Jason Schwartzman, fresh off a relentlessly acerbic performance as a misanthrope writer in Listen Up Philip goes intense again in The Overnight. Similarly, it’s not his fault this film about would-be swingers comes up limp. Schwartzman goes into overdrive with a gushing likability this time that is practically the flip side of his rotten-egg personality in Listen Up Philip. Schwartzman the actor would have been wise to invest as much time and energy in choosing a screenplay as his character, Kurt, does in trying to get a (much) straighter couple to like him enough to let their hair down a little.
Alex (Adam Scott) and Emily (Taylor Schilling) meet Kurt in a park while their little kids instantly bond. They’re new to L.A. and worried they might not make new friends. Wearing a hat that could be mistaken for a Hasidic adornment, Kurt is offbeat, charming and persistent. He invites the couple over for a pizza night. We’re led to believe from the trailer and the build-up that erotic shenanigans will soon ensue. You be the judge. Not only is the build-up far greater than any payoff but the whole evening is pretty much low-level cutesy masquerading as something deeper. While Kurt continues to enthrall with a semi-amusing charismatic pull, the rest of the foursome are duller than Jeb Bush. Kurt’s wife, Charlotte (Judith Godreche) is French and–whoa, he has videos showing her doing online ads for a breast pump. When she sneaks out to a massage parlor with an aghast Emily in tow while the men think they’re out to a liquor store, we’re supposed to be shocked that Frenchie has a brazen fetish.
Somewhere in this film it also becomes clear that Kurt is an artist who paints mostly assholes–literally. The there are bongs and plenty of wine and a pool where Alex is afraid to get naked because he’s, er, undersized. Kurt, wearing a prosthetic dong about a football-field long, reassures Alex size means nothing. Neither does this film, which strives for insight on social awkwardness but merely comes up awkward.
In a recurring animated sequence in Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, a moose suddenly appears and instantly tramples a small unidentified mammal. Symbolic of the school knockout’s treatment of the film’s lead character Greg (Thomas Mann), the sequence sets the tone for this quirky, steadfastly unsentimental film about important stuff. It also reveals Greg’s total lack of self-worth–a condition he seems to get uncannily more comfortable with as time goes on.
A born sociophobe, Greg’s trick of high school survival is to have only casual encounters with every clique but nothing deeper with any particular clique. This includes avoiding the all-important choosing of a cafeteria table for lunch. Instead he sits in the office of his history teacher (the usually daunting Jon Bernthal), along with Earl (R.J. Cycler), who he calls his “co-worker” rather than his friend who he’s known since they were five. Greg and Earl actually make films together–short, deliberately bad parodies of classics. (e.g., “A Sockwork Orange,” “Eyes Wide Butt”).
Then one day, Greg’s equilibrium is thrown off when his mom suggests–no, insists–he visit Rachel (Olivia Cooke), a newly diagnosed leukemia victim who Greg hardly knows. Thus begins a hard-won friendship that contains virtually no false notes nor any of the usual tacked-on sappy ones that usually have us heading for the exits in movies of these sorts. Based on a novel by Jesse Andrews, who also wrote the screenplay, this wholehearted film is directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rajon, and he’s certainly a talent to keep an eye on. Extremely versatile with varied filming techniques, long takes, and Richard Lester-esque madcap edits, in the end he achieves a dexterous balance of unconventional style, ironic off-the-wall funny charm, and bona fide delicate storytelling. No less a luminary than Brian Eno showed up to lend a hand and over a dozen compositions that provide eerie resonance and au aura of import.
It’s hard to choose between the film’s three young adult leads on who is the better actor, so I’ll call it a tie. They’re the year’s best ensemble cast so far. It must be mentioned that Cooke’s Rachel has an uncanny ability to refuse to elicit pity that ought to be checked out in acting schools. A supporting turn from Nick Offerman as Greg’s eccentric toga-wearing sociologist, pigs foot-eating dad doesn’t hurt either. What Brian Eno is to soundtrack music Offerman is to tearing a hole in your funny bone. He’s able to overcome the somewhat obvious notion that his character is probably superfluous to the film. Yet Offerman’s masterful comedic timing lends a heft to the atmosphere.
Some have complained that it’s a stretch that kids today would actually go ahead and make film parodies of classic art movies. It’s a conceit I’m willing to indulge. After all who’s to say a bright high schooler wouldn’t find a young Werner Herzog both highly compelling and a perfect target for satire? (Gomez-Rajon quotes Herzog extensively and hilariously). Our boys’ penchant for filmmaking also sets up a pivotal climactic plot development that is in perfect harmony with this terrific film’s overall spirit of capturing its kids’ cadences and interactions perfectly–their flaws included, of course.
Director Colin Trevorrow, fresh off the delightful, small-budget ($750,000) Safety Not Guaranteed, steps up to the $150,000 million Jurassic World. To quote some street jargon, Trevorrow’s not playing. The first flat-out summer blockbuster, Trevorrow’s film knows when to go hard and when to tread lightly. In the spirit of executive producer Steven Spielberg, Trevorrow’s screenplay (with co-screenwriter Derek Connolly and two others) takes its time setting up relationships and events. When the action finally comes, it’s no holds barred. For good measure, the star of the best popcorn movie of last year (Guardians of the Galaxy), Chris Pratt, provides tried and true charisma and bad-ass cred–just in case all the dinosaur talk and theme park politics gets a little stale. I mean this guy actually has killer dinos (velociraptors) eating out of his hands–dolphin style–for chrissake. By film’s end, he’ll be leading his raptors on a life-or-death motorcycle chase.
Since it would be unimaginable for a film in this franchise to be without a couple of kids running around getting in trouble, eleven-year-old Gray (Ty Simpkins) and 16-year-old Zach (Nick Robinson) provide just that. They serve as stand-ins for the 20,000 park attendees to whom the film pays merely intermittent attention. Shuttled off to Jurassic World under the auspices of spending some time with their aunt, Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), who’s a numbers crunching administrator at the park, the lads get shunned by the workaholic, clueless-about-kids aunt. When they find themselves out on their own roaming among Stegosauruses in a plexiglass gyroscope just when the shit starts hitting the fan, well that’s when–harrumph–Owen (Pratt) comes along to play Mr. Rescue.
Sporting the same humorous interludes of Safety Not Guaranteed, Jurrasic World plays up the strait-laced Claire’s aloof response to Owen, who once dated her. Their interplay, while bordering on sitcom-ish, primarily works–mainly due to Owen’s cajones. She may grapple with having to finally get her hair missed up, but Owen makes it fun, and she doesn’t exactly come up short in turning herself around.
To think there’s a controversy resulting from director Joss Whedon’s tweet that Trevorrow is actually practicing a little sexism here. His complaint sounds like no more than sour grapes. Whedon’s Avengers: Age of Ultron isn’t half the entertainment that Jurrasic World is. If the film’s leading female character may seem a little stereotyped, there’s certainly equal time on the male side. Vic Hoskins (Vincent D’Onofrio) seems to be practically foaming at the mouth at the prospect of converting Owen’s raptors into military tools for dominance. Hoskins seems like a character who roamed into the wrong movie but D’Onofrio possesses such good acting chops he’s allowed to stick around for awhile before he inevitably goes kicking and screaming.
Yet Hoskins is only the runner-up craziest character in the film. B. D. Wong plays Dr. Henry Wu, the mastermind geneticist behind the creation of a hybrid mutation dubbed Indominus Rex, whose aggressiveness far outdoes all the nastiness of existing dinosaurs. (Seems attractions like kids riding baby Triceratop dinos in the park’s version of a petting zoo can only take you so far in building up the ecotourist business). When billionaire owner of the theme park Masrani (Irrfan Khan) questions Wu on his gene-splicing models that seem to have gotten out of hand, Masrani is ludicrously shocked upon discovering the scale of it, as if it were a mere detail along the lines of choosing how much to charge for a soda (Jurassic charges $7.00, by the way, which is only slightly higher than the current going rate at American ballparks). When Masrani accuses Wu of creating a monster, Wu condescendingly mutters back that to a mouse a cat seems like a monster. Humans, accustomed to being the cat, become uneasy when they have to take on the role of the mouse. No kidding, Wu. Maybe you’ve begun to get Jurassic fatigue after appearing in all four of these films.
Despite such lapses into schlock, Jurassic World keeps its foot on the gas. Although I could have done without one or two of the many dinosaur battles, it keeps a brisk pace and delivers the right amount of spark. Horror movie tropes and film references, including snarky nods to Spielberg films, provide optional icing on the cake. This isn’t Shakespeare but it sure isn’t Joss Whedon either.
Did you see that Mosasaurus suck down that shark in front of a full audience? ….4 stars (out of 5)
The low point of last year’s lousy Melissa McCarthy vehicle, Tammy, was when the film completely changed from shrill, unfunny comedy to banal bathos in one ludicrous scene. McCarthy mooing with co-star Mark Duplass looking down at Niagara Falls was enough to make you ill. It’s even worse than the scene where McCarthy holds up a fast food joint to raise bail-money for her her doty, alcoholic aunt, Susan Sarandon. Yet Tammy actually may not be as bad as McCarthy’s turgid turn in the abominable Identity Thief. What happened to the promising comedic actress who was the best thing about the refreshing Bridesmaids? Why, unlike her charismatic role opposite Sandra Bullock in The Heat, was she suddenly unable to overcome nondescript screenplays?
Our worries are over. Reuniting with director Paul Feig (not surprisingly at the helm of Bridesmaids and The Heat), McCarthy has it going again. Her vulnerable yet assertive deskbound analyst turned in-the-field spy, Susan Cooper, hits all the right notes. It’s one of the funniest films you’ll see this year. Feig not only brings out the best in McCarthy, he surrounds her with three absolute pros: Rose Byrne, Jason Statham and Allsion Janney. The trio play their perfectly exaggerated characters to the hilt.
Byrne is Raina Boyanov, a deadpan spoof of a villain Bond-girl who happens to be Bulgarian. The perfect foil to McCarthy, her bitterness is as infectious as her piled-high hairdos and ridiculously tight dresses are absurd. Statham’s sleuth, Rick Ford, likewise spends the whole film insulting Cooper. He does so in rat-a-tat-tat hyper-monolugues consisting of little else besides profane-laden ticking off of his seemingly impossible physical exploits as a spy. Janney portrays Elaine Crocker, a no-bullshit CIA boss who delights in keeping Cooper in her place.
Adding to the spoils of three such fine supporting performances are two more. British TV comic Miranda Hart plays Cooper’s brutally honest sidekick, Nancy. Peter Serafinowicz offers an Italian spy a and driver, Aldo, who has a flair for most of the stereotypes of the aggressive, libido-driven Italian while he is clearly more interested in hitting on his ally in espionage, Cooper, than in any traditional spy-oriented tasks.
McCarthy’s Cooper is somehow good-natured yet at the same time unbridled and defiant. She is without regard for any of the hyper pretensions of Ford, the sardonic stuffiness of Boyanov, or the silliness of Aldo. Almost parenthetically, Jude Law is also in the film as Bradley Fine, a suave yet slight operative who would be nothing without Cooper coaching warnings and strategies in his earpiece while he dismantles a coterie of thugs in the film’s opening sequence. Just as Fine is indebted to his unheralded assistant, a rejuvenated Melissa McCarthy should thank her lucky stars she’s again in good hands with Feig. She might do well never to work with anyone else again.
Melissa McCarthy Rises Like A Phoenix From The Ashes Thanks To Paul Feig And A Great Cast… 4 stars (out of 5)
No doubt some crybabies will turn apoplectic at the stark contrast of Paul Dano and John Cusack splitting the challenging chore of portraying popular music genius Brian Wilson in the new biopic Love & Mercy. They’ll whine neither one (especially Cusack) looks like Brian and, furthermore, the two actors don’t even look like each other. None of that matters a lick. If it’s the essence of the Brian Wilson mystique that you are after, this film provides much insight and resonance. Although not perfect by any means, the film overcomes the inherent limitations that a Brian Wilson biopic by definition presents.
When it comes to white boy pop icons in the rock era Wilson is possibly surpassed by only Bob Dylan and John Lennon. The finest aspect of this Bill Pohlad-directed film is the attention given to the creative process. Brian’s panic attack on an airplane serves as a catalyst to spark him to stop touring at the height of the group’s success in order to create a more intricately textured album. He’s a mere 23 years old at the time. It’s loads of fun to witness just how cutting edge was the recording studio process and just how much respect Wilson received from the classically trained studio musicians he gathered to meticulously record what would become Pet Sounds (1966).
It’s a shame he got mostly scorn from his bandmates, which included two of his brothers, once they returned from the tour. Brian’s cousin, Mike Love (Jack Abel), leads the charge, telling Wilson, “Even the happy songs are sad.” Then there’s Brian’s dad, Murry (Bill Camp), who we witness offhandedly dismissing Brian’s new direction as far too off-formula and wimpy. Ironically, Murry’s wrath is directed at an early sketch of a song that would soon be “God Only Knows” — a track no less than Paul McCartney would come to call the greatest pop song ever written.
The bulk of Love & Mercy deals with Brian’s tenuous mental state and the efforts of Melinda Ledbetter (Elizabeth Banks) to help Brian come to grips with it. Melinda, a car salesperson Brian meets while shopping for a new Cadillac, would come to be Brian’s second (and current) wife, but not before she battles an additional thorn in Brian’s side. As if his dad (who beat his sons unapologetically) weren’t enough to deal with, the Cusack-era Brian must contend with a “guardian,” Dr. Eugene Landy, (Paul Giamatti), a dubious psychologist who monitors Brian’s every action via bodyguards. His misdiagnosis of Brian’s mental state as paranoid schizophrenia is just the beginning of his abusive treatment of him. Landy keeps Wilson doped up and a virtual prisoner. The always sharp Giamatti puts a plausible sheen on what could have been an overwrought depiction of a monster. Cusack, spacey and genuine, seems like a mere kid emotionally in many of his scenes with Belinda and Landy. Yet underneath his kowtowing to Landy lurks a rebellious nature just waiting for the right moment.
As performances go, though, the film belongs to Dano. His sheer innocence, coupled with a certainly tangible neurosis, permeates the early going. I can’t think of a finer actor to capture the rawness of the joys and setbacks of this fertile yet ultimately futile period. Screenwriter Oren Moverman (the bizarre but intriguing Bob Dylan biopic I’m Not There) decides to shift back and forth between the 20 years separating the two Brians rather than go chronologically — a wise move. Musical selections, while kept to a relative minimum, are well chosen. The segues from a live Dano hammering out a demo of a tune to the full-blown original recording couldn’t be better. The group’s hits are represented but so is as essential a Beach Boys non-hit as Caroline No.
Brian Wilson carried The Beach Boys on his back. His efforts to “keep up with” The Beatles as they were going through their revolutionary change to the Revolver/Sgt. Pepper era were basically done not only with very little help from his bandmates, but against the grain of their wishes. The film implies Brian’s pending descent into LSD-fueled despair was in large part the result of the commercial disappointment of Pet Sounds and Brian’s subsequent inability to finish its successor, Smile.
In the interim years between the Dano-era and Cusack-era Wilson, Brian would not leave his house and more or less not get out of bed for a few years. Although these years are referenced rather than depicted, in one eye-opening scene, he revealingly sits barefoot at his piano which lies on a bed of beach sand. That this genius not only recovered, but is recording and touring to this day at the age of 72 is no small feat. That he created such an immortal body of work amidst personal demons that would have killed most of us is even more stunning.
Gritty Portrait of a (Disturbed) Genius 4 (out of 5) stars
Viewed without the accompanying perspective of John Schlesinger’s 1967 version of Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Vinterberg’s new version of the Thomas Hardy novel might seem sufficient in capturing the 19th century period of rural western England. Michael Sheen may also seem a fine enough brooding Mr. Boldwell, as well as Carey Mulligan a well enough complex heroine, Bathsheba Everdene, wearily fighting the customs of the age she lives in.
Taking into account the earlier adaptation, even given as fine a performance as Mulligan delivers, Julie Christie offers a more vibrant character and Peter Finch’s performance as Boldwell, providing much greater depth and dignity, blows away Sheen’s. Schlesinger proves he’s a master filmmaker who gets all his detail perfectly, offering a much more majestic, insightful view of not only the ways of the village people but also the stings fate provides throughout the film’s deliciously extreme plot.
That said, Vinternger has crafted a rather fine film, and with the presence of Matthias Shoenaerts as Oak, has managed to give a much richer account of the relationship between Bathsheba and Oak than that provided by Schlesinger. (His character is admittedly underwritten so it’s not totally his own fault, but how often can the claim be made that Alan Bates was out-acted?) Whereas Vinterberg prefers to use shorthand in revealing the attraction Bathsheba feels for Troy (Tom Sturridge) and to cut key scenes of Troy late in the film, he makes up for it in not falling prey to Schlesinger’s own stillborn treatment of the Bathsheba-Gabriel dynamic. Sturridge also somewhat surpasses Terence Stamp in acting out the cad-like qualities of Troy although it’s pretty close to a wash.
“It is difficult for a woman to define her feelings in language which is chiefly made by men to express theirs.” Thus, with Bathseha’s words, deftly delivered by Mulligan, we come to view Bathseba as an incipient feminist. She is one whose societal challenges–here symbolized by the three men competing for her hand–may prove much too great. If the enormous pressures surrounding her and, also, her own vulnerabilities, don’t quite allow her to win her war it is comforting to witness her win individual battles.
So if you view the original film version as well as see the new one, you’ll come up with not only a richer experience but might be even more inclined to read this classic novel, a work of art whose supremacy rises above the two film versions–both in ways stellar yet each limited.
Far From 48 Years Apart…..
Far From The Madding Crowd (2015)….3.5 (out of 5) stars
Far. From The Madding Crowd (1967)….4 (out of 5) stars
