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JOKER – NIHILISTIC PLOT WASTES JOAQUIN PHOENIX’ INCREDIBLE PERFORMANCE

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF JOKER REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

Joaquin Phoenix’ mesmerizing and brilliant performance as Joker is wasted in the nihilistic plot of this realism grounded, extremely disturbing, origin story.

WHO SHOULD GO:

ABSOLUTELY ADULTS ONLY. This is not Caeser Romero. Heck this isn’t even Heath Ledger. Extreme violence, profane language, discussions of child abuse and neglect, demonstrations of mental illness all make for a showing difficult for most adults to see much less children.

LONG TAKE:

Under tour-de-force in the dictionary you should find a picture of Joaquin Phoenix in costume as Joker/Arthur Fleck from the movie of the same name. His performance in and as Joker should go down in cinematic history as a watershed accomplishment in the creation of an onscreen character.

The story in Joker is of a man’s descent into madness, and for Arthur Fleck, while the trip isn’t very long, it is shown in slow motion.

Todd Phillips, writer/director, takes a stab at what could be described as a documentary about the real story behind Joker, from which all of the cartoons and comic books were based, told in an observational style, as though Jane Goodall had hidden cameras on Arthur Fleck instead of gorillas.

Without giving too much away, Arthur is not born but created, as he suffers mentally, emotionally and physically at the hands of a mental health system which fails him, the people who should have protected him, and a violent uncaring culture which takes advantage of his initial simple view of life.

One of the main characters in Joker is invisible – the soundtrack. The music accompanying Joker is incredible, following Arthur like an unseen ghost, drawing in his madness and breathing it out again for others to hear. Hildur Guonadottir, an Icelandic composer, weaves a web of truly haunting cello music which, at turns, lulls and aggressively pursues the listener, echoing Arthur’s multi-faceted insanity: his depressed, hopeless state of mind, his hallucinatory flights of fancy, as well as his manic episodes of single-minded determination.

The cinematography visualized by Lawrence Sher is masterful. From the grim hues and motifs of rain and shadow, to the camera work which uses techniques such as the “dolly zoom” aka the “Vertigo Effect” where the camera pulls back and zooms forward at the same time – all work together to allow a bleak and twisted perspective into Arthur’s broken mind.

But, most tragic, all this wealth of creativity and talent is ultimately wasted.

While Joker, as I mentioned, can arguably be considered the origin story from which all the other legends and mythology of the D.C. Joker emerge, especially the cartoons, the comics, and Jack Nicholson’s rendition, the viewing of the movie is a long travail of suffering with very little purpose. In films like Les Misérables, for example, the suffering of Fantine and Jean Val Jean is altruistic and ultimately redemptive, teaching humility and mercy to the characters and vicariously to the audience. In Man of La Mancha, the prostitute, Aldonza, is shown literally and figuratively in the ditch in which she self describes as having been born, in order to illuminate how far Don Quixote’s kindness brings her when she reforms. Even silly fare like disaster movies serve as a mechanism for the characters to show courage and self-sacrifice.

In The Dark Knight, Bruce’s losses mold and inspire him into becoming a self-appointed defender of the weak and innocent. And there are Judeo-Christian motifs in the Dark Knight. Bruce Wayne dies to himself everyday, denying his own comfort and pleasures, instead taking on the sins of others, all the while pitted against the remorseless demonic figure of Heath Ledger’s Joker.

Even farces such as Mad Mad Mad Mad World, which feature the ne’erdowell indulgence of greedy impulses by groups of people succumbing to temptations, serve as lessons in horrible warnings against sinking into the mire of one’s baser instincts. The Mad Mad ensemble put themselves through brutal punishments and ultimately go to jail – all while making us LAUGH.

But there is nothing absolutive in Joker, nor are there any hints of a reckoning to come. And there is no proportionate justice for the wicked, especially not for Arthur, no purpose to anyone’s suffering and no humor. Joker is unrelentingly grim, unendingly dark, and grindingly depressing. In the end, the audience is left only with the familiar figure of a boy standing over the dead bodies of his parents and the dancing of Arthur in his Joker costume amidst the rampaging rioters in a burning Gotham.

Joker does serve as a demonstration in favor of institutionalizing the mentally disturbed as opposed to releasing into the “wild” those incapable of functioning in society.

It also serves as a horrible warning against the efficacy of vigilante justice as Arthur quickly moves from killing in self defense, to murder in order to cover his actions, to vengeance against those he believes have harmed him, to serving as judge, jury and executioner against those he deems as “awful”.

But there is nothing redemptive, or self-sacrificing about Joker’s actions. There is no moral base from which Arthur even attempts to rationalize his behavior. There is nothing to learn from the pain which Arthur endures or inflicts.

Zazie Beetz (Deadpool 2) is his exhausted single-mother neighbor Sophie, Brett Cullen (Dark Knight Rises) plays Thomas Wayne, Douglas Hodge makes a singular impression as Alfred Pennyworth, one of the only characters in the movie whose focus is not on themselves, as his primary concern is to protect Bruce, and Dante Pereira-Olson plays young Bruce.

Robert De Niro has a small role, as talk show host Murray Franklin. DeNiro’s presence is delicious irony. De Niro has played both a character as equally as unhinged as Arthur in Taxi Driver and as demented a fan who faces off against an idealized talk show host in the lesser known King of Comedy. DeNiro’s resume is incredible, featuring a list of movies with enough quality and variety to have secured the careers of a dozen actors: the casual, criminal violence in the characters of The Godfather II, The Irishman, and Cape Fear, the flawed heroes struggling in the dark worlds of Midnight Run, Deer Hunter and Taxi Driver, the boxer in Raging Bull, the captain of a fantasy ship in the light farce Stardust, the aging lead in the romantic comedy The Intern, the slaver turned priest in The Mission, the grim and frightening Al Capone in The Untouchables, the moving victim of catatonia in Awakenings. De Niro is impossible to pin down. Admittedly, it is a testament to the quality to which the filmmakers were aiming in Joker, that the legendary De Niro, himself a master at his craft, would agree to participate.

Unfortunately, the abundance of talent in Joker does not resolve the ultimate meaninglessness of the plot. The audience, much like Arthur, suffers pointlessly in following Arthur’s moral and mental descent.

While Joaquin Phoenix’ performance is mesmerizing and probably should serve in every acting class as a “how to create a character on screen” and while the director and the music serve, with masterful art, to bring us into Arthur’s state of mind and point of view, the journey ultimately has no end, no goal, and no exit strategy from the depths into which Arthur is thrown or the hole he continues to dig at the bottom of his well.

As of the writing of this article Joker is the highest grossing R-rated movie ever made. And it is disturbing to consider that such a pointlessly violent and unrepentantly dark film should attract so much attention.

If you are a student of acting, Joker is worth enduring for Phoenix’ performance. But for those just seeking entertainment or an extension to the D.C. world of Batman and Joker, give this one a miss and re-watch 2008’s The Dark Knight.

FOR A DISASTROUSLY GOOD TIME AT ACTS THEATRE!!! GO SEE – DISASTER: THE MUSICAL!!!

SHORT TAKE

Disaster: the Musical opens (tonight) January 24, 2020 at ACTS Theatre, [GET YOUR TICKETS HERE] through Groundhog Day (February 2, 2020) with evening performances at 7:30 and matinees at 3. It is a hilarious take off of disaster genre movies, especially The Poseidon Adventure.

WHO SHOULD GO

With slight reservations – anyone. Aside from a few off-color, stress related words, which are difficult to hear amidst loud music, ensemble conversation and special effects noise, the play is appropriate for any age which does not mind loud sounds and music.

LONG TAKE

I love disaster movies. The excitement, the drama, the special effects, the sappy songs. I even love the formula. Meet an unlikely ensemble group, usually: an older married couple, a sick child, a sleazy selfish person who will get their comeuppance, a religious figure, a dog, an entertainer, and at least one estranged couple who will re-bond through trauma. (SEE MY ARTICLE “CATACLYSM AS MARITAL THERAPY” HERE). They will then endure escape room dynamics to survive fire (Towering Inferno), water (Poseidon Adventure), predatory animals (Jurassic Park), rickety climbing structure (various), etc and combinations of the aforementioned, all while evading whatever caused the calamity to begin with: earthquake, fire, tsunami, escaped dinosaurs, hurricane, whatever.

As preposterous as some of these scenarios may sound they have been a guilty pleasure of movie goers for generations. I, for one, once watched The Poseidon Adventure (the first one with Gene Hackman – yes, I’m that old) in the movie theater IN the front row at MIDNIGHT (when the tsunami hit the ship). They are a hoot.

There’s something to be said for the opportunity to reestablish priorities – walking out of a theater knowing that while your dog may have eaten your only copy of your income tax return and the hot water heater is on the fritz, at least you don’t have to ride out the zombie apocalypse in the basement of a burning bar (Shaun of the Dead) or survive an erupting volcano in a collapsed mine shaft (Dante’s Peak). I mean – count your blessings!!

The grand-daddies of disaster, the majordomos of misadventure, and the comptrollers of catastrophe, were: Airport (1970 – with a zillion sequels coming out in the latter part of that decade), The Poseidon Adventure (1972), The Towering Inferno and Earthquake (1974), The Hindenburg (1975), and Meteor (1979).

And following in those esteemed footsteps is DISASTER: THE MUSICAL. Mostly capitalizing on The Poseidon Adventure, this hilarious parody leans heavily on 1970’s songs, costumes and the “disco culture” (such as it was) pervasively popular at the time. Written by Seth Rudetsky and Jack Plotnick for Only Make Believe’s fund raiser in 2011, the show was a hit and crept up from Off-Off Broadway to Broadway within a few years.

(And FYI Only Make Believe is a non-profit organization that creates and performs interactive theatre for children in hospitals, care facilities, and special education programs, operating under the core resolve that encouraging a child’s imagination is a vital part of the healing and learning process.)

Our local performers at ACTS Theatre throw themselves into the Disaster characters with deliciously shameless enthusiasm. As directed by veteran Kris Webster, no stops are unpulled and no scenery left unchewed.

ABBA style, the music is cobbled together from popular songs of the era. Top 40 tunes like: “Knock on Wood”, “Hot Stuff”, “A Fifth of Beethoven” and “Three Times a Lady”, are used in cleverly comic ways NEVER originally intended. I don’t want to spoil anything for you so won’t tell you all the songs, BUT when you go see Disaster, play a game – see what familiar 1970’s hit song might be coming up next, depending on the circumstances at hand.

The cast is terrific and, despite the weird circumstances in which the songs appear, belt out these archaic tunes with an irresistible gusto that makes singing along difficult to resist. Much like the source material for this comic catastrophe, the cast list is studded with an abundance of familiar talented faces.

Zac Hammons (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels SEE REVIEW HERE) is first on, setting the stage figuratively with a prelude, then appearing often to literally set and reset the stage, athletically bullying into shape the plethora of scenarios needed for the play.

Jordan Gribble (The Giver and the scene stealing father from Bye Bye Birdie SEE REVIEW HERE), is lovelorn Chad.

Mark Hebert (Arsenic and Old Lace SEE REVIEW HERE and Mamma Mia SEE REVIEW HERE) is Scott, Chad’s clueless friend.

Kane Todd (Mamma Mia, Bye Bye Birdie) is Professor Ted Scheider, the disaster expert.

Taylor Novak-Tyler (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Clue SEE REVIEW HERE) is Marianne, Chad’s old girlfriend.

Robert Goodson (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Clue) is Tony Delvechio, the slimy casino owner everyone loves to hate.

Kelly Rowland (Arsenic and Old Lace, I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change SEE REVIEW HERE) is Jackie, the entertainer and single mother with twins.

Ana-Claire Perkins hilariously bounces back and forth as both of Jackie’s twins, Ben and Lisa.

Markie Hebert (I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, Spamalot SEE REVIEW HERE) is Sister Mary Downy, a well meaning nun who has her own reasons for not wanting to go into the casino.

Kathy Heath (Steel Magnolias SEE REVIEW HERE, Arsenic and Old Lace) is Shirley Summers and Matt Dye (Arsenic and Old Lace, Taming of the Shrew SEE REVIEW HERE) is Maury Summers, the older retired happily married couple on their first real vacation.

At which point I have to note an in joke as SHELLEY Winters played a very reminiscent character in The Poseidon Adventure to SHIRLEY Summers here. Geddit? Shelley Winters/Shirley Summers….Hey I didn’t make it up, I’m just bringing it to your attention.

Sonia Yetming is Levora Verona, a washed up disco singer trying to get back on top.

Trevor Chaumont is Jake.

Jessica Broussard is Tracy.

Rhett Goodner is listed as a stock “Wealthy Man”.

Krista Austin plays Rhett Goodner’s character’s wife.

Jaylin Williams is the Chef.

Bobby Guillory, Nikki Guillory and Noelie Puckett lend their support as various cast members and in the ensemble.

And special commendation to all the stage crew, without whose hard work this crazy carnival of calamity would not have been possible.

So for a comedic catastrophe of clever carnage, for a gargantuan gag fest of gore, and a deliciously droll delivery of devastation (OK, I’m done)…go see — DISASTER: THE MUSICAL at ACTS Theatre, [GET YOUR TICKETS HERE]. Then go pet the dog, call a plumber ….. and smile.

FOR MORE DISASTER PHOTOS GO:

HERE

and

HERE

KLAUS OUTSHINES THE OTHER OSCAR CONTENDERS

AUDIO OPTION FOR REVIEW OF KLAUS

SHORT TAKE:

The animated feature Klaus cleverly and adorably postulates the origins of the Santa Claus story.

WHO SHOULD WATCH:

Any age, though there are Looney Tunes level scenes of “violence” and some images no scarier then the chef scene in The Little Mermaid, they are all played for laughs even the littlest can enjoy.

LONG TAKE:

I do not believe in coincidence. And I do not believe the writer-director of Klaus, Sergio Pablos (who also lends his voice to two of the more caricature cast members, Pumpkin and Olaf) does either. I think that everything happens for a reason, as directed by the Divine hand of our Creator. The story Mr. Pablos has lovingly crafted during the last two and a half years, addresses one possible explanation of the origins of the Santa Claus story, and demonstrates this purpose-driven theory beautifully.

Klaus is one of five contenders for the best animated feature film Oscar. The others are: Toy Story 4 (SEE REVIEW HERE), Missing Link, I Lost my Body, and How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World. I think Klaus should be the hands-down winner.

SPOILERS (THOUGH AS FEW AS I COULD)

The premise, without giving away too much, is about a spoiled little rich man who is forced to cope on the island of Smeerensburg, in the outer reaches of the north, among members of two feuding families who have made their community a generational war zone. The name “Smeerensburg” was chosen by Pablos, adopted from a city on the outskirts of the northern frontier with the name of Smeerenburg (without the middle “s”) which no longer exists, so is, in a way, itself now a myth.

While the violence is played for laughs, the oppressive gray scale, deliberately sharp intimidating ubiquitous icicle motiffs, angular houses and angry denizens make the point. This is not a place you want to stay.

But, unlike I Lost my Body, (which is about a severed hand trying and ultimately failing to reunite with the young man from whom it was cut), Klaus is not unrelentingly grim, dark and navel-mediatingly introspective. Klaus is funny, as animated films really SHOULD be. While there is a modicum of slapstick, the humor is mostly from the way people can be amusing just in interacting with each other. The writing in Klaus is warm, smart and clever, creating distinctive personalities amongst the cartoon creations. Klaus gives us likeable, interesting people, unlike one of the other Oscar contenders, the (ahem) abominable Missing Link, which latter movie, unsuccessfully relied upon star power and improv to write their failed script. Klaus is often amusingly unrealistic, especially as Jesper confronts obstacles and, of course, survives things that flesh and blood human beings would not. But much like the OLD Bugs Bunny shows, it establishes and follows its own Universal rules while tweaking real world ones. Missing Link, on the other hand, is all over the place, placing characters in “jeopardy” one moment then having them come away unscathed from other worse events.

Klaus, like any good fairy tale, has an ennobling theme repeated several times: “A true act of goodwill always sparks another.” As the movie plays out, the meaning of this phrase expresses itself more deeply – how great good can come from the most unlikely situations, even in the serendipitous meeting between one man suffering from deep grief and another so myopically selfish he can not see the good he is accomplishing, albeit for the wrong reasons.

The animation while not 100% state-of-the-art, is solid and updated 2D, often clever and delightfully detailed, reminiscent of the artful Anastasia. In contrast, How to Train Your Dragon has some truly gorgeous visuals and the main characters are as endearing as they were in the first two, BUT the plot to Dragon is thin and really just a slightly mixed rehash of ground already covered. Also, Dragon‘s story is far too padded with superfluous characters inserted for laughs but who just come across as obnoxious. What Klaus lacks in cutting edge visuals, it more than makes up for in well developed characters and a subtly intricate plot.

Jason Schwartzman’s Jesper reminds me a lot of David Spade’s cocky, cynically hip Kuzco from The Emperor’s New Groove. Like Kuzco, Jesper languishes in prolonged adolescence as an unchallenged, indulged youth but who comes into his own and becomes a mensch in discovering previously untapped and unsuspected wells of determination, ingenuity and altruism.

The soundtrack is light and lovely, and, although not a musical, is sprinkled throughout with catchy background tunes intended to reflect the mood of the moment.

Klaus, the character, is voiced by JK Simmons, who stole scenes as the loud blustery editor in the old Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movies.

The wonderful Joan Cusack (sister to and often co-star with John C.), brings ever-angry Mrs. Krum, (reminding me a bit of a female Yosemite Sam) to life. She is an actress who has graced many lovely movies like: Instant Family (SEE MY REVIEW HERE), Raising Helen, the first Toy Stories, and Martian Child. I do not believe I have ever seen a movie with her in it that I did not at least enjoy her performance.

Will Sasso (guest star on The Orville (SEE MY REVIEWS HERE AND HERE)) is the cluelessly combative Mr. Ellingboe. Rashida Jones (Tag SEE REVIEW HERE and Cumberbatch’s Grinch SEE REVIEW HERE) plays Alva, the poster child for demoralized teachers, a young woman who idealistically arrived in Smeerensburg 5 years before and has been selling fish to earn enough money for passage out ever since.

Unlike the devastating betrayal of Toy Story 4 (SEE MY REVIEW HERE), which squandered a deep well of talent, creativity and fandom to put an ignominious end to the entire Toy Story franchise, Klaus gives us a story of altruism and family with a theme repeated often: “A true act of good will always sparks another.” This is a much better theme than Toy Story 4‘s pathetic rationalization for men who abandon their families and responsibilities for the shallow pursuit of their own selfish desires, in order to “follow their heart”. (gag me with a SPOON!)

Klaus, in contrast, harkens back to It’s a Wonderful Life, where one man, DYING to himself (instead of indulging himself) every day can impact so many lives, even if they do not anticipate or understand what they are doing while it is happening.

So while other films may have more money, tech, star power, or a franchise to back them up, Klaus more than outshines them all in superlative storytelling, characterization, theme, heart and … true acts of good will. Regardless of whether Oscar recognizes this or not, Klaus is the true winner.

JUDY – A HORRIBLE WARNING BEHIND THE CURTAIN

AUDIO OPTION FOR REVIEW TITLED JUDY – A HORRIBLE WARNING BEHIND THE CURTAIN

SHORT TAKE:
Harsh look at the woman behind the magic of Judy Garland, aka Frances Ethel Gumm, in her waning professional months, near the end of her life.

WHO SHOULD WATCH:

Adult fare ONLY. Vulgar and blasphemous language, sexuality, implied pedophilia, scenes of alcohol and drug abuse.

LONG TAKE:

One of the things I’ve learned in writing movie reviews is that, once seriously analyzed, you never look at these celluloid miracles quite the same way. Not necessarily a bad thing, just different.

Like when Dorothy gets a peek behind the Wizard’s curtains. She discovers truths about him that perhaps she didn’t want to know but at the same time makes him more accessible.

This can be especially true about biographies, and Judy, a screenplay by Tom Edge, in turn based on the play The End of the Rainbow by Peter Quilter, is a prime example of learning more about the creation of a fantasy than is good for that imaginary world’s longevity.

I knew Judy Garland primarily for her unforgettable performance as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. Judy gives a look into the industry that stole her childhood, made her feel betrayed by the adults who should have been protecting her, addicted her to pick me ups and barbiturates, and ultimately contributed to her death at a prematurely aged 47.

Renee Zellweger, (Miss Potter, Bridget Jones, Chicago) up for best actress for her astonishing performance in Judy, is mesmerizing. Zellweger has captured the look and essence of Judy Garland. Not just the easy to imitate woman at the height of her career, but someone who was at the top of her game and now at the bottom of her own self-dug well, who, history dictates, will die in but months from a lifetime of physical abuse and addiction. Yet she is also a woman who has moments of great dignity and kindness in comforting a disconsolate fan, and sparkles brilliantly showcasing her incredible talent. Zellweger shines forth as brightly in Garland’s singing as she demonstrates the desperate darkness of Garland’s personal lows in the last months of her life.

Judy Garland blasted into America’s consciousness with her role as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz and never really left.

Zellweger looks, sounds and acts more like Judy Garland than Judy Garland. She demonstrates an incredible repertoire, performing Garland’s iconic songs: The Trolley Song, Over the Rainbow, You Made me Love You, Talk of the Town, By Myself, Get Happy, San Francisco, Zing Went the Strings, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, and Come Rain or Come Shine. These are worth seeing all by themselves.

But as good as Renee Z’s performance is, the same cannot be said for the other performers or the rest of the movie as directed by Rupert Goold, (mostly known for BBC mini-series filmings of Shakespeare). I could not shake the feeling, even while knowing better, that this was a made-for-TV weekly weeper. The close-ups, the episodic nature of the scenes, and the mediocre, caricature acting of the other performers made for a lukewarm film at best.

Renee Z appeared like a diamond sewn onto the waistcoat of a poorly fitting polyester suit from Walmart. The supporting structure is not terrible, and certainly serves its purpose but is nothing special.

The background soundtrack by Gabriel Yared is bland fare, applying fluffy disconnected tunes to scenes, seemingly chosen from a standard library of emotion emoting jingles.

The cinematography, as I have indicated, harkens back to boob tube “Scandal-of-the-Week” bio fodder which used to be sprinkled into the weekly TV Guide.

Judy’s greatest virtue, aside from Renee Z’s astonishing performance, is the horrible warning to parents who might have stars in their eyes. Releasing children into any industry without close parental supervision and protection is a disaster waiting to happen.

Miss Garland’s father cheated on Garland’s mother with men. Judy’s mother, according to the screenplay, as well as the prima facia evidence of Garland’s precipitous decline, sold her to the Hollywood System. Neither parent raised or responsibly watched over her. The child Garland (Darci Shaw) was tyrannically forced into eating and behavioral schedules torturous, inappropriate, and abusive to her slight frame. She was given pills to help her sleep and pills to wake her up so as to accommodate the brutal filming schedules. There were allegations of sexual advances from older men including Louis B. Mayer (portrayed by Richard Cordery from About Time and Les Misérables). In turn, Judy grew up pill addicted, fragile, cynical, and desperate for the attention of men. She crashed four marriages and died three months after marrying her fifth husband, Mickey Deans (Finn Wittrock – La La Land, Unbroken, Noah).

Garland struggled desperately to be a better mother for her three children, Liza from her marriage to Vincent Minelli, and Lorna, and Joey, with Sid Luft (played by Rufus Sewell – Hamlet, The Illusionist) but they have suffered from the sins of their parents as well.

Ms. Garland died at the age of 47 looking like she was the wrong side of 70.

Liza Minnelli, Miss Garland’s oldest child, expressly disapproved of the script and I can understand why. Not only does it dig up dirt on poor Miss Garland like dirty underwear on a laundry line, but it serves no end but to satisfy curious titillation. Further, it tarnishes the idealized image of the little girl who went to Oz with which we all grew up.

In Bohemian Rhapsody Freddie Mercury admitted to his failings and, despite his sufferings, carried on, tried to make amends with those he had hurt and soldiered on writing music with his band until days before his death. Ms. Garland, as shown in Judy, continued binge drinking, even showing up drunk to sold-out performances, resulting in her being booed off stage more than once. She fought for her own preferences over what was obviously in the best interests of her children. She was often unappreciative of the help others tried to provide her, and was eventually fired by people who loved and respected her talent when even they couldn’t tolerate her unprofessional behavior any longer. As a result she died penniless.

There is something to said for being a horrible warning. If keeping innocents out of the Hollywood System is the theme, it certainly serves that purpose and is worth viewing for that. But, having grown up with one image of Dorothy, there is a part of me who, having now peeked behind the Wizard’s curtain, kind of wished I hadn’t.

R.I.P. Judy.

LITTLE WOMEN – GERWIG-STYLE 2019 – BEAUTIFULLY TOLD, DEEPLY FLAWED, NOT FOR CHILDREN

AUDIO OPTION FOR REVIEW OF LITTLE WOMEN – GERWIG STYLE

SHORT TAKE:

Well told but fatally flawed as its ultimate intent is to brutally undercut the original theme of the classic story with a harsh feminist agenda.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Adults ONLY for its twisted theme revealed at the end of the movie.

LONG TAKE:

This 2019 version of Little Women, by extremely talented director/adaptor Greta Gerwig (Ladybird SEE REVIEW HERE), is the latest of 3 in three years based upon the titular novel. These three latest are only a few of many versions available on celluloid. There are LOTS more, including the 1994 version with none other than Batman’s Christian Bale in the role of Laurie and Stranger Things rehabbed Winona Ryder as Jo – but that would be a review for another time.

SPOILERS – EVEN FOR THOSE FAMILIAR WITH THE STORY

Little Women is based upon the classic children’s novel of the same name, about the Marches, a family of four girls and their mother living in Massachusetts on very moderate funds during the Civil War waiting for the family patriarch chaplain to return from the front lines. Included in the cast are the March’s very wealthy maiden Aunt March, their rich neighbor Mr. Laurence and their pitifully poor neighbors, the Hummels.

This 2019 Little Women tells the tale in period costume. However, the 2018 version told in modern day is far far closer to the book’s original theme and intent. The author of the source material, Louisa Mae Alcott had a very unpleasant childhood of poverty under the hands of a tyrannical and irresponsible penniless spendthrift father. Louisa became the breadwinner of the family in part due to her writing of this classic story, idealistically shaped from her wretched family life. Alcott’s autobiography would have been fascinating. Another retelling of Alcott’s story would have been lovely.

Unfortunately, Ms. Gerwig strove to have her reality and fake it too. We, members of the audience, are lead to believe the woman we see in the beginning of the movie is Jo. In fact, we find out at the end, she is Alcott, who holds in contempt the values of marriage which she is “forced” to insert into her book to get it published. This attitude is not only offensive but a sucker punch to everyone who went to see Little Women or, worse, unwittingly brought an innocent girl to view what should have been a delightful retelling of this classic.

That being said, and before I get to the ugly parts of the movie, the acting was splendid. Everyone did an excellent job. Notable were: Chris Cooper (recently in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood SEE REVIEW HERE) is terrific as Mr. Laurence. Timothee Chalamet (victimized in the pedophile advocating Call me by Your Name SEE REVIEW HERE) is heartbreaking as Laurie.

And Meryl Streep’s Aunt March stole every scene she was in. Streep was the perfect subtle combination of blunt and cynically gruff personality, offering criticism freely and offering no holds barred advice but hiding a genuine affection for her poor relatives about whom she is impatient and condemnatory of what she sees as their poor life choices, but about and for whom she cares deeply.

The cinematography by Yorick Le Saux is gorgeous – evoking the soft feel of two hundred years ago yet inserting bright colors to prevent any feel of drabness.

Alexandre Desplat is no stranger to writing soundtracks for off-the-wall movies, writing for bizarrely fascinating Isle of Dogs (SEE REVIEW HERE), the offensive Shape of Water (SEE REVIEW HERE), the eccentric Valerian and The City of a Thousand Planets (SEE REVIEW HERE). And he doesn’t disappoint here, constantly evoking the feel of young women running or dancing, using a variety of instruments to color the moment.

But all of these positives could not offset the serious negatives of this movie.

Instead of being honest about an eventual “reveal” that the woman we have been watching is not Jo, the character, but Alcott the author, Gerwig has Alcott masquerade as Jo. But in the end Gerwig has “Jo” remain a spinster, complain that she is forced to “sell” her heroine into marriage to sell her book, and insert a “fantasy” scene which portrays an idealized ending to her book in what can only be described as a backhanded, sarcastic middle finger to the audience, as though demonstrating how far Alcott had to condescend to the masses to get her genius in print – that a happy ending with marriage and family is merely a trite and commonplace mechanism with which to make money, not a noble example of what millenia of people have found to be a blessing.

Ms. Gerwig was true to neither the classic nor to what could have been an autobiographical historic drama. Given that so many versions of Little Women have come out recently it would have made sense to go complete bio and tell the story, not of Jo again, but of Louisa Mae Alcott and her sisters. Alcott’s sisters closely mirrored her literary characters. Elizabeth (Beth) did indeed die young. Youngest sister May (anagrammed into Amy) married, not the boy next door, but a businessman violinist. Anna (Meg) married one John, not Brooke, but Pratt who, like Mr. Brooke died unexpectedly young and not that well off.,

Ms. Gerwig placed one foot firmly in the familiar tale and the other in reality just enough to makes smarmy digs at the notion that women “had” to marry to be able to support themselves. Given Alcott’s success, this was obviously not entirely true, and only succeeded in making the March girls hypocritical and tipping Ms. Gerwig’s condescending hand towards the institution of marriage. Shoehorning political correctness into this otherwise lovely tale is unbecoming of this otherwise talented director.

Had she wanted to tell an honest tale of Ms. Alcott’s life story I think that would have been a far more worthy effort than to create a mish mash blend of reality and fiction that satisfied and did no true justice to either tale or genre.

There is much to commend this latest vision. But easy accessibility is not one of its virtues. This is Little Women: intermediate studies level. If you are not completely familiar with the story, you could easily get lost. The movie starts near the end of the story as “Jo” (who later turns out to really be Alcott but going by Jo) is in New York trying to get her stories published. Beth is already dying. Mr. Bhaer’s interest and honest friendship are going mostly unnoticed and unappreciated. The story then jumps back and forth, not only from there to Jo’s early life with her family in flashbacks, but back and forth between the script as written based upon the classic novel and “reality” as Jo changes her story while negotiating with her would be publisher, “shoehorning” in a love story for herself to make the book more marketable, which life event did not really happen. Alcott actually died a spinster.

Even if you ARE familiar with the story it will be very confusing. The characters are not identified right away so who they are gets muddled and is not aided by the frequent flashbacks. It is an interesting though ultimately very flawed perspective. Our family studied it while homeschooling, saw multiple versions over the years and even appeared as a family at a local community theatre production of the stage play. So I know the story well but still had to pay attention to be sure I got the characters right.

There are incongruities which are relatively trivial but VERY distracting. For example, the actresses’ ages chronologically match up to their respective March characters, but they don’t LOOK the right ages. The girl who plays Amy, Florence Pugh, LOOKS and acts the oldest but plays the youngest March. Emma Watson’s Meg (the oldest March girl) looks and acts as young as Amy should be. The actor playing Mr. Bhaer, Louis Garel, is 9 years older that Saiorse Ronan (Jo), but looks Ronan’s (Jo’s) age. He SHOULD look and act about 15 years older than Jo.

Attributed to everyone from Samuel Goldwyn to Humphrey Bogart, referring to people who want to propagandize movies, is the statement: “If you want to send a message, call Western Union.” Whoever said it first, Ms. Gerwig did not get the memo and has decided to create a hit piece on men and marriage in general and the themes of Little Women in particular.

Ms. Gerwig made the men as weak as possible. When Odenkirk’s pathetic Mr. March finally makes his appearance, far from the joyous relief of having their strong male protector back, as he should have been, I had the overwhelming impression that he was just going to be another weak dependent mouth for Marmee to somehow have to find a way to feed. In Bart Johnson’s Mr. March from 2018’s Little Women we see the backbone from which all these Little Women get their strength.

While it is understandable that Alcott would have experienced the Odenkirk version, she WROTE the Johnson version into her book – the man she likely would have wanted to be her father. But Gerwig, again, wants to merge the two to destroy the beautiful story Alcott wrote and simultaneously muddles her opportunity to tell a more true to life biography by awkwardly merging Alcott’s ugly truth with Alcott’s beautiful written literary vision.

Gerwig also made the sisters appear very cold and Machiavelian at times. As the three surviving sisters walk through the recently deceased Aunt March’s spacious home, which she has generously bequeathed to Jo, all Jo says is that she thought Aunt March didn’t like her, to which Amy comments she can dislike Jo and still give her the house.

The sisters never mention how, despite their Aunt’s cold exterior, Aunt March was incredibly philanthropic toward them, took Amy on a trip which secured her marriage to Laurie, invented work for the girls with which Aunt March could give the family money and retain their dignity, paid for Meg’s wedding despite her own misgivings about the wisdom of the marriage, and for all the many other generosities she surely provided her poor brother’s family. None of the things Aunt March did for them were mentioned, only a cool assessment of what she could still do for them now that she was dead.

Even worse, the faith in God upon which the Marches relied in the book was given little and nebulous short shrift lip service in this version.

Miss Gerwig is more intent on propaganda than telling a good story. Along with her obvious distaste for, dismissal of and contempt for men, she doesn’t seem to like America much either.

Mrs. March (Laura Dern) volunteers at the Civil War equivalent of the USO. This was only shown once and then only to provide a vehicle for a propagandistic hit piece as Mrs. March expresses how ashamed she is of her country, despite the fact it is literally bleeding to near death to make amends for its sins. This horrifying comment was not in the book. The only time anyone mentioned being ashamed in the book was of themselves for a fault or NOT being ashamed of hard work.

At one point Amy tells Jo that Jo’s writing about something makes it important, explicitly saying that things do not have inherent importance in and of themselves. This is the acme of hubris on Ms. Gerwig’s part. Apparently Miss Gerwig believes things are not relevant or of any significance unless they come out of the mouth of people like her – the professional writers who believe they can shape the world, not by proof or truth or real life experience, not by faith in God or inherent credibility, or common sense. Gerwig believes that truth comes only from the pen of those, like her, who have a self-assessment of their own importance. This is the essence of Fake News.

Ms. Gerwig has also decided on a PC perception of Jo as androgynous. Some on the left have even, fairly, interpreted many of the lines and attitudes Ms. Gerwig injected into Jo’s character as lesbian. Had Miss Gerwig wanted to examine that possibility concerning the author’s lifestyle in a legitimate adult oriented biography, I would have found that appropriate, interesting, and potentially insightful. But to distort Jo, the Jo from the source material this way, in this skewed version of Little Women is propaganda of the most base nature, inappropriately forcing an alternate sexual topic onto a children’s classic character.

So in conclusion, instead of either a faithful adaptation of the classic novel or an honest and what would have been truly fascinating examination of the real Miss Alcott’s life, Miss Gerwig has decided to work a classic children’s tale into a propaganda project of extreme feminism, anti-Americanism, and manifesto for alternate sexual lifestyles.

And for Miss Gerwig to present the story as an inextricable combination of the fact with the fiction with no disclaimer or delineation between the two, demonstrates that she wanted to have her credibility and fake it too.

Watch the far more delightful, faithful and faith FILLED 2018 version of Little Women instead.

RAMBO: LAST BLOOD — TRULY BAD MOVIE, BUT WORTH SEEING AS A HORRIBLE WARNING TO IDEALISTIC SNOWFLAKES

AUDIO OPTION FOR REVIEW OF: RAMBO – LAST BLOOD

SHORT TAKE:

Excessively violent without justifiable purpose, even for a Rambo movie, what feels like a first draft of what could have been a much better film had it been through a few dozen re-writes.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Adults only! For extreme violence (not sure if Screenit has a scale measurement long enough), language, and graphic scenes of human sex trafficking victims.

LONG TAKE:

“They should not have left him with nothing to lose.” This is an expression my husband and I use to describe plots where the bad guys have put the protagonist in a corner, so our intrepid hero goes out to kill them “all”. Examples are: Live Free or Die Hard and ALL the John Wick movies.

Rambo movies, even at their mildest, are a guilty pleasure of revenge “porn” – titillation from violence, rationalized by the protagonist’s desire to mete out “justice”. Last Blood is extreme even for its type.

SPOILERS – BUT HONESTLY, THEY WILL NEITHER HURT NOR HELP THIS POORLY CONSTRUCTED OVERBLOWN MESS.

I cheered during the last fight scene in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, watched Saving Private Ryan with pride, once sat through the entirety of A Clockwork Orange, and enjoyed all of the Alien franchise movies multiple times, but during parts of Rambo: Last Blood, particularly the last twenty or so minutes, I often cringed and had to look away. Granted the movie set up the bad guys for deserving everything that happened to them, albeit in a VERY heavy handed way, but it was still hard to watch and, unlike Saving Private Ryan, there was no moral, educational or historic purpose to showing it.

Rambo: Last Blood is not for the faint of heart or even for someone with a reasonably strong stomach. This had all the dread of a Taken, the gory tragedy of Titus Andronicus and the violence of Saving Private Ryan‘s first 10 minutes. That being said, the violence was really not this installment’s biggest problem. More painful to sit through was the paper thin, poorly thought out plot and caricature performances.

The premise is that Rambo, (self-made-Sylvester “Sly” Stallone – Rambo I – IV, Rocky I – VI, Creed I & II, Expendables I – IV, this boy DOES love his franchises, not to mention everything from the brilliant screwball comedy of valises Oscar to Guardians of the Galaxy II – proving Stallone IS capable of SO much better) now lives out a quiet existence on a ranch with his friend Maria (Adriana Barraza – small part in Thor as the owner of the diner in which Thor, memorably and emphatically, “asks” for another cup of coffee) and her teenaged granddaughter, Gabriella (Yvette Monreal). Gabriella gets information from an old “friend” Jezel, (Fenessa Pineda) about her abusive father, Miguel (Marco de la O), who abandoned her family years before. Gabriella sneaks off to Mexico to confront Miguel and, predictable to everyone in the universe but Gabriella, after meeting her abusive sperm donor, is drugged by Gizelle and sold as a sex slave to a Cartel run by the Martinez brothers (Sergio Peris-Mencheta and Oscar Jaenada). Then Rambo sets off to rescue her.

The acting was hammy-handed and mono-chromatic, but it is hard to blame the cast for sloppiness when the writers made little effort to construct a coherent adventure or characters, with a script that makes video game NPC (non-player characters) seem relatable by comparison. Only a couple of steps further, and had the topic (human trafficking) not been so grim, it might have been the grist for parody.

The bad guys are cookie cutter bad guys with zero redeeming features, or even self-justifying rationalizations for their behavior, which shallowness makes them uninteresting. They were simply place holders where the script said “bad guys”. I should not have been surprised had they started twirling black mustaches.

Even the soundtrack by Brian Tyler is generic – Southwestern echo-y trumpets, deep cello borrowed from every spaghetti Western cowboy duel not scored by Ennio Morricone.

There is a myth that Sylvester Stallone wrote the classic, brilliantly simple and beautifully inspirational script for Rocky in three days. In fact what he wrote was a 90 page detailed treatment of which, by his own admission, only about a third was used in the final script. While even this is an amazing accomplishment, the fact that even Rocky, successfully conceived with preternaturally rare speed was MOSTLY written over the following months during pre-production and with the oversight of the financing production company, gives you an idea of how much work goes into a good shooting script. Unfortunately, Rambo: Last Blood is what a movie would look like if you actually DID film something you dashed off in a long weekend. Penned by Matthew Cirulnick and Stallone, the dialogue is a string of cliches and the story often makes no sense, as though they are only passing time, meandering about until they have enough justification to get to the over-the-top mayhem.

And the story is just – for lack of a more tactful word – stupid. Here are some of the dumber points:

1. When the niece confronts her father, Miguel first seems welcoming and invites her to ask any question she has of him. Then, like a bad tempered female cat he turns vicious and sneeringly tells her that she and her mother meant nothing to him. But — if that were true why would he bother to speak with her at all? Why not just slam the door in her face or deny his identity? And if he truly did not care, why would he say so with such venom to an innocent young woman he hadn’t seen in 15 years? His response was so over-the-top that I thought it MUST be a ruse to get her to leave for her own safety. You would think Miguel might have at least escorted Gabrielle to the border, if for no other reason than to protect his own – ass-ets – knowing Rambo was helping raise her.

2. The writers made a big visual point about John taking medication, but they never explain what the prescriptions are for. Was he dying? Was it to help him suppress his more aggressive tendencies? He “symbolically” throws them away just before he goes off to kill the bad guys, but no one bothers to explain for what it was supposed to symbolize? Releasing his “inner demons”? Resigning himself to death?

3. When John shows up at Miguel’s house and Miguel does NOT confess that he had only been trying to get her to go home, I was actually surprised. I fully expected Miguel to join up with John in a reconciliation quest and then go off together to rescue the girl. But that didn’t happen. Instead, John confronts the deadbeat contemptuous Miguel, the guy at the center of the mess, and then just leaves.

4. John pointlessly allows himself to be seen, captured, and hopelessly outmatched during his first attempt to rescue his niece. The resulting delay, along with the attention he brings to Gabrielle in particular, effectively condemns his niece to a horrible death. Even a half-assed plan might have saved her. This is NOT in keeping with previous Rambo missions or movies.

5. It did not make sense that John would leave untouched the two people who were most responsible for putting Gabrielle in harm’s way: Gizelle who lured her to Mexico and Miguel who abandoned the family and then left his daughter to the mercies of a known dangerous city. Rambo could have, with a flip of a knife, dispatched Miguel then even have just “dropped a dime” on Gizelle to the Martinez brothers who would have happily taken care of her for him. I’m not endorsing this behavior. I’m just saying it’s out of character for a man this steeped in violence to allow the two people, without whom this whole scenario would not have happened, to get off Scot free. It’s just bad writing.

6. The Cartel Army —-? Wind up GI Joe dolls would have demonstrated more survival skills. The Cartel’s arrival – preposterous in itself as they stream through the border with a long line of “bad guy” black vehicles loaded for bear, proceed to make a LOT of noise during which time NO ONE shows up even out of curiosity – is greeted with a demonstration of massive ordnance mines. You would think cartel king Mr. Martinez might now have cause to rethink his frontal assault plan. But no – Martinez continues his World War II Russian front-style battle “plan”. His troops just throw themselves at John’s house accumulating the casualties you might expect. Then, even dumber, they descend into John’s home-made tunnels and search for him on his own turf, encountering booby trap after booby trap in an Aliens-level massacre and never ONCE attempt retreat, surrender, mutiny or escape but simply continue to run pell mell forward, as though John was tallying up frag points in Deathmatch and filming with all the same subtlety.

It’s as though Stallone and Cirulnick threw in a bunch of ideas but decided not to take the time to resolve them, in order to more (using a word homage to the INFINTELY better Stallone character, Angleo Provolone, from Oscar) “expeditiously” revel in all the bloody mayhem. Hey! We did our bit to create some human “drama” now LET’S GET TO SHOOTING PEOPLE AND BLOWING STUFF UP!!!

“Sly” Stallone has managed to accomplish a singular feat – I think he’s the first person to ever outlive his usefulness in TWO franchises of his own creation – Rocky and Rambo. He has become too old for either hand-to-hand combat or ring boxing.

He HAS creatively found ways to fit those weaknesses into the plot of both the Rocky and Rambo films. In the case of Rocky, Stallone has done a good job of passing the torch by “anointing” Adonis Johnson (Michael B. Jordan – Black Panther‘s nemesis Killmonger) as Rocky’s protégé and replacement. I could go into how Adonis artfully fit into the franchise as Apollo Creed’s son and how Rocky’s mentoring does poetic justice to Burgess Meredith’s memory as Rocky’s coach, but that can be a post for another day. (Meanwhile go see Creed I and II).

In the case of Rambo, Stallone does not seem to know how to let go or end the franchise.

My husband remembers reading the book First Blood, upon which the first Rambo movie was based. While Rambo: First Blood, the movie, diverges considerably from the source material, it still made for a fascinating and inspiring cult story of how a lone soldier suffering from PTSD responds when unwisely pushed into a corner. First Blood was a cult classic with legs. But oh how the mighty have fallen.

Putting all of my negative observations aside, I can’t help but applaud ONE aspect of the movie. Last Blood highlights the extreme dangers of diving head first into situations for which you are unprepared. More particularly, the film points out to misinformed, feminist-propaganda fed young Millenial snowflakes, who have been foolishly taught by the PC crowd they can go anywhere and do anything as long as they are following their heart, that the world is a very tough and sometimes horrible place which can quite literally eat you alive. Gabrielle discovers, quickly and brutally, that all the empowerment brainwashing in the world will NOT save you from a horrible death. BUT the protective men in your life who care for you: your father, your husband, your brother, your uncle, your guardian – CAN protect you AND YOU SHOULD LET THEM!!!!!

In short, when someone who you have good reason to trust, tells you something is dangerous, MAYBE YOU SHOULDN’T DO IT!!!

Rambo: Last Blood is a savage, unpleasant and ultimately unsatisfying experience, but if seeing it makes even one young adult hesitate to expose themselves to situations or people who, having seen the movie, might NOW look risky, then the movie would be well worthwhile to show them.

So, in short Rambo: Last Blood, while not great cinema…not even good cinema, serves as an exemplary horrible warning, .

LAST Blood? LAST, as in this is the end of the franchise? Please, oh please, oh please, let Last Blood be the final Rambo entry, despite the ambiguous Shane-like ending. Or, the way they are heading, Rambo will next be creating grenades in a nursing home and tossing them from a Zimmer Frame based on a script scribbled on a napkin during a quick lunch at McD’s.

STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER – WORTHY CULMINATION OF 42 YEARS AND NINE FILMS

AUDIO OPTION OF STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

The culmination of 42 years and nine films, the “last” Star Wars installment, which follows Rey as she seeks out the truth about her parentage.

WHO SHOULD GO:

No inappropriate sexuality, tiny amount of mild profanities, no blasphemy, BUT there is a good deal of very intense and cartoon-violence fighting scenes in a variety of frightening landscapes: underground, in extremely high seas, space, etc. So young teens or, with parental discretion, any age.

LONG TAKE:

I had read a lot of bad press about this latest Star Wars installment: Disney princess-fied, rehashing of old storyline, feminist diatribe, devaluing of men. So two of my kids and I went in as fairly hostile audience members. Honestly, none of the complaints were truly justified. We all kept waiting for it to be bad or get bad and it never happened.

Now if repetition is your irritant of choice, certainly there was an avalanche of nostalgic homages in this (supposed) last installment of the 42-year franchise, but that was to be expected. And director J.J. Abrams (contributor to Star Trek, Star Wars and Mission Impossible installments) with his team of writers does not disappoint with: exciting non-stop action, classically Star Wars-ian pseudo-science/fantasy, exotic species, deeply committed and self-sacrificing leads and smart aleck supporting cast dialogue.

The late Carrie Fisher appears thanks to CGI, left over footage and clever cinematography by Dan Mindel who has lent his talents to many franchises including Star Wars, Mission Impossible, and Star Trek. The most prominent of supporting cast members also include: Oscar Issacs (multi-talented actor whose resume includes The Nativity Story, Operation Finale, and X-Men) as Poe, the wisecracking pilot; John Boyega as Finn, former First Order (read new Storm Trooper) inductee and Rey’s best friend; Anthony Daniels reprising C3PO as the only cast member to be in ALL NINE movies (R2D2’s Kenny Baker having passed away); Domhnall Gleeson (About Time, the Cohen brothers True Grit, and Peter Rabbit) as the comically nefarious General Hux (whose success rate is about that of Colonel Klink in Hogan’s Heroes); Billy Dee Williams who cheerily reprises Lando with contagious enthusiasm; Ian McDiarmid returning as the oozy evil Emperor Palpatine; and the list goes on for miles. The majority of every character and actor who have ever appeared in a Star Wars movie show up regardless of whether they and/or their characters are currently dead or not.

Abrams’ writing team includes himself, Chris Terrio (D.C. universe and Argo), Derek Connolly (Pokémon Detective Pikachu, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom SEE REVIEW HERE, and Kong: Skull Island), and Colin Trevorrow (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom). There is a lot of sci-fi fantasy credentials involved and it shows.

This – allegedly – last Star Wars film examines who Rey (Daisy Ridley – Branagh’s Murder on the Orient Express) really is as she fights the last remnants of the Empire with a coalition of freedom fighters. As to having a female in the lead I saw nothing wrong with their handling of this story decision. Anyone who has read previous reviews knows I am adamantly against rewrites to crowbar in females where men had previously starred (ahem – Ghostbusters 2), and am on record for looking with a jaundiced eye at female led action movies. However, I also am equally vocal in praise of well done movies like Wonder Woman and characters like Black Widow, where the protagonist is awesome and the storyline well done and the lead just happens to be a female – hero first, woman second. Rey, here, is an action hero first who just happens to be a female. Well done her.

The music by John Williams (who else?!) blends smoothly with all the rest of the franchise music. It is but a variation on the same themes, but that is not a bad thing. (They don’t call the original soundtrack the “Star Wars Symphony” for nothing.) This iconic music is as much a character in all nine of the movies as Chewie or R2 or Lando or Leia or, for that matter, the Millennium Falcon.

The cinematography is visually spectacular – as you would expect from any Star Wars film. From a stark desert landscape to a fight surrounded by CAT 5 hurricane level waves, from a space dog fight to a duel underground, the screenwriters went out of their way to be sure we got the length and breadth of how a Jedi deals with hostile environments of all kinds.

If it were not for the fact this movie is supposed to be the wrap up to four decades of films catering to three generations of Star Wars fans, I would think they maybe had over egged the pudding. As it was there were both cheers and tears from the audience as the storyline went through its paces in a most satisfying effort to pull out all the stops.

I couldn’t help but see the parallel to the long running thread at the heart of The Blacklist‘s seven-season (and still going strong) tale, wherein the FBI’s most wanted (James Spader’s Red Reddington) turns himself in to aid the FBI in hunting down criminals so dangerous and elusive the FBI doesn’t even know they exist. But Red will only speak to Elizabeth Keen, newbie Quantico grad, who has never even heard of Reddington aside from his rap sheet. Though the titular storyline involves pursuing bad guys in clever ways, who Keen is to Red is the engine that propels the core of the show.

Similarly, the Star Wars Saga’s wrap up films have explored Rey’s search for closure. Rey is their new version of Luke – the Padawan with inexplicably extraordinary Force abilities – who searches for her parents and is occasionally sorry she asked.

There is something eternally appealing to the quest to reveal our origins, harkening back to our search for our place in the Universe and ultimately our relationship with our Creator. The annals of cinema history is rife with examples of orphans searching for their place in the Universe: Little Orphan Annie, Oliver Twist, Heidi, Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, Cosette from Les Mis, even Billy Batson from Shazaam! and Peter Pan – all search for what they see as their missing piece. Some, like Billy and Dorothy discover they never truly lacked anything to begin with and there was no place like home with people who already loved them. Others were disabused of idealized fantasies. And this is the identity crisis with which both Rey and her antagonist Kylo Ren (Adam Driver – Paterson SEE REVIEW HERE and Logan Lucky SEE REVIEW HERE) wrestle. Rey wants to know who her mom and dad are/were and why they left her. On the other hand, while Ren knows who his parents are, he is in a constant state of struggle in coming to terms with them and their beliefs. (And boy with 6 kids isn’t THAT a familiar theme.)

SPOILERS

Dove-tailing with the search for identity embarked upon by the lead antagonists, the resolution for Kylo Ren comes from a very Christian based theology. Ren has done terrible things: genocide, patricide, torture of innocents, random violence, all in the service of becoming a galactic tyrant. All very NON-Jedi activities. For the 3 or 4 people in the solar system who might not know, a Jedi is a monk-like warrior who leads a fairly aesthetic existence while fighting, armed only with a light saber and his connection to the “Force” of life, to ensure freedom and protection for innocents, even at the cost of their lives. Ren is the polar opposite of this, despite his parentage of Princess Leia, twin sister to Luke, a powerful Jedi master-knight and Han Solo, Luke’s best friend. But when Rey fatally bests him in battle, then, in an act of mercy, shares some of her life force with him to heal his mortal wound, he turns his back on what he has become. Ren repents! And when he dies, in a turn about to save Rey by re-offering ALL of his life force back to her, he disappears as Yoda and Obi Wan had done – a sign of ultimate acceptance by the Jedi Force of his worthiness.

So with Ren’s genuine repentance and his willingness to die for his one time enemy, to love his “neighbor” as himself, came true redemption. A laudable and admirable lesson with which to close out (if this truly IS the last) the Star Wars Saga.

On a completely different topic – A lot of ink has been spilled over a same-sex kiss. The film makers made a big deal about this but it is truly “much ado about nothing” and a ridiculous effort at some glad handing political correctness. It occurs during a World War II Victory-like moment of joyous abandonment and celebration of life so that everyone is hugging and kissing everyone else. The kiss was about a sexual as if, in the joy of the moment Poe had kissed Maz or Rey had smooched Chewbacca. It had the same feel as when Ernie kissed Burt on the forehead after they finish singing for George and Mary’s wedding in It’s a Wonderful Life.

Were it not for the hypersensitivity in this artificially created lame-stream media’s constant attempts at shoving politically correct agendas down mainstream audiences throats, I don’t even think anyone would have noticed. Noticing it and attributing any particular significance to it hints at a subtext. But the kiss comes out of nowhere and BECAUSE of the attention brought to it in advertising campaigns, it effectively commits the cardinal sin of breaking the suspension of disbelief, needlessly popping the viewer out of this otherwise wonderful moment which was 42 years in the making.

The only other significant critique I would give is the insufficient amount of time given to the, as my kids put it, non-“Emo” Kylo Ren. Ren spends the majority of his time in these movies growling behind a Vader-like mask, barking orders, destroying things in fits of anger, glowering, killing people, and generally being a REALLY tough audience. Ren’s moments of slight gentle humor after his miraculous healing by Rey are a surprise and delight. They are simple and little but effective moments where Ren is FINALLY channeling his father, Han Solo – like saying “Ow” after a fall or giving a wry smile and shrug as he pulls a lightsaber from nowhere to school some opponents. These are the best moments in all of Ren’s appearances in the entire franchise. They are memorable but tragically ever so brief minutes before he dies. Would that they had made an entire feature film with this aspect of his character.

So after all the reveals and (sort of) character deaths and familial connections resolved within the Star Wars Universe, you might think they really mean it when they say this is the LAST Star Wars movie to ever be made. Everyone who believes that shout out loud. (*so quiet crickets can be heard*) I agree and that’s just fine. See you at the NEXT “final” Star Wars movie.

JUMANJI: THE NEXT LEVEL – CLEVER AND LOADS OF FUN

AUDIO OPTION FOR REVIEW OF JUMANJI: THE NEXT LEVEL

SHORT TAKE:

Clever latest installment in the Jumanji franchise.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Mid-teens and up because of unnecessary profanity, including blasphemy, as well as some extreme cartoon gory violence.

LONG TAKE:

Paraphrasing Benjamin Franklin the way my high school teacher did with any recalcitrant students: “Experience is a hard teacher but some will have no other.” This seems to be a thematic motto of the Jumanji franchise (and in that group I would include Zarathustra). Like a harsh fairy godmother teaching in The Wizard of Oz school of learning things, the Jumanji game seeks out unsatisfied people to grant their wishes … but makes them earn it.

The General Studies program at the Jumanji School of Insanely Hard Knocks focuses on maturity, altruism, loyalty and the priorities of friendship and family which can overcome any obstacles no matter how off-the-wall: from eagle size mosquitoes to malicious bands of monkeys, carnivorous hippopotami and lethal semi-sentient poisonous vines, bonding comes from teamwork, accepting others weaknesses, and making the best use of your own strengths to help those you love.

Excellent lessons to learn and, as Mary Poppins might have said, it helps that the sugar to make the medicine go down is wildly funny scenarios, and great actors who are very good sports and don’t mind taking pokes at their own famous reputations.

The original Jumanji and its two sequels excel beautifully in all of the above points. Zarathustra, (the step-child of the group, as it uses a similar scenario and themes but is not strictly part of the Jumanji franchise) follows in those footsteps as well.

For those not up-to-date, Jumanji is a wild game of crazy challenges: stampedes, instant localized monsoons which fall only where you are, monster crocodiles, a homicidal big game hunter of people, malevolent monkeys — and places you IN the game. Not virtually, but in the real world. In the original Jumanji the creatures came into our reality. In the subsequent Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, the players are pulled into the game and manifest as Avatars. Spencer, a slight bookish boy with no appreciable upper body strength becomes Dwayne Johnson. Bethany, a narcissistic “Valley” girl becomes Jack Black. Martha, a girl with no inherent athletic abilities becomes Karen Gillan with preternaturally gymnastic fighting skills. And Fridge, an egotistical football player becomes the much shorter and weaker Kevin Hart.

This latest Jumanji, Jumanji: The Next Level mixes it up, starting only a few years after the first reboot. All the original team: Fridge, Bethany and Martha have gone to college, done well and look forward to a reunion. Spencer is in a funk, and finds himself longing for the days when he was the size of Dwayne Johnson with extraordinary powers of strength and speed. The temptation gets too much and without consulting his worried friends goes back into the game.

I don’t want to tell you much more and spoil things so I will shy away from specifics. But I will say Next Level has all the humor and inventive scenarios of the original, keeps to the same themes, brings back all the familiar faces but does not just rehash the old. There are lively and justifiable (for that universe) variations which make Next Level as new and intriguing as the very first 1995 incarnation.

The acting is A level and a lot of fun. Not an enormous amount of subtlety but each of the actors do a wonderful job performing multiple characters outside of what you might think is their comfort zone. Returning are: Dwayne Johnson (burly muscle in WWE, and the likes of Scorpion King, GI Joe and Fast and Furious) who truly shines in comedies like Get Smart, The Other Guys, The Tooth Fairy and here in Next Level, where he shamelessly and hilariously makes fun of himself as Dr. Bravehouse/Eddie and Spencer. I was genuinely impressed at the enthusiasm with which he launched into characters way outside of his usual fare. Karen Gillan returns as Martha/Ruby Roundhouse as well as Fridge (you’ll see). She was most notably known before this as Matt Smith’s Dr. Who‘s companion Amy Pond and here does a marvelous job with not only multiple personalities but an authentic American accent. Kevin Hart (The Upside SEE REVIEW HERE) is delicious as Fridge and Milo. Jack Black is delightful as Bethany and Fridge. In addition there are some wonderful small role/cameos by: short, growly voiced iconic comedian Danny DeVito (TV classic series Taxi, Throw Mama From the Train, Romancing the Stone, Twins) as Eddie; Danny Glover (Lethal Weapon franchise) as Milo; original Jumanji veteran Bebe Neuwirth as Eddie’s friend Nora; Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle reprise Nick Jonas (memorable in Midway SEE MY REVIEW HERE) as Alex; and Awkwafina (Crazy Rich Asians SEE REVIEW HERE) as Spencer and Eddie (again – go to the movie to see what this means).

Portraying the young versions of the “real” people are: Morgan Turner as Martha, Madison Iseman as Bethany, Ser’Darius Blan as Fridge, and Alex Wolff as Spencer. Colin Hanks (Tom’s oldest son) plays grown up Alex.

The soundtrack by Henry Jackman channels Lawrence of Arabia and Star Wars in very clever and appropriate moments, as if unable to resist the retro and multi personality motifs that the actors get to play.

Jake Kasden, writer/director (Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle) who is of significant lineage (son of the famous writer/director Lawrence Kasden who brought us both Indiana Jones, many of the Star Wars reboots, and The Big Chill), with cinematographer Gyula Pados, and the other writers Jeff Pinkner and Scott Rosenberg, do a terrific job creating multiple extreme scenarios. I was especially impressed with the realism in a ridiculously harrowing one with … let’s just say geometry was important.

I would love to recommend this for all ages. And while there is no sexuality, the writers unwisely decided to “enhance” a couple of the characters’ personalities with a smattering of profane and even blasphemous language: (*cough cough* Danny DeVito, Kevin Hart, Jack Black). Therefore I would recommended only to mid-teens and up and then only those who will have the sense not to parrot-repeat things they should not. That is a shame because it is the only limiting proviso to this otherwise charming film.

JUMANJI!!!!

A CHRISTMAS STORY – LOVELY NOSTALGIC REMINISCENCE AT ACTS THEATRE

SHORT TAKE:

Lovely Christmas tale, set in 1950’s Americana, of a narrator’s look back on his childhood quest for the ideal present during the weeks leading up to Christmas morning.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Anyone and everyone – children of all ages.

LONG TAKE:

A Christmas Story, which opened December 6, 2019 at ACTS Theatre and plays through December 15, 2019 (GET TICKETS HERE), is the stage play version, which premiered in 2000, based upon the charming classic holiday movie from 1983, which was, in turn, based upon the semi-autobiographical anecdotal book by Jean Shepherd, titled In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash.

The play tale is the same as the movie, narrated by the adult version of Ralphie, a little boy growing up in Indiana in the 1950’s during the weeks leading up to Christmas the year he desperately wanted and fantasized about having “an official Red Ryder, carbine action, two-hundred shot range model air rifle with a compass in the stock, and this thing which tells time”. Unfortunately his mother, his teacher and even the department store Santa gave the same litany response: “You’ll shoot your eye out!”

While Ralphie’s ploys to obtain this forbidden item create the Christmas tree trunk of the story, the real gems, like ornaments on the branches, are the moments of true Americana which made up Ralphie’s childhood: the bundling up ritual before venturing into the bitter weather to get to school; Ralphie’s fantasies of protecting his family and friends with his BB gun; his father’s constant struggle with their old furnace accompanied by a string of invectives translated for the play into child-appropriate made up words; Ralphie’s friend Flick getting his tongue stuck on a lamppost subsequent to a triple dog dare; his fellow classmate Esther Jane’s obvious crush on him about which he is, at the time, completely oblivious; the eccentricities of his little brother Randy; and most importantly the close knit time he spent with his family. It didn’t matter that the dinners often suffered from routine or his father erroneously thought he was a mechanic. The magic was in the fact the parents and boys were together every night and the quantity of time they spent together AS a family which brings meaning to the real Christmas Story. The moments in a child’s life spent, as my own husband refers to them, MAKING memories.

A Christmas Story is a comedy, in as much as people are naturally funny. It’s not a series of one liners or gags but finds humor in the people we have in our lives, or even the people we are, all of whom find places in this story. From Mother, “the Old Man” and brother Ralphie, to the bully Farkus and Miss Shields, his fifth grade teacher, all the characters will be quite familiar even to those who have never before seen the movie or this play. These are people who exist in all our lives in one form or another.

Noah Herbert is perfect as Ralphie, the young lead, sweet and ingenuous, he is the embodiment of that innocent time. Elizabeth Harper, as Mother, is the practical center of the family, kindly guiding her family through their antics like a loving human “face palm” of affectionate exasperation. Bobbie Guillory is “The Old Man”, a hard working devoted husband and father, whose amateur mechanics, whimsical commitment to contest entering, and attachment to a uniquely peculiar prize lamp inform many of the family events. Harper and Guillory create warm appealing characters with believable affectionate chemistry. Zac Hammon is the adult version of Ralphie looking back on his family and that particular Christmas with a fond nostalgia and warm wisdom, providing narration for the necessary exposition. Mila Alcantara is sweet and natural as Esther Jane, Ralphie’s crush. Hannah Miller chews the scenery as Scut Farkus, a comical version of the class bully. David Gustafson is adorable as Ralphie’s younger brother. Elliott Mitchell is the hapless Flick, constantly the butt of bad luck. Dorothy Thomason is fun as the stern but well meaning Miss Shields. And rounding out the cast is Dylan Freeman as Schwartz, and Jolie Leubner as Helen, Ralphie’s other classmates.

All the young actors do a magnificent job in their portrayals, timing and enthusiastic characterizations of these 1950’s children.

The set is appropriately always against the backdrop of the family kitchen. The kitchen was the heart and center of Ralphie’s home and life, with occasional forays to a nicely constructed upstairs bedroom to where Ralphie retires to think out loud, write essays of devotion about his Red Ryder gun and contemplate the mysteries of his life. Action outside the kitchen is set in front of the kitchen backdrop. This works on a conceptual as well as practical level, as the consequences of the outside world will eventually return and resolve to a satisfying conclusion there at the kitchen table anyway within the bosom of his family.

Director Clay Hebert, along with assistant Stan Morris and stage manager Lauren Manuel do a terrific job bringing this story together. Much of this stage incarnation echoes true to the film version but I must especially commend the director and his crew in what I personally perceive as a major improvement on the dynamics of the parents. In the 1983 movie Mother, as portrayed by Melinda Dillon, is a mousy creature and Darren MacGavin’s “Old Man” is kind of a clueless bulldozer. But Clay Hebert’s vision transforms those unappealing characters into the charming complementary couple of smart pragmatic Mother and energetic idealist “Old Man,” who we parents would not mind being remembered as. Plaudits go to all the cast and crew for successfully coming together as a troupe to offer this magical Christmas gift down memory lane to Lake Charles.

So go see this warm hearted show, which will conjure nostalgia for the past in the adults, ring true for children in the present, and light a unique lamp in the window for all families who look hopefully towards this Christmas and all the future Christmases to come.

KNIVES OUT – A MURDER ANTI-MYSTERY WITH A SHARP-WITTED PLOT AND RAZOR-EDGED HUMOR

SHORT TAKE:

Clever, witty, well acted, anti-mystery which will keep you guessing to the end.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Mid-teens and up for: profane and blasphemous language, unscrupulous behavior, and some violence and a few disturbing images.

LONG TAKE:

First off I have to be careful what I say. I don’t want to spoil any of this cleverly written murder anti-mystery.

If you are familiar with the old Columbo TV series you’ll know what I mean by anti-mystery. The anti-mystery is a plot format whereby the “mystery” is revealed in the first act. You know what is done, how and by whom, and in the classic charming Peter Falk vehicle the fun is in watching Detective Columbo as he “bumbles” around waiting for the killer to underestimate the savvy investigator and let his guard down.

Knives Out is similarly structured. Act I of Knives Out reveals a great deal in the first 20 minutes, leaving the consequences for the remainder of the movie. But despite starting at the “end” the plot is so clever that there were still a lot of legitimate surprises in store – none from left field and all earned.

The title is a “sharp”-witted, double edged – uh – sword, referring not just to murder weapons but the emotional knee jerk reactions of the family members to each other not just as events unfold but in their “normal” every day relationships to each other.

A truly star studded film written and directed by Rian Johnson, Knives Out will keep you guessing.

Daniel Craig definitely missed his calling. He made his name as James Bond beginning with Casino Royale in 2006, but his flare is for more humorous characters. His southern private detective, Benoit Blanc, is not a caricature but amusing in his juxtaposition amongst the New England snobby crazy rich Thrombey family. His timing is precise and his occasional quirks executed with style but without being distracting.Christopher Plummer is a veteran actor of both theatre and film whose career spans 6 decades – including such varied stories as The Sound of Music, The Man Who Would be King, Oedipus the King, 12 Monkeys, Waterloo, A Beautiful Mind, Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country, The Man Who Invented Christmas and made recent cinematic news by stepping up to replace Kevin Spacey in All The Money in the World when Spacey was excised in shame from the cast of that movie. Plummer has portrayed Kipling, Oedipus, Scrooge, Sherlock Holmes, a Klingon general, Santa Claus, Julius Caesar, Tolstoy, John Barrymore, King Herod and J. Paul Getty. Here, in Knives Out, Plummer portrays patriarch Harlan Thrombey. Wealthy, successful murder mystery (what else) novelist, he is found with his throat slit on the day after his 85th birthday party. (FYI Plummer was actually 88 during filming.) Suicide or murder? Police Detectives Elliott and Wagner (LaKeith Stanfield from Get Out and Noah Segan from Looper) work with Blanc to find out.

In life Harlan had been saddled with a crew of weak and dependent relatives. Chris Evans, in an obvious distancing from his Captain America persona, is Ransom, the obnoxious entitled grandson. (Halloween Scream Queen) Jamie Lee Curtis is cold and stiff Linda, Harlan’s eldest. Don Johnson (Miami Vice – the original, who made the five o’clock shadow a facial fashion statement) is Richard her socially clueless husband. Michael Shannon (12 Strong – SEE MY REVIEW HERE) is Walt, Harlan’s son and publishing employee who has otherwise never held a job in his life. Riki Lindhome (The Big Bang Theory) is Walt’s hanger-on wife. Toni Collette (Sixth Sense, and lots of other horror movies specializing in emotionally very unhealthy families) is aged hippie Joni, Harlan’s widowed daughter-in-law. Katherine Langford plays dependent, professional college student Meg, Harlan’s granddaughter. Jaeden Martell (It and St. Vincent) is Jacob, Harlan’s reclusive internet-addicted grandson. All are a bit like zoo animals, both confined and supported by a keeper until they can not function in the outside world.

Ana de Armas (Blade Runner 2049 and the upcoming Bond movie with Daniels, No Time to Die, in 2020) plays Marta, Harlan’s private nurse, through whose eyes much of the action is witnessed and whose very peculiar behavioral McGuffin provides a helpful plot anchor.

The cinematography by Steve Hedlin (San Andreas and Looper) takes advantage of cloudy days and dark passages to enhance the mood and theme of confusion – to make you doubt what you think you might know. He also does not shy from taking harsh advantage of close shots that put characters in “lights” most reflective of their personalities.

The theme music by Nathan Johnson is a very classy dissonant original string quartet and the rest of the soundtrack has the familiar richness of a symphonic poem.

The acting is wonderful: part caricature Clue characters part Agatha Christie – a fine ensemble group of players who walk that fine line effortlessly between realistic portrayals of dysfunctional people and outright hamminess. These are people you love to truly dislike but can’t wait to see what they do next. And Knives Out will keep you guessing to the tip end.