Evil Engulfs (orig. Soodhu Kavvum) [2013]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13) Times of India (4/5 Stars)  KollywoodToday (3/5 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
OneIndiaEntertaiment (OIE) listing 

BollywoodLife.com (IANS) review
DeccanHerald (S. Vismanath) review
IndianDragon,in review
KollywoodToday review
NewIndianExpress (M. Mannath) review
Rediff.com (S. Saraswathi) review
Sifi.com review
The Hindu (B. Rangan) review
Times of India (N. Venkateswaran) review

Evil Engulfs (orig. Soodhu Kavvum) [2013] [IMDb] [OIE] (directed and cowritten by Nalan Kumarasamy [IMDb] [OIE] along with Srinivasa Kavineyam [IMDb]) is a South Indian ("Kollywood") Tamil language / English subtitled _comedy_ about a distressing subject that's all too common across a good part of the world -- (petty) kidnapping for money (or secuestros as the phenomenon is known in Mexico / Latin America).  Note that earlier in the year I reviewed a far more serious Filipino film entitled Graceland [2012] about the same phenomenon.  Note also that the Somali pirates at times hijacking shipping off the Horn of Africa, the subject of two other recent films reviewed here (A Hijacking (orig. Kapringen) [2012] and Captain Phillips [2013]), are arguably motivated by similar pressures/desperation.

Why make a _comedy_ about this phenomenon?  Well, as the common saying goes, when faced with tragedy, "you can laugh or you can cry" ... and sometimes if one is laughing, even if _uncomfortably laughing_ rather than simply crying, one can keep one's eyes open long enough to perhaps understand better why this tragedy is occurring in the first place.  So it's in this spirit (seeking to explain why this phenomenon is going on) that I believe the film was made.  And then the film's title, in English "Evil Engulfs" ought to give Viewers (as well as Reades here) an understanding of how ultimately the film-makers view this phenomenon.

So then how does the movie play-out?  The film begins at the flat of three unemployed (actually two unemployed and one about to be unemployed) 20-something buddies: Pagalavan (played by Simhaa [IMDb]), Kesevan (played by Aschok Selvan [IMDb] [OIE]) and Sekhar (played by RJ Ramesh Thilak [IMDb] [OIE]).  When even the buddy who had been working at an IT firm of some sort gets sacked, the three do what 20-something young men do the world over in such situations -- they get up and go to a bar to get drunk / blow off some steam.

Well at said bar, they run into somewhat older, 40-something character named Das (played by Vijay sethupathi [IMDb] [OIE]) who's there with his (and you're never quite sure if she's real) very attractive, significantly younger and adoring girlfriend Shalu (played by Shanchita Shetty [IMDb] [OIE]) "drinking away his own sorrows" as well.  For he had come-up with an "awesome way to make some money" --  kidnapping people, but then not asking for too much money and treating them nicely -- and yet, when he had tried to do so for the first time, with his (imaginary?) girlfriend at the wheel, he couldn't get the 15 year old girl that he was trying to kidnap as she walking home from a volleyball practice into his rickety van because she kept hitting him in the head with her volleyball.  "Something was missing..." What was missing was a bigger "crew."  And his adoring girl-friend applauds when he "realizes" that this was "the flaw" in his plan...

Well, wannabe crime master (but also wanting to be "nice about" it ;-) Das spots the three 20-somethings drinking to the loss of their friend's job, and decides to walk over to them and "give them an offer" that they _obviously_ "could refuse."  But they are too drunk and, frankly too stupid to do so.  And the promise of "easy money with minimal risk" is just what their quite marinated minds were looking for.  So, they say "yes."

The next scene has Das some time illustrating on a chalkboard in a warehouse somewhere to his new not altogether bright three-man "crew" his theory of how to make Crime (petty kidnapping) "pay": (1) Always kidnap "regular people," (2) be nice about it, treat your er, hostages, nicely, (3) don't ask their parents or families for too much money because otherwise they will really get upset (and call the police...).  Instead, be nice, professional, not too greedy ... and you can't lose.  Das' adoring girl-friend applauds ... the three 20-somethings seem convinced enough to give it a try (besides they need rent or else they're going to get thrown out of the appt where they are living).

And so a few days later, they head off and kidnap their first child/teenager.  And with the additional "man power" the kid can't run away this time.  But they buy him an ice cream cone / let him play video games ... while they call the parents.  They tell the parents not to "freak out" but that they had their kid, that they were _not_ asking for a lot of money but only that they (the parents) "could afford" and enough to make it "worthwhile" to them (the kidnappers) ...  Terrible really... "kinder/gentler" kidnapping.  Naturally the parents scream initially but then calm down, realizing that the kidnappers were not complete animals, agree to a modest price, drop off the money somewhere and get their kid back ... all done in the course of day.  "Just another day in Madras/Chennai ..."

Well initially "all goes well."  Viewers see Das and the three 20-yearolds play repeat this drill with all kinds of other "little punks/spoiled brats" (one kid is shown playing with his gameboy all the time while the kidnappers are arguing with his parents over a ransom) UNTIL they mistakenly kidnap the kid of someone beginning to be "important" -- the boy of some low-level government official.   The low-level clerk still follows the same procedures as the other parents had done BUT after paying the ransom and getting his son back, HE WANTS to talk to them further.  Why?  He wants to try to get Das and his crew to kidnap a much older son of a much higher ranking government official who he had a grudge against.

Das is initially against this ... after all, he didn't want to "get into politics" or for that matter "get too greedy."  His whole philosophy was "keep this small."  But the other three, want to go for the bigger fish.

So ... they go for the bigger fish.  (Interestingly Das' adoring girlfriend abruptly leaves Das at this moment saying that she's had enough).  When they get the "bigger fish" TO THEIR SURPRISE THEY FIND THAT THE GROWN SON OF THE HIGHER RANKING GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL (1) WANTED TO GET KIDNAPPED, (2) DEMANDS THAT THEY ASK FOR MORE MONEY FROM HIS FATHER THAN THEY WANTED TO ASK FOR and (3) (of course) WANTS A CUT ...

Much ensues ...

Obviously, common morality demands that this story _can not_ end well (and if the Reader has been worried, look at the title again).  But since the film is also _a comedy_, it can't end too badly either. 

How to satisfy both demands?  Well that's the rest of the movie.  And it becomes an ever smiling (though ever more scathing) commentary about a society that's so corrupt that "kidnapping for modest sums of money" seems "almost normal."  And why would it be "almost normal"?  Well, look at how corrupt things get when one goes up a few notches above "ground level" on the social ladder.

Das and his crew become "beside the point" _pawns_ in a petty fight between a local politician and his grown son.  And once it becomes clear that the father/son are fighting in this way, THOSE TWO become pawns to the Party to which the local politician belonged to.  After all, regardless who'd win such a fight, the Party would want to make sure that it ended up looking good.

So in the end, the message of the film becomes that one can never really manipulate Evil to one's benefit (even if Das wanted to "keep it small," and the politician's son apparently wanted to "keep it personal").  Instead, Evil is bigger than all of them (and certainly even bigger than the politician's Party).  It's big enough to "get to" and "engulf" them all.

And all this is said in this film ... with a smile ... ;-)  Interesting film!


ADDENDA: The part of India that my religious order the Friar Servants of Mary is present in is Tamil Nadu, the capital of which is Madras/Chennai where this movie was filmed.

Recently, I also read Pakistani author Mohsin Hamid's book How To Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia (2013) in which the book's protagonist was far more "conventional" in his business plan (he comes to build a "bottled water empire").  However, the humor / cynicism by which he's described building said "bottled water empire" is rather similar to the film's here: "It's a dog eat dog world" but also one in which all one's actions do have consequences.  Mohsin Hamid is also the author of the book The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2008) on which the 2012 film by the same name (and reviewed here) was based.


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Zero Charisma [2013]

MPAA (UR would be PG-13)  ChicagoTribune/Variety (3 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune/Variety (P. Debruge) review
RE.com (M. Zoller-Seitz) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

 Zero Charisma [2013] (screenplay and codirected by Andrew Matthews along with Katie Graham) that played some time ago at Facets Multimedia in Chicago and is available now on Amazon Instant Video, is the kind of film that immediately divides its audience in two: those who upon realizing that the film is about RPG "gamers" quickly understand the inside joke present in the title and those who don't.

After that, I suspect that the film will continue to be (amusingly to me ;-) divisive: There will be people in both camps (gamers and non) who will find the film mean-spirited and others from both camps who will not.  Among those who find the film mean-spirited, there will be folks from both camps who will like the film for its unsentimentality/(at times) meanness and others will find the film's (at times) meanness unnerving.  Finally, there will be those who will find under all the film's (at times) meanness affirmation nonetheless.

What is clear is that this film was made by people "in the know," who've lived in the role-playing-gamers' "world"/subculture. [Note here that I would count myself as someone somewhat "in the know" as well, as I have been an RPG gamer since high school/college and play, as time allows, in a weekly game organized by a high school friend _to this day_.  And honestly, I enjoy / look forward to those games ;-)].  And while the film makers laugh _at times_ at said subculture, calling-out its occasional (at times, again...) meanness, I do believe that the film-makers refuse to condemn it completely.  For even "Mr Zero Charisma" himself -- overweight, one gets the sense that he probably doesn't shower much, self-appointed DND-style "game master" mid/late 20-something "man boy" still living at his grandma's Scott (played by Sam Eidson) -- is (quite amazingly, after that list of deficiencies...) NOT portrayed without redeeming qualities (among them that he does love above mentioned grandma (played magnificently in no nonsense fashion by Anne Gee Byrd) ;-).  Hence ... honestly ... what a character study / film! :-)  And this isn't a character study of a "Gandhi" but of a guy in his mid/late 20s having trouble holding onto a "sub-sandwich delivery" job. 

So yes, this is a film about Scott ... not exactly mild-mannered, more like troubled, with anger-management issues "air-guitar rocker" having trouble holding onto said "sub-sandwich delivery" job who LIVES for being "game master" once a week at his (er his grandmother's) house for a group of quieter nerds/friends who he keeps in tow not exactly by being nice to them but often, frankly, psychologically bullying them instead. 

When one member of his little group (and let's be honest here, THEY LIVE IN GOOD PART TO PLAY THIS WEEKLY GAME AT SCOTT'S GRANDMA'S HOUSE AS WELL) tells the group that he'd like to take a temporary leave of absence from the group because he has a girlfriend now, he (1) gets abuse from Scott, rolling his eyes as if to say (or perhaps he even said it): "Oh, how long will THAT last?" and (2) puts the rest of the group in crisis.  What now?  They're gonna need a replacement.

The replacement comes in the form of a way-cooler gamer/newcomer to town named Miles (played by Garrett Graham) who Scott meets delivering sandwiches to his old place of employment, a hobby shop named "The Wizards' Tower" (a job that Scott had clearly _loved_ but _lost_ for being simultaneously over-bearing and unreliable ... sigh, there are SO MANY TIMES you feel sorry for the guy, even as one sees "the other guy's," in this case Scott's former employer's, point...).  Miles, thin, with a light beard, stylish glasses, runs a similarly stylish (and highly successful) blog (with monthly hits in the millions) named "GeekChic" AND as the coup de grace, he has a girlfriend of every gamer's dreams.  Named Kendra (played again magnificently by Katie Folger), goodlooking, flirty/witty, kinda Goth, one gets the sense that she's played a few bards, druids and magic-users as well.

Well Scott, who brought Miles into his Game in good part out of desperation (he needed a replacement for his friend who left the Game for a girlfriend who thought "all this gaming" was "stupid") now faces a far bigger threat to his Game and indeed his Life than ever before -- a far, far cooler/more attractive version of himself ;-)

And then that's not all that's dropped onto his plate.  When grandma falls ill, ma who hasn't been in either his or his grandma's life for years, suddenly comes back with a(nother) boyfriend ... and she doesn't seem to care much about either her mother or her son who's been living (presumably for years) with her mother.  All she seems to see is her 'ma's house' ... and how much money she could get for it, if only she could sell it.

Much, much, much ... often very, very basic, very painfully existential ... ensues.  This is honestly a very interesting and often unnerving "little" film.

ADDENDUM: I would like to add that one of the things that I love about this film is there's a "welcome to my world" (as a Catholic priest) aspect to it.  Again, I don't deal with a lot of Gandhis or Steve Jobs in my line of work.  However, I deal with any combination of Scott, his mother and his grandmother on a more or less regular basis.  So it was a joy watching this film about a guy with very mundane but very real struggles in life.


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Out of the Furnace [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (L)  ChicagoTribune (2 1/2 Stars)  ChicagoSunTimes (4 Stars)  RE.com (C+)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (1 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
Chicago Suntimes (R. Roeper) review
RE.com (M. Zoller-Seitz) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

Out of the Furnace [2013] (directed and cowritten by Scott Cooper along with Brad Ingelsby) is a gritty blue-collar story with some excellently-crafted characters and situations set in rural/Appalachia Pennsylvania steel country that do evoke such iconic films as The Deer Hunter [1978] and the more recent The Fighter [2010] (both nominated for/winning a plethora of Oscars in their years).

However, it would seem to me that the current film, Out of the Furnace, spends _way too much time_ in portraying some episodes of exceptionally brutal violence that IMHO ultimately undercuts the rest of the film.   Worse the film's story STUPIDLY falls victim to the terrible Hollywood cliche' NEEDLESSLY denigrating "Hillbillies" / "Hicks" that I've written about (and condemned...) repeatedly in this blog (see my reviews of Shark Night [2011], Straw Dogs [2011] and more positively Tucker & Dale vs. Evil [2010] which challenged the stereotype).  Indeed, I had purposefully avoided seeing the recent film The Home Front [2013] for its more-or-less obvious "Hicks are amphetamine-crazed/Evil bastards" messaging.  Now I find the same messaging here in the supremely evil "inbred Hillbilly" (actual characterization of him and "his kind" by one of the steel-town/"city dweller" characters in the film) Harlon DeGroat (played by Woody Harrelson).  All that was missing was someone "twanging on a banjo" as in Deliverance [1972], the "Birth of a Nation" [IMDb] of "Hicks are Evil" "liberal" film-making.

So I find myself very frustrated writing about this film!

The story is about two brothers from the small steel town of Braddock, Pennsylvania. The older, Russell Baze (played by Christian Bale), is actually quite well drawn as someone who was flawed, even at times horribly unlucky but trying very hard to build an honest life for himself.  The other, younger Rodney Baze, Jr (played by Casey Affleck) is less nuanced, and portrayed as an increasingly troubled many-times deployed Marine who one starts to believe was actually safer in Iraq / Afghanistan than at home.  For "at home" Rodney _always_ got himself into money problems because of an (acquired?) "living on the edge" gambling addiction.

Inevitably, Rodney's gambling addiction/money problems get him in trouble with organized crime figures, be they the still rather civilized even arguably "paternal" local (still "city-dwelling") mob boss named John Petty (played by Willem DeFoe) or (eventually/inevitably) the crazed animalistic Evil Man "inbred Hillbilly" named Harlon DeGroat already mentioned above, living with his goons in the hill country outside of town.  Big brother Russell spends much of his time in the story trying to keep (and at times rescue) younger brother Rodney out of trouble.

But trouble finds Russell tragically as well.  A key difference between Russell and his younger brother appears to be that ever responsible Russell seems to accept the consequences of his actions (even to a fault) while the younger Rodney (perhaps strung out after so many deployments, perhaps even calling them on,,,) seemed to _search out_ ways to make his life more difficult.

Other well conceived characters include Lena Taylor (played by Zoe Saldana) Russell's girlfriend at the beginning of the story as well as her honestly _good guy_ cop boyfriend Wesley Barnes (played by Forrest Whitaker) who Russell finds her going-out with after a horribly tragic (drunk driving) accident lands Russell in jail for a number of years.  Honestly, what a tragedy.  Yet, Russell did get behind the wheel that time (and probably other times).  And yes, he did kill somebody utterly innocent as a result.  Still, he found himself paying for that mistake in ways that he never, ever would have imagined beforehand.  (Great writing!)

These, as well as others, were clearly very well conceived, often very nuanced characters.  So why did the film-makers choose to ruin it all with adding the STUPIDLY CONCEIVED utterly unnuanced CARTOON (from Hell) MONSTER Harlon DeGroat. 

The story itself is a supreme tragedy, but the story of the inventing of the story becomes a tragedy itself.  Without the monster Harlon DeGroat, this could have been an Oscar worthy film.  (Who knows, it may even be nominated anyway, however only at the expense of needlessly stereotyping/ridiculing "Hillbilly"/"rednecks.")


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Dallas Buyers' Club [2013]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (G. Kenny) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

Dallas Morning News (B. Minutaglio) 1992 original article
Time Magazine (E. Docktorman) fact-check article
NPR (E. Blair) article
DailyBeast (A. Romano) article

Dallas Buyers' Club [2013] (directed by Jean-Marc Vallée, screenplay by Craig Borten and Melissa Wallack) tells the true story (with _a couple_ of dramatic flourishes) of Ron Woodroof (played in the film by Matthew McConaughey) a rodeo-loving if not (as portrayed in the film) rodeo-riding Texas "red neck" electrician who in 1985 found himself surprised to be HIV positive and told that he was quite close to death with full-blown AIDS, (1) did some quick research, (2) drove himself down to Mexico, (3) bought some then non-FDA approved drugs/supplements there from an American doctor who had lost his license in the States that (4) stabilized his condition.  Both needing said unapproved drugs/supplements to keep himself alive and realizing that there were multitudes of others in the States who could benefit from the same drugs/supplements,Woodroof (5) setup a flirting-with-the-edges-of-the-law "Buyers Club" in Dallas in which patrons would pay "membership dues" to simply _belong_ to said club and then be able to receive all these unapproved drugs/supplements in any (reasonable) amount "for free."  In this way, Woodroof could argue that he was _not_ selling unapproved and arguably illegal drugs in the States.   


It makes for one heck of a story and the film captures well the very real desperation of the early years of the AIDS crisis, when in the face of mountains of HIV infected individuals facing then certain death, generally within 5 years of infection, standard (and time consuming...) FDA clinical testing protocols seemed positively cruel.  Indeed, throughout the film Woodroof's foils in the film were both doctors at "Dallas General Hospital," represented by the strict, "by the book" medical researcher Dr. Sevard (played by Denis O'Hare) and the more sympathetic/morally struggling "I understand your suffering, but I'm a doctor dammit, and I'd really, really like to keep my job" Dr. Eve Saks (played by Jennifer Gardner) as well as, of course, law enforcement officials.  In dramatic contrast, the film has Woodroof's partner in running the "Dallas Buyers' Club" be a HIV infected transvestite going by the name of Rayon (played by Jared Leto).

This is a very well done and throught/discussion provoking film.  The "rodeo" metaphor is excellent and multifaceted.  For as "tough guy" / "macho" as rodeos may seem at first glance, there's a lot of color present as well, and even some sadness (sad-faced rodeo clowns...).  Finally, rodeo contests often come down to "How long can you stay on the horse?"

Hence, while not exactly for kids, this is A GREAT THOUGHT PROVOKING FILM!  Good job folks, good job!


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Frozen [2013]

MPAA (PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-I)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (2 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. McAleer) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (C. Lemire) review
AVClub (K. McFarland) review

Frozen [2013] (screenplay and codirected by Jennifer Lee along with Chris Buck, story by Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee and Shane Morris inspired by the fairy tale "The Snow Queen" by Hans Christian Anderson [IMDb]) is an overwhelming positive positive story about two sisters Elsa (voiced by Idena Menzel) and Anna (voiced by Kristen Bell) growing-up as princesses in a fairy-tale Scandinavian kingdom named Arendelle.  Elsa's older and destined to become queen.  That destiny/responsibility itself could make her more reserved than her younger and more openly joyful sister.  However, Elsa's also born with a gift/curse -- she finds that she can make snow and ice at will.

At first, Elsa finds this strange gift of being able turn things into ice and snow to be a lot of fun.  Yet playing one day with her fun-loving younger sister Anna, she gets distracted and accidentally freezes Anna's head.  Oh dear, did she accidentally kill her? Well the girls' father, the King (voiced by Maurice LaMarche), takes Anna to some trolls who heal her, which they do, but they also give Elsa and the king a warning: "It's still relatively easy to unfreeze a brain, but it's much harder to thaw a frozen heart."

This warning sets off a more or less inevitable cycle of family dysfunction: (1) the girls' parents become overprotective of their daughters and Elsa in particular is locked-up so that she can't ever use her special ability again, not that she'd want to, because (2) Elsa herself feels enormously guilty for having nearly killed her little sister.  Finally, (3) to "protect" Anna from the effects of this terrible accident, their (regal) parents ask the trolls to cast a spell on her so that she has no memory of what happened to her.  So Elsa grows up guilty and fearful of her now bottled-up "power," and Anna grows up with no idea at all as to why she and her older sister Elsa are being "locked-up" in the Castle.


Things come to a head when the girls' parents eventually die and Elsa then is to be crowned Queen.  She's terrified that she might make an awful mistake that will hurt others, while Anna finally FEELS FREE.  And what does Anna do, now that she's finally "free?"  She falls in love with the first Prince, Hans (voiced by Santino Fontana), that she sets her eyes on.  Well, Elsa, already "with a lot on her mind" gets angry at this.  How could her little sister Anna be so irresponsible?  After all, they've just met, and ... no longer able to control the bottled-up power within her ... Elsa begins to turn everything around her into ice and snow and running away from her Castle, plunges the whole Kingdom into an Eternal Winter.

Well, needless to say, EVERYBODY is stunned.  Nobody's ever seen Elsa (or anyone else) EVER do this.  And Anna, who would have / could have actually known something about Elsa's power/gift/gift-now-turned-into-curse has had her memory erased and SO SHE TOO JUST DOESN'T UNDERSTAND.

So Anna then decides (wisely) to put-off her sincerely if very abruptly-announced wedding to Hans and to search-out her now lost and very distraught sister, who's literally put the whole Kingdom "on ice."  Much ensues ...

Among that which ensues is that Anna, who, in her memory, has never even stepped out of the Castle, meets in her search for her sistser a fair number of odd if generally helpful characters, including Kristoff (voiced by Jonathan Groff) a villager who used to make his living cutting and storing ice from the winter and selling it in the summer (but who wants ice now when it's always winter?) and his whimsical though still only grunting raindeer named Swen and then the utterly lovable but terribly naive talking snowman named Olaf (voiced by Josh Gad) who trying really, really, really hard to "fit-in" with everybody else hoping for an end to this unending winter, voices his "dreams of summer" as well and NOBODY has the heart to tell him what happens to SNOWMEN come the summer ;-)  The trolls also come back into the story and it all just becomes a lovely, lovely tale.

One of the aspects that makes the story so lovely is the reality that Elsa's special gift/curse is actually MOSTLY a lovely one.  She can make all kinds of things that one could only imagine out of ice and snow.  It's just that she herself has trouble seeing this potential gift as anything but a curse.

This is, of course, a Disney story, so it has to end well.  But it really is a lovely, lovely story about growing-up and also coming to see things that may initially seem as curses as gifts. 

Good job folks, very good job!


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Nebraska [2013]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (3 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (C. Lemire) review
AVClub.com (A.A. Dowd) review

Nebraska [2103] (directed by Alexander Payne, screenplay by Bob Nelson) is the kind of movie that I wouldn't want to recommend to any particular family (because it could be taken the wrong way :-) but one that all/most older families (w. adult kids) ought to see.  For "just in time for the holiday season," the film's a "gift" for all those who'd think that their families "have problems" ;-).

Old and long-time problematic guy Woody Grant (played by Bruce Dern), a Korean War vet who never really returned from that War in one piece but rather spent the following, count them, 6 decades mostly "in a bottle," now in his eighties ... receives a piece of mail.  What's the piece of mail?  Well it's a sweepstakes letter telling him (as these letters ALWAYS DO) that (given nearly impossible conditions ...) he won $1,000,000 (!!).  Most of us receiving these obviously borderline fraudulent letters throw them away.  But poor Woody, in his 80s, his mind mostly gone due to Alcohol, now mixed no doubt with the onset of one form or another of Dementia/Alzheimers BELIEVES THE LETTER THIS TIME.  All he thinks he has to do is go from his home in Billings, Montana to the sweepstakes office in Lincoln, Nebraska, that's heck, only about an hour from his home town where he'd grown up.  How hard can it be?   FOR A MILLION BUCKS...

'Cept, that ungrateful family of his, wife Kate (played _superbly_ by June Squibb) and two grown sons Ross (played by Bob Odenkirk) and David (played by Will Forte) DON'T WANT TO TAKE HIM THERE.  Why?  Because, let's recall the reasons: (1) Most obviously, THEY KNOW IT'S A SCAM, and (2) they are all resentful of the guy for having been a terrible (and mostly drunk) husband and father throughout most of their lives.  So none of them is in any mood of "enabling him" in this self-evidently FOOL'S ERRAND.  So ...

Woody decides to go on his own (walk...) from Billings, Montana to Lincoln, Nebraska, "only" 600 miles (!!) OVER OPEN COUNTRY (not a tree for miles in every conceivable direction) IN THE WINTER IN THE SNOW "to show 'em."  Wife Kate and older son Ross decide (initially) to "let him try..."  Younger son David, caves in first, and picks him up in his car some miles out and decides, as foolish and stupid as this Quixote-like quest may be, "dad's not gonna be around much longer," so why not ... maybe "on the journey" he'll "learn a thing or two" still about his dad.

And he does as we all do, as we the viewers join the two on this journey.  And as we follow the two, we begin to better understand Woody and his family and why they are the way they are.  By the time Woody and David make it to Woody and Kate's hometown, we find that the rest of the family's "caved" to Woody's dream quest as well.  Much ensues as different characters from Woody and Kate's hometown approach their surprising arrival with even more surprising news, even if we viewers (and most of the townsfolk, if they thought about it at all) realize that the "news" is, well ... NONSENSE.

Here I have to underline Kate's character (played as I've already said superbly by June Squibb).  Hers has got to be one of the best drawn characters of the year and certainly one of the best acted: If this film were viewed as a drinking game, and one had to take a drink every time Kate's character said something _nice_ about another person in the story, I do believe one would finish the film completely, utterly _sober_ ;-). For as smiling as she as Squibb plays her "sweet little old lady" role, I don't think there's a single nice thing that her character says about _anybody_ from family, friends to dead relatives in the entire film.

As such, this is why I don't think it'd be particularly wise to recommend the film to any particular family (as they might take it the wrong way), I think almost _every_ family would probably understand.  The characters are exaggerated but they also feel real.  And by the end of the film, even though it's clear that the family hasn't confronted _any_ of its "demons" ... one ALSO HONESTLY UNDERSTANDS.

This is a great, well written, well shot, low key "character piece" that will put smiles on a lot of faces even as we all hope we're a bit better, and better adjusted, than most of the characters in the film.  Still to most of us, the film will probably feel _a lot_ like home ;-)



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Black Nativity [2013]

MPAA (PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-II)  ChicagoTribune (2 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (D)  Fr. Dennis (4+ Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (M. Zoller Seitz) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review

BET articles
Ebony articles
Essence.com articles
TheSource articles
 
It seems fitting that Black Nativity [2013] (directed and screenplay by Kasi Lemmons, based on the original stage play/musical [Amazon] by Langston Hughes [IMDb]) would come out this year as part of an ever increasingly impressive wave of African American cinema becoming known as the Black Hollywood Renaissance [BBC] [CNN] [Ebony] [HPost].  I write this because Langston Hughes [IMDb]'s original which he characterized as a "Gospel song play" premiered in 1961 and came out of the African American cultural birthing ground that was Harlem at the time.

I've also enjoyed following this African American Hollywood Renaissance in good part because those "who have eyes and ears" (and souls) that are open can see the obvious: that African American film-makers along with the actors/actresses who play in their films are not ashamed of their Christian faith.  And it's not a "pie in the sky" spirituality that's present in these films.  These films -- I think of films as varied as Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family [2011], Flight [2012], Tyler Perry's Temptation:Confessions of a Marriage Counselor [2013], Fruitvale Station [2013], 12 Years a Slave [2013], Best Man's Holiday [2013] and the current film Black Nativity [2013] -- often name/confront very real pain, dysfunction and betrayal on all kinds of levels.  But they also do so with a confident belief in a God who is _not blind_, who is capable of sorting things out and capable of resolving things with both Justice (toward the injured) and Mercy (toward those who caused injury).  In a phrase, contemporary African American cinema is emphatically NOT Godless.  And someone like me can not but notice and indeed APPLAUD. 

To the film at hand ...

Screenwriter/director Kasi Lemmons creation tells the story of Langston (played by Jacob Latimore), a 15 year old named actually after Langston Hughes the writer of the original stage play.  He's been growing up in Baltimore, raised by his mother Naima (played by Jennifer Hudson), alone, and there are really A HUGE NUMBER OF FUNDAMENTAL YET UNANSWERED QUESTIONS IN HIS LIFE:  Who was his father?  Who were his grandparents, ANY OF HIS GRANDPARENTS?  He hasn't known any of them. 

Now it hasn't been that his mother was evil, we definitely come to see that as the story continues.  However, Langston finds himself with a rather evocative name, yet with little understanding of why he had been given it, and no one to explain ANYTHING TO HIM but his ever harried mother in perpetual survival mode.

Things though had come to a breaking point just as the story begins with Naima realizing that she and her son were about to get evicted and thus deciding to send 15-year-old Langston up to New York (Harlem) to spend Christmas (and probably beyond ...) with her parents (his grandparents) WHO HE'S NEVER MET.  Why such a drastic move?  Apparently at the end of her rope, she tells him: "I'M THINKING ABOUT WHAT'S BEST FOR YOU."  She's avoided this moment for 15 years, so it's obvious that this was a crushingly painful crossroads for her to arrive at.

She puts Langston on a bus with her parents' phone number should he miss them when he arrives.  Yes, there's some confusion when he does arrive.  He doesn't know who he's looking for, they don't know who they are looking for.  (I'm simplifying things ... after various things happening they find each other).

The BIG SURPRISE is that Langston's grandparents don't seem particularly "evil" either.   Langston's grandfather turns out to be a preacher, the Rev. Cornell Cobbs (played exquisitely by Forest Whitaker).  Yes, he's a bit on the stricter side, but he's no monster.  Grandma, Aretha Cobbs (played by Angela Bassett) is a sweetheart.  WHAT THE HECK HAPPENED?   Go see the rest of the film.

This is a great story about family conflict and reconciliation.  Yes, as Naima eventually finds her way up to New York as well.  And poor Langston who was an utterly lost soul / lost person at the beginning of the story NOT KNOWING ANYTHING ABOUT HIS PAST and WANDERING ABOUT AIMLESSLY in the present exclaims, "THIS IS MY CHRISTMAS MIRACLE" -- Note that nothing yet was resolved but in the same room (a Church), stood his Mother, his Grandparents and EVEN HIS FATHER ... and SUDDENLY THERE WAS HOPE that it all could come to make sense.  And one just wants to cry ...

This is a great story with a universal theme which anyone with a heart could understand.


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