Archive for the ‘Drama’ Category
Tuesday, June 16th, 2020
DA 5 BLOODS is Spike Lee’s new Vietnam War joint that happened to be produced by Netflix, so when our current global nightmare thwarted theatrical release they didn’t have to delay it, they just put it right onto their service, making it one of Pandemic Summer’s biggest blockbusters in my opinion. For now this is our James Bond and our Top Gun (I won’t say Wonder Woman, because it’s very male oriented).
Like so many of Lee’s movies, it finds interesting ways to visually connect history to the present. Think of DO THE RIGHT THING’s showcasing of the photos and quotes of Dr. King and Malcolm, MALCOLM X’s coda of real people (including a newly freed Nelson Mandela) saying “I am Malcolm X!,” or BLACKKKLANSMAN’s montage with the murder of Heather Heyer, the real David Duke and the president’s other Very Fine People in Charlottesville. Following in that tradition, DA 5 BLOODS opens with historical footage and photos establishing Those Uncertain Times of the Vietnam era.
Muhammad Ali explains his refusal to kill people who haven’t done anything to him on behalf of people who have. To the tune of “Inner City Blues,” we see black soldiers in Vietnam, whitey on “Da Moon,” Black Panthers, Malcolm, Martin, Kwame Ture, Angela Davis. We alternate between brutality in Vietnam and at home: burning monks, the Kent State shootings, the street execution from that famous photo, police clubbing protesters at the DNC, the children burned with napalm. When the war ends and this volley of fast-speed documentary turmoil subsides, the frame stretches and contracts to widescreen, and Saigon dissolves to modern tourism-friendly Ho Chi Minh City, where four of our titular quintet meet up in a hotel lobby, hugging and hand shaking, sipping the first of many fruity umbrella cocktails, in a present that will repeatedly bleed into the past. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Chadwick Boseman, Clarke Peters, Delroy Lindo, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Jasper Paakkonen, Jean Reno, Johnny Nguyen, Jonathan Majors, Le Y Lan, Marvin Gaye, Melanie Theirry, Norm Lewis, Paul Walter Hauser, Spike Lee, Veronica Ngo
Posted in Crime, Drama, Reviews, War | 15 Comments »
Wednesday, June 3rd, 2020
“You know, this is what happens when people spend too much time in Florida.”
I can’t lie. Half of my interest in CAPONE was a curiosity about the legend of its writer/director/editor Josh Trank. If you know who that is, you probly know him for a meteoric rise and fall. The success of one found footage movie (CHRONICLE) led to coveted studio gigs – a giant super hero movie and a Star Wars spin-off. But FANTASTIC FOUR was drastically changed from his cut, he quit the Boba Fett movie before they could fire him, there was a weird story in the Hollywood Reporter about his dogs wrecking a house he rented, and he made the career-sabotaging faux pas of disavowing FANTASTIC FOUR on Twitter just before it was released to terrible reviews and box office.
Seemed like a cautionary tale, and I can’t deny a morbid fascination with it. I didn’t love CHRONICLE, save for its cleverness about fitting good camera moves into found footage, so I wondered how these powerful Hollywood people got, and then lost, so much faith in the guy. But when I saw FANTASTIC FOUR I actually found alot to like about it, especially in the discovering-their-powers scenes that I described at the time as “more inspired by THE FLY than SPIDER-MAN.” And I realized that he hadn’t come completely out of nowhere – he edited and co-produced BIG FAN, a dark comedy/drama I liked.
Five years after his fall into the Great Pit of Carkoon, Trank has resurfaced with a self-generated, independent project, not inspired by “geek properties,” but by one of those historical deep cut kind of stories some people get hooked on. CAPONE is about Al Capone not in his gang years, but the last year of his life, released from prison to live in a mansion in Florida as his mental and physical capacity deteriorate from syphilis and strokes. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Al Capone, Al Sapienza, Edgar Arreola, El-P, Josh Trank, Kyle MacLachlan, Linda Cardellini, Matt Dillon, Noel Fisher, Tom Hardy
Posted in Crime, Drama, Reviews | 6 Comments »
Wednesday, May 6th, 2020
BARRY LYNDON is not the type of movie people recommend to me all the time, but it is the kind of movie that most people who have spent as long as me trying to be up on the good movies have, like, bothered to see at some point. Because it is widely known that that Stanley Kubrick usually did a pretty good job of the movies. Yet I managed to go several decades not seeing it. I guess there’s no way to be suspenseful about this – you’ve probly done the math and figured out that since this is a review of BARRY LYNDON by me that means I’ve finally seen BARRY LYNDON. An exciting day. I get to go over to the Homicide: Life On the Street dry-erase board and change the letters from red to black.
Ryan O’Neal (THE DRIVER) stars as Redmond Barry, horny Irish ne’er-do-well who has to leave home and have adventures because he thinks he killed an English officer in a duel. I’m not clear how old he’s supposed to be in the early scenes, but it’s funny that they keep referring to mid-‘30s, manlier-than-everyone-around-him O’Neal as a “boy.” Maybe they should’ve made him sit in oversized furniture like Martin Short in CLIFFORD.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Arthur O'Sullivan, Gay Hamilton, John Alcott, Ken Adam, Leon Vitali, Leonard Rossiter, Marisa Bernson, Michael Hordern, Murray Melvin, Ryan O'Neal, Stanley Kubrick
Posted in Drama, Reviews | 24 Comments »
Wednesday, April 15th, 2020
When we lost the great Stuart Gordon recently, I realized there were a few of his films I still hadn’t seen. It’s kind of nice, actually, to still have something left to discover. There’s a particular one that happens in space that involves truckers that I honestly have wanted to see since before it even came out, and somehow never have. It’ll be a few weeks before I can finally change that, because I decided to order a UK Blu-Ray instead of pay Amazon to stream it in standard def. But I wanted to watch this one first anyway – the one based on the David Mamet play.
Gordon and Mamet, if you don’t know, go way back. Long before RE-ANIMATOR, Gordon was doing envelope-pushing theater work in Chicago. He directed, at his Organic Theater Company, the production of Sexual Perversity in Chicago credited with establishing Mamet as a playwright, although there was an earlier one starring William H. Macy, who also stars in this movie.
Here he plays Edmond Burke, a dude who works for some kind of financial firm called Stearns & Harrington. He’s apparently had a bad day (his meeting on Monday got pushed back to 1:15 – WHAT IN THE LIVING GOD DAMN FUCK!?) when he heads home and, on a whim, stops to get a tarot reading. She tells him “You don’t belong here.” (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Aldiss Hodge, Bai Ling, Bokeem Woodbine, David Mamet, Debi Mazar, Denise Richards, George Wendt, Jeffrey Combs, Joe Mantegna, Julia Stiles, Lionel Mark Smith, Mena Suvari, Rebecca Pidgeon, Stuart Gordon, William H. Macy
Posted in Drama, Reviews | 12 Comments »
Tuesday, March 24th, 2020
Ever since 1989 I have been curious what the deal is with this “THE WIZARD” Nintendosploitation movie starring Fred Savage. But back then I was pretty busy having Batmania, so I remember I said “I better wait for Shout Factory to release a remastered 2-disc collector’s edition Blu-Ray.” And now that day has come.
The movie opens with Jimmy (Luke Edwards, I KNOW MY FIRST NAME IS STEVEN, NEWSIES, LITTLE BIG LEAGUE, JEEPERS CREEPERS 2), a seemingly autistic boy, walking along a desert highway. He must’ve been walking for a while, because there’s a small plane looking for him. When a cop comes and gets him, all the poor kid will say is “California.”
His motives are mysterious, but we’re told he’s been horribly traumatized, so it must have something to do with that. That doesn’t make his jerky stepdad (Sam McMurray, C.H.U.D., STONE COLD, CLASS ACT) any more patient with his wandering, so he decides to put Jimmy in what everyone keeps referring to as “a home.” That especially pisses off Jimmy’s brother or half-brother or whatever, Corey (Savage, director of DADDY DAY CAMP), who lives with his older brother Nick (Christian Slater, HE WAS A QUIET MAN) and drunk loser dad (Beau Bridges, MAX PAYNE). (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Beau Bridges, Christian Slater, Frank McRae, Fred Savage, Jenny Lewis, Sam McMurray, Universal Studios Hollywood, video games
Posted in Comedy/Laffs, Drama, Reviews | 8 Comments »
Wednesday, March 18th, 2020
Even before that fake baby in AMERICAN SNIPER, people were talking like Clint Eastwood was some confused old man who doesn’t know how to direct a movie anymore. Gotta disagree. I know I’m far from the only one who really enjoyed and was surprised by THE MULE, and now that I’ve caught up with Clint’s latest director-only drama, RICHARD JEWELL, I’m here to tell you that’s a good one too. Really good, and to me it’s by far the most compelling of what now seems to be a Real American Heroes series with SNIPER, SULLY and THE 15:17 TO PARIS*.
Okay, yeah, so there’s a part where kids drinking beer in a dorm room have a poster on the wall that says “Beer 2 Night.” Have fun with that one. I didn’t notice the fake baby before so maybe there’s some in this one, I honestly don’t care. It’s a fascinating story, it made me laugh, it moved me, it has one of if not the best lead performance of last year. My friends, I have Jewellmania. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Billy Ray, Charles Green, Clint Eastwood, Ian Gomez, Jon Hamm, Kathy Bates, Kenny Rogers, Olivia Wilde, Paul Walter Hauser, Sam Rockwell
Posted in Drama, Reviews | 24 Comments »
Friday, March 13th, 2020
(contains heavy spoilers for 15 year old movie)
LADY VENGEANCE is the RETURN OF THE JEDI of director Park Chan-wook’s Vengeance Trilogy in that it’s the third one (after SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE and OLDBOY), it’s loaded with delightful elements, and it’s my favorite even though most people probly say the second one is the best. It begins with a woman named Lee Geum-ja (Lee Yung-ae, JOINT SECURITY AREA) being released early from prison. She’s a national media sensation because of the mismatched combination of the horrible crime she was convicted of (murdering a five-year-old boy) and her youthful appearance of “unabashed naivety.” She got wall-to-wall news coverage, there was a trend of wearing polka-dot dresses like hers, tabloids compared her to Olivia Hussey.
(I wonder what Olivia Hussey is known for in South Korea? ROMEO AND JULIET? BLACK CHRISTMAS? Or maybe a random one like TURKEY SHOOT is huge there?)
(read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Chan-wook Park, Choi Min-sik, Go Su-hee, Kim Byong-ok, Korean cinema, Lee Yung-ae, Olivia Hussey, revenge, See Yeong-ju
Posted in Drama, Reviews, Thriller | 7 Comments »
Wednesday, March 11th, 2020
During my annual Oscar-bait viewing I was scared away from multi-nominee (best actress, best supporting actress, best makeup and hair) BOMBSHELL, about the Roger Ailes sexual harassment scandal at Fox News, when my friend Matt Lynch tweeted that it was “worse than VICE!” That was an effective and immediate optimism killer. Now that it’s on video though I gave it a shot and I don’t agree, it’s not nearly as obnoxious or frustrating as VICE. But what good does that do to me when it’s not very good either?
Three great actresses play three Fox News employees with their own little stories. Two are playing known real life TV personalities. All three are blonde. Charlize Theron (REINDEER GAMES) plays Megyn Kelly, the star of her own show who was held out as the smart and independent woman at Fox because a couple she noted Trump’s sexism a couple times during the 2016 election. Of couse she also did the same bullshit as every other jerk on that network (about the only example in the movie is her crusade against non-white depictions of Santa Claus).
Theron, one of my favorite working actors, captures Kelly’s demeanor well, and at times the makeup job is uncanny. But I kept thinking “Who does her accent remind me of?” and once I realized it was Mira Sorvino in ROMY AND MICHELE’S HIGH SCHOOL REUNION I couldn’t unthink it. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Charles Randolph, Charlize Theron, Jay Roach, John Lithgow, Malcolm McDowell, Margot Robbie, Nicole Kidman
Posted in Drama, Reviews | 29 Comments »
Monday, March 9th, 2020
(heavy spoilers)
Recently my editor at Rebeller asked me to do a column on Park Chan-wook’s so called “Vengeance Trilogy.” I had seen and reviewed OLDBOY long ago, but somehow never got to SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE and LADY VENGEANCE. I’m glad I watched them, and I thought they would be worth delving into further. That was a good column, but I’m officially reviewing them for posterity now.
In case you, like me, managed to hear 18 years worth of praise for MR. VENGEANCE without actually finding out what it was about, here goes. It’s the story of Ryu (Shin Ha-kyun, THE VILLAINESS), a deaf and mute young man who dropped out of art school to work at a factory because his sister (Im Ji-eun) needs a kidney transplant. He’s not a match, but he’s saving up his money in case they find a suitable donor. He’s able to narrate the story through letters he sends to a DJ to read on the air, and he’ll sit with his sister as she listens to the broadcasts. (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Bae Doona, Chan-wook Park, Korean cinema, Shin Ha-kyun, Song Kang-ho
Posted in Drama, Reviews | 8 Comments »
Monday, February 17th, 2020
Before the 2019 awards season dissipates entirely from memory I want to get my thoughts down about one of the movies I watched. As I’ve said before, one of the reasons I like following the Oscars is to get myself to watch a few things that I wouldn’t otherwise, for a little of the ol’ BoH (Broadening of Horizons). I always bring up the example of when I had no interest in THE MISERABLES but I watched it because it was the only best picture nominee I hadn’t seen and it turned out I loved it.
This year all the best picture nominees were things I’d seen or was already planning to see. But there was one movie that I correctly guessed would be a winner that I really did not think would be my cup of tea – JUDY.
Things I had against it: Not generally a fan of biopics. Not particularly curious about the life of Judy Garland. Never really impressed by Renee Zelweger. I absolutely would not have watched this for any other reason than “Eh, she’s gonna get best actress, might as well find out if I should be mad about that or not.” (read the rest of this shit…)
Tags: Andy Nyman, Bella Ramsey, biopic, Finn Wittrock, Gemma-Leah Devereux, Jessie Buckley, Judy Garland, Lewin Lloyd, Renee Zellweger, Rufus Sewell, Rupert Goold, Tom Edge
Posted in Drama, Reviews | 4 Comments »
