Another Earth [2011]

MPAA (PG-13) CNS/USCCB () Roger Ebert (3 ½ stars) Fr Dennis (3 ½ stars)

IMDb listing
Roger Ebert’s review

Another Earth (directed and cowritten by Mike Cahill along with Brit Marhling) is an independent-film which recently won 2 awards at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and IMHO deservedly so.

Driving home somewhat inebriated from a party, 17-year old Rhoda Williams (played by Brit Marhling) a talented student who had just been accepted into M.I.T (astrophysics, astronomy?), hears on the radio that a “new planet” _looking almost identical to the Earth_ had _just been discovered_ and _could be seen_ “just right of the north star” in the evening sky.  Looking-up at the sky for seemingly “just a second” to try to spot this new planet, she misses a stop-sign and crashes head-on into a stopped car at the intersection, putting the driver John Buroughs (played by William Mapother) into a coma and killing his wife and young son instantly.  Rhoda ends up serving 4 years in prison, presumably for DUI and manslaughter. 

After being released and not having really forgiven herself for what she had done, Rhoda takes a job as a janitor in her old high school.  (I just _loved_ the “cleaning lady” symbolism).  By chance, she comes across news that the driver of the car that she had hit had recovered from his coma some time back (apparently she did not learn of this while she was in prison) but that he had withdrawn from life, having given-up on his previous career as a composer and was simply living in an old broken down farmhouse somewhere in the nearby countryside.  She decides to go see him. 

When she arrives, he does not recognize her.  (He had been in a coma during her court proceeding at which she presumably plead guilty, and since she was a minor at the time of the accident her name apparently had not been publicly released).  Introducing herself as a cleaning lady, she offers to clean his home with a one-day-free trial.  He accepts.  Both impressed with her work and remaining utterly depressed (understanding that he was in no shape to take care of himself on his own), he hires her to come once a week to put his wreck of a house in order.

In the meantime, the story of the “Other Earth” does not go away.  Apparently this “Other Earth” was exactly identical to our Earth, only that for some reason had been previously hidden.  Visible now, it also proved not particularly far away (reachable by space flight).  During the course of this time, contact is attempted between this “other Earth” and ours.  When it is established, to _everyone's astonishment_, it is made between two scientists with exactly the same names, born on exactly the same days, one living on one Earth and the other on the other Earth (wow... ;-). 

An Australian sounding entrepreneur decides to build a space-craft that would fly from our Earth to the other one and offers an internet essay contest to _anyone_ who’d like to join him on this expedition.  Rhoda, who had previously wanted to be an astrophysicist, applies, writing a poignant essay recalling that the sailors who had done most of the sailing during the “European Age of Discovery” in the 1500s were "not the princes" but people, like her, at the margins of society, with stories to tell and pasts to expiate.  She of course wins.

In the meantime, as Rhoda cleans up John’s house, his life slowly improves and he starts to “have feelings" for Rhoda.  But of course "he does not know ..." What to do?

The rest of the film has its twists and turns, some rather predicable, some not.  The film has the feel of an old Twilight Zone episode.  And, of course there is a resolution. 

The basis of the story is a play on a theory, which is increasingly capturing the imagination of the public – that of a possibility of the existence of parallel universes, which differ only slightly from our own.  In one (statistical) conception of the theory, at _every point of decision_ that each of us comes to, the universe would split in two.  Presumably the final “outcome” of the Universe made up of all these parallel universes is the sum total of their individual outcomes.

So in this movie, a terrible accident happens just at the discovery of another identical world.  Guess what happened on the other world?

I really liked Another Earth and for _a lot of reasons_:  First, as I’ve written in this blog many times before, I am generally going to be a fan of low budget, independent creativity.  Second, I _really liked_ the theme of this movie of a search for redemption.  I _really liked_ Brit’s symbolic choice of profession (of “cleaning lady”) after returning home from prison.  It reminded me of Morgan Freeman’s portrayal of God as “maintenance man” in Bruce Almighty.  Finally, I do hope that a movie like this would encourage _all of us_ think a little, dream a little, reach out a little toward more ultimate questions than those that surround us in simply the day-to-day.  Day-to-day concerns certainly have their place, but they are _invitations_ to reach out to something more.  For we “do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” (Mt 4:4).


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Crazy, Stupid, Love

MPAA (PG-13) CNS/USCCB (O) Roger Ebert (3 stars) Fr Dennis (3 ½ stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1570728/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/11mv085.htm
Roger Ebert’s review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110727/REVIEWS/110729985

Crazy, Stupid, Love (directed by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, written by Dan Fogelman) is a good if mis-rated if very painful/funny romantic comedy for married forty-somethings with families.  I say mis-rated because while I _do_ understand why many parents would want their teens (and perhaps even certain tweens) to see this movie, I do believe that an R-rating (requiring that minors see it with their parents) would probably be more appropriate.  The language alone would justify the R-rating to say nothing of many “separated/divorcing parents acting stupid” situations.

But then the “separated/divorcing parents” situations are _exactly_ what makes the movie quite surprising, indeed compelling.  Ultimately unswayed, the CNS/USCCB gives the movie unsurprisingly an “O” (morally offensive rating).  Still there is a gentleness to this movie despite its many embarrassing situations that I do believe deserve consideration by families especially those that may be experiencing some problems (and the CNS/USCCB does recognize positive elements to this movie as well, even as it ultimately goes back to it's "O" conclusion.  So parents, I'm saying please read the CNS/USCCB review as well).

So, what’s the movie about?  The movie begins with 40-something married couple Cal (played by Steve Carell) and Emily (played by Julianne Moore) finishing dinner on a night-out.  Cal asks Emily what she wants for dessert.  She answers that she’s trying to figure out what she wants.  He announces that he’d like a slice of apple pie, she announces that she’d like a divorce.

The drive home is awkward.  Emily talks mostly in tears as she is driving about how they’ve drifted apart, and that yes, she’s gone to bed with a man in her office David Linghagan (played by Kevin Bacon).  Cal remains mostly stunned and silent, until after being pressed by Emily to say _something_ he declares that he’d just like to drop-out of the car, opens the door and does so (fortunately, they were near home, going rather slow on a residential street ...).  Now stunned herself, she stops the car, goes out to him as he brushes himself off.  He tells her that he’ll move out that night, and get his things as soon as he finds some kind of an apartment.

They come home where 17-year old babysitter Jessica (played by Analeigh Tipton) is waiting for them.  She’s had a quite a night as well, as she accidently caught Cal and Emily's 13-year-old son Robbie (played by Jonah Bobo) touching himself (Emily and Cal also had a smaller 8-or-so year old daughter) whereupon Robbie confessed that he was touching himself while he thought of her.  The strangeness of her evening is trumped however by Cal and Emily’s announcement to her that they are getting a divorce.

Why would they tell her, of all people, first?  Well they were both in shock.  And besides someone had to drive Jessica home, and it would explain why Cal was doing so, since Cal is leaving the house anyway... In the car, it becomes clear that Jessica is not only stunned that Cal and Emily are getting a divorce but that she’s also kind of had a crush on Cal.  Cal doesn’t respond to this at all and probably for two reasons: One, he’s not an idiot (and is basically a good man, as is _everybody_ in this story as we progressively learn). But also two, he was in shock about what happened at dinner with his wife.  So he just drops her off and her parents house and heads off, to a bar.

At the bar, he first runs into local playboy Jacob (played by Ryan Gosling), who the audience had already seen in action in a previous scene in which he struck-out with one young lady, Hannah (played by Emma Stone) and rebounding, scored with someone else.  Jacob is everything that Cal is not. 

Trying to drown his sorrows in the succeeding days, Cal goes to the bar a few more times always to run into Jacob there as well.  Jacob is scoring and Cal is moaning.  Finally Jacob gets irritated with Cal’s rather loud and repetitive complaints about how his wife left him (and was sleeping with another guy).  So Jacob calls Cal over.  He first reminds him that thanks to his loud complaints everybody in that bar probably knows more about Cal’s life than they should.  Then, he offers to help him “recover his manhood.”  Why would he do that?  Jacob himself says that Cal reminds him of someone he knew.  In any case, Jacob pulls Cal out of his funk, gets him a haircut, advises him on buying some new clothes, and teaches him a few lines.  Soon Cal is starting to score with the women at that bar as well.

Very good.  Why would there be _anything_ redeeming about this movie at all?  It’s what follows.  There _are_ a fair number of twists and a good number of awkward situations.  But as the dust settles at the end, EVERYONE HAS BEEN CHASTENED FOR THEIR SINS (often initially in surprising ways, but when one thinks about it, not all that surprising) BUT JUST AS IMPORTANTLY EVERYONE IS STILL STANDING and ARGUABLY HAPPY and _in their proper state_. 

I’ve seen a whole bunch of Steve Carell movies over the years including 40 Year Old Virgin, Evan Almighty, Get Smart, Dinner for Schmucks, Dispicable Me, Date Night and now this one.  ALL OF THEM were fundamentally _gentle_, even when in pretty much _all of them_, Steve Carell _plays the fool_ for the others.  I _really like_ Steve Carell’s stuff.  I like the gentleness and I like fundamentally positive message of his movies: we may often be weak, we may make mistakes, but that we are fundamentally good and certainly redeemable. Good job Steve and good job rest of the cast and crew!  And yes, the other performances by Emma Stone, Ryan Gosling, Julianne Moore, Kevin Bacon and even the babysitter Analiah Tipton and Marisa Tomei (as one of 13-year-old Robbie's school teachers) were _all_ good to excellent as well.

ADDENDUM:

Given some of the controversy surrounding one of the subplots in this film involving (off-screen) teenage sexting, I was wondering if someone like Chris Rock should redo this movie in a couple of years, perhaps even having a white wife (and hence mixed race children).  I say this because the people who end up suffering the most as a result of morality laws tend to be black men. As of a few years ago, there were black male minors in jail for having been caught with white girlfriends in sexually compromising situations for which it'd be next to _impossible_ to believe white male minors would find themselves serving time.

I personally think that sexting is unbelievably reckless (and yes, sinful). But given technology and teenage hormones, I find it to be almost inevitable (among teens). But it horrifies to me to hear of teenage lives destroyed by something (and again, often enough _black teenage lives_ destroyed by something) that wasn't intended to destroy anyone.

In any case, I liked this movie, definitely_not_ for its sexting. Rather, I liked it because, as in the case of many Steve Carell movies, at the end of this movie EVERYONE was left standing, and EVERYONE was basically happy. There were no "goats", no "villains." Carell finds/makes movies like this over and over again. And that I believe is a wonderful thing!


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Cowboys and Aliens

MPAA (PG-13) CNS/USCCB (L) Roger Ebert (3 stars) Fr Dennis (3 stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0409847/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/11mv084.htm
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110727/REVIEWS/110729987

Cowboys and Aliens (directed by Jon Favreau, screenplay by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman and others, based on a graphic novel by Scott Michael Rosenberg the same name, and at least partly supported by Stephen Spielberg, who served as one of the film’s executive producers) has one of the most audacious and clearly _intentionally unreal_ plot-lines of a major American motion picture made in years:

Stock characters (Cowboys, Indians, Outlaws, Lawmen, shop-keepers, womenfolk, youngsters and even a cute and very faithful dog) from a typical  American pulp-Western story (set in the l870s in the American South-West) are confronted by a sudden, unexpected but existential challenge posed by a foraging/data-collecting/mining expedition (representing an advanced guard?) of a technologically superior alien race from outer space.

Similar stories of an otherwise divided humanity uniting to fight a common (alien) enemy have been put on film before, notably Independence Day and Signs.  Interestingly enough, I’ve probably enjoyed Cowboys and Aliens the most, precisely because it was so obviously a parable and set sufficiently back in time to be “safe.”  For instance, I remember a number of Servites (members of my religious order) from Latin America scoffing at the “message” of Independence Day finding offense that its climactic battle was fought on “The Fourth of July” and led by the Americans (how convenient ... as a propaganda piece, "Big Brother America leading the rest”).

In Cowboys and Aliens, the “cowboys” find themselves being suddenly treated as badly (or worse) by the technologically superior space-aliens as they were treating the technologically inferior “Indians." Both groups find themselves needing to cooperate to confront the new existential threat.  Indeed, even the “cowboys’” vocabulary changes as the threat presents itself, with the cowboys starting to talk about the need protect “their people.”  This of course is the message and echoes a famous speech made by Ronald Reagan at the United Nations during his presidency in which he noted that all our world’s differences would probably fall quickly aside if we were to face an existential threat from an alien race. 

The performances of the various human characters are excellent – Daniel Craig playing the Outlaw Jake Lonergan, Harrison Ford playing Col. Woodrow Dolarhyde, a crusty Civil War veteran turned rancher a with no-good lout of a son Percy (played by Paul Dano) and Dolarhyde's right-hand man, if Indian born, named Nat Colorado (played by Adam Beach) who Dolarhyde took under his wing, when he saw him orphaned.  (Nat was far more responsible and a better “son” to Dolarhyde than Percy ever was, but Dolarhyde could never bring himself to call him that because of his “Injun past.”).  There’s the Sheriff John Taggartt (played by Keith Carridine) his spunky grandson Emmett Taggartt (playe by Noah Ringer).  There’s a plainspoken, gunslinging preacher named Meacham (played by Clancy Brown) and hapless Saloon owner named Doc (played by Sam Rockwell) and his devoted if initially probably far more capable wife Maria (played by Ana de la Reguera).  There’s Black Knife (played by Raoul Trujillo) a young but wise for his age Indian chief  leading a local and recently decimated band of Apache Indians.  Finally, there’s Ella Swensen (played by Olivia Wilde) a beautiful and mysterious character who seems to know more about the alien threat these humans are facing and how best to defeat them (and who as is often the case in the sci-fi/horror genre turns out to have a special role to play).

Yes it’s a story.  Yes, it’s a preposterous one.  On the other hand, perhaps precisely because Cowboys and Aliens is so preposterous, I found it quite easy to enter and watch.  All these characters are symbolic and the whole story plays out around a town called Absolution – as classic and symbolic a name as one could come-up with for a good ol’ Cowboy and Indian Western story even if, in this case, it is mashed-up with “space aliens.” ;-).

Finally, while Cowboys and Aliens is certainly a preposterous story, I would note that in current UFO lore there _is_ place in New Mexico called Dulce Mountain where supposedly there’s an underground base from which space aliens have been conducting abductions/animal mutilations for decades if not for centuries. As I watched the movie, I could not help but think that, _fictional_ as it is, that it was at least partly inspired by these stories and Indian legends.


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Conan Can't Stop

MPAA (R) CNS/USCCB () Roger Ebert (3 stars) Fr Dennis (3 stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1864288/
Roger Ebert -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110622/REVIEWS/110629993

Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop (directed by Rodman Flender) is a documentary which followed Conan O’Brien on his nation-wide comedy tour after his having been been first promoted and then 6 months later deposed as host of NBC’s Tonight Show. 

Much has certainly been written about his drama involving the transition of the hosting of the Tonight Show from Jay Leno to Conan O’Brien and then six months later back to Jay Leno.  However, what interested me first in the story and then in this documentary is that the Conan-Leno-Tonight Show saga doesn’t appear to me to be an isolated one but one which has played out in other areas in contemporary culture.  Indeed, I noted and wrote about this battle of the old vs new (and the apparent triumph/restoration of the old) in my review of this year’s Academy Awards show where I found this phenomenon repeatedly playing out from the triumph of The King’s Speech at the awards – a film about a stuttering dead English king from the middle of the last century to the blasting by (mostly older critics) of this year’s show’s new and very young hosts.

So I do believe that what had happened to Conan is not really an isolated incident but indeed a manifestation of an age-old battle between generations (old vs new) that even Sigmund Freud wrote about as the point of origin of war, civilization and even "Father/Patriarchical religion:"  A jealous father drives his sons away to keep his power / women to himself.  The exiled sons organizing themselves a band of brothers eventually overwhelm the father killing him.  But feeling guilty about this, they eventually deify the now dead/murdered father (S. Freud, Moses and Monotheism [1939], pg 130-131, Totem and Taboo [1950], pg 140-41, Civilization and its Discontents [1961], pg 47-48).  Interestingly enough, with the advent of diminished numbers of births due to the wide use of birth-control, this inter-generational conflict could actually have tilted in favor of the older generation (The older generation doesn't have to find excuses for wars anymore to cull the numbers of the younger generation.  The younger generation's numbers are now controlled at conception).  So expect more Conan O"Brien-like sagas in the future and more tear-jerking movies / miniseries about long dead white English kings (or even about long-dead corrupt Popes) and other symbols of Order and Stability.

So then, what could one say about this particular documentary?  First and above all, it is a movie about someone going through a fairly large disappointment in life.  Whether or not Conan “really was right” for the Tonight Show, whether he felt he entitled to it (after many years hosting NBC’s Late Night Show after it), whether or not he was promised it by NBC and then had that promise ripped away from him, it was clear that Conan was wounded by the experience.  So the documentary was largely about Conan making his way through that experience of disappointed and woundedness to something new.

In the process, a number of other things became rather clear.  First, Conan really is an _authentically funny guy_ and one capable of laughing at himself.  Promo “Where has Conan been these days?” shots for his comedy tour included him donning a _huge_ fake beer-gut, and lying passed out among empty pizza boxes and beer bottles.  As a __quite good guitarist_ in his own right, the blues song that Conan played for his audiences while on the tour – “I was born upper middle class” (“My ma, worked every day of her life – as a tax lawyer.  And my no good, no good dad was microbiologist, studying infectious diseases I believe ...”) – was hilarious.  Noting that NBC “probably still owned” the rights to the “Masturbating Bear” character on his old show, he unveiled a ever so slightly different “Self Pleasuring Panda” character to his cheering audiences.

All this is goofy, silly stuff, that made him such a hit among young people at the time-slot following the Tonight Shot.  Still, as he went through these very, very funny routines, it also reminded me of why this couldn’t have possibly worked on the Tonight Show whose viewers generally have been rather heavily stocked with seniors including seniors from my own parish.  Funny, yes, but would you imagine your grandma watching this stuff?

Finally, I was left wondering if all that many college aged young adults really care about the Tonight show either, especially since they can view and share clips from any of a large number of “late night comedians” (George Lopez, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and yes Conan O’Brien) any time they wish anyway.  So I was left wondering if Conan’s “tragedy” had been that tried and failed to become the “Captain of the U.S.S. Missouri” (or perhaps even the U.S.S. Arizona) in an age of Twitter, flash mobs, WikiLeaks, remote control Predator drones and cyber-warfare. 

So Conan, yes, you sort of got screwed.  But get over it.  The Tonight Show is going the way of network news and the Radio City Rockettes.  Just remember your friends, your fans, and yes you probably staged the best damn end to any talk-show on American TV with Will Farrell joining him playing Free Bird ;-).


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A Love Affair of Sorts

MPAA (NR) CNS/USCCB () Roger Ebert (1 ½ stars) Fr. Dennis (3 stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1776033/
Rober Ebert’s Review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110713/REVIEWS/110719993
AV Club Review -
http://www.avclub.com/articles/a-love-affair-of-sorts,57974/

A Love Affair of Sorts (directed by David Guy Levi and story by him and Lili Bordán both of whom also starred in the movie) is an experimental film that recently played at Facets Multimedia here in Chicago.   I became intrigued by the film when I read its listing on Facets' website promising that the movie was the first to be filmed in its entirety using cheap commercially available “flip" cameras.  Last year, I saw such cameras on sale at a Walmart.

A number of the reviewers have since panned the movie -- The youth oriented AV Club (the “serious side” of The Onion newspaper) gave the movie a D+ – but that did not dissuade me from taking a stab at seeing the film, and it proved to be a generally good decision to have taken the chance.

I have been a long-time booster of youth oriented/inspired, low-budget ingenuity – As a teen I loved Han Solo’s “Millenium Falcon” from Star Wars and I have generally squeezed every ounce of creative capacity out of any computer or item of consumer electronics that I have ever bought since.  As a young adult in the 1980s, I loved the Macgyver series.  In the 1990s, not long after I bought a Sony Handycam, I was more than impressed with what the makers of Blair Witch Project did with cameras basically of the same quality.  I enjoyed the premise of the recent movie Super-8, which was a nostalgic look back amateur film-making using Super 8 film cameras, that I knew well when I was a kid.  Finally, I was very impressed by the low budget creativity shown by the makers of Paranormal Activity I (and II, which I reviewed early in this blog).  I’ve also done my own “filming” in recent years of “waves,”  “fog” or “snow on Lake Michigan” or “autumn leaves in a forest preserve” using nothing more than the “movie option” on a low-end pocket digital camera.  So I was more than intrigued this movie’s technical challenge.  

I also think that I “got” (understood) the film’s premise as well:  Two “regular people” “meet” and decide to do a film project together, documenting their lives during the (Christmas/Hanukkah/New Year’s) Holiday season in 2009.  A _key twist_ in the story presented itself in the middle of the film, when it is revealed that _one_ of the two “regular people,” a “Hungarian au pair” named Enci (the other being the film’s director David), is actually being played by an actress (Lili Bordán).   So this “documentary” about "two regular people during the Holidays" turns out to _not_ be a documentary after all.

I thought the premise was awesome and actually quite important for people to realize – Just because something appears to “regular” / “common” etc, does not mean that it is not _staged_.  In this regard, A Love Affair of Sorts becomes a low-budget “regular people’s” rendition of the movie Wag the Dog, a very important (and arguably prophetic) movie of from the Clinton era, which also noted that in the media age everything, _even wars_, can be “staged.”

Finally, the film dealt with quite well (in that it was able to avoid) what one would expect to be a definite pitfall in this kind of amateur film-making (and a pitfall that would make PARENTS of teens understandably very nervous): Given “two people and couple of flip cameras” trying to “tell the story of a Holiday season together,” an “amateur film” of this sort, could have _easily_ fallen into the realm of porn.  To their credit, both the protagonists in the film (who were _also_ the film’s makers) were professional enough to not let the film collapse in that direction.  However, as one watches this film, one _could imagine_ how easily the film could have gone that way.  (It is also clear that the two protagonists/film-makers were aware of the boundary because _they did flirt with it_ -- the movie's called A Love Affair of Sorts, after all --  but they clearly recognized that they had a far better/more compelling movie if they didn't cross the line).

As such, while I would recommend this movie to _college aged young adults and above_, I would _not_ recommend this movie to teens or else _only_ with caution. I write this because it is _so easy_ to imagine a group of initially well-meaning teens to screw-up an “amateur film project” of this sort that they conceived themselves and end-up on all kinds of trouble.

Seriously, teens if you pick-up a camera, be very, very careful, because _if you screw-up_ and film something inappropriate _you_ could literally end up in jail (and on a sex offender list) with _your_ life ruined.

But if you’re a _young adult_ (already over 18) and make it a point to _work only with adults_ (and avoid the _cheesiness_ of porn) you could actually end up producing some really good stuff.  Indeed, a whole bunch of professional film-makers, from Martin Scorcese on down have _long said_ that the future of film is more what one sees on YouTube than what one sees at the theatre.

So with those words of caution, I have to say that I enjoyed the creativity of this film and I hope continue to _generally_ be a booster of such creativity in the future.


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Friends with Benefits [2011]

MPAA (R) CNS/USCCB (O) Roger Ebert (3 stars) Fr. Dennis (2 ½ stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1632708/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/11mv082.htm
Roger Ebert’s review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110720/REVIEWS/110729998

Friends with Benefits (directed by Will Gluck and co-written by Keith Merrymen, David A. Newman and others and starring Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake in the leading roles) is the second romantic comedy to be released in recent months exploring the meaning of current American jargon in the dating arena, the other movie being No Strings Attached starring Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher in the leading roles.  Perhaps, it should also be noted here that Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman co-starred together in last year’s movie Black Swan, which earned Portman an academy award for best actress in a leading role and many felt that Kunis deserved at least a nomination for best supporting actress as well.  So whatever else one may think of these movies (as well as the performances of the leading men, Kutcher and Timberlake) these two actresses can’t easily be dismissed anymore as “lightweights.”

Having said this, what then could (or should) one say on this blog regarding Friends with Benefits and No Strings Attached?   As I wrote in my review of No Strings Attached, NSA could be considered simply as a “day dream,” in the tradition of the tradition of romantic comedies dating back to Shakespeare's era like Midsummer Night’s Dream and more recently the famous Beach Boys’ song “Wouldn’t it be nice...?”  And after all is said and done, Hollywood comes to _the same conclusion_ that Holy Mother Church (acting _exactly_ as a _good_ and worried mother) would advise all along: that it’s impossible even on a relational/emotional (in Church/Magisterial speak “unitive”) level to become involved with someone sexually with “no strings attached.”  It can’t be done because one or the other in the couple is going to “fall in love” or come to understand the sexual relationship to be _more_ than “just” a sexual relationship.  And the Church, again _as a good mother, concerned for all her children_ would take the side of the person who was hurt.

I do believe that the expression “Friends with Benefits” is even more problematic than “No Strings Attached.”  NSA is at least honest in that it seeks to “play tag” with flat-out fantasy: that one could (or should be able to) have sex with someone without any consequences.  That’s simply a fantasy even in the emotional/relational/unitive realm.  “Friends with Benefits” assumes that two comprising the couple in question are already _friends_, hence that they already like/respect each other as friends.  Then, since they are entering into a sexual relationship, they are also physically attracted to each other.  At this point, one could imagine one’s family (and this plays out in this movie) _and hence _Holy Mother Church_ throwing its hands up in the air in exasperation, asking quite sincerely: WHAT ELSE DO YOU WANT?  And I do believe that this is a fair relational question that anyone seeing this movie, or any couple contemplating a “friends with benefits” relationship ought to ask: What am I / are we wanting to do here?  We’re already friends, we’re already attracted to each other?  What’s preventing me/us from calling the relationship what it is, _serious_, and why _should_ MARRIAGE (even EVENTUAL MARRIAGE) be considered “out of the question?”

It should also be noted here as I already mentioned in the review of the other movie, No Strings Attached, that THE ENTIRE PREMISE of a NSA (or in this case FWB) relationship _depends_ on contraception, certainly in the heterosexual realm (which still is, and by simple statistics will simply always be the normative relationship model.  The number of gay relationships will always be relatively small in relation to the number of heterosexual relationships).  Here again, the voice of Holy Mother Church, articulated best perhaps by Pope John Paul II in his encyclical Evangelium Vitae (the Gospel of Life) deserves _at least a hearing_.  He notes that even when contraception “works,” it has consequences: In the context of a “contraceptive mentality” the accidental conception of a child becomes a disaster or failure (EV #13.2).  Paraphrasing now and using _my own_ rather evocative phrasing ;-), a child conceived “accidentally” ought never to be thought of as having been conceived "as a result of a breach” that is, as a “spawn of Chernobyl” or something like that.

Then additionally, it should be noted that the whole contraceptive mentality runs in opposition to much of contemporary thinking.  I personally find it fundamentally contradictory for someone to be a vegitarian, eat only “organically grown foods,” oppose nuclear power and pretty much any hydroelectric project as being _inherently unsafe_ and “playing God,” etc and then _uncritically_ accept the birth control pill and condoms as _inherently safe and effective_.  Condoms fail (and generally _due to human error_) far more frequently than nuclear containment buildings and birth control pills re-engineer chemically hundreds of millions of women’s reproductive systems for the duration of their use of the pill.  Human experience has taught us to be skeptical of the safety claims of scientists in virtually every other realm from franken-foods, to the space shuttle, to nuclear power plants.  Why should one uncritically believe that birth control pills are _by definition_, “amen, alleluia”_inherently safe_?   I mention this simply to note the contradiction in thinking in popular society today and to note that the Catholic Church _has a point_ in its skepticism of the validity and ultimate morality of artificial birth control.

Wow.  All this to think about / reflect on as a result of a “simple rom com”???  Well welcome to life ;-) And yes, I’ve long believed that if one is going to evangelize, make comprehensible the Gospel and the teachings of the Church in the world today, one has to engage (and not simply condemn) popular culture. 

Would I recommend this movie?  Yes as a discussion piece to college aged young adults and above.  Also some of the supporting performances in the movie, notably Woody Harrelson playing an over-the-top studly gay coworker of Justine Timberlake, Richard Jenkins playing Timberlake’s beginnings of Alzheimer’s afflicted father, Patricia Clarkson playing Mila Kunis’ “still stuck in the ‘60s” mother are worthy of mention and and some discussion (notably Harrelson's whose enthusiastically gay lifestyle suggests that in the homosexual arena, NSA/FWB relationships are entirely possible).  But the central question asked in this movie is whether the concept “Friends with Benefits” is a worthy and ultimately workable one in the heterosexual arena.  And it should not surprise anyone here that as in NSA, Hollywood comes down on this matter actually quite close to Mother Church’s view (at least with regards to the relational dimension), that it just doesn't work. 

FINALLY NOTE TO PARENTS: The movie's R-RATING is _entirely appropriate_.  While the nudity in this movie is rather minimal, much more takes place in the movie’s bedroom scenes (yes, "covered by a sheet," but ...) than most parents would probably be comfortable with if they were viewing this movie with their pre-teens or teens.  People are people, parents are parents, but at least you have been warned.  Still, for the college-aged and above, I do think it is a great movie "to talk about."


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Captain America: The First Avenger

MPAA (PG-13) CNS/USCCB (A-II) Roger Ebert (3 stars) Fr. Dennis (3 stars)

IMDb listing
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0458339/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/11mv081.htm
Roger Ebert’s Review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110720/REVIEWS/110729997

Captain America: The First Avenger (directed by Joe Johnson, screenplay by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely) is one of a slew of comic book superhero movies to be released in recent months.  First published in the months leading up to the U.S. entry into World War II, the Captain America comic book series published by Marvel Comics were conceived as being intentionally patriotic.  The arguably propagandistic past of the Captain America character proved both an opportunity and a challenge to the makers of the current film.  And in my opinion, Johnson, et al _succeeded_ in their task.

The opportunity that director Johnson and the writers were able to identify and then advantage of was to set the movie in the America of the Captain America comic books of the 1940s.   So the comic’s protagonist Steve Rogers (played by Chris Evans) is introduced as a short, scrawny 90 pound teenager from Brooklyn who spent most of his life standing up to (and getting beaten-up) by assorted bullies.  With the U.S. entry into the war, Rogers tries to enlist in the army.  Indeed, he tries to enlist four separate times, but gets rejected - 4F - each time for simply being unfit for service.  The head of the local enlistment board tells him, “Son, I’m just saving your life.”  

Meeting a long time friend James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes (played by Sabastian Stan), who as per the movie saved him from all kinds of bullies over the years and who’s about to “ship out” to Europe to go to war, Rogers goes with him to a “Future Exposition” in New York.  There, at yet another recruiting booth, Rogers tries yet again to enlist.  There he catches the eye of a German accented scientist Dr. Abraham Erskine (played by Stanley Tucci) who’s moved by Roger’s desire to serve.   So he comes over to Rogers and asks him, “So you want to kill Nazis?”  Rogers answers yes.  Dr. Erskine goes through his recruiting record and tells him that he could help him.  He’s responsible for a military experiment that would make him much, much stronger.  Roger’s agrees and Dr. Erskine changes his recruitment classification from 4F to A1 and Rogers is inducted.

Colonel Chester Philips (played by Tommy Lee Jones) responsible for Roger’s basic training is utterly unimpressed with Rogers who is a foot shorter than all the other recruits and simply can’t keep up with the others in their physical fitness drills.  Still the good German (and _probably_ Jewish) immigrant doctor insists that Rogers _be the first_ of the soldiers to be given the experimental treatment that he has devised to make him stronger.  When Rogers asks about the treatment, whether it’s ever been tried before, Dr. Erskine answers that yes, one fanatical Nazi soldier had demanded the treatment because it promised to make him invincible.  Dr.Erskine tells Rogers that the treatment went awry with that soldier and that the consequences of that experiment convinced him that the treatment should be applied only to the weak because they would appreciate the gift of becoming strong. 

The treatment involved injecting the muscles of the subject with a serum.  To do so, Rogers is placed in a metal casket fitted with syringes to inject the muscles of his body all at the same time. Then a good deal of electrical current is run through him and after a scene involving sparks and electrical arcs befitting Frankenstein the casket is opened and Rogers is now a foot taller and much, much stronger.  Almost immediately after Rogers steps out of his casket, Dr. Erskine is assassinated right in front of him by someone who turns out to be a German agent who’s been watching the experiment and steals the remainder of Dr. Erskine’s serum.  Rogers, now with super human speed and strength runs down the agent, who swallows a cyanide pill to avoid interrogation but not before ominously telling Rogers, “I’m a member of Hydra.  You kill one of us, and two others will spring in our place.”

An instant hero for killing the German agent and now looking like a _perfect physical specimen_ of a soldier, Rogers is given the name “Captain America” put in a red-white-and-blue uniform, cape and mask along with a shield and is then used by the Army to recruit _other soldiers_ and sell war bonds.  Damn.  What Rogers _really wanted to do_ was to actually serve/fight.

Of course he gets his chance.  And the mysterious group, Hydra, is headed by non-other the Nazi soldier, Johann Schmidt (played by Hugo Weaving) who had undergone Dr. Erskine’s treatment.  Schmidt also has a secret ... 

Helping Rogers / Captain America is Peggy Carter (played by Hayley Atwell) a British agent who had served as an assistant to Dr. Erskine’s work as well as the Howard Hughes-like American industrialist Howard Stark (played by Dominic Cooper) who becomes important as the father of Tony Stark of Marvel Comic’s Iron Man series (Tony Stark being played recently in film versions of that series by Robert Downey, Jr).

Captain America comes to do many great things during the War, coming to fight, above all, this Johann Schmidt.  Near the end of the war though, Captain America is able to save the United States from a devastating air-attack planned by Schmidt.  In the course of bringing down the giant Nazi flying wing that would have wreaked havoc on the whole of the American seaboard, Captain America is brought down somewhere over the Arctic wastelands.  He’s lost forever?  Or is he? 

I have to say that I enjoyed the film.  Yes, the story is of a comic book quality, the characters being larger-than-life and having only the basic outlines of personality.  But the story was based on a World War II era comic book.  And then the story presented the origins of “Captain America’s” persona in a sympathetic manner.  He was a scrawny “kid from Brooklyn” who was made strong with the aid of an immigrant scientist and who used that strength to do basically good, even though many times those around him didn’t know how best to use him. 

I’m not sure how this movie will fly overseas.  In some some countries, the movie was renamed “The First Avenger” rather than “Captain America.”  But I do have to say that all things considered, the movie was done very well.  It portrayed World War II era America very well and yes America to this day would relate to that “kid from Brooklyn” made quasi-miraculously strong but seeking to use that strength then (generally) for the good of all.


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