Hitchcock [2012]

MPAA (PG-13)  Roger Ebert (3 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (2 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
Roger Ebert's review

Hitchcock (directed by Sasha Gervasi, screenplay by John J. McLaughlin, based on the book Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho [1990] by Stephen Rebello) definitely has its moments.

The beginning sequence where the character Alfred Hitchcock [IMDb] (played marvelously here by Anthony Hopkins) introduces himself to the audience is just great -- both shocking and funny -- exactly what one imagines the famous director to have been like.  And Hopkins does not let up, giving a great performance and probably one of the funniest/most enjoyable to watch (and probably to have played) of his entire career.

Similarly, Helen Mirren does an outstanding job playing Hitchcock's wife Alma who both had a life/career of her own and (as the viewer sees....) had to put-up with quite a bit of annoyances, some frankly a bit creepy (Parents take note ... I would have preferred honestly an "R" rating to "PG-13" for the film), being married to in her own words (with appropriate half-playful/half-serious inflection to be imagined here by the reader) "the great Alfred Hitchcock."

Even Scarlet Johansson gives a stellar performance as Janet Leigh [IMDb] who played the key role of Marion Crane the "wayward secretary" murdered by the "psycho" Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock's famous film.  In Hitchcock's Psycho [1960], Marion Crane was simply a "striking" (and to Hitchcock and much of late-1950s Hollywood, "striking" meant "young, voluptuous and blonde") but "bad" woman who the script leads to a very, very _bad end_.  Yet Johansson's Janet Leigh reminds the viewer that Leigh (in contrast to Marion Crane) was far more than a "fattened calf led to slaughter." Leigh who played the "bad" Marion Crane who was murdered in the shower by Norman Bates was _actually_ a wife and mother concerned actually about how her role would look _not merely_ to "movie audiences" but to her family and especially to her kids.  It all kinda makes the famous shower/murder scene in Psycho feel a bit different.  Yet, Janet Leigh was _not merely_ a wife/mother.  She was _also_ a professional actress.  As I write this, I find myself actually _in awe_ of Scarlet Johanssen's performance, even if it was supporting to Mirren's and Hopkins'.

Yet, despite these three outstanding performances -- and one could add James D'Arcy's admittedly rather small role in this film (but again IMHO _flawlessly_ executed) of playing Anthony Perkins [IMDb] (who played Norman Bates in Hitchcock's Psycho) -- this film about Hitchcock making his famous film still feels strikingly _flat_.

How could it be that _so many_ individual performances in this film would be _so good_ and yet the final product be soooo ... mediocre?  Blame it on the direction, blame it on the editing or on the script.  But it's honestly a shame.  Both the idea for the film and the individual performances were just great.  Yet this would seem to be one film that just did not come together.  And that deserves one big sigh ...


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Life of Pi [2012]

MPAA (PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Roger Ebert (4 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Roger Ebert's review

Life of Pi (directed by Ang Lee, screenplay by David Magee based on the best selling novel by the same name by Yann Martel [IMDb]) is certain to garner various nominations come Awards season at the end of the year including nominations for best picture, best director, best cinematography and best adapted screenplay.

The film is about Pi Patel (played by Irrfan Khan) recalling to a Canadian writer (played by Rafe Spall) the story of arrival in Canada from his native India via shipwreck at sea a story that the Canadian writer has been told will "make him believe in God."

Here readers of this blog ought to understand that the faith in God being offered is of a distinctly modern Indian / East Asian variety, one that Western Christians/Catholics of a more traditional bent would initially have difficulty in understanding.  Why?  Well India is a civilization with roots as old those of ancient Mesopotamia / Egypt (out of which the Abrahamic religions, including our own, came) and certainly older than those of Greece and Rome.  So anyone who's ever been friends with folks from India would know any discussion that does not give due respect to India's cultural (and therefore, in good part, religious) heritage is largely pointless.  Many/most Indians that the Westerner would meet in the West will simply dismiss the Westerner unless such respect is given.

So how does one talk to an Indian (or more generally East Asian) about religion?  (1) Honestly, ask an Indian (and even Indian Christian/Catholic, there are tens of millions of them, probably 1-2 families in your own parish, even if also spread over a land/cultural landscape of over a 1 billion people), and (2) Very much along the lines of the presentation in this film/book.  That is, one which cedes a relative equivalence of religious traditions that many Westerners would be (at least initially) surprised/uncomfortable with.  Welcome to a world of 8 billion people and even to the world that even Pope John Paul II knew quite well and _encouraged_ Catholics to engage in (JP II made _many_ references during his pontificate to St. Paul's preaching at the Aeropagus in Athens, Greece in the time of the Early Church and _encouraged us_ to do the same).  

So then Pi first tells the Canadian writer of his encounters with God in India as a child, saying that he first encountered God in the Hindu conception adding: "Well there are 30 million of them in the Hindu religion, so you're bound to run into a few of them eventually." :-) And he added, "They were the Superheroes of my youth." He then talks of his encounter with the Christian God _in the Catholic conception_ with a kind Indian Catholic priest explaining to him the central mystery of the Christian conception: "That God [TM] so loved the world that he _chose_ to give his Son for our salvation" (so that we could return to be in communion with him) (cf. John 3:16).  Like so many others of us who've ever reflected on the question, Pi wonders "Why would God do that? Give his only and _innocent_ son for us (the guilty)?"  And the Catholic priest answers in the most Orthodox of answers (across all times and ages) "out of love for us."  And Pi was impressed.  Finally, Pi also told the Canadian writer that he was also impressed with the Muslim tradition of _submission to God_ saying that he when he was kneeling down on his prayer rug saying his prayers (in the direction of Mecca no doubt) he felt that the ground below him was for that instant made holy (that in his submission to God, he was being sanctified).  All these are lovely and edifying insights for us all.  And let us remember that in the Second Vatican Council's Declaration on Non-Christian Religions, the Council did declare that the Church "rejects nothing which is true and holy in these [other] religions." (NA#2)

Pi's family ran a zoo in his home town in India.  At some point, when Pi was a teenager, Pi's father for reasons that are not entirely clear (but probably to give his sons a better life) receives permission to emigrate with his family to Canada, and decides to take the zoo's animals with him (to Canada) where they could sell the animals (presumably at a higher price).   During the course of the ocean voyage, the ship sinks in a storm, and after the storm clears, all who survived the storm is the (vegetarian) teenage Pi and ... a (flesh eating) bengali tiger ... in a lifeboat in the middle of a trackless ocean.   Much ensues ...

Remember that the promise of the story is that at the end of it, one's invited to believe in God.  Does it work?  I'll leave it to the viewers of the film to decide, but I will say that I have previously used a similar appeal in my preaching, at house blessing and in the course of marriage prep as well:  Today people are, in fact, able to _choose to believe_ (or to _not believe_) and lead their lives accordingly.  (Hopefully)  it should be clear that I do _choose to believe_ (and I do actually in fair part for the same reason that this story offers... ;-).  But I won't say more here other than say ... if you wish, go see the film ;-)


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Anna Karenina [2012]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Roger Ebert (2 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Roger Ebert's review

Anna Karenina [2012] (directed by Joe Wright, screenplay by Tom Stoppard, based on the novel [wikipd] by Leo Tolstoy [IMDb]) will probably irritate _some_ purists.  But as has been the case of the wildly extravagant recent adaptations of the Sherlock Holmes [2009][2011] stories and especially the Three Musketeers [2011] (complete with added "Da Vinci style airships" and "in 3D" no less ... ;-) it's more or less obvious that "purists" are not the intended audience here.  Instead the goal appears to be to re-capture _the original intended audiences_ of these once beloved stories, if not with fidelity to the "letter" of the originals then certainly to their spirit.  So just like The Three Musketeers was originally intended to be a teen-oriented adventure story and so the 2011 film sought _really, really hard_ to re-capture that spirit of _over the top_ adventure, so too, Anna Karenina was originally a novel about young adulthood (both early and late...) set in a milieu every bit as vicious/dangerous as that existing perhaps in today's Gossip Girl [IMDb] ;-). 

In the spirit then of the recent adaptations of Sherlock Holmes and The Three Musketeers [2011], the presentation of Anna Karenina here is _highly stylized_.  Indeed, about half of the current film takes place "on stage."  IMHO the metaphor is _appropriate_ because even as the still quite attractive, late 20-something/early 30-something, though already married with a 8-10 year-old son Anna Karenina [IMDb] (played IMHO superbly by Keira Knightley) (in today's parlance, Anna could have easily been one of the neighbors on Desperate Housewives [IMDb] or, even more to the point, be considered to be a 19th century equivalent of a "MILF" but we get ahead of ourselves...) and her eventual lover, the younger but supremely confident, mid 20s-something, "dashing" Russian cavalry officer Count Vronsky [IMDb] (played again superbly by Aaron Taylor-Johnson) go about their lives and later ... their affair, _it is_ as if parts of their lives become played out "on stage" before their circle of family/friends.  So the stylization, that may irritate some older viewers actually _underlines_ the core of the story taking place.  (So honestly, I thought it was _great_).

How then does the story unfold.  The story begins as the novel with Anna traveling from the "more modern" St. Petersburg to the more traditional Moscow on something of a "rescue mission."  Her brother Prince Stepan "Stiva" Oblonsky [IMDb] (played by a mustached Matthew MacFedyen) had been "caught with the governess" of his children and, needless to say, his wife, the sweet if still from an aristocratic family (though presumable of a somewhat lower rank) Dolly [IMDb] (played by Kelly MacDonald) was upset.  (Apparently the Oblonskys did have something of a predisposition to ... "stray").  Anna came over to reprimand, in as much as she could, her largely incouragable brother and to try to smooth over things with Dolly.  "You have to forgive him." "But how?" "I know it won't be easy, but what else can you do...?"

While Anna is there in Moscow, Anna _also_ has the opportunity to attend the "coming out party" "debutante ball" of Dolly's 18-year old sister Kitty [IMDb] (played by Alicia Vikander and _again_ superbly cast).  When we meet her, Kitty's bubbling with excitement.  This is going to be her big night.  Yet as the night plays out, two things go wrong.  First, a bumbling if certainly utterly sincere (and also significantly older) admirer of Kitty named Levin [IMDb] (played by Domhnall Gleeson) comes over to her and _just before_ the ball is about to start _proposes to her_.  "Oh why, why him and why now...?" ;-)  Flustered and still trying to focus on what she believed was going to be _the beginning of her adult life_ she has to tell him "no" (crushing him of course) and then _refocus_ on the evening to come.

But the rest of the evening doesn't go well.  Kitty has had a crush on the previously mentioned "dashing" young mid-20 something Count Vronsky [IMDb], who _is_ dutifully attending "the ball."  Why?  Because it's a "big social occasion."  HOWEVER (and perhaps inevitably), for someone like Vronsky, Kitty's "too easy."  Yes, maybe she's "entering into society" that evening and all ... But to him, she's still "just a kid."  WHO he finds _far more attractive_ and _far more challenging_ is ... Anna, who's married, 30-something and really at the ball more or less _by accident_.  But yes, in a somewhat younger "Mrs Robinson" [IMDb] like (if _accidental_) way she _is_ really, really attractive.  So he comes over and asks her to dance ...  and they dance ... and dance ... and pretty soon _everybody else_ (including Kitty ...) _stop dancing_ and just watch them (with increasing scandal...) ... dance.  And all this then comes to be transported to the above mentioned _stage_.

Now Anna's husband, Karenin [IMDb] (played surprisingly but again perfectly for the role by Jude Law) is a _good_ if rigid/proper-to-a-fault man.  (One woman tells Anna of him: "You're married to a Saint.  And we all must cherish him ... for Russia's sake."  What 30 year-old woman would want to hear her husband described (only) in such terms .... ;-).  Throughout the whole of the tale, Karenin is _able_ to _forgive_ (why? because that's what good, proper men do in good society....).   But his rigid propriety renders him increasingly lifeless.  Anna, who didn't exactly search out Vronsky (or anyone else really) to have an affair with, once "involved" becomes increasingly so and comes to simply _hate_ the good if, yes, let's admit it, boring Karenin, her husband.

Those who know something about Sigmund Freud could perhaps appreciate the pre-Freud but now more or less _obvious_ split occurring between the Karenins.  Karenin, the husband, has basically given his lot to the "superego" doing _everything_ that Society wishes him to do.  Anna, instead chooses to follow her "id" choosing the pleasure of being with Vronsky over society's indeed _God's_ demand that, once married, she be with her husband Karenin.  In Freud's model, there's the adult "ego" which seeks (if often not particularly successfully...) to balance the demands of what one _wants to do_ (follow one's "id") with the demands of society/authority demands that one do (follow the "superego")  Here neither is willing to be a true adult here, and ...  

So soon enough, "the lot" of the various characters is cast.  Foregoing whatever else he might be thinking/feeling about all this, Karenin is willing to keep even his unfaithful wife under his wing while Anna increasingly just wants freedom.  The rest of the story plays out from there...
 
What, indeed, a story!  And for those who'd have any doubts about how it ends, remember that this story was written originally by Tolstoy, not a Hollywood hack.  Tolstoy was an Orthodox Christian mystic at the end of his life.  So God's will / judgement does _definitely_ play out here, if perhaps not in the knee-jerk hammer-over-the-head manner that sometimes we (believer or non) expect or even demand that God's will be expressed ...

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 [2012]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Roger Ebert (2 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Roger Ebert's review



The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 (directed by Bill Condon, screenplay by Melissa Rosenberg based on the Twilight novels by Stephenie Meyer [IMDb]) closes this cinematic telling of the saga.   How does it do?  Well from the sound of the packed audience of viewers that I saw the film with on the night that it opened, it did quite well.


In terms of fireworks, I do think the close of the Harry Potter series (which also split the last book into two films) was certainly more dramatic.  But then it would seem to me that The Twilight Saga was _always_ about a "different kind of drama" than the Harry Potter series was.  Harry Potter was largely about a titanic struggle between good and evil taking place on a parallel supernatural plane where the lowly Harry Potter was going to have a key/dramatic role.

The Twilight Saga was always about a simple teenage girl growing-up/coming into her own/making friends/making her own community in the backwoods of often dreary and certainly rainy/snowy Washington State.  Yes, she discovered a truly _fantastic_ richness (_both_ werewolves and vampires, and even entire cultures/histories supporting them, who would have guessed? ;-) in her seemingly "humble surroundings."  But _none of the main characters_ -- from Bella Swan (played by Kristen Stewart) who starts off as an awkward/klutzy teenager from a small town in the middle of, if not nowhere, than utter "nondescript average-ville" (yes, in the "backwoods" of Washington), to Edward (played by Robert Pattinson) the equally socially awkward vampire from the "Cullen clan" who she falls in love with, to the more jockish Jacob Black (played by Taylor Lautner) descendant of a "shape shifting" Indian tribe that's "always lived in those woods" but again is ultimately nothing to brag about (he's destined to "howl at the moon" like his ancestors always did, knowing the same rocks, same woods, same lakes, same streams as they did as well) -- none of these people was in any world/history altering way "special."  Yes they all had (or came to have) "gifts" / special abilities.  But none of them were known outside their group, and indeed, for various reasons their "gifts" / "special abilities" _had to be hidden_ from the larger world/society.  If Harry Potter was about magic on a _grand scale_, the Twilight Saga was about finding "magic' / "specialness" on a small scale, in those "backwoods" of every day, otherwise _nothing to brag about_, "life." 

So the ending episode, which is largely about Renesmee (played by Mackenzie Foy), Bella and Edward's child (hence "half-human / half-vampire"), while "dramatic" remains so _only_ within Bella / Edward's circle of family and friends.  The humans in the area, including Bella's father, the small town cop, Charlie Swan (played by Billy Burke), don't even know that Renesmee is "half human / half vampire," and the Edward's vampire millieu (that has had to live in the shadows for centuries) comes to understand that this new child _isn't_ going to cause them problems after all.  The story ends up having (arguably / thankfully) _less drama_ than the 1967 film Guess Who's Coming to Dinner where for the first time in a Hollywood film a young white woman (played by Katherine Houghton) brings a young black man (played by Sidney Poitier) home to meet her parents (played by Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn).  It would seem, (I hope) that we've made a good deal of progress in this area (even in "the backwoods") since that time.

So honestly my hat off to writer Stephanie Meyer and then the cast and crew of the Twilight series.  You've created and presented a story that's both "Great" and at times "dramatic" and yet whose characters always remain (like most of us) "small."


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