Andy's Film Blog: 2016

Showing posts with label 2016. Show all posts

Monday, November 20, 2017

Personal Shopper

An American personal secretary (Kristen Stewart) to a demanding Parisian debutante attempts to channel the spirit of her recently deceased twin brother while being digitally stalked by what may or may not be an otherworldly presence. Olivier Assayas' Personal Shopper is both an eerie ghost story and sincere character study featuring a commanding performance from Stewart, which is able to succeed in being ambiguous while also carrying meaning.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Monday, November 6, 2017

The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman's Portrait Photography

A photographer retreats from the hustle and bustle of 1960s New York to Boston where she discovers her calling: taking natural photographs in her home studio on a rented, oversized 20x24 Polaroid camera. Uninspired Errol Morris documentary, one of his worse, where he curiously opts to forgo the use of his Interrotron, a device which has helped maintain the fascination level in his movies. As for the subject, though Dorfman seems wise and affable, this is essentially a profile of a family portrait photographer who just happened to be friends with Allen Ginsberg and snap a couple pictures of Bob Dylan.

** out of ****

Wednesday, November 1, 2017

The Death of Louis XIV

After basking in his gardens at Versailles, the Sun King (Jean-Pierre Leaud of Truffuat/Antoine Doinel fame) develops a misdiagnosed case of gangrene. and is attended to by servants. advisers, clergy, weeping women, and a team of doctors as he bids farewell to his young heir and settles in to join the ranks of the dead. Albert Serra's The Death of Louis XIV makes use of sustained shots and employs an extremely measured pace yielding a sometimes compelling but mostly dull and surprisingly drab looking (especially for a period piece) result.

** 1/2 out of ****

Monday, October 30, 2017

Cloverfield/10 Cloverfield Lane

Cloverfield

A scaly, Godzilla-like creature strikes Manhattan during a going away party held by twenty-somethings, and as a group of them attempts to escape the carnage, they catch fading glimpses of the monster on their hand held camera. Though the characters are extremely unlikable and the queasycam approach wears thin quickly, Cloverfield has its moments of shock and stretches where it soars.

** 1/2 out of ****

10 Cloverfield Lane

(spoilers)

In a barely related plot and a totally different kind of thriller, a young woman (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is run off the road by a paranoid (John Goodman) who takes her into his custody in a self-sufficient bunker with claims of nuclear war ongoing outside as signs point to the fact that he is more crazy and calculating than initially let on. 10 Cloverfield Lane is a solid thriller, with a surprisingly talented cast that goes over the top in its still competent finale with a killer that won't die scenario and even more outlandish occurrences.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Wednesday, October 25, 2017

The Shallows

Still grieving the death of her mother, a med school dropout (Blake Lively) body surfs a secluded Mexican beach and finds herself trapped by a great white only a few hundred yards off shore with only a handful of buoys as her only point of refuge. The Shallows is effective in parts, containing some good scares, but the singular plot wears thin and grows tiresome quickly with the lovely Lively unable to carry the picture.

** 1/2 out of ****

Thursday, October 5, 2017

Certain Women

The story of three barely connected women inhabiting small-town Livingston, Montana: a lawyer (Laura Dern) and her relationship with an unhinging client (Jared Harris); a sullen woman (Michelle Woman) on an errand in the country which reveals her troubled marriage; a young lawyer (Kristen Stewart) making a slight friendship with a farmhand (Lily Gladstone) at a night class she's teaching. Kelly Reichardt's Certain Women, based on the writings of Maile Meloy, is essentially three self-contained shorts, touching, melancholic, and minutely observed and made with great actresses and beautiful Western landscape photography.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Monday, September 25, 2017

Things to Come

A Parisian philosophy professor (Isabelle Huppert) living a comfortable middle class existence only comes partially unraveled when a succession of curveballs are thrown her way, including her husband moving in with a younger woman, her needy mother’s health gradually deteriorating, and her publisher deciding her book will not be renewed. Things to Come is pompous intellectual French filmmaking made salient by Huppert’s profound presence.

** ½ out of ****

Thursday, August 31, 2017

Game of Thrones

It is difficult to review television without giving away something of the plot. Tread lightly if you haven't seen the series in its entirety.

Season 7 (2017)

As the threat from the White Walkers grows ever more imminent, Jon and Daenerys finally acquaint as they quarrel over patronage before coming to terms with an alliance and a potential love affair and Cersei and Jaime prepare for war at King’s Landing while the surviving stark siblings have a bitter reunion at Winterfell as Littlefinger’s presence ominously looms. As the end nears in this first half of the final season, the pace is quickened, the storylines converge, and the number of battle sequences increase, the series is still bogged down by unnecessary asides, woeful plotting and characters, absolutely insipid dialogue.

** 1/2 out of ****

Season 6 (2016)

Cersei plots revenge while sitting back helpless in humiliation as her son is taken in by the High Sparrow and the gods, Arya learns some harsh lessons in life and death, and Sansa, after being rescued by an unlikely source, reunites with an unsurprisingly resurrected and differently composed Jon as they gear up to retake Winterfell from the odious Ramsay Bolton. In this first season without George R.R. Martin as a writer and as the series eyes the finish line and moves all of its pawns into place, it is nice to see the pace finally pick up with so much finally happening in this multi-storied universe, with also some incredible set pieces to boot in the latter episodes. Still the quality of the dialogue seems the worst its ever been, some stories still seem stuck in limbo (i.e. Daenerys and Tyrion), while Arya's would be powerful tale comes off as insipid and disappointing.

*** out of ****

Season 4 (2014) and Season 5 (2015)

An act of treachery at the Royal Wedding sends Tyrion toward a new destiny and Sansa into greater peril. Daenerys learns how to rule over the recently liberated Meereen and Stannis provides relieve to the Night's Watch only to find more obstacles on his quest to the Iron Throne. The fourth season of Game of Thrones is a marked improvement over the previous one, with the intrigue at King's Landing exciting enough to cover for the dull wheel spinning that continues to go on elsewhere (i.e. The Wall, Meereen), only to return for a dreadful, monotonous fifth season that brings nothing closer to resolution except in killing off several major characters in the end, which surely will thrill many fans but seems a giant waste of their protracted storylines. Without having read the books, it almost seems as if George R.R. Martin crafted an excellent first entry, which was then adapted into a great first season, and then had absolutely no idea what he signed on for or where it was going after that. While watching the "previously on" segment for Sunday's finale I realized that I had never seen a show with so much going on where so little actually happens.

Season 4: *** out of ****

Season 5 ** out of ****

Season 3 (2013)

As the inhabitants of King’s Landing recover from the their costly victory at the Battle of Blackwater and Stannis and his few remaining followers lick their wounds on a remote island, war parties led by Rob Stark and Daenerys Targaryen continue their arduous march on the capital. I wanted to keep this short and sweet after feeling the ire from panning another highly popular show, but season three represents an even steeper decline for this beloved series and, even in the “Golden Age of Television” as many have dubbed it, provides further evidence of the difficulties of sustaining an extended serial, even one based on extensive source material. You can almost picture George R.R. Martin and the HBO execs sitting at their round table brainstorming their smoke and mirrors tactics saying, “You know, we could just go through with a long, boring, protracted season where things wind up basically where they started, so long as we kill off a few major players in the end, we’ll still have ‘em hooked.”

** out of ****

Season 2 (2012)

As three challengers to the throne march upon King's Landing, an unexpected foe lays siege on Winterfell, causing more turmoil and heartache to the already beset Stark family. Tyrion has his hands full as Hand of the King in dealing with his treacherous sister and malevolent nephew. Daenerys, her dragons, and dwindling tribesman remain stranded across the Narrow Sea and Jon Snow begins his tour beyond the Wall as the dreaded Winter finally arrives. Following the spectacular first season of Game of Thrones, the followup series, while still maintaining a high level of interest, meanders and goes in circles for many of its story lines, and ones which were the top draw in season one (ie Daenerys, Jon Snow and the Wall, Rob Stark and his army) now seem to have lost their way and are stuck in standstill for virtually this entire round. Also, following the exit of Sean Bean, the show does not have a lead actor to anchor itself around and while Peter Dinklage (who went from Best Supporting Actor Emmy Winner to first billed in the credits) is excellent, he is not a leading man. I was still engaged with this season. The court intrigue and Arya's storyline worked best for me but the show seemed only interested in its primary story, which was made evident in the climactic Battle of Blackwater episode. "Game of Thrones" is a vast drama, and about as in depth as anything you can expect from television that still nonetheless needs to iron out its storytelling kinks.

*** out of ****

Season 1 (2011)

A long and brutal winter is approaching the kingdom of Westeros and treachery is afoul as the Hand of the King has been murdered. Surrounded by the cunning and powerful family of his duplicitous wife, King Robert Baratheon sends for his old friend and battle mate Eddard Stark to take up the position of the deceased and be unwillingly hurled into the deadly title scheme. The HBO adaptation of the George R.R. Martin novels is an excellent entry in the fantasy genre, simultaneously telling an involving, intelligent, violent, but grounded other worldly tale. Filmed throughout Northern Ireland and Scotland, as well as in parts of Morocco, the series features the most stunning visuals to be found in any television series. Its epic cast of mostly British players is uniformly excellent and if forced to select a handful as my favorite I would chose Iain Glen as a courageous exiled knight, Emilia Clarke as his queen and charge, samely exiled, Peter Dinklage as a witty and underestimated dwarf, and Sean Bean as the noble, sullen Eddard Stark. "Game of Thrones" is wonderfully engaging entertainment that isn't afraid to break the "rules" of television and has characterization and intelligence to match its harsh tone and violence.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Wednesday, June 14, 2017

I, Daniel Blake

After suffering a heart attack on the job, a marginalized widowed carpenter (Dave Johns) attempts to maintain his dignity while being forced to jump through hoop after hoop to qualify for disability benefits while befriending a downtrodden single mother (Hayley Squires) up against the same bludgeoning system. With a rich, humanistic performance from Johns, Ken Loach's minimalist story, which resonates all the more in its few powerful moments, hits the nail on the head with its attacks on a steely, uncaring bureaucracy but is surprisingly artificial in the trite scenarios involving Squires. An especially Loachian finale is riotous, solemn, and embraceable.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Tuesday, April 25, 2017

20th Century Women

A product of the Depression Era, an older mother and single parent (Annette Bening) attempts to understand her punk influenced adolescent son (Lucas Jade Zumann) who seeks guidance from a sickly artistic tenant (Greta Gerwig), an aloof maintenance man (Billy Crudup), and an advanced peer (Elle Fanning) in 1979 Santa Barbara. Phony, magniloquent Mike Mills production, who took nearly the exact same approach with Beginners (ostensibly depicting his father, here his mother), is the kind of material with appeal solely for West Coast liberals and middle-aged Gen-Xers. Bening delivers a nice performance and helps buoy the film along with Gerwig and Zumann. Sean Porter's photography helps too.

** out of ****

Monday, April 24, 2017

Rules Don't Apply

One of the many starlets (Lily Collins) on Howard Hughes's payroll lives by the stringent rules accorded by the aging, shadowy, and eccentric billionaire (Warren Beatty), which includes not dating your assigned driver and personal spy, in her case a straight-edged, business driven Christian (Alden Ehrenreich). Beatty's self-aggrandizing, first directorial effort in almost twenty years is a strange, tonally shifting, and shamefully bad screwball comedy that only conjures up memories of Scorsese's The Aviator, a vastly superior Hughes picture. Only Ehrenreich keeps the picture afloat.

* out of ****

Sunday, April 23, 2017

Patriots Day

Fresh off suspension and nursing a bum knee, a police sergeant (Mark Wahlberg) somehow manages to be present at every turn of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and the ensuing five day highly coordinated search for the treacherous, radicalized suspects. Overcooked Boston elements, too many liberal platitudes and speeches, and an epilogue that just will not end mar Peter Berg's latest Wahlberg starring tragic recent news rehashing. Pretty much what you'd expect except the manhunt sequences are surprisingly thrilling and the saga is surgically recreated and aided by true life surveillance footage.

** 1/2 out ****

Friday, April 21, 2017

A Man Called Ove

A recently widowed curmudgeonous engineer (Rolf Lassgard), made redundant by technology, finds himself lording over his condo association and continually failing at taking his own life until he is given purpose by the newly arrived kindly and forthright next door neighbors. Soupy Swedish export is easy, cliched, PC, tear jerking material, the cinematic equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel, though Lassgard is excellent and the movie is amusing in bits and admittedly hard to dislike.

** 1/2 out of ****

Wednesday, April 19, 2017

Christine

A high-strung TV newswoman (Rebecca Hall) prone to depression finds herself butting heads with the station manager (Tracy Letts) over the lack of exploitative angles in her stories and rejected by the lead anchor (Michael C. Hall) before sending shockwaves across the country in a live, desperate act. Christine (not to be confused with the Stephen King killer car movie) manages to make intelligent observations about mental illness, sexism, and careerism on top of the more obvious point of news sensationalism while leading towards a shocking denouement that is actually enhanced by beforehand knowledge of the story. Rebecca Hall's performance seems awkward initially but eventually clicks, generating empathy, and she is given fine support by Letts, Michael C. Hall (no relation), J. Smith-Cameron playing her mom, and Maria Dizzia as a concerned coworker. An unemphasized 70s soundtrack also contributes nicely.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Tuesday, April 18, 2017

Defying the Nazis: The Sharps' War

Prominent Massachusetts Methodists Waitstill and Martha Sharp risk their lives and ultimately sacrifice their marriage and much of their own savings in order to personally assist the exodus of hundreds of refugees as Hitler increases his territorial holdings in Greater Europe. Directed by Ken Burns and Artemis Joukowsky, Defying the Nazis: The Sharps' War is a cheaply made, limited telling of an intense story of selfless heroism, which opts mostly for testimonials and almost entirely forgoes any opportunities the story offers for intrigue.

** out of ****

Sunday, April 2, 2017

Fastball

A history of the pitch, including scientific breakdowns to determine who through the fastest and interviews with some of the greatest living hurlers of all time. Excellent baseball doc is sure to thrill fans while others may grow restless. Makes great use of footage and interviews, while Kevin Costner provides worthy narration. Only complaint is that it could have been more inclusive with some big names (Roger Clemens and Randy Johnson come foremost to mind) seem to be conspicuously absent.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Saturday, April 1, 2017

Zero Days

When a self-sufficient, irreversible, impossibly advanced malware (dubbed Stuxnet from key pieces of its code) was determined as the cause of sabotage at an Iranian Nuclear Plant in 2010, it was traced back as the product of a joint partnership between the U.S. and the Israelis, the latter of whom's overeagerness to thwart their enemy would lead to a global unleashing of the deadly cyber virus. As told by tight lipped government officials and an unidentified source from within the NSA, Zero Days is yet another profound examination from Alex Gibney, here playing like a solid thriller, building slowly than terrifyingly, while delivering its concise message.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Tuesday, March 28, 2017

Kubo and the Two Strings

Passing along legends to the village peasants, as told to him by his slowly fading mother, of his noble samurai father and his demise at the hands of his malevolent, immortal grandfather (an incident which also resulted in the loss of his own eye), a young boy is whisked away to an icy netherworld where he is stalked by the old man’s presence once more and protected by a surly monkey and an absentminded beetle. The Overamericanized Kubo and the Two Strings goes down a Disneyfied path just when you think its veering toward a different, darker direction although the animation is sharp, the story resonant, and boasts some great action sequences.

*** out of ****

Friday, March 24, 2017

Tower

Shown mostly through animation and some stock footage, witnesses recount that blistering August day in 1966 when Charles Whitman, after killing his mom and wife, rode the elevator to the top of the University of Texas Tower with a considerate arsenal and held the campus hostage during 96 minutes of terror where he murdered 16 people with a high powered rifle and was finally thwarted through the actions of brave police officers and civilians. Keith Maitland's documentary is intense. frightening, and overall well mounted but seems like it could have gone further, with the animation being overdone and not nearly enough use made of actual footage.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Monday, March 20, 2017

Snowden

At a Hong Kong mall in 2013, as Edward Snowden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) meets with media contacts in an attempt to pass classified documents gained from a Hawaii based NSA outpost, his professional career is looked backed upon beginning with an Army stint followed by a CIA run and some contract work that led to a continuing disillusionment at how the U.S. government cataloged its own citizens. Snowden has some of your typical Oliver Stone paranoia, sermonizing, and alternate history, which is all well and good for the iconoclast director, but the movie is way too pat, reverential and largely non-screenworthy and after more than two decades of not being able to craft a worthwhile film, it almost seems like Stone has plumb forgotten how. As for the acting, JGL falls into that trap of resting entirely on impersonation while the rest of the cast is limp and uninspiring except for Nicolas Cage who shines in an all too small walk on role.

** out of ****