Finally, Film Babble Blog’s Favorite Films Of 2023!

As s it’s almost February, and the Oscar noms have been announced (and I finally got around to watching PLEASE DON’T DESTROY: THE TREASURE OF FOGGY MOUNTAIN), I’m finally posting my 10 Top movies (and some spillover) from 2023.

This has been a much better year for film than any of the last several, since before the Pandemic actually, so it was an easier time making these picks. Like a number of my choices, the first one was a movie that surprised me with how much I liked it. 

 

1. DREAM SCENARIO (Dir. Kristoffer Borgli) Nicholas Cage’s 11,875th film is one of his best, featuring an timely, inventive premise in which Cage’s schlubby college professor starts showing up in many people’s dreams, giving a new layer to going viral. It’s a profoundly cringy experience that I bet will stay with me longer than most of the other movies on this list. Read my review: When Nicholas Cage Dreams Become Nicholas Cage Nightmares (11/30/23).

2 KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON (Dir. Martin Scorsese) 

Master movie-maker Marty made a corker of a three and a half-hour thriller about the Osage Reign of Terror in early 1920’s Oklahoma set to the late, great Robbie Robertson’s superbly subtle, bluesy score, which should get him a posthumous Oscar (I'm not going to predict anything yet though). And the powerful film features a career best Leonardo DiCaprio, and a more invested than he has been lately, Robert De Niro together again, for the very first time (they worked together before in A BOY’S LIFE, but this is their first film under Scorsese’s direction together (DiCaprio has been in six Scorsese films; De Niro’s tally is 10). Read the Film Blog Review (10/19/23).

 

3. OPPENHEIMER (Dir. David Nolan)

Nolan’s epic biopic of nuclear physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, played by Cillian Murphy, wowed the world in the wake of the crazy BARBENHEIMER movement by being a three-hour biopic about a scientist that grossed $955 million. Robert Downey Jr. is a lock for his portrayal of a political rival of our rail thin lead is a lock for the Best Supporting Actor Academy Award, but with 13 noms, this film has a good chance of sweeping. Read my review: Christopher Nolan's OPPENHEIMER Is Kind Of A Big Deal (7/19/23)

 

4. THE HOLDOVERS (Dir. Alexander Payne)

Payne rebounds from the disappointing DOWNSIZING, with this charming, and very amusing early ‘70s-set dramedy with Paul Giamatti (for his second collaboration with Paybe after the superb SIDEWAYS) as a classics professor at a New England boarding school that has to baby-sit a few students (mostly the talented newcomer Dominic Sessa) who are stuck on campus during the holidays. Da’vine Joy Randolph definitely deserves her Supporting Actress nom for work here as school’s head cook, who’s grieving over son who just died in Vietnam, and the other four noms are worthy too, so this is one I hope more people seek out.

 

5. ANATOMY OF A FALL (Dir. Justine Triet)

The DVD screener of the first film I watched on New Year's Day, 2024

Oscar Best Acrtress nominee Sandra Hüller did double duty this last year in two majorly recognized films as she’s in this French courtroom drama, and Jonathan Glazer’s excellent THE ZONE OF INTEREST. Here she nails her role as a stressed writer trying to prove her innocence in her husband’s death, and the screenplay by Triet, and Arthur Harari keeps us guessing as it goes through gripping court proceedings. Like #4, this also got five Oscar noms, and shouldn’t be missed.

 

6. GODZILLA MINUS ONE (Dir. Takashi Yamazaki)

Now this was a complete surprise as another Godzilla movie was not the most enticing prospect, but the 37th entry in the series that started 70 years ago, is an amazing, gripping action adventure motion picture that won me over early on with its engaging drama about Japan recovering from World War II, and having to band together to fight this nuclear-radiation created reptilian monster that is more convincingly depicted (thanks to state-of-the-art CGI) than ever before. I certainly agree with Keven Smith that it’s the best Godzilla movie ever. 

7. MAY DECEMBER (Dir. Todd Haynes)

This immaculately-made duel of a drama between Julianne Moore, as a woman who did time for the second-degree rape of a 13-year old, but 20 years later is married to the man who was that boy; and Natalie Portman as an actress who is visiting the couple at their lavish Savannah, Georgia home, for research for a film where she’ll play Moore’s character. The compelling narrative, with its tasty twists and all, helps it stand with Haynes finest work including VELVERT GOLDMINE, I’M NOT THERE, and CAROL.

8. PAST LIVES (Dir. Celine Song)

Another surprise here as a Oscar Best Picture contender, and as a movie that I liked enough to make the list, as this a small movie about a relationship between two childhood friends from South Korean who contain their spark, mostly online as they live far away from each other into adulthood. It’s a of unrequited love with naturalistic performances by Greta Lee, and Teo Yoo, with John Magaro putting in a nicely sensitive side character to the couple as Lee’s understanding husband. However, I doubt this will win anything Oscar-wise other than many viewers hearts.

 

9. BEAU IS AFRAID (Dir. Ari Aster) 

My placing of this weird ass A24 surrealist tragicomedy horror film (that’s what Wikipedia’s calling it so let’s go with that) shouldn’t be read as a recommendation or a warning or well, anything but that I couldn’t deny its hold on my troubled soul. It’s a grotesque, stressful, and just plain f-ed up story about Joaquinn Phoenix of a man living a hellish existence, who is going on a trip to his mother’s, but chaotic circumstances make his journey a nightmare. If you’re only going to see one Joaquin Phoenix 2023 movie, make sure it’s this and not NAPOLEON.

 

10. ALBERT BROOKS: DEFENDING MY LIFE (Dir. Rob Reiner) 

The life, and career of one of my all-time comedians, Albert Brooks, is explored over lunch with his best friend, Rob Reiner in this HBO biodoc that is so packed with great footage of Brooks’ legendary variety, and talk show appearances from the late ‘60s-‘70s that it should be mandatory viewing for aspiring comics. Brook’s classic comedies (like REAL LIFE, MODERN ROMANCE, and LOST IN AMERICA) are insightfully given discussion, with one of its best segments being about the film that inspired this film’s title, DEFENDING YOUR LIFE . A stand out moment, is when Brook's wife since 1997, Kimberly, says of her first wanting to meet him because of that movie, “This man, wrote, directed, and starred in this? That’s the kid of guy I want to marry. I swear to God I said that.” Touching stuff indeed.

Spillover:

THE ZONE OF INTEREST (Dir. Jonathan Glaser)

AMERICAN FICTION (Dir. Cord Jefferson)

TALK TO ME (Dirs. Danny and Michael Philippou)

Some franchise films I thought were better than okay:

SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE (Dirs. Joaquim Dos Santos,Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson)

JOHN WICK 4 (Dir. Chad Stahelski) 

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART ONE (Dir. Christopher McQuarrie) This film's title really needs a colon.

And finally, yes, it’s far from a great movie, but it’s still one of the most notable, and memorable films of 2023:

BARBIE (Dir. Greta Gerwig)

Okay, I’m done. 

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‘Tis The Season For Oscar Bait Biopics: MAESTRO, FERRARI, and NAPOLEON

Yes, it’s that time of year again when the studios drop the big prestige pictures, and this round of Oscar-bait biopics are for sure the most prestigious this season. As these three films, each big ass, lavish productions with big ass names behind, and in front of the camera, are going to be in theaters or available streaming over the holidays, I thought I’d give ‘em the ole Film Babble Blog appraisal, so here goes:

MAESTRO (Dir. Bradley Cooper, 2023)

Bradley Cooper’s follow-up to his acclaimed 2018 directorial debut, A STAR IS BORN, garnered criticism when early buzz revealed that the actor (also the film’s co-writer, and producer) wore a large prosthetic nose to enhance his resemblance to his subject Leonard Bernstein, but upon being incredibly charmed by Cooper's lush, loving tribute to the iconic composer/conductor, it is not a critique that holds much weight.

For the nose just fades convincingly into the face of Cooper’s Bernstein, or Lenny to his friends, fronting a lived-in, layered, and authentic-feeling performance that is sure to get plenty of accolade action in the weeks, months, and years to come. Cooper’s portrait has a predictable structure - the narrative is initially told in black and white flashbacks (the film switches to color as it moves into the modern era) structured as remembrances in interviews by the elder Bernstein shown in crisp color - but it transcends this convention with its fluid style, and poetic, tuneful tone.

In a portrayal that rivals Cooper’s, Carey Mulligan beautifully plays Bernstein’s wife of 26 years, Felicia Montealegre Bernstein. Their relationship is the crux of the story as we see that despite his homosexuality (i.e. affairs with men), Felicia loved Lenny, and put up with his infidelities, though we witness that taking its toll.

For the uninitiated, Cooper and Josh Singer’s screenplay serves up Leonard Bernstein 101, from his debut with the New York Philharmonic in 1943 to scoring such Broadway classics as On the Town, and West Side Story or classic motion pictures like ON THE WATERFRONT to his legendary conducting of Mahler's Resurrection Symphony at Ely Cathedral in 1973, among other career highlights sharply shot by cinematographer, Matther Libatique (PI, REQUIEM FOR A DREAM).

With superb supporting work by Sarah Silverman, Matt Bomer, and Maya Hawke, MAESTRO is Cooper’s moving love letter to Bernstein, and the evolving emotional languages of the times he lived in, and helped shape musically. It’s one to stream on up when it hits Netflix tomorrow (December 20).

FERRARI (Dir. Michael Mann, 2023)

Michael Mann makes sleek, streamlined, manly movies about powerful, conflicted men and his latest fancy flick about Italian car racing entrepreneur Enzo Ferrari is no exception. A coiffed, gray haired Adam Driver plays the motor mogul in a measured, stoic manner, which is offset by the tirades by his wife, Laura (Penélope Cruz), who, in an early scene shoots at him with a gun his mother scoffs at him for giving her.

“Your mother missed on purpose,” Enzo says as he visits the tomb of his dead son, Dino. “One day, she won’t, and I’ll be in here with you.” Such sets the tone as the movie veers from the love triangle between Enzo, Laura, and his secret mistress (a possibly miscast, but still affecting Shailene Woodley) and his race track excursions in 1957, when the tragedy of the Mille Miglia occurred killing nine spectators - a profoundly disturbing shot as Mann, via Director of Photography, Eric Messerschmidt, stunningly captures (with the help of some CGI, of course).

Driver and Mann’s approach may be cold, and overly slick, but FERRARI is a purposeful portrait with a lot of gusto and glorious oomph especially in its racing sequences. It doesn't reach the heights of previous Mann movies like HEAT or COLLATERAL, but it is far and above his last works, PUBLIC ENEMIES and BLACK HAT for certain. It's well worth getting out of the house for when it opens Christmas Day.

NAPOLEON (Dir. Ridley Scott, 2023)

Since its release at the end of last month, Ridley Scott’s long awaited historical epic about the infamous French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, has gotten mixed reviews, and underperformed at the box office - bad news for a movie that cost 137 million.

But does the film deserve that unimpressive reception? Well, yes and no, but mostly yes, as it suffers from horrible dialogue (“You think you're so great just because you have boats!” is an actual line), uninspired performances (actually Joaquin Phoenix does his best with a questionably written role, but no one else in the cast offers much energy) has lengthy sequences that drag, and overall left me with an empty feeling.

This is largely because Scott’s treatment, scripted by David Scarpa (a screenwriter whose previous work including THE LAST CASTLE, and the 2008 remake of THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL is less than stellar), is all about how pathetic its subject is, despite having conquered most of Europe in the 19th century.

Napoleon calls his wife, Joséphine (Vanessa Kirby) a slut because while he’s off at war, she's taking lovers, which inspires ridicule in the press, and much of the narrative concerns their rocky relationship. This material is strained, and dull, with the more successful scenes being the battles. Scott, with the aid of cinematographer Dariusz Wolski, takes us convincingly into such major skirmishes as the Battle of Austerlitz, which, taking place on a frozen lake, visually pops more than anything else in the movie.

More than once, I was reminded of a moment in Woody Allen’s LOVE AND DEATH, a parody of War and Peace that also features Napolean, where Allen’s character observes that the battle he's in looks different to the generals up on the hill, and the film cuts to a flock of sheep instead of soldiers being driven forward.

So, yeah, NAPOLEAN is a very mixed bag that proves that the Joaquin Phoenix movie to see in 2023 is Ari Aster’s BEAU IS AFRAID.

So, two out of three ain’t bad when it comes to this season’s Oscar-bait biopics.

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Hey Kids! Funtime 2020 Oscar® Predictions!

Here we go again - and much earlier this time as the 92nd Academy Awards is taking place the earliest in the year that the ceremony has ever been held. On February 9, a show with no hosts will give out gold statues to mostly white folks, and celebrate 2019’s most profitable, I mean memorable cinematic works. 

So below are my predictions. I went back and forth as to whether PARASITE or 1917 would win the big awards (Best Picture, Best Director), but I went with 1917 as it seems it's right in the Academy voters wheelhouse - according to past years. Now take these guesses with a grain of salt as last year I had my worst score ever (13 out of 24), but I have some good years too (my best was 21 out of 24).

Anyway, here they are:

1.BEST PICTURE: 1917

2. BEST DIRECTOR: Sam Mendes

3. BEST ACTOR: Joaquin Phoenix (JOKER)

4. BEST ACTRESS: Renée Zelleweger (JUDY)

5. BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Brad Pitt (ONCE UPON ATIME IN HOLLYWOOD)

 
6. BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Laura Dern (MARRIAGE STORY)

7. PRODUCTION DESIGN: Barbara Ling, Nancy Haigh (ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD)

8. CINEMATOGRAPHY: Roger Deakins (1917)

9. COSTUME DESIGN: Jacqueline Durran (LITTLE WOMEN)

 
10. DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: AMERICAN FACTORY

11. DOCUMENTARY SHORT:  LEARNING TO SKATEBOARD IN A WARZONE (IF YOU’RE A GIRL)

12. FILM EDITING: FORD V FERRARI

13. MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING: BOMBSHELL 

 
14. VISUAL EFFECTS: 1917

15. ORIGINAL SCORE: Thomas Newman (1917)

16. ORIGINAL SONG: “(I’m Gonna) Love Me Again” (ROCKETMAN) 

17. ANIMATED SHORT: KITBULL

18. LIVE ACTION SHORT: BROTHERHOOD

19. SOUND EDITING: 1917

20. SOUND MIXING: 1917

 21. ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY:  Bong Joon Ho, Han Jin Won (PARASITE)

22. ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Taika Waititi (JOJO RABBIT)

23. ANIMATED FEATURE FILM: TOY STORY 4

24. BEST INTERNATIONAL (No longer FOREIGN) FILM: PARASITE

As I always say, tune in Monday to see how many I got wrong.

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2019 Fall Film Roundup Part 1

As I’ve said before, I haven’t been babbling much these days as I’ve been publicizing my new book Wilcopedia (available here). But that doesn’t mean I haven’t seen any new movies so this is my roundup of a handful of films that I’ve taken in lately.

JOKER (Todd Phillips)

It was funny that on the same day that the news that Martin Scorsese put down the whole superhero genre by saying, “That’s not cinema,” the most Scorsesean comic book movie ever was released. Phillips’ film borrows heavily from MEAN STREET, TAXI DRIVER, and THE KING COMEDY, even featuring those movies’ star, Robert De Niro. 

Dancing and cackling through all of this is Joaquin Phoenix in the title role, Joker, not “The Joker” like I thought going in. Set in a crime-ridden Gotham City in 1981, Phoenix starts the film as clown-for-hire Arthur Fleck, who, after getting attacked by thugs , suffers a series of setbacks which lead to him cracking up and killing two Wall Street guys on the subway. 

Phoenix is fully invested as Arthur Fleck/Joker in a performance that is as entertainingly disturbingly as you can get. However, this dark, and grotesque, and fearsome flick is ramshackle in its pacing and its message (is there one?) is muddled. I think its theme is something about the necessary of violence class warfare, but I’m not sure. What I am sure about is that Phoenix alone is why I’d recommend this film. 

ZOMBIELAND: DOUBLE TAP

(Dir. Ruben Fleischer) 

It’s been ten years since the first ZOMBIELAND, but you wouldn’t know it from the returning cast, Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, and Abigail Breslin who all look about the same. Well, except for Breslin, who was 13 in the original. A good bit of the plot concerns Breslin’s Little Rock leaving the gang, and finding a hippy boyfriend (Avan Jogia). The others go after them, fighting zombies all the way, and meeting new characters or cameos in the form of Rosario Dawson, Luke Wilson, and Zoey Deutch, who brings a big sitcom element in the form of her typical dumb blonde role. 

While the first one featured a rollercoaster orgy of zombie blood, this time we’re treated to monster truck rally of a climax. ZOMBIELAND: DOUBLE TAP (meaning to strike the fatal blow to the undead twice), is roughly the same quality as its predecessor, meaning that its equally fun, and funny, but the zombie genre is growing a bit tiresome (at least to me). I do appreciate that they’ve tried to up the ante with elements like smarter zombies, dubbed T-800s, a slew of new rules that are spelled out on the screen, and “Zombie Kill of the Year” (it was “of the week” the first time around), but I’m hoping they’ll leave it there. However, maybe in 2029 I’ll want to see a third entry. Time will tell. 

DOLEMITE IS MY NAME (Dir. Craig Brewer) 

Eddie Murphy makes his comeback in this delightful yet extremely profane biopic of comedian, filmmaker, and blaxploitation icon Rudy Ray Moore. The film starts off in 1973, with Moore as a struggling comic/musician who considers himself a “total entertainment experience,” but can’t get his dated ‘50s-‘60s R&B singles on the radio. Moore’s luck changes when he appropriates the rhyming tales about a lewd pimp named Dolemite from a neighborhood wino (Ron Cephas Jones) and becomes a star reciting the raunchy routines with enthusiastic vigor at clubs and then on best-selling records. 

Before long, Moore wants to make a movie about the character, and recruits screenwriter Jerry Jones (Keegan Michael-Key), actor/director D’Urville Martin (a superb Wesley Snipes), producer Theodore Toney (Tituss Burgess), and singer Ben Taylor (Craig Robinson) to perform the film’s theme song.

The movie is a lot of infectious fun that’s propelled by the determined D.Y.I. spirit and swagger of Murphy’s Moore. The funky film, which is full of garish ‘70s threads and groovy soul, may end with the trope of a triumphant movie premiere (see BADASSS, HITCHCOCK, and THE DISASTER ARTIST) but it completely earns its charming climax. Murphy owns his performance throughout as it’s a charge to see him reeling off reams of rhythmic profanity in his first R-rated role in 20 years. 

The hilarious and oddly inspiring DOLEMITE IS MY NAME is currently available streaming on Netflix.

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DON’T WORRY, HE WON’T GET FAR ON FOOT: The Film Babble Blog Review

DON’T WORRY, HE WON’T GET FAR ON FOOT

(Dir. Gus Van Sant, 2018) 

Once again, Joaquin Phoenix puts in an outstanding performance in a film very few people are likely to see.

This touching, and funny adaptation of the memoir of controversial cartoonist John Callahan is only playing at a handful of theaters in my area (the Triangle in N.C.) so it’ll probably come and go under most moviegoers’ noses and that’s a shame.

Callahan (1951-2010) was a Portland, Oregon-based hippy who became a quadriplegic after a drunken automobile accident in 1972. We learn about his life via an array of different threads including Phoenix’s Callahan as the speaker at a college event, giving a confessional at a AA meeting, and showing his ink-drawn cartoons to a group of kids who come to his aid when he falls out of his wheelchair in the street.

The film flashes back to the 21-year old Callahan’s last day when he could walk before the accident in Los Angeles, in which he parties hard with a mustached, side-burned Jack Black as Dexter, a guy he had just met at a party.

They leave that party to head to what Dexter says is a better party, stopping at a bar along the way to get even more wasted. The drunk duo drive around aimlessly, ride a rollercoaster at an amusement park, puke, and pass out – well, Callahan passes out while Dexter at the wheel of Callahan’s Volkswagen Bug smashes into a light pole at 90 mph.

Callahan comes to and is told by a doctor that he’s possibly paralyzed for life, and he goes through the various stages of his physical recovery in which a blonde, short-haired Rooney Mara with a Swedish accent shows up for some reason – she might be his massage therapist, I dunno - to tell him he’s very good looking.

Then we’ve got a slimmed-down Jonah Hill with long blonde hair who’s great as Callahan’s sponsor, Donnie, who lives in a lavish mansion he inherited where he holds support group meetings. In a few of the movie’s best scenes, Callahan gets to know his fellow recovering alcoholics like Beth Ditto as the outspoken Reba, Mark Webber as the angry Mike, and Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon as the acerbic Corky (another indie rock icon, Sleater Kinney and Portandia’s Carrie Brownstein appears as Callahan’s case worker).

But despite Donnie and the group, Callahan still drinks, but around the film’s halfway mark he has an epiphany where he has a vision of his mother (Mireille Enos) that had abandoned him when he was a kid and this inspires him to change his ways.

Callahan starts to scribble crude cartoons with edgy captions, and, as he later tells his audience at the aforementioned speaking engagement, he realized that he “should’ve been a cartoonist, a gag man, all along.” Throughout the narrative, Callahan’s black and white cartoons, one of which the title of the film comes from, get a bit of the animation treatment, but it doesn’t come off as too gimmicky. 

Rooney, now a flight attendant, pops up again for some romance with Phoenix’s Callahan, but the rest of the film mostly concerns his getting recognition for his cartoons when they are published by such notable outlets as the New Yorker, Penthouse, and Playboy, and many newspapers. Some folks don’t take too kindly to the taboo teasing nature of his work, so they are many complaint letters and people telling him off in public but he develops a thick skin and perseveres.

And that’s what this fine film, one of Gus Van Sant’s most personal works, is about – persevering. It could have been a cheesy inspirational biodoc – Robin Williams was originally slated to play Callahan and it could’ve been another PATCH ADAMS - but with Phoenix’s invested performance, its excellent cast, and its sincere, unpretentious approach via Van Sant’s very thoughtful screenplay, DON’T WORRY, HE WON’T GET FAR ON FOOT is a strong drama dealing with addiction and overcoming disabilities while finding oneself in the process. The laughs that come through Callahan's cartoons are the icing on the cake.

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No Rationale Makes IRRATIONAL MAN Into Worthwhile Woody Allen

Now playing at an art house near me:

IRRATIONAL MAN (Dir. Woody Allen, 2015)

In my review of Woody Allen’s previous film, 2014's MAGIC IN THE MOONLIGHT, I proposed that in the last decade or so of Woody Allen's nearly half-century filmmaking career, every other film is worthwhile. However, while his latest, IRRATIONAL MAN, is a considerable improvement over the fluffy, inconsequential rom com MAGIC, I'm seriously re-thinking that theory.

However, it does starts off intriguingly with protagonist Joaquin Phoenix as Abe Lucas, a boozing, tortured philosophy professor arriving at the fictional Braylin College in Rhode Island to teach a summer session. Phoenix’s inner monologue/voice over tells us that he’s hit rock bottom emotionally and existentially, while gossip among the staff and students around campus tells us that that’s exactly what makes him attractive (“I kind of like the burnout look,” we hear a coed tell her friends, who wholeheartedly agree).

Before long, Phoenix’s Abe is spending a lot of time with one of his students, Jill Pollard played by Emma Stone, making her second appearance in an Allen film (MAGIC was her first), and he’s also being pursued by Parker Posey as Rita Richards, an unhappily married science professor.

Abe succumbs to Rita, but his mental hang ups have rendered him impotent. This helps him to resist Jill’s attempts to seduce him, citing that she has a devoted boyfriend who’s more suited for her, the preppy Roy played by Jamie Blackley. Blackley is stuck with one of Allen’s clichéd archetypes – the nice guy boyfriend who’s destined to be cheated on.

So for a bit we follow Phoenix and Stone around as they stroll around Braylin (actually Salve Regina University), and Newport discussing the subtleties of situational ethics, and referencing the work of such grand thinkers as Dostoyevsky and Kant. Then an actual plot development occurs – in a diner they overhear a conversation in which a woman talking with friends about her bitter custody battle. The judge presiding over the case is on her ex-husband’s side, and he’s drawing out the trial in order to bleed the woman dry. “I hope the judge gets cancer,” she exclaims, but Abe, stricken by what he hears, starts to hatch a plan in his head.

Abe, believing that he has finally found a meaningful act that will snap him out of his despair, schemes to murder the judge. He figures that his lack of motive and connection to the involved parties will make this the perfect crime, and that the world will be a better place without the corrupt judge. This decision changes Abe’s outlook on life radically, and the scenes in which he plots his victim’s demise are the most compelling in the movie – aided in no small part by the well utilized lively piano jazz of the Ramsey Lewis Trio on the soundtrack.

Abe secures cyanide to do the deed by stealing Rita’s key to the college’s chem lab, and stalks the judge so that he can learn his routine. Early on a Saturday morning, Abe is able to successfully poison the judge’s orange juice while he’s taking a break from running to read the paper on a park bench.

Initially, it looks like Abe has indeed committed the perfect murder as the judge’s death is considered to be by heart attack, but days later an autopsy detects the cyanide. Both Jill and Rita begin to suspect Abe, especially after certain clues start piling up that point to his guilt. Jill confronts Abe and he confesses the crime to her, but sticks to his stance that the murder was morally justified. Then its announced that the police have a suspect and Abe has to deal with the fact that an innocent man may take the fall.

As similar situations have happened in Allen’s work before – most notably in CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS and MATCH POINT – it can appear that the 79-year old writer/director is obsessed with whether murder can be gotten away with or if we live in a moral universe where that’s impossible. Problem is that he’s handled these themes much better before (especially in CRIMES which it appears he's remade several times now) and in this effort it feels a lot like he’s yet again treading water.

Underneath all the talky philosophizing, there's no interesting ideas that are being expressed in Allen's screenplay. It's pretty by-the-numbers stuff narratively, and its ending is an unsatisfyingly rushed wrap-up. The love story angle, whether it's between Phoenix and Stone or Phoenix and Posey, is fairly unaffecting as well.

But it does feature some fine, appealing acting - Phoenix’s lived-in performance as Abe, a guy who's into Russian novelists and Russian roulette, beautifully conveys a kind of meticulous messiness, Stone makes an energetic effort in embodying Jill, and Posey makes the most out of a underwritten role. On another plus side, returning cinematographer Darius Khondji, who shot Allen's TO ROME WITH LOVE, MIDNIGHT IN PARIS, and MAGIC IN THE MOONLIGHT gives the film a great, lush look (the town of Newport, Rhode Island never looked better), but there’s just not any there there.

Allen’s 46th film as filmmaker is sadly another weak late period effort. It’s time for me to throw the “every other one is good” theory out the window, because there’s not a rationale I can think of that makes IRRATIONAL MAN into worthwhile Woody Allen.

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INHERENT VICE: The Film Babble Blog Review

Opening today at an indie art house near me:

INHERENT VICE

(Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, 2014)

In a recent interview on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast, writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson claimed he wasn’t a stoner, that he really didn’t get stoned. 

Well, INHERENT VICE, Anderson’s adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s 2009 comic-noir novel of the same name, coulda fooled me.

It’s such a rambling, sprawling, shaggy dog story with a lotta ins, a lotta outs, a lotta what-have-yous as The Dude would say, all filtered through hazy clouds of pot smoke that it feels like it could’ve only been made by a filmmaker who’s stoned out of his mind.

Of course, my mention of The Dude doesn’t come from out of the blue. The film’s depiction of a countercultural underdog unraveling connections throughout the seedy underworld of Los Angeles heavily recalls the Coen brothers’ THE BIG LEBOWSKI (1998), as well as Robert Altman’s THE LONG GOODBYE (1973).

Pynchon’s novel seemed to have those references embedded in it as well, and Anderson puts forth a largely faithful take on the original source material, right down to the exact wording of large chunks of the book’s dialogue.

In his second film for Anderson following 2012’s THE MASTER, Joaquin Phoenix plays pothead protagonist Larry “Doc” Sportello, a long-haired, unkempt sideburns-sporting private investigator living in Gordita Beach, California in 1970. Doc’s ex-girlfriend Shasta (the pretty and appropriately flighty Katherine Waterson) shows up after an absence of over a year, and asks him for his help concerning her current boyfriend, a real estate mogul named Mickey Wolfman (Eric Roberts).

Mickey’s wife (Serena Scott Thomas) and her lover, are working on what Shasta calls “a creepy little scheme” to have her rich husband committed to a mental institution so that they can make off with his fortune.

From there, Phoenix’s Doc gets hired by The Wire’s Michael Kenneth Williams as a member of the “Black Guerilla Family” gang to find a white supremacist, named Glenn Charlock (Christopher Allen Nelson), who happens to be one of Mickey’s bodyguards.

After following a lead that ends up with our extremely high hero getting knocked unconscious at a Massage parlor named Chick Planet, Doc is questioned by his long-time cop nemesis, Christian “Bigfoot” Bjornsen (Josh Brolin, going big and succeeding), a thick-necked, flat-topped, hippie-hating hardass member of the LAPD.

Luckily, Benicio Del Toro as slick marine lawyer Sauncho Smilax swoops in to get Doc released, but, unluckily, Shasta and Mickey have completely disappeared into thin air.

As if things weren’t complicated enough, Doc takes on another case that’s possibly related, involving the death of surf-rock saxophonist Coy Harlingen (a whispering Owen Wilson) as his widow Hope (Jena Malone) thinks he’s still alive.

From there, Doc visits with his special lady friend, Deputy D.A. Penny Kimball, played by Phoenix’s WALK THE LINE co-star Reese Witherspoon, gets interrogated by FBI agents (Parenthood’s Sam Jaeger and Veep’s Timothy Simons), and, most amusingly, does cocaine with Martin Short as an coked-up dentist. Doc’s trail keeps leading to some sinister entity called “Golden Fang,” which is either a mysterious ship for running drugs, an Indo-Chinese heroin cartel, and/or a syndicate of dentists. I’m still not sure which.

Making her film debut, indie singer/songwriter Joanna Newsom serve as the film’s onscreen narrator Sortilège, a minor character in the book but here the custodian to descriptions of Doc’s inner thoughts, somewhat surreally I might add.

Which means that one minute, Doc is driving with Sortilège riding shotgun telling us about “the long, sad history of LA land use,” and the next minute she’s gone. The freshness of Newsom's delivery of Pynchon's prose enhances the dry sections of the film considerably.

The fading of the sunny idealistic ‘60s into the scary, smacked out ‘70s is conveyed strikingly through Robert Elswit’s always stunning cinematography (Elswit has shot 6 of Anderson’s 7 movies), which gives both dark, dank interiors and sun-bleached exteriors a great burnt-out look, and the score by Radiohead’s Johnny Greenwood mixed with well chosen songs by Neil Young, Can, Lex Baxter, and the Chuck Jackson Motown classic “Any Day Now,” perfectly evokes the era as well.

Unfortunately INHERENT VICE is no masterpiece. It’s frustratingly low energy at times with scenes that linger on and on. Many critics are calling it “incoherent vice” (there’s a joke I bet will be made at the Oscars) for understandable reasons, but while I sometimes stared at the screen and thought that it was a meandering mess, I was more often struck by the brilliance of many of its moments.

I’ve seen it twice now, and I enjoyed and “got it” a lot more the second time. Phoenix's performance, which initially bothered me as being half-assed, seemed more nuanced (I could see that he was really using his full ass), and I felt more of a poetry to its slow pace than before.

Being the first ever adaptation of a Pynchon novel – books that many have said are unfilmable - is no small feat, and I can’t imagine anybody doing a better job with this particular material than Anderson.

Folks who aren’t Anderson or Pynchon fans going in aren’t likely to be won over, especially at its long-ass length of 2 and a half hours, but those who are hip to its vibe and can get into a groove with its stoned tone are likely to think it’s a gas, man. Sorry, to lay that outdated lingo on you, but I bet deep down you dig it.

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Joaquin Phoenix Is Smitten With His Operating System In Spike Jonze’s HER

HER (Dir. Spike Jonze, 2013) 

This is way too lovely and poetic a film to find mixed in with the formulaic fodder at your local multiplex. Yet that’s where it’s playing in my area having bypassed the independent theater circuit because of awards season buzz.

Set in a shiny clean Los Angeles in the near future, where everyone wears beltless high-waisted pants, the film concerns a love story between a meek mustached Joaquin Phoenix and his phone’s sentient operating system voiced by the sultry Scarlett Johansson.

Having weathered a painful breakup (we catch fleeting glimpses in flashbacks of Phoenix in an extremely emotional relationship with Rooney Mara, best known for the American version of THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO), our soft spoken protagonist purchases said OS1, which is billed as the first artificially intelligent operating system, and is immediately taken with the disembodied voice of Johansson.

Johansson, names herself Samantha after reading the book “How To Name Your Baby” in two one hundredths of a second, and goes about sorting through all of Phoenix’s files on his hard drive.

Phoenix writes for a company that produces custom made greeting cards (Beautiful Handwritten Letters Dot Com), so his sentimental “sad and mopey” (as Amy Adams, his documentary film maker friend, puts it) nature comes in handy.

After Adams sets him up on a blind date (played by Olivia Wilde in a small but crucial cameo) that at first goes well but ends badly when commitment comes up, Phoenix finds himself falling hard for Samantha. What’s freaky is that Samantha feels the same and even hires a surrogate (Portia Doubleday) to act as her body so they can have sex.

Phoenix’s predicament isn’t an anomaly as many others are having relationships with their OS’s including Adams since her marriage (to a jaded Matt Letscher) went south. The film’s take on a future world in which isolationism is a lifestyle choice, isn’t so farfetched as anybody who’s been in a public place filled with folks with their faces buried in the screens of their devices can attest.

Jonze first solo screenplay, which won Best Screenplay at Sunday’s Golden Globes Awards), shows that he learned much from Charlie Kaufman, who wrote the director’s first few films (BEING JOHN MALKOVICH and ADAPTATION).

There’s a lot of emotional material that’s hard to pull off on display here, but Jonze handles it with endearing delicacy and a pure sense of purpose. He’s greatly aided by Phoenix putting in one of his most fully realized performances as the supremely sympathetic lead – a man who looks like he’s aching inside even when he’s smiling. 

Factor in Johansson conveying the OS’s evolving vulnerability with poise, and Adams making a stunning transition from being a ‘70s glamour puss con woman in AMERICAN HUSTLE to embodying the mousy insecure frizzy-haired could-be love interest and you’ve got a cast as charming as the film itself.

HER’s soundtrack doesn’t expand much on the musical palette of Jonze’s previous film, his and David Egger’s adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, as both Arcade Fire and Karen O. both return to provide songs, but this is so not a complaint as their music, especially when matched with Hoyte van Hoytema’s incredible cinematography effectively fits the highs and lows of the lightly surreal scenario.

The concept of having cyber sex with Siri aside, I can’t think of another recent film dealing with romance that better captures the way it feels to first fall in love; how wonderfully intense and scary it can be. It also nails how painfully fleeting the losing of love can be as well. HER is an immersive and beautiful cinematic conversation about what our real wants and needs are.
 
But it may not be for everybody – just those with two eyes, two ears, and a heart.

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