Guillermo del Toro’s Take On Gill-Man In Love

Now playing at more multiplexes than art houses in my area:

THE SHAPE OF WATER

(Dir. Guillermo del Toro, 2017)

When Guillermo del Toro turned down the chance to remake (or reboot) the CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON for Universal’s “Dark Universe” series he definitely made the right decision.

And that’s not just because the pending franchise has gotten off to a very shaky start with last summer’s THE MUMMY flop, and is in danger of being scrapped altogether, but because there’s no way he would’ve been able to build upon the concept to make such a beautifully bizarre love story thriller as THE SHAPE OF WATER under a big studio banner.

Del Toro, co-writing with Vanessa Taylor, infringes on no copyrights here, as the amphibian man here is never referred to as “Gill-man,” but it uses the basics as obvious jumping off points for the premise of “what if the creature got the girl?”

Set in 1962 Baltimore, the film is told from the point of view of Sally Hawkins as Elisa, a mute cleaning lady who works the night shift at a secret government laboratory. We get a look into Elisa’s lonely world up front as we see her eat pie with her neighbor Giles (Richard Jenkins), a depressed, closeted artist who loves watching old musicals on TV. Elisa and Giles live in rundown apartments above a movie palace theater, so del Toro works in his love for cinema there too.

At Elisa’s work, where she converses in sign language with her co-worker Zelda (Octavia Spencer, again playing the help), she learns that a aquatic creature is being held in a huge metal water tank at the facility, and that it’s being tortured by Colonel Richard Strickland (a deliciously creepy Michael Shannon) who captured it in South America.

Elisa makes friends with the amphibian man (played by actor / contortionist Doug Jones) by feeding it hard boiled eggs, and teaching him how to sign, and a romance forms. When she finds out that they’re going to dissect him, over protest by scientist Robert Hoffstetler (Michael Stuhlbarg), she plots to help him escape.

The escape sequence, among other elements, gave me flashbacks to Ron Howard’s 1984 rom com SPLASH, which had Tom Hanks falling for Daryl Hannah as a mermaid who he rescues from a secret lab, but that did nothing to hinder the spell this film so sweetly casts.

Back at Elisa’s apartment where the fish guy mostly stays in a bathtub filled with salt and some chemicals that Hoffstetler gave her, they consummate their relationship. While the movie contains much grotesque imagery concerning such things as Strickland’s bitten off fingers, and a cat being eaten, the love scenes are as tasteful and touching as scenes between amphibians and humans can possibly be.

You just may need to suspend disbelief considering such premises like that by putting towels under the door you can fill the bathroom of a crumbling apartment completely to the ceiling with water, but if you can do that you’re in for some visual treats courtesy of cinematographer Dan Laustsen.

Without speaking, Hawkins puts in a wonderfully communicative performance that shows fluid chemistry with Jones’ creature, and has a great moment standing up to Shannon’s evil Strickland.

She is a large part of what makes the small, dark off-kilter fantasy THE SHAPE OF WATER del Toro’s most emotionally affecting work yet.

Maybe this means that more established filmmakers should turn down franchise work to go off on their own to make movies inspired by concepts they wouldn’t be allowed to do in those big studio entries. I mean, it sure worked for del Toro.

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WHITE HOUSE DOWN: More Fun Than It Has A Right To Be

 Opening today at a multiplex near you:

WHITE HOUSE DOWN (Dir. Roland Emmerich, 2013)

So, yeah, it shares the same premise, and pretty much the same title as OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN from earlier this year (Olympus being the fictional code name for the White House in that movie), but Roland Emmerich’s WHITE HOUSE DOWN is bigger, dumber, and a lot more fun than that like-minded Gerald Butler action vehicle. 

They’re both stupid, but if watching OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN makes you shake your head, watching WHITE HOUSE DOWN makes you laugh out loud while you're shaking your head.

In Emmerich’s much more preferable take on the DIE HARD meets AIR FORCE ONE formula, Jamie Foxx is the President, Channing Tatum his Secret Service savior against an attack on the White House by a domestic paramilitary group. Actually, Tatum isn’t in the Secret Service; he just happens to be there applying for the job shortly before the hostile takeover occurs. 

Tatum gets turned down for the position by Maggie Gyllenhaal, as the chief Secret Service supervisor or something, so he takes his daughter (12-year old Joey King, who looks kinda like a tiny Sandra Bernhard) on a tour of the famous Pennsylvania Avenue residence.

Foxx (going from freed slave in DJANGO UNCHAINED to the Commander in Chief in six months - now there's an American success story!) is established right up front as a noble, dignified peace-seeking President of the people. 

Of course, one can’t help but think of Obama, especially when Foxx chews nicotine gum and mimics a few familiar mannerisms, but there’s no real statement being made here about our current administration, it’s just all in good fun.

Of course there’s corruption among all the President’s men with James Woods, seemingly reprising his role as H.R. Haldeman from Oliver Stone's NIXON, being the first baddie we can identify as a retiring Head of Presidential Detail who orchestrates the evil plan because he blames Foxx for the death of his son in the Middle East.

So Tatum’s tour group is taken hostage, and you know the DIE HARD drill - most of the action has Tatum, who strips down to the Bruce Willis-style wife beater tank top, and Foxx running around dodging machine gun bullets, getting into brutal fist fights, talking on walkie talkies, and making heroic wise-cracks all over the rooms, and hallways of the historical house.

There’s even a hilarious SUV chase all over the White House lawn to break up all the inside scenes. The leader of the thugs they fight, ZERO DARK THIRTY’s Jason Clarke is a particularly good bad guy, who gets angrier as the body count of baddies rises – these guys are usually related to each other or real close so there’s that revenge incentive growing.

Everybody appears to know how silly this all is, but they play every action movie cliché with a straight face, and that results in many genuine laughs, even if at times you can’t tell if something is intentionally funny or unintentionally funny. This move gleefully doesn’t care about the difference.

An incidental character, a know-it-all White House tour guide played by Nicholas Wright is responsible for some amusing moments as he’s personally offended by the thugs’ destruction of the house’s priceless artifacts. Michael Murphy has a thankless nothing role as the Vice President, who spends the movie aboard Air Force One, but Richard Jenkins has a better part as the Speaker of the House, but it’s a pretty transparent role too.

No matter, they’re just well-oiled parts of this machine of a movie that I bet movie-goers will enjoy than most of the other big ass offerings out there (WORLD WAR Z, MAN OF STEEL, and STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, I’m looking in your direction). Emmerich has made big dumb disaster flicks before (INDEPENDENCE DAY, THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW, 2012), but this one has more appeal due to it tongue in cheek tone, and its confidently corny approach.

I’m tempted to call WHITE HOUSE DOWN the summer’s best brainless blockbuster wannabe, but then I haven’t seen FAST & FURIOUS 6 yet. So I’ll just say that it’s a gloriously stupid good time at the movies this summer (just in time for 4th of July celebrating), and a better DIE HARD movie than the last actual DIE HARD movie.

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Tom Cruise Confidently Strides Through Another Action Thriller Formula In JACK REACHER

Opening today at a multiplex near you: 

JACK REACHER (Dir. Christopher McQuarrie, 2012) 

As the tough as nails title character, Tom Cruise confidently strides through this overly familiar yet still solid action thriller formula.

Based on Lee Child’s 2005 bestseller “One Shot,” one of 17 novels featuring the army trained badass Jack Reacher, Christopher McQuarrie’s third film as director, concerns Cruise investigating what, at first, appears to be the random daylight killing of 5 people by a mysterious military sniper at PNC Park in downtown Pittsburgh.

“Get Jack Reacher!” the suspected shooter (Joseph Sikora) writes on a pad instead of confessing right before slipping into a coma, and before you know it, the suspect’s Defense Attorney (the Disney doe-eyed Rosamund Pike) is in Cruise’s company, as they both try to uncover the truth about the killings.

Cruise’s character, a self described drifter living off the grid, arouses suspicion from lead detective (David Oyelowo) and district attorney (Richard Jenkins), who happens to be Pike’s father.

While Pike goes to talk to the families of the victims, Cruise starts sniffing out a conspiracy, especially after being targeted by some thugs in a bar who were paid to put him down. The unflinching Cruise, puts them all down (except for the two that ran), of course, in a street-set fight scene that shows off the characters’ skills. Pretty standard stuff, we’ve seen lots of times before, but still entertaining in a tongue-in-cheek way.

Better is a brutally funny fight set in a tiny skuzzy bathroom, in which Cruise battles a couple of beefy boneheads wielding a baseball bat and a crowbar, but as amusing as this is, it’s a typical example of how the odds are always in our hero’s favor.

Cruise’s chief adversary is the almost as confident Jai Courtney, who’s the henchman of sorts to Werner Herzog, yes that Werner Herzog - the acclaimed German filmmaker, as the one-eyed, one fingered villain (definitely one of the better elements here), so we know exactly who’ll Cruise will have to face down in the construction site climax.

In the midst of the finale, in which Cruise is aided by the grizzled wise-cracking Robert Duvall as the owner of a nearby gun range (their first film together since DAYS OF THUNDER), I had more vivid feelings of déjà vu that I had experienced before in a movie. Its ultra derivative third act was so by-the-numbers, that I swore every single second has been done to death, right down to the dialog and deaths of the bad guys.

Director McQuarrie, who co-wrote VALKRIE also starring Cruise, is working from an established source, but he’s outfitted it to be just another standard movie star action vehicle. It’s got more class and style, largely due to Caleb Deschanel’s gritty yet sleek cinematography, than many of the recent offerings of the genre (the BOURNE re-boot, TAKEN 2, JOHN CARTER, et al), but it never reaches the heights of Sam Mendes excellent 007 entry SKYFALL, my choice for best action film of 2012. 

However, if you’re a fan of Cruise, it’s a must see. Now that it seems criticism of his crazy couch jumping, and scientology silliness, has faded, the man stands tall (yes, I know how short he actually is) as a major presence in the movies. 

As it was in last year’s far superior MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: GHOST PROTOCOL, it’s again a blast to go along on a ride with him, even through such a cookie-cutter crowd pleaser like this.

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Talky KILLING THEM SOFTLY Gives Us A Lesson In Gangster Economics

Opening today in Raleigh and the Triangle area:

KILLING THEM SOFTLY (Dir. Andrew Dominik, 2012)

Although this film is based on the 1974 crime novel “Coogan’s Trade” by George V. Higgins, fans of The Sopranos are going to find its trappings familiar. Not only because it features Tony Soprano himself, James Gandolfini, and series regulars Vincent Curatola, and Max Casella, but because its scenario set-up about low level idiots that try to get ahead by robbing a mob protected card game is ground well trodden by David Chase’s iconic characters.

But director/screenwriter Andrew Dominik, re-united with his THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES star, Brad Pitt, has loftier goals that just staging a big screen Sopranos episode. Dominik sets the story in New Orleans in 2008, and we are taken back to the days of Obama getting elected during the country’s economic collapse via a string of television screens in the background always tuned to the news. The underlying implication is that the mafia is yet another American corporation whose business model is faltering in these tough times.

Pitt, with slicked back hair, shades, and goatee, plays an enforcer for the mob who’s brought in to track down the three low level idiots who thought it was a good idea to rob a high-stakes card game run by the fidgety stressed-out Ray Liotta. Liotta, is in real hot water with this theft, because he’s robbed the game before himself, and he’s going to take the blame for this one.

An often smirking Richard Jenkins, brings his Nathaniel Fisher (the all-knowing ghost dad on Six Feet Under) confidence in his part as Pitt’s contact, a jaded mob lawyer, who says matter-of-factly that “this is a business of relationships,” ever so slyly adding to the movie’s not-so-subtle set of themes.

Gandolfini shows up as a boozing burn-out of a hitman that Pitt seems to think he needs in order to pull off the job. Gandolfini and Pitt have a few intense and intimate scenes together; one on one exchanges in which you feel their history together both as these shady guys, and as actors who’ve worked together for 2 decades, starting with Tony Scott’s TRUE ROMANCE. 

Despite some vivid violence (this movie is where to go to see Liotta getting the shit beaten out of him), it’s a dialogue-driven film, all about the sit-downs. The power and thrust of the film’s thesis can be found in Pitt’s parked car consultations with Jenkins, Gandolfini’s meaty monologues, and the frightened babbling of Scoot McNairy’s Frankie (one of the idiots involved in the card heist), who steals the movie out from under the bigwigs when he’s onscreen with his perfectly unhinged performance.

As McNairy’s partner in crime and stupidity, Ben Mendelsohn (ANIMAL KINGDOM) is also effective as a seedy heroin addict you can’t believe anybody would trust to get them coffee, let alone pull off a dangerous job.

Pitt, who is one of 17 (!) different producers on this project, provides a solid performance, but it’s nothing we’ve never seen him do before. Still, the man’s particular brand of presence is never bland.

Sort of like a mash-up of GOODFELLAS and MARGIN CALL, KILLING THEM SOFTLY may be a bit too talky for its target audience. 

Because of its marketing, which highlights the stars, the stylishness and the one explosion, audiences are likely to think that it’s a different movie than it is - much like Anton Corbijn’s THE AMERICAN, which looked like a commercial George Clooney action flick, or Nicolas Winding Refn’s DRIVE, which looked like a commercial Ryan Gosling car chase thriller. Both turned out to be artsy cerebral takes on their genres, and while film buffs like me loved them, I knew many folks who were turned off.

This take on the gangster drama genre deserves an audience’s attention, even if the dry tone that Dominik creates, along with the immaculately shot framework (by cinematographer Grieg Fraser) surrounding some of the year’s most astonishing acting, ultimately makes more of an impression than any of the political points he’s attempting to make. 

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DARLING COMPANION (Dir. Lawrence Kasdan, 2012)

Lawrence Kasdan’s, newest film - his first since 2003’s DREAMCATCHER is his slightest yet.

All it’s about is a group of people looking for a missing dog. Okay, a few themes are broached - aging, love, the needs of family - but those are just brought up and discarded as these folks go through a few days worried about where their shaggy mutt (named Freeway) ran off to in the Colorado Rockies.

It’s mainly Diane Keaton that’s worried, her self-asorbed surgeon husband Kevin Kline acts like he’s just trying to appease her, especially since he’s the one who is responsible for the dog’s disappearance - the dog runs off chasing a dear while Kline was on his cell phone on a walk in the woods. This is something we have to endure Keaton over-emotionally whining about for a lot of the film’s running time.

Keaton and Kline had just hosted the wedding of their youngest daughter (Mad Men’s Elisabeth Moss who pretty much phones her part in) at their vacation house, when this traumatic world-stopping event happened. Some family stay behind to help them with the search: Dianne Wiest as Keaton’s sister, with her son (Mark Duplass), and as her new boyfriend (a way too goofy Richard Jenkins).

Then there’s Gypsy caretaker (Ayelet Zurer) who claims she has the gift of psychic powers. Though the gang is initially skeptical of Zurer’s, uh, visions, they still take it to heart. Just when I thought my eyes couldn’t roll any more, Keaton has a nightmare which is done in animation - a completely misguided move as it tonally doesn’t fit at it all, and is, well, just weird.

Another silly addition is Sam Shepherd as a crusty sheriff. I actually can’t remember if he helps the search or if he’s as useless as the psychic - both as a character and as a plot device.

It’s sad to see Kasdan, the man who wrote and directed many popular (and good) titles including BODY HEAT, THE BIG CHILL, GRAND CANYON, and my personal favorite THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST, (not to mention his screenplays for THE EMPIRE STRIKES AGAIN and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK) have so little to say.

I knew before I read it in the credits that this was based on a true story, because it was so boring that it just had to based on something from the everyday existence of Kasdan and his wife Meg (who co-wrote).

Keaton comes off flightier than usual; she puts a lot of effort into her performance, but try as she might she can’t elevate the weak material that she’s given.

Kline should’ve lived up to his nickname “Kevin Decline” and passed on this (he really doesn’t put as much effort as Keaton into his character), but since he’s Kasdan’s go-to guy (he’s starred in 6 of Kasdan’s movies now) he was probably just doing it as a favor.

In Kasdan’s 1991 drama GRAND CANYON (also starring Kline) - not a great film, but it sure looks like a masterpiece compared to this - Steve Martin plays a slick movie producer who tells Kline that his problem is that he hasn’t “seen enough movies - all of life's riddles are answered in the movies.”

Well not one riddle is answered in the miserable DARLING COMPANION.

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The Film Babble Blog Top Ten Movies Of 2008

Like last year, I held off making this post earlier because there were several contenders I hadn’t seen yet. It seems my area is the last to get certain movies in current circulation. Also, I still haven’t seen a number of movies I see making other ‘Top Ten’ lists including WALTZ FOR BASHIR, LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, and FROZEN RIVER among many others that are filling my NetFlix queue right now. Of course, nobody could see every movie in the running so now is as good a time as any to list my favorites. So here’s my Top Ten:

1. SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK (Dir. Charlie Kaufman)

It got snubbed by the Academy and many critics dissed on Kaufman’s epic tragicomic (as Wikipedia calls it) but I loved every sad sordid symbolic second. Philip Seymour Hoffman as the literally crumbing playwright Cayden Cotard builds sets inside of sets inside a ginormous warehouse recreating New York with New Yorkers and the actors that play them – including him. Joining him is maybe the best female ensemble cast ever assembled for such a movie - Catherine Keener, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Hope Davis, Samantha Morton, Emily Watson, Michelle Williams, and the great Diane Wiest. Maybe it was just too cerebral and complex to catch on but I believe time will lay waste to much of the competition while this beyond meta-masterpiece will still stand strong. My original review is right here.

2. WALL-E (Dir. Andrew Stanton)

Such a dark dystopian premise for such a cute heartwarming movie that plays beautifully like sci-fi Chaplin. Wall-E (I’m sure you well know but I’ll tell you again anyway) is a garbage compacting robot left behind on Earth hundreds of years from now who falls in love with a search probe (who by design looks like a large iPod) sent by the Buy N Large Corporation. It doesn’t sound like the sort of stuff that would make one swoon but Pixar yet again proves they can do anything from making rats lovable (and here that extends to cockroaches) to making us believe robots can love. An animated instant classic as my original review proclaimed.

3. SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE (Dir. Danny Boyle)

There’s been an odd mini comment war on my original review of this delightful yet edgy Mumbai success story, which goes to show that this was one of the most talked about and vital movies of the year. It’s an amazing spectacle from start to finish with protagonist taking us through his hard knock life by way of a glittery game show – the Indian version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. As the comments on my post suggest, some folks could’nt get past the violence or what they thought was an inaccurate cultural depiction but dammit, I thought it was a stone cold blast! I’ll bet (again literally) it’ll win Best Picture at the Oscars.

4. FROST/NIXON (Dir. Ron Howard) Nice to see Opie Cunningham take a break from the dumb DaVinci Codage and revisit his old 70’s stomping ground to take on everybody’s favorite nemesis – Nixon. These were definitely not Happy Days though for the impeached President (played magnificently by Frank Langella) making a $huge$ deal for a series of TV interviews with the slickly ambitious David Frost (Michael Sheen) while in self-imposed exile in California. As riveting as a round in the ring with “The Ram” (see next entry) this showdown scores on every front with ace casting (in addition to the leads – Kevin Bacon, Sam Rockwell, Rebecca Hall,and Oliver Platt mull about entertainingly), a great screenplay by Peter Morgan (THE QUEEN), and Howard’s best direction in ages. My original review? Oh yeah, it’s here.

5. THE WRESTLER (Dir. Darren Aronofsky) Yeah, it’s true – Mickey Rourke is back and I’ll be surprised as Hell if he doesn’t take

home the gold come February because nobody else literally went to the mat like this! Call it a comeback for Randy “The Ram” Robinson who may be washed up and working at a supermarket estranged from his daughter (Evan Rachel Wood) while pinning for a stripper (Marisa Tomei) but he’s overdue for redemption even if it means he’s going down for the count. This character is going down in cinema history for sure – read my original review for more gushing about this gritty gutsy grabber of a movie.

6. THE FALL (Dir. Tarsem Singh)

This fantastical visually splendorific film is all the more impressive because it contains no CGI. It’s a colorful joyful ride through fairy tale conventions which, crazily enough, orginates from a tale told in the 1930’s by a injured stuntman (Lee Pace) as a bargaining tool to get a young girl (Catinca Untaru) to break in to their hospital’s sanctuary to steal morphine for him. It’s vivid and emotional in all the right places with folks appearing WIZARD OF OZ style both in real life and the fantasy scenerios. Again you can read my praising review here.

7. THE DARK KNIGHT (Dir. Chris Nolan)

The more you think about it, the more flawed this film is. Batman’s (Christian Bale) exaggerated gravelly voice, ersatz plot elements like ‘hey, what happened to the folks at the skyscraper party after Rachel (Maggie Gyllenhall) was rescued by the caped crusader?’, and the unnecessary Hong Kong subplot (ThePlaylist jabbed some of these complaints funnily enough here). All may rub movie logical minds wrong but what did work here is arguably as good as movies can get. Heath Ledger’s amazing performance as the demented Joker was precision defined while the Gotham grandeur frighteningly filled every frame. Read me clumsily reach for more operatic poetry here.

8. IRON MAN (Dir. Jon Favreau)

Another superhero movie sure, but with Robert Downey Jr. in the metallic title role, Gwyneth Paltrow as the love interest, and Jeff Bridges as his adversary, it’s one Hell of a superhero movie! Downey Jr. is both intense and funny as Tony Stark and the streamlined shiny production surrounding him is perfectly provided by Favreau. Yep, a class action movie as I reported last summer here.

9. THE VISITOR (Dir. Thomas McCarthy) I was elated that Richard Jenkins was nominated for a best actor award for this fine understated Indie movie that many ignored late last Spring (Mind you - I don’t think he’ll win). As a displaced professor who finds 2 illegal immigrants (Haaz Sleiman and Danai Jekesai Gurira) living in his New York apartment and forms an unfortunately brief friendship, Jenkins finds a graceful ingratiating tone and a note that will resonate long after a single viewing. Yep, more here.

10. VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA (Dir. Woody Allen)

More than just a fine return to form, the Woodman gives us a lush and lavish look at the loony intertwined coupling that the ladies of the title encounter on their trip abroad. Javier Bardem woos Scarlet Johansen, Rebecca Hall, and what Allen has before called a “Kamikaze woman” - wife Penélope Cruz (she may yet woo the Academy). We’re all woo-ed in the end - well, at least I was. Read all about it here.

Spillover:

Again, the ones that didn't quite make the Top Ten grade but were still good, sometimes great flicks - click on the title for my original review.

PINEAPPLE EXPRESS (Dir. David Gordon Green) A great Apatow-appoved comedy that like the next few titles got the Spillover shaft by my silly blog.

FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL (Dir. Nicholas Stoller)

TROPIC THUNDER (Dir. Ben Stiller)

MAN ON WIRE (Dir. James Marsh) Great intense doc in which even the re-creations make for great cinema.

4 MONTHS, 3 WEEKS, AND 2 DAYS

GRAN TORINO (Dir. Clint Eastwood) It got strangely shut out come award season (which is strange because the Academy loves Clint) but it’s a strong addition to the Eastwood canon.

SHINE A LIGHT (Dir. Martin Scorsese)

One of the world’s greatest directors filming one of the world’s greatest bands - maybe I’m just biased because I was blown away by the movie at an IMAX theater last Spring but I still think it’ll hold up as one of the best concert films ever in years to come.

W. (Dir. Oliver Stone)

BURN AFTER READING (Dirs. Ethan Coen & Joel Coen, 2008) Trivial throw-away Coen Brothers fare still makes for great movie-time in my book - or on my blog that is.

MILK (Dir. Gus Vant Sant) Biopicalicious!

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BURN AFTER READING: Not As Disposable As Its Title Suggests

BURN AFTER READING (Dirs. Ethan Coen & Joel Coen, 2008)



You can’t get any more A-list than the cast of this movie. George Clooney, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton are Oscar winners, John Malkovich has been nominated more than once, and Brad Pitt is, well, Brad Pitt (yes he’s been nominated too). 

Mix in a couple of the most acclaimed character actors working today - Richard Jenkins (Six Feet Under, THE VISITOR) and J.K. Simmons (J. Jonah Jameson in the SPIDERMAN series, JUNO) and you've got as rich and tasty an cinematic ensemble soufflé that could be served today. 

Coming off the ginormous success of NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (yes, more Oscars) it seems the Coen Brothers needed to blow off some steam just as RAISING ARIZONA was the silly satirical followup to their dark debut BLOOD SIMPLE and THE BIG LEBOWSKI came right after FARGO, this is the ice cream to NO COUNTRY's full steak dinner. Okay, I’ll get off the food analogies. Seems somewhat pointless to try to recount the plot but I’ll still have a go at it. Malkovich is a boozing low level CIA agent whose files and memoirs are copied onto a disc by his wife (Swinton) after he is fired and she plans to divorce him. 

The disc is found at the gym Hardbodies where McDormand and Pitt work who, the money-grubbing schemers that they are, plan to blackmail Malkovich with. Meanwhile Clooney (also an idiot) who is having an affair with Swinton meets McDormand on one of his many misadventures with online dating. Misadventures is the right word for all of this as we see these pathetic people go through a series of sloppily handled escapades. 

The disc is, of course, a MacGuffin as its contents are unimportant and, as anyone in the film who studies it confirms, worthless. The conviction of McDormand, who wants the money to have extesive cosmetic surgery (“I’ve gone just about as far as I can go with this body”) coupled with Pitt's badly bleached blundering makes for a lot of laughs while Clooney’s wide eyed doltish womanizing brings his fair share of funny too. Malkovich's jaded jerk of a foul mouthed (his most repeated phrase throughout is “what the fuck?!!?” I think) failed spy won’t win him any awards but it’s among the finest comic acting of his career or at least since BEING JOHN MALKOVICH. 

Swinton seems to be the only one that is ill at ease with the material though that's probably because her character is so ill at ease with these situations. “We don’t really know what anyone is after” J.K. Simmons as Malkovich’s former superior says in an indifferent ‘whatever’ manner at one point and I bet many critics will say the same about BURN AFTER READING. After the powerfully astute NO COUNTRY... this may seem merely a funny throw-away.

A high class but trivial piece that treads water between more ambitious efforts, I’m sure some will remark, but I believe there is a lot more going for it than that. 

Sure, it would be easy to conclude that this is a silly statement on our current technology driven paranoia and that everybody is stupid, glib, and completely out for themselves but I think that would be dumbing it down considerably. With their patented low angles, wide interior shots, and the overall free for all spirit that they appear to instill in all the films participants, the offbeat world we are presented could only be Coen created - this is a view of their private sector, to use some Washington D.C. jargon. 

Like many Coen Brothers movies this will take repeat viewings to fully appreciate and to formulate more of a take on where it stands in their canon. Right now I can only say that BURN AFTER READING is consistently hilarious with a host of A-listers at the top of their game and I’m looking forward to seeing it again. It’s an enjoyable and extremely silly sector that I’m glad they don't keep so private.

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A Marvellous Minimalist Movie Before The Blockbuster Bombast Begins

As you well know we are on the verge of the Summer blockbuster season. We've got IRONMAN, INDIANA JONES, BATMAN, SPEED RACER, and many many more multi-million dollar platters to contend with so it seems apt to have a small scale appetizer of an independent human interest story to snack on beforehand: 


THE VISITOR (Dir. Thomas McCarthy, 2008)



Richard Jenkins, best known as Nathan Fisher Sr. - the father on Six Feet Under, finally gets a leading role in this quietly compelling movie.

After tons of movie and TV roles in which he perfected a weathered hangdog demeanor, Jenkins wears his character in THE VISITOR like an old comfortable suit.

Being that his character is a familiar one - a widowed college professor toiling for years on an unfinished book, isolated from social life and going through the motions in severe need of a wake-up call.

Yes, it's a ‘wake up and realize you're alive’ movie like ABOUT SCHMIDT (or even HOW STELLA GOT HER GROOVE BACK) and a good one at that with its lack of flash and abundance of grace. 

Jenkins returns to his little used in apartment in New York City to find 2 illegal immigrants (Haaz Sleiman and Danai Jekesai Gurira) living there. Realizing they had been rent-scammed they pack up to leave but Jenkins allows them to stay. He forms a friendship with Sleiman who teaches him to play the bongos. 

Scenes showing a business-suited Jenkins and the paisley attired Sleiman drumming away in the park are particularly smile inducing. The good times are short lived as Sleiman is arrested and detained with deportation imminent. Jenkins does what he can to help his new friend and in the process courts Sleiman's mother (played wonderfully by Hiam Abbass). 

Writer/Director Thomas McCarthy's first film THE STATION AGENT was a pleasing personable picture and THE VISITOR is a fine follow-up. So subtle that it may leave some movie-goers with a “with just happened?” feeling but I believe most will savor its subtle charms. Jenkins' measured performance lingers and the straight-forward framework is refreshing in these days of quick-cuts and contrived narrative gimmicks. 

“Please step away from the glass” Jenkins is frustratingly told repeatedly by a immigration station desk jockey in a sober 3rd act scene, and it's a chilling moment; the sad reality of how people are tragically separated for purposeless political reasons inhales all the air of the room and leaves our protagonist on the verge of existential limbo. 

Finding one's own rhythm - to maybe the beat of a different drummer as the expression goes, is the only way back into the human race. There among the beats, both inner and outer, can be found a sense of soul and way of life that Jenkins learns shouldn't just be visited. 

More later...