JULIET, NAKED

Rose Byrne     Ethan Hawke     Chris O’Dowd     Azhy Robertson

     What a delightful and entertaining rom-com this turned out to be!  It has smart, funny dialog, along with a lot of heart and truthfulness.  Based on a Nick Hornby novel, the screenwriting (Evgenia Peretz, Jim Taylor, and Tamara Jenkins) syncs well with Jesse Peretz’s direction, and the actors (Byrne, Hawke, O’Dowd, and Robertson) hand it to us on a silver platter.  

     The story centers around Annie (Byrne), a modest anthropologist and curator, who lives with a self-preoccupied film professor named Duncan (O’Dowd), whose music idol is a washed up singer named Tucker Crowe (Hawke).  Crowe is not only his idol, he has a school boy-like obsession with him; e.g., pictures, posters, and other Crowe memorabilia line the walls of his study at home—a little creepy, right(?), which is what we are supposed to feel.  Understandably, Annie finds this insufferable, but she tolerates it as best she can.  (She’s had a life that steered her toward patience.)  Then one day, her exasperation surfaces, and she responds to Duncan’s effusive compliments about one of Crowe’s songs on his blog with a negative review.  

     Much to her shock, of course, Tucker writes back about how much he agrees with her critique.  They have a back-and-forth online which blossoms into a friendship.  Meanwhile, Duncan has been prey to a new faculty member, succumbs to her charms, and subsequently gets kicked out of the house.  In Tucker, Annie has discovered someone who is interested in her and what she has to say, a novel experience for her. Of course, in her innocence, she regards this as a platonic friendship, but she does realize that Tucker makes her feel good about herself.

     What follows elaborates on Tucker’s history (He’s like the old woman in a shoe—he has so many children he doesn’t know what to do.) and his way-extended family, he and Annie meeting in London [him, with his lovable child Jackson (Robertson) in tow], hilarious encounters with Duncan, and working through the complex set of relationships.

     It’s clear that much thought and consideration of many current issues went into this production.  It touches on how professional women are regarded in the workplace and in their personal lives; it demonstrates how fame can lead a star down paths that have lifelong repercussions that can be both regrettable and shameful; it shows the pain and consequences for those who are in the star’s path and perhaps left behind; it gives an example of how one of those stars attempts to compensate for previous weaknesses; and shows the self-actualization one woman experiences when she finally realizes she has aspirations and choices she needs to heed.  None of this is ground-breaking, of course, but the way it all comes together is novel.

     On the surface, Juliet, Naked could be regarded as simply light entertainment—the usual.  But it doesn’t take much to scratch below the surface and glean many basic human truths within it.

I congratulate the novelist and filmmakers on their success in upgrading a genre from a “That’s nice!” to an examination of human strengths and foibles.

Grade:  B+                                    By Donna R. Copeland

SEARCHING

John Cho     Michele La     Debra Messing     Sara Sohn     Joseph Lee

     Searching is more and more an apt title as you begin watching the film (mostly reading messages online and watching videos), then stick with it to the end, which doesn’t come as soon as you think. After all, it starts with home movies (haven’t we all sat through those at friends’ and on Facebook?), then it moves to interchanges between a father and daughter—the usual fare (“Clean up after yourself!”).  The next scenes pick up, showing a father trying to connect with his daughter after she went to a study group one evening.  He has missed calls she made to him, and she doesn’t respond to his numerous texts or phone calls.  He doesn’t know whether to be worried or be annoyed with his daughter.

     That’s about enough for you to know to avoid giving away spoilers.  David Kim (Cho), the father of Margot (La), eventually reports his daughter missing to the police, whereupon Detective Rosemary Vick (Messing) picks up the case and does her best to reassure him.  Kim is facile with the computer, and immediately runs searches about her to evaluate her qualifications.  She is apparently dedicated and noteworthy, and he relaxes a bit.  However, he keeps searching online for more and more information, something he does throughout the story, and the viewer sees the same information he finds online.

     This movie is about many things.  It’s certainly about how much we can find out online by searching.  But it’s also about what we may do with the information we find there.  We see that one can jump to (false) conclusions on specific bits of data. We see the important distinction between presumably objective professionals (like detectives) conducting such searches and someone emotionally involved in interpreting the data.  We see that sometimes the emotionally involved nonprofessional person can spot things or know things a professional might not know or might miss.  The filmmakers seem to be quite aware of the tension and paradoxes here and exploit them knowingly.

     At first, I was turned off by the approach taken by writer-director Aneesh Chaganty and his co-writer Sev Ohanian.  My thought was something akin to:  “I spend hours a day on the computer, do I have to do the same thing in a movie?”  I love actors and sets within real-life dramas; reading a story online is off-putting.  But the storytellers were not through, and I would eventually be taken to a familiar place of action and human drama.

     In this film, we’re gradually given more and more information that makes a ho-hum drama turn out to be intriguing and even exciting.  It’s a victory for the Internet and plainly shows how substantive intellect applied to it can be invaluable.  The story also ends up being a thriller as we discover incrementally leads that end up nowhere but one in particular that nails the case.

     John Cho as the father and the one who essentially carries the movie with impressive skill exemplifies going through every imaginable emotion as he tries to sort out whether his daughter ran away from home, as he discovers how little he really knows about her life, as he gets into trouble for over-reacting and drawing false conclusions, as he deals with his brother Peter (Lee) who apparently knew his daughter better than he did—Cho captures the whole range. Debra Messing competently steps out beyond her sit-com role in TV’s “Will and Grace” to embody a very different character in Detective Vick.  

     This is a fascinating movie, not only for the content, but also in its focus on the Internet’s role in our lives today.  My experience was one of ambivalence about the techno aspects initially, and by the end, when high drama was so lavishly thrown in, I felt a bit like I had been jerked around.  A good detective story gives out clues all along that one might see (preferably) only in retrospect; this script throws in twists and turns that have simply been added on for dramatic effect.

A surprise thriller that starts out slow and gradually builds up to something you can really care about.

Grade:  B                                    By Donna R. Copeland

THE LITTLE STRANGER

Domhnall Gleeson     Ruth Wilson     Will Poulter     Charlotte Rampling

     Based on Sarah Waters’ gothic novel, The Little Stranger movie preserves the “creepiness” attendant on an old, crumbling house, mysterious sounds and goings on, periodic tragedies, and an eccentric family, once wealthy, trying to hang on as long as possible.  Whereas the young doctor who’s called for medical treatment now and then appears to be a sensible, dedicated physician (and narrator for the story), he becomes strangely attached to the family and the house, which actually dates back to the time when he was a child and his mother served as a maid at “Hundreds Hall.”

     All this is a perfect set-up for a horror movie, on which Lucinda Coxon has based her screenplay, and Lenny Abrahamson has directed.  But in addition to the mysteriousness, the author of the novel had social issues in mind, wanting to show a picture of what began to happen to the idea of class post WWI and the decline of wealthy estates.  We see, then, the brilliant descriptions of the narrator’s impressions of the mansion when he was the child of a maid visiting on a holiday.  As a grown-up physician attending to the inhabitants of the mansion years later, he develops a strange attraction to them.  Clearly, he is in touch with the young child’s aspirations to belong in such a place, but in his grandiosity, he is also convinced that he can help and protect them from any kind of threat, perhaps as assurance that he can belong.  He “over-identifies” with them.

     Probably also as a residue of the class system, the well-to-do family is ambivalent toward accepting Dr. Faraday wholeheartedly.  Some of his medical treatments are met with ambivalence, as are his attempts to woo the daughter of the matron.  Caroline (Wilson) is grateful for Dr. Faraday’s (Gleeson) attention and care, but going beyond the professional relationship is not a given for her.

     The author of the novel and the filmmakers have been clever in maintaining ambiguity and suspense, so that the reader/viewer has to observe, analyze, and guess what is going to transpire.  The haunting of the house is seductive—particularly if it’s related to the deceased child of the owner—but just as much is the pull toward a “psychological” explanation, as defined by Dr. Faraday and his colleagues.  If you find that the ending is ambiguous, you will not be alone.  So you get one character’s observation of “Something in this house hates us” and then, “This whole thing between us has never been real”, the former indicating a haunted house, and the latter being more of a psychological explanation.

     Domhnall Gleeson is up to his previous performance in Ex Machina in portraying a complex, somewhat naïve character.  Ruth Wilson, Will Poulter, and Charlotte Rampling are excellent in their supporting roles. Wilson expertly exhibits an ambivalent person who is perpetually torn between two positions.  Will Poulter is skilled in showing a dark character with layers of anger and resentment.  Charlotte Rampling always has just the right balance between being threatening toward others and being playful.  

     Working against the film is the pace, which many found slow, although since much attention was given to character development, I didn’t mind it. What did bother me was the darkness of the picture, which may be attributed to a dim bulb on the projector.  At any rate, many scenes were so dark it was difficult to see the action.   Understanding Irish accents is also a problem for the viewer at times.  

     In its favor, are numerous horrific scenarios, some of which come as a surprise and make you jump in your seat.  As mentioned, the additional commentary on social change and upheaval of the time (post WWI) describe the characteristic viewpoints of the wealthy and the common.  

A film that does justice to its genre of horror, drama, and mystery.

Grade:  B-                                    By Donna R. Copeland

OPERATION FINALE

Oscar Isaac     Ben Kingsley     Melanie Laurent     Nick Kroll    

Lior Raz     Michael Aronav     Joe Alwyn     Greta Scacchi

     The title is borrowed from Nazi Adolph Eichmann’s term, the “Final Solution”, his proposal in 1942 to get rid of the Jews in Germany, which was to exterminate them, something he accomplished with staggering efficiency.  The result was the deaths of 3-4 million Jews in occupied Europe and another 2 million elsewhere.  Fast-forward to 1960, when Israeli Jews discovered where Eichmann was after his escape before the International War Crimes Tribunal was held in Nuremburg.  He had fled to Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he lived with his family under a pseudonym and worked in a Mercedes-Benz factory.  

     With the blessing of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, a small team of Mossad agents was dispatched to Buenos Aires to abduct Eichmann and bring him to Israel for trial.  Disagreements had to be worked out between those who were still so enraged they wanted him killed and maybe tortured on the spot.  But cooler heads argued that putting him on trial for the whole world to witness was a better plan.  

     Although the real events were laden with drama, the movie, Operation Finale, elaborates on history to increase the tension and excitement for audiences.  It could be argued that this is unnecessary, in that simply telling the story like it happened is drama enough.  For instance, I understand that in actuality Eichmann was drugged and disguised as an injured airline worker with a bandage on his head in order to fly him to Israel.

     At any rate, the film focuses on the Israeli operatives and their interactions with one another and with Eichmann, giving us background stories that make us care about them and their families and accomplices, and helps us appreciate the dangers of the operation.  The action of the story is so absorbing and exciting, that if you didn’t know the outcome—or even if you do—you will be impressed.

     Oscar Isaac as Peter, one of the Mossad agents, and Ben Kingsley as Adolph Eichmann make the two characters come alive, especially during the time they are in a safe house before their departure from Buenos Aires.  Peter is convinced that they will get more from Eichmann—specifically, a signature—by establishing rapport with him, rather than obtaining it through force and torture.  This is borne out, which pleased me, in that it has been shown that this approach is much more effective than torture.  Unfortunately, they also demonstrate torture giving captors the information they desire, which undercuts the good example.  (Whether or not these circumstances are a reflection of true events or whether they are fiction for the movie I cannot say.)  

     All of the actors are very good, and Matthew Orton’s script and Chris Weitz’s direction—along with the lesson in history, albeit a compromised one—make this a worthwhile movie to see.  The “dressing up” for film audiences doesn’t detract too much from essential historical elements, which allows me to recommend it.

A thrilling, tension-filled story that reflects enough of the historical events to make it worthwhile for all to see.  

Grade:  B                                    By Donna R. Copeland

PAPILLON

Rami Malek     Charlie Hunnam

     Papillon the character isn’t like a butterfly at all (the name comes from a tattoo on the real Papillon’s chest); he is strong as an ox and has a stubborn sense of purpose that no amount of torture can break.  Henri Charrière (nicknamed Papillon), a thief, has been framed for murder, and is sent to prison in French Guiana.  He immediately begins planning for his escape, and wisely offers protection from the other inmates to bespectacled Louis Dega (Malek), a refined counterfeiter whom he has rightly guessed is not likely to survive prison, AND he has money.  Papillon makes his offer in exchange for Dega helping plan (and fund) their escape.  

     What will follow are infractions and at least four attempted escapes by the two men with various others.  They are always caught, and swift punishments ensue.  From the beginning, they had been told by the well-fed warden in a white suit that “keeping you is no gain; losing you is no loss.”  This is announced in the courtyard with a guillotine clearly visible for those who commit murder; solitary confinement is for lesser violations like trying to escape.  

     Papillon will undergo severe punishments, including two years of solitary confinement, then total darkness and half rations because he refuses to give up the name of the person who had sneaked into him a coconut every day for a while. Demonstrating his pluck—as he often does—Papillon insolently thwarts every attempt to make him turn. (He would be turning in his new-found comrade, Dega.)

     Papillon is beautifully filmed (Hagen Bogdanski) and scored (David Buckley), which helps offset the repetitious brutality and frustration of repeated escape-capture-punishment sequences.  Another compensation involves following the quirky relationship that develops between Papillon and Dega.  Both actors skillfully pull you in because they are so good, but also because their characters’ connection is nuanced, with Dega being ambivalent in the beginning, Papillon struggling with Dega’s dependency, but then ultimately feeling genuinely responsible for him.  (There is honor among thieves, apparently, and these two seem to develop a deep, long-lasting bond.)  Director Michael Noer has orchestrated well all the components to make this a worthwhile film to see.

     It’s a lesson in fortitude certainly, but with principles as well.  At times, Dega ribs Papillon about being the son of two schoolteachers, but although they weren’t able to keep him totally honest, they did teach him two important principles:  Don’t kill, and don’t leave anyone behind.  As Dega says in the preview of the movie, “That man risked his life for me.”

This film—as well as its 1973 production—is based on the 1969 autobiography by Henri Charrière, some events of which have been questioned.  The general consensus seems to be that 75% of the book is true (according to the author), and that much of the content derives from other prisoners’ accounts.  At any rate, this Papillon is provocative, and although it may be better (partly because of new technology) than its 1973 sister, there is still a question about why/whether a remake was necessary or desirable.

At base, Papillon is a lesson in principled fortitude, showing heroism even among (some of) the incarcerated. It’s a fascinating account that holds you captive.

Grade:  B                                    By Donna R. Copeland

THE HAPPYTIME MURDERS

Melissa McCarthy     Bill Barretta     Elizabeth Banks     Maya Rudolph     Joel McHale     Dorien Davies

     The title refers to a group from a failed sitcom called the “Happytime Gang” (puppets) who are getting killed off one by one.  Disgraced ex-cop/now private detective Phil Philips (Barretta) is assigned with his partner Detective Connie Edwards (McCarthy) to find the killer (just the first in a plot made up of nonsensical actions).  What follows is a series of charades in which Phil happens on the scene just before or after each tragedy, so that he always looks guilty, and is finally the one charged with the murders.

     It’s a long time, though, before the crimes get solved, and in the interim, the audience is “treated” (treated?) to all kinds of shenanigans, most involving Philips and Edwards insulting and fighting one another, alternating with pal-sy buddy cop intervals.  Discrimination is highlighted in puppets being disparaged by humans at every turn, but, unfortunately, the filmmakers fail to relate this to any meaningful observation of today’s world.

     The movie is based on the premise that audiences will just love foul language in almost every sentence and scene after scene of all kinds of sexual perversions. For those of us not reveling in such “humor”, however, it is a pain to sit through.  Cleverness is alien to the writers (Todd Berger and Dee Austin Robertson), and instead they insert vulgarities to get titters from the viewers.  An example:  “If I’m a-gonna get next to it, I’m a-gonna f… it”, spoken by Sandra White (Davies), who has come to Phil, asking for his help.  Of course, he succumbs to her “charms”, in still one more crude, vulgar sequence.  

     Melissa McCarthy, one of the main draws for the film, plays the same character she has played in almost every film she’s been in.  Elizabeth Banks is hardly seen in the film at all, and Maya Rudolph—drawing on the Saturday Night Live experience presumably—does come across as a character at least mildly funny.   (She is better than the script written for her.)  Bill Barretta as Phil Philips plays his role well, too, putting his signature on a detective’s narrative that engages and explains.

     There is not much else I can say about this film, which seems to be a failure from conception to execution.  Perhaps it makes a case for taking puppets more seriously, but as rendered, it doesn’t make the grade.  Directed by the son of Jim Henson (of Sesame Street fame), Brian, it sadly does not live up to the father’s accomplishments.

Unless you’re into adult porn with puppets, there is not much here to entertain.

Grade:  F                                    By Donna R. Copeland

BLAZE

Benjamin Dickey     Alia Shawkat     Charlie Sexton     Josh Hamilton     Alynda Mariposa     Jenn Lyon

     Blaze is an unusual biopic about a singer/songwriter who was almost famous in ‘70s-‘80s country music.  His idols were Hank Williams, Red Foley, and John Prine, and they were the inspiration for many of his songs.  He rubbed shoulders with other well-known musicians such as Townes van Zant, played in the film by Charlie Sexton, and apparently paved the way for the well-known country music stars Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson.

     The film is in the form of an Impressionist painting, in that it doesn’t flow in chronological order, but gives the flavor of Blaze’s life by showing scenes when he is performing, hobnobbing about with buddies, or—the most interesting—when he interacts with the woman who became his wife, Sybil (Shawkat). Sybil wrote the memoir on which the movie is based, worked closely with Director Ethan Hawke, and she was on site during filming.  One of her unique contributions was to suggest a scene in which Blaze and his friends howl at the full moon.  During an appearance in Houston, Texas, Hawke said he was reluctant at first to include it, but finally relented, and it is, indeed, in the final cut.

     Sybil and Blaze were attracted to each other right away, and lived a few blissful years in what they called a “tree-house” in the woods near Atlanta.  As it was provided rent-free from a benefactor, it was perfect for a young musician and a writer just trying to make their way.  Sybil, a spunky Jewish woman decides after a time that Blaze is ready for something bigger, and they move to Austin, Texas, in hopes of his being recognized.  That is where the story turns dark, as Blaze doesn’t find the audience attention he craves, moves back to Atlanta without Sybil, then asks her to go to Chicago with him to try something different. Eventually, their marriage cannot withstand the separations and Blaze’s drug use.

     Director Ethan Hawke and his editor Jason Gourson elected not to frame the film in chronological order, but rather to go back and forth in time for Blaze, his wife, and Townes van Zant—I think the intention was to convey the essence of who Blaze was.  However, this arrangement is not successful, in that it becomes confusing for the viewer to keep track of time and place.  For instance, it’s disconcerting to know that the couple split up, after which Sybil reappears as his wife.  Likewise, having Townes van Zant appear and reappear interferes with the story, although Charlie Sexton’s portrayal of him is exemplary.

     The mood of the film is rather somber, reflecting the sad, disorganized, somewhat impotent life of a man who constantly made poor decisions and lacked the social skills to make it big in the music world.  Although he and his music is remembered fondly by those who knew him and followed his work, most people who see the film might wonder about the purpose of making the story into a film.

     Blaze is perhaps a movie for the dedicated country music fan.  Benjamin Dickey does a fine job in portraying him as a person and a musician, and when the actor’s own renditions of Blaze’s music are played, it is enjoyable to hear him.  We were treated to some of his songs during his and Hawke’s brief appearance in Houston at Rockefellers just before the release of the film.  Dickey’s and Alia Shawkat’s performances are the best part of Blaze, and reflects the possibility that Blaze’s not holding on to her in his life was one of his biggest mistakes.

This is a sobering tale of a musician who tried his best to make it big, but because of some bad luck and personal problems, it was not to be.

Grade:  C                                    By Donna R. Copeland