Reverend’s Reviews: Hearts & Brains

‘Twas the week before Valentine’s Day and all through the Cineplex, several scary creatures were stirring: zombies, giant spiders and, perhaps most terrifying of all, Julianne Hough!

Zombies have replaced vampires as the monsters du jour on movie and TV screens, largely due to the massive success of AMC’s The Walking Dead.  Adding welcome doses of romance (yes, really) and humor to the genre is the current Warm Bodies.  Clearly targeted at the tween fans of the recently concluded Twilight Saga (and released by the same studio), it depicts the blossoming love of an undead boy for the ex-girlfriend of the guy whose brain he just ate.  Brains have been zombies’ chief dietary staple since at least 1985’s Return of the Living Dead, and Warm Bodies proposes a novel hypothesis that zombies inherit the memories of the living.

British actor Nicholas Hoult plays R., a bored “walker” who spends his days wandering the remains of a decimated airport and collecting mementoes from the pre-apocalyptic world.  Hoult is memorable as the sexually-questioning student who befriends Colin Firth’s gay professor in A Single Man and also headlines next month’s big-budget Jack the Giant Slayer, by gay director Bryan Singer.  Here he gives his most endearing performance to date as the fine young cannibal suddenly smitten by Julie (Teresa Palmer, vet of I Am Number Four and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice).  Unbeknownst to R., Julie is the daughter of the living’s leader (a game and very good John Malkovich), who has walled off their city from the zombie-infested world and has a zero-tolerance policy toward brain-munchers.

The initial, uneasy alliance between R. and Julie grows into a Shakespeare-lite love story complete with a balcony scene.  In the process, R. regains his heartbeat and starts to become human again, as do those fellow zombies who witness his and Julie’s romance.  Unfortunately, this marks them all as menu items for the Boneys, ghastly skeletal creatures (brought to pseudo-life by so-so digital effects) who have completed their zombie transformation and, we’re told, will eat anything with a heartbeat.

Jonathan Levine, who adapted the screenplay from a young adult novel by Isaac Marion and directs, has a definite knack for stories about young people facing life or death situations.  His last film was 2011’s acclaimed 50/50, in which Joseph Gordon-Levitt deals with a cancer diagnosis.  Warm Bodies takes place on a grander scale but is in essence a similar story about a 20-ish guy who steps back from the brink and learns to live, and love, again in the process.  Despite being slow in spots, it has enough gore (albeit minimal given the film’s PG-13 rating) and scares to keep the guys interested while being the rare female-skewing horror movie thanks to its genuinely moving — not to mention beating — heart.

Spiders, which premieres this Friday in numerous L.A.-area theaters and premium Video on Demand, certainly lives up to its title.  Chock-full of supersized arachnids infused with alien DNA who fall to Earth from a crippled, Cold War-era Soviet space station, it evoked for me pleasant childhood memories of watching such "giant monsters on the loose" B-movies as Them!, Tarantula and The Giant Spider Invasion.

When the station crash lands without warning in a New York City subway tunnel, Transit Supervisor Jason Cole (Patrick Muldoon, who previously battled giant bugs in Starship Troopers) understandably suspects a terrorist attack.  The truth soon becomes known once a worker he sends to investigate is killed and military scientists descend on the site.  Most inconveniently, the situation causes Cole to be late for his daughter’s birthday dinner, infuriating his already estranged wife, Rachel (Christa Campbell).  Conveniently, though, Rachel is a city health inspector and she becomes convinced Jason is telling the truth about his excuse for being tardy when dead bodies filled with spider eggs start turning up.  Jason and Rachel find themselves thrust into the major responsibility of not only saving their daughter but everyone else in the Big Apple from the eight-legged horde and their monstrous queen.

Several elements raise Spidersa notch above what could otherwise have been cheap Saturday night programming on the SyFy channel.  Most critical perhaps are the excellent special effects, which make the spiders appear more organic than most digitally-created critters (note how the real parked cars move up and down when the spiders crawl on them).  Another merit is Lorenzo Senatore’s hi-def cinematography.  Finally, the film’s NYC setting looks and feels completely authentic despite the fact that most of it was shot in Bulgaria.

Director and co-writer Tibor Takacs (best known for the pretty bad but beloved-in-some-circles 1987 horror movie The Gate) dispenses with much of a set up to the plot and continue to keep things moving along throughout. There are worse ways to spend 90 minutes than watching Spiders; just wait ‘til Julianne Hough arrives next week in the sure-to-be-sappy Safe Haven.

Reverend’s Ratings:

Warm Bodies: B

Spiders: B-

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest, Rage Monthly Magazine and Echo Magazine.

Awards Watch: Short Stories

For the seventh year, Shorts HD will be presenting in theaters special short film programs collecting this year's Academy Award nominated animated, live action and documentary shorts. As in the past few years, this is a great opportunity for movie fans and Oscar watchers to see these small, often overlooked gems not only on the big screen, but also before the Big Night, therefore possibly giving you a leg up in your office Oscar pool. The Oscar Nominated Short Films 2013 opens today with the separate animated and live action programs, with the documentary program premiering next Friday.

Unlike in recent years when the Animated Short category has often been populated -- and won by -- cynical and/or esoteric fare (Logorama, The Lost Thing), this year's batch of toons are all accessible and lighthearted (but not light weight). And there is none of that fancy-schmancy computer animation either; two are animated via old school stop motion, while the other three are traditionally hand-drawn. And all five are dialogue-free, not as uncommon in this category as one might think.

You may have actually seen one or two of the nominees already, as Disney's Paperman and Fox's Maggie Simpson in "The Longest Daycare" were paired theatrically with, respectively, Wreck-It-Ralph and Ice Age: Continental Drift. The former is a an almost all black-and-white tale (directed by John Kahrs) of a lovelorn office drone desperately trying to connect, via paper airplanes, with the pretty secretary in the office building directly across the street from his. It is sweet and sharply animated, in typical Disney style, however anyone who has seen the popular internet short Signs may feel a strong sense of déjà vu while viewing it.  As for the latter, it is a little ironic that, where The Simpsons Movie failed to get nominated for Best Animated Feature a few years back, little Maggie Simpson got a nod all on her own (actually, the nomination goes to director David Silverman). As the title suggests, our favorite pacifier-sucking yellow toddler finds herself in the "Ayn Rand School for Tots", where she faces off against a unibrowed brat intent on smashing her new butterfly friend. Fast-paced and lively, this one is as cute as its leading lady.

Fresh Guacamole, the only non-narrative short among the animated block, is a stop motion fiesta by the animator known only as PES, wherein viewers are treated to the preparations of the tasty title dish, but with a twist.  At a mere 105 seconds, this is by far the shortest -- and thus slightest -- of the lot, but still a mouth-watering delight.  The other stop motion entry, Timothy Reckart and Fodhla Cronin O'Relly's Head Over Heels, takes place in a topsy-turvy house where an old married couple live, one on the ceiling, the other on the floor. Often at odds with each other, the two eventually find a way to share a common ground in a charming resolution.

As good as all the animated nominees are this year, the final one, Adam and Dog by Minkyu Lee, stands out as the best and is my personal favorite out of all the shorts in these programs. Simply yet beautifully crafted, Adam and Dog answers the question, "what if Eve had competition for Adam's attention... and it was a dog?" Filled with subtle humor and even (gasp!) full frontal cartoon nudity, this one is my prediction for the win on Oscar Night.

Now on to more serious subjects in the Live Action category, which represent five different countries and languages yet still have a few common themes.  Three feature children in prominent roles, two take place in impoverished lands, four deal with death and all, to varying degrees, have the "twist ending" that is seemingly a surefire way to a nomination in this category.

From South Africa, Asad (Bryan Buckley and Mino Jarjoura) has the unique distinction of having a cast made up entirely of Somalian refugees. The title character is a street smart boy who, regarding his future, is torn between the adventure of being a modern day pirate or the mundane life of a fisherman. Like a lot of shorts, this one ends just when it seems to be beginning. Sam French and Ariel Nasr's Buzkashi Boys from Afghanistan fares better with a similar story, this one about two boys (one an orphaned beggar, the other the son of a blacksmith) with dreams of glory as Buzkashi riders (a polo-like sport, but with dead goats). Poignant and tragic, Boys plays as the most true-to-life of the five nominees and is a strong contender for the final prize.

From gritty realism to stark fantasy, Belgium's Death of a Shadow (a.k.a. Dood van een Schaduw) by Tom Van Avermaet and Ellen De Waele focuses on a Mr. Rijckx, a soldier slain in World War I who is given a second chance at life by a mysterious Mephistophelean "collector", who sends him out to capture the shadows of the dying for his grim galleries. With elements of steam punk and a taste of The Twilight Zone, the end result is a bit too convoluted in the confines of a short film, yet its compelling ideas would make for an interesting feature if the story were expanded. Also dealing with the theme of death and the dying is Henry, from Canadian filmmaker Yan England. A fading concert pianist, Henry's life is thrown into turmoil at the apparent disappearance of his beloved wife. As a sort-of mini Notebook, the plot's twist and turns are somewhat predictable, yet the heartbreaking lead performance of Gérard Poirier adds heft to the emotional dénouement.

In the same darkly comic vein as such recent Live Action Short winners as The New Tenants and Six Shooter, Curfew begins with our protagonist sitting in a bathtub filling with blood from his freshly slit wrists. A phone call from his estranged sister interrupts him, and he soon finds himself babysitting -- and unexpectedly bonding with -- his precocious preteen niece. Written, directed and starring (in a Ryan Gosling-esque performance) Shawn Christensen, Curfew deftly balances on a fine line, never falling into the depths of hipsterness that, say, God of Love did. Considering the recent run of "oddball" winners in this category, plus the fact that it is the only American entry, Curfew looks to be the stand out and eventual victor.

As for the Documentary Short Subjects, only one was made available for previewing, the MTV sponsored Inocente. An aspiring young artist, Inocente is also homeless, and the documentary (co-directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine) follows her story as she tries to find herself through her highly imaginative, brightly colored art (think Keith Haring meets Jackson Pollock). Although "youngster triumphs over adversity" docs like Smile Pinki and Music by Prudence have triumphed in this category recently, Inocente falls a little short in that regard, especially compared to fellow nominee Open Heart, about a group of Rwandan children who leave their families behind to embark on a life-or-death journey seeking high-risk heart surgery in Sudan.

The remaining three nominees (all five will screen in the doc short program) deal with less grim subjects, such as a group of elderly people living in a Florida retirement home (Kings Point), New Yorkers who survive off the money they make cashing in recyclables (Redemption) and a Long Island beauty salon that services cancer victims (Mondays at Racine).

For more information about the Oscar nominated shorts programs, including trailers for all the nominated films and where there will be playing near you, visit the official website.

Reverend’s Reviews: Paradise Lost & Found

The plight of the “West Memphis Three,” a trio of then-teenagers railroaded by the courts and public opinion and ultimately convicted of the murders of three 8-year old boys in Arkansas in 1993, has been well-documented previously in HBO’s Paradise Lostseries.  However, a stunning series of new developments in the case over the last few years inspired director Amy Berg (Deliver Us From Evil) to pick up the torch, resulting in West of Memphis (now playing nationwide courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics).  Berg and the film received major backing from Lord of the Ringsand Hobbit producers Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh as well as from rocker Eddie Vedder, who had all become convinced of the now-adult prisoners’ innocence.

Horribly killed and possibly abused sexually in the process, news of the boys’ murders rightly shocked locals and much of the US when originally reported.  Though two of the boys’ parents were early suspects, suspicion quickly settled on three young men in the community who better fit their neighbors’ stereotypical image of would-be killers.  Damien Wayne Echols, Jessie Miskelley and Jason Baldwin were social misfits who kept to themselves, wore dark clothing and listened to heavy metal music.  Rumors swirled that satanic worship, animal abuse and homosexual relations (horrors!) were practiced among the three.  The court of public opinion found them guilty long before a jury did so, even though the start of the teenagers’ trial was rushed in comparison with similar cases.

Lorri Davis, initially Echols’ pen pal and now his wife, became convinced that the three had not committed the murders.  As Davis pushed for a new investigation with the benefit of now-routine DNA testing of evidence, she also began an e-mail correspondence with producer Walsh that led to documentation of her and others’ renewed efforts to exonerate Echols, Miskelley and Baldwin.  The three were finally freed in 2012 by pleading “innocent but guilty” via an Arkansas legal quirk rather than the state go through an expensive new trial.

The first third of West of Memphis is largely comprised of a recounting of the crime and trial that will seem overly-familiar to those who have seen any of the Paradise Lost films.  However, the remainder of the new documentary contains shocking new revelations, among them the results of DNA testing of a strand of hair found in the rope with which one of the victims was tied that virtually proves Terry Hobbs, stepfather at the time to one of the boys, was the killer (no DNA linking those convicted to the murders has been found).  Hobbs has yet to be arrested, let alone tried.  Several witnesses in the trial against the West Memphis Three have since recanted their testimony and explain why they did so in West of Memphis.  As one of Echols’ accusers now says in reversing his damning words on the stand and, it should be pointed out, under oath: “He was just a normal kid.”

Berg’s doc is gripping, often infuriating, but in the end hopeful about the ability of the truth and innocence to prevail thanks to the efforts of those who strive against all obstacles to uphold them.  Of his interest in the case, producer Jackson bluntly states, “I have a pathological hatred of bullying; rights must prevail.”  Kudos to him.  What that all multimillionaire filmmakers shared Jackson’s commitment to social justice.  West of Memphis is frequently horrific and heartbreaking but an excellent, engrossing expose.  How did this not get an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary this year?

Paradise found and lost is a central theme in the otherwise completely different Tabu, a new feature by Portuguese writer-director (and former film critic) Miguel Gomes.  From Adopt Films, it opens today at Laemmle’s Royal in West LA and Playhouse 7 in Pasadena before expanding this spring.  The movie is even divided into two parts entitled “A Lost Paradise” and “Paradise.”

In part one, a recent retiree and devout Catholic, Pilar (Teresa Madruga), obsesses over the health and loneliness of her elderly neighbor, Aurora (veteran Portuguese actress Laura Soveral), in post-Christmas Lisbon, 2010. Aurora, meanwhile, is concerned about her distant daughter and Santa, her possibly voodoo-practicing maid (played by Isabel Cardoso).  When Aurora becomes hospitalized on the verge of death, Pilar is dispatched by Santa to retrieve a mysterious elderly man named Ventura from a nursing home so Aurora can see him one last time before she dies.

En route (and during the film’s dialogue-free part two), Ventura relates to Pilar the secret love story shared between him and Aurora fifty years earlier in colonial Africa.  Young Ventura and the married Aurora meet and eventually begin a heated affair.  Carlota Cotta (as Ventura, looking like a 1950’s Brando) and Ana Moreira (as younger Aurora) are lovely and give affecting performances all the more impressive for their silence.  Also worth noting, for gay viewers, is the homoerotic vibe between Ventura and his best friend, Mario (Manuel Mesquita).

For a decades-spanning, country-hopping romance on a low budget, Tabu looks great.  Shot in black & white by Rui Pocas (with help from artistic consultant Silke Fischer), it intentionally evokes in aesthetics, settings and/or plot elements such cinematic classics as Casablanca, The Postman Always Rings Twice, A Streetcar Named Desireand even the original King Kong.  The script includes more direct references to The Snows of Kilimanjaro, Out of Africa (including the line “Aurora had a farm in Africa…”), Jean Renoir’s The River and possibly even the 1999 giant crocodile-Betty White mash-up Lake Placid (Aurora has a certain pet on said farm).  Only an avowed, lifelong movie fan such as the 40-year old Gomes could possibly incorporate such diverse sources of inspiration.

The performances sometimes seem stiff among the women in part one but this may be melodramatically intentional à la acting styles of the 1940’s-50’s.  Gomes remarks in the press notes for Tabu that his latest work is “about the passage of time, about things that disappear and can only exist as memory, phantasmagoria, imagery — or as cinema, which summons and congregates all that.”  Even if Gomes doesn’t succeed 100% at capturing or conveying this, the talented young filmmaker gets credit for trying.

Reverend’s Ratings:

West of Memphis: A-

Tabu: B

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest, Rage Monthly Magazine and Echo Magazine.

Reverend's Reviews: Road Movie

Numerous filmmakers have attempted over the decades to bring Jack Kerouac’s Beat Generation classic On the Road to the big screen.  Walter Salles, who hit it big with The Motorcycle Diaries in 2004, has finally done so.  I hesitate, though, to say that he has succeeded with his adaptation.  It is well-cast, with relative newcomer Garrett Hedlund (Tron: Legacy) and Twilight star Kristen Stewart revealing previously unseen emotional depths.  The film also boasts a number of cameo appearances by such big name actors as Terrence Howard, Amy Adams, Viggo Mortensen, Kirsten Dunst and, in a surprising gay turn, Steve Buscemi.

Kerouac’s novel is autobiographical and deeply personal, which can be difficult to translate to film.  Indeed, trying to “open up” the source material to make it more accessible while remaining true to the author’s rebellious spirit is what stymied most of Salles’ predecessors.  Also, much of the narrative is comprised of road trips that naturally take place in the cinematically-unfriendly confines of cars.  Salles and screenwriter Jose Rivera achieve decidedly mixed results.  On the Road is a great-looking production thanks to Eric Gautier’s beautiful photography of an array of American landscapes, but much of it remains interior and inert.

On the plus side, the movie features considerable gay and bisexual content.  Hedlund’s character, Dean, has sex with women and men (including the aforementioned Buscemi), and occasionally with both at the same time.  Tom Sturridge plays the poetic, defiantly gay Carlo Marx (a stand-in for Kerouac’s friend, fellow beat writer Allen Ginsberg), who doesn’t hide his attraction to Dean and ultimately helps Dean embrace his bisexuality.  Subsequently, gay viewers with an interest in classic American literature may best appreciate On the Road.

Reverend's Rating: C+

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest, Rage Monthly Magazine and Echo Magazine.

Reverend’s Reviews: Thanksgiving Leftovers

The long, quiet Thanksgiving/Black Friday weekend presented me with the opportunity to dive into several recent releases.  Like the offerings laid out on a holiday dinner table, these films ended up representing a variety of flavors and colors — artistically, politically and/or religiously speaking — but I didn’t walk out of any of them completely unsatisfied.

For an appetizer, I couldn’t resist the sexually-charged true story The Sessions.  While it has been generating awards buzz ever since its January premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, primarily for John Hawkes’ and Helen Hunt’s soul-and-body-baring performances, I was unprepared to find the movie so deeply moving.  I had tears in my eyes for nearly half of the 95-minute running time.  Viewing paralyzed protagonist Mark O’Brien’s plight is inherently humbling, even though the Oscar-worthy Hawkes (an Oscar nominee for Winter’s Bone and also visible in the current Lincoln) invests him with a sense of grace and humor that nullifies any potential pity.  I was equally touched, though, by William H. Macy as the compassionate Roman Catholic priest (seemingly a dying breed nowadays) who serves as Mark’s spiritual and unwitting sexual advisor.  But perhaps more than anything, The Sessions impressed and moved me with its all-too-rare, positive approach to human sexuality.  While Hunt’s real-life sex surrogate is the least-developed character in the film (Hunt deserves kudos for making her more complex), she rightly demonstrates — and learns for herself — that sex entails much more than intercourse.  This is a great movie for adults and even for older adolescents.

I next jumped to what many fellow critics would surely call the turkey in my cinematic buffet: Breaking Dawn — Part 2, the finale to the mega-successful Twilight Saga.  Having sat out the first part of the series’ climax after seeing the previous chapters, I was quickly struck by how I apparently hadn’t missed anything but the birth of Bella and Edward’s bizarre vampire-human hybrid baby (who is even more bizarrely named “Renesmee”).  Edward (Robert Pattinson) is a little less gloomy since marrying Bella (Kristen Stewart) in the last chapter and she’s happier too, at least until she receives word that the ruling vampire clan, the Volturi (led by a deliciously campy Michael Sheen), are out to kill Renesmee.  Everything builds to a showdown, which is the case in most of the Twilight films, but this one is truly impressive and features a truly unexpected twist.  If only the other films in the series featured such surprises instead of being so by-the-numbers in adaptation and crafting, the saga might have proven more significant.  At least the filmmakers have truly saved the best for last.

Lincoln arrived in theaters swathed in early critical accolades and a seeming guarantee that it would be the important, “good for you” movie of the year, essentially serving as the green vegetable in one’s Thanksgiving dinner.  Steven Spielberg’s biopic about the 16th president of the United States, resurrected via a compelling performance by two-time Oscar winner Daniel Day-Lewis, boasts a screenplay by gay Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Tony Kushner (Angels in America) as well as a massive cast of other award-winning actors including Sally Field, Tommy Lee Jones, James Spader, David Straithairn, Jackie Earle Haley, Hal Holbrook and many more (watch for a brief but welcome appearance by Tony winner and gay fave Julie White of The Little Dog Laughed and Transformers fame).  The proceedings are beautifully shot and given a burnished, painterly quality, and are supported by typically top-notch art direction, costumes and a John Williams score.  Kushner’s script, however, seems much too narrowly focused on Lincoln’s efforts to pass the 13th amendment that would ban slavery; as my partner aptly commented, the movie should have been more accurately titled The 13th Amendment.  The resultant, generally saintly image projected of the “Great Emancipator” ends up feeling constrained and limited, not to mention historically questionable.  The film is a talky, 150-minute affair but not without interesting modern-day ironies and parallels, including to our GLBT fight for marriage equality.  While worth seeing for Day-Lewis (Field is also great as his wife, Mary Todd), one needs to take the one-sided history depicted in Lincolnwith a grain of salt.

For dessert, I took in Ang Lee’s 3D visual spectacle Life of Pi at the end of Thanksgiving weekend, appropriately enough.  I have not read the bestselling book it is adapted from so I knew little of what to expect other than a kid and a tiger stuck in a lifeboat together.  The movie, at least, is a thought-provoking religious parable.  Primarily conveyed by grown-up survivor Pi (Irrfan Khan) to a doubting writer (Rafe Spall, a late-in-the-game replacement for Tobey Maguire), it entails young love in Pi’s native India, a shipwreck that claims the rest of his family, and a handful of exotic animals that also make it to the lifeboat.  One is a full-grown Bengal tiger with the unlikely moniker Richard Parker, superbly brought to life by CGI.  Young Pi (an excellent, wholly believable turn by newcomer Suraj Sharma) must befriend the tiger to make it through what turns out to be more than six months at sea, and he learns more than a few things about both animal and divine nature in the process.  The storytelling approach is used a bit excessively; I think I would have preferred it limited to the opening and close of the film and let the images and action speak for themselves in between.  Otherwise, Life of Pi is a profound, haunting and beautifully-made motion picture experience suitable for ages 10 and up.

Reverend’s Ratings:

The Sessions: B+

Breaking Dawn, Part II: C+

Lincoln: B-

Life of Pi: B+

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reel Thoughts: Without a Hitch

The battle of the Hitchcock biographies has played out with The Girl on HBO and Hitchcock on the big screen, and the winner is no contest. Hitchcock murders The Girl like Norman Bates slaughtered poor Marion Crane The dull, one-note The Girl never stood a chance against Anthony Hopkins as Hitch, Helen Mirren as Mrs. Hitch, Alma Reville, and Scarlett Johansson in a spot-on performance as Janet Leigh. Hitchcock delights in showing all the dishy behind-the-scenes dramas that went into the making of Psycho.

The Girl, on the other hand, fails miserably to capture the complex and allegedly abusive relationship between Hitchcock and his “exciting new discovery,” Tippi Hedren. Toby Jones does well, but seems small in stature and presence as Hitchcock, while Sienna Miller never even captures Tippi’s signature sexy monotone, much less her odd charisma. The film misses many opportunities to celebrate the films Hitch and Hedren made together, especially The Birds, never even showing Hedren with a single co-star. Was the budget that low? All we see is unpleasant to watch sexual harassment from Hitch toward Hedren, his obsession.

On the other hand, Hitchcock pumps up the suspense, naturally, considering that it is a film about making one of the scariest movies of all time. Director Sasha Gervasi and Black Swan screenwriter John J. McLaughlin introduce infamous serial killer Ed Gein (Michael Wincott), the inspiration for Norman Bates, as a devil on Hitchcock’s shoulder as he films Psycho. With Gein's unexpected appearances, you are never sure if he will start some bloodletting of his own via Hitch, although he's essentially a red herring.

Hopkins disappears into his role as Hitchcock, capturing the brilliant director’s ego and vulnerability, while Mirren also gives a moving performance as a woman used to being invisible beside her famous husband. Toni Collette is wonderful as Hitch’s faithful secretary, and Jessica Biel is fun as the unfortunate Vera Miles, who suffered Hitch’s wrath on Psycho for having previously dared to get pregnant when he wanted to make her a star. Johansson is the real stand-out, managing to capture Janet Leigh down to the most subtle detail. Likewise, James D’Arcy makes the most of closeted star Anthony Perkins, who found parallels between his struggles and his twisted character.

Hitchcock is a fun behind-the-scenes look at 1960’s Hollywood that is one of the best movies of the year

Review by Neil Cohen, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Phoenix's Echo Magazine.

Reel Thoughts: Tiger By the Tale

If you were captivated by the film and novel The Black Stallion, you will fall in love with the gorgeously-shot Life of Pi. Ang Lee’s adaptation of the 2001 best-seller makes the best use of 3-D you will see this year as he tells the story of a teenager who survives an unbelievable 227 day ordeal at sea.

Living happily in India, Pi (which is short for piscine, the French word for pool) is upset to learn that his parents plan to sell the zoo that they own and move the family to Canada to escape political unrest. Along with most of the animals, Pi and his family board a Japanese freighter for their trip across the Pacific. Unfortunately, a terrible storm capsizes the ship and only Pi escapes onto a lifeboat with an injured zebra who jumped in as the boat launched. Pi then discovers a spotted hyena hiding under the boat’s cover, followed by a beloved orangutan who floats up on a raft of bananas. His last unexpected guest is the ferocious tiger humorously named Richard Parker, who leaps onto the already crowded lifeboat. As the sea’s fury continues, nature’s fury unfolds on the boat, leaving Pi with life-or-death decisions to make in order to survive.

Pi and the tiger form an uneasy truce as the need for food and fresh water becomes more and more serious. Amazing sights and events happen, like a phosphorescent sea of jellyfish that light up the water one evening, or the mysterious island Pi discovers that holds a deadly secret. Lee’s storytelling and visual genius makes Life of Pi the most beautiful film of the year with a haunting story that will appeal to most ages. The animal violence may be too harsh for younger kids and the long time at sea may tire them, but otherwise the film is perfect for everyone.

It is no spoiler to say that Pi survives his adventure at sea, since the story is told in flashback by Irrfan Khan from The Namesake to an interested writer. Khan’s epilogue on the story creates questions about what really happened, but the film concludes with a moving scene that caps the tale beautifully.

Life of Pi is a movie you have to see on the big screen, and you will be blown away.

Review by Neil Cohen, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Phoenix's Echo Magazine.

Reverend’s Reviews: Ice, Rust & Bone

The holiday season has begun, and its requisite songs celebrating snowy landscapes dominate radio stations. "Sleigh Bells", "Winter Wonderland", "Let It Snow" and other tunes are as much a part of Christmas as trees and tinsel.  We should enjoy the frigid phenomenon they celebrate while we can since, as the makers of the new documentary Chasing Iceillustrate, it probably won’t last much longer.

Chasing Ice (now playing in Los Angeles and New York before a national rollout) reveals the staggering damage done to Earth’s ice caps as a result of human-caused global warming via stunning time-lapse photography shot between 2007 to 2010.  National Geographic photographer James Balog and his crew perched cameras on the edge of millennia-old glaciers in Greenland, Iceland, Canada, Alaska and other historically snow-covered spots. When they retrieved the footage a few years later, they were stunned — asviewers will be — by the shockingly rapid pace of melt they captured. The results are not only now-barren wilderness but also rising sea levels with decreased salinity that is impacting life both in the ocean and on land.  The reduction in ice is also contributing to a global rise in temperature and increasing ferocity of hurricanes and other “superstorms.”

So long as filmmaker Jeff Orlowski keeps his focus on the findings from Balog’s Extreme Ice Survey (EIS) and the researcher’s subsequent efforts to educate the world about global warming, Chasing Ice is gripping.  Occasional diversions into knee surgery that Balog had to undergo and logistical hardships his team endured seem calculated and excessive.  This award-winning testament to disaster need provide no greater human interest than the obvious natural effects we will all soon suffer.

Jacques Audiard’s unsparing drama Rust and Bone is also screening now in NY and will open in LA on December 7th.  I first wrote about the film a few weeks back in my preview of AFI Fest, where it received a special screening.  Marion Cotillard (who won the Best Actress Academy Award for La Vie En Rose and seems a shoo-in for a nomination this year for her exceptional work here) plays Stephanie, a whale trainer at Marineland in the south of France who loses both her legs during a performance gone bad.  While I was grateful that Audiard depicts this accident minimally and tastefully, it also left me wondering exactly what happened.

Now confined to a wheelchair, Stephanie reaches out to a club bouncer she had met briefly prior to the accident. Ali (Matthias Schoenaerts, the terrific, previously unknown star of last year’s Oscar-nominated Bullhead) is a brutish, washed-up fighter with a little boy who has had to move in with his sister and her husband.  Although Ali accuses Stephanie of being a whore during their initial encounter, he’s the one who has sex with women indiscriminately and farms himself out for small-scale boxing matches to make money.

Stephanie and Ali gradually find wounded common ground, and more, between them.  A subplot about Ali installing surveillance cameras in unsuspecting workplaces seems extraneous, and Ali’s young son is forced to undergo a considerable amount of physical and emotional trauma during the course of the film.  Rust and Boneisn’t a love story for everyone, but many will find it and its two lead performances undeniably powerful.

Reverend’s Ratings:

Chasing Ice: B+

Rust and Bone: B

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reverend's Report: AFImpossible

I have to come to admire the annual AFI Fest greatly, not only for its programming mix of potential end-of-the-year awards contenders and US premieres of acclaimed foreign language films but because tickets are provided free of charge to many festival attendees thanks to presenting sponsor Audi.  However, this year's fest, which ran November 1st-8th at Graumann's Chinese Theatre and neighboring venues in Hollywood, proved frustrating to me and numerous other people with whom I spoke.  Free tickets ran out quickly online, and some hopeful attendees who secured them were ultimately turned away from over-filled capacity screenings.  Even holding a press pass, which I had, was no guarantee of admission.  Press were permitted in the priority admission line for some screenings but, inconsistently, not for all.  And many of us journalists were denied tickets for the fest's opening and closing night gala screenings of Hitchcock and Lincoln.

Fortunately, I got into a special screening of the family drama/disaster movie The Impossible but not without overcoming unexpected obstacles in the form of the film's uninformed PR reps and an overzealous security guard.  You know a situation has become intense when I -- a generally rules-abiding, non-threatening type open to dialogue -- and said security guard were angrily staring each other down from a maximum of two feet apart at the gate in front of the Chinese Theatre entrance.  Two other journalists were detained with me for not having hard tickets to the screening, which bearers of press passes weren't required to have, but our initial attempts to clarify that fell on deaf ears.  Thankfully, an in-the-know AFI staffer intervened and let us into the theatre after several harrowing minutes.

Our uncomfortable dilemma was nothing, though, in comparison with the horrific destruction and loss of life depicted in The Impossible that many Thai nationals and holiday tourists endured on December 26th, 2004. A massive tsunami generated by an earthquake in the Indian Ocean struck the coast of Thailand and 13 other countries that tragic morning, killing approximately 230,000 people.  Ewan McGregor, who was on hand to introduce the AFI Fest screening, and Naomi Watts star as a real-life married couple on vacation with their three sons when disaster struck.

 

The Impossible is undeniably compelling and frequently harrowing thanks to its very impressive visual and make-up effects.  The always likable Watts (who spends most of the film’s second half incapacitated) and McGregor have no trouble gaining audience sympathy for their characters’ terrible plight, and the young actors playing their sons are similarly good and charming.  Unfortunately, Spanish director Juan Antonio Bayona (The Orphanage) unnecessarily piles on foreboding touches such as extreme airplane turbulence during the family’s flight to Thailand.  He also employs a  new 3D sound system so loud and strong that it literally made my teeth vibrate.  Such excesses tend to distract from rather than augment this otherwise solid drama.

There is annually a “secret screening” or two announced during AFI Fest, and this year’s biggie was the Los Angeles premiere of Skyfall on November 7th.  This 23rdJames Bond adventure is indeed (in keeping with its advance buzz) one of the very best in the series’ 50-year history.  Daniel Craig truly owns the role now, and his steely blue eyes are more piercing than ever thanks to Roger Deakins’ superb cinematography.  Theatrically-trained, Academy Award-winning director Sam Mendes (American Beauty, Revolutionary Road) gathered a superb cast and technical team for this 007 outing and their collective proficiency shows.  Judi Dench as M gets a fitting send-off, Javier Bardem as the possibly gay villain is simultaneously terrifying and comedic, and series stalwarts Q and Miss Moneypenny, both MIA in recent episodes, make welcome returns.  Bond is back after a 4-year hiatus and the series is in its best shape since the 1960’s.

Of course, AFI Fest is primarily construed of smaller independent films, many of which receive their world or US premieres.  One lovely example this year was Joe Swanberg’s All the Light in the Sky.  The increasingly revered writer-director, who also photographed and edited here, is also an actor who made a memorably graphic appearance in 2010’s gay indie Blackmail Boys.  Jane Adams (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Brave One) headlines Swanberg’s latest as Marie, a 40-ish actress quietly questioning her career and life in general as she finds herself increasingly losing roles to the likes of Kristen Wiig.  A visit from her young, relationship-testing niece (well played by Sophia Takal) helps give Marie some perspective.  The film, beautifully shot in Adams’ own Malibu beach property, is observant, gently adult and wryly funny.  Meanwhile, the festival’s Audience and Jury Awards went to the similarly low-budget Eat Sleep Die, A Hijacking, Only the Young and Nairobi Half Life. 

Two of the best films I’ve seen in recent weeks weren’t at AFI Fest but had played other festivals prior to their current theatrical releases.  Cloud Atlas is a stunning romantic-philosophical spectacle that gleefully mixes genres as it hops back and forth through 500 years of past and future history.  Its spectacular cast includes Tom Hanks, Halle Berry (the best utilized she has been in some time), Hugh Grant, Susan Sarandon, Jim Broadbent and Bond’s new Q, Ben Whishaw, among others.  Sadly, the pricey film — co-directed by trans filmmaker Lana Wachowski, formerly Larry of The Matrix series’ Wachowski Brothers — has been a box office flop in the US, so I encourage anyone remotely interested to see it on the big screen for which it was intended immediately.

Then there is Flight, the Denzel Washington-starrer instantly notable for its standout shot of a passenger jet flying upside down.  Once that intense sequence ends in a crash thirty minutes into the film, there are still 100 minutes to go that serve as a very effective and positive exploration of the time-honored Twelve Steps in overcoming addiction.  As one of those steps prescribes the recognition that there is a Higher Power capable of restoring an addict to sanity, there is considerable and welcome discussion of faith during the movie.  Washington is award-worthy as the denial-plagued pilot, and it is great to have Robert Zemeckis directing flesh and blood characters once again after his motion-capture opuses The Polar Express, Beowulf and A Christmas Carol. The screenplay does get a bit heavy-handed bordering on the preachy at times, but Flight succeeds as thought-provoking and inspiring cinema.

Reverend's Ratings:
The Impossible: B
Skyfall: A-
All the Light in the Sky: B
Cloud Atlas: A-
Flight: B+

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reverend’s Reviews: Dead Funny

Even though he passed away in 1989, that hasn’t stopped Monty Python’s Graham Chapman from starring in a new cinematic testament to himself, albeit in animated form. A Liar's Autobiography - The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman — which also features the voices of MP members John Cleese, Michael Palin, Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones — will premiere tonight at 10:00 p.m. Eastern on EPIX. It is also having an exclusive, one-week theatrical run starting today at Santa Monica's Aero Theatre, and in 3D no less.

Chapman was the blonde, more athletic-looking (thanks to rugby and mountaineering) troupe player who also had lead roles in their Life of Brian and Yellowbeard films. Born in Great Britain during the outbreak of World War II, Chapman’s eventual comic sensibility was seemingly impacted by the war-time violence he witnessed as a youngster (which may have been the case with all of MP’s members). He was also MP’s sole gay member, and A Liar’s Autobiography explores Chapman’s sexual coming of age in fairly graphic cartoon detail (see clip below). Sadly, Chapman died of throat cancer when he was only 48 years old.


The film is animated in a variety of styles and with numerous amusing touches to illustrate the stages of Chapman’s life. These styles of animation include traditional hand-drawn, both crude and more sophisticated forms of CGI, stop motion (notably during a Sigmund Freud segment which features the voice of “gratuitous special guest star” Cameron Diaz as Freud), charcoal sketches and watercolor paintings. Some live-action archival footage of Chapman and Monty Python is also utilized. All of the vignettes are framed by a theatrical sketch that has Chapman playing Oscar Wilde.

For gay audiences at least, the film’s primary point of interest will be the substantial amount of time devoted to Chapman’s homosexuality. While initially stating “my sexual life consisted of sleeping with women while dreaming about men,” Chapman later determined himself to be 70% gay on the famous Kinsey Scale. He fell in love with the man who would become his longtime partner, David Sherlock, during a trip to Ibiza. Prior to his death, Chapman came out publicly and also admitted to his longtime alcoholism on British talk shows.

As suggested by its subtitle, The Untrue Story of Monty Python’s Graham Chapman, A Liar’s Autobiography is hardly dedicated to painting a completely accurate portrait of the late comedian. However, directors Bill Jones, Jeff Simpson and Ben Timlett draw primarily from Chapman’s own reading of his book, so any discrepancies between the subject and the telling are likely the result of liberties taken by Chapman himself. Both the storytelling and the imagery are often beautiful, sometimes baffling, but captivating throughout. To MP devotees, this film will serve as a great companion piece to Holy Flying Circus, a clever exposé of the controversy surrounding Life of Brian that was just released on DVDlast month.

Reverend's Rating: B

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.

Reverend’s Reviews: Hitting the Slopes

The Swiss Alps have served as a backdrop for adventure and romance in such classic movies as On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and The Sound of Music.  In Ursula Meier’s Sister (opening today in Los Angeles), which is Switzerland’s official entry in this year’s Academy Awards, the famous mountain range is the setting for a darker, more personal story.

12-year old Simon (an excellent performance by Kacey Mottet Klein) is in many ways your average, precocious pre-pubescent.  He spends his days hanging out with friends at the tourist-oriented ski resorts nestled high above their middle-to-lower-class homes in the valley.  Simon has hit upon a novel way to support himself and his older, unemployed sister: he steals high-end skis from tourists and resells them at a considerable profit.  Though it is a risky enterprise, the boy finds eager buyers in the seasonal adult workers shopping for low-cost Christmas gifts for their own kids.

Desperate for his neglectful sister’s attention, Simon gives her money and lavishes her with high-end clothing.  She continues, however, to spend days at a time away with strange men.  The more mature Simon strikes up friendships with a handsome cook at one of the resorts as well as with a British woman (played by Gillian Anderson of X-Files fame) on vacation with her two young sons.  But once the season ends and Simon again finds himself alone, he begins to realize he has to start making some choices for his own happiness.

Sister, which also won the Silver Bear at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, posits the virgin-white snow and frolicsome attitudes of the resort guests in stark contrast to the somewhat incestuous, psychologically-complex relationship between Simon and his sibling (Lea Seydoux, who appeared last year in the US films Midnight in Paris and Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol).  Their relationship is revealed to be even more tangled, heartbreakingly so, than it initially appears.  Agnes Godard’s cinematography and John Parish’s spare, acoustic music score provide strong technical support.  You may be shocked, you may be moved, but you won’t easily forget Sister.

Newly out on DVDand VOD and airing tonight on the PBS series Voces is the eye-opening documentary, Lemon.  It recounts the rags-to-riches-to-rags saga of poet and playwright Lemon Andersen. Born in Brooklyn to a Puerto Rican mother and Norwegian-American father (both of whom later died from AIDS), Lemon began to “take my lemons and make the best goddamn lemonade” via poetry at the age of 20 after serving time on Riker’s Island.  He was discovered by producer Russell Simmons at an open mic event and was chosen to star in Simmons’ Broadway production, Def Poetry Jam, which won a 2003 Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event.  Lemon received his own award as one of the cast members.

Lemon became briefly popular before the show’s closure and demons from his past intervened to derail his success.  As his money ran out, Lemon found himself back in the projects.  In time, though, he picked up his pen and began writing anew, hoping to stage a comeback.  He has since appeared in the feature films Inside Man and The Soloist.

There aren’t many Tony Award winners who are also three-time felons, but the documentary allows Lemon’s talent and ambition to shine through.  I wish co-directors Laura Brownson and Beth Levison had gone into more detail regarding his parents’ fascinating though ultimately tragic lives and the circumstances their subject was born into.  Still, this Lemon-ade is worth sampling as is.

Reverend’s Ratings:

Sister: B+

Lemon: B

Review by Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine.