MISS BALA

Gina Rodriguez    Anthony Mackie    Ismael Cruz    Thomas Dekker    Matt Lauria

     It’s a mystery to me why a remake of a mildly successful movie would be attempted. This production directed and executive produced by Catherine Hardwicke is an example.  The previous Miss Bala (2011) received some recognition after its premier at the Cannes Film Festival, but did not win any significant awards.  Nevertheless, it was regarded more highly than this version is likely to be.  Both are based on an actual event that occurred in 2008 when a beauty pageant winner in Mexico, got mixed up in a drug trafficking scandal.

     In 2019’s Miss Bala, Gina Rodriguez as Gloria, a makeup artist, returns to Mexico where she grew up to visit her old friend Suzu (Christina Rodlo), who is competing in a contest to become Miss Bala of Baja, California.  They’re thrilled to be together again and decide to go to a club in the evening where the mayor is supposed to be.  Suzu tells Gloria that he is influential in the contest, and she wants to make contact with him.  She does indeed, and introduces him to Gloria.  The evening is cut short when the club is terrorized by gang members shooting it up.  The two women are separated, and although Gloria survives, she can’t find Suzu.

     What follows is a series of mishaps in Gloria trying to get help, and instead, getting abducted, not just once, but twice.  The first time is by Lino (Cruz), the leader of the Estrellas gang, who eventually promises to help her find Suzu IF she will do something(s) for him.  The second time is by a DEA agent (Lauria) who wants her to help him locate Lino.  Each man places her in a double bind so that she is forced to help both of them—a real dilemma.

     There are some exciting, interesting scenes and plot twists, but these are weakened by illogical and implausible situations and actions, some simply going against common sense.  An example is when the club is attacked and bodies are falling all around her, Gloria does not lie on the floor and play dead.  She risks her life by running through a barrage of bullets, and then puts her trust in someone who betrays her.  Another is when Gloria becomes an expert shot with an AK 47 after one lesson.  A major issue for me is when a DEA agent (Lauria) is portrayed unfavorably as compared to Lino, who is shown at times to be heroic and respectful.  Not to say that DEA agents are all fine and upstanding, but this portrayal seems to come from a bias against them.

     The main actors (Rodriguez, Mackie, Cruz, Lauria) hold their own in terms of skill and being convincing; Rodriguez and Mackie, especially so.  Probably the weakest aspect of the film lies in the script by Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer that stretches plausibility.  Catherine Hardwicke’s direction seems well measured with a good sense of timing.

     For viewers looking for an entertaining two hours and willing to accept flaws in the plot, this is an OK movie.

A novel twist on a beauty pageant mixed up with drug trafficking.

Grade:  C-                                    By Donna R. Copeland

DETROIT

John Boyega     Will Poulter     Algee Smith     Jacob Latimore     John Kraskinski     Hannah Murray     Anthony Mackie

   Hardcore racism is difficult to watch, especially when the offender is weak and overcompensating for it with sadistic acting-out.  Detroit puts us in the shoes of black people who have endured hundreds of years of false accusations and persecution.  When I became so disturbed watching it in the movie and had the urge to leave, it told me this is something I need to stay for, watch, and listen. 

      Kathryn Bigelow and her trusted writer Mark Boal give an account of the 1967 race riots in Detroit from a perspective that perhaps has never been presented before.  Its value in dramatizing it is in their bringing white people in to see firsthand what black people experience every day, and hopefully to give black people the sense a) that some of us do understand, and b) they get some vindication for the stereotypes that have been foisted on them.  Stereotypes of black people are rampant in the story, and sadly are still prominent in our society fifty years later.

     The film focuses on random people getting together in the Algiers Motel on the third night of rioting.  They include a member of the aspiring vocal group, The Dramatics, and their agent, two young women from Ohio who enjoy the company of black men, their black male friend, a prankster, and a couple of his friends.  Unfortunately, the prankster has a starting pistol (for track races) that makes a pop like a real gun, which he uses to play a joke on his guests.  Then, when he looks out to see patrols on the street, he shoots it out the window, “to show them how scared we get when they’re after us.”  Little does he know that one weak officer Krauss (Poulter) will jump to conclusions, think there is an actual sniper in the motel, and proceed to locate the shooter, no matter what it takes, including planting evidence.  He has already been reprimanded by a superior for his conduct, but it doesn’t “take.”

     The film portrays the rioting and looting similar to a newsreel, (perhaps deriving from real ones) showing police and politicians taken by surprise (because they had not paid attention to the growing unrest from joblessness and promises not kept), and the National Guard is brought in.  The rioting has already been going on for two days before our hapless Algiers Motel group gets drawn in by what Krauss (Poulter) hears is a sniper.  He then proceeds to round up anyone in the motel he can find who might know something, and abuse them in an attempt to get them to identify the shooter.  (Difficult, since there was none.)

      I understand the story is based on reports of the events that occurred before the riot, as well as events leading up to it.  Boal and Bigelow elaborated on these accounts for dramatic effect, including the creation of the Krauss character, loosely based on an officer who was charged with a crime, but subsequently found not guilty by an all-white jury.  Some questions are not addressed, such as why none of the hostages mentioned that Carl’s gun was a starting pistol (no bullets) until they were in court proceedings.  Why was Krauss put back on the force after he had shot a looter in the back and killed him?  Why didn’t the hostages get the officer’s name?  Why didn’t people ask for lawyers when they were arrested?  Was the prosecution in the court trial really that bad?  These are minor points, and may be explained partly by the time; in 1967, the people held hostage may not have realized they could ask such questions.

      My skepticism has lessened after reading Mark Boal’s account in Vulture, “Why I Wrote Detroit” http://www.vulture.com/2017/07/mark-boal-on-why-he-wrote-the-movie-detroit.html.  His sources included “the historical record”, consisting of documents, police files, John Hersey’s book The Algiers Motel, and interviews of the people involved, including Cleveland Larry Reed, the Dramatics co-founder and singer who was held captive by police officers and emotionally damaged permanently as a result.  In actual fact, three black men were killed that night and nine people were kept hostage in the Algiers Motel.

     Rather than the story being character driven, Boal and Bigelow wanted to show that at times, social forces take precedence over individuals’ actions and will.  He says, “The underlying intention…was always pretty straightforward: to unpack the riot and this one incident at the Algiers from the point of view of its many participants, and thereby enable the audience to experience the events themselves.”  And in that respect, the filmmakers are entirely successful in giving viewers the sense of really being there and experiencing the horror, a horror that could conceivably be entirely true, even today.  Helplessness in an individual in such system-wide movement is aptly illustrated by the fine actor John Boyega playing a security guard who valiantly tries to intervene in the Algiers Motel, but is usually brushed aside and even falsely arrested.

The dramatization of horrific events fifty years ago that can inform us today.

Grade:  A                                    By Donna R. Copeland

LOVE THE COOPERS

Alan Arkin   Diane Keaton   John Goodman   Marisa Tomei   June Squibb

                                        Olivia Wilde   Amanda Seyfried   Anthony Mackie   Ed Helms   Jake Lacy

          And you probably will end up loving the Coopers in a film that many will see as a perfect holiday movie.  Although don’t expect to be immersed in warm fuzzy feelings throughout; this is a family that can throw barbs and “gotchas” with hardly a twitch of an eyebrow.  They all seem to have some gene that eventually and invariably alienates the person they’re talking to.  The script reads a bit like Little Miss Sunshine in its mixture of bittersweet, tender, and outright comedy.  The difference is that in Love the Coopers there’s a lot more bitterness in tone, especially in the beginning when everyone seems to be writhing with unhappiness—or maybe it’s just anxiety about the upcoming get-together.

         The drama mainly centers around couples—not necessarily the expected pairings.  The paterfamilias (Arkin) is alone in his old age, but has made a solid friendship with a young waitress at the local diner (Seyfried).  His daughter Charlotte (Keaton) has been married to Sam (Goodman) for 40 years, but it looks like the parting of the ways for them.  Their current issue is whether or not to announce their separation at the family celebration.  Son Hank (Helms) is going through a divorce, and he is not in good shape at all.  His other daughter Emma (Tomei) is alone not by choice, except maybe it has something to do with her not being able to form a bond with anyone and tending to feel sorry for herself in being alone.  We’re introduced to Charlotte’s and Sam’s daughter Eleanor (Wilde) in the airport where she has bumped into Joe (Lacy) who is headed out to report to duty.  Present at the Christmas celebration are also a number of grandchildren who are as quick-witted and verbal as their elders.

          Certain interchanges between characters in the drama really entertained and sparked my interest.  One was Eleanor and Joe doing a complex, often contradictory, mating dance that epitomizes budding relationships today.  Liberal meets conservative, but somehow, after many fits and starts, they find more common ground than conflict.  Another was that between Emma and the policeman (Anthony Mackie) who arrests her for shoplifting.  Being a life coach, she starts out asking him about himself, but when it ends up, he is giving her valuable advice.  They end up helping each other, and he is to be admired for insisting on appropriate boundaries. 

        The depiction of Sam’s and Charlotte’s relationship is not terribly interesting—it’s rather hackneyed—and although these are fine actors, I found myself yawning and fidgeting during their interchanges.  The best ones (Eleanor and Joe; Emma and Officer Williams) entertain us and make us think, and therein lies the best of this movie.

A soulful family Christmas with meaningful observations on mating.

Grade:  B                                                            By Donna R. Copeland

OUR BRAND IS CRISIS

Sandra Bullock     Billy Bob Thornton     Anthony Mackie     Ann Dowd     

Scoot McNairy     Zoe Kazan     Joaquim de Almeida

          Crisis is the key word here in this picture showing the seamier (realistic?) side of politics.  The setting is Bolivia where a race for president is going on, the screenplay (Peter Straughan) of which is inspired by a documentary (same title) directed by the talented Rachel Boynton (Big Men http://texasartfilm.com/bigmen.html) about a political race for president of Bolivia in 2002.  Candidate Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozado hired an American political firm that consulted all over the world to run his campaign:  Greenberg Carville Shrum.  (That’s Carville, as in James Carville.)  Since I haven’t seen the documentary, I don’t know how much the movie reflects events in that work.

          Our Brand is Crisis the movie begins with two political strategists, Nell (Dowd) and Ben (Mackie) driving through the snow to Jane Bodine’s (Bullock) isolated cabin to talk her into joining their team in Bolivia.  Hurt by political machinations in her work as a crack strategist in the past, she has developed new interests and a new life.  Somehow, though, the thrill of a campaign is seductive, and she decides to join them. 

        Unfortunately, after arriving in Bolivia with altitude sickness and feeling rotten in general, she realizes that her prior nemesis Pat Candy (Thornton) is on the scene.  Bad news.  The movie takes a neutral stance about their past, so it is unclear who actually was responsible for the most heinous dirty tricks in previous campaigns, although, I think they want us to believe that it was Candy, who comes across as slimy as the snake in the Garden of Eden. 

        The campaign proceeds and the two teams end up going for the jugular.  It is a fascinating (at least to me) look at how political campaign strategists think and reason.  In Jane’s case, she deftly sizes up the psychology of her candidate Castillo (de Almeida) and figures out how to turn his weaknesses into strengths—clearly going against the advice he is currently receiving from his own consultant and the American team.  In view of this perceptive cogency, the filmmakers’ showing her clumsy and neurotic for comic effect was silly and an unnecessary distraction.  They should have dispensed with the “comedy” altogether and gone for dramatic effect and political illumination.

          Although we learn how the election turns out, the film ends with an ambiguity that I see as a strength.  Beneath Jane’s many “masks” (alternately crazy, tender, calculating, insightful, and—above all—perceptive), she is a thoughtful and sincere woman with convictions who will continually surprise.

       We know Sandra Bullock is a phenomenal actor, and I think she portrayed this character to a T.  Such a talent actor can make the character come alive so forcefully you forget the actor.  She was strongest in this film when Candy is speaking to her in a taunting, seductive, goading manner and she simply stares into space (and you know exactly what she is thinking) or—in contrast—when she forcefully confronts her team or the candidate with hard truths; or at the end when she is mulling over in her mind the comments of the young campaign worker and all that has just transpired.  Billy Bob Thornton is masterful in portraying a truly evil person, all while talking in the most civil and seductive manner.  His idea of coming into the filming looking exactly like James Carville was a brilliant move.

          David Gordon Green does the quiet, personally revolutionary films that I am inevitably drawn to (e.g., Prince Avalanche, George Washington).  I imagine he smiles as he thinks about the issues he has brought up in Our Brand is Crisis that will spark controversy and differences of opinion.  In discussions about this film, I expect many will have strong opinions about political consultants, political processes (particularly elections), and the marketing of candidates.

An insightful look at the underside of political campaigns.

Grade:  B                        By Donna R. Copeland