Tag: movie review

GREEN BOOK – MUST SEE COMEDY-DRAMA LESSON ON HISTORY AND HUMANITY

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF GREEN BOOK REVIEW

 

SHORT TAKE:

Excellent buddy dramedy based closely on the real life friendship between a black gifted but haughty pianist and the thuggish but fundamentally noble white bouncer he hires to chauffeur him during a concert tour through the Deep South in the 1960’s.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Any mature mid-teen and up but with parental discretion due to language, the examination of extreme racism during this time period and some conversation topics.

LONG TAKE:

Green Book is one of the most delightfully charming movies I’ve seen in a long time. The story is about a New York Copacabana bouncer, Tony Vallelonga, conventionally bigoted for the 1960s, hired as the driver for a brilliant black pianist, Dr. Donald Shirley, for a concert tour through the Deep South.

Based on a true story, Tony Vallelonga was already a part of Hollywood. The real Vallelonga appeared in movies like Goodfellas. His son, Nick, wrote and helped produce this movie based upon interviews with him and Dr. Shirley about this road trip taken when Nick was a little boy.

The title refers to the name of the catalogue the men use as a guide for the places that black people were allowed to go – the hotels, vacation spots, tourist areas, bars, and gas stations where black people could stay without fear of harassment from regional authorities and punitive local ordinances. The title comes from its author, Victor Hugo Green, a New York postman and a black man. The book was published yearly from 1936 until 1966, when Civil Rights Law made it, thankfully, obsolete.

The unlikely pair are wonderful to watch. An entire play could have been made just out of their time in the car together as they exchange observations of the world from their own unique perspectives. Tony is white, tough, with a mediocre education, naive in his own way, and world-wise in others, who lives in a simple small house with his devoted wife and two boys,  living somewhat hand to mouth, between jobs, even willing to engage in a hot dog eating contest for an extra $50 towards the soon-to-be due rent. Shirley also grew up poor, but after being recognized for his gifted playing has become an effete, sheltered, black man residing in an artfully appointed apartment literally above Carnegie Hall. He distances himself from his black heritage in particular and most people in general. Both have much to teach the other.

We get a tour of 1960’s Americana, from the gift stands at the local gas stations to the tough bars, and the “coloreds only” seedy hotels to which Dr. Shirley is relegated because of the color of his skin.

The acting is Oscar-worthy. Mortensen, stepping, chameleon-like into the skin of this gruff and uneducated but likeable and protective bodyguard, is almost unrecognizable in physique, mannerisms or even speech patterns from such previous characters as the seduced professor Halder from Good or the incorruptible hero Aragorn from Lord of the Rings. Along with the accent, the body movements and facial expressions of Vallelonga, which surviving son Nick claimed were so accurate they brought him to tears, Mortensen gained 45 pounds to get into character. Mortensen’s Vallelonga is a three-dimensional character from moment one on the screen throughout. Brutal and thoughtful, principled and amoral, loving father, devoted faithful husband, and violent bouncer, Mortensen creates a completely recognizable person from characteristics which could have lent themselves to a cliched caricature.

Mahershala Ali (small parts in Hidden Figures and Hunger Games) does an excellent job of portraying the stiff and defensive Shirley while incorporating the subtle chinks in his armor through which the unassuming Vallelonga connects. His Shirley is sensitive and subtle with a tough core of dignity, principle, and determined courage.

Linda Cardellini (Daddy’s Home) is lovely as Tony’s devoted wife, Dolores. In real life the Vallelongas were happily married for 41 years until her death in 1999.

In addition there is the fantastic music, and delightful songs played in classical mode by Dr. Shirley. The background soundtrack was written by Karol Bowers whose hands, through the miracle of CGI, physically sub for the gifted Dr. Shirley piano performances. Much effort went into blending Ali’s physical performance with Bowers piano playing prowess and it works very convincingly.

Peter Farrelly, whose credits up until now mostly amounted to questionable  movies such as Three Stooges, Movie 43 and Shallow Hal, has really found his inspiration in this script. Green Book is masterfully crafted – balancing the natural humor that comes from people simply interacting with each other against the tragic drama of abuse, condescension and indignities which black people endured all over the country during the 1960’s. Every detail is complete and period – from the gas station gift stands full of trinkets to the chandeliered restaurants and the florid night clubs.

By all accounts the script details both their trip and their characters very accurately, coalescing experiences described in interviews with both Vallelonga and Shirley. The only liberty taken was that the road trip lasted, not two months, but a year and a half! While taken directly and in detail from real life, the story still serves as an allegory. Vallelonga is an  example of the transformation America was making from the caricature perceptions of minorities to the informed friendships and respect which would soon be crafted, blossom and become commonplace all over the country.

Historically educational, were it not for the rough language, admittedly appropriate to the characters, their occupations, times and places, and one scene depicting a massive character flaw of Shirley, this movie would be family-appropriate. As it is, while I very highly recommend this movie, it is only for midteens and up and even then only upon the discretion of a pre-informed parent. The language is not confined to profanity, but is littered with historically accurate racial epithets often casually included in conversation.

This is a movie both men should be very proud of having made. It touches on very sensitive racial issues from the ’60’s but does so with politically incorrect good natured humor, an acknowledgement of the past with both its virtues and its mistakes, and attention to detail in authenticity which would have made any history professor proud.

With its slice of the past, the inspirational character learning curves, the marvelous music, and the splendid performances, time going to see Green Book is time well spent.

THE UPSIDE – ACCURATELY NAMED, UNEXPECTED AND INSPIRATIONAL BUDDY COMEDY-DRAMA

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF THE UPSIDE REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

Wonderful and beautifully acted movie, based on a true story, about a quadriplegic and the unlikely friendship he forms with an untrained and world-wise ex-con who is hired to be his caretaker.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Mid-teens and up only – for language, topics of conversation, a bit of  bawdy behavior with a couple of paid female companions, and some realistic though mostly unseen necessaries involving the care of a paralyzed man.

LONG TAKE:

The Upside is a remake of the French film The Intouchables. The story is based on the real relationship between the wealthy quadriplegic Philippe Pozzo di Borgo and his caretaker Abdel Sellou. In the movie, respectively, the characters names are Phillip Lacasse, (Bryan Cranston most famously of Breaking Bad) and Dell Scott (Kevin Hart most recently of the Jumanji remake), the latter a down-on-his-luck ex-con who is behind in his child support and broke. Though Dell has no skills in taking care of anyone, let alone a disabled man, Dell’s blunt, un-indulgent and pragmatic personality appeals to Phillip who is weary of having everyone walk eggshells around him and treat him like a fragile hothouse flower. Each man has been broken in their own way by their own mistakes.

One would not, on first glance, think that a movie about a man so severely disabled and a caretaker with a ill-functioning moral compass, would be funny. But it IS very funny — and very human, as well as delightfully inspirational. Everyone faces obstacles in life and Dell and Phillip exemplify the near extremes of challenges, respectively, of upbringing and the physical.

Courage is not the lack of feeling fear but of experiencing every painful moment of it and pressing forward anyway. And this is what Dell and Phillip learn to do with the aid of each others’ examples as well as their friends and family, even when those supports are initially pushed away. Everyone will be able to related to at least some feature of these brave men’s disadvantages.

Cranston is brilliant in the kind of performance I haven’t seen since Daniel Day-Lewis in My Left Foot or Joaquin Phoenix’ Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot. Cranston performs the entire movie using only facial gestures and the occasional head gesture, but you quickly forget his movement limitations in Cranston’s compelling and versatile performance. The normally frenetic Kevin Hart modulates his talents into the breath of fresh air that Phillip desperately needs. The two friends together make up one really good man. And they teach each other to face their fears and face the world with courage, determination and a renewed sense of purpose.

Nicole Kidman, in a turn that is way better than her teeth grittingly breathy and campy Atlana in Aquaman, here in Upside is absolutely adorable as Phillip’s fussy and protective executive assistant, Yvonne.

Much of the movie takes place in Phillip’s apartment, and I couldn’t help thinking that this could easily be converted into a lovely theatrical play.

The songs incorporated into the structure of the script are delightful and as eclectic as the combination of Dell’s and Phillip’s personalities. Tunes range from Nat King Cole and Aretha Franklin to Rigoletto and Carmen. The background soundtrack is intense and reflects the longing of the characters to be better men regardless of their ultimately superficial limitations. The movie, especially considering it is based on a true story, is inspirational.

I highly recommended this movie but for mid-teens and up only because of language, topics of conversation, mostly unseen illicit sexuality, and some quite humorous and genuine situations brought about by the circumstances of Phillip’s infirmity.

So, major kudos to Hart and Cranston for tackling this project with such tact, respect and skill, and hopefully some award wins for Cranston, at least, in this captivating, charming, and truly compelling story of a beautiful platonic friendship and the strength those unlikely friends give each other.

GOSNELL: THE TRIAL OF AMERICA’S BIGGEST SERIAL KILLER

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF GOSNELL REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

Documentary-style bio pic about Kermit Gosnell, an abortionist who violated even Pennsylvania’s liberally permissive abortion laws, extending his convictions to include manslaughter of a mother and murder of three full term infants, and the people who brought him to justice.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Adults only – for the topics and many of the visuals of the abortion mill. But of those adults who seek truth or justice, a MUST SEE.

LONG TAKE:

In the movie Jacob’s Ladder, Tim Robbins plays a military veteran suffering from such extreme PTSD that he has visions of hell. One of those manifestations is of a hospital of filth and gore staffed by demons indifferent to his suffering. While watching that 1990 surreal film, I never dreamed I would one day see real-life footage of the actual place. But footage of a real place, just like Jacob’s visions, were included in Gosnell, the movie about the exposure and trial of Kermit Gosnell, (portrayed by Earl Billings, a familiar face from many TV shows all the way back to the 1970’s), the perpetrator of the cold blooded killings-for-hire of full-term infants and the casual death of one of his “patients,” who was, to quote Bernard Hughes’ character in the dark satire The Hospital, “neglected to death”.

The film, Gosnell, tracks the investigative and legal activities that stopped Gosnell’s Eichmann-like casual killing business. If you see Operation Finale, (to read my blog on Operation Finale click here), you will note the similarities between Ben Kingsley’s portrayal of Eichmann and Earl Billings’ Gosnell. Both men had an affluent, family-oriented life.

While Eichmann’s personal obsessions wandered into the fastidious, Gosnell wandered onto the other end of the bell curve with profound levels of filth. While Eichmann behaves like Lady Macbeth, figuratively (and sometimes literally) trying to wash the guilty stains from his hands, Gosnell wallowed gleefully in the depravity, denying its existence. Both men swam in the blood of others to achieve their goals of career security in an environment and culture which protected their activities for years regardless of the heinousness of the crimes they committed.

The acting in both cases was amazing. Kingsley will likely, and deservedly, be up for awards for his portrayal as the cold, tunnel vision author of the deaths of millions, who wore blinders and chose to see himself as merely a clerk or cog in a machine convenient to his advancement. Billings, despite his equally subtle rendition, because of the politically protected nature of Gosnell’s occupation as abortionist, will likely be ignored for his cine-magic contribution. Billings plays a man who, in other surroundings, could be mistaken for a genial, grandfatherly, old-fashioned doctor. It is only the subtle body language, quirks, facial tics and tiny contradictory gestures which visualize Gosnell’s fundamentally broken, corrupted and rotted moral view.

Were the director creating this monster out of whole cloth, he might have been lauded for the extremely effective, visually poetic symmetry of the man’s life. Gosnell lived in a beautiful suburban home, in a Biblical sense the outside of the vase. But the house’s rooms reflected Gosnell’s inner corruption in the piles of trash, the chaotic disorder, Gosnell’s personal hygiene, and the dead animal rotting in a cellar of aggressively flea infested debris. Gosnell’s clinic, while purportedly there to serve the poor, gave preference to white customers, regularly employed underage untrained teenagers to administer dangerous levels of anesthesia, and  housed garbage bags full of decomposing infant parts, casually discarded in hallways, up stairwells, and in so-called operating rooms.

Likely the only reason this abattoir was not over run with four legged rats was because there was a plethora of irregularly cared for cats who roamed at will using the entire clinic as their kitty box.

Like the serial killer in Silence of the Lambs, Gosnell kept trophies in small jars of body parts. So insulated was Gosnell from the rest of the world, humanity, or his own culpability, that he did not understand he was actually displaying evidence against himself.

None of this was manufactured by the filmmakers. The stomach-churning images were re-created, and in some cases simply copied directly onto the film, from actual footage made by the investigating police officers, there initially to pursue probable cause of the death of one of Gosnell’s victims/patients. The police entered planning a drug bust. They left with evidence of a serial killer whose murders had been covered up for over two decades by a corrupt Pennsylvania Department of Heath, the steaming environment of political correctness, and the permissive Pennsylvania abortion laws.

Despite the heinousness of Gosnell’s activities, the repeated complaints, and the obvious incompetence and flagrant disregard for even the most basic sanitation much less safety of his patients Gosnell was left alone to continue his habits for decades.

It came up in trial that the health department of the state was for at least 17 consecutive years forbidden from pursuing even the most serious of complaints against him because of his status as a black abortionist in a poor neighborhood. But there was no protection for the unwary, vulnerable, scared and defenseless inhabitants that served as Gosnell’s prey.

Gosnell had no respect for the mostly poor minority women who came to see him, nor the tenants of basic common sense medical sanitation, nor even the law which had closed its eyes to his behavior for so long. Given his protected status it is perversely understandable why he legitimately believed he could get away with murder with impunity. He admitted as much to his attorney when he laughed at his solicitor’s concerns about his legal vulnerability, saying that he was certain no one would question his personal determination of what constituted a human life regardless of the law which forbade abortion passed 24 weeks.

The director, Nick Searcy, who also plays the defense counsel, Mike Cohan, creates a calm, even somewhat sterile atmosphere for the investigations and courtroom. This makes for a relieving counterpoint to the simple video walk-throughs of the “clinic” which view like the abandoned labyrinth of a series of dystopian torture chambers. The supporting characters, from the initially reluctant Asst. D.A. Lexy McGuire (Sarah Jane Morris) to the immediately invested and likeable lead detective James Wood (Dean Cain) to the computer geek/blogger Molly Mullaney (Cyrian Fiallo) do wonderful jobs in solid performances. And the screenwriters, Andrew Klavan, Ann McElhinney, and Phelim McAleer, used composites of real people to flesh and round out the cast. But Billings, as I said, is a standout in the lead with his restrained but utterly creepy portrayal of a man who would fit in a horror movie about a grandfather who hands out razor filled apples and cyanide laced candy on Halloween night.

Evidence showed Gosnell murdered seven born alive infants. He was convicted of three with an unknown tally of death on his belt over the previous two decades. Gosnell was convicted of one count of manslaughter in the death of a “patient” but who knows how many others died directly from his hands or indirectly from his gross negligence and malpractice. There was evidence of 21 late term abortions, even illegal in Pennsylvania. But who knows how many he committed? And he was convicted of hundreds, out of the likely thousands, of violations of the rules concerning 24 hour informed consent, which are, themselves, but pathetically thin attempts at some common sense to this horrific practice. And all this doesn’t even touch the thousands of babies in the womb he murdered under the auspices of “legal abortion”.

While Gosnell was held to account for his crimes, he was, in truth, merely a symptom of the greater evil of the governmentally, not just allowed, but protected, murder of millions of unborn children.

While this is a difficult movie to watch, we must all stand, like the Jews who survived the Holocaust and their descendants, as witnesses to atrocities which should not be happening now and, once defeated, must never happen again. It is our duty to testify against the laws and institutions which allow monsters like Gosnell to exist and thrive, for those already lost and those at risk and yet to be born.

INSTANT FAMILY – A TALE OF THE TRUE SUPER HEROES

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF INSTANT FAMILY REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

Instant Family is the charming, inspirational and humorous story of a DINK (double income no kids) couple who decide to foster three children. The film manages to be smart, brutally honest, funny and even whimsical all at the same time.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Must see! BUT only for older teens and up for language and story content.

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LONG TAKE:

SPOILERS!!

Instant Family COULD have been called Foster Parenting for Dummies. This is no one’s idealized version of a blended family. This is not The Brady Bunch, Three Men and a Baby, Despiccable Me or even……… The Blind Side (and you’ll see why that’s funny when you see the movie). But the movie is honest and very funny, miraculously achieving that delicate balance between comedy and drama which many movies attempt but at which few succeed. The innate parity between laughter and tears, which exists in the human condition but is rarely found in movie scripts, comes naturally to this script because the story was inspired by writer/director Sean Anders and his wife’s real life experiences of adopting. All of the characters, from the kids to the support group members to the social workers, are based on the real people Anders met through the process – normally flawed humans with the usual awkward family dynamics trying to do their best under difficult circumstances..

Instant Family soft pedals nothing as it follows Pete (Mark Wahlberg – Mile 22, Deep Water Horizon and Lone Survivor), and Ellie (Rose Byrne – Moira from the X-Men reboot and Bea from Peter Rabbit, and who, though from Australia, does a spotless American accent) from their naive, romantic visions of fostering a child, through the often hilarious mandatory support group meetings, the spotty support of their doubtful relatives, through the decision making and then to the realities of trying to support, protect, guide and raise three at-risk and traumatised children of different ages.

Sounds like heavy stuff, and it is, but it is also laugh-out-loud funny.

The movie occasionally wanders gently into slapstick and slight caricature but only in a way one might, with the humor and affection gleaned from the wisdom of retrospection, remember an experience that did not seem funny at the time but ends up being one of your favorite memories. Instant Family reminds me a lot of last year’s equally brilliant Wonder, about a family coping with a severely handicapped child. There are no bad guys, only the challenge, tackled by adults and children alike, to interact with the people who love you as best you can.

And if you ever wondered, as the PSA querries, that you had to be perfect to foster a child, the characters in Instant Family will disabuse you of that notion pretty quickly.

The support group scenes are especially funny, populated, as they are, by every possible combination of would be foster parents, from: single wanna-be super mom, to idealistic fundamentalist Christians, to an infertile interracial couple, to a gay couple, and to our protagonists – an upwardly mobile self employed couple, who initially think of these children the way they do the houses they renovate for a living. All come with a unique set of priorities and preconceived, often conflicting, sometimes counter-intuitive notions. Some are even portrayed as ridiculous or annoying. But, fundamentally, ALL of them have one thing in common: A core desire to provide a loving stable home for children who have none, and who are often at risk of abuse, addiction and even death at the hands of their biological parents and the environment to which they are subjected.

These foster parents, for all of their differences, flaws, quirks, and even errors in judgment, are the living life rafts on the treacherous and stormy seas of our broken culture, desperately trying to rescue survivors who sometimes don’t even want to be saved. I love movies about: The Avengers, Thor, Hulk, Spiderman, Iron Man, Superman, Wonder Woman, Ant Man, Batman, Justice League and Agents of SHIELD. But these disparate, sometimes awkward, occasionally clueless foster parents are the true super heroes.

The acting is terrific, never succumbing to the easy temptation to sink into saccharine or false empathy, but neither does it avoid showing the warts of the torturous foster process.

Wahlberg and Byrne are excellent and never shy away from any of the very strong emotions of the moment, but don’t dwell on them either. And there is a constant balance of the solemn with the naturally evolving moments of humor that always arise from even the grimmest of circumstances. For example, the social workers, Sharon and Karen, played by Tig Notaro and Octavia Spencer (Hidden Figures and Zootopia) are very funny as odd couple co-workers. Notaro is the prim, proper, white, reserved, rule follower while Spencer is the outspoken, blunt, pragmatic, black counterpart. But they both have a realistic view of their jobs. When Pete asks Sharon and Karen about the foster children’s father the only answer he gets is uncontrolled laughter. This humorously speaks serious volumes without belaboring the tragic point. In another scene, after learning of a significant hitch in their plans, Pete and Ellie come home to discover Ellie’s mother, Jan, being decorated with permanent ink sharpies. There was no malice involved. Children and Jan alike had mistaken them for washables. Jan, performed by Julie Hagerty, whose unforgettable stint in Airplane made her synonymnous with ditzy characters, solemnly offers good and sage advice but, of necessity, while indelibly and distractingly face painted.

The music is a cheerful and delightful sprinkling of songs like Wings’ “Let ’em In,” George Harrison’s “What is Life,” and Jefferson Starship’s “Nothing’s Gonna Stop us Now”. The perky upbeats also help soften the more somber moments. You can get the individual songs streaming on Amazon here.

The children are very natural. Isabela Moner, singer and actress, is Lizzy, the teenager who is simultaneously grateful for the safe haven Pete and Ellie provide for herself and her siblings and understandably resentful of these same people as interlopers to her “real,” incarcerated, drug-addicted mother. Moner has a truly beautiful voice and sings the credit song, “I’ll Stay,” at the end of the movie. Gustavo Quiroz is adorable as Lizzy’s clutzy, well meaning and inept younger brother, Juan. And Julianna Gamiz is the youngest and precocious sister, Lita.

The two younger kids act with the normal and very believable open ingenuousness, quick impulsive affection, manipulative behavior, and selfish temper tantrum demands of normal kids. But the writing skillfully runs a thread of abnormality underneath these kids’ otherwise normal veneer. For example, Lita happily plays with Ellie when they first meet until Lita begins play-acting with her doll, calling her doll racial epithets and interacting with the doll  in ways she is obviously imitating from her previous foster parents. It’s nothing sinister but casually cruel. And it gives the audience a taste of what every precarious day can be like for these kids whose parents have abysmally let them down  and are in a system which can sometimes fail them. But again the serious tone is undercut by the humorous way the failed foster couple insist she must have heard it on TV.

A lovely cameo is of Joan Cusack as an elderly, awkward, but concerned neighbor who helps to deflate another scene which could have degenerated into mawkishness but for her delightfully eccentric presence.

The filming style itself is very straightforward, almost like professionally made home movies, as we see quite intimate moments of Ellie and Pete with each other, with their families, and with the foster kids, and the support group sessions.

While there is no sexuality shown on screen, there are sexual topics which come up necessarily and inevitably with the raising of a 15 year old girl from a bleakly broken background who has severe daddy issues. In addition, under stress, there is some humorously interjected but understandable profanity that crops up sprinkled throughout the movie. This, with the serious topic of abandoned and at-risk children, make this movie suitable only for older teens and up. However for that demographic for which is appropriate it is a must-see movie.

GIRL IN THE SPIDER’S WEB: FROM ANGSTY BOOK TO ACTION ADVENTURE MOVIE

 

I am delighted to present another review by my sister, Wynne, this time co-authored with her friend Mike.

Click on the title to check out Wynne's previous review of another unusual movie, The Florida Project.

SHORT TAKE:

Action adventure based on the fourth of five books from the Millenium series and sequel to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Older teens and up for violence, sexual content, and language.

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LONG TAKE:

The Girl in the Spider's Web is based on the fourth book in the Millennium series. The first three books were written by Stieg Larrson. After his death the series was continued by David Lagercrantz. The Girl in the Spider’s Web is Lagercrantz’ first installment in the series. This is the second American movie from the series, the first was The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The book and the movie follow the same characters but the movie does have a different story line.

Lagercrantz seems to have studied the Larrson books. The characters have perhaps evolved but not changed. Where there is evolution in the characters or relationships, it is natural, as any author might do with characters created in previous books, such as Michael Connelly's detective creation Harry Bosch. Lagercrantz emulates Larrson's complex and intriguing plots quite well.

Three actresses have played Lisbeth Salander, and each brings a slightly different take on the character. Naomi Rapace starred as Lisbeth in the Swedish production of the first three books: The Girl: With the Dragon Tattoo, Who Played with Fire and Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest, as well as the TV miniseries Millenium. Rooney Mara plays Lisbeth in the Hollywood production of the first book The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Now Claire Foy takes on the role of Lisbeth in the Hollywood production of the fourth book in the Millennium Series, The Girl in the Spider's Web. We have read four of the books in the Millennium Series. There is a fifth book, An Eye for an Eye, which we have not read yet. All three actresses are similar physically to the Lisbeth in the book: slight in stature, tough, dark figures, who can effectively convey plenty of angst.

Naomi Rapace, in the 2009 Swedish production of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, portrays a more vulnerable Lisbeth, with angst and grit. The movie had thirty-five nominations and eighteen wins from various awards, with Rapace winning BAFTA’s Best Leading Actress award in 2011. Rotten Tomatoes gave the movie 86%. Reviews in Rotten Tomato applauded: "Rapace's gripping performance makes The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo an unforgettable viewing experience" and admired that she was a "haunting, enigmatic Lisbeth".

We have not seen the Hollywood version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, so we will rely on reviews. Rooney Mara won an Oscar as Best Actress in 2012. The movie had a total of ninety nominations and twenty-eight wins for various awards. Rotten tomatoes gave the movie an 80%. Reviews in Rotten Tomatoes stated that Mara gave "total role commitment" and a "brilliant, revelatory performance".

When a re-boot of the Millennium Series, with The Girl in the Spider's Web, was considered, the Swedish actress, Naomi Rapace, decided to pass. Rooney Mara said she wanted to return as Lisbeth, but the studio decided to go with a different director and cast.

In the latest production, Lisbeth Salander is brilliantly portrayed by Claire Foy of The Crown. Foy has played three different roles in movies that we have seen. In The Crown she plays The Queen, Elizabeth, as a young woman. She portrays Neil Armstrong's wife, who supports her husband in his endeavor to be an astronaut in First Man, giving a strong performance depicting the stress of being an astronaut's wife. And now she is Lisbeth Salander.

SPOILERS

Lisbeth and Camilla Salander are fraternal twin sisters, raised by their father, a Russian crime lord and head of the Spider Society. He physically and psychologically abused them both. Lisbeth wants them both to escape, but Camilla chooses to stay with her father. So Lisbeth escapes alone. The choices made at that moment result in the twin sisters taking different life paths. Much like in the old classic Angels With Dirty Faces, the question hangs over both the characters' lives and the movie of: had they both escaped (in Angels, from the police, in Spider, from their abusive father) would their lives have been different?

In the first book, Lisbeth's first guardian is a kind man. When her first guardian becomes ill, she is turned over to a second guardian who sexually and physically abuses her. As a teen she decides to take matters into her own hands and not be abused any more. With her abilities as a tech genius and computer hacker she becomes a vigilante, taking the law into her own hands. She will stop at nothing to bring justice to the abused and mistreated. She chooses the path of good.

Left alone with a sadistic and abusive father, Camilla evolves into a cold-blooded killer, becoming the head of the Spiders, following in her father's footsteps. The Spiders are a ruthless group that will stop at nothing to get what they want, including murder. She chooses the path of evil.

Camilla did not enjoy the few short years of kindness that Lisbeth had. Did this difference push each into the direction that their lives went? Camilla blames Lisbeth for the years of abuse she underwent with her father and questions why Lisbeth did not rescue her. Camilla cannot understand that the real villain is their father.

The movie's main theme revolves around who can get control of the computer program, Firewall, a program that can access codes for nuclear weapons worldwide. There are four groups in the race. One of the players is Lisbeth working for Frans Balder, played by Stephen Merchant, (mostly known for his comedy in shows like The Big Bang Theory and the British version of The Office), whose autistic son, August (Christopher Convery), is gifted and sought after by competing interests. Another is Camilla Salander, played by Sylvia Hoeks, (the evil replicant Luv from Blade Runner 2049) who is hired by the Swedish Security Police (SAPO). Then there is deputy director of SAPO, Gabriella Grane, played by Synnove Macody Lund (previously a model, journalist and film critic). Finally, an American National Security Agent (NSA) programmer and sniper, Ed Needham, played by Lakeith Stanfield, (appearing in the acclaimed Get Out and recently in Sorry to Bother You) is also in the hunt. All want to obtain Firewall for different reasons.

Frans Balder wrote the program, then was fired from the NSA. He hires Lisbeth Salander to steal it back. Camilla, the leader of the Spiders, the bad guys, wants control of the program to launch nukes and frame Lisbeth. The Swedish Security Police wants the program because Sweden has not been in a war in recent history and considers itself a neutral country, which will keep the world safe. The American NSA programmer and hacker, Ed Needham, wants the program returned to the United States.

It would be difficult to compare the book with the movie because they are so different. The characters are the same, Frans is still murdered, and poor August is still the pawn going back and forth between the groups. While the book’s plot has no computer program like Firewall, it does include a chase after government secrets. We liked both the movie and the book. We did think the movie had more action. The book was more mental.

August in the book and the movie has two savant talents. One is mathematics and another is drawing. In the book, August’s talent as an artist is used to help find his father's killer. In the movie, his talent as a mathematical genius is the key to cracking the code that will open Firewall. We thought it was interesting that each version highlighted a different talent.

When the two sisters come face to face, toward the end of the movie, Camilla blames Lisbeth for how her life evolved and the years of abuse she endured. She is out for revenge. Lisbeth tearfully replies that Camilla chose to stay with their father. Again, if Camilla had chosen to escape with Lisbeth as children would her life have been different? Would Camilla still be a psychopath? The debate of nature vs. nurture plays out with the two sisters.

The movie got a 41% from Rotten Tomatoes. They felt that the movie had an "uninspired story and poor character development," and that the movie turned Lisbeth into a "generic action hero". Rolling Stone noted that Claire Foy was "killer good" as Lisbeth Salander.

We liked seeing Lisbeth come to life on the big screen, done especially well by Claire Foy. The movie had plenty of special effects – lots of explosions and fires, stabbing people with needles delivering different serums to sedate or blind or kill, and the use of a cattle prod is very popular in the movie. The sequence with the sniper, Ed Needham, shooting the thermal images of men inside the walls of a building shown in 3-D was truly exceptional. There are car chases over beautiful Scandinavian scenery, with dark old buildings giving an eerie affect in contrast. Many special tech devices are used and you wonder if they really do exist somewhere. Lisbeth has an endless supply of devices that can operate just about anything electronically, any of which would inspire envy among the Star Trek crew.

In an interview by Aubrey Page on HUFFPOST done with the director Fede Alvarez, he states, "It's not Lisbeth Salander the assistant or Lisbeth Salander the muse. This time it's Lisbeth Salander the main character that really drives the story". He wanted to place Lisbeth in the forefront and not as Blomkvist sidekick.

Reviews compare the movie to the James Bond series. Except for the massive explosions and techy gadgets, We did not make the connection. The two characters are very different. James Bond is a suave, martini drinking, secret agent, who always ends up with the woman. Lisbeth is a dark, bisexual, tech savvy loner whose only friends are Mikael Blomkvist, a former lover, played by Swedish actor Sverrir Gudnason, and a computer geek, Plague, played by Cameron Britton.

In reviews there is also reference to Lisbeth being portrayed as an action figure. This somewhat trivializes her abilities and makes her appear as a comic book character. Will there be action figures coming out for Christmas? This would be sad because there is a lot more to Lisbeth than that.

Another complaint from reviewers is that Camilla's character is not fleshed out more, that she should be presented as a more interesting and complex character than Lisbeth. But Camilla only even shows up in the second half of the movie. The movie missed an opportunity in this regard. Nor does the movie portray Lisbeth with as much depth as do the books. We believe the movie was more into action and special effects than character portrayal. But we really enjoy action movies, so this is why we enjoyed both the movie and the book for different reasons.

In the book, Camilla did not die at the end. Maybe she didn't in the movie, we only see her step off a cliff and fall through the clouds.

Another reference in reviews is made to the #METOO movement, but remember the book was written in 2015 before #METOO. A scene near the beginning of the movie does show Lisbeth has become: "the girl who hurts men who hurt women". But in the rest of the movie she is on a different quest.

As we stated earlier, we like the book and we liked the movie. For the movie, you have to turn your brain off a bit and live in her world and just believe she can do all she does. We agree with critics that this is mainly an action movie and characters could have been developed more. But good special effects on the big screens are great fun. Of course, (this is Wynne now) my favorite kind of movie has bad ass dinosaurs creating havoc in the world. But that is not in this movie.

The movie is rated R because of violence, language and sexual content. So, take your older teens to go see this movie but leave the kiddos at home.

THE FOUNDER – DULL BIOPIC OF THE BUSINESS VULTURE RAY KROC IN A WASTE OF KEATON’S TALENTS

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF THE FOUNDER REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

Dry and uninvolving biopic, despite Michael Keaton’s efforts, about Ray Kroc, the avaricious business predator, who co-opted then outsted the McDonald brothers from their own creation.

WHO SHOULD WATCH:

Limited to adults and older teens only because some language and Kroc’s lack of interpersonal and business ethics. The mechaniations of enterprise – good and bad – might be interesting to business and history students.

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LONG TAKE:

If you can not be a good example be a horrible warning. I’m not sure which one the makers of The Founder intended it to be.

The Founder is a 2016 biopic about Ray Kroc, the man who made McDonald’s a multi-bazillion dollar enterprise and its distinct Golden Arches logo one of the most recognizable symbols on (literally) the entire planet.

McDonald’s was a singular hamburger restaurant – one of, if not the first, walk-up, designed by the McDonald brothers, Maurice and Richard (John Carroll Lynch of Jackie – see my review of Jackie here – and Nick Offerman from Parks and Recreation). Their’s was a unique concept, carefully designed and laid out, innovative and revoluitionary in the Drive-In-car hop-predominated culture of America in the 1950’s. Richard and Maurice, had created this style as a money saver – no car hops, broken glassware, or dallying hoodlums. People stood in line to get great tasting burgers, in throw away packaging, in a clean family friendly environment. What the McDonald brothers saw as the fulfillment of a lifelong dream, Ray Kroc saw as a golden goose just waiting to be plucked.

SPOILERS

The film starts with Ray as an unsuccessful multi-spindle milkshake salesman who happens upon this singular successful enterprise and recognizes the brilliant business model for what it is. The McDonald brothers think “small” but Ray believes in BIG. And the McDonald brothers don’t know to whom they are linking their futures when they sign a contract with Ray to establish franchises. Ray’s personal motto is “Persistence” and he uses his formidable variation on it to: slowly negotiate, maneuver and leverage their business right out from under them, steal the wife of one of his franchise partners, leave his own wife, and cheat the McDonald brothers out of the royalty fees to which they were promised when they inevitably are forced to sell out to Ray.

This is NOT a nice man, but then neither was Vito Corleone in The Godfather Trilogy or Loki from The Avengers movies. And people generally love both the Corleone patriarch and Thor’s sly brother as guilty pleasures.  But what the latter two had in abundance, Ray Kroc, as portrayed in The Founder, had none of – and that was a relatable personality.

The Founder plays out like the dramatically filmed version of a documentary. It is not filmed in documentary style but is written as a series of facts filmed in vignettes. The movie is seen through Ray Kroc’s eyes in a terrific performance by Michael Keaton but only in the visual sense. By that I mean, we see what happens as Kroc himself might remember them but we, the audience, get no real feel for seeing AS Kroc might have seen life. We are never given opportunity to see the world as Ray Kroc sees it. We only hear him voice the sentiments of his own avarice without understanding what it was that drove him to HAVE those views. No back story, no moments of reflection, no knowing how he reconciles with or justifies to himself what he has done to others. Certainly, no King Claudius self-tormenting moments from Hamlet, wherein the character knows the wrong he has done and would like to repent but is unable because of his own weaknesses for the things he has acquired through those same outrageous acts.

Keaton has been Batman, Bird Man, Vulture in Spiderman Homecoming, and Mr. Mom – all variations on super heroes with a dark but redemptively inclined streak in one form or another (even his character in the comedy Mr Mom gets within a hair’s breadth of the dark action of cheating on his wife but comes to his senses in the nick of time). So playing an appealing villain would not be his first rodeo. Unfortunately, the script gives him little to do but posture and go through the motions. Once he establishes his unsuccessful frustrated character then woos the McDonald brothers, the rest of the movie is merely a checklist of events. Expand the business – check. Buy land – check. Meet his business associate’s wife and show interest – check. Use innovations, like dried instant milkshake without the McDonald brothers permission – check. Tell the brothers he has more money and so he can do what he wants and they are  out – check. Movie over – check.

Don’t get me wrong. Keaton does his best with this dry script. He even manages a few moments which gives a glimmer of what the movie should have been. For example, there’s one scene where he joins his future second wife, Joan (Linda Cardellini from Daddy’s Home and Avengers: Age of Ultron) at a piano where she works and, right in front of her husband, manages to woo her by singing with her. And the first scenes which show his woeful attempts to sell his multi-mixers demonstrate his gift of gab which is falling on deaf ears. I mean, his pitch was so good I was almost ready to buy one! But, alas, his potential buyers were noT so convinced. So you come to understand why, when he sees this extremely profitable “hamburger joint” his mouth starts watering and not just for the French fries. But for every one of the few interesting scenes there are several astonishingly bland ones, such as when he announces, as they eat a silent dinner at their kitchen table, to his all but ignored wife, Ethel, (Laura “Jurassic Park”  Dern), that he wants a divorce. She just puts down her fork, the camera pans back and away from her, the end. (Huh?) The audience pretty much knew this was coming, but instead of Beatrice Straight’s Oscar winning 5 minutes in Network where she reads her husband the riot act for walking out on her, we get something more akin to the emotional vacuum of Dave as he eats alone in the empty house in 2001.

This is a humorless look at the man. Kroc states as his personal philosophy to the McDonald brothers at one point – “If my competitor was drowning I’d stick a hose in his mouth.” So “business is business” is obviously a manifesto with Kroc. But that does not mean this arid POV has to be reflected in the way the movie is written. I can’t help but wonder how much better this movie would have been with a Cohen Brothers-style hero in the lead.

In short, this is a flat film whose basic moral could be stated as: “If you are persistent enough you can have everything you want and never have to suffer the consequences of your evil actions.” Kroc stole his partners’ business, his friend’s wife, and cheated the McDonald brothers out of hundreds of millions of dollars of royalties —- because he could. But we ultimately don’t care. We don’t know the abused well enough to empathize and we are givennothing with which to relate to the main character.  It’s an unpalatable story which wastes the considerable talents of Keaton.

So……….next time, Keaton wants to play a vulture, I’d much rather it be one in a Spiderman sequel.

BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY EXPOSES FREDDIE MERCURY AS A VICTIM OF HIS OWN INDISCRETE EXCESSES

SHORT TAKE:

Mesmerizing biodrama of Queen, the rock band in general and Freddie Mercury its lead singer, in particular, from its formation in the early 1970's through its appearance at the 1985 benefit concert Live AID, including a positively brilliant performance by Rami Malek as Mercury and completely spot-on recreation (or so I've read) of Gwilym Lee as Brian May, lead guitarist.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Primarily adults only due to the nature of Mercury's personal life. Exceptions might be made on an individual basis, but I would STRONGLY advise that the parent see the movie first before considering allowing anyone under the age of full consent see this movie. For lifelong Queen fans I would say this is a must see movie.

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LONG TAKE:

SPOILERS – AS FEW AS POSSIBLE BUT MOST PEOPLE KNOW THE KEY POINTS ANYWAY

What do an astrophysicist, a dentist, an electronics engineer and…an airport baggage handler all have in common? No. It's not a group gearing up for the next Oceans movie. It's, respectively, Brian May (Gwilym Lee), Roger Taylor (Ben Hardy – Angel in X-Men), John Deacon (Joseph Mazzello – as a child actor was Douglas Gresham in Shadowlands and Tim from Jurassic Park) and Freddie Mercury/Farrokh Bulsara (Rami Malek – Mr. Robot series and Twilight Saga – Breaking Dawn) of the 1970's rock group Queen. Maybe I was the last one on the boat with this one, but a lot of the personal details about the members of this unique, audience participatory and groundbreaking musical phenomenon were a surprise to me.

They formed when I was in grammar school and hit their peak with their come back performance at the benefit relief concert for the Ethiopian famine in 1985. While it was a band which achieved unusual longevity and success via the strength of their loyalty to each other and egalitarian approach to the structure of their band, one member, nonetheless, stuck out due to his flamboyant style and scandalous personal life.

In full disclosure – growing up, Queen was, to me, in many ways just background music and a caricature. I liked the music but it was off the wall in the same way that Pink Floyd was, with its experimental sounds and genre combinations. I did not follow any of the details or titillating stories at the time. However, I assume the film presentation is accurate based upon the commentaries from those who consider themselves lifelong fans. So my review will assume the accuracy of the film story as presented.

Much of their personal lives, explored in the movie, came as a surprise to me. All these men were accomplished, intensely creative, profoundly talented, and intelligent men. Most had wives and children. Mercury's personal life was a bit more complex. Fairly quiet about his private life, his flamboyant and effeminate stage behavior was a constant source of unsatisfied conjecture with reporters. According to the film, Mercury was bisexual. In the early 1970's he started a lifetime romance with Mary Austin. In this regard, his life parallels Cole Porter's, who married, but then constantly cheated on his wife with homosexual lovers. Mercury, on the other hand, was faithful to Mary (Lucy Boynton from Murder on the Orient Express), and seemed to genuinely adore her and she him, until he went on tour to America without her. Predictably, his already vulnerable personality succumbed to the allure of wealth and celebrity – indulging in drugs, and the experimental promsicuous sex which lost him this love of his life, his health and eventually his life.

Rami Malek's performance as Mercury is breathtaking, recreating Mercury's flamboyant on and quiet off stage personas. But Mercury's unique four-octave, Tuvan (vocalizing a note AND its undertone at the same time) singing, with exceptional vocal control, and high speed vibratto, was impossible for Malek without assistance. Malek's voice, Mercury's studio recordings and the voice of Canadian Christian rock singer Marc Martel (near the bottom of this page is a video of Martel singing as Mercury) are blended, synced, combined and edited to re-incarnate Mercury's singing voice for Bohemian Rhapsody.

Similarly the instrumental performances of May, Taylor and Deacon were reproduced as accurately as possible, even with the assistance of May, Taylor and other coaches, but these virtuoso musicians could not be duplicated and there is some slight of hand with both the visual as well as auditory recordings.

The result is a spot on reproduction of Queen's music and many of their performances. The music was wonderful – artful and masterful incarnations of the songs which are so familiar to us now, the movie allows us to watch and listen to a vision of how those iconic moments were conceived, recorded, blended and molded into the unique musical expressions we have come to love – from "Happy Birthday" and "Killer Queen" to – of course – "Bohemian Rhapsody", we are privy to their manifestations as reproduced through the magic of cinema. However, and wisely, unlike many other movies about musicians which drown in music to the damage of plot, Bohemian Rhapsody, from scene to scene, as Donald O'Connor might have said, leaves us wanting more. We are only given tidbits of song snacks which enhance the storyline, so that the ending 20 minute full re-creation of the Live AID benefit concert is a welcome musical feast.

One common complaint, with which I agree, is the abruptness of the ending after the benefit concert. Mercury lived for six more years and while I understand and respect the decision not to wallow in Mercury's illness and decline, there was a good deal more Queen written after 1985 to explore.

These men were first, last and primarily, musicians of exceptional talent and creativity. The best parts of the movie were the expression of that talent – even if it was merely re-creations of those brilliant acts of inspiration: building entire songs from one individual phrase, enhancing and individualizing their sound with deliberately peculiar assists like water or coins on the drums, stressing their falsettos, or planned genre blending with opera. During one scene, for example, a disagreement starts to get out of hand between two members while a third is physically trying to keep them separated. The fourth simply starts a guitar riff and the combatants are so taken with it and the idea of creating a song around it the dispute is defused.

Along with the great performances – both acting and the musical slight of hand, there is an amusing cameo by Mike Myers (Shrek) as Ray Foster, loosely based on Roy Featherstone of EMI Records.

Mercury's descent into the more carnal excesses of celebrity are not shied from but are treated with a measure of restraint – ergo my cautionary note to parents. Otherwise the movie is appropriate for mature older teens – but again with serious provisos depending on the discretion of the parents.

So if you are an adult, especially an adult fan of Queen, this movie is a musical treat but also a reminder of the consequences which can occur from a lack of self-restraint. Mercury sang and contributed continuously to Queen until only a few days before he died. Without him, the band could not function as it had before and Deacon's grief over the loss of his friend and collaborator was such that he declined to contribute to the making of the film. Mercury's unnecessary and early death ended the prolific and brilliant contributions of Queen to the rock scene.

But this is not a new or unique story. Indeed, Bohemian Rhapsody does for Freddie Mercury what Amadeus did for Mozart and All That Jazz did for Bob Fosse (Fosse actually made the thinly veiled autobiographic film All That Jazz, which ended in the lead character's death, then himself died the same way a few years later). While I am not comparing Mercury to Mozart to Fosse, there are parallels of tragedy in the needless premature loss of significant musical contributions in their respective genres, all because of personal weakness and the lure of excess, exacting a terrible price from them, their families, and to the culture at large. May they rest in peace.

THE (“CUMBER”) GRINCH – WELL DONE UPDATE TO BELOVED CLASSIC STORY

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF THE GRINCH REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

The new The Grinch is entertaining for adults and children alike and respectful to its source material, but still manages a fresh take on this most beloved of children’s Christmas tales.

WHO SHOULD GO:

ANYBODY! EVERYBODY!

LONG TAKE:

How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss was published in 1957, two years before I was born, and the first and most famous filmed animated version, narrated by Boris Karloff, was released in 1966 when I was 7. So the story of The Grinch has been on my radar my entire life, not to mention the fact that I have read probably every other Dr. Seuss story to my kids about a hundred times.

There have been several adaptations, including a musical and a Jim Carrey movie in 2000, the latter of which I did not much care for, as Carrey’s Grinch was a little too reminiscent of   Pennywise the clown from Stephen King’s It for my taste.

BUT – those of us who grew up with the original 1966 version need fear nothing about this latest version of The Grinch. The epynomous character is voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch (Sherlock, Smaug from Lord of The Rings, Khan from the Star Trek reboot). Danny Elfman, Tim Burton’s go-to composer, deftly incorporates not only traditional Christmas music but songs from the 1966 animated film, including the Whoville Christmas song. The set ups for the story are the same, only a bit more flushed out and funnier.

The voice acting was smart and cute, even featuring a cameo from the grande dame of theater Angela Lansbury as the Mistress of Ceremonies at the Whoville tree lighting. Cindy Lou Who was performed by the charming Cameron Seely (The Greatest Showman).   Prolific composer Pharell Williams did the narration. Rashida Jones, daughter of Quincy Jones performs Donna, Cindy Lou’s mom. And Keenan Thompson voices the eternally optimistic and joyful (even for a Who) Mr. Brickelbaum.

One thing I actually like better in this version than I did in the original 1966 one, was the inclusion of several Christmas songs which reference the Nativity. Unlike other modern “Christmas” movies, this one highlights lyrics which refer to the birth of Christ, such as in “God Rest You Merry Gentlemen”: “…remember Christ Our Savior was born on Christmas Day….” Granted, it was sung by an overly enthusiastic Whoville, flashmob, Pentatonic-style choir who (pun intended) unintentionally chased the flinching Grinch through Whoville in a rather comedic scene, but the song was beautifully done.

There are a number of other similarly respectful moments in the film, which makes this 2018 version even more endearing than it otherwise would have been.

And do not be concerned about the occasional “Happy Holidays” that you will hear, because there are plenty of “Merry Christmas!” salutations to be heard, especially after the Grinch’s conversion. This might not have been a casual decision, but a deliberate script writing device. Either way it works nicely.

Benedict Cumberbatch does one of the best American accents by a Brit that I know. The only one who does it as well, I think, is Kenneth Branagh (Dead Again). Of course, I could just be biased because I am admittedly a fan of Mr. Cumberbatch. Like Mr. Branagh, Cumberbatch is not a movie star, he is an actor. (Don’t believe me – watch his Hamlet.)

The original film short was only 26 minutes. This 2018 runtime of 90 minutes uses the extra time well, investing the story with more about the Grinch’s backstory, as well as providing more credibility to his conversion, without eliminating any of the original elements from either the book or the 1966 movie.

. This movie is absolutely and completely suitable for everyone.There is no innuendo or profanity of any sort. It’s funny for adults, charming for children, enhances the original theme, and maintains the intent of the original story.

So – bravo to directors Yarrow Cheney (Despicable Me) and Scott Mosier (who, up to now has NOT been a maker of child-friendly films), scriptwriters Michael LeSieur (You, Me and Dupree), Tommy Swerdlow (Cool Runnings, Snow Dogs) and, of course Dr. Seuss/Theodor Geisel. Congrats also to music composer, Danny Elfman, and especially Mr. Cumberbatch for lending their talents to create this newest and very successful rendering of this most charming of Christmas stories for children of every age.

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SMALLFOOT – CLEVER AND SWEET WITH A SURPRISINGLY THOUGHTFUL UNDERLYING MESSAGE

AUDIO PODCAST OPTION OF SMALLFOOT REVIEW

SHORT TAKE:

Clean, genuinely funny, very kid-friendly movie about the sequence of events which results when a village of yetis is revealed to a “smallfoot”/human.

WHO SHOULD GO:

Anybody can go but be advised, at 96 minutes, it is about 20 minutes too long for the average pre-kindergartner.

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LONG TAKE:

Fides et Ratio was an encyclical by Saint Pope John Paul II in 1998. Translated, the title means “Faith and Reason”. In it, then Pope, now Saint John Paul II explains that faith without reason leads to superstition and reason without faith leads to nihilism and relativism. Smallfoot, surprisingly, tackles the former of these heady, complex philosophical musings.

While I do not normally like to lead with a lot of spoilers, when analysing for a movie whose demographic is young children, as a parent, I would want full disclosure before bringing MY smallfoot, so I offer the same to you readers.

SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!

This children’s tale begins with a colony of yetis who live high up on a mountain, cut off visually from the rest of the world by a constant ring of clouds. Our protagonist is a good natured, happy-go-lucky yeti named Migo (Channing Tatum) whose personality almost exactly parallels that of Chris Pratt’s eternally optimistic Emmett from The Lego Movie. You almost expect him to burst out with “Everything is Awesome” as he strolls through the yeti village. This is not meant as a criticism. It’s actually quite cute as he observes the seemingly pointless Rube Goldberg occupations to which everyone is assigned, but which are explained later.

The songs are, BTW, quite catchy and one in particular, sung by the female protagonist and Migo’s love interest, Meechee (Zendaya from The Greatest Showman), “Wonderful Life”, features some thoughtful lyrics:

Take a look around
And see the world we think we know
Then look closer
There’s more to life than meets the eye
A beauty to behold
It’s all much bigger than we know.

She sings this as she shows things to Migo he never noticed, like a small butterfly crystalized in a frozen stalactite, and the details in a snowflake. Beautiful imagery for a lovely idea: that the more we see, the more we realize the grandeur in Creation.

Their belief system, literally written in stone, is a seemingly random collection of unquestioned statements, including the command that if you feel the urge to question one of the stones you should “push it down” and not think about it. The stones describe strange and mythical beasts which must be fed or cooled or tended to in odd ways. One stone commands an absolute dismissal of the possibility that there could be anything below the cloudline. The stones are worn like scale armour by the tribal leader, Stonekeeper, (Lonnie Rashid Lynn aka the rapper Common). Migo, the son of Gorgle, the Gong Ringer (Danny DeVito) is one of the biggest stone-trusting advocates in the village, until one day Migo, by chance, observes a plane crash and the ejection of a smallfoot from this flying metal object. Problem is: the existence of smallfoot is absolutely denied by one of the earliest stones. No one will believe Migo as the evidence is quickly blown off the mountain.

Meanwhile, Percy, James Corden (voice of Peter Rabbit and guest companion in a couple of Matt Smith Dr. Who’s) is the host of an animal show which is on the decline. The ejected pilot happens upon Percy with his story of sighting a yeti, and before Percy, desperate for ratings, can take advantage of this knowledge, Migo appears, looking for the pilot and proof of his smallfoot story. Their first contact is cute and clever and takes full advantage of their inability to immediately communicate.

Tatum and Corden do a wonderful job of voicing the life into their respective characters and the writers do an excellent job with the miscommunications which arise from their inability to understand each other.

The movie is occasionally laugh out loud funny. It is completely clean – no bad language and, a rarity, totally innuendo free.

As the plot progresses it is revealed that the Stonekeeper is wearing a set of lies, deliberately created to protect the village because of previous lethal encounters with humans, generations ago. The stones’ commands all begin to form a pattern: If smallfoot does not exist then there’s no reason to go look for them. The ring of clouds is manufactured for camouflage by the steam generating machine deep within the mountain which the ice ball production and turning gears on the surface facilitates. The other stones which describe a sky snail and mammoths under the clouds which are cooled by the ice balls all were made up and commanded to be accepted without question to protect the villagers from leaving and revealing their village.

There are plot points in Smallfoot which harken back to other movies, certainly: the hidden city of Wakanda in Black Panther, and a concept accepted without question which keeps two potentially friendly but very dissimilar groups apart, but which is a complete lie, as in Monsters, Inc. for example, that children are dangerously toxic. (I won’t even discuss The Village because Smallfoot is a much better movie). But Smallfoot is not a derivative of any of them.

If I make the movie sound like it is heavily philosophical, it is not. The movie plays out like any normal child friendly film with lots of slap stick, goofy looking characters, Bugs Bunny-level pratfalls, bright colors, and non-lethal force. (Exs: an angry mama bear appears to be attacking, but when translated is just loudly chiding Migo for disturbing her family from their hibernation when it took her WEEKS to get her cubs to sleep. A crashing helicopter’s propellors are caught in trees spinning the body of the copter and the pilot emerges unscathed but incredibly dizzy.)

But it is the thoughtful story and clever characters that put Smallfoot above the general mishmash of kid movies which usually populate the screen. Inevitably the yetis’ faith without reason in the commands on the stones, about which Saint Pope John Paul II cautioned, breeds a mindless superstition requiring blind belief, and when challenged by truth, falls apart. It is only when reason and faith come together – when truth is combined with some earned trust between Migo and Percy, that a peaceful diplomatic solution is possible.

I liked Smallfoot. It has all the charm of a harmless silly kid movie, adds sly but innocent humor for the adults, and has an intelligent underlying theme. The characters are well fleshed out for the cast of an elementary school level movie. Plus the songs are catchy and cute without being heavy handed and are sparingly used. And best of ALL – it did NOT go for the STUPID, almost UBIQUITOUS “female empowerment” message with which we are regularly bludgeoned and which has ruined entire franchises (I’d sneeze the words Star Wars if I was standing right in front of you to make the point, but I’m not so you’ll just have to imagine that.)

My only real complaint is that it was a bit too long, by about 20 minutes, for the primary school demographic to which the producers were aiming. My two year old grandson loved it and was mesmerized until the last bit and wanted to walk around while watching the denouement. At 96 minutes it really should have gone through one more trimming.

Aside from that very small criticism, Smallfoot is a delightful film with a bit more meat on its bones than you might expect or is carried on your average kid movie. It will entertain even the littlest kids, but still provide mom and dad with something worthwhile to mull over with even the oldest.Arguably the best kid movie I’ve since in 2018 yet(i)…..sorry couldn’t resist.

GUEST REVIEWER FATHER TREY ANGE’S ALL SAINTS’ DAY HOMILY REFERS TO MOVIES ABOUT – WHAT ELSE? – SAINTS

If you are a regular reader you know I enjoy posting guest-written reviews. This morning I had the singular privilege and pleasure of hearing a homily from Father Trey Ange which I thought would make a DELIGHTFUL guest post on saints, appropriately enough, for All Saints' Day. I added the pictures, so any inaccuracies, errata, or plain old dumb mistakes in the visuals are NOT Father Ange's fault but entirely my responsibility.

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So – without further ado, please enjoy this guest review from Father Trey Ange, Parochial Vicar, Our Lady Queen of Heaven Catholic Church in Lake Charles, LA:

Our Lady Queen of Heaven Thursday, Nov. 1, 2018

Solemnity of All Saints Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14; Matthew 5:1-12

So, I’m a big movie fan. I enjoy movies and there’s SO many great stories! Yes, most get recycled, re-made & re-booted. But some of the best true stories are the stories of the saints. Some saints movies are incredible! Becket, A Man For All Seasons, and The Reluctant Saint are just a few. But to be honest, the majority of movies about saints are just …terrible, low budget, not well done – at all, unfortunately.

I do enjoy other movies too, like a good superhero movie! This summer, my brothers and Fr. Jeff Starkovich watched the new Avengers Infinity War which was fantastic and lots of fun! Now just imagine if ALL of the Avengers AND the Justice League characters were all together in one place! Let’s throw in X-Men, and ALL the superheroes from the Marvel Universe, the DC Universe and every comic hero ever! It would be a pretty incredible gathering, wouldn’t it?

Not compared to Heaven. Just imagine all of the SAINTS together in one place. Jesus’ disciples, the apostles, religious sisters, popes, the many martyrs who were killed for their faith – they are our real heroes. And they are already together in one place singing God’s praises. And since THEY are so close to God in Heaven, since THEY can intercede to God for us, – together, their prayers have far more power than ALL of the combined Superheroes EVER. The power of God is greater than anything we can EVEN imagine in fiction. And this is actually REAL.

Our first reading paints this picture for us! John receives this revelation – this "vision of a great multitude… from every nation, race, people, and tongue… wearing white robes and holding palm branches" crying out in a loud voice. These are the saints in Heaven. "These are the ones who have survived the time of great distress; they have washed their robes and made them white in the Blood of the Lamb." Where did they come from? And how do WE get to be – in that number? That number when the saints go marching in? The Gospel gives the answer.

BLESSED ARE: the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, clean of heart, peacemakers, and ones persecuted for the sake of righteousness. When we are persecuted for our faith, – take it. Take it like the saints. "Rejoice and be glad" Jesus tell us, "for your reward will be great" not on earth necessarily. He says: they will be comforted, satisfied, shown mercy, inherit the land, called children of God, and the Kingdom of HEAVEN will be theirs. Not earth. Saints don’t seek glory on this earth.

Although their stories might not be as action-packed as superhero films, the lives of the saints are far more real and inspiring than any superhero. Because they lived life with virtue, many of them survived some of the worst conditions on earth, and they made it to Heaven. We come to Mass today to celebrate their triumphant glory, and we ask for their intercession. We here on earth – give thanks to God for the lives of the saints, who inspire us and pray for us. We hope to live like they did.

Do we have a chance to become a superhero? Possibly. Someone may already look up to us as their hero. But the reality is: we have an even greater chance to become a saint! A saint is someone who is in Heaven. And in his Gospel, Jesus gives us many instructions on how to become a saint with Him in Heaven. Our Church teaches and preaches how to become a saint. Don’t let the enemy convince you that you’ll never make it, or that you should just aim for Purgatory. Don’t be content with Purgatory, aim for Heaven. Don’t believe any lies that tell you to be mediocre or worldly. Look to the life of Christ – like the saints did – STRIVE for virtue and holiness – and become a saint. – Father Trey Ange