Kingsman: The Secret Service - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Kingsman: The Secret Service  

Starring Colin Firth, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Caine, Mark Strong, and Taron Egerton

Directed by Matthew Vaughn

Rated R

Run Time: 129 minutes

Genre: Action-Adventure

Opens February 13th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Kingsman: The Secret Service is an anarchistic, pessimistic, and caustically funny spy caper that stands as the most thrilling action film to be released by a major studio in years. While most will peg the film as a British actioner in the vein of James Bond due to its source material, cast, and even most of its crew, that typecast defies every convention that the film aims to undermine. Throw away predictable spy tropes and intense action scenes without any care for the violence they are inflicting; the audience here is asked to revel, revolt, and altogether examine why we must senselessly watch long bouts of extreme violence. Every moment is infused with character, empathy, sophistication, and humor. It's a difficult, near impossible mix of tone and quality that are unrecognizable in practically any way; I have, simply put, never seen a seething satire with as much skip in its step and weight in its heart as this one. Director Matthew Vaughn has made his best film to date, and one of the decade's most distinct, thrilling visions of modern socio-political world affairs.

Harry Hart (Colin Firth) is a veteran agent within a secret service in the United Kingdom. They call themselves the "Kingsman" service, a name that comes from the store that makes all of their tailor-made suits and acts as their unofficial headquarters. Enter through practically any dressing room and there are weapons hiding in secret compartments, an elevator that heads down hundreds of feet to an underground transportation system in the center of England, and of course the standard mirrors and hooks to ensure people fit their suits correctly. After the death of one of Harry's co-workers, he realizes the deceased saved his life and heads home to console the wife and newborn son. He provides them with a necklace engraved with a number that, when called, will provide them help when they need it most. That child turns out to be "Eggsy" (Taron Egerton), a rebellious teenager living with his downward-spiraling mother and newborn sister. His family life is hell because his stepfather is a repulsive, abusive man, so naturally he acts out and gets himself into far too much trouble.

In comes Harry to save the day, and their journey begins. World leaders are being kidnapped around the world without any hint of their location; it's at the whim of a madman, one who turns out to be a billionaire tech genius named Valentine (Samuel L. Jackson) with a lisp and all of the power in the world. When he unveils his new product to the masses, everyone lines up for the free technology that will obviously carry ulterior functions. Harry and crew, including the resourceful Merlin (Mark Strong) and the old-blood Arthur (Michael Caine), aim to take down Valentine and save the world from a deadly, greedy, and evil plan. While many of these elements sound conventional and commonplace in the traditional spy film, Kingsman takes them and infuses every one of their occurrences with comedy and social awareness. Valentine acts as a man driven by greed and power who has gone practically insane, while people like Harry and Eggsy come from lower social rank and feel the weight of the wealthy leaders' actions. That's one of the many themes explored underneath the action-packed surface.

Kingsman ends up being an absolute blast without a care for audience expectation or predictability. There's something inherently zany and exciting in practically every scene, yet almost every moment is prefaced with concrete context and the stakes at hand. The audience is never left as pure spectator, but almost taking place within the picture itself. Vaughn asks us to introspectively revel at the action when incredibly violent scenes take place, yet they often end with the "hero" either facing a certain realistic peril or regretting their mayhem. Even a scene within a Southern Baptist Church where members spew hate is filled with a certain level of sympathy; that's a huge testament to the filmmaking power on display here. Major characters also die more often than expected and the film uses remarkably unconventional action, including an amazing villain with blades for legs. A random, loving ode to The Shining gains social meaning while the peril of children and even dogs are not used to excite, but to terrify. Kingsman: The Secret Service respects the audience, asks them to enjoy the ride, and simultaneously makes them feel weary about everything they have just seen. It's an amazingly confident, brutally honest take on the action genre.

Fifty Shades of Grey - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Fifty Shades of Grey  

Starring Dakota Johnson, Jamie Dorman, Jennifer Ehle, Eloise Mumford, and Marcia Gay Harden

Directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson

Rated R

Run Time: 125 minutes

Genre: Romance

Opens February 13th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Fifty Shades of Grey is an effectively erotic and self-amused film until its second half, when it falls into the much-talked about BDSM sex scenes that continue to titillate everyone's imagination. It may come as a surprise, then, that director Sam Taylor-Johnson's approach is reserved and mostly sensual in nature, with Seamus McGarvey's impressive cinematography allowing for the kinky visual metaphors and color-drained imagery to soak up the Northwestern landscapes. As far as controversial romances go, Fifty Shades has held the attention of the masses for the past year, with everyone hyping it up as a shock-and-awe type love story that so decidedly goes against what we've seen before in cinema. Yet it's all very rote and familiar, minus the handcuffs and whips. It's not misogynistic, nor is it disgusting; rather, it treats the concept of explorative sexuality as a means of understanding someone and their upbringing. The film empowers Dakota Johnson's Ana, even if Jamie Dornan's Christian is a sadomasochistic nutcase with clear power issues and familial struggles. It's just a traditional romance in the guise of something more exploratory.

The film opens with Anastasia Steele (not a porn star's name, oddly enough, but Johnson's virginal protagonist) heading into Grey Enterprises to interview the man behind the company. Her friend, Kate (Eloise Mumford), was supposed to interview him until she came down with a sickness; now, Ana gets ten minutes with the intimidating Christian (Dornan). Even if she feels threatened by his billionaire aggression, she is clearly attracted to him; when she walks out into the rain and becomes soaking wet, it's clear that the visuals are telling us something far more self-revelatory. Christian won't leave her mind but also won't stop showing up in her life. He appears in the hardware store where she works when she's not at school studying English literature and even shows up on her night out with Kate and friends. He simply won't let her be, and that's because he, too, is attracted to her. While most people would find these actions stalker-ish, Christian sees them as a normalcy because he's used to using his power to get what he wants. Since Ana won't give it to him, that complicates things.

Look, Fifty Shades of Grey serves its target audience very, very well. It appears to follow the book religiously (based on the girl next to me reacting giddily for most of the film), minus the complaints about misogyny, and gives its central character Ana plenty of amusing confusion surrounding her whole situation, including some unexpected humor. There's not much chemistry, though, between the two leads because Dornan's Grey is given so little charm. Johnson plays her role convincingly and showcases a virgin being sexually awakened in pretty much every way she can be; it's like ordering a sampler on a restaurant's appetizer menu, except your sampler includes physical pain and sexual arousal. Depending on your type of restaurant, that metaphor might connect with you. Taylor-Johnson's film isn't backed by a particularly strong script from Kelly Marcel, considering most of the dialogue focuses on characters like Christian talking in abstracts about their life. It's frustrating, because there's plenty underneath the surface when the film wants to explore those moments. They're just few and far between.

The much-discussed sex scenes aren't necessarily graphic, although there's plenty of frontal nudity by women. Men, eh, not so much. I suppose that stems from the film being more concerned about commercial appeal, including Danny Elfman's mostly inoffensive score being littered by pop staples like Ellie Goulding's "Love You Like I Do," which blares over a helicopter ride. Strangely enough, though, I found the film quite intelligent, more so than people will expect. While the romance is one-note and tiresome after the 125-minute running time due to a repetitive structure, there are some hilarious moments that stem from the main couple's lingering attraction. One shot early on zooms in on a pencil that Ana is biting right when the word "Grey" appears for the camera. You don't need to be a lit major to read into that metaphor. There's also their first meet-cute in her hardware store where he's buying what she deems "serial killer" items. I found it oddly off-putting, then, when the film grows self-serious in its conclusion in favor of overblown melodrama. As a Valentine's Day romance, it fulfills many standards. Whether those standards are appropriate for romantic filmmaking is another story entirely.

Jupiter Ascending - Movie Review by Monte Yazzie

Jupiter Ascending  

Dir: Andy and Lana Wachowski

Starring: Mila Kunis, Channing Tatum, Eddie Redmayne, Sean Bean, Douglas Booth, and Tuppence Middleton

PG-13

127 Minutes

The best way to describe the Wachowski’s newest science fiction film is to relate to it to a buffet. And just like a buffet, filled with good-looking fare, you’ll get a little of this and little of that. Put it all on the plate and some of the entrée will be exceptional while other selections will be terrible and others will be spoiled simply because of the mixture of everything on the plate. “Jupiter Ascending” looks great from the outside, with some incredibly accomplished special effects making for adrenaline pumping moments, however with so many ideas floating aimlessly in and out of scenes and a narrative that operates without much cause for coherency, the result is a film of squandered potential.

A young caretaker named Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) dreams of a life with more than just her unruly family and dirty toilet bowls. She wakes up each morning, coaxed repeatedly out of bed into the same routine day after day. However, Jupiter’s life is far from normal. Her place in the universe is one of royalty, an heir from a family that controls with the power of planets. The ruthless son (Eddie Redmayne) of this powerful family targets Jupiter for his own domineering plans. However, Jupiter is saved from assassins by a hunter named Caine (Channing Tatum), a genetically engineered warrior who takes Jupiter to a far away planet and protects her from the numerous forces looking to take advantage.

The filmmaking flair that the Wachowski’s are known for is in full display here. The special effects are impressive, from the painstakingly complex chase at the beginning of the film that weaves and dodges through the skyline of Chicago, to the dazzlingly choreographed fight scene between a gravity defying, speed skating-like Channing Tatum and a giant reptile with wings. The cities are exquisitely rendered, one in the midst of an enormous hurricane of fire and chaos while another is within the overpopulated confinements of a bureaucratic big city. It’s all very interesting to look at. Unfortunately all these great sights exist within a narrative that is confusingly overblown with seemingly every idea the Wachowski’s have ever wanted to incorporate within a film. The worst part is that there are actually some very interesting thoughts proposed. Some that if is expanded on more thoroughly could offer an exceptional film. The film moves quickly from one thought to the next, never giving appropriate time or proper explanation to the proposed concepts. Instead, this swift moving surface examination makes the film feel detached from scene to scene. There is also an obvious predictability, one that the Wachowski’s fall victim to often, seen throughout the film. The viewer can telegraph when the romantic connection will happen, when the hero will swoop in to save the day, and when the villain will gain the first upper hand of the film, it becomes exceedingly formulaic as the film proceeds.

It’s easy to get swept up into the visual enjoyment of “Jupiter Ascending”, though it’s unfortunate that the narrative doesn’t match the beauty of the design. Even with the help of some accomplished actors the script is lacking material for them to build upon, Channing Tatum is left to float around being chased by spaceships and bounty hunters while Eddie Redmayne is relinquished to whispering threateningly. While “Jupiter Ascending” struggles from the very beginning, there are enough thought-provoking concepts proposed here to indicate that these filmmakers still have places to explore.

Monte’s Rating

2.25 out of 5.00

Jupiter Ascending - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Jupiter Ascending  

Starring Channing Tatum, Mila Kunis, Sean Bean, Eddie Redmayne, Douglas Booth, and James D'Arcy

Directed by Andy and Lana Wachowski

Rated PG-13

Run Time: 127 minutes

Genre: Action/Sci-Fi

Opens February 6th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Jupiter Ascending is a cinematic marvel, if only because it's such a blundering misfire on a narrative and emotional level. While the prominent special effects are often exciting and altogether well-produced, the story surrounding them resembles a toddler who plays with toys and dreams up a story full of twists and turns without any character development or foreshadowing. Unlike the filmmakers' brilliant, toweringly ambitious Cloud Atlas or even the zippy Speed Racer, the writer-director-producer siblings have assembled a misguided assortment of storytelling clichés. At times, there are hints of the film aiming for Star Trek-level ensemble space exploration, with other times feeling like it borrows the best of Star Wars and other space capers. There's no semblance of an original voice, theme, or message. It's a vapid film with miscast leads and an even campier, more awful turn from Eddie Redmayne as the soft-talking villain. It's an overblown, exasperated take that epitomizes the film's misjudgments from inception.

The film follows a young destitute maid named Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis). Her father loved astronomy and, after his unfortunate passing, her mother succumbed to his wishes and named her after his favorite planet. Jupiter lives with her Russian family, starting the film with narration talking about her being an "illegal alien" (cue obvious metaphor). While preparing for a medical donation, she has a run-in with Caine Wise (Channing Tatum), a half-Lycan half-human that travels across space to protect whom he considers a special woman. Jupiter finds out through him that she may have the exact same DNA coding as a famous queen from another race of humans (bear with me, here). Her genes could be a "recurrence," as the film names them, a quasi-form of cloning that links itself to the Abrasax family. The arrogant, power-hungry brother at the helm of their dynasty is Balem (Eddie Redmayne), who wants Jupiter captured from Earth so that he can mine the world for their resources. In this case, that means human lives. That leads to another long-winded metaphor surrounding natural resources and presumably genocide, but the editing makes for a muddled film with even more confused thoughts, characters, locales, and motivations.

It's shocking how inept Jupiter Ascending becomes over time, a solid explanation for Warner Brothers' decision to delay the film from a late summer release to work on improving special effects and more. That "more" are probably a trimmed running time, more linear narrative, and the ensuing hodgepodge. It doesn't feel like the same type of film from the people behind Cloud Atlas, which was also a box office disappointment for Warner Bros. despite a tremendous cast. With leads like Channing Tatum and Mila Kunis, their latest should be a resounding success. Yet it's tracking poorly amongst younger viewers and doesn't even have a discernible set of characters, which becomes more apparent with its thin supporting crew and a significantly weaker thematic pull. The film is simply thin on narrative meaning and full of repetitive special effects. No matter how compelling they may look, they don't drive the story. There are shreds of a longer, more ambitious narrative here, but Jupiter Ascending testifies that the Wachowskis were given far too much freedom in a narrative that falls flat on its head.

Your Favorite Movies - Mark Stolaroff

What are Your Favorite Films?

For the 2015 Phoenix Film Festival we encourage you to Find Your New Favorite Movie! As we approach the festival we’ve started a new series on our site where we ask some Phoenix Film Festival filmmaker alumni about some of their favorite movies.

Sheri Lindon of The Hollywood Reporter says of The House That Jack Built, “Using Bronx locations and a strong cast of Caribbean-Latino actors, director Henry Barrial constructs a convincing portrait of a neighborhood and its Nuyorican culture, staying true to the scale and sensibility that filmmaker Joseph B. Vasquez envisioned for the movie.”

The film’s producer, Mark Stolaroff, represented at PFF 2014, accepting three awards: Best Picture; Best Director – Henry Barrial; and Best Screenplay – Joseph Vasquez (sadly, Vasquez died in 1995, never to see his last screenplay produced).

This week, Mark shares a few of his favorite films to add to your list!

What is your …

• Favorite Comedy

Monty Python And The Holy Grail.  I saw this film when it came out in the theater. I was 10, and was already a fan of the Pythons from late night TV.  I just thought this was the funniest film I'd ever seen, starting right off with the credits.  Honorable Mention:  Kentucky Fried Movie, Animal House

• Favorite Drama

This is tough, but probably The Godfather.  Just such a perfect film. I was reading a book recently on visual language and then saw the film again, and it was like seeing it anew.  There is so much going on with just the camera.  Gordon Willis was a genius. And Coppola was utterly inspired. Honorable Mention: Godfather Part 2, Chinatown

• Favorite Documentary

This is really hard because there are so many great ones, but I'm going with a film that many people aren't familiar with, despite it winning the Oscar for Best Documentary. Murder On A Sunday Morning. Brutal, enlightening, moving film.  And still so relevant.  Maybe more so today.

• Favorite film you saw on the circuit

Obvious Child.  Saw this at Sundance and fell in love with it and Jenny Slate.  A great movie for Jews!

• Favorite film that you think most people have never seen, but should?

Oh, Man, that's a hard one. I see a lot of films!  There's a great little film by a really talented filmmaker named Sean Baker called Starlet. It won some awards and got some attention, but not what it deserved.

• Do you have a favorite film poster?

Maybe the poster for 127 Hours.  In the film, the guy climbs between rock walls in the desert and then gets stuck. He only has so many hours to get free before he dies.  The poster shows a guy climbing between two rock walls, but when you look closer, you see that the rock walls form the shape of an hourglass, and the boulder in between is like a grain of sand.  I mean, how clever is that!

Following PFF, Mark tells us that The House That Jack Built played a number of festivals, and won eight more awards.  “We're showing it to distributors and we hope to have a deal soon.”   www.thehousethatjackbuiltmovie.com

– Laurie Smith

Black Sea - Movie Review by Monte Yazzie

Black Sea  

Dir: Kevin Macdonald

Starring: Jude Law, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelsohn, David Threlfall, Tobias Menzies, Michael Smiley, Karl Davies, Daniel Ryan, Konstantin Khabenskiy, Bobby Schofield, and Grigoriy Dobrygin

By Monte Yazzie

Many films have found success by putting a group of people in a confining space and letting human nature take its strange course. Place variables like an alien trying to get into a barricaded room, the decision lingering for a jury of clashing personalities, or the quest for gold at the bottom of the ocean inside the belly of a claustrophobic submarine and you have the makings of good storytelling. That finishing submarine scenario is the subject of Kevin Macdonald’s underwater thriller “Black Sea”, a film that succeeds in building suspense and remaining exciting even though it becomes a familiar and predictable story.

A recently laid off submarine captain named Robinson (Jude Law) comes across valuable information concerning a German U-boat that was lost in the depths of the Black Sea and contains a life-changing amount of gold Russia paid Germany during World War II. Robinson is angry with the company that he loyally served, a job that kept him away from his family and created a rift in his marriage that ultimately led to a divorce. Robinson dreams of better times with his family but only awakens to unhappiness; this leads him to an American financer who endorses the voyage to the depths in a corroding submarine with a group of men equally as discontent.

Greed and desperation are two themes that Macdonald utilizes effectively. At the core of this story is simply a group of men trapped in a submarine, a vessel filled with hopefulness that quickly turns into a container of deteriorating life support. Robinson lets the men know from the beginning that the treasures will be split equally, it doesn’t take long for the men to realize that less people means more money and greed takes over. This leads to disaster for the submarine then desperation for the men and their lives, but also their fortune that is within grasp. On board the submarine is a diverse crew of Russian and British men, a device cleverly used by Macdonald to instantly draw the lines of allegiances between the groups. Add into the mix the role of an American broker named Daniels (Scoot McNairy) and a young homeless teenager named Tobin (Bobby Schofield) and the narrative becomes prime with character motivations.  Unfortunately these characters all fall into easily identified categories that make decisions that become overly predictable. While this isn’t always a bad thing, especially in a film like this, it does make the holes in the narrative seem even larger. The decision to limit the transitions between underwater scenes that display a moving submarine and the interior confinements of a submarine creates great claustrophobic atmosphere, though in parts it also restricts the space inside the submarine making the movements throughout seem somewhat confusing.

Jude Law is excellent here, changing Captain Robinson emotionally throughout the journey. He begins as the levelheaded leader and moves into an obsessed tyrant with ease. The remaining cast is also good even though they are unsurprising and familiar characters, however the performances keep together the loose ends that periodically snag the viewer out of the film.

“Black Sea” is one of those films that pleasingly occupies time for an impromptu movie decision. While there is nothing terribly wrong with this film, there is also not much that is especially memorable either. Amongst the weekly barrage of new releases at the movie theater, it’s still nice to have something that is purely and simply entertaining.

Monte’s Rating

3.25 out of 5.00

Two Days, One Night - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Two Days, One Night  

Starring Marion Cotillard, Fabrizio Rongione, Catherine Salée, Batiste Sornin, and Pili Groyne

Directed by Jean-Pierre and Paul Dardenne

Rated PG-13

Run Time: 95 minutes

Genre: Drama

Opens January 30th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Two Days, One Night refers to the amount of time that Sandra (Marion Cotillard), a young Belgian mother, has to convince all of her fellow workers to keep her job. Her co-workers were posed with an opportunity that was misleading yet enticing: not everyone could be kept at their factory, so by cutting off one employee, all of them would be provided a raise. Due to the working class infrastructure of these families and their desire for a higher income, the decision was simple; they wanted to keep their jobs and didn't want to be fired, so naturally they'd get rid of another worker. But the workers were misled by their supervisor, leading Sandra to plead for a recount on Monday and give the others the weekend to deliberate. This simple premise allows for Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the talented Belgian writer-directors, to explore a human in her most fragile state. The result is one of the finest films from 2014, a beautiful examination of a struggling woman put in the hands of her comrades.

Sandra has a nervous breakdown that causes her to leave work for a considerable amount of time. During her time away, the workers realize that they can cover her hours, working slightly longer each day, and making more money in the process. The management ends up convincing the employees that Sandra is redundant, and the greater pay (in addition to the proposed "bonus," which is simply a distribution of Sandra's yearly wages) leads almost all of them to vote in favor of her dismissal. Sandra, then, uses the weekend to plea with these people that she once considered her friends, at least in the workplace. Now, she must get a majority vote or else she will be passed over. This leads to some traumatic attempts at convincing others to sacrifice what they have now been promised (their raise) in favor of giving this woman a second chance at restarting her life after it almost fell to pieces. Her life on the domestic front hasn't eased matters either, particularly with her post-breakdown depression involving a lot of sleep and dependence on prescription pills.

The Dardenne brothers have crafted a delicate feature that truly glistens in its dialogue. Much like other foreign directors that want to shine a light on their country's economic state and the humanity that must endure, the filmmakers have explored the nature of the workplace and the breakdown of trust when certain circumstances challenge those relationships. Particular scenes that shine include a discussion with a man coaching a soccer team as Sandra feels defeated after multiple rejections, and a conversation with a man and wife that both have different emotions toward her in two drastically different scenes. Marion Cotillard was a surprise Oscar nominee this year, her second after her win seven years ago for La Vie en Rose. She's one of my favorite actresses working today simply because she embodies every role with a commanding humanity; here, then, the role is perfect. Two Days, One Night delivers a solemn ending, reminding the audience that the film is decidedly anti-Hollywood in its narrative and aims for a more realistic dictation of society.

Match - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Match  

Starring Patrick Stewart, Matthew Lillard, and Carla Gugino

Directed by Stephen Belber

Rated R

Run Time: 92 minutes

Genre: Drama

Opens January 30th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Match takes place almost entirely in an apartment, which reminds the audience of the source material's adaptation from a stage play. It recalls Roman Polanski's ensemble piece Carnage, a film that utilized a cast confined to interiors and made the most of its material, bringing every insecurity and imperfection to the surface. Here, three terrific performances emerge from the cast, with Patrick Stewart leading the way in an outstanding role that emphasizes longing, regret, and a missed opportunity. As a professor of dance at Juilliard, Stewart's Tobi Powell lives a fairly lonely life involving cross-stitching, smoking weed, and keeping to himself when not motivating young talents. One day, he's called upon by a woman (Carla Gugino) and her husband (Matthew Lillard), the former of which is working on her dissertation for dance in 1960s New York. They begin at a diner, then move to Tobi's apartment, where the interrogations grow increasingly personal and begin to reveal that something else is amiss in their journey.

Toni lived a promiscuous life in the 1960s, with many of the questions aiming at his romantic interests, particularly a young female dancer with whom he was involved with for a short while. According to him, everyone was experimenting back in those days, whether it meant with drugs, sexuality, or really any kind of lifestyle. He describes those moments in his life with fanfare and nostalgia, a clear divide in his psyche as only the audience has seen just how empty and quiet his life is today. Gugino's Lisa feels more adventurous than her husband, including smoking with Tobi, while Lillard's Mike is a police officer from Washington who isn't shy when it comes to bending or avoiding the law. Clearly everyone is hiding something from each other, so the film plays out awkwardly and unevenly for much of its opening moments. The middle act, though, particularly as the central reveal emerges and lays out all of the film's dramatic force, is especially pointed and challenging. Questions of ethics and goodness boil underneath the surface of every conversation, while sympathy and antipathy run rampant in these characters and their pasts, presents, and prospective futures.

Match features one of Patrick Stewart's best performances in his illustrious career. His character is a flamboyant bi-sexual dancer that doesn't seem to have a need to hide anything, but elements of his past that have haunted him simply cannot be avoided when examining his own actions during the 1960s. Stewart plays the role with confidence and chews every bit of scenery in the apartment; considering much of the film relies on the confinements of those walls and allows us to see every square inch of his living space, Stewart breathes life into every one of those moments. His character has a nagging place in his heart where his past continues to gnaw away at who he is and what he has become; if only, if only. That sense of personal regret and tragedy underly his character and allow Lillard in particular to dichotomize him masterfully. It's one of his finest performances as well in a career that hasn't allotted him many great roles. This is one of them. The film's conclusion is a little rushed and tied in a neat bow, but the journey is wholly fulfilling and proof that micro-budget independents can be thematically and emotionally powerful.

Cake - Movie Review by Monte Yazzie

Cake  

Dir: Daniel Barnz

Starring: Jennifer Aniston, Adriana Barraza, Anna Kendrick, Sam Worthington, Felicity Huffman, Chris Messina, and William H. Macy

Rated R

102 Minutes

There is a moment in Daniel Barnz’s film “Cake” when the lead character stares at a blank wall where a significant picture once hung. The grief on the characters scarred face is visible, displaying the effect of time with wounds both physical and emotional. Jennifer Aniston plays Claire, a woman who was in a car accident and is struggling with constant pain amongst other upsetting issues from the past. Aniston is quite good in the lead role, bringing a performance that holds the otherwise predictable and oversentimental story together.

Claire is introduced in a group therapy session for people dealing with chronic pain. A large poster of a young woman named Nina (Anna Kendrick) sits on a chair in the front of the room. Nina recently committed suicide and the group is sharing their thoughts and feelings in a discussion. The question “Will you forgive me?" is asked by the group counselor (Felicity Huffman), referenced as if Nina were asking the group. Claire, biting her tongue long enough, is asked how she is feeling about the situation. A scathing and offensive response is given and Claire is kicked out of the group. This mask of aggression coincides with the pain that is controlling Claire’s life.

The narrative moves ever familiar from one transition to another. Claire begins in a very bad place, searching for pain medication hidden throughout her expensive, memory shadowed home and yelling at her physical therapist who is clearly tired of hearing the same excuses from her. Then Claire begins to pick herself up with the assistance of her sympathetic maid, played by an exceptional Adriana Barraza, and begins to confront the ghosts of her past and present. The rest of the journey is as foreseeable as they come. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with a film that indulges in these simplicities, there are moments where the film touches on some very interesting aspects of the healing process, specifically the people that help you along the way. Adriana Barraza plays Silvana, a character that accepts Claire with all her faults regardless of how terribly Claire treats her. Silvana knows all the personal details of Claire’s past, even handling the grieving process in her own way by helping Claire without question. In one excellent scene Silvana’s own daughter questions why she puts up with Claire. The response from Silvana is simple yet somehow still complicated, exposing more than any other scene, the character of Claire through the changed relationship experienced by Silvana. It’s unfortunate that these insightful scenes are overlooked, instead replaced with situations that offer nothing more than movement from scene to scene.

Jennifer Aniston is given the opportunity to showcase her talent. The portrayal of Claire is more than just grimaces and guarded motions, Aniston ventures to make more of the character than what is on the surface. And for the most part she succeeds. It’s unfortunate that other characters, ones that could have offered more for Aniston to work against, were terribly underwritten. “Cake”, at the focus, attempts to examine the process of grief. While Jennifer Aniston offers an exceptional performance, the narrative doesn’t offer more to make the healing journey more compelling and meaningful.

Monte’s Rating

3.25 out of 5.00

Cake - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Cake   

Starring Jennifer Aniston, Adrianna Barraza, Anna Kendrick, Sam Worthington, Felicity Huffman, and William H. Macy

Directed by Daniel Barnz

Rated R

Run Time: 102 minutes

Genre: Drama

Opens January 23rd

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Jennifer Aniston delivers the performance of her career in the uneven and familiar Cake. She brings to light a character quietly marked by tragedy and a hope for triumph, even if that end doesn't seem in sight. Aniston's Claire Bennett is first seen in a support group for chronic pain, surrounded by other women mourning the loss of one of their own, Nina (Anna Kendrick). As the leader of the group, Annette (Felicity Huffman), explains, Nina recently committed suicide because her pain was simply too much. Claire doesn't seem all that sentimental, interested, or even human, but rather makes a callous comment about the nature of the suicide and then is formally asked to leave the group. She's not particularly liked by many because she doesn't try and doesn't seem to care. Her housekeeper and confidant, Silvana (Adrianna Barraza), doesn't think she's trying hard enough to overcome her pain and self-pity, but Claire mostly doesn't listen to her and instead opts for drinking wine and taking pain killers as a cathartic escape.

Not only is Claire an addict, but she's also recovering from a personal tragedy. Her husband, Jason (Chris Messina), wants to collect all of his belongings from the house and doesn't seem to love Claire like he used to. There are suggestions as to what happened to her but never a description of the events that transpired; I'll leave out the details that are given for fear of spoiling any undisclosed plot details. Nonetheless, Claire is ravaged and in constant pain. She had pins in her legs for a year and must now learn how to walk and live comfortably without the support of those in her body. Water therapy, a permanently reclined car seat, and various aids to her pain can't seem to alleviate the constant self-hatred and loathing she feels. She externalizes everything and makes others feel terrible, while also being haunted by Nina everywhere she steps. She meets her widow, Roy (Sam Worthington), who can't even live with his son because the young boy can't stand staying in the house anymore.

The film wallows in pain and starts to feel like it revels in our sadness toward these characters. Patrick Tobin's screenplay, though, is aware of its nature and handles most of its tragedy with gentility. I was surprised by how many clichéd elements and subplots pop up that seem to still fit in this narrative; I didn't so much have a problem with them as I found them predictable. Daniel Barnz's direction, then, is even further graceful and elegant, not necessarily providing new insight into the narrative so much as letting Aniston occupy almost every frame. There are some hackneyed visual cues that remind us of her drug addiction and struggles with reality, which are unnecessary, but Aniston owns those scenes. She's such a commanding force throughout the film, bringing intensity when needed but mostly playing it cool and composed. Her face says it all. She's been a talented comedic actress for most of her career, but there's endless potential on this new path she's explored. Cake handles personal tragedy with occasional grace despite its familiar narrative, yet Aniston's performance remains the biggest, most affecting takeaway.

Winter Sleep - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Winter Sleep  

Starring Haluk Bilginer, Melisa Sozen, Dermet Akbag, Ayberk Pekcan, and Serhat Mustafa Kilic

Directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan

Not Rated

Run Time: 196 minutes

Genre: Drama

Opens January 23rd

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Winter Sleep is a sweeping, universally compelling epic that probes at the heart of its characters' moral and ethical dilemmas. The dialogue stings like a scorpion and pierces like a just-sharpened spear, diving farther and farther into the psyche of these individuals and the way that saying one thing incorrectly can drastically change the tone of both a conversation and friendship. Encompassing 196 minutes, the film is an impressive achievement in absorbing the audience and keeping their attention; that's a wholehearted testament to Anton Chekhov's source material and the Ceylan's sensitivity and perseverance. As director, Nuri Bilge Ceylan has created a world marked by the sad, cold emptiness of winter and a longing for a life not lived nor explored. That sense of hope and, unfortunately, hopelessness makes for wholly compelling, twisty scenes of dialogue. The film loses focus in those long-winded conversations but never strays from acting as a morality fable, and feels like one of the stronger foreign works released in the past year.

The main character is Aydin (Haluk Bilginer), a former actor who runs a small hotel in central Anatolia with his young wife, Nihal (Melisa Sözen), and his sister, Necla (Demet Akbar). He has a fiery relationship with the former, one with its fair share of ups and downs, and the latter is a woman who simultaneously supports his writing endeavors but also wants him to strive for greater things. Her recent divorce has put her in the doldrums and her recovery period leads to some nagging conversations between the siblings. As the snow begins to cover the landscapes and winter takes on its full emotional and physical force, the family begins to disintegrate in front of Aydin's eyes, mostly due to his selfish absorptions and empty-minded actions; he doesn't seem to care about people so much as what good they are to him. The catalyst of the story is simple: a young boy throws a stone through Aydin and his friend's car window, leading them to chase down the boy and take him back to his drunkard of a father. This leads to a distraught relationship between all of them, followed by Aydin's decisions to have the family take care of the car lead to his relationships further growing past their ability to be mended.

Winter Sleep is reminiscent of many cinematic styles, both modern and nostalgic: the influence of Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi is uncanny in Ceylan's approach to human life and the banality of conflict that can become compelling in cinema, while the visual flair (or lack thereof, depending on who you talk to) of French New Wave approaches lead to a calculated visual style. Yet past that influence, the star of the film is not the central actor, Bilginer, who is outstanding, but the film's script. It navigates lengthy, ten-plus minute conversations surrounding ethics, ambition, sympathy, and virtually any other human emotion or conflict that can arise in everyday life. It's so engrossing that each individual scene shines. Their cohesion leaves a bit to be desired, feeling much more like vignettes with a lot of power that do not mesh into a single message. But that's probably intentional, considering the morality fable underlying the central narrative. Even if Winter Sleep leaves the viewer a little bit cold and detached, it mirrors its central character and has the heart grow fonder of these people over such a long duration. It's a rewarding film.

The Boy Next Door - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

The Boy Next Door  

Starring Jennifer Lopez, Ryan Guzman, Kristen Chenoweth, John Corbett, and Ian Nelson

Directed by Rob Cohen

Rated R

Run Time: 91 minutes

Genre: Thriller

Opens January 23rd

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Sleazy, repugnant, misogynistic, and somehow unintentionally hilarious, The Boy Next Door is an unintelligible disaster on all levels. Featuring a self-serious narrative with sexual euphemisms dominating much of its vernacular, the film occupies an ugly territory in the thriller genre. It's not confident enough to be a slasher nor is it exaggerated enough to be a satire of the genre itself; rather, it wallows in sexual violence and aggression toward women while employing a passive, depressing lead character in Jennifer Lopez that seems just as shocked by everything as we are. Hailed as a $4 million success story of micro-budget filmmaking, Lopez and company have crafted a narrative that never employs logic or continuity checks because, well, money can only buy so much. There's no room for caring about the audience or their journey, just in reveling in clichéd notions of obsession, emotional regret, and homoerotic montages of shirtless men punching the air. Wait a second, maybe they're onto something new with that last one...

I digress. The film opens with Claire Peterson (Jennifer Lopez) running through the forest for a morning jog. Naturally, her clothes expose cleavage and show her trying to escape the feelings that torment her past. Those flashbacks include her recent divorce from Garrett (John Corbett), a sleaze ball that cheats on her with his secretary on business trips to San Francisco. Claire teaches at a San Fernando Valley high school that her son, Kevin (Ian Nelson), also attends. Her life is tumultuous with Garrett continuing to be in her life and attempting to reconcile the relationship with family trips to a favorite place of the past, but Claire won't have it. Help indirectly comes in the form of her new neighbor, Noah (Ryan Guzman), a 19-year old boy who lives with  his senile great uncle that's looking for a bone marrow transplant. Noah provides a friendship to Kevin and also helps Claire with her garage and around the house. He also enjoys her cookies, as he repeatedly says. Get it? Cookies.

No surprises come when Noah turns out to be hiding a secret past. That includes being a skilled computer hacker with the ability to forge signatures, quoting Homer's The Iliad off the top of his head, and essentially having the ability to seduce any woman on command. Here's where the film falls from campy romp to grotesquely unsettling romance. Noah effectively coerces Claire into sex in a scene that involves her having a little bit of wine in her system, refusing to have sex with Noah, and having him strip her of her clothes and forcing her to change her mind. It's not seduction, but force. He takes advantage of her as she seems to recoil at first, with pain switching to ecstasy and having the audience forget that the scene started with gross insinuations. The film does linger on her satisfaction, a rarity particularly in as misogynistic of a film as this one. Claire's mistake of sleeping with Noah leads to an obsession that runs rampant, involving him stalking her (but he lives next door, so that joke pops up because it's simply too easy to avoid), writing her name on the wall in the bathroom during Spring Fling, and banging her son's date to said dance. All in what feels like a ten-minute sequence.

Things turn ugly quickly, and the film hits every cliché in the book in an attempt to follow a rote, overdone formula. Repetition escalates matters and the familiarity of the narrative makes every note predictable. I whispered to a friend a few times what I thought would happen and, sure enough, they happened, as did his predictions. Stupidity is a given for characters in a film like this, and Noah is the biggest example, with him keeping criminal actions on his computer from years before and trusting Claire far too much with sensitive information when he already has the upper hand. Claire's passive approach to handling men in the film is perhaps the most frustrating: what could've stood as an empowering narrative for women fighting against men who become obsessed instead devolves into submissive, "damsel-in-distress" material for Lopez. She's better than that. Rob Cohen's film has no semblance of creativity or nuance, even if it does involve some good jokes with a senile old man and an eye-popping closer that brings the film to an abrupt stop. The Boy Next Door is just bad on all levels of filmmaking, as it is both an incompetent and hilarious film for all of the wrong reasons.

King of Herrings - Digital video release review by Monte Yazzie

King of Herrings Dir: Eddie Jemison and Sean Richardson

Starring: Eddie Jemison, Joe Chrest, Laura Lamson, Andrea Frankle, David Jenson, Wayne Pére, John Mese, and Carl Palmer

“King of Herrings” starts in a bar with a group of friends who have known each other for too long. The typical banter and storytelling of these round table revelries ensues, escalating in emotion and culminating in a shouting match that introduces the beginning of the end for the ever-so-thin bonds holding a long friendship together. The situation sounds like the beginning verse of the blues song, the music that identifies the New Orleans streets this ragtag group of men traverse. Written and directed by Eddie Jemison and Sean Richardson, “King of Herrings” is darkly humorous and at times a richly poignant portrayal of friendship and masculinity.

Ditch (Eddie Jemison) is a one of those friends everyone knows; he is loud, egotistical, and brash, that friend that rubs everyone the wrong way. Though Ditch has found his merry men, a group of guys that seem to accept him and all his faults, his attitude has finally exhausted his friends. During a night of poker dissension is created within the group, leading to a split of allegiances between Ditch and The Professor (Joe Chrest), a seemingly self-given moniker by another friend in the group. The situation intensifies with more words cutting deeper rifts into the disagreement leading to destructive threats and unforgivable revenge ploys.

Character plays an integral and important aspect in this film and from the opening moments, the film builds an interesting quality of identifiable people. The leader with a Napoleon complex, the supportive to a fault friend, the peacemaker who keeps everyone calm, the friend who is waiting to take over, the lonely woman on the verge of self-discovery; these characters are all well rendered here. It’s a compliment to the narrative structure, which moves somewhat aimlessly, that these difficult characters remain believable amidst all the underhandedness that transpires. Though it’s easier to accomplish this when you have such a talented cast. Eddie Jemison is in the spotlight and accomplishes the task of becoming a loathsome character in the first few minutes of screen time. This continues throughout as Ditch vehemently muses on aspects of love, sex, marriage, and friendship. It’s comic yet wholly serious, a thin line that displays Jemison’s skill. Joe Chrest does a great job as The Professor, moving from an insufferable smart aleck, to a revenge-seeking degenerate, to a confused suitor; you never know what aspect of the character is genuine if any at all. The best character in the mix comes along unexpectedly in the form of Laura Lamson who plays Ditch’s wife Mary. Her character is mistreated and degraded by Ditch throughout, relinquished to an almost captive state as a lonely woman desperate for escape and the self-esteem to stand up to her husband. Lamson starts off subdued but slowly emerges as the strongest character amidst a group of men whose misguided masculinity in a way becomes their vulnerable limitation.

While the film may linger in spots, taking too much time reiterating a theme already told, it’s never boring, but in fact remains consistently stimulating. The characters are well executed and the black and white aesthetic works charmingly within the New Orleans streets. Whether about the trappings and misunderstandings found in masculinity, the emergence of feminine strength, or the complexities of relationship in different ways, “King of Herrings” explores challenging subject matter and difficult characters with a keen eye and a healthy dose of dark comedy.

Monte’s Rating

4.00 out of 5.00

An interview with Eddie Jemison by Michael Clawson

Eddie Jemison discusses King of Herrings

by Michael Clawson of Terminal Volume

To C-word or not to C-word. When given the choice, Eddie Jemison C-words.

Which is why he spent some time shrugging his shoulders at little old ladies at festival screenings of King of Herrings, a film he wrote, co-directed and starred in that follows four on-again/off-again buddies who are not shy about dropping the taboo word that many American audiences still cringe at.

“The Sex Pistols called each other c**ts. That was just their way. It was their scene and their language,” Jemison says of the word. “But a lot of people are turned off by it. Old ladies, as it turns out, don’t like it. I don’t blame them. I just apologize. On the other side, though, people hear the word and laugh; they aren’t grossed out.”

Jemison admits the word is tempered not by his four male stars, but by the film’s female lead played by the lovely actress Laura Lamson, the actor-director’s real-life wife. Lamson plays Mary, much-better half to Jemison’s Ditch, the wildly offensive leader to his circle of misfits and miscreants. When Ditch pushes his caustic sense of humor a little too far within the group, The Professor (played by Joe Chrest) plans a retaliatory strike by befriending Mary, Ditch’s lonely seamstress wife.

“Whenever people start thinking the movie goes too far, it really centers all back around on Mary. It’s her movie,” Jemison says of King of Herrings, which played at last year’s Phoenix Film Festival and is available digitally Tuesday.

Jemison, as the pig-headed misanthrope, plays against type; he is widely remembered as a dweebish character actor, frequently playing mild-mannered men in technical positions usually involving numbers or computer code. He’s had small parts in Waitress, HBO’s Hung and Bruce Almighty, but he’s most recognizable in fellow Louisiana State University alum Steven Soderbergh’s films, including as sweaty computer expert Livingston Dell in the Ocean’s 11 movies.

“Of course, I’m usually typecast. I’ve always hated that, but what can you do? For this, though, I cast everyone against type. Me more obviously, but also Joe Chrest, who’s easily the most assertive of all of us,” he says. “It was a blast being a big jerk with a Napoleon complex.”

The film came to be during an acting workshop in which Jemison was asked to write a script. “I had this scene I wanted to write where a guy says ‘c**t’ a lot,” he says, adding that the class got involved and the film blossomed in front of him. “Everyone wanted to know the end of the story, so I knew I had something there that was working.”

The film works not only because of its delicate sleight of hand with the star of the film -- as Jemison says it, the film may play like a boys club but it’s really about Mary -- but also because its characters chew the screen. They live in a world that must smell like old cigarettes and cheap beer. Cracked vinyl seats, flickering fluorescent lighting, bowling alleys, dog tracks, laundromats. The world is lived in and worn, and the four characters are in no big rush to leave it. The film was shot in color, but given a high-contrast black-and-white treatment in post-production, a look that solidifies the film’s forgotten time and place. It looks very indie and cheap, but in this case that works quite splendidly.

This is Jemison’s directorial debut, which he shares with co-director Sean Richardson. Much of the cast, and some of the crew, go way back to their LSU days, back to around the time Soderbergh was filming sex, lies, and videotape, and casting many of King of Herrings’ actors in his early movies. Jemison hopes Herrings is enough of a success that he can take the LSU crew down to New Orleans and film a new project “with the exact same actors, like repertory cinema.”

One actor who was easy to work with was Lamson, his wife in and out of the movie. “She’s so good in this movie. I would tell her stuff, but she would really just take over. And as I would be busy directing, she would direct me. She would remind me to give more and to not hold back,” he says, repeating again that Lamson’s Mary calms Herrings’ more sinister verses. “She provides the balance the film needs. When we were showing this movie early on, it was getting really dark responses. But the more people who saw it, the more who started seeing through the film’s more menacing tone. They were finding this sad character in it, and she was cutting through all the rawness.”

“It’s a weird, hard movie,” he admits. “But we’re very proud of it.”

King of Herrings is available on VOD Tuesday.

King of Herrings releases on DVD and VOD by Eric Forthun

Winner of the Breakthrough Filmmakers Award at the 2014 Phoenix Film Festival, King of Herrings releases this Tuesday, January 20th on DVD and VOD platforms.

 

Starring Eddie Jemison, David Jensen, Joe Chrest, John Mese, and Andrea Frankle

Directed by Eddie Jemison, Sean Richardson

MPAA Rating: Not Rated

Run Time: 82 minutes

Genre: Comedy

Releases January 20th on VOD/DVD platforms, including iTunes

 

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

King of Herrings characterizes an offbeat friendship with cold compassion and biting retorts. Eddie Jemison's comedy is one that, like the classical structure, falls into tragic elements in its conclusion that underly the nature of these people and their manipulative, backstabbing ways. They're all antiheroes in a world that doesn't craft particularly heartfelt or inherently connectable characters, yet they remain compelling on screen due to the strong performances from the ensemble and the zippy, spontaneous nature of the script. Jemison's work has been described as a mixture of Woody Allen and Tom Waits, which feels fitting considering the former's emphasis on character-driven narrative with the latter's offbeat sensibilities. In using those two artists as his main point of reference, the film feels like a twisted homage to the two with a touch of his own creation, even using black-and-white cinematography to explore the black-and-white arguments that haunt these characters. The film's humor is vulgar, a characteristic I enjoyed, but it'll be off-putting to some, yet the foundation of the film thrives when it relies on the connection to the mostly unlikable, potentially earnest men at the center.

The film focuses on Ditch (Eddie Jemison) and company, including the Professor (Joe Chrest), Gat (David Jensen), and Augie (John Mese). They're a ragtag group of friends that always seem to fight over trivial matters in New Orleans. The catalyst for the story involves a debt of nine dollars that's completely asinine in the grand scheme of things, but to these men means everything. It's a semblance of respect and honor that they cannot seem to fulfill that haunts their decisions and leads to increasingly disrespectful actions: adultery, threatening, violence, and anything else that could possibly destroy friendships. The characters aren't relatable in their actions but in their emotions; I cared for the characters when I could see compassion shining through their tomfoolery. Characters need heart and Jemison's film allows them that, even if there are slight bouts of misogyny that pervade the men's decision-making. King of Herrings meanders in the middle as the characters' actions begin to feel a bit strained, but the conclusion is worthwhile and a reminder that comedies must have notes of tragedy or else, well, what are we laughing at?

A Most Violent Year - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

A Most Violent Year  

Starring Oscar Isaac, Jessica Chastain, David Oyelowo, Albert Brooks, Alessandro Nivola, and Peter Gerety

Directed by J.C. Chandor

Rated R

Run Time: 125 minutes

Genre: Crime Drama

Opens January 16th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

A Most Violent Year bites with confidence and leaves the impression of a master filmmaker telling a story of building one's future in America. Writer-director J.C. Chandor's third directorial feature is a staunchly astute and caustically biting film about an immigrant attempting to accrue a fortune with a gas oil company in 1981 New York. After making two drastically different cinematic worlds with the talkative, socially critical Margin Call and almost wordless, contemplative All is Lost, Chandor makes his most conventional, accessible, and altogether compelling characterizations to date. By hiring the two hottest actors in Hollywood today, Chandor has the benefit of Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain embodying his strong forces on screen as the divided, composed husband to the quiet, ruthless wife, respectively. They each hold their own in a world that makes them feel inconsequential, but the endless devotion to their company and, perhaps more importantly, keeping their pride and family alive, makes the story a universally appealing, beautifully rendered aspiration toward the American Dream.

Abel Morales (Oscar Isaac) runs Standard Heating Oil, a company that largely ships through trucks around New York City but has recently faced some thefts on their routes. The business is already competitive with plenty of other rivals being potential suspects, but Abel has no semblance of who it can be. It's costing his company by the minute, though, and he can't let it keep up. None of his men are armed or prepared for such turbulent drives, and the people taking advantage of them know just that. Abel's weakness is that he hasn't committed to protecting his company at all costs, and his domestic life begins to brew with dissension. His wife, Anna (Jessica Chastain), keeps tallies on the company and knows where they need to make up for discrepancies. She handles the finances, but she's not a glorified secretary; she's a strong woman that holds a much larger grasp on the company than even Abel realizes at times. That makes for a wonderful dichotomy that grows stronger over the film, whether that be through dinners with potential investors or on the domestic front as they dispute the future and potential of the company.

The film opens in the vein of The Godfather and never really lets up tonally or thematically. Alex Ebert's score underlies every scene hauntingly and powerfully. There's a growing sense of unease over the course of Abel's pursuit of happiness in an American landscape that looks down on his immigrant status and aims to benefit those already in power. The film's most powerful scene is one that's been discussed often, rightfully so: Abel's presentation of his business model to future employees not only shows the way he wants his employees to think, but also the way he does his own work. He's slyly manipulative and justifies every reprehensible action with an intelligent reason. Isaac makes him one of the most compelling protagonists of the year, and follows up his amazing work in Inside Llewyn Davis, with an equally complicated, well-drawn figure. Chastain is the more subtly powerful force; her scenes are magnetic. Chandor's film oozes with confidence and is shot excitingly, particularly when the action scenes amp up. A Most Violent Year is confident and aware of its own footing, making for a terrific, thought-provoking feature.

American Sniper - Movie Review by Monte Yazzie

American Sniper  

Director: Clint Eastwood

Starring: Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller, Kyle Gallner, Luke Grimes, Ben Reed, Keir O’Donnell, Sammy Sheik, and Marnette Patterson

Rated R

132 Minutes

“American Sniper” is a story about Chris Kyle, a Navy Seal sniper who served in four tours of duty in the Iraq war. Based off his memoir the film, directed by Clint Eastwood, displays the harsh realities of combat and the subsequent conflict of choice in a character study of a complicated man tasked with a complicated occupation.  The themes of service, honor, revenge, regret, and justice all take form in some way throughout this film, one which seems tailored to the professional work of Clint Eastwood whose many career characters embodied these same topics. Eastwood guides “American Sniper” with ease, transitioning between war-ridden cities and familiar, albeit affected, homelands while keeping focus on a man struggling to find the balance of both.

We are introduced to Chris Kyle as a child, being taught a life lesson by his father that will form the basis of his ambitions as an adult. Chris (Bradley Cooper) grows into a wayward, hard partying adult until he is motivated by the events of September 11^th to join the military, specifically the elite Navy Seals. Chris excels during boot camp at long distance marksmanship and is moved into a position as a sniper. A hero to his fellow band of brothers, which garnered the nickname “The Legend” for his confirmed enemy kills, Chris struggles with life stateside where his wife (Sienna Miller) and children must put the pieces of their life back together every time he returns home. For Chris the call to service and the responsibility of duty becomes the consuming purpose.

Bradley Cooper offers one of his best performances as Chris Kyle, creating a character that is deeply affected by the choices he has made though never completely vulnerable to those around him. His character is revered, a symbol of heroism and bravery but also hope to the men and women that serve along side him. Cooper shows the split second doubts during life or death decisions, harbors the strain of returning to a life he is unfamiliar with, and demonstrates the steadfast nature towards completing the mission regardless of the outlook. Sienna Miller is also good as Chris’ wife, a woman trying to understand a man who she seldom sees and desperately holding together the semblance of normality at home.

Eastwood is accomplished when handling war and soldiers; take for instance the attitudes of the service people in both “Letters from Iwo Jima” and “Flags of Our Fathers” or the retired veteran in “Gran Torino”. These characters are all different but they all come from the same time honored and respected tradition of military service. Here, Eastwood maneuvers through frenzied action and pauses in the quiet moments, displaying the unexpected nature of violence and the tension that is consistently present. The film transitions back and forth within Chris’ home and service life, and if Eastwood stumbles in any way it’s in the portrayal of the home life where little time is spent. The moments when Chris is home, playing the role of husband and father, are the most interesting but also the most limited. There is a lack of displaying the entire character, especially how influenced he is by the life he leaves on numerous occasions. While this demonstrates the sacrifice of those serving it could have been utilized to add depth and emotion to the character.

“American Sniper” is an interesting character study with an exceptional performance by Bradley Cooper and confidently directed by Clint Eastwood. The film wisely never consolidates politics into the narrative but instead simply displays the difficult decisions made everyday during war by men and women tasked with a job. While the film could have offered more exploration into the influences and struggles of family life for the soldier, “American Sniper” is still a well composed portrayal of a man who served his country with pride.

Monte’s Rating

3.75 out of 5.00

American Sniper - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

American Sniper  

Starring Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller, Max Charles, Luke Grimes, and Kyle Gallner

Directed by Clint Eastwood

Rated R

Run Time: 132 minutes

Genre: Action/Biography

Opens January 16th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Bradley Cooper redeems the sporadically affecting, overly manipulative narrative of American Sniper. It's loosely based on the true story of the NAVY Seal Chris Kyle, who has now lived in legend as the most lethal sniper in American history. There's something commendable about a film attempting to explore the atrocities of war and the lengths to which it destroys a soldier's psyche. Yet that element has been explored by other filmmakers to more affecting degrees: Stanley Kubrick tackled it masterfully in Full Metal Jacket almost thirty years ago, and Kathryn Bigelow's extraordinary The Hurt Locker won Best Picture less than a decade ago. Bradley Cooper creates Kyle as a determined individual that wants to make a difference, yet he feels brainwashed by a society that has told him to fight against the evils outside of the United States. If the film stuck more to those core values and the biting social commentary underlying his action, it would be more impactful; instead, we are left admiring his ability to kill and left with little outside of manipulative family melodrama.

Chris Kyle is a rodeo cowboy that aspires to be more after seeing the aftermath of 9/11 on a struggling country. He enlists as a Navy Seal, with his previous credentials more than serving him well, and he is sent on a tour to Iraq as a sniper. He has remarkable pinpoint accuracy, and records the most kills of anyone out on the battlefield. The trailers on television have teased at the film's opening scene, which is undeniably thrilling: Kyle is presented with an outstanding moral dilemma. A child is seemingly holding a bomb but there is no definitive proof; they have just exited a building known for specializing in terroristic acts. If he shoots, he might make a fatal mistake, destroy his life and the child's, and ruin the integrity of the war effort by murdering an innocent boy. But if he's right, he'll save the lives of his fellow soldiers while committing a necessary evil. When the film tackles moral dilemmas like that and make Chris an embattled protagonist, Sniper is captivating.

Yet the film revels in violence and uses it to increasingly grating effect. Take a scene where a terrorist kidnaps a helpless child and not only threatens him in front of his family and soldiers standing in the distance, but he drills holes into the child's hands because, well, he's evil. He has to show that he's evil or else people wouldn't understand! There's a black-and-white nature to exterior evils in the film, with the narrative caring more about the internal struggles of Chris Kyle and the soldiers on hand. Much like last year's Lone Survivor, the story is a testament to the power of an individual rather than the actual cause he is fighting for. There's an indictment of the Iraqi War to be found somewhere and the fact that Kyle has ultimately been brainwashed by the media to believe that all native citizens of those war-torn countries are evil. Yet I have a problem with the film whitewashing such tumultuous issues when they are rarely handled in cinema; instead of giving us the unfamiliar, more compelling story surrounding the extent of America's actions on this native land, we're given another story of an American "hero" who ultimately feels the war tear him apart.

Bradley Cooper's performance is being deservedly praised, since his transformation both physically and emotionally testifies to his career's trajectory. He's become a powerful actor that can embody practically any individual, and here he makes a hard-nosed, passionate individual into a disconnected, ravished soldier who seems like a shell of his former self by the film's conclusion. Sienna Miller is given moments of sincerity and power as a stay-at-home mother waiting for her husband to return, but she's also delegated to the unfortunately stereotypical domestic presence that feels like it's torn out of a 1950s drama. Clint Eastwood's direction, like much of his work, feels calculated and distanced, which lessens the emotional impact of many of his films. Cooper allows those powerful moments to emerge, particularly in his times at home when he is facing thankful citizens and doesn't know how to respond. There's affecting filmmaking to be found in American Sniper, and it's one of the most beloved films of the year by audiences around the nation. Ultimately, though, it left me cold and unconvinced of its importance.

Blackhat - Movie Review by Monte Yazzie

Blackhat  

Director: Michael Mann

Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Viola Davis, Wei Tang, Jon Ortiz, Leehom Wang, and Holt McCallany

133 Minutes

Rated R

Technologically driven cybercrime has steadily increased with the advancements of powerful technology easily accessed. Computer hackers are creating havoc on a corporate, governmental, and personal level. The release of information and content that nearly crumbled a major company or the invasion of privacy and identity that is happening this very second, the computer is an avenue of serious crime for some people. The world perspective of this specific crime has offered numerous adaptations and seems fitting for director Michael Mann, known for films like “Collateral” and “The Insider”, to tackle with his distinctive brand of films. “Blackhat”, another term for a computer hacker, has all the stylized flair of a Michael Mann film but unfortunately doesn’t offer much more than clichéd computer rhetoric and run-and-gun action scenes.

A high level organization of cyber criminals creates a catastrophic malfunction in a nuclear facility in Hong Kong. A task force is organized by the Chinese government to hunt and stop the network that perpetrated the attack. Nick Hathaway (Chris Hemsworth) is a highly skilled computer hacker who is serving a prison sentence; a code that he wrote was partially utilized to assist in the attack in China. The Chinese task force gains assistance from America after another attack, this time targeting the stock exchange, and the group releases Nick to assist in the globe trotting investigation.

“Blackhat” is crammed with material; from the shifting and jet setting plot, to numerous subplots and character developments, the film rarely takes the time to slow down to explain much of these matters. Instead the film moves from locale to locale in chase of an unknown subject, watching the chaotic maze of numbers and symbols on a computer screen. Mann handles many of these movements with ease, implementing his patented style of shooting in the natural settings of the night with quick and frenzied action sequences abetted by startling unexpected violence. In one of the films better sequences, shot against the golden glow of the city lights, Mann’s skills are executed with heightened tension and breakneck action. Some of the images utilized by Mann seem to correlate the disconnection promoted by technology, the loneliness of a world dominated by technology wherein the characters are most comfortable in front of a computer screen than sitting across from another person, as one scene obviously points out. Unfortunately these images aren’t supported by the narrative, which suffers from a lack of cohesiveness. Whether the inane, overly complicated motivations of the criminals or the misplaced emotional aspects, the tone consistently feels disorganized.

Michael Mann seems like the perfect choice to tackle the themes proposed in “Blackhat”, the disconnection found in people and the isolation found in society are two elements found in many of his films that are also present here. Many times throughout “Blackhat” Mann’s direction and style elevates the material with assistance from some great performances by Viola Davis, Wei Tang, and Leehom Wang in strong supporting roles. However, there are more moments when the film becomes lost in its own cluttered conceptions rendering “Blackhat” a film with undeniable style misguided by a narrative that doesn’t match the flash.

Monte’s Rating

2.75 out of 5.00

Blackhat - Movie Review by Eric Forthun

Blackhat  

Starring Chris Hemsworth, Viola Davis, Tang Wei, Ritchie Coster, and Holt McCallany

Directed by Michael Mann

Rated R

Run Time: 135 minutes

Genre: Action/Drama

Opens January 16th

By Eric Forthun of Cinematic Shadows

Blackhat's technical problems on screen are one of the most ironic things to consider for a film about computing experts. Michael Mann's latest action thriller is convoluted and overblown, preposterous yet opportune, and it remains oddly thrilling for some of its duration despite its confusing, globe-trotting narrative. The film, though, feels like it was spliced together with no care for the actual material, despite the hacker narrative feeling not only timely but necessary and vital to understanding our ever-changing world. So why, then, is the film such a slog and difficult to follow? I enjoyed the film walking out if only because I found it fun and zippy, yet looking back it feels like a bunch of hobbled ideas cut up, then taped together sloppily. The casting is also off-putting, considering the Chinese actors are often incomprehensible in English or dubbed in other scenes, making the sound of the film structurally (pardon the pun) unsound and the production feel overly calculated for a worldwide success.

The film follows Nick Hathaway (Chris Hemsworth), an extremely talented hacker who has been imprisoned for the past few years as part of a 15-year sentence for a serious offense in hacking banks. The U.S. government, though, along with cooperation from Chinese officials, determine that they need him because his code that was built during his college years has been modified and used in cyberthreats. A nuclear explosion in China has threatened and killed lives after a pump was technologically manipulated to blow. Those cyber hackers are talented and ruthless, and largely faceless for most of the film; their plan is kept under wraps until the film's final act. Hathaway teams up with his old buddy Chen (Leehom Wang) and his sister Lien (Wei Tang), with the latter starting to have a fling with Nick. Cooperation comes from Carol Barrett (Viola Davis), an FBI agent that doesn't necessarily trust Nick, but knows he is needed. The results are a story that navigates virtually the entire globe and follows a cyber trail that is mostly confusing and unnecessarily shrouded in close-up shots and fluffy dialogue.

Blackhat isn't a bad film because it actually has something on its mind that feels socially cognizant and relevant. That's vital for mainstream films in our cinematic landscape, so it's a shame that the writer of the film, Morgan Davis Foehl, doesn't know how to make that narrative cohesive. It feels as if ideas were put on a cork board and then connected by string as an afterthought, without care for how much sense they make. When they can't connect, tonally bad elements like a random character trait surrounding 9/11 feel oddly offensive and out-of-place. Michael Mann is talented when he creates compelling characters in new landscapes (Collateral and Heat come to mind first), so naturally a hacking narrative with strong antiheroes should be intriguing. Unfortunately, though, as I distance myself more and more from the film, I find glaring plot holes that signify a lack of care behind the actual product. The aforementioned technical faults, particularly in sound, make the film overwhelmingly difficult to follow. Blackhat has enjoyable components that will please people looking for an innovative thriller, but it won't leave them thinking about much else.