Splatter: on FILM

THE BOOK THIEF (2014) movie review

February 12, 2014October 25, 20157 Comments

At least with Titanic, you knew the boat would sink.

This film showed such perseverance of the soul, such hope in desperation, such light in darkness, such freedom breaking out with boldness, bursting through despite fear. It was gorgeous until…

…until the end.
The end, if you can call it an ending, attempted to jump 80 years or so into the future and relay the deaths of ALL OF THE CHARACTERS!
Never before have I seen a script invest in and develop characters and relationships so delicately, so painstakingly right up until the instant death of almost all.
Sure, there are gruesome war films. But this? Everyone dies horribly, too soon, only to be found by the one girl who loves them all. We have to watch the main character grieve again and again over each one. It was too much.

They all live through wars, but die in a moment? They fight to love then lose their lives? What is this, Downton? My apologies. I give Fellowes far too much credit for killing his characters when their lives are sweetest to them. War is never sweet. But life can be. I confess I’m on the constant watch for the sweetness of life. I hunt for beauty like treasure. I value words as the character Max did.

This film is not what I imagined it would be at all.
Skip the narration, choose the alternate ending and turn it off before the end of the war.

JACK RYAN Shadow Recruit (2014) movie review

January 23, 2014October 25, 20151 Comment

Chris Pine becomes the next Jason Bourne as military-turned-hunted-intelligence-agent takes his own unintenitional action thrill ride.
“I’m just an analyst.”
Classic. Oldest trick in the book to turn beautiful brainiac into defensive killer.

Give him a mentor (Kevin Costner) whose old gig was Bodyguard for Whitney and a sassy rehab nurse (Kyra Knightly) with a soft spot for her patients. Then spin the wheel. Anything can happen… Jack could use math to predict the end of the world. She could refuse to marry him then question his commitment. All we know is not to trust anyone. From Mission Impossible to well…every action adventure, we know better than to trust the mentor, father figure. We even know not to trust the girlfriend. A good audience member loves playing slueth, and this one banks on that. Directors rely on dramatic irony as a tool. Sleuth or no, you’re set up to be surprised.The last thing you’ll expect is for the good guys to actually be good and to believe in each other and support until the end, and for the bad guys to be ultimately all bad. Too simplistic for Brannaugh? Not exactly. This Shakespearean stage man turned Thor director marries his two loves and acts in this as well with a decent Russian accent.

AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (2013) movie review

January 11, 2014October 25, 20154 Comments

Please run from not to this film.

It’s a modern mid-western Alice in Wonderland tale without the dreamy Disney flair. The foul unfiltered Alice character, Julia Roberts, ventures into her prairie Wonderland: Osage County, Oklahoma. Following her white rabbit father, Sam Shepard, down the rabbit hole of dysfunction, addiction, and death, where she meets the Queen of Hearts herself, the former Devil in Prada with undeniable talent and swagger, Meryl Streep. Threatening to bite her daughter’s head off, she verbally rips at the entire cast reducing each one to a flimsy fellow card in her wild deck. Off with their heads.

It’s heartbreaking and that is all. Real? I suppose. While most people crave resolve of some kind, this offers none. Conflict and tension aplenty, but an absence of resolve.

“Why is a raven like a writing desk?” queries the author Lewis Carroll through the mouth of his Mad Hatter. The riddle has no answer, and neither does the question of why this perfect cast, (including Benedict Cumberbatch who attempted an Oklahoma accent while most native to the US didn’t bother), came together to perform this…everyone’s worst Thanksgiving. Family holidays are the worst, second only to family funerals. August offers both wrapped in tragedy, tied with the bow of summer heat and midwest prairie dust. The sister Tweedles, Dee and Dum, cannot refute incest and prostitution. Nor can the caterpillar stop offering his drug of choice to the littlest and future Alice, played by Indie cutie, little miss Abigail Breslin.

Roberts central, losing her marriage to the smiling Cheshire Cat, Ewan Mcgregor, takes a final step through the looking glass and sees… herself, that she has become her greatest enemy: her own mother, the queen of Osage County.

HOBBIT 2: The Desolation of Smaug (2013) movie review

January 11, 2014October 25, 20152 Comments

Peter’s pet project is a bit too precious to him, but who can complain…it’s Peter Jackson.

He makes big movies worth every lingering glance over every centimeter of middle earth.

We may presume that we would have removed those extra elfin arrow shots or that half of the dwarf scowls on the multiple could have been edited out. Jackson has built the mansion of the Hobbit trilogy, and despite it’s penchant to extended editioning, this second in the series is lovely indeed and feels more accessible than the first with the additions of human and elf characters in new locations like Laketown.

Hobbit 2 swings out from systematic book adaptation and includes information from other Tolkien books like The Silmarilian, and it adds a new character: Tauriel. This female elf heroine, a Jackson original, raises the standards as Kate from Lost glistens and fights and alights from tree to boulder with ease wielding weapons and sassing her companions. She asks pivotal questions of Legolas that will direct his future course and lead him, no doubt, on his road toward war between Middle Earth and Mordor.But nothing trumps the dragon. Bets are off. Dinosaurs no longer frighten. Monsters look like house pets in the fiendish glow of the heated snarky Smaug the magnificent and terrible.

AMERICAN HUSTLE (2013) movie review

January 11, 2014October 25, 20153 Comments

Christian Bale will break your heart. His soft-spoken badger-like hunched persona seeks redemption, grace, requited love.

Amy Adams will make you question a million motives. She’s snake-like, a survivor. The tin-man shell coating, like clear polish, only glosses over her wounded, exposed red-beating soul.

Bradley Cooper will finally allow you past his pretty boy image and let you almost dislike him. He pitches back and forth, buoyed by power potential, by recognition, by attention-deficient, by hunger, by ideas unexamined and unrealized.

Jennifer Lawrence will make you laugh a hearty Napoleon Dynamite type laugh that you feel guilty for exhaling once it’s out. She’s the available one, the ironic truth teller, the unwanted wife.

Jeremy Renner will win your vote. He’s cool, collected, the honest family man politician from a time when most thought that men like him told the truth.

This film is a foul glimpse at underbelly life in the attempted pursuit at middle class. It’s untaught good intentions misguided and nearly mobbed out of existence. It’s life in the 70’s. It’s ABSCAM and FBI half-truths. It’s the birth of the “science oven.” It’s a masters class in acting. It’s David O. Russell on his A-game.

Every character actively pursues love, to know and be known, the internal meditative dialogue of need and desire. All seek redemption. All hunger for normalcy and fight to find it.

THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY (2013) movie review

December 29, 2013October 25, 20156 Comments

I held my breath so many times. When it was too beautiful or too shocking or when I was too worried for our hapless hero. Don’t miss this journey into adventure, into bravery and joy, into LIFE and living it.

Starring and directed by Ben Stiller, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is an instant family classic reminding us to seize life and live it. It also shows the value in cherishing everyday moments that seem mundane, those unposted, ungrammed, forgettable day-to-day type events like work and meals. My friend Dan says, “No one posts pictures of themselves in their cubicles at work because they don’t seem glamorous enough for Facebook, but we all go to work and it’s okay.” Dan is wise. Flat, grey paper Mitty from side A of the film would not agree, but post-transformation Walter Mitty feels the valuable weight of each moment.

Don’t worry. It’s not a spoiler. Every character must undergo transformation. Dorothy must go over the rainbow but return to admit that “There’s no place like home.” The Grinch-heart must grow 3 sizes. The underdog must win. Even the bad guy must see his ills in a mirror and move to change and become likable. Transformation.

Life Magazine‘s humorous first motto was “While there’s Life, there’s hope.” Stiller offers another cinematic take which graffiti fonts the film and leads Mitty on his path to self-discovery. Kristen Wiig, Adam Scott, Patton Oswalt, and other TV funny people walk alongside Stiller holding hands with greats like Sean Penn and Shirley MacLaine. It’s a beautiful film. I went with my family after Christmas. We will most likely go again. Probably tomorrow.

SAVING MR. BANKS (2013) movie review

December 27, 2013October 25, 20158 Comments

Saving Mr. Banks is a beautiful film reawakening Mary Poppins as an eternal classic. Etched into the psyches of most adults who watched it as children, we all know, for instance, that a spoon full of sugar actually does make the medicine go down. For every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. Children should play games, all sorts. Height can be measured by one’s character and be “practically perfect in every way.” Birds are meant to be sung to and fed, tuppence-a-bag. Sister suffragettes have earned a glee-filled “well done!” Neighbors have their quirks and canons. Street art is best. Carousels are magical. Uncles often get lost in their own jokes and must be brought back down to earth. Chimney sweeps were the first dirty dancers. Mothers should all be allowed to hire governesses, cooks, and cleaners. Fathers must be forgiven for working hard and then we must teach them to fly kites.

Emma Thompson plays P L Travers, British author of the Mary Poppins books. Her character appears to be the quintessential British matron with grand expectations and low tolerance for superfluous nonsense. What a pairing with the original imaginarian, Tom Hanks as Walt Disney himself. This film peaks through the office doorway into the early glory years of Disney. As an adult, I still believe that Disneyland is the best place, “happiest on earth” as it claims to be. I love it so much. It remains quaint but moves forward, new and inventive while reviving vaulted delights at will. Creativity personifies within those gates, often showing up as the Mouse.

The brilliantly cast Colin Farrell is Mr. Banks, the one who must be saved. And Paul Giamatti delights with his quiet affirmations. He won me over as well. Jason Schwartzman and B.J. Novak march in as the brilliant unsung jolly song writing duo who turned so many children’s books into a show giving characters musical life.

What we don’t realize while watching Mary Poppins that it battles heart wrenching issues, offering hope to children when real life gets them down. Though slower-paced than Poppins, edgier and more emotional, Banks is all heart as it endears and renders fathers forgivable at long last.

movies-saving-mr-banks-colin-farrell

THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE (2013) movie review

December 16, 2013October 25, 20152 Comments

So far, both fans of the first film and book fan purists that I have spoken to agree in favor of Catching Fire.

No spoilers here. You’ll have to see it for yourself. Avoid bringing kids. The violence is overwhelming and the storyline intense.

Finally heroism is about sacrifice. Finally mercy trumps judgement.
Finally a film allows its heroes to fight for a cause bigger than personal survival.

The build up intensifies to climax AND payoff.

Jennifer Lawrence inhabits our Katniss as bow dragging, ugly crying, Liam kissing arena queen.

Welcome new characters. Fall hard for the old. Find yourself trying to choose between team Peeta or Gale. Enjoy the fancy friend to popular book-to-film adaptations, Jena Malone.

For a while, it seems that film writers hit a dry spell and the best writing went to television. If films keep this up, there just might be a revolution, a new dawn for good films with solid characters in the writing. I like it.

THOR 2 The Dark World (2013) movie review

November 24, 2013October 25, 20159 Comments

Scandinavian heritage and curiosity regarding its folklore may have encouraged your ticket purchase, but no one can deny an attraction to Chris Hemsworth‘s beautiful body…of work. Avengerites across the globe sit theater-bound searching for clues in the connective tissues between the franchised Marvel movies.

Natalie Portman is finally allowed to laugh in Thor 2. It takes grizzly black goblin goo, but giddy Natalie trumps stern constipated Nat any day. She courageously glides into a galaxy far away without a hitch. She is scientific, pragmatic.

It is, as always, Tom Hiddleston as Loki who steals the show. He is the maniacal brother with daddy issues who woos an audience with ease.

Zachary Levi (best known as the lead in the tv show Chuck) adds contagious joy and enthusiasm to every scene he graces.

Riddled with humor, color, high action, and life, Thor 2 is as promised, a true comic book film bringing characters to life. It did not disappoint.

ENDER’S GAME (2013) movie review

November 20, 2013October 25, 20151 Comment

Heartbreaking. As essential questions go, this film delves deeper into the empathetic psyche forcing a mirror glance into beliefs about war and genocide than most want to explore.

A jocund former Juliet becomes starfighter as Hailee Steinfeld lifts lazer blaster to teach Ender, the young Asa Butterfield, how to win a very serious anti-gravity laser tag sphere game. The guarantee from the start is that it is all a game. The government recruits children because they lack the fear and hesitation that comes with a fully developed frontal lobe. Instinct and impulse rule decisions, so in the training camps they learn to lead and develop war strategies in interactive gaming scenarios.

Warning, this film is NOT for children, despite promotional ploys. Children love games until the mask is lifted and the game becomes real. Young men feel bulletproof in war until they understand the gravity of the task before them and see themselves in the reflection of those they are fighting. This film lifts the mask, albeit slowly.

The Last Starfighter is a parallel precursor film of sorts, and my favorite pre-teen film. It is fun,lively, and oh so 80’s. Alex Rogan, least likely intergalactic warrior, breaks the record on a video game at his trailer park only to be approached and recruited by the game’s creator who needs a Starfighter in space. Alex is left with a decision to sacrifice known for unknown and use his innate skills to take down the enemy in the real universe or go back to playing games.

Or is he? Where ignorance is bliss, knowledge negates choice. Just as Truman could never have continued the Truman Show once he knew the… truth. In the same way, Jack from Lost, knows he must go back and save the island and the Little Mermaid will never be content to swim for life. Heroes like these stand alone, optionless on the platform only to bow and wish the afflicters a hopeful “Good afternoon, good evening, and good night.

Innocence has its own beauty. It equates with child-likeness. Harrison Ford and Viola Davis do an excellent job in this film of grieving its loss when weighing the cost in the light of war. Highlighting defensive strategies allows audiences to root for underdogs. Good guys must win, until the plot twists and we don’t recognize the good guys anymore. Ender’s twist ending unmasks the essential question of the film, and therein his heartache as well.

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?

Your Thoughts?