Balcony Blues

Returning to the suspense realm he so strikingly presented in Munich (2005), Steven Spielberg tackles the Cold War era in Bridge of Spies with resounding success. Tom Hanks stars as an unwitting spy straight out of Frank Capra. Hanks plays James Donovan, an insurance lawyer with no apparent political leanings (although he had worked as a prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials). When the New York Bar Association undergoes a lottery to pick an attorney to defend apprehended Soviet spy, Rudolf Abel. Hanks draws the short straw. His law firm boss (Alan Alda) preps Donovan with a nod and a wink as he flatly states the defense is meant to be no more than a response on behalf of a half-hearted show trial.

When Donovan takes the job seriously and digs deeply for his client, he quickly becomes a pariah. The backlash includes just about everybody including his immediate family. Given that it is Spielberg we are talking about, the Americana overflows out of Donovan’s home. His wife Mary (the ever-versatile Amy Ryan) is a dead ringer for Harriett Nelson or June Cleaver and, like all good 1950s TV dads, Donovan wears a tie to the dinner table and chuckles a lot. When someone shoots out his front window, scaring the hell out of his three kids, the stakes suddenly rise. They will continue to grow as Donovan (this time he’s asked rather than told) decides whether to head for East Berlin for some officially unofficial negotiating with mysterious Soviet operatives.

Cinematographer Janusz Kaminski evokes imagery that represents the long forsaken era with brilliant mood. Kaminski isn’t the only master craftsman on hand: the Matt Charman screenplay was rewritten by none other than the Coen Brothers as likely evidenced by the quirky witticisms prevalent once Donovan arrives in Germany.

So don’t write this one off as “old fashioned”–a quality that happens to be Bridge of Spies greatest strength. With Hanks putting forth full-blown Hanks-isms and a piercing performance by Peter Lorre-esque Mark Rylance as Abel, there is quite a bit going on in Bridge of Spies that elevates it above most films of its genre. Also, when it comes to it’s old-school nature, don’t kid yourself. A film this compassionate to an enemy spy would never have been given a chance to be made back in the Eisenhower years. As for modern-day relevance, Donovan prides himself on the U. S. Constitution rising above whatever the pragmatic concerns of a particular era–a timeless notion certainly equally vital in today’s war on terror.

Yet Donovan is no softie. Based on a real-life character who went on to negotiate bigtime deals on behalf of the American government (including the freeing of 9700 Americans and Cubans from Cuban jails in 1962), Donovan as portrayed by Hanks may seem offhand and in over his head. But he knows exactly what he’s doing in striving for the best deal. I would love to know if the Coen Brothers brought into the screenplay a very sharp reference connecting a Donovan tactic used in negotiating with the foreign agents with an earlier scene where he hustles a fellow insurance lawyer.

The Spy Who Came In From The Insurance Firm….4.5 stars (out of 5)

An impossible perfectionist, an utterly vainglorious egomaniac, an intently focused mover and shaker, Steve Jobs also sucks at life outside the workplace. Yet he’s somehow not a total asshole. Leave it up to his biographer and people who knew him to pass judgement on the accuracy of Michael Fassbender’s performance as Steve Jobs. On the entertainment and insight scales, however, Fassbender (Hunger, A Dangerous Method, 12 Years A Slave) positively nails it. Simultaneously revolting and highly compelling, Fassbender’s Jobs effectively makes you hate him for his inscrutable insensitivity, but not before proclaiming, “Hey, wait a minute.”

Not that he isn’t trying hard to be despicable. Jobs would rather deny his paternity of 5-year-old offspring Lisa than take the time to deal with the situation. His treatment of Lisa’s mom (Katherine Waterson–Inherent Vice, Queen of the Earth) sure seems utterly wretched given his multi-millionaire status versus her welfare-level existence. The usually hyper-intelligent Jobs challenges his fathering of Lisa despite the prospect of DNA testing. When it comes in at 94 per cent chance of his being her dad, Jobs still hedges. What’s with this guy?!

Director Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours) and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing, The Social Network) focus on Job’s shortcomings yet actually cut him a break by stopping the film at 2008. Not mentioned are the multiple scandals acutely depicted in the documentary Steve Jobs: The Man In The Machine that occurred after the rollout of the I-phone and the I-pad, two events not covered here. Boyle and Sorkin are content to focus on the swath of time that included a couple of fairly huge business failures for Jobs, and his unwavering ability to rebound even stronger. Throughout, Jobs has little concern for the feelings of original partner Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen) who expresses a stinging resentment over Jobs’ unwillingness to acknowledge Wozniak’s team’s contributions with the Apple2. Since Jobs deems the Apple2 a dinosaur, he doesn’t budge.

Given Sorkin’s rat-a-tat erudite dialogue and Boyle’s fervid but at times exorbitant direction (his use of a magical realism device is decidely excessive and silly), the proceedings here are often downright theatrically dizzying. Yet, despite the presence of Boyle and Sorkin, this feels like Fassbender’s movie more than anyone’s. He creates a believable monster yet one without undue artifice. Whatever the innate excesses of the main character of this film, none can be attributed to attenuation due to overacting. Fassbender is totally in control and now the favorite for the Best Actor Oscar. Very good turns by Jeff Daniels (as Apple CEO John Sculley), and Kate Winslet (as Jobs’s marketing director) contribute nicely.

By the film’s climax, a sudden shift occurs and what can be perceived as a (gasp) sentimental ending rears its unseemly head. Jobs’ interest in Zen Buddhism is barely mentioned in this film. A significant element in Steve Jobs: The Man and The Machine, it was apparent that Jobs was likely far more interested in Zen as a facilitator for greater career focus than as an avenue for compassion.

When Jobs’ moment of empathy finally comes, it’s an odd duck of a desperate gesture. Boyle stylistically milks it to death, rendering it weak compensation for what had been a hard-hitting criticism, now tempered if not fully compromised. Yet just as Jobs’ nastiness is shadowed throughout the film by a mysterious and insistent counter-force, the film’s maudlin conclusion contains a naggingly soothing glass-half-full aspect if one wishes to sidestep its jarring change of tone.

Jobs Falls Further Off His Pedestal; Fassbender Climbs Into The Lead For Best Actor….4 stars (out of 5)

To steal a sports metaphor, when Michael Shannon is in one his his “zones” the result is pure magic. In 99 Homes, Shannon portrays Rick Carver, a calm-as-a-monk, slyly ruthless opportunist. His game? Real estate repossession manipulation and outright scams, and he’s a hall-of-fame level competitor. The plot device here is Dennis Nash (Andrew Garfield), a single father and unemployed building tradesman who lives with his mom (Laura Dern) and his young boy, Connor, gets tossed out of his home by Carter but that is far from the last they will see of each other.

The Nash’s removal is sudden-slap-in-the-face brusque, complete with cops throwing their possessions on their front lawn. They retreat to a motel. Nash looks for odd jobs, and, swallowing his pride (and holding his nose), manages to do a particularly unpleasant job for Carter. What follows is The Odd Couple/Housing Crisis Edition–minus the laughs.

Nash, caught in the desperate predicament of trying to save his home after all is apparently lost, faces a Hobson’s choice of compromise. For all of Nash’s caution, once he gets deeper and deeper into aiding his new predatory boss, Carter plays him like a violin. Their interactions are a sight to behold. Shannon is in his finest form since his uncanny performance in Take Shelter (2011).

Nash hides the whole thing from his mom despite bringing her and Connor a string of gifts that continuously escalates in value (this isn’t one of Dern’s more cerebral characters). By and large, though, director Ramin Bahrani (Chop Shop, Goodbye Solo) keeps the implausibility in check. 99 Homes contains a big heaping of solid drama, loads of compelling anger from stung victims, and dollops of suspense–even if things do errantly veer off into melodrama at its conclusion.

Sumptuous Shannon Showcase….4 stars (out of 5)

An unnerving, exhilarating, you-are-there capturing of the sensations an aerialist experiences is really all that matters in The Walk. Director Robert Zemeckis (Back to the Future, Forest Gump, Cast Away) tells the story of Philippe Petit, who walked a high wire strung between the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center not long before the irrecoverable monuments opened to the public in 1974. Zemeckis trumpets Petit’s daredevilry and moxy amidst an extravagant if impressive feast of special effects probably not for the fainthearted, nor for the acrophobic.

Perfectly designed to showcase IMAX 3-D technology, the film’s visceral immediacy is so enhanced it ought to also work effectively in conventional 2-D formatting. Almost lost in the technical giddiness are a couple of close calls. Zemeckis does his best to shore up any uneasiness concerning the towers’ eventual tragic fate. His solution is a climactic, hope-laden tribute that although it is not without honor, rings a bit glib and hollow. It doesn’t help that The Walk will not win any awards for its screenplay elements but of course complaining about story elements here is like whining about a slow Ferris wheel in an amusement park with a dozen state of the art roller coasters. Zemeckis overcomes any hammy ingredients largely with the help of lead actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

Gordon-Levitt may seem about as much of a Frenchman as Ian McKellan but he’s perfect in portraying the intensely purpose-driven Petit, who must mastermind a task equal in difficulty to the actual walking of of the wire. Posing as an architect and various workmen, Petit, along with an assembled team, including a key aide suffering from an acute fear of heights, investigates the lay of the land in the towers. After using a bow and arrow to project a thin wire from one tower roof to another, followed by a rope and finally the actual wire, Petit sets out on the wire in time for the morning rush hour. Before long NYC cops right out of “Car 54, Where Are You” are bellowing epithets like, “Hey, that’s enough buddy; knock it off.” In defiance, Petit turns around just before reaching his destination and goes back to the other tower.

On second thought, if you are afraid of heights, take a chance on this film anyway. It’s only a movie, but a damn good one from the thrills perspective. If more recondite aspects are needed, follow it up with the 2008 James Marsh documentary, Man on Wire. Yet as good a film as Man on Wire is, you won’t actually feel like you were there.

Innocent Times, A Brazen Feat….. 4 (out of 5) stars

A couple of apparent losers get acquainted during a poker game in some godforsaken Iowa town. One, Gerry (a terrific Ben Mendelsohn), is a fascinating degenerate gambler who probably couldn’t stop if someone told him the world would end tomorrow if he didn’t. The other player, Curtis (an equally good Ryan Reynolds), is like-able although swaggering and outgoing to the point of badgering. He is also hard to figure out. Curtis gambles, too, although more on the people in his life, strangers included, than on actual games.

Pleasantly Plot-light and atmosphere-heavy through most of its 108 minutes, Mississippi Grind turns the tables and indulges in a flurry of dramatic twists in its final quarter. Most of them work but chiefly as exclamation points on an unnerving, intimate character study. As Curtis is quick to point out during the twosome’s road jaunt through St. Louis, Memphis, and New Orleans, it is the journey that counts not the destination.

The Australian Mendelsohn (Netflix’s Bloodline) gives one of the finest performances of the year. It’s hard to reimagine this movie without him. Gerry’s hubris, in poker terms, is raised by his sensitivity. One minute fearless, the next foundering with fear, Gerry may incidentally recall other characters in gambling movies like California Split and The Gambler, but, in essence, he’s a whole new ball of wax. His nervous energy, his fatalistic elan, compress into a single facial expression of a walking time bomb. We think he’s bound to lose it all; we don’t know exactly how and when.

Curtis seems like an even edgier character. As he bears the brunt of Gerry’s predictable actions, it’s difficult to gauge what is under that ultra-calm exterior. It can’t be good, can it? Tonally, in Of Mice and Men terms, he’s practically George to Gerry’s Lenny. He not only takes him under his wing; he steps aside long enough to let Gerry reach the edge of self-destruction before he reels him in.

Once Curtis’s unique Achille’s heel is revealed, he gains a newfound complexity. Gerry, although he may not seem to have veered off the same broken behavior patterns, gains immensely from Curtis’s seemingly casual gifts. As the giver in this intriguing tale, Curtis –his motives and fate–requires the fuller contemplation. Hold onto your hat for a righteous blues soundtrack to wash down this gritty film full of card games, casinos, racetracks, friendly hookers, estranged families, and, underneath it all, a messy, compelling desperation.

When You Ain’t Got Nothing You Got Something To Blues….3.5 stars (out of 5)

There’s not a whole lot of real substance in The Martian, and even less surprise. What it does nicely maintain, though, is a frisky well-above-average entertainment level. Director Ridley Scott has been around so long he practically makes cinematic moves in his sleep, and most of them work. While it may all seem a bit too calculated and safe, much of what lies within this movie provides the small-pleasure quotient far too often missing in more cerebral films.

Not that The Martian doesn’t have grand notions of its own intellect. Its overtly wonky stance is luckily offset by the aw-shucks, snarky smartness of is lead character, Mark Watney (Matt Damon). Watney’s tendency to annoy is itself offset by the hard-as-nails director of NASA, Teddy Sanders (a superb Jeff Daniels). Together they’re enough to beckon a partial forgiveness for The Martian’s multiple cornball Scotticisms.

Due to circumstances beyond their control, Watney’s fellow crewmembers
leave him stranded on Mars. He seems about as worried as if he’d missed the final evening train and merely needs to wait a few hours to catch the first one in the morning. Watney happens to be a botanist who will grow his own food and perform all sorts of science projects to stretch his food supply and also to get himself transported across the sizable distance to where he needs to be if he’s ever rescued. Not sure it makes any sense that he can’t just stay put and still get rescued but growing your own potatoes from scratch can only take a film so far.

Watney’s diet eventually becomes more lean than an anorexic’s but back on earth NASA is pulling scientific strings to come get him. Rule-breaking, chicanery, mutiny and ultimately a wacky underling’s left-field hypothesis all contribute to an attempt at rescue but not before a very skinny Watney jettison’s most of his escape rocket–the first “convertible” model to hit the movies. Scott, meanwhile effectively uses David Bowie’s “Starman”in its entirety but decided against the perhaps more appropriate “Is There Ljfe On Mars.”

Jessica Chastain, who seemed to wander into this film following Damon from the set of Interstellar, plays the spaceship crew leader. Michael Pena is around to throw jibes at Watney. Their camaraderie out in space is in stark contrast to Sanders’ amusingly stone-serious gravitas back on earth. Somewhere in that juxtaposition lies a symbol for The Martian itself. Keep it light when you’re practically certain to die alone on a distant planet because once you get home to Earth the fun is over.

Is There Life on Mars?….3.5 stars (out of 5)

Sicario (translation: Hitman) doesn’t fool around. With an uncanny intensity, it centers on a covert CIA mission to combat Mexican drug cartels–an exercise intended to “create chaos” and “dramatically overreact.” So says the group’s unlikely ringleader, Matt (Josh Brolin), who’s apparently so important he attends a high-level meeting with FBI officials clad in flip-flops and a T-shirt.

The mission itself, however, is far from casual. Along for the ride from The Phoenix FBI is Kate Macy (Emily Blunt), an FBI agent whose specialty is leading raids to free kidnapping victims. She struggles to figure out why she’s been invited along. Serving as a nearly comatose aid to Matt is Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro), perhaps a mysterious Mexican former prosecutor who tells Kate before they embark on the mission “nothing will make sense to your American ears, and you will doubt everything we do.” Alejandro is so calm, his hair could be on fire and he wouldn’t bat an eyelash.

Let’s make a few things clear. Director Denis Villeneuve is a master of the dark underside. His three most recent films (Enemy, Prisoners, and especially the splendid Incendies, all possess a bleak yet highly plausible wisdom. Here he teams with a Del Toro who, having already won an Oscar for a previous drug-cartel-themed film, Traffic, tops not only that performance here but also his completely sociopathic crazy-man in Savages. Brolin, on the heels of his offbeat detective character in Inherent Vice, and Emily Blunt, following her turn as an action-prone character in Edge of Tomorrow, are also both excellent. Then, for good measure, add ace cinematographer Roger Deakins and Oscar-winning soundtrack composer Johann Johannsson. The elements jell into a film that out-actions nearly every action film of late, yet holds its head above the genre fray enough to succeed on multiple, deeper levels.

As set pieces go, you couldn’t wish for two better ones than Sicario’s spectacular traffic shoot out and its opening sequence. In the latter, after a highly suspenseful swat raid, dozens of corpses are discovered lining the walls of an Arizona house deemed to be the site of hostages. The carnage foreshadows the mutilated bodies that will later hang from an overpass in Juarez, Mezico.

No one has ever accused Villeneuve of offering cheerful imagery. In fact, Sicario is a suspense movie that, for effect, uses horror movie tropes to tell its story. When you’ve got a technical and acting crew both this talented, the possibilities are mind-boggling. As is Sicario, despite its closing ambiguity, which given Alejandro’s cryptic nature, fits like a glove.

Uneasy Does It….4.5 (out of 5) stars.

In its best scenes, Black Mass flirts with the extraordinary. The rest of the film, by no means prosaic, is propelled by a stellar ensemble cast in support of two unforgettable lead performances. Johnny Depp, who by now you know sports a killer baldcap, exorbitant latex makeup and two contact-lens-fueled blue eyes, inhabits the persona of the legendary Boston Irish mobster Jimmy “Whitey” Bulger. Australian ace actor (and now very credible director–see this year’s The Gift) Joel Edgerton goes no less full force in portraying the childhood buddy of Bulger turned FBI agent, John Connolly.

It’s been a while we’ve had a gangster pic this good. In fact, the last one this well done and authentic was probably Scorcese’s The Departed (2006), itself partially based on a Bulger then played by Jack Nicholson. Cooper and co-screenwriters Mark Mallouk and Jez Butterworth are forced to economize interesting aspects of Bulger’s biography. He was a guinea pig for LSD experiments while in prison in his early years and during the time frame of the film Bulger actually wins $14 million in the Massachusetts State Lottery, yet both are barely mentioned in the film. Nonetheless, the force and brutality of Bulger could hardly be captured any more incisively.

While the stirring steak dinner scene in Black Mass channels Joe Pesci in Goodfellas, the goings on here depart from Scorcese in the direction of the straightforward, with lessened pyrotechnics to glamorize the acts of a very mean-spirited man. Director Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart) does try his best to humanize Bulger, to mixed effect, but his depiction of him is unflinchingly honest regarding Bulger’s sociopathology. He may be liked by his neighbors and treat his mom very nicely, but he’s not above talking warmly to an underling just before blowing his brains out. Or targeting family members of trusted associates.

All the while, Bulger’s brother Billy (Benedict Cumberbatch), no less than the president of the Massachusetts Senate, looks on, ostensibly neutral. Connolly talks Bulger into turning informant for Bulger’s own protection from the “eye-talian” North Boston Angiulo gang, who, upon getting very powerful, are prime targets for the FBI. Connolly must sell the idea to his superior (a very good Kevin Bacon), a savvy cop with a built-in bullshit detector, but Connolly gets the best of him. Connolly’s only indomitable foe is his own wife (the brilliant Julianne Nicholson), who’s both too innocent and way too smart to fall for the charade her husband sets up. In a vivid later scene where she hides pretending to be sick in her bedroom behind a locked door in order to avoid Bulger, he takes the liberty to pay her a visit to “check up on her.” The results channel not just Bulger’s depravity, but, oddly, his own sharp memory of his son’s demise from a rare affliction years earlier. Even when Bulger might be resembling a caring human being, he’s more likely simultaneously playing a sick angle.

Seventeen years after playing an undercover FBI agent in the underrated Donnie Brasco, and six years after portraying John Dillinger in the undistinguished Public Enemies, Depp inhabits Bulger’s character in a gripping yet almost understated manner. Depp throws all the requisite facial tics, squinting eyes, and Boston-accented invective our way. Yet what distinguishes his performance is an innate ability to express both emotion and the lack of it while hardly batting an eyelash. The supporting players are uniformly great here, not least a rollicking, manic Peter Sarsgaard as a paranoid, coke-snorting smalltime hood. Yet they hold court for Depp, whose Bulger lingers in the memory like a bad dream.

Depp Takes On Nicholson–Result: Much More Mellow Yet Highly Compelling….4 (out of 5)stars

For what it’s worth, I was a part-time club DJ from 1981until 2000. Although I hung up my headphones just before the advent of the laptop-era it was with more than passing interest I penciled in We Are Your Friends as a film to be checked out. Here was a movie purporting to cover the rave culture–replete with all the high-tech gadgetry that replaced my beloved Technics 1200 turntables. Hell, it even had Wes Bentley (American Beauty) in a supporting role. Granted, the title made no sense going in (that doesn’t change after seeing the film) and the usually annoying Zac Efton was playing the lead.

All told, I wish there had been a warning along the lines of “We are your friends. Don’t waste time on this flick.” Director Max Joseph (producer, MTV’s Catfish), who has made documentary shorts on EDM (for the uninitiated: electronic dance music) does an adequate if unspectacular job of conveying the buzz inherent in laying down a mix that shakes a crowd to its foundation. The problem is there’s a screamingly pedestrian story here populated with characters as thinly conceived and written as the plot.

Cole (Zefrin) hangs around with a bunch of loser roommates, one of whom is nicknamed “Squirrel.” Then he meets James (Bentley) a washed-up formerly big time L.A. DJ who for some inexplicable reason (plot facilitation?) lets Cole hang around his hotshot recording studio. Sophie (Emily Ratajkowski, the best thing about this film) is James’s younger, very appealing assistant/girlfriend. It doesn’t take much to figure out where this is going and with the help of some Ecstasy or some such, she and Cole make nasty.

In a nod to Bentley’s acting skill, it isn’t clear whether James will kill Cole or shrug his shoulders when he inevitable finds out. The film has it both ways, as it does seemingly glorifying drug use only to slip in an 11th hour scene abruptly condemning it. I wish I could say all is well as long as we stick to the DJ stuff but that would be as big a lie as screenwriters Joseph and Meaghan Openheimer’s credibility on telling a decent story.

An animated drug sequence, a few half-decent tracks and a heavy-handed script….1 star (out of 5)

Highly observant yet often annoyingly mannered, American Mistress takes director Noah Baumbach’s Frances Ha to the realm of farce. With casual dialogue as antic and fast-paced as a Marx Brothers movie, Baumbach, who again co-wrote with Greta Gerwig, explores another New York City fallen and frustrated, snarky character. Brooke (Gerwig) has a lot more audaciousness (and arrogance) going for her than Frances did, and unlike Frances, she at first seems like she has her life a whole lot more together.

Until it begins to dawn on the viewer that she’s a rock singer who we haven’t heard sing a lick, and an interior decorator whose only example we get to see is her own apartment. And until you stop and think of the prospects of her projected new business enterprise: a restaurant/convenience store/hair salon hybrid to be called “Mom’s.” Her partner: a Greek guy who’s conveniently out of the country. It’s later said to be her failure to “follow through” that is her Achilles Heel, but an overwrought imagination doesn’t help. Baumbach and Gerwig present Brooke as both having vision and simultaneously suffering the results of her own mean streak and skittishness.

Since things happen at the drop of a dime in this movie, Brooke’s high ambitions are suddenly thwarted. Before long Brooke’s Times Square apartment zoned for commercial use reverts to, shall we say, limited access. (Brooke explains she chose Times Square of all neighborhoods in part because that’s where she got off the bus). Tough times call for tough measures and Brooke looks up her “nemesis,” Mamie (Heather Lind), who stole both her boyfriend, Dylan (Mitchell Chernus) and business idea for t-shirts with flowers.

Brooke’s “sister to be” (her dad is set to marry her mom) is Tracy (Lola Kirke) a college freshman at Barnard who fancies herself a writer and serves as the movie’s point of view. Bored with college life (“it’s like when you are at a party and don’t know anyone–only it’s like that all the time”) Tracy becomes enamored with Brooke and seems very much in admiration of her. That all falls apart at the Connecticut mansion of Mamie and Dylan. Here’s where things accelerate to a fever pitch–and then promptly crash. A secret is revealed about Tracy amidst a whole lot of frenetic characters talking over one another, the short-term effect of which is sporadically invigorating comedy. Then it distressingly goes on extra innings. What starts off (and thankfully ends) as a pretty good relationship movie, goes off course in the middle.

When Brooke makes her pitch of the restaurant idea to millionaire Dylan and Mamie and Brooke’s posse (a couple college kids friends of Tracy) and other assorted hangers-on, the film quickly and irrevocably saunters off to Stupidville. Good farce needs to be believable. Here, when everyone swoons at Brooke’s pitch, it’s as bad as a Hollywood schlock piece. That scene serves as a sad reminder that the director of The Squid and the Whale, Greenburg, and Margot at the Wedding has seen better days even if stylistically he’s in a different time zone now. It’s a shame, too, because amidst the disjointed jumble, there are witticisms galore here.

Greta and Noah Take Manhattan (Again)….3 stars (out of 5)