Highest 2 Lowest (Apple TV+)

    Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 film High and Low, about a wealthy shoe company executive who is extorted when his chauffeur’s son is kidnapped instead of his own son and held for ransom, gets a remake/update as a Spike Lee joint called Highest 2 Lowest.  The basic premise is the same but, in this case, Denzel Washington plays a wealthy music label executive and his driver, whose son is kidnapped, is played by Jeffrey Wright.  Right off the bat those are a couple of heavy hitters.  I haven’t seen High and Low so I can’ t make any specific comparisons.  Overall though, this is a very good film, but it is flawed.

     I guess I’ll start with what is good about it.  Of course, the talent brought to the piece by Washington and Wright can’t be beat.  They work well together, and their performances propel the narrative during the quieter times.  The rest of the cast work pretty well too, though I bumped up against a couple of challenges with a few of them.  I think those are personal issues of my own though.  Really, the movie lives or dies with Washington and Wright.  Their performances keep the film alive.  They are the main characters.  Spike Lee’s direction, at the very least, holds your attention when the narrative shifts (more on those later) happen or he feels the audience might need a little shake to make them focus.  He’s good at that.  From broad, striking drone shots of the New York City skyline to slight overlaps in the action at cuts.  One minute your awed by the vista shot and the next you’re blinking your eyes because something caused a bump in your experience that makes you take notice.  Some are more successful than others, but he keeps the viewer actively watching.  Since I hadn’t seen High to Low, I wasn’t sure what kind of movie I was in for.  The film starts off as a suspense drama that is saying something about the American version of the “class system”.  When it’s the executive’s son that is thought to have been kidnapped the family is ready to pay the ransom without question, but when it turns out to be the driver’s son.  Well, let’s say Denzel Washington’s character has to think on it a little.  Then the movie shifts into a bit of an action piece.  With elements that pay tribute to films like The Taking of Pelham 123, with an ordinary guy up against very clever and organized baddies.  THEN there’s a bit of Washington going into his Equalizer mode, which I didn’t see coming.  Each stage of the film works as the type of film it’s being, especially the “delivering the ransom” sequence, but I’m not sure they blended together totally naturally.

     There’s no denying that Denzel Washington is a great actor and he delivers in this film too.  I do feel that maybe he’s a little long in the tooth for this part though.  He has lost a bit of weight since Equalizer 3 and is looking older.  They did die his hair, I guess to “youth him up a bit” and during a foot chase scene it’s painfully obvious at one point that we’re watching a stunt double.  His wife is played by Ilfenesh Hadera who also appeared in Spike Lee’s TV series version of She’s Gotta Have It.  Not that a powerful businessman couldn’t have a younger wife, but she is supposed to be the mother of a 17-year-old son, who is played by an actor that is himself a little too old to be playing 17- Aubrey Joseph of the TV show Cloak & Dagger.  This is not a knock on either of their performances.  They’re quite good.  I just bumped up against the visuals of it.  There was also the casting of the token white cop played by Dean Winters, probably is best known for personifying “mayhem” in those Allstate insurance ads.  My having that baggage colored my viewing of his performance.  He’s kind of playing it as Mayhem the Cop.  He’s the smart-ass white guy who already knows everything and doesn’t need any help doing his job.  His performance is fine, but he did bring baggage from those commercials into his work on the movie.  I also found the musical score to be a little odd.  At first, I thought maybe Spike Lee was using snippets of scores from other films of the 70’s and 80’s, but it’s an original score by Howard Drossin, not Lee’s usual composer Terence Blanchard.  The score is sometimes big and sweeping in small moments and sometimes just a piano during suspenseful or action moments.  Quite often I didn’t think the music was actually for this movie. 

     Admittedly, I wouldn’t call myself a big Spike Lee fan, but I have liked several of his films and certainly appreciate his talent.  Highest 2 Lowest is definitely worth your time.  The two main performances along with a terrific action sequence involving the delivering of the ransom money help you get past any of its flaws.  In my opinion this film falls somewhere in the middle of Spike Lee’s filmography.  It was nice to see a Spike Lee Joint set in New York City again and his love of the city permeates each frame.  This is one of, if not the most beautiful portrayals of NYC on film in recent history.  Matthew Libatique’s cinematography is striking.   

Happy Gilmore 2 (Netflix)

     Back in the early ‘90’s I wasn’t a fan of Adam Sandler. I wasn’t into his shtick on Saturday Night Live, so when he started making movies I stayed away. That is why it was just one month ago that I watched Happy Gilmore for the first time and I was pleasantly surprised. It certainly does have some of that “annoying Sandler” stuff in it, but for the most part it’s pretty funny. Having had a good time watching it I checked out Adam Sandler’s latest and it’s sequel- Happy Gilmore 2. There’s some fun to be had with this follow up to his 1996 hit, but there is also a lot of self-indulgent “throw everything, and everyone, at the wall and see what sticks”.

     In Happy Gilmore 2 we find Happy in a not so happy place. He’s raising 5 kids alone and dealing with the guilt regarding the death of his wife. He’s an alcoholic and working in a local grocery store. When his teenage daughter’s ballet teacher tells him that she’s so good that she could study in Paris and that it would cost tens of thousands of dollars a year, Happy knows that working at the market and drinking much of his earnings is not going to get her there. So, at 58, he decides to clean up and get back into golf to earn the money to send his only daughter (the other 4 kids are boys) to Paris to follow her dream. Having been away for so long it’s not easy to get back in shape, but about the time he does a young entrepreneur approaches Happy about an opportunity to be in on his plan for an “X Games”-like version of gulf. He passes but challenges this “new” golf to a contest against himself and other pros for the future of the sport.

     If you’re a huge Adam Sandler fan then this is probably going to hit that sweet spot for you. Being a passing fan but having enjoyed the first movie I thought it was just ok. The character is pretty consistent with what he had created 30 years ago but there is just too much time between actual laughs and/or feels in this movie. There are a lot of call back to the original. Many hit while others are just there because Sandler figured fans would want to see it. For example, in the original movie SCTV alum, the late great Joe Flaherty played a guy who was paid to annoy Happy as he played in the big tournament. He was sort of a running gag. Here we get his son, played by rapper M&M. He’s similarly dressed to his father and annoys Happy during a game. It’s just a call back that has nothing to do with the story being told. It’s an excuse to put a familiar face in the movie, and wearing a fake beard it’s actually hard to recognize M&M anyway. So why? It isn’t even funny. There are a few moments like that scattered throughout. The cast, supporting and cameos, is filled with friends and family, even family of friends in some cases. What it reminded me of is a cluttered room with a few very interesting and useful items that “are in there somewhere”. There is good stuff in this movie but you have to look past the clutter to get to it.

     Sandler is the highlight of the movie. He plays Happy more like a grown up this time around, which was good to see. He still had a temper but it’s a lot less irksome this time around. I like the Father-Happy. Christopher McDonald returns as Happy’s nemesis Shooter McGavin, and even though it’s extremely predictable what is going to happen between them, he’s a better character this time around too. Julie Bowen returns for a bit, but mostly for quick moments in Happy’s mind. Since Carl Weathers passed away just before the making of this movie they introduced a “son” character for him too, played by Lovell Crawford. But his character is pretty extraneous as well.

     The actual story being told is fine and there is one. Again, you just have to keep poking around the clutter to keep up with it. Again, if you are a fan of Sandler and Happy Gilmore you’ll enjoy it. I enjoyed enough of it to not feel that I wasted my time. It’s better than Hubie Halloween but that is a VERY low bar to compare something to. Turns out there was some life in the Happy Gilmore character. I just wish a little more time had been spent on telling the story in a funny way and less telling the story and surround it with gags.

The Old Guard 2 (Netflix)

     The long-awaited sequel to the 2020 Netflix hit The Old Guard is here and it’s not bad.  I chose not to rewatch The Old Guard, even though it’s been 5 years since I saw it.  I did, however, take a look at my review of that film.  Reading it I realized just how much I’d forgotten about it.  The Old Guard 2 picks up 6 months after the events of the first film and the team of, mostly, immortal mercenaries is in the midst of a mission where we are reintroduced to the group.   Charlize Theron’s, now mortal, team leader- Andy, Chiwetel Ejiofor mortal- Copley, Marwan Kenzari’s Joe, Luca Marinelli’s Nicky, and Kiki Layne’s Nile, who discovered she was immortal in the first film.  After that mission they learn that a very, very, very old friend of Andy’s has been found and working with another very old immortal who calls herself Discord, played by Uma Thurman and it appears that she is intent on destroying all the immortals.

    I was having a pretty good time with this one.  I actually liked the story better than the first movie.  We get to learn more of the lore of the immortals and actually do some world building, that the first movie didn’t do as much of. The action scenes are good and, at least I felt, there are more character moments. At least for some of the characters.  After the first half Ejiofor’s Copley nearly disappears from the film and Henry Golding’s Tuah, another immortal, who has been, sort of, the keeper of the immortal’s stories becomes a main member of the “gang”.  I enjoyed the premise playing out and the cast works together pretty well, though there were a few pieces of groaner dialogue.

   This is not to say that it’s a great movie.  I was enjoying myself until it just ends.  They pull an Empire Strikes Back without actually announcing that there will be a third film.  So, until we get the third film, which I can only assume Netflix already said “yes” to, because this film has no ending, we are literally in the middle of the story being told.  My feelings are now on hold until we get the resolution.  I can say I was having a good enough time with it while it lasted, but if they don’t stick the landing in the next film it will take this one down with it. If you recall enjoying the first movie you should have a pretty good time with this one too. Just remember that it does end with a cliffhanger, so be prepared.

Havoc (Netflix)

     I’ll have to admit that Havoc is the first thing I’ve seen by writer/director Gareth Evans, so I can’t compare it to his other work. (though I may have to check out Apostle since, like Havoc, it is available on Netflix) He comes from a horror background, not one of my favorite genres. Havoc is a pretty horrific action/thriller but it owes more to the 1970’s gritty cop movies of the 1970’s, like Dirty Harry and The French Connect, than to his horror roots, but there is plenty of blood and violence for either genre.

     Tom Hardy stars as big city detective with questionable ethics, but basically he’s a good guy. He was once involved in something unsavory with a group of his fellow officers and the man expected to be the new mayor, Lawrence Beaumont (Forest Whitaker), knows about it and holds it over him. When Beaumont’s son gets mixed up with an Asian crime family and is accused of killing the son of it’s leader, Hardy’s Detective Walker has to find and protect the young man before the mob finds him.

     I’ve heard others say that this is a stylish film with nice characterization. I didn’t see that. Tom Hardy is doing his American accent that he did in the Venom movies, so it can be difficult to understand him sometimes. The only thing stylish about this movie is that fact that everything looks a little bit “off”. They never come right out and say it takes place in New York, it’s implied but never stated. Many times it looks like a backlot street or in a soundstage. It was shot in Wales, which explains the number of U.K. based actors in the cast. The Americans being Timothy Olyphant, sort of the leader of the group of bad cops Walker was involved with, Forest Whitaker, and Justin Cornwell, who played the young Beaumont. All the action scenes and sequences are not bad but were shot all hand-held, which, after a while, made me a little queasy. There’s so much hand-held camera that you have a hard time following the action. From what I could see, the fight choreographer and stunt team were doing a pretty good job but it gets all muddied up with shaky camera work.

     The performances are fine, but they don’t have a lot to work with here. Maybe they were told backstories but we don’t get to know any of it. The “incident” that the crooked cops were involved in is a little vague. We do get a flashback but never really know what the purpose of it was. Other than something shady. We learn that Walker has an ex-wife and 6 year old daughter but they aren’t all that important to the story being told here. Of the talented cast I’ve pointed out so far I would like to single out Jesse Mei Li, an actress I hadn’t seen before, who plays a uniformed officer teamed up with Hardy who gets pulled into the whole mess. She was in the fantasy series Shadow and Bone (which I have not seen yet) and had a part in Edgar Wright’s Last Night in Soho, which I did see but can’t recall Li in it. She is also an English actress, but does a great American accent. She steals the movie when she’s on screen. I also think hers is the only character I was actually rooting for. She’s the only truly “good cop” in the story, but I was under the impression I was supposed to be cheering for Hardy’s Walker. I’ll have to check out Shadow and Bone and keep an eye out for her in the future.

     I suppose if you are a big fan of ultra-violent action films you’ll really enjoy Havoc. I have no problem with violence as long as it serves the story in some way. I think Quentin Tarantino can go a little overboard with the blood in his films, but most of the time it’s there for shock value to serve the story. Some of the kills were cool, especially the speargun spear through the throat, but after the second or third big bloody brawl scene in Havoc I started to tune it out. It was just too much and all jumpy and waggly hand-held too. I’m glad it wasn’t any longer than it’s 107 minutes. So many modern film makers feel the need to make their movies, no matter the genre, over 2 hours and more often than not over 2 ½. So good job Gareth Evans not feeling that your movie had to be longer than the story called for. I think some of the fights could have been cut down a little, but blood splatter action fans will like this one.

Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy (Peacock)

     Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy is the latest in the franchise, and perhaps the final installment.  I was a fan of the original 2001, which is very funny and breathed some life into the love triangle concept.  The two follow ups—2004’s The Edge of Reason, which felt a bit like “more of the same”, and 2016’s Bridget Jones’ Baby, brought in Patrick Dempsey as the competition for Colin Firth’s Mr. Darcy.  Both had a few laughs but didn’t work as well as the first film.  While there are two love interests in Mad About the Boy, it’s not a triangle, no competition between the men.  This movie is about something different, while keeping the flavor of the romantic comedy.

    It’s been 10 years since Bridget married Mr. Darcy.  Now we find her with 2 children, Mabel & Billy, and in her fourth year of being a widow.  Her friends are telling her it’s time to get “back in the game” and start dating, but she is resistant.  After meeting a younger man (Leo Woodall) in the park while playing with her kids who shows interest in her, she gives in and begins a relationship with him.  At the same time, the science teacher at the children's school (Chiwetel Ejiofor) is becoming a bigger presence in the kid’s lives.  Especially Billy who is having some difficulty dealing with the passing of his father.  Hugh Grant’s Daniel is still in the picture, but not as a love interest.  Just a close friend and “Uncle Daniel” to the kids.  Now Bridget, as clumsy and uncomfortable as always, has to navigate all these relationships to find what works best for her family.   

    I’d say this installment comes closest to bringing something new to the series.  As I mentioned before, the movie isn’t really about Bridget having to choose between suiters, it’s about grief and navigating it.  From time-to-time Bridget sees her husband, representing his continued presence in her life.  There is also an owl that seems to represent his presence to the children, that they see outside their bedroom window each night.  Dealing with loss while the world continues to turn is at the core of the film and the romantic relationships are just part of the process of “getting on with life”.  While the outcome of the movie is a fairly predictable forgone conclusion, the journey to the final scenes is very entertaining.  Renee Zellweger, while older and physically much smaller this time around, still knows the character and is charming and silly and exactly what fans of the series expect.  Along with Hugh Grant, Jim Broadbent returns as Bridget’s loving father, her gang of friends are all back, and Emma Thompson is back as Bridget’s doctor.  Isla Fisher appears as an upteght neighbor for one scene, which I found odd.  Why hire Isla Fisher for one scene?  My guess is that there was a subplot that had to be excised for time, because this film already runs a few minutes over 2hrs.  The kids are cute, charming, and fit right into this world.

     I liked the fact that this movie breaks a bit from the previous Bridget Jones formula and moves the focus more on healing and not so much on a competition for her affection.  Director Michael Morris, who comes from TV having directed shows like Brothers & Sisters, Preacher, and Better Call Saul, also made the critically praised film To Leslie and does a fine job keeping the movie from falling into being another silly comedy.  The mix of silliness and emotion works well.  My only challenge with the script would be that the relationship with Chiwetel Ejiofor happens a little too fast.  There are a couple of sequences where Bridget and Ejiofor’ s Mr. Wallaker have one on one time, but neither scream romance.  So, when he professes his feelings and she reacts to it, it seems kind of sudden.  Not enough to dislike the film though.  It’s genuinely funny and charming.  If you are a fan of the series you’ll enjoy yourself, and if, like me, you liked the first one but a bit cold on the two follow ups, this one might work for you too.

Back in Action (Netflix)

     Back in action marks the return of Cameron Diaz after a decade away from acting to have a family and it’s a mixed bag.  Teamed with Jamie Foxx, they play former spies who met and fell in love while saving world.  Now, 15 years after giving that life up, they have two kids and a life in the suburbs.  Unfortunately, their past catches up with them and they are forced “Back in Action” to save the world again, only now, in order to protect them, their kids are along for the ride.  Back in Action is a very “by the book” action comedy that hits pretty much all the standard tropes of the genre.  You can predict most every big moment before it happens and yet, it’s kind of a fun film.

    There are times when this movie feels like a “made for streaming” action flick.  The writing is far from original.  We’ve definitely seen all this before.  Our heroes are dragged back into the action against their will, innocents (their kids) get dragged along, the villain is revealed to not be the one they are hinting at (actually making them the obvious baddie), a helpful character from their past (this time Diaz character’s estranged mother, played by Glenn Close), every form of transportation (short of a train) used in action sequences, a little globetrotting, a character whose there for mainly comic relief, and a closing scene where they all gather together for a family event.  I’m pretty sure this movie was reverse engineered.  They began with casting Foxx and Diaz, then the title, then they plugged in all the action/comedy tropes and build the story from there.

     In spite of everything going against this movie a couple of things make it watchable.  The first is the cast.  Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx’s chemistry is terrific.  I especially loved Foxx’s asides, where he would make little observations at the end of a scene.  My guess is most of them were improvised because they were the funniest moments.  Their charisma, along with Glenn Close’s, keep your mind off of the fact that you’ve seen most of this before.  The other thing that keeps it watchable are, most, of the action pieces.  By no means are they Chris McQuarrie quality, they also didn’t have the budget of a Mission: Impossible film, but they work fairly well none the less.  I especially appreciated the gas station scene when they first arrive in London.  It is the one that had the most original moments in it and was a lot of fun to watch.  The tone is kept pretty light with the glaze of being outside reality.  I mean there are children placed in peril but you’re never all that worried about them being harmed.  You know what I mean?  It’s a place you get into mentally when watching a mindlessly fun action movie.  You know you’re not going to hold it too responsible for following the principles of physics that closely.  There’s also a moment toward the end when our heroes end up in the river Thames and I thought; “well, they all need tetanus shots now.”  Yet I still came away from the movie having had a pretty good time.  It’s far from great and I can’t say I’ll ever want to revisit it, but sometimes the charisma of a cast can push a movie to a level it doesn’t deserve on paper.

Juror #2 (Max)

    Juror #2 is Clint Eastwood’s latest, and possibly final film (the man is 94 years old). In the hands of a lesser director, I think, this film could easily have been a total mess. In the hands of Mr. Eastwood it does rise to the level of “good”. This seems to be, again my opinion, the plateau his films have reached since Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima. Some a bit better than others, but none reaching the quality of Million Dollar Baby, Unforgiven, The Outlaw Josey Wales, or even Play Misty for Me, his first turn as director over 50 years ago.

    In the film Juror #2, Justin Kemp (Nicholas Hoult), realizes, as the trial unfolds, that he is probably the person responsible for the death of a young woman and not the boyfriend being accused. On the same date of the woman’s death he was driving the same road she was found off of and struck something with his car. It was night and pouring rain, so when he stopped to learn what he had hit, he couldn’t see anything. He assumed it was a deer that had run off. Justin is a recovering alcoholic with a wife pregnant with their first child. Throughout the trial you can see his struggling with what he should do with this information. He can’t let an innocent man, with all evidence pointing to his guilt, go to prison, but he also doesn’t want to blow up his own life. He asks his AA sponsor (Kiefer Sutherland), who happens to be a lawyer, what he should do. He is told that if he came forward, with his history of alcoholism, he would serve no less than life in prison for vehicular manslaughter. Now his only plan is to convince his fellow Jurors that there is reasonable doubt and get an “innocent” judgment. Easier said than done.

    The cast in this film is stacked, and another reason it is as good as it is. Lead by Hoult, it costars Toni Collette as the prosecutor, Chris Messina as the defense attorney, and J.K. Simmons, Adrienne C. Moore, Leslie Bibb, and Cedric Yarbrough as a few of the other jurors. Gabriel Basso, of the terrific Netflix series The Night Agent, plays the accused man. He sports a beard and the way he carries himself makes him nearly unrecognizable from that show. These are all experienced actors who know how to work the words on the page. The problem here is that the words on the page are kind of dull. Clint Eastwood is doing his best to keep the pace moving and the images on screen interesting, but I think this is a 60 minute concept stretched out to 2 hours. I will say that the third act does mix things up a bit and brings a bit of new life to the film, but in the end leads up to a pretty unsatisfying ending.

    Eastwood pulls out all the stops with interesting angles and the production design is very good too, although how much can you dress up a courtroom and a deliberation room? Some of the movie feels like it was just dialogue lifted out of 12 Angry Men, a much better film, only somehow made less impactful. Much like The Mule, Sully, and Gran Torino, I liked it some of the time, but it just misses the goal I believe Mr. Eastwood was shooting for. A few more passes on the script, or maybe bring in a different writer with fresh eyes to polish it up. I don’t know, but, in it’s completed form, Juror #2, in spite of all the talent at work, is merely good.

Music by John Willims (Disney+)

    Let’s be honest, it would difficult to screw up a documentary on the life of the great film composer “Maestro” John Williams. Director Laurent Bouzereau, who comes from the world of short docs like you find as bonus material on DVDs, has crafted a film that not only celebrates the work of John Williams but shares with his fans the first real exploration of his life and career. At least that I have seen.

    I, along with a great many people, am in many cases intimately familiar with John Williams’ motion picture scores. When I was a kid we didn’t have home video. After I saw a film in the theater I would buy the soundtrack and listen to it again and again, seeing the movie in my mind. His scores for Star Wars, Superman The Movie, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Raiders of the Lost Ark were what I listened to the most. Sure I enjoyed pop music, but I “listened” to those movie scores. Even now when I hear a piece of a score from those films I mentioned I can tell you where they appear in the film. In High School one year our band (I played trumpet) played a medley of Williams’ music. It included his, at the time, new Olympic fanfare along with themes from Superman, Raiders, and Star Wars, including The Imperial March from The Empire Strikes Back. Over the years I’d always clock the films he scored because, even if the film wasn’t that great, there was a good chance the music would be. Having said all that, Music by John Williams covers all the highlights of his film career, as expected. What is so wonderful about this film is that we get to know John Williams as a person. From his childhood to today. Much of the film is made up of interviews with Williams himself, now in his 90’s, along with talking head sequences of family members and film makers who have worked with him and/or been inspired by him.

    The film’s intimacy is what sets it apart from a piece of DVD bonus material about a particular score by John Williams. You get the impression hearing Mr. Williams recount events of his life, especially those involving his wife who passed away in here early ‘40’s, that he’s a very emotional man who holds a lot of it in but releases it in his compositions. He even remarks that he’s uncomfortable talking about his late wife. Not only is it wonderful that this man is still around to actually answer these questions but has taken some time to share with us- his admirers. Documentarian Laurent Bouzereau, in recent years, has released a few really good films about Hollywood luminaries. Earlier this year “Faye” about Faye Dunaway was released, Timeless Heroes: Indiana Jones and Harrison Ford, and Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind. All are very good. Maybe it’s because it’s the last one I watched or the subject matter so close to my heart but I’d say Music by John Williams is his best to date.

    If you’re a John Williams super-fan or have never paid that much attention to his contribution to film history, you’ll really enjoy this movie. Now I can not only count myself a lover of his music but also a fan of the man too. Music by John Williams is currently streaming on Disney+.

Faye (HBO)

    The new HBO Documentary “Faye” does a pretty good job of giving us a look into the life, career, and mind of actress Faye Dunaway.  Director Laurent Bouzereau, who has mostly done those short documentary supplementary materials for home video releases, allows Dunaway to tell her story along with the usual “talking heads” of friends, family, and admirers.  It’s not a hatchet job nor puff piece, it’s a fairly balanced view into the world of a celebrated, and complicated person.

    The film starts right off showing Ms. Dunaway preparing for the interview for the doc and she doesn’t disappoint.  She has a reputation for being difficult and from the opening moments of the film we see a little of why that is.  She’s “ready to go” and doesn’t want to wait.  Then her hair isn’t right, the seat she is in just isn’t comfortable, and she give suggestions for camera angles and lights.  The thing is, she comes off more as someone who knows how this stuff works and works for her, and not really mean or difficult.  At least that was my take.  Though you understand how that reputation could have been earned.  Once everything is set she opens up about her life from childhood to the present, good and bad.  The “experts” that come in to add details on her work are fine, but the really good stuff is when she is giving her first had recollections.  One interesting tid-bit that I had not known about was her diagnosis of being bipolar fairly late in life.  That shined a light on the “why” she did and said the things she had in her past and how she could come off as mean and difficult.  You can see, as she recalls the diagnosis, all the pieces falling into place in her mind.  Her son, Liam, is also a credible and interesting person in her life that gives insight into the way she thinks and her life from his perspective.

    I hadn’t realized just how may great performances in great films she gave.  I’ve actually seen more of her films that I thought I had, and it is very interesting to hear Ms. Dunaway’s thoughts and recollections of them.  As we live our lives we think of these actors from the past as they appear in those films—Bonny and Clyde, The Thomas Crown Affair, Network, Chinatown etc., and don’t notice when they seem to fade from the scene.  This is most true for actresses, unfortunately, and Faye Dunaway did keep plugging along in the late ‘80’s through the ‘90’s, mostly with television projects.  At least I, and I imagine most people, don’t take into account what a challenge it is for these older performers to find work. Let alone remain relevant.  As we learn about projects she had worked on in more recent years I was confronted by that realization.  That I took no notice of her, sort of, dropping out of site.  I see her in those classic performance she gave and, at least in my mind, she’s still that.  The fact that she’s a person, and an aging woman, rarely would cross my mind.  Maybe a “I wonder what Faye Dunaway is doing now?” would cross my mind, but I wouldn’t linger on it.  It’s a little difficult at first to except her appearance today.  She, like so many aging performers, has “had some work done” and it’s a little jarring, but when a really sincere grin crosses her face and her eyes twinkle you can see that same beautiful woman from The Thomas Crown Affair and Chinatown.  I wouldn’t consider myself a big Faye Dunaway fan, but having seen this film I realized that I am a bigger fan I thought I was.  It’s an interesting and entertaining look into the life of a living icon of cinema.

Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F (Netflix)

    Like many people, especially of my age, I’m a huge fan of the original 1984 Beverly Hills Cop, which began Eddie Murphy’s reign as one of the biggest movie stars of the 1980’s.  The 1987 follow up is a pretty good movie too, but when a third installment was made in 1994 (directed by John Landis and ditching the supporting characters of the previous movies) it failed both critically, with audiences, and financially.  So, the franchise went into hibernation.  After a lot of false starts and attempt at a TV series, Murphy, first time feature director Mark Molloy, and a fistful of money from Netflix Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F is finally here. 
    This long awaited fourth adventure of Murphy’s Axel Foley is a marked improvement over the ill-conceived third movie, though not as good as the first two Cop films.  It’s been over thirty years since we last caught up with Detroit Detective Foley and in that time, he has continued to serve, and be trouble for, the Detroit PD.  He also had been married and has an adult daughter.  Their relationship is estranged and haven’t spoken in several years.  When Axel receives a call from old Beverly Hills friend Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) that his daughter, a defense attorney in Beverly Hills, is in danger, our hero hops the next plane to L.A. to help.  Rosewood, now a P.I., has been pursuing a drug smuggling case that appears to lead to dirty cops.  Axel teams with his estranged daughter to uncover the conspiracy.
     Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F gets most things right.  Sometimes it relies a bit too much on beats from the original movie, like the use of needle drops from the first film.  For example, when he arrives in Beverly Hills there is a scene of him cruising down the road in his rental care while Glenn Frey’s The Heat is On plays.  In that case it works great, you feel like you’re watching a Beverly Hills Cop movie.  But then they go on to also use the songs Shakedown by Bob Seger and Neutron Dance by The Pointer Sisters.  Sure, they bring more nostalgia but get in the way of this movie having it’s own identity.  There are a few scenes that are very familiar to some in the first film too that I bumped up against.  I’m sure it was a tightrope to walk to give this movie the same feeling of those first two movies, while still being its own thing.  One thing that I thought worked great was the inclusion of those important supporting players from the original movies—Judge Reinhold’s Rosewood, John Ashton’s John Taggart, and Paul Reiser’s, now chief, Jeffrey Friedman.  Their being there didn’t feel forced at all, at least not to me.  One returning character, which was a little forced, but still works in the film, is Bronson Pinchot’s bizarrely accented Serge.  They give him a believable enough reason to be there, and he isn’t overused.
     Eddie Murphy is back in form returning to this character that made him a superstar.  It feels like the same guy, only with a lot more miles on him.  His relationship and chemistry with his daughter Jane, played by Taylour Paige (Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom), is quite good and actually improves as the film goes on.  Other additions to the cast are Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Kevin Bacon.  Gordon-Levitt plays a Cop and former love interest of Jane’s and Bacon is the big bad.  It’s pretty obvious from his first appearance that Kevin Bacon’s the bad guy, but it’s also easy enough to just “go with it” and enjoy ride.  At first, I just wasn’t feeling Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s character, until one particular scene that brought him into the story in a more intimate way and from that point on he and his chemistry with Murphy, was great.  This return to Beverly Hills with Axel Foley is definitely flawed but it recaptures enough of the magic I felt watching those first two movies that I really enjoyed myself.  It’s nice to see Eddie Murphy enjoying himself on film again.  I’d say, along with Dolemite is My Name, this is the guy we’ve been waiting decades to see again.  

Jim Henson: Idea Man (Disney+)

     Directed by Ron Howard, Jim Henson: Idea Man, is a worthy documentary of the man who created the Muppets and touched billions of people, all over the world, with his art. Like the man, this doc is a quiet, gentle look at Jim Henson’s life and career. It’s told by Henson himself, via interview footage, and through new interviews with his friends and family, including his children and long time collaborator Frank Oz.

     There have been other docs on Jim Henson, mostly hour long examinations or celebrations of his life, but this one seems a bit more comprehensive and personal. Being a fan, I knew a lot about his career and history, but this film shares events of his life that I was unaware of before and put a lot of what I already knew in new context. Sure, some may say it’s a fluff piece that only presents Jim Henson in a glowing light. Everyone he knew and worked with seemed to love him. It’s probably because he was a gentle and kind man. We do see how his need to create and work undercut and finally ended his marriage. His wife isn’t portrayed as “the bad guy” at all, and we understand the how and why. Outside of Sesame Street, I was unaware of Henson’s live action short films. Seeing snippets of them only made me appreciate the fact that he really was an artist and not just a puppeteer. There even seemed to be a period of his career where it looked like he’d be moving away from puppets, but opportunity and circumstances made them the priority again.

     Jim Henson: Idea Man isn’t perfect. I think there are parts of his life that were glossed over or didn’t get the kind of detailed attention I would have liked. Watching this doc made me think that a multipart documentary on Henson could be just as interesting and that there is plenty of story that is still to be explored. His death at a tragically young age of 54 makes for a bittersweet conclusion to the film. We’ve been following this insanely creative man who had yet to slow down, and then he was gone. You can’t help but feel emotional about it. Even if you’ve seen and read everything about Jim Henson you’ll still find this film interesting and entertaining. Much like the man himself.

The Beach Boys (Disney+)

      The new Beach Boys documentary- “The Beach Boys” is now streaming on Disney+ and it’s fine. I’ve seen quite a few docs on The Beach Boys and Brian Wilson over the years, I even read Mike Love’s autobiography from a few years ago and this new film, co-directed by mega-producer Frank Marshall (Indiana Jones films, Jurassic Park films, Back to the Future, etc) and Thom Zimny, who has directed almost everything involving Bruce Springsteen since the 2014, is ok. There’s not a lot of new material here and it’s not presented in a very original way. There are some modern “talking heads” like Janelle Monae, but they’re not enough to hold a Beach Boys fan’s attention all that long.

    We follow the story of The Beach Boys from their childhood formation of the group through about 1980. The facts seem right, but many are not followed through. Sure Brian Wilson famously had some emotional and psychological trauma but they don’t get very deep into the “whys”. The thing is, the story of The Beach Boys is fascinating and much more complex then this almost 2 hour movie. It just can’t come close to doing their story justice AND it still seems to drag at times. It may seem counterproductive to suggest that this two hour doc that felt long should have been longer, but that is exactly what it needed to be. This group and their story really needs a multi-part documentary similar to the Gary Shandling and George Carlin docs or the recent Steve Martin doc. Their story didn’t end in 1980, things got even weirder for a while in the 80’s. Frank Marshal, in addition to being a producer of blockbusters is actually a pretty good documentarian. His 2020 doc The Bee Gees: How Can You Mend a Broken Heart is terrific! I recommend it highly. This film plays like a Reader’s Digest version of the first couple chapters of the story of The Beach Boys.

     If you’re a passing fan of the band and haven’t seen or read ANYTHING about them then you’ll enjoy this film. Though I think you’ll feel like a lot was still to be told. Like I said, it’s fine. It’s family friendly (there is half of an F bomb), it just feels a little like Disney saw what a success Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back (which was in 3 parts) was and started looking for another band to feature. “How about The Beatles main competition in the mid-60’s?” Not a bad idea, but this movie feels like something produced with a release date already set. Too bad, there is a great story to be told. You just won’t find it here.

Unfrosted (Netflix)

     If you were a viewer of the ‘90’s classic sitcom Seinfeld, then you’ll know of Jerry Seinfeld’s love of breakfast cereal and fascination with everything about it. Well, he, and a couple of former Seinfeld writers, have created a movie inspired by the creation of the Kellogg’s Pop Tart. This is not a dramatization of that story, this is a way out there, and sometimes downright bizarre, re-imagining of how it may have happened.

     Co-writer and director, Jerry Seinfeld stars as Bob Cabana an R&D man who reports directly to Edsel Kellogg (Jim Gaffigan) himself and he is trying to create a breakfast treat that is portable and doesn’t require milk. He hires a former Kellogg’s employee and current NASA food scientist (Melissa McCarthy) to help make it happen. They are in a race with competing cereal giant Post (it’s owner, Marjorie Post, is played by comedienne Amy Schumer) to break this breakfast barrier. With the help of some crazy characters that include Chef Boy Ardee, Steve Schwinn, Tom Carvel, and America’s “Godfather of Fitness” Jack Lalanne, work begins. They even inadvertently create a new life-form before finally coming up with the Pop Tart we all know and love.

     I had a good bit of fun watching this movie. The story is secondary, though there is a plot and it works as a through line for the film, what makes it work is the sheer amount of jokes and gags being tossed your way. Do they all land? No, but, at least for me, most do. For the most part they are just silly. There are no complicated comedic setups that will be paying off later in the movie, well… maybe a couple, but they are equally silly. Here are just a few examples. When Cabana arrives at NASA to recruit Melissa McCarthy’s character, he shows up driving a Moon buggy. Later there’s a line like; “it’s weird that they’d leave these things lying around.” There’s a, sort of, subplot involving the cereal mascots like Tony the Tiger, and Snap, Crackle & Pop looking for fair compensation. And, in an example of some of the surreal comedy in the movie, the character of Tony the Tiger, or rather the real life voice of Tony the Tiger- Thurl Ravenscroft, played by Hugh Grant, being the actor in a Tony the Tiger costume. Again, some of the comedy works great while others, not so much. There is a riff on the January 6^th attack on the Capital building that is a little heavy handed, but it doesn’t ruin the movie. In addition to all the comedic actors I’ve mentioned already, this thing is full of really funny performers- Mikey Day, Patrick Warburton, Max Greenfield, Andy Daly, Cedric The Entertainer, Jack McBrayer, Bobby Moynihan, Thomas Lennon, James Marsden, Tony Hale, and Bill Burr as John F. Kennedy, and that’s not even a full list. These are performers who know how to take a bit and milk it for all it’s worth, and that’s why the movie works more than it doesn’t.

     If ridiculous and silly for the sake of silly (think The Three Stooges) does not appeal to you, then this movie won’t work for you. If a movie is presented to me as a comedy and it makes me laugh nearly all the way through, even though I can predict some of the punchlines before the setup is done, then it’s a success in my book. I actually think Unfrosted is more successful with it’s silly comedy than when it tries to make a comment or observation on real events. Sometimes you just want to laugh and this movie made me laugh.

Spaceman (Netflix)

     The new Netflix movie Spaceman stars Adam Sandler as an astronaut half way through a year long solo mission to study a strange nebula-like feature that has appeared near Jupiter, who winds up combating his loneliness, and yearning for a wife that he can feel pulling away, with the help of a giant spider-alien (voiced by Paul Dano) he names Hanus. Here are some things to keep in mind if you plan on watching this film. Even though it stars Adam Sandler, it is NOT a comedy. Think more along the lines of Punch Drunk Love or Uncut Gems Sandler. It’s also not a fun sci-fi romp. Think more along the lines of 2009’s Moon or Silent Running. We’re watching a man slowly let himself sink into depression until an unlikely friend (real or imaginary?) helps pull him out of it.

     I make the comparison to Moon and Silent Running because it’s a fairly small story, with the exception of a few people we follow back on earth, like the head of the space agency- Isabella Rossellini, a mission control person- Kunal Nayyar, and the astronaut’s wife- Carey Mulligan. Only half-way through his mission Sandler’s character is literally trapped with no way to get to his wife, who we learn really is planning on leaving him. The agency is withholding this info from him because it could compromise the mission. Which is very true, but it’s probably too late since he knows something is wrong and if you’re like me, and this character is in this respect, not knowing the details of a situation your mind creates all sorts of scenarios that can gnaw at you and keep you from thinking rationally. This is the tone of the film. When this big talking spider shows up the astronaut is afraid, then assumes he’s losing his mind, but the creature speaks in a calm, reassuring voice and claims to want to help the man. One thing I found interesting was the choice of the filmmakers to give the creature a, kind of, human like mouth. For some reason it did make him a little less scary. Dano’s voice works well as the calming presence for a man in psychological distress. In the end, not really implying one way or the other as to whether Hanush was real, I think, worked best for the film.

     I do have some questions though. We’re told that this is a Czechoslovakian space agency, with a mention of the “Euro-space agency”. My question is why? The film’s stars are American, English, Italian, Swedish, and the director (Johan Renck) is Swedish. Why keep the Czech based local from the book- Spaceman of Bohemia- it’s based on? If I was to make my best guess, it’s that no one would finance a weird little movie starring Czechoslovakian actors. Nor would making the cast do their best Eastern Block accents. So I get that, but why keep those details? The emotions and point of the film does not come from the fact that it’s a Czech character. I just bumped up against it every time that fact was mentioned in the script. I also question why so much of the dialogue is delivered in a whisper. At least for me, watching it on Netflix I had to keep turning down the volume when the score or sound effects played and then turning it up, up, up to hear the dialogue. I considered turning on the closed captioning but hate to do it when the film is in my native tongue (English). In the end, I liked the movie. It’s interesting and Sandler’s character does finally have a realization that changes him and his view of his situation. This is not a movie for everyone. It has a fairly slow pace and is kind of talkie for a flick with a giant spider in it, but even with it’s strangeness I’m glad I saw it. I had a similar experience with another movie that featured Paul Dano- Swiss Army Man. That is one weird movie that I didn’t know if I liked or hated at the time I watched it. Looking back, I did like it, but, in the same breathe, I have no ambition to revisit it. The same goes for Spaceman.

2024 Golden Globes Broadcast

     This past summer the Hollywood Foreign Press Association officially dissolved under a complicated reorganization plan that allowed the Golden Globes to continue.

Eldridge Industries, a holding company, and Dick Clark Productions, which has produced the award show’s telecast for decades, agreed to buy the organization’s Golden Globe assets for an undisclosed price. The proceeds went to a new nonprofit organization known as the Golden Globe Foundation to fund philanthropic efforts. The voting pool was expanded, from less than 100 in the old system, to about 300 jounalists from around the world and that is where we pick up the story as the Golden Globe telecast began last night on the CBS television network. Finding a host seemed to have been a challenge because it was only a couple of weeks ago that it was announced that stand-up comic Jo Koy would serve as M.C. Personally, I’ve only seen him on talk shows, snippets of his stand-up, and the trailer for his film Easter Sundy from a couple of years ago. I haven’t seen the film myself yet. So I had absolutely no preconceived notion of how he would do. In my opinion, he had a rough night. He fell back on the old “look around the room and comment on the stars in attendance and joke about them and/or their work.” Most of his stuff was meh at best. He then got a bit defensive with lines like; “I only got the job 10 days ago, what do you expect?” and “I didn’t write all these (jokes). Mine are the funny ones.” Don’t make excuses. Own that you’re bombing and use your comedy skills to improvise something clever. I think he discovered he wasn’t ready for this gig. I’m told it’s a difficult one because the audience is eating and drinking. It’s not like they are sitting in a theater all paying attention. Ricky Gervais, who won the first ever Globe for Stand-up Special, had everyone’s attention when he hosted. Not everyone thought he was funny, but he commanded the room.

     I’ve heard others say the night was full of surprises. I predicted most of the winners, with a few happy exceptions. Oppenheimer was the big winner with Best Score, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor in a Drama, Best Actor, and Best Motion Picture Drama. A very happy surprise to me, because I really liked this movie, was the success of The Holdovers, taking the Best Actor in a Comedy and Best Supporting Actress. I have not seen Poor thing, though I’m dying to, which took Best Picture Comedy and Best Actress in a Comedy. The big surprise, for me, since I hadn’t really even heard of this film, was the Best Screenplay award for Anatomy of a Fall, which also won Best Non-English Language film. Where’d that come from? The rest of the awards pretty much fell as I figured they would. Barbie got the first ever Cinematic and Box Office Achievement Award. No surprise there. The HBO series Succession cleaned up in the TV Drama categories for it’s final season, The Boy and the Heron for Best Animated film, and Lily Gladstone for Best Actress in a Drama. I figured The Bear would win many of the Comedy series awards (which it did), but is it a comedy? Really? I was a bit surprised at how well the show Beef did, winning Best Actor, Actress, and Limited Series. I still have to check that show out too.

     The presenters were all very pretty and well dressed, but the “presenter gags” they were given were, for the most part, lame or just stupid. Very few worked. I felt so bad for Kevin Costner, Angela Bassett, and others who you could see were trapped in these idiotic sketches. A few of them were saved by clever performers like Will Ferrel and Kristen Wiig, and Ray Romano and Keri Russell. Let’s get some better writers next time or just stick to presenting the awards and cut the “clever” banter. All in all the show was fine. These things are usually saved by some fun and/or sincere acceptance speeches and this show had a bit of both. There were WAY too many commercials. I would bet the entire show lasted just over 2hrs without the breaks. I think we should stop blaming the producers for award shows going “over their expected end times” and blame the networks for selling too much ad time. This is why so many people are turning to streamed content. Even the ones with ads offer fewer than over-the-air channels. There’s definite room for improvement Golden Globes, but I’ll be back next year anyway.

Maestro (Netflix)

    Right away, let me get it out there that I don’t really have a great amount of knowledge of Leonard Bernstein, so any holes in my knowledge may show themselves in this review of Bradley Cooper’s film Maestro.  The 1949 film version of On the Town is actually my favorite movie musical of all time and it features songs by Bernstein, and I was aware of his work with Stephen Sondheim in West Side Story and that is really the level of my Bernstein knowledge.  So, what is fact and what has been “fictionalized” by the creators of this movie is not something I can comment on.
      Maestro is Bradley Cooper’s second film as director, he co-wrote and stars here too.  My personal opinion is that Maestro plays more like a large-scale presentation of Cooper’s need for the world to see him as an “artist” than as a satisfying bio pic.  By that I mean he pulls out all the stops when it comes to the technical side of the film.  He plays with aspect ratio and being in black & white or color depending on the period of Bernstein’s life.  There are also some pretty wild seemingly single shot moments where the camera follows our characters from one place to another, that puts the opening shot of Citizen Kane to shame.  There are shots framed by windows, foliage, and even a garden gate.  All are very nice and, in many cases, impressive, but I found myself looking at the composition of the images and paying little attention to what the characters may be saying.  There are also whole scenes that occur in one long take. Some are more effective than others. Cinematographer Matthew Libatique’s (who has worked on films as varied as Cooper’s A Star is Born, Josie and the Pussycats, Iron Man, Black Swan, and The Wale) work in Maestro looks terrific in both black & white and color.  This guy knows how to shoot a movie and I’m sure Bradley Cooper tossed some challenges his way in this one.  Cooper himself is heavily made up to resemble Leonard Bernstein.  There are times when, as the younger Bernstein, it does look a little artificial.  On the other hand, I was really impressed with the Bernstein late in his life look.  It’s hard to say how much the make-up supports the performance, but it did get in my way a couple of times, both by noticing it’s artificiality and by admiring how real it could look.  I’m sure there is some CG supported shots but, for the most part, they are totally invisible.  On the technical side Maestro is a very successful film.
     I was also impressed with the performances, not so much with the script though.  Bradley Cooper took a lot of time to key into Leonard Bernstein’s “voice” in each period of his life.  His Bernstein in his ‘20’s is very different from the old Bernstein after 50 years of chain smoking.  Cooper’s performance also portrays a man who didn’t filter himself very often.  He’s bisexual and only vaguely hides his affairs from his wife, while also being very comfortable expressing his joy for life.  Having said that, Carey Mulligan, as Bernstein’s wife Felicia, is the actor that makes you stop and listen when she’s on screen.  She masterfully takes you through Felicia’s joyous highs to her heartbreaking lows when battling cancer.  All with the support of very little age make-up.  Another, though in a much smaller part, performance that surprised and impressed me is Sarah Silverman as Bernstein’s sister Shirley.  We’re used to her comedic talent but here, and again it’s a small role, she is nearly unrecognizable.   I kind of wanted more of Shirley.
     Where this film doesn’t work for me is, well, the rest.  There is a lot of dialogue, but much of it seems to amount to very little.  The movie is basically in three parts.  Bernstein’s early career, his mid-career heights along with meeting and falling in love with Felicia, and the fissuring of their marriage and her cancer battle.  There is a very short bit at the end with Bernstein toward the end of his life that wraps up the movie as well.  The only section that felt like there was a story being told was the part where Felicia confronts Leonard about his barely hidden affairs followed quickly by her cancer diagnosis.  This is really where Carey Mulligan pulls out the big guns and steals the movie too.  I don’t have a problem with unconventional bio pics (Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis for example), but Maestro seems to skip huge swaths of the life and career of Leonard Bernstein and fills it with very talky moments that, mainly, don’t further the story.  If the film had focused mainly on that period where Felicia begins to question whether her giving up her own career for a man who needs more than just her through her passing it would be much more emotionally impactful.  The three children of the couple are in the film, but we never get a good introduction to them or know them very well.  This is a movie of broad strokes, but the broad strokes are sometimes parts of the man’s life that were kind of mundane.  Maybe I missed something, but I found myself really being engaged in about 30 minutes of this 129-minute film.  There is definitely impressive stuff in this movie, but it’s a bit of a slog to get to that good stuff.

The Killer (Netflix)

    Director David Fincher’s latest, and second film of his deal with Netflix, is The Killer. In it Michael Fassbender plays a hired killer who, after an assassination goes wrong, returns home to find his wife/girlfriend/someone he cares about (we aren’t told) has been very badly beaten and left for dead. Once he’s satisfied she is going to be ok, he heads off in search of the party or parties responsible. At least that’s what I think was happening.

    I’ll admit, I’m not a big fan of David Fincher’s movies. I do like Se7en and his last movie, Mank, was ok. So it wasn’t a surprise really that I wasn’t feeling this one as it played out in front of me. It’s mostly Michael Fassbender’s “The Killer” driving, walking, flying in planes, taking cabs, or on a fairy. He’s traveling a lot. When he gets to these various locations stuff happens, but it was difficult, at least for me, to understand where exactly these people fit in his search for the responsible party. He pretty much kills everyone he encounters so after a while I just wasn’t invested in him and his quest. At least with John Wick I knew he was killing the baddies. I mean The Killer is himself a baddie, which can still be the character you can sympathize with, even knowing they aren’t actually a good person. Here, he’s a narrating, The Cure songs loving, TV character names as aliases using guy. The aliases were kind of fun I’ll admit. The movie plays out at a snails pace with a few nice moments peppered in there from time to time, but not enough to keep me from occasionally yawning and checking my watch, and in the end, it all seems to have amounted to nothing. At least that’s how it seemed to me.

    There were a few things to admire about this movie though. Fassbender’s American accent is actually quite good, but seems odd coming from him since I’m so used to his English accent. There is a really good scene between him and Tilda Swinton as well. Well, it’s mainly Tilda Swinton since she carries the most weight in the scene. It was nice to have a moment of clever dialogue with dark undertones between The Killers travels. For me, she was the highlight of the movie and I think she probably has 5 minutes of screen time. There’s a terrific fight scene between Fassbender and a huge brute of a guy. The Killer takes a lot of punishment, that I could feel as it happened, before barely coming out on top. The Killer is also a beautiful looking movie. That’s one thing I can not fault Fincher for. He knows how to photograph a beautifully lit and staged scene. All his films, that I’ve seen, look great.

    For me, all the good stuff just couldn’t make up for the amount of dullness that pervades this movie. It’s a technically great looking film featuring some talented performers that just couldn’t get me to care about the main character, or almost anyone really. There are a couple of genuinely innocent people who he takes out, I guess, so there is no chance he could be traced to them. I just didn’t buy it. I’m not saying you can’t enjoy a movie about a bad person. A Clockwork Orange comes to mind. Malcolm McDowell’s character is a pretty nasty human being, but in the end I actually feel a little bad for him and he’s as entertaining as hell along the way. I’ve heard of other people really liking The Killer. I just can’t be counted among them.

Quiz Lady (Hulu)

     The movie landscape hasn’t been very kind to comedies in recent years. Especially with theatrical releases. So we’re seeing the films that would have, definitely, been in theaters make their premiers on streaming services. Quiz Lady is the latest and one of the better. First let me admit that I am an Awkwafina fan. I think she’s a talented comedienne. And how can you not be a fan of Sandra Oh? She’s always good but it’s not often that she is seen in a comedy and I definitely hadn’t seen her play a character like this before.

     Awkwfina plays Anne Yum, who becomes known as the “Quiz Lady” when her directionless older sister (Jenny), posts a video of her playing along with a long running quiz show and knowing all the answers. Anne works a thankless office job but pays the bills. When her mother runs away from her retirement home she and her sister, who showed up thinking Mom had died and also needs a place to crash, are approached by a man who says their mother owes him $80.00 in gambling losses and he has kidnapped their dog (Linguine) to hold until he gets him money. Once Jenny realizes that if her sister could get on that game show she could win the money they need to get Linguine back she plots to make it happen. So, after an awkward, but successful audition, they head to L.A. to be on the show.

     I had a lot of fun with this movie. It’s been a while since I laughed out loud consistently through a recent comedy. Awkwafina actually plays the more grounded and “normal” person in this story while Sandra Oh is the wild child sister. Both bring some belly laughs and worked well together. Will Ferrell plays the host of the game show and he’s good too, but he’s really just playing the same character he did in countless game show sketches during his time on SNL. Jason Schwartzman is the long running winner on the show. A smart man, but kind of a smug egomaniac. Holland Taylor plays Anne’s crotchety neighbor, who gets swept up into their adventure and Tony Hale has some nice moments as a Philadelphia themed hotel manager who “plays” Ben Franklin and stays in character, as best he can, while working too. We’ve seen most of the comedy themes of this movie before- the crazy sister who brings chaos to her sister’s life, the grumpy neighbor, and “we need money to pay off the mob”. Nothing new there, but the dialogue is fun and the cast talented enough to rise above the cliche’s and play things real and still really funny.

     This is director Jessica Yu’s first feature. She’s been working as a TV director for some time on shows like 13 Reasons Why, The Morning Show, and This is Us. There isn’t much in the way of comedy in her resume’ but she handles it pretty well. She’s not a “showy” director, but definitely has control of the story. Writer, Jen D’Angelo, also comes from TV having written for comedies like Workaholics and Young Rock. She also worked on the movies Hocus Pocus 2 and the recent Amazon horror/comedy Totally killer. I don’t know how much of the really funny stuff in Quiz Lady is D’Angelo and how much was improvised by this amazing cast, but the combo works. If you’re missing silly comedies for adults, that don’t rely on raunchy humor, you’ll have a lot of fun with Quiz Lady.

No One Will Save You (Hulu)

     Hulu’s No One Will Save You is a little bit Close Encounters of the Third Kind and a little bit Invasion of the Body Snatchers with a seemingly out of nowhere ending, that I’ll admit I didn’t see coming and actually turned me around a bit on how I felt about this flick.

     In this nearly dialogue free film we follow a young woman named Brynn (Kaitlyn Dever of The Last Man Standing and Booksmart) living alone in a house on the outskirts of a small town. We learn through some interactions with a few townspeople that she is something of a pariah. No one seems to like her. We’ve seen nothing to warrant it, but something happened in the past. All clues point to what happened and it’s not that hard to figure it out before the reveal later on. So she is secluded and alone physically, alone in her house, and emotionally with the entire town seemingly against her. Anyway, one night she is awakened by some strange noises and realizes that her house has been broken into. Only these intruders are NOT HUMAN! Yes, aliens have invaded her home and they don’t seem to be friendly. She fights back, surviving the night. In the morning she heads to town for help and notices that a lot of the townsfolk are not acting like they usually do. She then has another round of nighttime battles with aliens, culminating in an ending that you’re going to want to discuss with someone.

     There are other people in this movie but 99 percent of the screen time belongs to Kaitlyn Dever. I loved her in Booksmart and was even impressed by her in the Julia Roberts/George Clooney romantic comedy Ticket to Paradise. A film that doesn’t try real hard to be original and works as well as it does solely by the charm of it’s stars. Devers is required to deliver what is basically a silent performance. She utters maybe 5 words in the movie and they all come toward the end. Otherwise she is left with grunts, screams, and whelps to support her physical performance, which she does very well. Other than the “dark moment from her past” stuff I had no problem understanding what was going on and what she was feeling throughout. She is never the problem with the film.

The aliens are not all that original. The film makers went with, what is basically, the traditional “Greys”. Oblong heads that taper down to a small chin and mouth. They, and I believe this was a conscious choice, look a lot like the aliens from Close Encounters. We see that there are three distinct different types of creatures. One is the traditional human sized being, another that is smaller and a lot more aggressive, and a supersized creature with extra long arms and legs who could be contenders in a pop and lock dance competition. While not too original they can be pretty creepy and threatening. I can’t say how much of the creature effects was practical and how much was digital, but I’m willing to bet that there was more practical than you’d expect.

     The concept is interesting and thrilling throughout that first night Brynn battles the aliens but it goes on. When she goes into town the next day and it’s revealed that her house was not an isolated location for the invasion it still works pretty well. This is where the movie could have made a choice as to what it wanted to be, but she goes back to her house for, basically, a repeat of the first night. By this time you don’t see any way she is going to come out of this. She’s way out of her league physically and it’s inevitable that she will be caught. The second night of alien fighting just goes on too long. There is a stereotypical red haring scene where you think; “maybe everything is ok”, but it’s just too easy to see through. What happens at the end, I’m sure, will be divisive. For a lot of people this will be what they hate about the film. For me, it is so out of left field that it, sort of, redeemed the film a bit. This is only Writer/Director Brian Duffield’s second film as director. The other being Spontaneous a romantic comedy featuring spontaneous combustion. He wrote the screenplays for one of the Divergent films (which I actually didn’t dislike), the Natalie Portman western Jane Got a Gun (which I did hate), the Kristen Stewart thriller Underwater (which is surprisingly entertaining), and the weirdly comic Love and Monsters (which is also pretty fun). I can see some similarities in No One Will Save You to his past work. He’s not afraid to take his stories to some odd places, but wears his influences right out in the open. Nowhere more than in this film though.

     At this point I want to discuss the ending. So, if you want to see the movie, go watch it and then come back and pick up right here to see my thoughts. Otherwise, you’ve been warned. I am about to spoil the living crap out of this movie.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

If you’re still with me I assume you’ve seen the movie or just don’t care. Again, I saw no way out for Brynn. She was going to get caught, so just get on with it. The goofy “was it all a dream?” sequence was much to easy to see through. It’s when she is finally caught and brought aboard the aliens ship that my interest was peeked a bit again. Where can they go from here? I’ll admit, I did not predict that the aliens would look into her mind, see that she had killed her friend (I’d figured out that she’d killed her friend long before this point), and decide; “Well, lets put her back and give her a positive place to live”. Part of me thinks that it is a brilliant idea, while another part of me thinks- would Brynn really be happy knowing that all the townsfolk are actually aliens now? She seems pretty into it. We see the creature in the neck of the boy she’s dancing with, but not in hers. So, my reading of the ending is that the aliens felt bad for her and gave her a happy existence. The fact that she seems to be really into it is what doesn’t quite ring true for the character we’ve just followed for the past 90 minutes. Maybe she is so shallow that this works for her. It’s left up to us to figure it out. The ending is so out of nowhere that I just have to give Brian Duffield credit for going for it. I don’t think I’ll revisit this movie any time soon but it does give you something to think about and discuss with friends.

You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah (Netflix)

     So, let me say right out of the box that I am not the target audience for You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah. This Adam Sandler produced (and co-starring) movie is aimed squarely at the 12-18 girl audience.  Don’t expect an “Adam Sandler movie”, this is not that. Thats not to say it’s a bad movie. For what it is, it’s not bad at all.

    Sandler’s real life daughter Sunny plays his movie daughter Stacy, as she prepares for her impending Bat Mitzvah and navigates life as a teenage girl.  Her crush on a popular boy causes her a few embarrassing moments and serious strife between her and her best friend Lydia. Which becomes the backbone of the story.

    While Adam Sandler’s family members have had bit parts and walk-ons in many of his films in the past this is the first time his children have played major roles.  Sunny actually being the film’s lead. Older sister Sadie plays her older sister, and their mother plays the mother of Stacy’s best friend Lydia.  Sandler and Idina Menzel are Stacy’s movie parents. Other supporting players are Sarah Sherman (of SNL), Luis Guzman (Wednesday), and Ido Mosseri (a big name in Israel).  Again, Adam Sandler takes a back seat to daughter Sunny here.  He has a few funny moments but plays things pretty calm and lets her shine.  Luckily, she has some natural talent and, while there are a few awkward performance moments, she delivers what the story required.  Giving us the “feels” a couple times where it was supposed to be.  I found myself wondering if any of this was “inspired by” something that the Sandler family actually lived, because she was so good.  If she wants to, with a bit more training, she could definitely make a career of acting and be successful.

    Like I said, this movie is for a younger audience, though I appreciated the “parent” moments the most, since I am also the father of 2 teenage girls myself.  I didn’t understand most of the references the kids made nor was I keyed into what it must be like to be a teenage girl today.  I was a teenager, though not Jewish, so there is enough commonality that I could still relate.  Not having the same references as the kids did keep me from enjoying some of their gags and the “teen angst”, probably because of the vast amount I deal with on a daily basis in real life, got a little old.  It does fall a little into the cliche’ “teen movie” tropes once in a while, but also went a few directions I wasn’t expecting.  I would have liked a bit more Adam Sandler and Idina Menzel.  They seemed mostly waisted, but I know that this was never meant to be a movie about the adults.  So, I can’t fault the movie for that. In the end it’s a cute “slice of teenage life” movie.  It’s not fall down laughing funny, nor is it a sappy teen relationship story.  It does a pretty good job of keeping the story moving forward and doesn’t overstay its welcome, coming in at 104 minutes.  If you have teenage girls in your family, watch it with them. They’ll have fun.

Heart of Stone (Netflix)

      I’m sure Netflix is hoping its new spy thriller- Heart of Stone will be the first film of a new franchise.  It’s actually not bad, but after watching it I also wasn’t dying to see more adventures of super spy Rachel Stone, played by Wonder Woman herself- Gal Gadot.  The movie opens with an MI6 team undercover at a fancy ski resort trying to capture a drug dealer.  One of the members of that team is Rachel Stone and we learn fairly quickly that she isn’t the “new agent” the rest of the team believes her to be, but a super spy who actually works for "The Charter".  An international spy organization that all other national investigation organizations believe is a myth.  When The Charter’s super A.I. ("The Heart"), that gives them their missions and unlimited access to tech around the world, is stolen and used to begin to dismantle The Charter, Stone is the only agent left to get it back.

     Here’s the deal.  Heart of Stone is really nothing we haven’t seen before.  It’s a pretty “by the numbers” action thriller in the vein of the Bond series.  But… if you go in without expectations it’s fairly entertaining too.  The big action pieces are mostly pretty good and affective, and the plot is kept pretty simple, so you don’t have to think very hard to follow along.  There’s a nice amount of “globetrotting”, though some of it is there just for the sake of globetrotting, and a few of the characters are interesting too.  Again, the film is led by Gal Gadot, who also serves as one of the producers, and she's fine.  She’s as charming and as at home in the action as she was in Wonder Woman, so there is no problem accepting her as a super spy.  The supporting players like Jamie Dornan, who plays against his usual type, and Alia Bhatt (RRR) are good too.  Especially Alia Bhatt.  I just had a good time when she was on screen.  Watch for BD Wong and Glenn Close in small roles, not much more than cameos, too.  The special effects are better than you’d expect here as well.

    Having said the nice things, admitting that it is watchable. and at times kind of fun, this movie doesn’t offer up anything new to the genre.  Sure, a female led spy series could be great, but it needs to bring something different, other than having a female protagonist.  Even the threat of a potentially malevolent A.I. in the wrong hands has been done a few times.  While the cast is good and does their best, there just isn’t anything special about these people that makes them stand out in the genre.  Snappier and more clever dialogue would have helped.  Two of my favorite characters don’t survive the second act.  Luckily Alia Bhatt’s Keya squeezes everything she can out of her role and, along with some pretty entertaining action sequences, helps keep the movie from withering on the vine.  I didn’t dislike Heart of Stone but wouldn’t have any desire to see it again either.  A “Rachel Stone” series of films could work, but they’ll need to do something to differentiate themselves from the Mission: Impossibles and Bonds in order to succeed.