests). He has a following of several “actors” and crew who he employs, but one is special. That is a young kid named Eddie (Mark Wahlberg in one of his early roles) who Jack discovered at a nightclub and decides to give him an audition. Jack discovers that Eddie has a special “talent” that is valuable in porn films and soon Eddie is starring in several movies where he comes to be known as Dirk Diggler. This is at a time when the movies are still shot on film and are shown mainly in theaters. Jack has a dream that his movies should evolve into an art form where people actually stay for the story. What he doesn’t realize is that a revolution is coming called videotape that will result in most films being watched at home. In reality the action scenes look like they belong in bad B-movies. If you have seen it then you know that Boogie Nights doesn’t really look like a porn movie as the sex scenes have a business-like quality to them and much of what we see are the behind-the-scenes aspects of filmmaking. (The film avoided getting an NC-17 rating.) Besides Jack and Dirk Diggler, the film focuses on a wide variety of characters, showing the role of each and their hopes for success. But about an hour into the movie things fall apart for each one as they get lost in a world of crime and drugs. They include Amber Waves (Julianne Moore) a former housewife who has lost custody of her child, Rollergirl (Heather Graham) who always wears her roller skates, Reed (John C. Reilly) who has a crush on Dirk, Scotty (Philip Seymour Hoffman) who is especially lacking in confidence, Buck (Don Cheadle) who dreams of owning his own wi-fi business, club manager Rodriguez (Luis Guzman), Little Bill (William H. Macy), the assistant director, whose wife likes to have sex with every man in the business and Kurt (Ricky Jay) the cameraman. The lives of each one spiral downward into chaos with only some of them making a recovery. Dirk in particular hits rock bottom after he gets a very inflated idea of his own stardom. In one notable scene he and two of his friends try to take advantage of a playboy in a drug deal that takes a turn for the worse. Anderson catches the feel of the seventies and early eighties with his attention to detail in the sets and the wardrobe. He adds to the atmosphere with the wide range of music from the period. Like his other films, Anderson makes Boogie Nights all about the human qualities of his characters. This is one that I’m sorry I missed when it came out as it created quite a splash at the time for Anderson as well as for Burt Reynolds. I also recommend you check out some of Paul Thomas Anderson’s other notable films that include Magnolia, There Will Be Blood and Inherent Vice.

Hamnet

Hamnet                 5 stars

We start with watching a woman alone in a dense forest who has tamed a falcon that obeys commands. She appears to be completely at home in this natural environment. Then we see a young man who meets the woman and is instantly taken with her. The pair marry and have three children and will suffer the worst nightmare that can be imagined by a parent. The pair is William Shakespeare and his wife Agnes, and this is the movie Hamnet. Based on Maggie O’Farrell’s novel Hamnet and directed by Chloé Zhao (The Rider, Nomadland), the movie imagines the married life of Shakespeare and his wife and the raising of their three children while he is embarking on a writing career. There has long been speculation that after the death of their son, Hamnet at 11-years-old, the tragedy was the inspiration of one of Shakespeare’s most loved plays, Hamlet (Hamnet and Hamlet being synonymous). Zhao brings the story to life thanks to her style in displaying the closeness of the characters and their grief when Hamnet is taken from them in the pestilence sweeping the country. Much credit must be given to the two actors, Jessie Buckley (Wild Rose, The Lost Daughter, Women Talking) and Paul Mescal (Aftersun, All of Us Strangers), who make us feel their love for their children and their unimaginable pain when the son is lost. Buckley, who has had a string of successful and quirky roles, especially deserves praise for perhaps the most emotional performance of the year. As if that were not enough, she follows this up with pure wonder, when witnessing the first performance of Will’s play Hamlet where the final scene of Hamlet’s lament and death is played out. The scene, in the setting of the Globe Theater can be described as overwhelming.  Audiences will also be very pleased by the performance of young Jacobi Jupe who plays the playful and mischievous Hamnet. The casting was perfect with this choice. The movie will likely be most remembered for Jessie Buckley’s emotional performance as the young mother, so expect there to be a few awards this season for her plus in a few other categories.