Chef [2014]

MPAA (R but should be PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (2 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (4+ Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. McAleer) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (S. Wloszczyna ) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

Don't let the absurd R-rating fool you, Chef [2014] (written, directed and starring Jon Favreau) is a lovely family oriented / Hispanic oriented film celebrating food, family and getting one's priorities straight.

Carl Casper (played by Jon Favreau) begins the film as a divorced, career driven, head chef at a trendy L.A. restaurant whose owner (played by Dustin Hoffman) while making some allowances for Carl's talent, idiosyncrasies and yes ego, at the end of the day makes it clear who's boss in HIS restaurant.  As such, while certainly talented and just as certainly driven, Carl begins the story frustrated even as the costs of his (in Catholic parlance) "disordered passion" are obvious to all but to him: Not only did Carl drive wife Iñez (played magnificently here by Sofia Vergara) away, but he also stood to lose their 10 year old son Percy (played by Emjay Anthony) who Carl would only "fit into his schedule as he had the time."

Well this unstable situation, of course, could not stand.  So in hopes of impressing a random if irritating/blowhard food critic (played again magnificently by a young Roger Ebert-looking Oliver Platt) Carl has a public melt-down at work, causing him to get fired by his pushed-too-far boss.  And since this is the age of social media, his public meltdown in front of a restaurant full of customers was captured on cell-phone video and posted quickly on YouTube rendering him all but unemployable.

So what to do now?  He finds himself having to depend on some of the people who he had previously pushed away, notably his ex, who's been telling him for years that he'd be happiest if he worked on his own -- if perhaps starting-out in a food truck.  Pulling some strings (notably with another ex of hers ... played by Robert Downey, Jr), she gets him that food truck -- back in her home town of Miami.  With his other bridges burned, Carl decides to "eat some crow" ... and flies out to Miami to get said truck.  The rest of the story proceeds from there:

The truck's of course a mess, but help of a Cuban-American friend named Martín (played again magnificently by John Leguizamo) who had previously told him that if he ever got his own place, EVEN IF IT WAS "JUST A FOOD TRUCK" (back then it was just a joke ... ;-), he'd drop everything to be his "sous chef."  So hearing that Carl got said food truck back in Miami, Martín does drop everything to fly out to help him.  And with his help, Carl is able to fix said truck and then with Martín and 10-year-old Percy goes on a wonderful cross-country "road trip of discovery" from Miami, through New Orleans and later Texas back to L.A. serving both "Cubanos" (cuban sandwiches) and whatever local cuisine they meet along the way.  The film will honestly make your mouth water, even as it's making mine water as I type now ... ;-)

Along the way, of course, Carl reconnects with his son and gives him memories that will last both of them a life time.  He also discovers that he really did have friends, in Martín, and even in his ex-wife Iñez.

I honestly don't understand the R-rating because the ending (as indeed the whole story) is about as "family oriented" and POSITIVE as it gets.  And yes, it all ends as happily as it possibly could.

It's just a lovely, lovely film about friends, family, and having patience with a loved one who first loses his/her way and then works his/her way back getting his/her priorities straight.  HONESTLY A GREAT (HISPANIC ORIENTED) FAMILY FILM!


ADDENDUM:

I would also add that one of the food places showcased in the film -- The Versailles Restaurant on 8th Street ("Calle 8") in Little Havana/Miami -- I know quite well.  I used to be stationed at a (then) parish of ours in the Orlando area and I'd occasionally have the opportunity to go down to Miami.  I thank my good fortune that the first time that I did so, with a couple of visiting Servites, that I had the sense to ask at a Catholic book store (also on "Calle 8") "Hey, BTW, what'd be a good Cuban Restaurant here in Miami?"  They immediately responded "Why the Versailles, of course."  It's a great place, open nearly 24 hours a day, with very, very reasonable prices and _by legend_ is the place where the 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion was both planned ... and betrayed (the latter supposedly by a traitorous waiter ... ;-).  Anyway, the place is a well known landmark / treasure and certainly worth the stop if one ever has the good fortune of passing through Miami.


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The Lunchbox (orig. Dabba) [2013]

MPAA (PG)  BollyMovieRevs (4.38/5.00) TimesOfIndia (3 1/2 Stars)  ChicagoTribune (3 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B-)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing

BollyMovieReviewz review list
Times of India (S.M. Das) review

HollywoodReporter (D. Young) review
NY Times (A.O. Scott) review
Slant Magazine (N. McCarthy) review
Spirituality&Practice (F & M.A. Brussatt) review
Variety (J. Weisberg) review

ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
AVClub (B. Kenigsberg) review

The Lunchbox [2013] (written and directed by Ritesh Batra) is a little Indian film, the director's debut, that nevertheless caused something of a sensation at last year's Cannes Film Festival and the subsequent festival circuit.  It played recently (again) at the Gene Siskel Film Center here in Chicago and articulates exactly one of the reasons why I love movies and why I created my blog.

Most of us living in the United States will never be able to go to India (it's almost exactly "halfway around the world" from us -- 12 time zones), even if many/most of us will get to know at least a few Indians or descendants of Indian immigrants during the course of our lives, perhaps in a professional capacity, perhaps at work, perhaps at school, perhaps as neighbors.  However, our interactions are still largely determined by our Western setting where our interaction would most likely take place.  (An excellent film that expresses this difficulty is The Namesake [2006] (which incidentally costars Irrfan Khan one of the stars of the current film) in which an Indian grad-student "making good" in the United States finds when his father dies back home in India that his American girlfriend, lovely and kind though she is, is utterly lost when they go back to India for the funeral).

I do believe that "little" but well made films like The Lunchbox [2013], not only set in India, but also written, directed and acted entirely by Indians, telling stories of the "joys and hopes", lives and struggles of a small set of "regular people" (in India) can help Westerners (and  non-Indians-in-general) appreciate both the fantastic richness of life there (so many people, so much seeming "chaos" to the outsider, yet to those living there entirely in the norm) and the obvious commonalities in human experiences and aspirations: We all want to be loved, we all sometimes feel lonely (even in a crowd) and we all struggle to built happy and meaningful lives out of "the cards" (circumstances) that we're given.

So then, to the film ... ;-).  The Lunchbox [2013] is built around a wondrously complex hot lunch delivery phenomenon existing in Mumbai, India involving specialized couriers called Dabbawalas who pick-up hot lunches generally made by wives at home and transport them (hundreds of thousands perhaps even millions of them) by bicycle, train, lorry (truck) and again individual courier into the hands the individual workers in the city to whom each of these individual lunches is destined.  Honestly, when one watches the journey made by just one of these lunch boxes -- carrying the hot lunch prepared by Ila (played by Nimrat Kaur) a young housewife with help of her Auntie (voiced by Bharati Achrekar who we never see but hear and who lives on the floor above her) for her husband Rajeev (played by Nakul Vaid) working somewhere in the city -- one wonders how this delivery service could possibly work (the individual lunchboxes, all different shapes / sizes, don't seem to be labeled in any way).  And yet it (mostly) does...

I say "mostly" because, one day the lunch box carrying Ila's lovingly-made lunch made for her husband (in hopes that he'd come to appreciate her more) ends up on the desk / office / office building of another, a Saajan Fernandez (played by Irrfan Khan) an irritable, older man, approaching retirement.  Since Saajan was a widower, he had no one to cook for him.  So he had ordered his lunches, delivered in the same way, from a local caterer.  Well, even if Rajeev did not seem to be particularly impressed with Ila's cooking, Saajan was.  Now, readers understand here that Saajan did not understand initially that the lunch box that arrived for him was not intended for him, but he did appreciate the food.  So when the lunch box returned back at Ila's home at the end of the day, she found that it was completely wiped clean ("as if he licked clean all the bowls" she happily recounts to her auntie living above).  And indeed, Saajan was so impressed with the meal that made it a point of stopping by the caterer who normally made his lunch to compliment the cook for a lunch well done.  "Please keep doing the same," to which he happily agrees.  However, when Ila's husband Rajeev came home that evening and she asked him about how he liked the meal that day, he didn't seem to react with much excitement at all.

Hmm, so what happened?  After a couple more days/meals Ila figures out that the lunch she is preparing for her husband is going to the wrong person.  So one day she encloses a note with the lunch telling the recipient that she suspects that he's not her husband, but -- like perhaps a lot of underappreciated spouses in any land -- she writes that she doesn't care anymore and appreciates that at least he, the recipient of her meals now, seemed to like them.  Saajan writes back, and a penpal relationship based on "culinary adultery" begins ... ;-).

The rest becomes a fascinating story.  It becomes clear that Saajan didn't even realize how lonely he was since his wife had died (or how awful a person he had become to those who still surrouneded him, and could have been part of his life if he gave them a chance).  There's a lovely side story that takes place during the course of the film involving an underling named Shaikh (played by Nawazuddin Siddiqui) to whom Saajan pays absolutely no mind ... until he himself becomes happier.  For her part, Ila comes to the realization that she really needs more out of her marriage than a relatively comfortable roof over her head provided by a husband who otherwise also didn't seem to pay her no mind. 

Now for a conservative society like that of India, formal onscreen adultery, is all but impossible ... and it actually does become clear to Saajan that he's much, much older than Ila (and his own sense of moral propriety makes it impossible for him to take the relationship in that direction). But this film makes it absolutely clear that everyone from Ila to her Auntie to Saajan to his coworker/underline Shaikj, fundamentally need to feel loved / respected.

Thus this film, even if it takes place "half a world away" from the United States and in cultural circumstances that also seem quite different from those of the United States, still articulates fundamental needs that all of us can understand and in a way that honestly helps one to learn a little bit about life and the customs of contemporary India as well.  No wonder this film was such a hit!  Great job!


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Blended [2014]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-II)  ChicagoTribune (1 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (1 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C-) 

As part of my contribution in our parish's participation in the Archdiocese of Chicago's Campaign "To Teach Who Christ Is," I've decided to forgo seeing (and therefore reviewing here) one or two movies a weekend and instead contribute the money I would have spent to the campaign.

I'm trying to be strategic about this, picking movies that would "hurt somewhat" to miss, that is, films that are not "so bad" that I wouldn't see them anyway nor movies that I really would need to see/review or else my blogging effort would cease to be worthwhile.

As per my custom, I will try to provide links to usual line-up of reviews that I also consider as I write my own.

This week, the film I chose not to see / review here is the Adam Sandler vehicle Blended [2014].  Readers of my blog will know that I've actually been kinder to Adam Sandler's films (That's My Boy [2011]) than many / most reviewers.  IMHO his films often have a rather positive message even if that message is often lost in a swamp of rather juvenile jokes and crudity.  It would seem that this film is somewhat different as even reviewer for the CNS/USCCB (the U.S. Catholic Bishops media office) give the film an A-II (appropriate for adults and adolescents) rating that the "L" (limited adult audience) or "O" (offensive) ratings that have graced recent Sandler films.  More mainstream critics still give the film somewhat predictably low marks.  Casablanca [1942] or African Queen [1951] this film apparently is not ... ;-)

X-Men: Days of Future Past [2014]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (2 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
ChicagoTribune (C. Borrelli) review
RE.com (S. Abrams) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review

X-Men: Days of Future Past [2014] (directed by Brian Singer, screenplay by Simon Kinberg, story also by Simon Kinberg along with Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaugn inspired by Marvel Comics X-men [MCU] [wikip]) is a rather complex superhero movie will probably require at least some background reading and/or background viewing for newbies to understand (followers/fans of the x-men film series will certainly have no trouble understanding this one, though knowledge of the original comics underlying the X-men [MCU] [wikip] story-line certainly will help / enrich one's appreciation of the film as well).

At minimum, readers here should understand that the current film, X-Men: Days of Future Past [2014], is actually the seventh X-men inspired Hollywood major motion picture to be made since 2000 (five devoted to the X-men in general, two devoted to the character Wolverine in particular, the last two films X-Men: First Class [2011] and Wolverine [2013] having been reviewed on my blog, which I began in the Fall of 2010).  Newbies would be served to have seen at least X-Men [2000] [IMDb], X-Men 3: Last Stand [2006] [IMDb], X-Men: First Class [2011] [IMDb] [FrDatM] as well as X-men Origins: Wolverine [2009] [IMDb] prior to having seen this one.

At its heart, the entire X-men [MCU] [wikip] story-line (the first X-Men Comic being published in 1963) is about responding to one's own "Otherness" (or more positively one's own "Uniqueness") in relation to the larger Society.  Readers and viewers are invited to identify with a cluster of radically unique / exceptional people (indeed, one of the ways to understand the "X" in the X-Men title would be that the "X" is short for "exceptional").  The reason given for their radical uniqueness / exceptionality is "genetic mutation."   So while positively these characters were considered (at times) "exceptional," negatively they are also derided by various "regular people" as "mutants."

Some words about setting:  While many of the key original X-men characters were already portrayed as living at the time of World War II -- notably (1) Eric Lehnsherr / the future Magneto who was born Jewish in Europe and discovered his super-power to bend anything metal (in anger) when he was forcibly separated from his parents in a Nazi Concentration Camp; (2) Logan / Wolverine, who was born on the Canadian frontier in the late 1800s, whose mutation allowed his body to repair itself from almost any kind of damage thus making him all but immortal (e's shown in Wolverine [2013] as a Canadian POW serving in a camp at the outskirts of Nagasaki easily recovering from even the nuclear blast there); (3) Charles Xavier who was an American boy growing up in a Franklin D. Roosevelt style "Hyde Park" / "Old Money" mansion outside of New York (another meaning for "X-Men" becomes those characters allied to him) whose mutation allowed him to "read minds," and (4) Raven / Mystique whose mutation allowed her to shape-shift into appearing like any person / character that she desired -- the series plays on developments that came out of the post-World War II era.  These developments included (1) Fear of Radiation (resulting in all kinds of often dangerous/disfiguring mutations), and (2) the Red Scare and the rise and increasing success of the African American Civil Rights Movement.  The early 1950s Red Scare and the mid-late-1950s increasing success of the African American Civil Rights Movement stoked a fear of "Otherness" in the larger American Society even as all kinds of previously marginalized groups -- people of color, women, gays, even Catholics and Jews -- were awakening to the realization that their "Otherness" from "the Norm" (white, heterosexual, male, preferably of Anglo-Saxon and Protestant background) had been keeping them down (and more to the point, that this marginalization need not remain a permanent condition).

So while the characters in the X-Men series were generally wildly drawn "mutants," with all sorts of crazy super-powers, A LOT OF READERS and MORE RECENTLY A LOT OF VIEWERS could relate to them: They're "different from the Norm" (just like we are).  

Okay, in this story line about this community of "highly exceptional people" / "mutants" of the X-men series there has always existed a fundamental conflict with regards to how best to relate to the non-mutant "regular" people (people of the Norm).

Heading one camp has been (Professor) Charles Xavier [IMDb] (played in the films as an older man by Patrick Stewart and as a younger man by James McAvoy) who though also a "mutant" (again, he can "read minds") coming out of a privileged upbringing of Rooseveltian wealth, he has maintained that the mutants' best chance would be to seek to live in peace with the non-mutant majority.

Heading the other camp has been the traumatized, Jewish-born, Holocaust surviving Eric Lehnsherr / Magneto [IMDb] (played as an older man by Ian McKellen and when he was younger by Michael Fassbender) who SIMPLY DOES NOT BELIEVE that the "regular" non-mutant majority WILL EVER ACCEPT PEOPLE WHO DON'T "FIT THE NORM."  Hence, his loyalty has been exclusively "other mutants."  He remembered the "regular" non-mutant majority seeking to exterminate him and his family (for being Jewish) during the Holocaust and being experimented upon (by Nazi scientists) when they discovered that he had "special properties" that they found useful.  HE FOUND NO USE FOR SUCH "REGULAR" (AND FEARFUL / EVIL) PEOPLE AND THOUGHT THE BEST WAY TO DEAL WITH THEM WOULD BE TO FIGHT (and DEFEAT) THEM.

All five of the X-men movies involve a conflict between these two "exceptional men", Professor X [IMDb] on one side and Magneto [IMDb] on the other.

In the current film, the mutants (and the rest of "regular" humanity) find themselves in 2023 in a hellish world, largely destroyed on account of a vicious, apocalyptic war between humanity and the mutants with humanity actually on the verge of "winning." (But "winning" what?  The world was largely destroyed in any case ...).

The reason why humanity was on the verge of winning was NOT because they were physically or intellectually "exceptional" like the mutants.  Instead, interestingly/tellingly, humanity "adapted" in a different way -- it created robotic weapons called "Sentinels."  These weapons had become all but indestructible even when facing the genetically superior mutants.  Why?  Again tellingly, after the shape-shifting Raven/Mystique [IMDb] (played in the film by Jennifer Lawrence) managed to assassinate the Sentinels' initial designer Dr. Bolivar Trask [IMDb] (played by Peter Dinklage), she herself was killed and HUMAN SCIENTISTS THEN ADDED HER "SHAPESHIFTING" ABILITY TO THE DESIGN OF THE "SENTINELS" making them all but indestructible.   Thus human thinking/defenses proved to be able to "evolve" without needing "genetic mutation."

Thus fighting a war between humanity and the "genetically superior mutants" was proving pointless.  As such, in a desperate gambit, Professor X and Magneto of 2023 decide to utilize the super-power of one of the remaining mutants among them Kitty Pride / Shadowcat [IMDb] (played by Ellen Page), who can send the consciousness someone back in time, to send the consciousness of Logan / Wolverine (the most indestructible of the mutants among them) back to 1973 to stop Raven/Mystique from assassinating Dr. Bolivar Trask and instead work to make a peace between the mutants and humanity.

To do so (to find Raven/Mystique she was a shape-shifter afterall), Logan's told to find Professor X and Magneto of 1973 first.  But neither was in a particularly good state in 1973:

Professor X, depressed after loosing his control of his legs at the end of X-Men: First Class [2011] provef willing to take a medicine that gave him back the use of his legs (at the expense of losing his "mind reading" superpower ... and yet they needed that superpower to find Raven/Mystique).

Magneto, on the other hand, found himself locked-up in an ALL CONCRETE PRISON (no metal... ;-) 100 stories below the Pentagon "for his role in the 1963 Kennedy Assassination."  But what could possibly have been Magneto's role in the Kennedy Assassination?  Well ... JFK was killed by a "magic" (metal) bullet that appeared to have "changed direction" mid-flight ;-).  (When Magneto inevitably was freed from this seemingly impregnable prison, again 100 stories below the Pentagon, he protested his innocence in the Kennedy Assassination to his fellow mutants saying that he was there in Dallas on the day of the Assassination but to protect JFK"  Why?  Because Kennedy was "one of us" (if not a mutant, then one who had been previously marginalized).  How?  Well with the exception of current President Barack Obama (1/2 African-American), JFK (Catholic) remains the only American President who was not a WASP -- "White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant" ;-).

Anyway,  Logan / Wolverine and Professor X along with the help of two other mutants Hank / Beast [IMDb] (played by Nicholas Hoult) and especially lightning fast Quicksilver [IMDb] (played by Evan Peters) help break Magneto out of his prison.  They do then find Raven/Mystique and do try to stop her from assassinating Dr. Bolivar Trask.  During the course of all this, the younger 1973 Magneto increasingly realizes that his whole confrontational approach toward humanity was being challenged and it's never really clear if he's on board, even if he's being told by Logan / Wolverine that he's come back from the future to try to change it for the better and that even the older 2023 Magneto was in favor of it.

Anyway, much of course plays out ... while I'm not going to tell you how, Logan / Wolverine does succeed in altering events in 1973 and thus alter the reality of 2023.

So where do then Professor X and Magneto find themselves (as well as the other mutants) in 2023?  I'm not going to say.  But the film does invite viewers to reflect perhaps even more deeply on the philosophies of these two main characters in the X-men story line and which of the two approaches would probably produce the better outcome for those/all involved.

All in all, like many other Marvel Comics based movies of late, it makes for a very interesting and thought provoking film, if also a rather destructive one.  The violence is kept at a PG-13 "glass shattering but not blood" level ... but like a lot of films of this type, there's a lot of it.  

Still, in the end, the film certainly gives viewers a lot to think about with regard to finding a way in which we could all "live in peace together."  Good job.


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Ida [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
Filmweb.pl listing*
Stopklatka.pl listing*

CJG.gazeta.pl (P.T. Felis) review*
Onet.pl review*
Film.org.pl (E. Świeca) review*
Wnas.pl (L. Adamski) review*

CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
HollywoodReporter (T. McCarthy) review
SlantMagazine (C. Cabin) review
Variety (P. DeBruge) review

Ida [2013] [IMDb] [FW.pl]* [SK.pl]* (directed and screenplay cowritten by Paweł Pawlikowski [en.wikip] [Culture.pl] [IMDb] [FW.pl]* [SK.pl]* along with Rebecca Lenkiewicz [IMDb] [FW.pl]*) is a Polish language / English subtitled film critically well received in both Poland and Outside (see links above) about a young late-teens/early-20s woman named Anna (played very well by Agata Trzebuchowska [IMDb] [FW.pl]* [SK.pl]*) who after growing-up in a Catholic orphanage/convent in Communist Era Poland (the film's set in Poland of the early 1960s) and had decided to become a nun in the Community of Sisters who had taken care of her, is told by her Mother Superior prior to accepting her vows, that she actually has a living relative, an aunt, who hasn't necessarily been easy to contact, but who the Sisters felt she should meet prior to making her vows. 

Very well, Anna is given her aunt's address and dispensation to leave the Convent to meet her.  When she does, she discovers that her aunt, Wanda (played magnificently by Agata Kulesza [IMDb] [FW.pl]* [SK.pl]*) is a rather hardened by life (for reasons soon become obvious / heart breaking) and consequently rather hard-drinking COMMUNIST JUDGE (she was known in the region as "Red Wanda" for having put all kinds of "Enemies of the People" behind bars and often to death).

So then, why was Wanda so "hardened" and consequently so hard-drinking/etc?  Well SHE (AND ANNA, whose birth name prior to being left at the Convent as a baby was IDA) WERE JEWISH.  Anna/Ida had never known this ...

The rest of the story un-spools from there.  There are, of course, a lot of questions that the audience (and Anna/Ida) would have:

Why did Wanda and Anna/Ida survive the Nazi occupation while the rest of their family did not?  Why did Wanda become a Communist while Anna/Ida ended-up at a Convent's doorstep and grew-up as a Catholic?   Why didn't the Sisters tell Anna/Ida earlier?  Why didn't Wanda pick-up her niece earlier?  And of course ... what now?  The rest of the film unspools from here...

This is a painful and at times ugly story.  In writing this review, I struggled with the question of how fairly Anna/Ida's character was drawn.  Was she just a device or caricature?  I do wish that SOMEDAY a film could portray the community life of nuns as well as the community life of male religious was portrayed in the French film Of Gods and Men (orig. Des Hommes et des Dieux) [2010].  (AND ACTUALLY FILM MAKERS -- I COULD DIRECT YOU TO PEOPLE / CATHOLIC RELIGIOUS SISTERS OF ALL KINDS, BOTH IN THE UNITED STATES AND ABROAD, WHO COULD HELP YOU TO DO THIS WELL / BETTER).  However, I came to the conclusion that I'd be asking for a different kind of movie here than the one that the film makers were trying to make.

I would note again to readers here the overwhelmingly positive critical reaction IN POLAND to this film and also would note that I'm not surprised.  This is a very well done film, ever somber, ever in black-white-and-grey, often in rain and snow, about a time and an aftermath of a time that was also cold, painful, and broke many, many, indeed, millions of people, both Pole and Jew.  And what is clear as day to me today -- Poles, at least in Poland, at least the young -- DO WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT and are able to do so with somberness and respect (unsurprisingly, for a nation with as sad/somber a history as Poland has had and consequently with composers like Chopin ... to express this well)  Honestly folks, a very good if sad/somber job!


* Reasonably good (sense) translations of non-English webpages can be found by viewing them through Google's Chrome browser. 

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Palo Alto [2013]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (2 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (C)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars w. Expl.)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (M. Olsen) review
RE.com (S. O'Malley) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) revie

Palo Alto [2013] (screenplay and directed by Gia Coppola (yes she's the granddaughter of Francis Ford Coppola and Sofia Coppola's niece) based on a collection of short stories by James Franco [IMDb]) doesn't paint a pretty picture of upper-middle class suburban life in Silicon Valley's Palo Alto.

Palo Alto may be the site of Stanford University, the birthplace of Apple, Inc, the current headquarters to Hewlett Packard and apparently Skype, and such legendary high tech firms as Sun Microsystems, Logitech, Google, Paypal and Facebook, all have called it "home" at some point.  Yet, believe it or not (and on reflection ... and transporting myself back to a mindset of a middle/upper-middle class American teenager ... I _do_ believe it) this is all "grown-up history."  To the "eyes rolling" teenage children of, perhaps, Silicon Valley geniuses (or at least of those who keep Silicon Valley humming with one new gadget or "app" after another) Palo Alto is apparently just another "pretty boring" and perhaps even _soulless_ place.

And really, again, _on reflection_ why should one be surprised?  The "genius parents" are either at work or otherwise "not present" (as they try to come-up with and then bring-into being that "new indispensable gadget or app" that none of us, or even the parents' competitors, had ever even thought up yet) while their kids deal with the anxieties and day-to-day "mundanities" of teenage high school life, even as they face, at least on some level, the Über-Anxiety that they will probably never, ever, ever be as gifted, successful (or even as lucky) as their parents.  Indeed, gets the sense that director Gia Coppola, a third generation Copolla in the movie-making business, as well as any number of the other "pedigreed" members of the cast -- Emma Roberts, the niece of Julia Roberts, as well as Jack Kilmer, the son of Val Kilmer, play lead / key roles -- would know EXACTLY what the characters in the film were going through.

So this is perhaps the brilliant if rather depressing insight of the film and James Franco's short stories that inspired: While to the outside world Palo Alto may be "the cutting edge" (the avant garde of the world) and that perhaps the parents of the kids in this film / these stories live at this "cutting edge" and are the avant garde of the world, THEIR OWN KIDS are floundering in soulless, "petty bourgeoisie" existences that the avant garde Left has always ridiculed.  That is to say, to be Steve Jobs, Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg would probably be really really cool, but to be their teenage kids (and as far as I know, NONE OF THEM HAVE HAD ANY KIDS ... that they have admitted to ...) would still probably really, really suck.

And so the teenage kids of the Palo Alto of these tales flounder about, in one striking, gut-wrenching scene after another, mostly stoned, engaging in rather empty sexual activity and occasional acts of blind stupid vandalism and nihilism. 

In one scene at a party, a random high school girl/classmate takes Teddy (the character played by Jack Kilmer) upstairs to a bedroom to service him (not shown).  Mind you, neither of the two particularly like (or dislike) each other (He's definitely stoned, and she's rather drunk and apparently kinda known for giving the occasional < > when she "finds herself that way").  Teddy, in as much as he's reflective at all, seemed to like April (the character played by Emma Roberts).  But no matter, the random girl was present, and ... in the next scene, the random girl is shown gulping down some mouthwash she found in the bathroom next door, presumably to "wash away the taste from her mouth..."  Mission accomplished (for both) and in the meantime Teddy finds himself down the stairs to rejoin the party where, somewhat surprised, finds April somewhat irritated with him for having gone upstairs with the random girl in the first place.  Why?  What was the problem?  Even April can not seem to explain ...

But April has her own problems.  Her perpetually stoned but presumably genius "working from home" step-father "Stewart" (played by Val Kilmer) keeps "correcting" her homework to such a degree that she (and her teachers...) find it incomprehensible (and she gets accused of plagiarism later in the film...).  Meanwhile, her creepy / loser (proving perhaps more clearly in high tech Palo Alto, city of geniuses, than perhaps elsewhere the adage that "those who can't , teach") soccer coach "Mr. B" (played by James Franco), divorced, with a 8-10 year old son, starts "grooming her" in order to eventually sleep with her.  "I'd really prefer to go out with people my own age," she tries telling him as he becomes more and more obvious. "Why?  You're so much better than that," he answers.  Yuck.  But her own step-father's a different kind of a-hole / creep.  And her ma' "just wants to be her friend" ... sigh.

So folks, this is no Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet [1952-1966] or The Brady Bunch [1969-74].  I can't see myself recommending this film to teens, but rather TO PARENTS OF TEENS.  We adults HAVE BEEN TEENS.  We know (or can be reminded by a film like this) what it was like to be a teen.  PERHAPS by watching a film like this we can be challenged to be BETTER ADULTS / ROLE MODELS / PARENTS to the teens around us.  Because otherwise, this is one very, very depressing and hopeless film ...


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Godzilla [2014] / Million Dollar Arm [2014]

As part of my contribution in our parish's participation in the Archdiocese of Chicago's Campaign "To Teach Who Christ Is," I've decided to forgo seeing (and therefore reviewing here) one or two movies a weekend and instead contribute the money I would have spent to the campaign.

I'm hoping to be strategic about this, picking movies that would "hurt somewhat" to miss, but movies that are neither "so bad" that I wouldn't see them anyway nor movies that I really should see/review or else my reviewing effort would cease to be worthwhile.

I will still try to provide links to usual line-up of reviewers that I also consider.  I just won't provide my own.  With all that in mind, this week the two movies that I'm foregoing seeing are:

Godzilla [2014] -- MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (3 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (3 1/2 stars)  AVClub (B+)

Million Dollar Arm [2014] -- MPAA (PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (2 Stars)  AVClub (C)


Those who follow my blog will recognize some pain in my selections as if not for the start of this campaign I would have CERTAINLY seen and reviewed Godzilla [2014] as I try to make it a point of seeing / reviewing films that I know a lot of the young people in my parish are going to see (in addition to reviewing more obscure movies that a lot of people would probably _not_ see but would seem in some way interesting).  Previously, I've reviewed and generally liked Transformers 3 [2011] and Pacific Rim [2013].  But I "wanted to make a splash" ;-) with this ... So Godzilla [2014] it is.  And by forgoing Godzilla [2014] this week, I'll be happily seeing Marvel's X-Men: Days of Future Past [2014] which comes out next weekend ;-)

As for Million Dollar Arm [2014], while as one who takes seriously the Catholic Church as a universal church and therefore I make it a point of trying to review both from and about people and places from  all over the world and I actually don't have that many films reviewed in my blog which are from/about India, after deciding not to see Godzilla [2014] this week, I couldn't bring myself to see Million Dollar Arm [2014] either ;-/.

So I'm going to try to forgo seeing one or two movies of some quality (but not 4 star quality) a week as my visible contribution to our parish campaign.  Hopefully this will both directly support it and help inspire others to make similar sacrifices that will "hurt" somewhat as well.