Power Couple Broken, Power Restored: House Of Cards Season Four Is Claire's Season!

The Good: Moments of performance, Plot and mood development, Character development
The Bad: Protagonists become utterly unredeemable, Oppressive mood
The Basics: House Of Cards Season Four starts and ends dark with a middle that unites the Underwoods against the world.


House Of Cards had a rough third season (reviewed here!). Outside the introduction of Petrov and Heather Dunbar and the debate episode, it is hard to go back eagerly to the third season of House Of Cards. Nevertheless, I found myself getting up at 4 A.M. to start watching the fourth season of House Of Cards with pizza, coffee and a surprising amount of anticipation. House Of Cards Season Four is a slow-burn season; the first few episodes are slow and the mood is ponderous and oppressive, but it builds to something engaging and smart fast enough to make the initial investment worthwhile.

It is impossible to discuss the fourth season of House Of Cards without significant references to the prior seasons, especially where the third season left off. Indeed, the fourth season relies upon the prior seasons - especially the way it peppers back characters from prior seasons in significant ways - for its successes. The reappearances of Lucas Goodwin, Raymond Tusk and Russian President Petrov have significant repercussions in the fourth season of the show.

Opening with Lucas Goodwin in prison, getting information from his cellmate about the Armenian mob, the Department Of Justice puts the former reporter into witness protection and Goodwin comes back into play. While President Underwood struggles to fend off the primary challenge from Heather Dunbar, amid rumors that his marriage is falling apart, Goodwin makes his play by trying to enlist Dunbar in his investigation of Underwood. Underwood is besieged by Claire, though, when she leaves him and heads back to her family's home in Texas. Claire's mother, ill for years without her knowledge, quietly enlists her friends to support Heather Dunbar, while Claire scouts out a seat in the House in her family's district. Outmaneuvered by Frank for the House seat, Claire plays hardball with her husband and when he refuses to work with her, she threatens to divorce him after Super Tuesday.

But when Underwood is shot at a public event, the entire political landscape changes. When Donald Blythe assumes the responsibilities of the President, Claire seizes upon the opportunity to become de facto President. While Frank Underwood lays dying, Claire Underwood brokers an international deal that promises to lower gas prices at the pump by bailing out the Russian Federation. In the wake of a liver transplant, Frank resumes his post as President, now with Claire as his equal. Together, they run for President and Vice President after manipulating the nomination process and they run against the Republicans. But as terrorism and political enemies multiply, all of the Underwood's secrets are exposed!

The fourth season of House Of Cards is oppressive and intense before it becomes clear what the direction of the season will be. As the relationship between Frank and Claire disintegrates, House Of Cards becomes almost unwatchable. The thirteen episode season quickly takes focus as an assassin pops up and Claire's mother's health teeters on the edge. House Of Cards Season Four has a lot of death . . . and a lot of the darkest aspects of politics.

In its fourth season, House Of Cards returns every major character - save former Vice President Matthews and Rachel Posner - even if just for flashbacks or cameos. The resurfacing of the media as a factor in the lives of Francis and Claire Underwood returns the show's original dynamic, though now with a much darker flair.

The essential characters from the fourth season of House Of Cards are:

Francis Underwood – President of the United States, he is a Southern Democrat who is in an intense primary race against Heather Dunbar. He has taken Claire for granted and after she walks out on him, he begins to hallucinate doing violence against her. After removing her ability to run for Congress, he finds himself negotiating with her just to try to save their marriage. When an assassination attempt nearly takes him out, costing him his liver, he returns to the White House and Claire with greater strength and commitment,

Claire Underwood – The Southern debutante, she escapes to Texas where she reunites with her horrible mother. As she confronts her mother's sickness and her legacy, she decides to force the issue of prioritizing her ambitions with Francis. As a result, she steps in with the Russians and then maneuvers Durant out of the way for the Vice Presidential nomination. She is clever and takes serious power after threatening Frank with the nuclear option of divorce and outing his family secrets in Frank's race against Dunbar,

Katherine Durant – The Secretary Of State who has spent three years executing Frank Underwood's will, she slowly loses her influence at the White House. As Claire negotiates with the Russians, Durant gets skittish by her reliance upon Raymond Tusk, the Chinese, and continuing to work with Frank,

Donald Blythe – Entirely a nonentity, until Frank is shot, he is lost as acting President. He quickly leaps to the conclusion Frank wants, which is to not try to be on the 2016 ticket,

Jackie Sharp – Still having an affair with Remy Denton, she is extorted into helping to pay for the Russian bail-out. Remy works to protect her, but she opts to come clean instead of continuing to work for Frank,

Doug Stamper – Chief Of Staff to Underwood, he continues to ruthlessly enforce Underwood's will. He struggles to remain sober and maintain control over Seth and the secrets he has held for the President. When he uses his influence to get Frank bumped to the top of the liver donor list, the resulting casualty leads him into an intriguing new personal relationship,

Leann Harvey – A campaign consultant, she is hired by Claire to win the Congressional seat in her home district in Texas. When Frank torpedoes that effort, she stays with Claire as her de facto Chief Of Staff before Stamper hires her to run the Underwood campaign. Mistrusted by Stamper, Leann quickly proves herself invaluable to the Underwood team,

Conway – The sudden, presumptive Republican nominee, he has massive popular support and a mechanic to build a credible run for the Presidency right out of the gate! The governor of New York and a former Air Force officer, he is instantly formidable. He has a hot young wife and two children, which sets him apart from the Underwoods. But the Underwoods quickly figure out that Will Conway is a narcissist and they learn to use it against him,

Heather Dunbar – Despite losing the Iowa Caucus, she makes a powerful fight for New Hampshire and then capitalizes on Leann's interference to make serious gains in South Carolina. She slips when Lucas Goodwin contacts her and the resulting fallout forces her to choose between politics and integrity,

Tom Hammerschmidt - The former editor of The Washington Herald, he comes back into play after the assassination attempt on Underwood. After going through his notes, he investigates the story Lucas Goodwin brought him years ago. After discovering Meechum's travel logs were forged, he begins to woo people Underwood betrayed in order to expose the corrupt President,

and Remy Danton – Former Chief Of Staff, he resurfaces as a liability to Jackie Sharp maintaining her post as Minority Whip. He is finally put in a position where he reaches the end of his rope and is willing to betray Underwood.

House Of Cards might have dark, utterly depressing character arcs that lead to a rapid and powerful ascendancy for Claire Underwood and utterly ruins any lingering empathy viewers might have for Frank. The prevalence of past characters popping up at random makes it so viewers must have seen the prior seasons of House Of Cards in order to get the most out of the current season.

The fourth season gives Ellen Burstyn the plum role of Claire Underwood's mother. Burstyn has amazing range and develops the new character from a stubborn, somewhat off-putting, repressive matriarch to a wounded, deeply ill woman whose last chance for redemption pops up fast. Burstyn will undoubtedly get Best Supporting Actress for the role and the truth is, given the power of her performance, she deserves it.

House Of Cards once more gives Kevin Spacey a chance to showcase his range. Never before have viewers seen Francis Underwood so wounded and Spacey plays the physical aspects of Underwood being shot and slowly recovering brilliantly. Spacey has nothing on Robin Wright, though. Season Four of House Of Cards is very much Claire Underwood's season. Robin Wright plays Claire as ruthless, pragmatic, focused and she makes Claire a credible tactical threat to Frank. When Claire and Francis reunite, Wright is able to portray more emotion and depth than with many of the prior seasons.

Ultimately, the fourth season of House Of Cards redeems the slacking flagship Netflix series. As the Underwoods fight to maintain their power, the show refocuses in an interesting way. With Underwood's father exposed as (potentially) being in the Klan and an election year Supreme Court nomination, one has to wonder if Netflix employs prophets. The full-season's arc takes a couple of episodes to get going and there is a lull near the end before it explodes in a new potentially villainous direction for the next season! That makes House Of Cards Season Four worthwhile television.

For other Netflix exclusive seasons, please check out my reviews of:
Arrested Development - Season Four
The Clone Wars - Season Six
House Of Cards - Season 1
Jessica Jones - Season 1
Orange Is The New Black - Season 3
Sense8 - Season 1
Daredevil - Season 1
Grace And Frankie - Season 1

6/10

For other television reviews, please be sure to check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Hardly An Epic, Sadly Unincredible, Why Interstellar Is Not All It Should Have Been. . .

The Good: Decent plot, Adequate acting, Moments of character, Metaphysics
The Bad: Not stellar on the character or performance fronts, Huge detail problem that is never addressed
The Basics: (Mostly) Well-constructed, Interstellar is still deeply unsatisfying.


Coming into Oscar Pandering Season, indeed for most of the year, it is easy to say that the film I was most anticipating was Interstellar. I have largely enjoyed the works of Christopher Nolan and I am a fan of Anne Hathaway. Eager for her biggest film since Les Miserables (reviewed here!), I spent the day on a splurge: I went downstate to see Anne Hathaway in IMAX. I was excited to spend the day out and splurge seeing Interstellar in IMAX [Rant #1 – Hey, you, jackasses at the Warner Brothers advertising department! If you’re going to make the claim that “This film will be released two days early in IMAX” live up to your promise! There were no IMAX showings of Interstellar in Michigan on November 5, but your commercials sure made it here! Grumble!]. I otherwise went into Interstellar virtually blind; I managed to avoid spoilers, reviews and previews.  So, having made a day of it . . .

. . . it is hard to discuss my level of disappointment now. I know the moment the film was done that I enjoyed it more than I did Gravity (reviewed here!). But, when I went to assign a number rating on Interstellar, I had to go back to my literal, strict, formula for rating and Gravity, it turns out has a half point on Interstellar by the numbers! My wife asked me before if it was the worst Christopher Nolan film and I said, “No,” thinking that I liked Interstellar more than The Prestige (reviewed here!). While this might be an implicit argument that sometimes films get rated higher based on a first viewing (The Dark Knight Rises, I am most certainly looking at you!), my gut tells me that Interstellar is suffering in the opposite direction . . . and yet . . . and yet. There is much to recommend Interstellar, but there are some gaping holes in the science and science fiction of the film. As a result, I have decided that the best way for me to approach reviewing Interstellar is with a fractured review; the top half will have the spoiler-free critique (Jessica Chastain had a much bigger role than Anne Hathaway, the visual effects were not actually all that spectacular, etc.) and then a more thorough analysis of the problems with Interstellar (which is impossible to do without some spoilers). There will be a clear delineation.

Set in a nebulous future where blight has killed off many major crops and made farmers more important to Earth than engineers and astronauts (not to mention military powers), Cooper is a farmer who was once, briefly, a pilot. Living in the new dust bowl, Cooper farms corn and raises his son – Tom - and daughter, Murph, because humanity has turned so against science and medicine that MRIs no longer exist to find things like cancerous tumors in time to save the life of Cooper’s wife. Murph is a bit of a troublemaker at school and refuses to believe things like the Apollo missions were just government productions devised to bleed the Soviet Union financially dry and she is convinced she has a ghost in her room because books keep falling down. After a particularly violent dust storm floods Murph’s room with dust and dirt, Cooper becomes convinced that there is something going on in Murph’s room; the dust lands along specific lines of gravity and from those lines, Cooper discerns a simple binary message. Something is giving Cooper and Murph coordinates and Cooper (unwittingly taking Murph with him) makes a journey to find what is at those coordinates.

What they find is an old NORAD facility, which has been secretly used by NASA, which has existed in secret long after the public thought it was gone. Cooper meets Amelia Brand, who shows him the truth: in the years to come, the Blight will adapt to corn and the Earth will be unable to feeds its people and NASA is working on an ambitious project to evacuate the population or repopulate a distant planet with humans using embryonic genetic material. Cooper is reunited with Dr. Brand, whom he knew from his past days in NASA, and he meets Doyle and Romilly, along with the robots TARS and CASE, who are intended to go on a mission through a wormhole that appeared 48 years prior out near Saturn. Cooper learness that their mission would be the second endeavor through the wormhole; a decade ago, the Lazarus Project under Dr. Edmund went through the wormhole and sent twelve pods out to nearby planets to try to find a habitable one. Despite Murph being furious at Cooper for going, Cooper joins the mission as the pilot, leaving behind a watch for Murph and hoping to return by the time she is his age.

The crew of the Endurance goes to sleep for two years and wakes up when the ship reaches Saturn and the wormhole there. Cooper pilots the Endurance through the wormhole – in which Brand has a close encounter of sorts – and arriving near the black hole (Gargantua) in a far away galaxy, the crew discovers that three of the twelve probes give them reason to hope. The crew heads right away to Miller’s planet, where the orbit of the planet has such a relativistic distortion that an hour on the planet is equivalent to seven years outside the distortion field! Trying to track down Miller turns disastrous, though; her planet is all-water and while the lander finds her wreckage, they lose Doyle and are delayed while the engines drain of water. Returning to space, Brand and Cooper learn from Romilly that twenty-two years have passed. While he has managed to learn all he can about gravity from the nearby black hole, the years have drained most of the Endurance’s power and now the Endurance has only enough fuel to investigate one of the two remaining close planets. When Cooper exposes Brand’s determination to go to Edmund’s planet as a result of her love for him, he makes the choice to take the ship to Mann’s planet. During that time, Cooper finally starts getting messages from Murph, who has begun working with Dr. Brand on the project to get a worldship off the ground. As the years go by, Murph struggles to keep hope up for saving humanity. Hope is in short supply, though, when Dr. Mann’s optimistic appraisal of the planet he has been marooned on for decades turns out to be way too good to be true and Dr. Brand delivers a deathbed confession to Murph that causes her to question the whole nature of the mission her father is on.

Throughout Interstellar, the lingering question is who They are. They are the people who sent Murph and Cooper a message in the dust by manipulating gravity, They are the ones who created the artificial wormhole and other gravity anomalies, They seem to want humanity to survive, but They do not communicate directly with humanity. Unfortunately, the narrative technique of Interstellar makes this answer troublingly obvious – more about that in the spoilerific section below the rating! For no particular reason that makes much sense, Interstellar opens with elderly people discussing their childhood in the time period that the film begins in. While this is wonderful for creating a sense of time and place – they put plates on the table flipped over because of all the dust – it telegraphs the largest possible arc of the movie in a disappointing way. From almost the first frames of Interstellar, writers Jonathan and Christopher Nolan seem to be obsessed with saying, “Don’t worry, humanity will survive!”

Ultimately, though, that is at the root of the problems with Interstellar; the film tries to make mysteries and then completely lets down the audience with the payoffs to them. The film is riddled with inconsistencies much larger than Murph’s disappearing necklace between a p.o.v. shot change; the audience is meant to feel a sense of peril, but there is no larger sense of jeopardy because we already know humanity lives on. Similarly, Cooper opens the film as a scientist of such strength and conviction that it gave me hope that should Matthew McConaughey win any awards for his portrayal of Cooper in Interstellar, he could not reasonably waste time thanking the Divine in his acceptance speech. But for all of the rigid science of Cooper’s views, much of Interstellar is about faith. Anne Hathaway’s Amelia has her most impassioned speech of the film about the power of love; Murph is an educated scientist whose devotion to the cause borders on the fanatical in the absence of any reasonable reinforcement for decades!

This is not a complaint about the final act’s metaphysical nature. In fact, I enjoyed that. After a very literal film about the perils of space travel, Interstellar evolves and goes into cerebral territory much akin to 2001: A Space Odyssey. I have no problem with cerebral science fiction; indeed, I enjoyed Love (reviewed here!) more than most and more than I did Interstellar. But for a film that is supposed to be about human resilience and hope in the face of potential extinction, Interstellar really cheaps out with a faith angle that is not at all scientific.

On the performance front, Interstellar is adequate. Some of the casting is a little weird; Mackenzie Foy looks like a pre-teen version of Anne Hathaway, yet her character Murph grows up to be played by Jessica Chastain and then Ellen Burstyn, so there’s really no clear evolution in how her body changes throughout her life cycle! That said, all three actresses make incredible use of their time on screen – Foy especially is a scene stealer. Jessica Chastain has a powerfully substantive role in Interstellar and what is perhaps most impressive about her performance is how she sells some of the most ridiculous leaps a scientist could make as plausible. For plot purposes, Murph realizes something impossibly obscure and Chastain acts around the improbability remarkably well.

Interstellar has an impressive supporting cast, led by Anne Hathaway. Hathaway is given remarkably little to do; her character of Amelia seems cold initially and Hathaway has to play the part with a bad-enough poker face for Cooper to realize that Amelia has an attachment to Edmund and she does that. But Hathaway has only one big scene in Interstellar where she is otherwise given enough space to act and give her character any dimension. Ironically, Matt Damon’s character of Dr. Mann is in Interstellar for far less time, but he is given more to do with greater range. Damon is able to evolve Mann from good-natured and grateful to unsettling and unhinged, with careful gradations in his behaviors! Wes Bentley, Michael Caine, Topher Grace, Casey Affleck, John Lithgow and David Gyasi (wow, Interstellar sure is a sausage fest – are all the women in this bleak future out farming, too?!) all have moments that make their characters watchable and/or interesting. But no one in the film really shines and makes the viewer think “wow, that’s an amazing performance!”

That includes Matthey McConaughey as Cooper. McConaughy plays Cooper as a reluctant leader who is determined to juggle two potentially opposite things; save the Earth and get back to Earth before his daughter dies! McConaughey is good for the film’s physical moments and he does most of the jargon just fine, but his performance is nothing superlative.

Sadly, the same can be said about the special effects in Interstellar. I was psyched to go see Interstellar in IMAX and once the film finally got off Earth, I became excited again. Just as Prometheus (reviewed here!) made great use of the massive IMAX canvas for illustrating a tiny ship next to a massive planet (it’s a very different effect on Blu-Ray on a small screen!), Interstellar features a tiny space ship next to Jupiter. And the spherical wormhole is pretty cool. And the trip through the wormhole is appropriately trippy. And the film’s climactic, metaphysical, event is awesome. But in between . . . meh. Director Christopher Nolan tells a few cool things using effects – the lander hitting a frozen cloud in the atmosphere of Mann’s planet is neat – but the effects are more mundane and obvious than they are incredible or truly special.

In fact, in the quest to make some good special effects frequently works to the detriment of the story in Interstellar. The Coopers are farmers in a society that values farmers; why is their house falling apart?! Seriously, we have better windows and doors today than the Coopers do and there is no real rational reason for that to be so (see the spoilerific section for more on this!).

The result is a surprisingly middle-of-the-road science fiction piece that does what it promises in the film’s first few moments - it tells the story of how humanity was saved – it just does not do it very well. In fact, Doctor Who pounded the same theme on the importance of exploration in the recent episode “Kill The Moon” (reviewed here!); that might have had an equally preposterous underlying supposition, but at least it was shorter!

6/10

So, beyond this point is the crux of my issues with Interstellar - SPOILERS ABOUND! READ BEYOND HERE AT YOUR OWN RISK TO ENJOYING THE MOVIEGOING EXPERIENCE!!!

Interstellar is plagued with some serious problems that the film is unable to reconcile and it is unfortunate for how a film that tries to be smart ends up being so very, very stupid. First, the narrative technique; old people discussing life in the future, where they were children. The Nolans seem to think viewers who they want to be smart enough to understand physics and philosophy will be unable to grasp that the narrative technique they use to establish the precepts of their near-future also deny the viewer of any question as to whether the mission of the Endeavor and Lazarus Project will be successful! This film is not like “The Inner Light” (reviewed here!) where all that is going to survive are the planet’s stories.

The second big problem is They. “They” are referred to as being interested in saving humanity and giving Cooper the coordinates to the NORAD facility. They set off a story that is inherently cyclical. Unlike Inception (reviewed here!) where the movie may be viewed as a loop that the audience is working back to, Interstellar depends upon the loop. In fact, the film is all about the loop. Unfortunately, the nature of the loop is obvious from almost the very first moments of the film. When a time/space anomaly is detected that is clearly artificial and has such specific effects as coding a message to a single person in a specific place and time, the nature of that loop is pretty obvious. Anyone who likes science fiction will know that Cooper is sending himself on the mission.

But, wow, does Cooper go the long way around! “They” are influencing gravity to make messages in dust. That ability could be used, any time after Cooper has left on his mission, to write messages in the dust without causing a paradox. In fact, if the Cooper house had just had modern windows, “They” could have written pretty decent, concrete, messages in the dust on the windows. Cooper could have written something in the dust that would have made Murph’s ridiculous leap make sense, something like “Second hand!” But alas, Interstellar does not do anything quite that smart, even as it is appearing to be smart.

That is because the entire conceit of the movie defies any sense of logic and reason. I understand paradoxes and I love narrative loops. I have absolutely no problem with effect preceding cause . . . but it has to make sense. Sadly, Interstellar doesn’t. Even non-linear narratives need to have a sense of reason; if time is a loop, events must conspire such that the first time through time, people or planets get to a point where the loop may occur (i.e. if the Earth is destroyed by all-out nuclear war before the time machine is invented, a human from the future cannot come back to influence the past). The reason it fails to make sense comes during the metaphysical climax to the movie. Cooper does not do enough to influence his own timeline to make events happen after he and TARS enter the black hole. Cooper should have created the gravity anomaly that crashed his first mission, but the Nolans forgot to address that.

The wormhole is a problem that is a macguffin that is not satisfactorily addressed. The Lazarus Project and the Endeavor are only able to go out to a distant galaxy thanks to the wormhole. The wormhole was supposedly created by Them, which would be Cooper and TARS, but they forgot to make it before reality on the other side the event horizon collapsed. Therefore, someone else had to make the wormhole and the only implication in the film is that it is hyper-evolved humans who exist in five dimensions in the distant future. But, here’s the problem; without Cooper getting saved by them, they can never exist. Cooper’s own story which puts him in the distant galaxy on the other side of the wormhole hinges on him getting messages back to Murph in both the past and present. Cooper’s message cannot be transmitted unless he and TARS solve the equation from within the event horizon. The choices then are that he is saved by aliens who have mastered the fifth dimension or that he and TARS create the wormhole to save themselves. Otherwise, cause and effect be damned; humans would not have come through the wormhole to evolve into fifth dimensional beings to save Cooper! They couldn’t have left the planet to get there. So, that puts Interstellar once again in remarkably unsatisfying territory; Cooper and TARS forgot to engineer the wormhole so they were saved by unseen aliens who manufactured a wormhole . . . why?!

Seriously, if we’re to buy that aliens save humans what. the. hell.?! Many, many galaxies away, aliens bend time and space to discover humans and they commit themselves to saving them . . . by putting a hole in space not really near enough to them to be particularly useful. Ugh!

For other works with Jessica Chastain, please check out my reviews of:
The Martian
The Help

6/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Barry Levinson Makes A Statement, But Not A Point, With PoliWood

The Good: Great participation from both sides of the political spectrum, Raises a few good questions.
The Bad: Fails to land on a number of key points, Levinson talks over several of his subjects.
The Basics: Barry Levinson explores some important questions about how Hollywood celebrities influence politics without coming to any real answers in PoliWood.


When it comes to movies, my wife has a pretty simple formula for figuring out how to pick out a film I’d want to watch when we have a night to spend together: she looks up Anne Hathaway’s IMDB page and finds projects Hathaway has been involved in that I have not yet seen and she picks them up for us. That list is getting increasingly short, but my wife managed to find one such movie tonight: PoliWood. Given that my wife and I are politically active, PoliWood seemed like a documentary that we would have quite a bit of interest in and because I have largely enjoyed the works of Barry Levinson, it seemed like a good fit. PoliWood is a documentary or video essay by Levinson and it stars a number of Hollywood celebrities who are active in politics . . .

. . . admitting they are active in politics. While Levinson has some narrative to his video essay, PoliWood rambles with surprisingly little in the way of purpose. In fact, it was not until I sat down to write a review of PoliWood that I realized how little point there was to the movie.

The concept of PoliWood is simple: several actors and actresses who have gained a level of celebrity have publicly made political statements and supported candidates. The assumption has been that most of the most wealthy and outspoken celebrities are liberal and have exerted an undo influence over the American political process. Director and essayist Barry Levinson follows around several members of The Creative Coalition (a group that has largely come together to advocate for government funding of the arts) during the 2008 Presidential election. The documentary follows Anne Hathaway, Richard Schiff, Ellen Burstyn, Rachael Leigh Cook, Tim Daly, Giancarlo Esposito, Susan Sarandon, Matthew Modine and Josh Lucas as they attend political, sporting, and entertainment events.

Levinson follows the group to both the Democratic National Convention and the Republican National Convention and he comments (and documents comment from others) on the process of advocacy the celebrities utilize as they reach out to voters about issues important to each of them.

The problem is that the film does little more than that. PoliWood starts with the premise that Hollywood actors are blurring the lines between politics and entertainment. The film ends in the exact same place with no real growth in between. The subjects of Levinson’s documentary do not sufficiently address the concepts Levinson seems to want to explore with PoliWood. In his opening narration for PoliWood, Barry Levinson laments the role of the television in the American family; he talks about how daily life was changed by the invasive nature of the television and then how politicians were remade into television stars in order to get elected.

After that, Levinson follows his subjects around. PoliWood meanders around with the director asking the question of “Do Hollywood celebrities have too much influence over American politics?” and then shows them advocating for their cause and “common” Americans complaining about how out-of-touch those celebrities are with “middle” America. Perhaps the best moment of PoliWood is when Tim Daly discusses all of the non-actor related jobs he had and how he devotes quite a bit of time to “normal” things like car pools and coaching little league. In a smart, reasonable way, Daly quietly dispels one woman’s utter ignorance about how celebrities are somehow not as human or real as other people are.

But the documentary falls apart outside that. While there are decent moments, like Anne Hathaway admitting she hates talking about political issues she is not adequately informed about and some of the members of the Creative Coalition rejecting the refusal of a couple members to even hear out a successful strategist for Fox News, but largely Levinson asks questions that go unanswered or he asserts his own statements without actually backing them up in any demonstrable way in the film. For example, a number of misconceptions about celebrities are brought up during the film and one of the big ones is that right-of-center actors have a harder time getting work in Hollywood than leftists. It is not pointed out how Jon Voight and Clint Eastwood (for example) have almost constant work, even as they advocate for Republicans. Actor Robert Davi talks about a personal experience where a fan was turned off by his conservative activism, but he did not detail any issues he had with getting acting work as a result of the same activism.

Levinson also neglects to discuss at all how the influence of “Hollywood liberals” is, in part, a response to conservative businessmen advocating against social spending or progressive issues. It’s hard to say that Hollywood actors have more influence than the businesspeople who spend more money against their causes.

As a result, much of the movie swirls around Levinson making his own assertions and spreading his philosophy. He ends the movie where he begins it: articulating his own personal philosophy that television might be a destructive force in substantive political debates. PoliWood fails to back up or present a sophisticated view of its own premises (Levinson, for example, comments on how Al Gore drew attention to the global warming crisis through An Inconvenient Truth - reviewed here! – by essentially becoming a Hollywood celebrity while completely ignoring that the documentary only became a phenomenon because of Gore’s political celebrity and that if he had not been Vice President, he never would have managed to get the documentary produced) and the result is a lackluster documentary that only serves to reiterate the idea that the political process in the United States is damaged.

For other documentaries, please check out my reviews of:
Craigslist Joe
Jedi Junkies
Trek Nation

4/10

For other movie reviews, please check out my Film Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Nightmares In Drug Addiction: A Great Film Not Worth Watching - Requiem For A Dream

The Good: Excellent direction, acting, presentation, themes
The Bad: Nightmarish, unredeeming characters
The Basics: Disturbing and horrific, Requiem For A Dream is well directed and well acted and an experience so miserable that it should not be watched. Ever.


This might end up as a short review and if it does, that should certainly say something significant about Requiem For A Dream. It's a rare thing that I rate a movie as high as this one and still give it a "not recommend." It might seem an oxymoron. I can and will acknowledge the technical achievement of Requiem For A Dream, but I can think of no good reason to subject other people to this film.

Sara Goldfarb is an old woman who is lonely and dreams only of appearing on an inspirational television show. When she is invited to be a part of the studio audience for the show, she becomes determined to fit into her old red dress, which means losing weight. To lose weight, Sara begins taking dieting pills (speed) and becomes horribly addicted. In the same summer, her son Harry begins working as a drug dealer with his friend Tyrone. His goal is to help his girlfriend, Marion, afford her own business.

Come fall, though, Tyrone is arrested and the drug market is drying up. Frantic, poorer and addicted, Harry, Tyrone and Marion begin to do whatever it takes to score drugs to get high and make money, ruining everything in their lives in the process.

Just when I thought I had seen Jennifer Connelly in the most depressing movie I could see her in, with The House Of Sand And Fog (reviewed here!) I find out about and witness Requiem For A Dream. Requiem For A Dream is an unrelenting movie that I can only describe as a psychologically horrific masterpiece by director and writer Darren Aronofsky and writer Hubert Selby Jr. Aronofsky reminds the viewer what great direction can do. Great direction TELLS the story the director wants to convey, using the full medium to its greatest advantage. Aronofsky does this masterfully by blending together the lives and drug use of Sara, Harry and Marion.

I finished watching Requiem For A Dream approximately fifteen minutes ago and I'm writing my review now because I do not want to ruminate on the film. I intend to erase it from my memory. That's how powerful the imagery was. Aronofsky is explicit with the drug-use imagery and the repetition of it combined with the mixing of the scenes of legal and illegal drug use create a nightmarish cinematic landscape that is boring into my brain.

The acting in Requiem For A Dream is utterly convincing. Ellen Burstyn, who I loved in the inspirational The Spitfire Grill (reviewed here!), is captivating in her descent as Sara. She makes full use of her body language and facial expressions to convey paranoia and loneliness. Her acting is tremendous here; there is not a shred of strength of character in her that she has used in other characters she has played.

Jared Leto is creepy and good as Harry. Perhaps the big acting surprise was Marlon Wayans. The Wayans brothers are most known for comedy and Marlon here has no humor as Tyrone. He's cold, calculating and dramatically heavy. That he did not win any awards for his portrayal (he was nominated for several) is too bad.

Jennifer Connelly . . . sigh. I suppose once you've watched Connelly play a character who degenerates into a crackwhore, you've pretty much seen everything an actor can do. Watching Connelly made me sad. There's no other way to say it. Her performance is wrenching and depressing.

I can take depressing movies, but I want there to be something to come back to, something to make it worthwhile. Something that catches me. The direction here is good, but all of the characters are unredeemably miserable. I feel foul having watched this movie and that's why I know it was well-made.

I think this movie is suitable only as part of a "scared straight" program for 12 year-olds with reinforcement with clips from the latter half of the movie every six months until they are terrified adults who never use drugs. Outside that, no one deserves to be subjected to this movie.

For something far more entertaining and overall better, try Magnolia (reviewed here!). Now I'm off to take a shower and have some ice cream and forget I ever saw this movie.

Honestly, though, I doubt I'll be able to sleep.

For other films that are well-made, but not worth watching, check out my reviews of:
Hard Candy
An American Crime
The Other Woman

8/10 (Not recommended!)

For other film reviews, please visit my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Josh Brolin May Be Many Things, But He's No W.

The Good: Moments of character insight and decent direction, General format of story
The Bad: Pacing, Acting (casting), Light on DVD extras
The Basics: Oliver Stone's W. is strangely unsatisfying - especially to those who despise the administration of the former president - from the casting on down.


Having survived the administration of George W. Bush (which was not always a forgone conclusion in my case), I finally found myself at an emotional place where I was ready to open up to some entertainment about the former president. I had, previously, watched the documentary George W. Bush: Faith In The White House (reviewed here!) and been irked at the propaganda feel of that. So, when I felt ready to lighten up and allow myself to be entertained by the foibles of the former president, I got out W. on DVD. If there was anyone ready and eager for a film the ripped into the administration of George W. Bush, it was me.

Unfortunately, W. is not that film. Oliver Stone, strangely, takes the safest possible route creating a timid, neutral presentation on the 43rd president that ultimately makes no real statement in any direction. This is the story of a hapless man, trying desperately to live up to his father's expectations, not of greatness, but rather of productivity. In W. George H.W. Bush does not have aspirations that his son Junior will do anything extraordinary, merely that he will do something and stick with it long enough to accomplish something. Sadly, Oliver Stone allows most of the compelling moments in the last eight years fly by with little recognition of their importance or George W. Bush's role in creating the history we have just lived through.

Following the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, George W. Bush and his cabinet and advisors consider how to strike back at those involved. As Bush's approval ratings soar, key members of his inner circle - Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, George Tenet, and Condoleezza Rice - encourage Bush to link Saddam Hussein to the terrorist attacks to allow a strike against Iraq by U.S. forces. As the speeches are altered and interrogation techniques are approved, the United States moves closer to war and George W. Bush considers how he got to the most powerful position in the world.

He reminisces of time in Texas and at Yale, his fraternity days and the times when he was just a young, rowdy guy who drank, danced and had sex with some blonde he didn't have money for a ring for. He dreams of baseball and catching a hit that might otherwise be a home run and he slouches from oil rigs to investment banking jobs to working on his father's presidential campaign, while George H.W. Bush continually bails him out of jams he gets in (sometimes literally). George W. Bush meets Laura, finds god, gets sober and on his father's campaign meets with the extremists in the Republican base, specifically Karl Rove, who sees in George W. Bush the potential to be the tool the ideologues need to restore their vision of America to the presidency.

W. might have succeeded has it not been released in 2008. Seriously. I write this not because the film would be any better years from now, nor because of the hope the Obama Presidency created to foster the impression many of Bush's most egregious positions and executive orders would be overturned, but rather because the film had to compete against Frost/Nixon. The strength of Frost/Nixon is arguably on the performance of Frank Langella, a man who neither looks nor sounds like former President Nixon. Langella could not (obviously) get over the first part, but within moments of his appearance on screen, Langella's body language and speech patterns are those of Richard Nixon. Langella transforms into Nixon and it is eerie and powerful to watch the movie because the performance is so amazing.

Sadly, Josh Brolin does not pull off George W. Bush. Josh Brolin, who impressed me with his performance in No Country For Old Men (reviewed here!), is cast to embody George W. Bush and he fails utterly, save two shots in the entire movie, one on the baseball diamond, one talking to his speechwriters with his hair rumpled. The rest of the time, Brolin utterly fails to embody Bush. It is not just that he does not look much like Bush, but Brolin does not move like the former president at all. Will Farrell had a much better take on George W. Bush for one simple reason; presenting a parody of George W. Bush often presents the most real body language of the man. Before those who still adore our previous president jump on that, go back and watch videos of George W. Bush; the man has a very loose body language. His head wobbles, when he speaks - especially in the early years of his administration - he shifts from foot to foot, and when he first appears before cameras, he looks more determined to not break into a smile than anything else. He's an easygoing guy . . . he's a GUY. What some found charming or appealing was his accessibility and that largely came from his body language of being a loose, cool guy one could sit down, have a beer with and watch the game with.

Josh Brolin completely fails to get that. He is stiff throughout W., treating everything as if it is serious and while he appropriately furrows his brow whenever anyone asks Bush to consider something, Brolin doesn't get the performance right. Thandie Newton, who plays Condoleezza Rice, pulls off her brief supporting role better than Brolin manages to get the main role.

Unfortunately, because so many of the figures are public figures still at the forefront of the American consciousness, the look of the characters is incredibly important and here the casting and make-up were not as precise as they ought to have been. Jeffrey Wright's Colin Powell's forehead is a little too high, Toby Jones's Karl Rove is too obviously toady and James Cromwell - whose work I usually adore - is hit or miss as George H.W. Bush depending on the scene. In fact, the only casting that is perfectly executed is Richard Dreyfuss as Dick Cheney. Dreyfuss assumes the look and bearing of the former vice president perfectly, though he essentially replays his role from The American President to pull this off. Elizabeth Banks and Ellen Burstyn both evolve into the roles of Laura and Barbara Bush, respectively, but they do not appear on screen convincingly as either at their first appearances. Oliver Stone ought to get credit, though for taking two beautiful women and toning down their looks to try to fit the roles (conversely, Newton plays her Hollywood good looks perfectly in the role as Rice, who always seemed attentive to her appearance).

So, the casting is seriously off. Add to that, W. is poorly paced and more than the character lacking direction, there are too many portions where the viewer is left feeling like Oliver Stone does not know what he wants to be saying with the film. Ultimately, he ends up saying very little. As Bush is pressed toward war by Rove and Cheney, Powell stands as the lone dissenter and Bush gleefully steamrolls over his objections to the group's plans. Powell, unfortunately, is presented with only limited backbone and the viewer ends up feeling more empathy for him than for the hapless title character.

More than anything, Oliver Stone seems to be making a film that takes the tact that George W. Bush was a guy who did not truly care about anything who stumbled into the presidency. Once there, he was content to let others do what they felt, signing off on critical orders based on how many pages he was handed. He is not a caricature here as a witless man or incompetent president, merely a guy who roams uncaring through the world until he is at an important office that actually makes demands upon him. The character is not pitiable, nor is he or his exploits interesting to watch (just as many of us were uninterested in participating in his years as president).

Now on DVD, W. features a similarly listless and controversy-free commentary track by Oliver Stone where he avoids any real thorny issues and talks more about the making of his boring film. There are trailers for other Lionsgate films and there is a mildly more engaging featurette on the actual Bush Administration in which several liberals decry his policies without getting too specific or relating it back to the film.

And keep in mind, I was ready to like this film! But at the end of the day, I wanted W. to inform or entertain or some combination of both. It did neither. Instead, it plodded along for far too long with a guy who could be virtually any Southern or Midwestern heir doing little and evoking little empathy or interest for doing it.

For other works with Toby Jones, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Snow White And The Huntsman
The Hunger Games
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
My Week With Marilyn
Captain America: The First Avenger
Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Part II
Frost/Nixon
Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets
Ever After
Orlando

5/10

For other film reviews, be sure to check out my Movie Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |

Nicholas Cage Runs From Being The Next Wicker Man In The Wicker Man!

The Good: Good cast
The Bad: Terrible acting, Predictable plot, Hammy, hammy acting, Nothing stellar in character
The Basics: While The Wicker Man starts with an intriguing hook, it quickly degenerates into Nicholas Cage running around screaming. Not worth your time.


No sooner had I recovered from my disappointment from watching Pulse than I found myself subjected to The Wicker Man, the 2006 remake of the 1973 screenplay by Anthony Shaffer. Reviewing The Wicker Man brought instantly to mind the exchange between C-3P0 and Han Solo in the middle of Star Wars: A New Hope, when R2-D2 is playing a game against Chewbacca. Solo advises R2-D2 to let Chewbacca win, to which C-3P0 declares, "No one worries about upsetting a droid." "That's because a droid don't tear your arms off when he loses," Solo responds. Watching The Wicker Man, all I could think was "No one worries about upsetting a Wiccan."

Edward Malus, a motorcycle cop in California, assists a mother and daughter on the highway when a truck collides with their car, killing both. Placed on the sick list, Edward works to get his nerves back and receives an intriguing letter from his former fiance in the mail from the station. This leads Edward to an island off Washington to search for his ex-fiance's daughter who may or may not exist, may or may not be dead and the viewer may or (let's not kid ourselves, this is the option that counts) may not care about.

The first five minutes of The Wicker Man are the best in the movie, being the most exciting, intriguing, well acted and well directed. During the first five minutes, Nicholas Cage is Edward Malus, beat cop. We believe him, he is a character, we care. After Edward journeys to Summersisle, the movie quickly degenerates into a film one would expect to see parodied in Scary Movie 5. Everything begins to break down. In fact, there is a precise moment when Nicholas Cage is running through a field of bees that I was watching the movie and was forced to acknowledge it was Nicholas Cage (not Edward) running through the field.

This disconnect where the actor falls out of character intensifies as Cage begins to yell at virtually every woman on the island. Edward is transformed from a quiet, introspective "law and order" guy to a screaming maniac and it doesn't fit the character. But it's easy to see Nicholas Cage in this in that we've seen him play angry characters before. As he yells and runs around, the sense that he is acting becomes lost to the idea that Nicholas Cage is on screen.

Sadly, while Cage breaks character from mild-mannered to freak, the rest of the cast is not graced with genuine character to begin with. The Wicker Man is populated by truly great actresses, though this is not a movie that exhibits the talents of any one of them. Ellen Burstyn, second billed, appears rather late in the movie as Sister Summersisle. Burstyn portrayed a wonderful, strong female character in one of my favorite movies, The Spitfire Grill (reviewed here!) and I recently saw her in Requiem For A Dream. In The Wicker Man, Burstyn exhibits none of her talents. In fact, Burstyn is playing Louise Fletcher as Sister Summersisle. Burstyn sounds and acts like Fletcher (best known as Nurse Ratchet in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest).

Similarly, Frances Conroy, who earned my respect for her solemn, quietly desperate portrayal of Ruth Fisher in Six Feet Under (reviewed here!) is knocked further off her pedestal for appearing in this drecht. As with her performance in Catwoman (reviewed here!), Conroy is stuck in the role of "wise crone" and her part is simply an archetype role being filled. There is nothing genuine or distinctive about the character of Dr. Moss or Conroy's portrayal of her.

There is not another single actress in The Wicker Man who impresses the viewer. All of the castmembers play generic tree-hugging women who are ready to engage in human sacrifice to appease their deity. This part of the plot seems especially silly in this day in age and writer-director Neil LaBute seems to have no problem with making women look ridiculous and infantile or with mocking wicca.

On that front, I return to my comment from A New Hope. Wicca is an ancient religion and while it is not the mainstream religion of the United States, its practitioners deserve the same basic respect that we give people who practice Christianity, Judaism, Deism, Scientology, Hinduism or any other of the hundreds of religions out there. Somewhen it became chic to mock wicca and witchcraft and horror movies have a tendency to exploit that. The Wicker Man is an especially ugly interpretation of arcane Celtic-Wiccan religions and what offends me is the double standard our society tolerates. When Kevin Smith released Dogma, he received death threats. The Wicker Man portrays wiccans (and women in general!) as a hyperbole of brainless and/or bloodthirsty and nothing happens.

Oh yeah, that's because wiccan's don't tear your arms off when they lose.

Sigh.

The Wicker Man is a horror film that is not scary nor entertaining. The performances are almost universally bland and none of the characters have . . . well, character. This movie is not worth your time. It wasn't truly worth mine to write about it.

For other movies with Nicholas Cage, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
The Sorcerer's Apprentice
Kick-Ass
G-Force
The Family Man
Snake Eyes

2.5/10

For other movie reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

| | |

Darren Aronofsky Presents 2001: The Next Generation With The Fountain

The Good: Well acted, Interesting characters, Moments of mood, Scope, Effects
The Bad: Much of the mood, DVD extras
The Basics: When Tomas goes on a quest for the Tree of Life, he finds himself bound to a love that lasts a millennia in a slow, but pretty awesome cinematic experience.


Spike Feresten, a former writer for Seinfeld, had a late night show on Fox in the illustrious midnight-after-MadTV-on-Saturday timeslot. On his appropriately titled Talkshow With Spike Feresten, he had a bit called "Comedy For Stoners," where after refusing to condone drug use he provides a sketch that could truly only be appreciated by someone who was high. I mention this at the outset of my review for The Fountain because while being a bit of a prude against drugs myself, I think this film might be benefited by some form of mind-altering substance in order to get the most out of it. Perhaps the tagline, instead of "What If You Could Live Forever?," should have been, "If You Fondly Remember Seeing 2001 Baked.'" It certainly couldn't have hurt the film's grosses.

When I was going through a patch of watching films recently and not getting around to reviewing them right away, I was suddenly barraged with requests by people in my life to tell them what The Fountain, now on DVD was actually about. This recent film by Darren Aronofsky, who previously bored me with Pi, left me ambivalent with Black Swan (reviewed here!) and revolted me completely with his magnificent, if overwhelming Requiem For A Dream, is billed as a science fiction masterpiece in the vein of Stanley Kubrick's cinematic interpretation of 2001: A Space Odyssey and it certainly lives up to that reputation. Yes, it's a bit slow.

In the 1500s, Spain's Queen Isabel is beset by the forces of the Grand Inquisitor. As her empire falls under the yolk of the Inquisitor and fear overcomes her lands, she turns to Tomas, a Conquistador who she believes can help save Spain. Queen Isabel sends Tomas to the New World on a quest to find the Tree of Life amid the Mayans. Five hundred years later, Dr. Tom Creo, is searching desperately for a cure to an incurable cancer and he strikes on using the bark from a tree only he knows about. As he works to save the woman he loves, his wife Izzi, she works on a novel describing Tom's past and his future, a future that will take him to the birthplace of stars in an attempt to reincarnate the love of his life.

The Fountain, as I've explained to several people face to face, is a story that is told in a nonlinear fashion and that seems to be what throws a lot of people. In the year 2500, Tom is sailing through space with the Tree of Life toward the birthplace of stars. His little treeship is sailing along and he is having hallucinations of Izzi, his long-dead wife. In his memories of Izzi, he recalls her novel, which just happened to be the story of Tom's life, including his quest five hundred years before to find the Tree of Life and projecting the reality he is in at that moment, traveling to the birthplace of stars. Once one accepts that things are happening out of order and that Tom is an immortal, there is little truly open for debate in the film.

Yes, outside the narrative structure and the supernatural immortality and ability for Izzi to reincarnate at five hundred year intervals and somehow know Tomas's past and future, it's a remarkably straightforward film. What many people may have problems with is that this is the classic highbrow science fiction story that we do not see frequently in United States cinema any longer. Aronofsky is trying to make a thinking piece, filled with ambiguity resulting in something the viewer has to wrestle with or contemplate. It's not intended to be something that gives all of the answers to the viewer, more to inspire the asking of questions.

In that regard, it's something of a mystery why Aronofsky edited the film so it could get a PG-13 rating. This is not a movie that is being marketed toward the 13 - 18 crowd, so cutting it for content (it originally was given an "R") seems almost as esoteric as the final cut. This is science fiction - and cinema! - for people who want to experience a cinematic experience, not simply be entertained or watch big explosions on a big screen. It's not that type of film.

The Fountain is basically a character study and that is where it succeeds. Tomas or Tom or Tommy is a compelling protagonist who lives his immortal life obsessed with one great love. He never gives up on his love for Isabel or Izzi and as a result, the film effectively implies much of what the viewer never sees. In short, Tom is living his life for one great love. How do we know it is great? We see the effect it has on him. Instead of belaboring the film with defining just what Tom's love is and how deep it goes, the viewer is left to understand that through the lengths he goes for that love. And that works quite well to inform the viewer.

After all, how many men would spend a thousand years obsessing on the same woman, leaving all sense of reality behind to attempt to rescue her and rebirth her in the one place in the galaxy that might actually be possible? Short list of men, long list of women who might want said man to turn their attention to her.

Isabel is suitably distant as queen and her reincarnated self as Izzi is wonderfully emotive, expressive and loving; everything that was not fulfilled by Tomas's relationship with Isabel is evident in Tom's relationship with Izzi. The figment Tom sees while aboard the treeship is his own hallucination, memories of the woman from five hundred years prior, so her appearance then is less an expression of her character and more a reflection on Tom's. Izzi is interesting, though it is clearly Tom who dominates this story and the expression of love director Aronofsky is exploring.

Tomas is played by Hugh Jackman and this might well be his most original performance on screen since Scoop. Here, Jackman is frequently frustrated, portraying his character in all three times as a man almost always on edge. Maintaining that level of emotional uncertainty to evoke a strongly unsettling quality is not easy, but Jackman makes it seem effortless. He performs without the wry wit of his character from Scoop and without the fury he must maintain as Wolverine in the X-Men films. He is articulate, humble, charming and he bears a broken quality through much of the film that helps define his character as unlike any he has ever played.

The incarnations of Isabel are portrayed by Rachel Weisz. Right around the time I saw The Fountain, I saw Weisz in Constantine. Weisz proves her ability to act by creating an entirely different - and more convincing - persona as Isabel than she did in her role in Constantine. As Isabel, she is regal, strong and distant in the way one expects a monarch - especially a besieged one - to act. He has presence in the role and is convincing. Similarly, as Izzi, she is loving, accessible and entirely human, which fits her character perfectly. Married to Aronofsky, the director clearly knew how to get the best of out her and her performance in The Fountain shines.

The film is not going to satisfy everyone. This is definitely a piece for those who can watch films on a metaphorical level instead of a literal one. The narrative technique can be confusing and it is a strongly visual film, so it needs to be watched and paid attention to. Aronofsky and his crew are of little help; there is no commentary track on the DVD. Instead, there is a featurette (six featurettes in one) that focuses on the production challenges associated with making the film, but not much more. There is also the theatrical trailer for The Fountain. This is a very light DVD when it comes to extras and that is bound to disappoint anyone seriously confused by the work.

For other works with Rachel Weisz, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Definitely, Maybe
Envy
The Mummy Returns
The Mummy

7/10

For other food reviews, please be sure to visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2011, 2007 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

| | |

The Quiet Perfection Of The Spitfire Grill

The Good: Strong characterization, acting, cinematography, plot
The Bad: 95% predictable, No DVD bonus features.
The Basics: Curl up under some blankets with a partner -or with a mug of hot cocoa if you're alone- and watch The Spitfire Grill. It's a wonderful film!


It's rare to find a film like The Spitfire Grill where character comes before anything else. I first saw The Spitfire Grill in the art theater when I was in college and I was enchanted by how well the movie TOLD the story it was telling. When I found it on DVD recently, I was not surprised to discover that it appeared only in a "no-frills" presentation. It was not commercially successful.

In Gilead, a small town in Maine, a young woman named Percy Talbott comes to settle down after getting out of prison. She is put up in the local inn, called the Spitfire Grill where she begins to wait tables and help out the aging proprietor, Hannah Furguson. Hannah is feisty and crabby, yet takes Percy in and with the help of her introverted daughter-in-law, Shelby, the three run things. When Hannah breaks her hip, though, she decides to get rid of the Grill and Percy's idea to have an essay-writing contest to give the inn away causes Shelby's jealous husband to investigate why Percy was in prison at all.

The film is essentially a character study set in the small town in Maine. Throughout the film, the question of healing is raised, with Percy explicitly asking, "Do you think a wound can run so deep" it can't ever be healed? That's the question that occupies the film. The three main characters have wounds: Percy's cloaked past, Shelby's constant abuse from her husband and Hannah's guilt over choices she made in her past (part of the story the movie tells that I shall not reveal!).

It's easy to complain about the film having a slow pace, but that's actually part of what makes it so good, it's something the director got right. Writer and director Lee David Zlotoff perceptively captures small time life, complete with gossips and the standards that come in rural America of marrying the local girl and sticking around in the area to raise a family. In Small Town, Anywhere, life DOES move at a slower pace and while it can be irritating to people accustomed to bigger cities, it's actually part of the magic of what makes The Spitfire Grill excellent.

The bottom line is sometimes it takes getting to the middle of nowhere, living slow for a while, to heal. "Heal Thyself" wasn't told to a physician who was supposed to go out and run a marathon! The Spitfire Grill tells a story in a rather old fashioned way; by building the character threads, weaving them together in a realistic fashion and THEN letting the characters move around with the decisions they have made.

And in this film, there are people who need to be healed. The most obvious is the wonderful and simply beautiful Percy Talbott (Alison Elliott). Her benefactress Hannah (Ellen Burstyn) and the occasionally simple Shelby also need healing in one form or another and through the cathartic nature of the meandering plot, we're assured all people get it. The characters are decent and in large part that comes from the acting.

Ellen Burstyn is feisty and strong-willed as Hannah. She plays the role with an ornery quality that seems like a parody of the crotchety old woman, but Burstyn makes it her own. Her body language is solid through the movie, so when her character has to move fast near the end, Burstyn is convincingly crippled and unable to make her body move. That's getting into a role!

Marcia Gay Harden is decent as the mousy Shelby. She behaves exactly like a woman who has been browbeaten for years would behave and her performance is, in some ways, the most difficult to watch. Harden convincingly plays a woman used to being put down and the way her body language changes as Shelby gets some positive reinforcement in her life is part of the simple pleasure of watching The Spitfire Grill.

It is Alison Elliott whose burden it is to sell the movie and she succeeds wonderfully. She's so good in The Spitfire Grill that I'm surprised she has only had a handful of roles since. Elliott is, quite simply, a compelling young woman wounded by her past. She plays the part without a moment of letting the facade slip and it's a joy to see such young talent in film today (or ten years ago now!).

One of the nice things about The Spitfire Grill is it doesn't meet all of our expectations. The happy ending we ultimately expect doesn't quite arrive. Zlotoff wisely tells a compelling story that includes normal human foibles. More than anything else the film succeeds because the people act like real people. They are being human with all of their quirks, prejudices and especially fears. It's a marvelous character study that succeeds even though certain elements fall along predicted plots.

The Spitfire Grill did not do well in theaters, but catching it on DVD is certainly worthy of your attention. It's an artful, enjoyable film and it moves at a pace that helps tell the story it wants to tell, the way it wants to tell it. What could one want more than a story with compelling characters, well acted, with a genuine emotional core to it?

I don't know.

For other quiet, subtle dramas, please visit my reviews of:
One Day
Brokeback Mountain
Dear John

10/10

For more movie reviews, please check out my index page!

© 2010, 2007, 2001 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

| | |