Movie: La La Land

La La Land:  a 21^st century Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers flick.  When was the last time you saw a good old fashioned Hollywood musical?  If you’ve been jonesing for a big screen romantic music & dance fete, this is your film.  In fact, even if you are not a big fan of those Gene Kelly/Fred Astaire films,  I think you’ll enjoy this movie written and directed by Damien Chazelle.  The spontaneous dance numbers that pop up throughout the film are well integrated into the romantic tale of Sebastian Wilder (Ryan Gosling) and Mia Dolan (Emma Stone), who have a refreshing on-screen chemistry.  La La Land opens with a dance number out of the 1930’s and the movie takes place almost entirely in – of course – L.A.   Mia works at a coffee shop located on a movie studio lot and has been auditioning for various roles.  Sebastian is a piano player who wants to open a traditional jazz club.  After a few chance meetings, Mia and Sebastian connect at a Hollywood party, which leads to a beautiful dance number at the Griffith Park Observatory.  The film unfolds in unexpected ways.  The musical score by Justin Hurwitz should earn him an Oscar nomination.  The jazz is first rate.  Also, there’s an excellent number by and performed by John Legend a little more than halfway through this 127 minute film.  J. K. Simmons has two brief appearances; he doesn’t dance.  Gosling and Stone do dance and their scenes carry this delightful movie.   Gosling and Stone have paired up twice before in Crazy Stupid Love and Gangster Squad.  This film is totally different.  I don’t remember seeing a big time musical that has delighted me as much as La La Land.  The only comparable films I’ve seen have been relegated to the Turner Classic Movies venue.  

 

Movie: Manchester By the Sea

Manchester By the Sea:  a family drama written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan.  This Manchester is in Massachusetts, not England.  When I saw the film’s preview, I thought it might be an interesting flick but given the number of films that debut during the holidays, I figured I would skip it.  My normal M.O. is that if the preview isn’t sufficiently convincing then see something else.  Then I read a New Yorker article about Lonergan and Manchester and changed my mind.  I’m very pleased I did.   Casey Affleck will probably receive an Oscar nomination for his performance as the lead character, Lee Chandler.  Affleck is on screen for a significant portion of the film’s 137 minutes.  When the film commences, Lee is working as the janitor of an apartment complex in Quincy, Massachusetts.  The event that triggers the heart of this story is a phone call Lee receives advising that his older brother, Kyle, is in the hospital.  Although Lee leaves immediately, by the time he gets to Manchester, Kyle has died.  Via flashbacks, we learn that Kyle has had a heart condition and an ex-wife with an alcohol problem.  Following Kyle’s death, Lee learns that Kyle had designated him as the legal guardian for his sixteen year old son Patrick (Lucas Hedges), which is totally unexpected.  The rest of the film deals with how Lee handles the news (not very well at first) and why, and in the process we learn why Lee is living alone and what happened to his family.  Michelle Williams is superb as Lee’s former wife.   I think if you have had any relationship with working class Catholic New Englanders, you will easily relate to the characters in this film.  Manchester is a film about grieving and how one man with significant communication challenges deals with death and relationships.  The characters are genuine and the interactions among them have a level of realism frequently lacking in movies.  This is particularly true for Patrick who is active in sports (New England = hockey scenes), plays in a band, is indifferent to his studies and is very interested in girls.  You quickly grow to care about whether Lee and Patrick will work things out between themselves.  The one negative in this film is its musical score; there were certain scenes I just couldn’t get into because of the background music.  But in the overall scheme, this is a minor criticism.  I believe this film will receive an Oscar nomination for best original script, among other categories, including Jody Lee Lipes for Best Cinematography.  The film offers humor amidst the grief and presents us with a slice of life, some of which can be ridiculous.  I won’t say more because I want to preserve for you the effect of the storyline.

Movie: Moonlight

Moonlight: not your typical coming of age film.  The story takes place in Miami.  We meet the protagonist as a young boy (Alex Hibbert), then as an adolescent (Ashton Sanders) and finally as an adult (Trevante Rhodes).  Each actor does a superb job of portraying an individual who fails to fit within his society’s given models.  During the course of this 110 minute film by Barry Jenkins (director and co-writer), we vicariously experience drug abuse, school violence and some of the difficult issues relating to sex and sexuality identity.  The film is based on the play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue by Tarell Alvin McCranney.  I understand the film runs true to the play.  The story opens with the protagonist as a young boy called “Little”.  He is being raised by Paula, a single, crack addicted mother played brilliantly by Naomie Harris.  Her crack dealer is Juan (Mahershala Ali), who happens to meet Little through other circumstances.  Juan takes a liking to Little and begins to take care of him like a son.  There is a very tender scene where Juan, who was born in Cuba, teaches Little how to swim.  There is another scene in which Juan reminisces about his own childhood and explains to Little the importance of defining himself and not letting others do it for him.  Then Juan, Paula and Little recognize the dots that connect them to each other.  I would like to have known more about Juan.  During the middle portion of this film, school violence is a focal point.  Our protagonist is called Chiron.  This segment includes a troubling sequence of events involving Chiron’s long time schoolmate, Kevin.  We see Kevin in all three segments of this film; Jaden Piner plays Kevin as a boy, Jharrel Jerome as an adolescent, and Andre Holland as an adult.  The adult segment shows Kevin placing a late night call to Black, an adult now living in Atlanta.  The three segments come together with a positive link between Kevin and Black  and a positive relationship between Black and his mother.  There is a violent undercurrent running through this film but scenes of actual violence are minimal and brief.  At the end, you will be pleased to have met Little/Chiron/Black and will be glad to have had the opportunity to travel with him on his painful and difficult road to adulthood.  I believe Moonlight will receive a few Oscar nominations.  Although it’s been a week since I saw this film, a number of the scenes continue to flash into my mind and linger.

Movie: Loving

Loving: a true life love story.  This is the story of Richard and Mildred Loving, the individuals who challenged Virginia’s law banning Blacks and Whites from marrying each other.  In 1967, by ruling in favor of the Lovings, the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated state laws prohibiting interracial marriage.  Virginia passed its first anti-miscegenation law in 1691.  This film, however, does not focus on the law’s 276 year history nor is it a legal drama.  Rather, Loving is a story about the relationship between Richard (Joel Edgerton) and Mildred (Ruth Negga).  The movie opens in 1956 with Mildred telling Richard she is pregnant.  Richard is very pleased and, in a subsequent scene, asks Mildred to marry him.  Knowing that such a marriage was banned in Virginia, the couple drives to Washington D. C.  Upon their return, Richard proudly hangs their marriage license in the home they share with Mildred’s family.  Richard’s mother, who lives in a neighboring house, is the midwife to this rural Virginia community.   A short while later, the local sheriff (Marton Csokas) arrests the Lovings in the middle of the night.  It is from the sheriff that we learn about the community where Richard and Mildred have spent most of their lives.  It is racially mixed with considerable Native American bloodlines, which explains in part why Mildred identified herself as Indian on the marriage license.  Because the community is self-contained and located in an insular rural area, it did not seem unreasonable for Mildred and Richard to believe they could live together in peace despite Virginia’s anti-miscegenation statute.  The film tracks the Lovings’ personal life from 1956 until the 1967 Supreme Court decision, including their time living in D. C.  Both the court scenes and the meetings with the ACLU lawyers Bernie Cohen (Nick Kroll) and Phil Hirschkop (Jon Bass as) are brief.   Jeff Nichols directed this 123 minute film and also wrote the screenplay.  His telling of Richard and Mildred’s story affords you a full understanding of their deep love for each other and their children.  Nichols relies significantly on the 2011 documentary, The Loving Story, which is also worth seeing.  Nichols clearly understands rural America (see his 2012 film Mud with Matthew McConaughey).   The acting throughout this film is first rate.  Edgerton totally nails Richard and you will be blown away by his performance.  Also, of special note, is Michael Shannon’s brief appearance as the Life magazine photographer.  I thoroughly enjoyed this film and highly recommend it.

 

 

Movie: A Man Called Ove

A Man Called Ove:  a Swedish comedy-drama.  When we first meet Ove (Rolf Lassgard), we meet a stereotypic Grumpy Old Man.   Although his grumpiness never fully goes away, we discover during the course of the film that Ove is not really that old (59).  We also learn about his life, the reasons why he is so grumpy, and that Ove is a truly decent human being who is grieving deeply for his recently deceased wife.  After the introductory sequence, we watch as Ove attempts to kill himself.  His effort, however, is interrupted - again and again and again - each time by an intervening and humorous event.  With each interrupted suicide we learn a bit more about Ove.  As it turns out, Ove has lived an eventful life filled with good deeds and blessed by a wonderful marriage.  The movie opens a few months after Ove’s wife, Sonja (Ida Engvoll), passes from cancer.  We get to know Sonja through charming scenes of Ove’s remembrances of their life together.  Ove’s residence is part of a small homeowners association.  Many of the owners ignore the regulations established by the Association but not Ove, who is rule and enforcement excessive.  Into this tight community moves a young couple with two young children and another on the way.  The husband is Swedish and from the general area.  The wife is Iranian.  Through kindness and persistence, Parvaneh (Bahar Pars) forms a relationship with Ove and, in the process, we learn even more about our character.  Parvaneh and Ove develop a father–daughter relationship and the children think of Ove as their grandfather.  Part of the reason their relationship grows is that Ove views Parvaneh’s husband, as he views most folks, as an idiot.  The more we learn about Ove, the more respect and appreciation we have for him and the more we understand his tremendous grief over losing Sonja.  Ove is a person who has endured tragedies but still managed to create a good life, until Sonja’s death.  This 116 minute film is based upon Fredrik Backman’s 2012 bestselling Swedish novel of the same name.  It is directed by Hannes Holm.  The sub-titles are posted at a readable pace.  There is far more humor in A Man Called Ove than this outline indicates.  This is a very enjoyable film and, if you take the time to see it, you will be pleased to have met Ove. 

 

Movie: Denial

Denial: a British film about an individual who denied the Holocaust and sued for liable in an English court an American academic who published a book calling him a Holocaust denier.   The individual is Daniel Irving, played marvelously by Timothy Spall.  The American is Deborah Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz).  The film is based on her book: History on Trial: My Day in Court with a Holocaust Denier.  This true story was more entertaining than the subject matter would lead you to believe.   Partly, this is due to how much you will loath the Irving character.   It is not just that he is publicizing a hideous lie but is doing so with a smugness that is incredible to watch.    A second reason is the performance by the British barrister employed to defend Lipstadt.   Tom Wilkinson, who has given many fine performances, is at his best and basically carries the final third of this 110 minute movie.  The third factor is that if you ever wondered about the importance of who has the obligation to prove a fact in a courtroom, this is your film.   While the legal technicalities get a little muddied, the key to why Irving sued Lipstadt in England and not America is that in England, Lipstadt had to prove that Irving knew he was a liar as opposed to the American rule which would require Irving to prove that Lipstadt was knowingly making false comments about him.   This results in this being a film about how you prove the existence of the Holocaust without the testimony of Holocaust victims.  The lawyers did not want to give Irving the opportunity to cross-examine Holocaust survivors.   A fourth reason to see the film is the sequence when Lipstadt and her attorneys, including Wilkinson, visit Auschwitz.   The pre-dawn presentation of the grounds with a blanket of snow and fog is a beautifully shot scene and makes the point as to why the falsity of a big lie propaganda by someone like Irving needed to be proven to be false in a court of law.  The film was directed by Mick Jackson from a screenplay by David Hare.   The cinematographer was Haris Zambarloukos.     While I knew the outcome without seeing the film, the movie held my attention due to the skill of the two actors. 

Movie: The Accountant

The Accountant:  I’m looking forward to seeing The Accountant II.  Despite some goofiness in the story line, this movie is entertaining.  Ben Affleck plays this very unusual accountant, Christian Wolff.  We later learn that Wolff is not the character’s real name and it’s unclear whether we’re ever told his true moniker.  When we first meet the Accountant, he is doing what accountants do –helping a couple resolve a tax problem.  He displays no personality and no emotion, which somewhat fits the stereotypic image of an accountant.  This benign segment occurs after the opening shot in which we watch a person entering a crime scene littered with multiple dead bodies.  We then regress to a scene from childhood.  There are individuals and an autistic child.  The child is the Accountant, and Seth Lee does an excellent job playing the child.  This movie is comprised of two intertwined stories.  There is a junior accountant, Dana Cummings (Anna Kendrick) who has discovered irregularities in a company’s books and the Accountant is hired by the company to find out who’s been messing with its finances.   John Lithgow gives a quality performance as the head of the company.  In the concurrent story, Raymond King (J. K. Simmons), head of the Treasury Department’s financial crimes division, is trying to learn the identity of a guy who keeps appearing in photos with various criminal heavyweights and terrorists.   King brings in Marybeth Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) to assist him.   As the movie progresses, we meet Braxton (Jon Bernthal).  This is the character whose role in the story led to my comment about goofiness, but to say anything more would spoil the telling of this tale.  With uniformly strong performances by all the main characters and the odd quirkiness of the Accountant, I was entertained throughout this 128 minute film.  The director is Gavin O’Connor.  Bill Dubuque wrote the screenplay.  Escapism and the draw of physical action successfully drives this movie to its conclusion.  But if one dwells on the underlying tale, you cannot ignore its story of a depressing and violent childhood.