Better Than Any Seat In The House: Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids Still Underwhelms.

The Good: Decent footage, Awesome charisma, Very cool that the documentary presents the full ensemble
The Bad: Short, Underuse of iconic songs, Presentation/performance, Very odd arrangement
The Basics: Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids might document accurately the final performance from the 20/20 Experience Tour, but it dramatically undersells both the concert experience and Timberlake's talents.


Every now and then, it is hammered home to me the age difference between my amazing wife and I. She is more than a decade younger than me and sometimes those years show in our musical preferences. So, when she put on the Netflix concert documentary Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids, I quickly realized just how few songs from Justin Timberlake as a solo artist I actually know. I also realized that I have a very different concert-going experience than most people her age. I am not, as it turns out, into the whole big amphitheater concert thing. The musical artists who I have seen in concert - with the exception of Matchbox Twenty - have all been smaller venues where everyone can see and hear the performer.

That is not the experience documented in Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids.

Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids is a ninety minute concert documentary that chronicles the final performance by Justin Timberlake and The Tennessee Kids at the Las Vegas MGM Grand as part of the 20/20 Experience World Tour. Fleshed out with material of the concert preparation, Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids is a pretty straightforward concert performance. While the 20/20 Experience World Tour might have been one of the most profitable musical tours in history, viewing the film Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids objectively, it is hard to see why.

The concert performance chronicled in Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids is a mix of Justin Timberlake songs with covers and mash-ups that include Michael Jackson's "Human Nature" and Bel Biv DeVoe "Poison." Of Timberlake's original songs, I recognized three and they were good, as were the rest of the songs. Justin Timberlake and his ensemble have a pretty wonderful performance ability when they are singing and dancing, as one might expect.

Director Jonathan Demme and Justin Timberlake do an awesome job in Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids of highlighting the whole ensemble. All of the instrumental performers and dancers are interviewed for Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids and they all seem very excited about the experience of working with Justin Timberlake. It is very classy that Justin Timberlake and Demme do not simply focus on the a-list celebrity who is the film's prime focus.

But Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids is far from perfect. First and foremost, while the footage from the concert is undoubtedly better than any seat one would have had at the actual concert - a thought nailed home by several shots that showed just how massive the theater was - it is edited in a very weird way. Many times when Justin Timberlake is performing, the shot changes to a completely random shot of someone else in the ensemble. For some of Justin Timberlake's most impressive dance moves, the camera is placed so far back that it barely captures his moves.

Beyond that, Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids illustrates one of the serious issues with major concert performances; the performer barely performs. Throughout the concert captured in Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids Justin Timberlake calls out for audience participation and he stops singing and lets his backing vocalists carry the songs. There is something very frustrating about watching Justin Timberlake smile in the build-up to one of his songs, hear him sing three words and then watch him just give up and let others carry the song. Sure, he pops back in for an occasional word or phrase, but there are astonishingly few songs as the documentary goes into its second half that Justin Timberlake performs with his full voice and ability.

Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids also has a very weird arrangement. Near the middle of the performance, Justin Timberlake and his ensemble perform a mash-up that includes "Human Nature." It's a great closer. But the concert goes on. After this decent downbeat, Justin Timberlake and the other performers ramp the whole performance back up and it makes for a very awkward flow.

Ultimately, Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids might accurately capture the final performance of Justin Timberlake and The Tennessee Kids on the 20/20 Experience World Tour, but it does not highlight well the energy of the concert experience, the talents of Justin Timberlake or make for an overall entertaining experience. Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids barely showcases the talents of The Tennessee Kids, Justin Timberlake's back-up dancers and the audience at the show.

For other Netflix originals, please check out my reviews of:
Love - Season 2
Santa Clarita Diet - Season 1
A Series Of Unfortunate Events - Season 1
One Day At A Time - Season 1
Travelers - Season 1
"Happy Fuckin' New Year" - Sense8
The OA - Season 1
Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life
Girlfriend's Day
Take The 10
Clinical
Barry
Spectral
True Memoirs Of An International Assassin
I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House
Mascots
ARQ
XOXO
Tallulah
Special Correspondents
The Fundamentals Of Caring
The Ridiculous 6
Luke Cage - Season 1
Stranger Things - Season 1
Grace And Frankie - Season 2
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt - Season 2
Arrested Development - Season 4
The Clone Wars - Season 6
Orange Is The New Black - Season 1
House Of Cards - Season 4

3.5/10

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

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Anne Hathaway Is One Of The Few Bright Lights In Rachel Getting Married.

The Good: Anne Hathaway's performance, Generally the acting.
The Bad: Pacing, Camera movements, Unlikable characters, DVD subtitle issues.
The Basics: Slow, belabored and obvious, Rachel Getting Married is a rare failure featuring Anne Hathaway; indeed, it is only the acting that even marginally saves this.


To understand just how disappointed I was with Rachel Getting Married, one needs to understand just how much I was looking forward to seeing the film. Last year, I saw a lot of movies and Rachel Getting Married was one I did not get to see in the theaters. In fact, the one time I was in a place to see it, the person I wanted to see it with told me she was going with someone else later in the week. Thus deprived, I had to wait until it arrived on DVD. So, I was pleasantly surprised last night to see that my library had managed to get the film in. So, despite having just watched Crash (reviewed here!) as part of the Best Picture program I was hosting at the library, I took Rachel Getting Married out and rushed home to watch it.

Perhaps it is sitting and watching two depressing movies in a night or perhaps it was the early camera stylings in Rachel Getting Married that made me think that the cameraman from NYPD Blue filmed this while falling down the stairs, but Rachel Getting Married might well be the biggest disappointment of 2008. Other movies were worse, to be sure, but there was none from last year that I went into expecting greatness and I ended up wondering how the film had managed to get such good press. To wit, at one point in the movie, I checked to see how much time was left and I was supremely disappointed to discover that only an hour had elapsed and I still had fifty minutes left to endure.

Rachel Getting Married is not actually about Rachel, it is about her sister, Kym, who is checked out of rehab for the weekend in order to attend Rachel's rehearsal dinner and wedding. The first major problem is that where the film sets up all the necessary elements in the first few minutes with implications any adult audience will pick up, the film later makes entirely explicit, beating into the viewer's heads all of the addiction/recovery issues in a way that is not informative and nowhere near entertaining.

Kym is signed out of her in-patient rehabilitation facility by her father, Paul, and stepmother, Carol. Almost immediately, she begins chain-smoking to cope with the sheer number of people staying at her father's Connecticut house. Overwhelmed by the people and the situation, Kym embraces the court-mandated support group meetings, which - because of the nature of her addiction and the crime associated with it - she is forced to cycle to. After the meeting, she discovers that the Best Man in the wedding, Kieran, was one of the people who spoke at the meeting and she finds a kindred spirit in him.

Through Kieran, Kym discovers she is not the Maid Of Honor for her sister that she thought she was and she begins to press the issue with Rachel. As the usual wedding issues come up, Kym's addiction issues complicate things to force the family members into familiar roles which they adapt or break as the film goes on.

Rachel Getting Married, like 28 Days (reviewed here!) is essentially a glorified after-school special with a more impressive cast than its television counterparts. Indeed, if I were still in a middle school health class, I could no doubt name the roles each member of the family is playing, though I know Paul is most often the enabler here. The purpose of my comment here is quite simple; it does not take long before the film becomes less about characters interacting in real ways than it is about character types from the archetypal addict/recovery story. Mixing the addiction and wedding issues - weddings often known to not bring out the best in the people involved! - could be intriguing, but everything in this film falls entirely along predicted lines.

As a result, in the first moments of the movie, there is Unspecified Prior Event which is alluded to, which upsets Kym, even before she is picked up. Then, at the rehearsal dinner, someone refers to a Missing Character, and Kym and virtually everyone else looks upset. Is it a surprise, then, when Kym has Obvious Breakdown/Revelation at her group therapy session? No, not really. And while this could be played out in an interesting or wonderful way, instead, it makes it into the film in the most droll and perfectly-timed execution possible. Rachel Getting Married is so by-the-book, in fact, that one suspects director Jonathan Demme had to shake the camera just to get the film made under the guise of "Yes, I can make this old story seem new." Unfortunately, the camera movements, which are intended to portray how unsettled Kym is returning home are so chaotic as to be nauseating and distracting, in addition to being an Obvious Artistic Technique.

Here's the thing, I love art house films, but what I most frequently appreciate about them is how they get performances or concepts across that mainstream movies do not usually do. Demme gets Hathaway to take her shirt off. Big whoop. Where is the substance? Where is something - anything - audacious? Alas, it is not in Rachel Getting Married. Instead, this movie, which will probably be a favorite for high school Health teachers henceforth for its formulaic portrayal of a dysfunctional family wrestling with addiction issues, is boring.

Rachel is appropriately self-centered given that it is her wedding and the circumstances are complicated by Rachel having to deal with Kym, a mother, stepmother and in-laws. But while some of her issues are understandable, supporting characters act too frequently in monolithic ways that could only serve this specific story. So, while realism is a great aspect of the performances in much of the film, it is not present in all of the characters. To wit, late in the film an artifact from the Missing Character is uncovered, which unsettles Paul in an overlong dishwasher loading sequence. It is at this moment that Paul, distraught, abandons Kym. The thing is, when Paul leaves the room, all of the characters - few who are anywhere near as emotionally invested in the object or its appearance - walk out as well. It feels like Art House Chic and more stylistic than substantial. For a film trying to be gritty and real, this is a fatal flaw.

That said, what is not overrated about Rachel Getting Married is the acting. The acting is all that sucks this out of the most dismal layers of ratings. Anne Hathaway is wonderful as Kym because from the first moment she appears on screen puffing heavily on a cigarette, the viewer is set up to not like her. As a fan of Hathaway's, getting me to not like her character is a challenge, but here she makes it seem effortless. Hathaway slouches through much of the film without her trademark (certainly off-camera) dignity and in the film's quiet moments, she is soulful and vulnerable in a way that makes viewers believe she deserved every award nomination she received for her performance. She is truly exceptional as Kym.

Despite the character predictabilities, Bill Irwin is wonderful as Paul, playing the character with a realism and genuine sense of conflict as he wrestles with protecting and aiding his daughters. Irwin has a likable affect to him and he plays the character almost constantly as a man wearing a mask and he sells us on Paul's fragile attempts at appearing invulnerable. Similarly, Mather Zickel is decent as Kieran, playing him with both the sense that he could have been an addict and that he is in a very different place than Kym.

On DVD, Rachel Getting Married comes with minimal extras, which include several trailers for other movies. There is a commentary track and I was distressed to discover that the two subtitle options were garbled as a result. Activating the subtitles split the subtitles between lines from the commentary track and the actual film. Neither subtitle option was "pure," both had fragments of either of the audio tracks, so those who need to engage the subtitles are likely to have problems with the film. That said, the commentary track lays out all of the symbols in the usual self-congratulatory way independent film do on DVD.

I spent months excited about Rachel Getting Married and Anne Hathaway, great as she is, cannot cover for a script that is predictable and obvious. But it is the look of the film, washed out yellow and characterized by spinning camera movements that add up to nothing that ultimately plunge this average film below the bar.

For works featuring Anne Hathaway, please check out my reviews of:
Love And Other Drugs
Family Guy Presents: It's A Trap!
Alice In Wonderland
Valentine's Day
Passengers
The Princess Diaries

5/10

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

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Timeless And Tense, The Silence Of The Lambs Is A Great Thriller.

The Good: Acting, Tension, Pacing, DVD bonus features, Plot development
The Bad: One too many reversals, Moments where plot/character does not make real sense.
The Basics: Frightening and creepy, The Silence Of The Lambs is a consistently intense film which puts an FBI trainee in a match of wits with a serial killer!


Believe it or not, but the most I've known Jodie Foster as (until I saw The Silence Of The Lambs) was a voice talent. In all of my moviegoing experiences, I've actually never seen a movie that had Jodie Foster in it. Before this film, it was voice-over works in The X-Files and The Simpsons as well as the general pop culture knowledge of Jodie Foster which was the extent of my experience with her and her work. All that changed when my wife enthusiastically sat me down for a viewing of The Silence Of The Lambs. As a fan of The X-Files (reviewed here!) I now have to wonder if Gillian Anderson was ever considered for the role of Clarice Starling as they seem to occupy similar cinematic niches.

As for The Silence Of The Lambs, I can see why it is so very popular as it has a consistent level of tension throughout and an amazing performance by Sir Anthony Hopkins, but it is not the flawless film some sold it to me as, though it did manage to surprise me in points. As always for movies based upon books, this is a review of the 1991 film The Silence Of The Lambs and not the novel by Thomas Harris by the same name. I have not read the book, so this was actually a very pure viewing of the film.

Clarice Starling is a trainee at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia when she is called to the office of the Behavioral Sciences unit and its director, Jack Crawford. As a serial killer nicknamed Buffalo Bill continues to kidnap and skin his victims, Crawford sends Clarice into a maximum security mental institution to interview the deranged serial killer Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a cannibalistic psychotherapist who has been in custody for eight years. Polite and charming, the utterly creepy Lecter begins to play a game with Clarice where they exchange information and Lecter actually begins to aid Clarice in the hunt for Buffalo Bill.

But when a Senator's daughter is captured by Buffalo Bill, heat is put on Crawford, who has Clarice deliver an offer to Lecter that offers the psychopath the chance at relocation. When Crawford and Clarice's betrayal is revealed, Lecter leaps on an opportunity from the Senator and the corrupt, egotistical operator of the facility, Dr. Chilton, to get turned over to the police. As the FBI moves in on Buffalo Bill, Lecter masterminds his own escape.

The Silence Of The Lambs is a thriller which is surprisingly low in gore, especially by today's standards. Still, it is remarkably tense and frightening, and the rumors about the greatness of Anthony Hopkins' performance are true. In fact, the only real problems with The Silence Of The Lambs are in the setup and how rewatchable the film is. While The Silence Of The Lambs might be wonderful to watch for the appreciation of the nuances (how many truly great movies include a scene where a man throws semen on a woman?!) the reversals must quickly get old (by the final one in the film, I was tired of them the first time) and because so much of the tension is based on surprise, when one knows what is coming next, it is hard to imagine this is terribly entertaining.

That said, the only real problem with The Silence Of The Lambs is in the suspension of disbelief needed to make the basic premise work. For sure, it is easy to believe that the FBI would employ serial killers to help with their profiling, that makes perfect sense. What doesn't work nearly as well is Crawford's use of a trainee for such an important assignment as contacting Hannibal Lecter or the continued use of her after she begins breaking the rules as to what type of contact she may have with Lecter. The movie is especially heavy-handed about the lack of respect women get in law enforcement, but then Crawford becomes more lax with Clarice about the rules, which doesn't "read" right either.

Largely what The Silence Of The Lambs is is a psychological chess match and a chase. The chess match occurs in creepy scenes where Clarice and Hannibal Lecter square off and trade information on killers and Clarice's past. Lecter constantly pushes for more information and Clarice uses key moments to redirect the psychopath to try to get closer to what she truly wants from him. The scenes play out like careful chess moves and they do enhance the overall creepy feel of the movie.

Moreover, director Jonathan Demme cleverly uses the film medium to keep the film interesting. For example, when leaving Hannibal Lecter, Clarice sees a car the same color as the sky in a memory that unsettles her and the blending of the traumas makes Clarice much more interesting. Similarly, when a new fact is revealed in the FBI investigation, its context is shown with Buffalo Bill. This is refreshing in that the movie does not suddenly overload the viewer with all of the story's revelations at once. Instead, the film plays out with a sense that it is building and while there is a lot of tension in it, The Silence Of The Lambs is not built on quick, jumpy reversals.

Instead, this is a surprisingly bleak character study of a deranged scientist - Clarice is always quite careful to call Hannibal Lecter "doctor" - and a woman running from her past through trying to stop evil in the world. Clarice is naive, but clever, and she is well-played by Jodie Foster. Foster is deliberate and intense with her eyes boring into the viewer in virtually every one of her scenes. She plays off both Anthony Heald (Chilton) and Scott (Crawford) flawlessly. Despite how obvious and sanctimonious the line is, Foster makes Clarice calling Crawford out on the example he sets in front of other law enforcement work.

But this is Anthony Hopkins' tour de force. Hopkins - far more known for quiet, dignified roles like his part in The Remains Of The Day - swaps his British accent for a Southern dialect and he is flawless. Hopkins is uniformly dark and he plays Lecter as a determined man with a coldness that is calculating and brutal. There is not a single scene that Hopkins is in where he does not draw the eye or the attention of the viewer.

On DVD, The Silence Of The Lambs comes in a two-disc Special Edition loaded with bonus features. The film has a commentary track which is informative as well as a second disc loaded with featurettes. The featurettes mostly explore the making of the film, both the psychology, the translation from the novel and the acting. They are well done and intriguing. There is also a gag reel, a series of creepy deleted scenes, and the original featurette for television of the movie. As well as photo galleries, trailers and a phone message from Anthony Hopkins, the second disc gives fans of The Silence Of The Lambs all they could hope for.

For fans of psychologically-driven horror movies, The Silence Of The Lambs has all that one could hope for. It is dark, well-acted and has a constant ramping up of the tension that makes it harrowing to watch. But make no mistake; this is both terrifying for adults and the beginning of a cinematic franchise. But what a start it is!

[As a winner of the Best Picture Oscar, this film is part of W.L.'s Best Picture Project, please check it out by clicking here!]

For other horror movies, please check out my reviews of:
The Blair Witch Project
Let The Right One In
The Alien Quadrilogy

8.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my index page. That may be accessed by clicking here and it contains the most thorough listing of my reviews!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Case For Philadelphia

The Good: Excellent acting, Good characters, Good plot, Good direction, Excellent themes.
The Bad: Predictable, Some pacing issues
The Basics: An all-around excellent cast with good direction and a progressive message float Philadelphia through its slow points and obvious nature.


After years of watching and enjoying The Practice, I decided it was time to sit down and watch Philadelphia, which, despite the hype surrounding it still, is just a courtroom drama film. And as far as courtroom dramas go, it's a very good one.

Philadelphia centers around Andrew Beckett, who is played by Tom Hanks, who is terminated from his job at a high priced law firm. Beckett suspects it is the result of him having AIDS and one of the senior partners recognizing that, a suspicion leapt to when an exceptionally important case file disappears only to reappear seconds before the trial is to begin. Beckett hires Joe Miller to represent him in a wrongful termination suit against the firm. What follows is a courtroom drama without any twists or turns or real surprises.

Part of that is the problem. While the film expertly sways from the courtroom action to the character struggles and epiphanies both plod along predictably. That's not to say they aren't interesting, but it is to say they are unsurprising. The moment Miller's prejudices are revealed, it becomes clear it's one of "those films," that is a film with a message. It's a laudable message, but it's still laid on very thick and it's predictable where the film is going.

Surprisingly, considering Hanks gets so much credit for the film (which he deserves), the story is focused on Joe Miller, who is played by Denzel Washington. Washington gives an excellent performance and deserved an award for his portrayal. While his character arc was predictable, Washington played Miller well, with subtlety and distinction. It was more than well written, the direction captured perfectly the expressions in Washington's face and eyes that are hallmarks of great acting.

Outside the obvious social importance of a film decrying the prejudices that exist between the white heterosexual male populace (or financial) majority and pretty much every other group on earth, Philadelphia does it well, mostly because it does it consistently and it has a very real feel to it. The movie exposes the questions that lie at the heart of the prejudice and articulates them openly. For that it ought to be commended.

The only drawback on the entertainment front is, surprisingly, in the courtroom. As a fan of The Practice it's very difficult to watch the inside of the courtroom being so stark, tensionless, and downright slow. The pacing of the epiphanies in Miller's life come with delightful precision and timing, but that same gentle ebb works less well for the dramatics of a courtroom.

Certainly a worthwhile film with an ending that's both satisfying and pyrrhic.

For other courtroom films, please check out my reviews of:
The Social Network
The Life Of Emile Zola
Flash Of Genius

8.5/10

For other film reviews, please visit my index page for a complete listing of all the movies I have reviewed!

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



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