Quartet [2012]

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

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Roger Ebert's review

Quartet (directed by Dustin Hoffman, original play and adapted screenplay by Ronald Harwood) is a lovely arguably too idyllic story about growing old, retirement and coming to terms with it all.  I say the story may grate some folks as being "too idyllic" because it is centered around the life at "Beecham House" a retirement community  "somewhere in England" for former operatic singers and classical musicians.  As such, this is not exactly the average "senior community," much less a nursing home that the vast majority of Americans would understand (and often honestly and with some reason fear...).

That being said, the story is a reminder that economics aside, coming to terms with "growing old," fixing what relationships need to be fixed, etc is still not easy.  And perhaps with economic questions largely set-aside in this film (though central to the story is actually the "plot device" of the residents having to perform an annual "benefit concert" to help pay for the continued operation of their lovely retirement home) the more universal concerns of "grief" / "loss" and reconciliation can come to fore.

Central to the story is the attempt to bring back together for said benefit concert the four operatic singers, all now retired and -- with the arrival last, Jean Horton (played by Maggie Smith) -- all now living at Beecham House, for a reprise of their famed performance/recording of the Rigoletto Quartet (YouTube) by GiuseppeVerdi.  This, of course proves "not particularly easy," as there are egos and past hurts that need to be overcome.  Reginald Paget (played by Tom Courtenay) had been briefly married to Jean when they were young and their marriage collapsed after Jean confessed to cheating on him (once) while she (apparently always a bit more successful than he) had been singing for a season at "La Scala" in Rome.  Reginald also has seemed to have a tougher time of retirement than former colleague Wilf Bond (played by Billy Connolly) who enjoys happily flirting young women in his old age in contrast to Reginald's (remember, he had been hurt by someone cheating with his wife ...) wounded rigidity on the matter.  Still Reginald has tried to "keep himself young" in another way: by engaging the contemporary generation of young musicians and keeping up with their styles and times (Operatic singer though he was, he seemed quite happy to engage and applaud the ability of a young rapper he encounters during a music theory/history class that Reginald continues to offer in his retirement).  Finally, there is the good-hearted Cissy Robson (played by Pauline Collins) who has remembered the four's long-ago recording of the Rigoletto Quartet as one of the high points of her life, and apparently not just from a "career" point of view, but simply that their previous time working together had brought her great joy. 

Much of course needs to be fixed/reconciled as the story progresses ... but it makes then for a very, very nice story such coming to terms with the Past, the Present and even what awaits in the Future.  So it all does make for a very lovely story offering everyone much to reflect on as one considers these questions in the context of his/her life as well. 


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Warm Bodies [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Chicago Sun-Times (3 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (A. Shaw) review
Chicago Sun-Times (R. Roeper) review
AVClub (T. Robinson) review

Warm Bodies (screenplay and directed by Jonathan Levine, based on the novel by Isaac Marion) is a surprisingly gentle "post-Apocalyptic" teen oriented love-story between a young zombie who's still trying really hard "to communicate" but, among other things, can only remember that his name had once begun with the letter "R" (played by Nicholas Hoult) and a cute teenage/young adult girl named Julie (played by Teresa Palmer) with a "super protective dad" (played by John Malkovich).  Readers, what do these names remind you of...? ;-)

Now Julie's dad was the military officer (National Guard?) responsible for defending what's left of their town and he did so by building AN ENORMOUS WALL around it to keep the remaining healthy humans inside the walled-off city and the infected flesh/brain-eating zombies outside.  HOWEVER, every so often, he (a necessarily older/middle-aged military commander) had to allow his necessarily younger "soldiers"/"charges" (including his daughter and her other universally militarily trained friends...) pass outside the walls (in foraging parties) to search for needed supplies so that the inhabitants from walled-off city could continue to survive.  Here the analogy may not be pefect, but once again, Readers, what contemporary situation does the predicament Julie, Julie's dad and the rest of the surviving humans in the completely "walled off city"_kinda_ remind you of?

Well during one of those "military" incursions/excursions, "R" runs into Julie and after killing Julie's boyfriend (played by Dave Franco) and then necessarily "eating his brain" (after all, that's how zombies feed themselves) "falls in love" with Julie abducting (but not killing) her.  The rest of the film unspools from there.

Among what both Julie and "R" discover is that "R's" zombified condition IS REVERSIBLE.  The experience of compassion makes "R's" heart and then of his best friend "M's" (played by Rob Corddry) beat again.  This excites, above all Julie's best friend Nora (played by Analeigh Tipton).  Like all the young people of her town, Nora's had to go through military training and carry weapons to defend the town from zombies, but what she always really wanted to be was "to be a nurse."  Now "zombieism" proved to be a TREATABLE CONDITION.

However, things are still not that easy.  There are the "recently zombified people" and there are the "hard-core zombified" people called "bonies" (all that's left of them are ligaments and bones even though they are as hungry for human flesh/brains as the others) who "R" introduces as "those zombified people who just gave up hope."  These "bonies" still have to be dealt with...

Anyway, while not a perfect parable about compassion/reconciliation -- the zombified people were still treated as only having been sick (victims) without having anything positive to offer ("healthy") humanity from their experience -- I can't but be in awe at the film's BEAUTIFUL, YOUTHFUL OPTIMISM.  Even "flesh/brain eating zombies" are redeemable.  How wonderful is that!

Finally, a note to Parents:  This, IMHO, is a completely appropriately rated PG-13 film.  While the zombies may still be a bit too frightening to smaller children, by the time one gets to the "tween age" they'd probably be able to handle it.  And it's just a nice story (and arguably _less violent_ and certainly with a happier ending) than the Shakespearean story that it's largely based on :-)

SO GOOD JOB FOLKS, HONESTLY, GOOD JOB!


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Movie 43 [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  Chicago Sun-Times (0 Stars)  AVClub (D-)  Fr. Dennis (1 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
Chicago Sun-Times (R. Roeper) review
AVClub (N. Rabin) review

Movie 43 is actually a series of shorts each written, directed and acted by different people.  Coherence, such that it is, to the film is given by narrative featuring a writer/director named Charlie Wessler (played by Dennis Quaid) pitching the idea of a film composed of a series of shorts to a mid-level studio exec named Griffen Schraeder (played by Greg Kinnaer).  The central joke in the film is that Charlie Wessler is, of course, completely insane and the film that he's proposing is, except as a joke..., utterly unmakeable.  But then even as he's talking about these series of really stupid, generally over-the-top ridiculously offensive shorts, the viewers get to see these really stupid, often obscene shorts (often acted-out by some of Hollywood's top actors/actors) play out.  So we see an "utterly unmakeable" movie being "made" even as it is being simply "discussed as a hypothetical..."

The result is a really, really stupid R-rated with a huge capital R film.  Honestly parents, there's no reason at all to take a minor to this film and plenty of reasons not to.

That said, I do have to say that a number of the shorts, if borderline unspeakable, are very very funny.

Consider a couple of the vignettes:

(1) Kate Winslet plays Beth, a busy Manhattan executive being set-up to go on a blind date.  As the short begins, she's listing to her friend all the concerns that she has as she approaches this blind date.  Is he an unemployed "loser"? (No, he made senior partner at his law firm at 28).  Is he therefore "all business"?  (No, he's volunteered weekly at a homeless shelter for years and is on the board of numerous philantropic boards across the city).  Is he therefore fat, out of shape?  (No he's "run triathlons" or whatever...).  So they meet by the restaurant, Kate's character is impressed.  "Davis" (played by Hugh Jackman) is the good looking, benevolent, witty lawyer that she's been told that he is, EXCEPT when he takes off his scarf as they enter the restaurant, he's shown to have ONE utterly UNSPEAKABLE (and, indeed, obscene...) "defect" on his neck ;-).  The rest of the short proceeds from there ...

(2) Samantha (played by Naomi Watts) and Sean (played by Alex Crammer) share "the joys" of "homeschooling" their teenage son Kevin (played by Jeremy Allen White) to their new neighbors (played by Liev Schriver and Julie Ann Emery) telling them that they've wanted their son to have "the whole experience of high school" even if he was studying at home.  So Samantha (Kevin's mom) repeatedly knocks Kevin's books down as he carries them around the house (presumably to go to different classes) calling him a "loser."  His dad has him performing exhausting and humiliating drills on their drive way as part of after school "sports practice."  They even wanted him to have the "awkward experience having his first kiss."  So _both_ of Kevin's parents, Samantha and Sean, "hit on him." Sean (dad) in particular sitting next to Kevin tells him ever so awkwardly, "I'm not like into guys, but if I was, you'd be like totally who I'd be into..." (Insanely "Yuck" ... but also, honestly IMHO very funny.  What a nightmare THAT would be...!)

(3) Vanessa (played by Anna Faris) and Jason (played by Chris Pratt) have been dating for 16 months.  Both want to "take it to the next level."  Jason wants to propose, but before he can get the words out, Vanessa confides to him that she wants him to "poop" on her ... leaving him both disgusted and suddenly wondering if he really wanted to go out with her at all ... ;-).

And the other vignettes are all basically of the same vein, all both almost unspeakably disgusting and yet ... most actually "with a point."

Once again, parents, clearly this film is _not_ for your "young ones" and FILM MAKERS TAKE NOTE that it's REALLY HARD for potential viewers to justify paying anything near "full price" to see this gross-out fest.  Still, I suppose I found the film to be funnier than I expected.  Did this film "need to be made?" certainly not.  But it is (or can be) quite funny :-)


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Parker [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  Chicago Sun Times (1 1/2 Stars)  AV Club (C+)  Fr. Dennis (1 Star)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. McAleer) review
Chicago Sun-Times (P. Sobczynski) review
AV Club (J. Modell) review

Parker (directed by Taylor Hackford, screenplay by John. J. McLaughlin based on the character by the same name from Donald E. Westlake's crime novels) is another of several rather poorly produced films that were released this past weekend.

The story in this film centers on Parker [IMDb] (played by Jason Statham) who is conceived in Westlake's novels as a "criminal with a code."  Indeed, he first appears on the screen in this film dressed as a Catholic priest (even as he leads a raid on the central bank at the Ohio State Fair...) telling the money counters there (even as he asks them to lie down on the floor while his cohorts tie their hands behind their backs...) that "I don't steal from anyone who can't afford it, and I don't hurt anyone who doesn't deserve it."  

No doubt the hope is that movie goers see in Parker a modern-day Robin Hood [IMDb].  That Parker be  introduced in the film in this way -- dressed as a Catholic priest -- is, of course, rather jarring (to be kind) or appalling (to call it for what most, especially older, Catholics watching the film would see it as).  One of course remembers that Friar Tuck [IMDb] was a member of Robin Hood's "Merry Men."  One even remembers that the recent film For Greater Glory [2012] portrays a gun-toting (and arguably mass murdering...) Catholic priest as a "hero" (one who led a raid that blew-up a train killing several hundred innocent passengers ... But apparently his cause was deemed by the film-makers to be "good" so it was "okay" while priests merely suspected of sympathizing with left-wing guerrillas fighting appalling social and economic inequalities in Latin America during the 1980s were routinely investigated by the Vatican and often defrocked...).  Finally, one remembers that during the infamous crime wave that hit the United States in the early 1930s during the early years of the Great Depression, many common people, including many common Catholics considered bank-robbers like John Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde to be Robin Hood like heroes as well.  All this said, however, the film makers here have chosen to make their product so needlessly bloody/violent that it's honestly difficult find any sympathy for Parker or whatever "code" that he chose "to live by."

And beyond the blood and the gore of this film of which there is plenty (Parents take note that this film features definitely an R-rated bloodbath of violence, which in the context of the recent real-life massacres in Aurora, CO and Newtown, CT has become all the more difficult to watch), critical aspects of the film appear to have been left on the "cutting room" (editor's) floor.  For instance, the primary usefulness to Parker of the "Palm Beach, FL real estate agent" Leslie Rogers (played by Jennifer Lopez) was that she could help him escape Palm Beach island after a second, climactic heist near the end of the film, without detection.  She had told Parker, in effect, "The people of Palm Beach are smart, they all know each other, they are all well connected with the local authorities and you won't know how to get off their island (after your heist) without someone like me."  Yet, after the heist and the police as a matter of course lift all the draw bridges leading from the island, we're _not_ shown how the two get off the island effectively reducing Lopez' character in the film to simply eye candy.  And frankly both Lopez and the audience deserved better.

So between the blood and the poor execution of the film one's left with a really disappointing product which given the allusions to past folklore and history mentioned above could have been far more intriguing than the film turned out to be. 


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Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  Roger Moore (1 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C-)  Fr. Dennis (1 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Roger Moore's review
AVClub's review

Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (directed and cowritten by Tommy Wirkola along with Dante Harper) is IMHO one of several surprisingly poor films released this past weekend.

To be fair, I do think that some aspects of this film were certainly fun/creative.  For instance, the film plays with, indeed, glories in an aesthetic that resembles that of the recent Sherlock Holmes movies (with lots of grudgingly "plausible" if generally "over the top" anachronistic gadgets and time altered action scenes) the SH films themselves no doubt influenced by earlier sci-fi The Matrix movies.  Thus the Hansel and Gretel of Grimm's fairy tales, the children who were abandoned in the woods by their parents and who escaped from the clutches from an evil witch who wanted to cook/eat them, triumphantly emerge in this story from the forest as confident young-adults, Hansel (played by Jeremy Renner) and Gretel (played by Gemma Arterton), toting semi-automatic cross-bows and Gatling-gun style shot-guns (one can't really make a musket into a Gatling gun ...) setting themselves on a crusade to rid Europe of witches with news of their exploits spreading via "press clippings" made possible by, well, the then "recently invented" Gutenberg press.

I'm in awe with the amusing take on the story.  However, the film deteriorates into a needless Matrix style bloodbath as the two splatter their way through a CGI medieval Germany ridding it of some really grotesque looking and generally Evil, child-eating witches.  Further there is a truly (in our day) surprising nude scene in the film in which an inevitably good witch slowly strips in front of Hansel (and the viewers) and takes a slow leisurely dip in a magical mountain spring giving us all a truly _leisurely opportunity_ to take in the view of far more of her (up down, pretty much all around) than could possibly be justified by the plot's demands.  Don't get me wrong, the actress was drop-dead beautiful, but other than for the sake of "getting to see her naked" (and then from a fair number of angles ...) there's really no justification for the way that scene was filmed. 

So while the underlying concept is rather cool, the execution is needlessly violent/crude.  Tone down the violence and rewrite "magical mountain spring scene" and this could have been a 3 1/2 star PG-13 winner.  Instead, it's a 1 1/2 star R-rated groaner/disappointment.


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Broken City [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (L)  Michael Philkips (2 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Michael Phillips' review
AVClub's review

Broken City (directed by Allen Hughes, screenplay by Brian Tucker) is IMHO a very well written and well acted exploration of life/corruption and political life/corruption in a large contemporary American City.  Set in New York, it centers, above all, on two life long New Yorkers who could have been neighbors when they were young.  One, Billy Taggart (played by Mark Wahlberg) has lived his life pretty much on street level, the other Mayor Hostetler (played by Russell Crowe) has risen clearly to greater heights.  Yet a good part of the mayor's his political appeal seems to have been that he has remained comfortable at least speaking the language of the street.

As such, it's not really a surprise that when at the beginning of the film Billy Taggart then a NYPD officer is standing trial for effectively murdering a street thug (who had beaten the rap on a technicality for the brutal rape/murder of a 16 year old girl from his old neighborhood), he finds in Hostetler an ally.  Since a gun was found on the thug -- after Taggart had shot him dead -- Taggart himself gets acquitted.  But the circumstances of the shooting are such that the Police Commissioner, Carl Fairbanks (played by Jeffrey Wright) recommends Taggart's (quiet) dismissal from the force anyway.  But the mayor wants to get a look at Taggart before he goes.  So he invites him to his office, and in the presence of the Police Commissioner breaks Taggart the news:  "There are some wars you fight and some you walk away from.  This is the kind you walk away from ... but in my book, you're a hero."  As such, the Mayor does what needs to be done, but does so in a manner that Taggart himself must have felt that, despite being fired (by the Mayor) the Mayor actually "liked him" / "had his back."  Wow, that's smooth ... ;-)

So what does Billy Taggart do after being unceremoniously dumped from the force?  He becomes a private investigator, not a particularly financially successful one, and eventually shacks-up with the sister of the rape victim whose rape he had avenged (Apparently Taggart had known the rape victim's family from his youth.  As such, his flirtation with vigilantism was neither random nor driven by particularly high ideals.  He simply avenged the brutal rape and killing of a family friend).  His live-in girlfriend Natalie (played by Natalie Martinez) thus is also "of the old neighborhood" and while she, like the mayor, also has "higher aspirations" (seeing herself as a "struggling actress") as long as she remains "struggling" she doesn't mind hanging around a "struggling private investigator" like Taggart, who seems to end-up being beaten up as often as he is paid.  And this goes on for some years ...

Finally both Billy and Natalie get their big breaks at roughly the same time.  Natalie gets a "starring role" in an "Indie production," Billy gets a call from the Mayor ...  While it soon becomes rather clear what Natalie's willing to do to become a star ... Billy has a tougher time of it.  Billy's given the job by the mayor, involved in a hair-thin tight race for re-election, to follow the mayor's wife (played by Catherine Zeta Jones) who the mayor tells him he's convinced is cheating on him. ("New Yorkers will elect all kinds of people as mayor, but not someone who's own wife is cheating on him" he tells Taggart).  Taggart takes the job, especially when he's given his advance ($25K wow! he can pay his bills for once ... ;-)  But as Taggart begins to tail the mayor's wife, he enters into a looking glass world of corruption and intrigue far beyond that which he would have ever imagined from his previous "street level" perspective.  Much ensues ...

I liked this movie.  I liked the diversity of characters -- Black, White, Hispanic, new-rich, old-rich, working class, poor, even gang-banger, artsy, blue-collar, Harvard educated, night-school educated, gay, straight, everybody -- kinda like what you'd find in a big American city like New York today ;-).  And I thought that the film-makers did a great job weaving a tale out of a canvas as big as that.

Finally, reviewing this film from Chicago, I would say that the "conspiracy" that the film finally settles on is one that Chicagoans would certainly understand.  Cities across the country have struggled to find ways to "balance budgets" in recent years.  The approach proposed in this film is one that Chicagoans will know quite well. Great film!


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The Last Stand [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (L)  Richard Roeper (2 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B) Fr. Dennis (1 Star)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Richard Roeper's review
AVClub's review

The Last Stand (directed by Jee-woon Kim, story and original screenplay by Andrew Knauer, rewrite by Jeffrey Nachmanoff supervised by George Nolfi) is I suppose what one could expect of an Arnold Schwarzenegger starring action movie.  There's, of course, a heck of a lot of gun play.  There's also a bit of "Ahnold" Schwarzenegger charm, some self deprecating jokes about his age (He's over sixty now, and playing here in his first full-length action movie since serving 2 terms as Governor of California).

All this said, the film is definitely problematic on two fronts.  First, it is needlessly graphic.  Yes, that a lot of bullets are spent and a lot of glass is broken is standard fare in Hollywood "shoot em up" action movies.  But only some of these movies make it a point of lingering or even focusing on the gore.  This is one of those films.  Yes, we see an evil lieutenant of a drug kingpin kill a troublesome local (American) farmer near the border of Arizona and Mexico.  But did we really need to see him blow his head off with bits of head flying all over the place?   And this choice of showing the blood / gore is made repeatedly in the film.  And as far as I can see the choice is made to no particular purpose except perhaps to shock.

The second problem, is to be found in the appalling racial messaging in this film, this despite the film's apparently significant rewrite:  Blacks are shown as incompetent. The hapless FBI agent John Bannister (played by Forest Whitaker) first loses and then is repeatedly unable to recapture a Mexican drug kingpin named "Gabriel Cortez" (played by Eduardo Noriega) who he was responsible for.  There's also a black "swat commander" who's shown only long enough to register that he's black and completely out of his depth because _seconds_ after receiving an order from said Agent Banister he and his unit are completely put out of commission by said escaping Mexican drug kingpin).  Hispanics are shown as alternatively cowardly to a "minstrel show level" as portrayed by Luis Guzman playing the silly, comic-relief affording deputy named Mike Figuerola to the strong (and über-white) Sheriff Ray Owens (played, of course, by Arnold Schwarzenegger) or criminal as exemplified by the escaping drug-king pin "Cortez" and even a turncoat woman Hispanic FBI agent played by Genesis Rodriguez who helps Cortez escape in the first place.  Even "the white women" while "dependable under fire" as exemplified by Sheriff's deputy Sarah Torrance (played by Jaimee Alexander) seem to prefer to be "led by a strong (and white) man" if only one would step up ... which Ahnold, of course, does as does (eventually ...) poor Sarah's "boys will be boys" ex-and-future boyfriend.

All this is somewhat sad because Schwarzenegger has played his share of GERMAN accented (or otherwise FOREIGN accented) villains in his day.  But perhaps he's back to taking the roles that he can get.

In any case, perhaps the best way to see a film like this is to see it as a double feature with Robert Rodriguez' Machete [2010] (which inverts just about every one of these stereotypes) and then wonder why these blood-soaked films are made at all.


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