DARK WATERS

Mark Ruffalo     Anne Hathaway     Tim Robbins     Bill Camp     Bill Pullman     Victor Garber

     Robert Bilott (Ruffalo) is a promising young attorney who has just made partner in a respected corporate law firm.  He has a number of key supporters as a result of his work defending chemical companies, who believe he will distinguish himself (and them) because of his deliberateness and passion for the law.  He will indeed live up to this faith, although not in the way his supporters think.

     Soon after starting this phase of his career, Rob is personally visited in his office by a West Virginia farmer, Wilbur Tennant (Camp), wanting representation. He has been referred by his neighbor, Rob’s beloved grandmother.  Rob patiently explains that he is a civil lawyer and not likely to serve the client well.  Tennant leaves in a huff, feeling that all his antagonism toward authorities is justified.  

     But Rob is conscientious, and visits his grandmother for more information. She reminds him that as a boy he used to go to the Tennants’ farm every summer (to swim and learn to milk cows!) and thoroughly enjoyed it.  Rob does a bit more investigation, looking at a landfill near the farm, and being shown by Tennant some of the devastation, which he thinks is perpetrated by the DuPont company (DuPont de Nemours, as they prefer to be called).  

     After doing more research into the company and getting the EPA reports, it begins to dawn on Rob that there is something to investigate (like water and air contamination, as well as animal/human organ damage.  The Tennants do not have the money to hire him, so he discusses with his boss Tom Terp (Robbins) the possibility of taking on pro bono what they foresee as a short-term project.  Terp reluctantly agrees on the basis that it will promote the Taft Law Firm’s good name.

     What is in store for them is (literally!) mountains of data for Rob to go through, unsatisfying responses from the DuPont company to his inquiries, and later on, major resistance and obstruction as a defense by DuPont, despite ever-mounting evidence against them.

     I wish I could describe to you a heroic story in which legal and political action made a decisive difference.  Although I cannot, I nevertheless urge the public to see this film (updated/extended from the Erin Brockovich) for its application to contemporary environmental and political concerns.  It’s a bit like a detective story that must accumulate data over a long period of time, and becomes a drama that is all too familiar today.

     Mark Ruffalo does an exemplary job portraying a man trying to overcome a compromised history by committing himself to helping the disadvantaged.  This comes at a cost, and we see his, his wife’s (Hathaway) and their family’s sacrifices.  Noteworthy (and perhaps award-worthy) is Bill Camp’s performance in playing a West Virginia farmer who is astute but not given credit for it by virtue of his accent, his class, and where he is from geographically (West Virginia). He successively endears others, and distances them because of his extreme (but well justified) anger. He is a significant supporting actor.

     Todd Haynes continues to surprise with his explorations into varying subjects and he and cinematographer Edward Lachman’s foray into innovative techniques in Wonderstruck, Far from Heaven, Carol, and this film, show their abilities to portray the poetic as well as the meaningful in their joint works.  I want to give a shout-out to composer Marcelo Zarvos, whose music has a paradoxical effect of being soft and lyrical, but with ominous overtones, even from the beginning.  Those tones let you know this will not be a romp through the park.  

     The movie gets into substantive issues relevant today about environmental concerns, corporate power, and the costs of social advocacy, while engaging you emotionally into the drama.

Dark Waters turn out to be toxic.

Grade:  B+                                    By Donna R. Copeland

WILDLIFE

Jake Gyllenhaal     Carey Mulligan     Ed Oxenbould     Bill Camp

     After demonstrating his acting abilities in acclaimed movies (e.g., There will be Blood, Little Miss Sunshine, Love & Mercy), Paul Dano decided to try his hand at directing a movie based on a book written by Richard Ford, which brings us to Wildlife.  The book spoke to Dano, reminding him of his own experience of his parents’ separation, in which, as an only child, he was inclined less to rebel and act out, and more to try to hold everything together.  He was the responsible one, the “parent child” in psychological parlance.

     In the film, we see the family first as having just moved from Lewiston, Idaho, to Great Falls, Montana.  Joe (Oxenbould), a teenager who has felt uprooted with the move, is trying to satisfy his father’s wish for him to become a football star.  His father Jerry (Gyllenhaal) has aspirations to become a force in golf at the local club where he works.  However, he gets fired—in his own words—because he is so good with the customers.  When the club has second thoughts and wants to re-hire him, the narcissistic wound of rejection prevents him from accepting.  Instead, for some reason (visions of greatness?), he decides instead to fight forest fires raging in the nearby forests, which will take him away from the family for several months.

     Incensed, Jerry’s wife Jeanette (Mulligan), rails at him for the stupidity of his plan.  In the meantime, she has decided to ignore Jerry’s wish that she remain a housewife and has taken a job as a swimming coach.  This will introduce her to a different world from that she has been trained for and is used to, and brings her in contact with people in the town; one of her students is a wealthy widower, played by Bill Camp.

     The story is about what happens in this interim when the parents are separated, and Joe, feeling the tension between them, tries his best not to take sides and accommodate to an altered world.  But in fact, in Dano’s description, he is a “kid being kicked out into the wild [and told], “This is the real world.”  In other words, get used to it.  

     The rest of the story is about Joe’s experience of being with his mother, completely cut off from his father, and having to somehow make sense of it all.  In the role of this character, Oxenbould, a young Australian actor, perfectly captures the basic dilemma and the multiple awkward positions his mother places him in during the course of the movie.

     Problems with the film could be with the way the parents communicate with Joe. It seems to me they relate to him in ways that are unrealistic, asking his advice at strange moments (“Joe, what do you think I should do?”; “Joe, how do I look?” [for an interview or for a date], and always turning to him in moments of crisis.  I haven’t observed any parents being this blatant, but given that Dano is basing this partly on his own experience, maybe it happens.

     This is probably the “meatiest” role in Carey Mulligan’s career, and she takes to it with all she has.  She is brilliant.  Her character’s common sense arguments/putdowns of her husband’s decisions are careful not to attack him directly and personally, but clearly she conveys she is her own person and not willing to subject herself to anyone for any reason.  

     I never have enough words of praise for Jake Gyllenhaal; he inhabits all different kinds of characters in ways that are always believable.  I had a hard time at first seeing him as a passive/aggressive figure who is fiercely independent, assuming his family would be waiting for him with open arms when he returns, but of course he does just that with all the authenticity the role requires.  

     Paul Dano should be very proud of his new direction (and a script in collaboration with Zoe Kazan); he has all the makings of a good director who has an eye for the overall picture and knows characterization well enough to cast fine actors for the roles.  I congratulate him and his collaborators for a film in which a kid succeeds despite his parents’ utter disregard for him.  Let’s all hail the promise of the human spirit over adversity.

An example of how a teenager can master the challenges his family—and life—can throw at him.

Grade:  B+                                    By Donna R. Copeland 

MOLLY'S GAME

Jessica Chastain     Idris Elba     Kevin Costner     Michael Cera

Jeremy Strong     Chris O’Dowd      Bill Camp     Brian d’Arcy

     This is one of the few, or only, major films showing a female character who is strong, cheeky, brilliant, daring, and successful, and who chooses an honorable path regardless of the consequences.  Often, we see a film showing men in that position, but not women. 

     Molly Bloom (cunningly played by Chastain) is a cheeky woman brought up by her sports-obsessed father (Costner) to compete to the death on a ski slope; he’d had great success with her older brothers.  When she was 12 years old, after major surgery for scoliosis and doctors’ recommendation not to ski again, she went on to compete in the Olympics as part of the U.S. team.  Bad luck came in the form of a small piece of pine embedded in the ice slope, which ended her skiing career forever.

      Nevermind.  This is a woman of many talents and formidable determination.  She’s set to go to law school, but against her father’s wishes, she chooses to move to Los Angeles from Colorado and find “temporary employment” as a waitress in a nightclub and as an office assistant, just for a break.  Her employment as office assistant turns into a 24-hour a day job for Dean Keith (Strong) who runs a gambling casino in the Cobra Lounge.  Molly is nothing but smart, and quickly learns everything she can about poker; moreover, she draws up spreadsheets (something Dean has never heard of) showing the bets, wins, losses, and financial information. 

     When Dean sees how much she is making as his assistant, he tries to stiff her (as will another character later on, both planning to do an age-old con on a woman), but she is already ahead of him and opens her own place of business.  Keep in mind that all along, Molly takes great effort to see that her business is legal and above board.  She is circumspect in not indulging in many of the activities men in her position have a history of doing. 

     However, the money is so good, and she takes a few risks in cutting corners.  But she is back on track toward her goal of enrolling in Harvard Law School when she is arrested by the FBI.  This brings her in contact with Charlie Jaffey (Elba), a high-priced, circumspect lawyer who doesn’t regard her as rich enough or ethical enough to warrant his law practice.

Their interactions and conversations are quintessential Aaron Sorkin—fast-paced, erudite, and funny.  Molly has to convince him to take her on as a client with drawbacks that are against his standards of practice as well as money.  That’s when the film takes on the elements of a thriller and an inspiring life story.

     Chastain brings her considerable talent to this role, most likely reinforced by the nature of the character’s challenges and struggles.  It’s another victory of brains and ethical grounding winning out over masculine pride and ego, including those of a psychologist-father, who took many years to understand how much grit she had and how much like him she was.  Chastain tackles the role as she always has in grasping all the elements that make up her complicated character.  Idris Elba is just as much master of his role, and the two of them make an excellent pair in shaping the action.

     This film should be an inspiration to women aspiring to achieve success and to men who want to understand these women in a non-stereotypical manner.

A refreshing and different take on a crime thriller.

Grade:  A                                    By Donna R. Copeland

THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER

Nicole Kidman     Colin Farrell     Raffey Cassidy     Sunny Suljic

Barry Keoghan     Alicia Silverstone     Bill Camp

    The Murphy family looks like a sea without a ripple in it.  It appears that everything is under control, with little friction, and ever-polite conversation about mundane matters making up the family’s conversations.  Even lovemaking has a ritualistic quality to it.  And yet, occasionally one of them will burst out with some extremely personal information.  Steven Murphy (Farrell) is a heart surgeon, and his wife Anna (Kidman) is an opthalmologist and head of a clinic.  Teenager Kim (Cassidy) is bright, with an interest in music, and younger Bobby (Suljic) is also very bright, but has yet to show particular talents.  They live in a large, orderly house with neatly tended gardens.  What could go wrong?

     For some reason—we initially don’t know why—Steven befriends one of his daughter’s classmates, Martin (Keoghan), who is the son of one of his patients who died some years back.  Knowing that Martin and his mother are struggling financially—or perhaps for some other reason we don’t know—Steven treats him to meals and gifts.  Gradually, Martin begins insinuating himself into Steven’s life, appearing at the hospital, calling him on the phone, and meeting him in the hospital cafeteria.  He even invites Steven to his house for dinner with his mother, which, curiously, Steven accepts.  However, while there, he encounters a situation that makes him leave abruptly.

     But Martin does not leave him alone; he has fantasies in the form of predictions that, when he voices them, are weird and shocking, but understandable psychologically from what we know of him.  What we don’t understand until the final scenes is the power he comes to have over this family.  And is it his power?  We are left to speculate on the events that transpire during the last half of the film, which have curious resonance with what Martin has predicted will happen to Steven and his family.  And these are dire predictions. 

     We’re given a clue about the film’s title by learning that Kim wrote an essay at school for which she received an A+.  It was about the Greek myth of Iphigenia, Agamemnon’s daughter who had to be sacrificed because of Agamemnon’s offense of killing a sacred deer that belonged to Artemis.  Without this sacrifice, Artemis would interfere with the winds Agamemnon needed to sail to Troy. 

     This is a successful truly horrific film that keeps the viewer engaged in trying to figure out what is going on.  The acting is superb, with Farrell and Kidman lockstep in their talents portraying people who are conventional on the outside and with deep recesses in their core personalities.  The “gossip” that surrounds them (and helpful “friends” are only too happy to inform them) raises suspicions, but we never know whether these are reality-based or not.  Barry Keoghan evokes the teenager you definitely don’t want your daughter to date; he portrays a threatening eeriness that you can’t quite put your finger on, and although what he says might be hogwash, a part of you will believe it.

     Director Lorgos Lanthimas and writer Efthymis Filippou have collaborated on previous films (The Lobster, Dogtooth, and Alps) that tend toward the mysterious and bizarre, and this is no different.  It will intrigue you and repel you at the same time.  Perhaps Lanthimas selected the music for the soundtrack, which is mostly classical and modern orchestral and choral music—dissonant, even screeching at times, to accompany the feelings of dread and eeriness of the script.  In addition, there are a couple of popular tunes sung by Kim.

     The Killing of a Sacred Deer will not be to everyone’s taste, but for those who value creativity and insight into the human condition, it will be a gratifying experience. 

Vulnerability to human weaknesses can help explain this drama.

Grade:  A                                    By Donna R. Copeland