American Hustle [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  ChicagoTribune (4 stars)  RE.com (4 Stars)  AVClub (A-)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J.P. McCarthy) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (C. Lemire) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

American Hustle [2013] (directed and cowritten by David O. Russell along with Eric Singer) while cynical (from _top to bottom_ about deceit and far more problematically often _celebrating it_) and hence definitely NOT for "young minds" (NOT for minors, the R-rating, _for theme_, is certainly deserved) is still probably one of the more compelling American films of the year. 

Telling the story, sort of (the film begins with the introductory line "Some of this actually happened ..."), of the late 70s post-Watergate FBI-sponsored "Abscam" sting operation that sent 7 members of Congress (six Representatives and one Senator) to jail, the film centers on two "kindred spirit" small-time con-artists, Bronx native Irving Rosenfeld (played magnificently by Christian Bale) and transplant to New York from Albuquerque, NM, Sydney Prosser (played outstandingly as well by Amy Adams), both characters apparently on the low-level con-artists that the FBI used/"flipped" to set-up the Abcam operation.

Rosenfeld had inherited his dad's struggling "glass business" (experiencing his dad as having been "a terrible businessman," he had on his own "started to help his dad out" by... "creating business" for him, that is, basically picking-up an occasional stone or two, and well...).  He had expanded into running a series of dry-cleaning shops in both the Bronx and Manhattan, but made his real money selling fake art to more-status-conscious-than-smart/ladder-climbing/wannabe investors and above all offering "loan services" to people with debt problems (For a non-negotiable cash upfront fee of $5000 he promised them $50,000 from "overseas connections."  Of course, after paying the $5000, the folks never saw him again...  Who would fall for such a scam?  Well ... someone who's had a gambling addiction, had embezzled, etc, etc, that is, someone for whom losing of _an additional $5,000_ would really be the least of his/her problems ...).

Introduced to poor-but-ambitious Sydney Prosser at a party, Rosenfeld takes to her, and introduces her to his little operation and she, who presents herself in a voice-over as someone "who'd like to have been ANYONE but who she was" is smitten as well, responding to his "partnership offer" in a British accent, re-introducing herself to him as "Edith Helmsey of high social pedigree and Royal connections" from "across the pond" in England.  And so both the "fake art" and "loans from overseas" business (scams) really take-off from there, even if good-old Irving Rosenfeld is actually married ... to Roselyn (played wonderfully in the film by Jennifer Lawrence) who he largely keeps in the dark about his business because ... though he is smitten also by her, he simply finds her too unpredictable to be able to trust her (her unpredictability is apparently exactly what he finds attractive about her, even if, in his "line of work" ... conning people ... unpredictability is incredibly dangerous).

And so it goes.  Since "business" was going so well for Irving and Sydney, err Edith Helmsley, eventually they attract the attention of the FBI, agent Richie DiMaso (played magnificently by Bradley Cooper, yes ALL THE LEAD CHARACTERS IN THIS FILM PLAY THEIR ROLES OUTSTANDINGLY) making the sting.

BUT Agent Richie DiMaso has "bigger plans" for them.  So impressed by their con-operation, he recruits them to help him set-up a sting operation "from the ground up" (what became known as Abscam) to catch/entrap politicians taking bribes to help an FBI stand-in (played by Michael Peña) posing as an Arab sheik get U.S. citizenship in order to help invest in the building of new Casinos in Atlantic City (it is true that just around that time, New Jersey had legalized gambling in order to bring-in casinos to Atlantic City to help return it to its previous weekend tourist-Mecca glory).  Irving doesn't like this at all, as he'd always seen his operation as being "small" and now he was being asked (forced really by FBI agent DiMaso) to "go big" and help them entrap politicians, which Irving felt could only go badly.

The first person they try to entrap is the big-haired (Rod Blagojevich-like?) and largely big-hearted (perhaps also, honestly, like Blagojevich) mayor of Camden, NJ, Carmine Polito (played again magnificently by Jeremy Renner).  The character of Carmine Polito again seems based on the actual mayor of the time of Camden, NJ Angelo Errichetti.  Believing that casinos in Atlantic City would bring jobs to his neighboring Camden, NJ, he wholeheartedly enlists, introducing then Irving Rosenfeld, Edith Helmsley, and Richie DiMaso to all kinds of New Jersey politicians AS WELL AS (perhaps inevitably ...) THE MOB (a representative of whom is played, again magnificently, by Robert De Niro).

The entry of THE MOB into the picture scares the daylights out of Irving Rosenfeld, who of course knows that "there is no Arab shiek," etc.  And he also grows increasingly uncomfortable in framing the heart of gold mayor (if clearly mobbed-up) Carmine Polito.

What to do?  Well that's the rest of the film ... ;-)

Great, great story even if it is built from top-to-bottom on deceit.  Perhaps it does teach the lesson: "Oh what webs we weave when we first come to deceive."  Irving Rosenfeld saw himself as basically "an honest crook" but wow ... what mess he found himself in ...


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Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (2 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (2 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B-)  Fr. Dennis (0 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (M. Zoller Seitz) review
AVClub (B. Kenigsberg) review

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues [2013] (directed and cowritten by Adam McCay along with Will Farrell) is a really unending parade of racial/racist jokes about Blacks, Hispanics, even Filipinos (!) with a smattering of Polish jokes (to remind Poles and really all Slavs/Central and even Southern Europeans that when white hooded folk of WASPish / Aryan stock talk of "white people" they don't really mean to include them ...).  Of course the trailer to the film already featured a racist dinner scene at an African American home (all that was missing would have been Will Farrell's character asking "Where's the watermelon?") so what would one really expect?

Well, I would have expected a boycott of the film by critics AND THE CNS/USCCB (U.S. Catholic Bishops' Media Office) to give the film at minimum an "L" rating ("limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling") which the CNS/USCCB recently gave 12 Years A Slave [2013] (!), and more appropriately an "O" rating ("morally offensive") which it recently gave American Hustle [2013] (FOR LANGUAGE and _PROVOCATIVE CLOTHING_) and had previously given to the children's film Gulliver's Travels [2011] (because it contained a scene in which Jack Black's "giant" Gulliver (discretely) pissed on the Lillipots' castle and, accidentally, their king to put out a fire, when the Lillipots' fire fighters had run out of water ;-). 

Given that the majority of American Catholics today belong to the very ethnic and racial groups targeted in Anchorman 2's dimwitted dialogue while NOT A SINGLE REVIEWER FOR THE CNS/USCCB is of non Irish / German extraction, perhaps some changes in the CNS/USCCB's media office are in order so that the reviewers become far more reflective of the tremendous ethnic/racial diversity of the Catholic Church in the United States today and really in the world.  We are supposed to be a universal church.  Racial jokes especially when it's NOT EVEN CLOSE but A PARADE OF THEM ought to earn a film at minimum an "L" and more appropriately "O" rating.


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The Book Thief [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-II)  ChicagoTribune (2 Stars)  RE.com (1 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B-)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (G. Cheshire) review
AVClub (B. Kenigsberg) review

The Book Thief [2013] (directed by Brian Percival, screenplay by Michael Petroni, based on the novel by Markus Zusak) is the story of a German girl named Liesel (played magnificently by Sophie Nélisse) growing-up in the adoptive home of an older, otherwise childless couple Hans and Rosa (played by Geoffrey Rush and Emily Watson), living on Himmel Strasse (Heaven Street) in Nazi-era Stuttgart, Germany.

A fair number of critics (see above) have complained about the "sappiness" of the film, intended for younger / pre-teen audiences.  Yet regular readers here will note that I'm not necessarily against "sap" and often A FAN of it, and no exception here.  Indeed, if the intended audience to The Book Thief, both novel and now film is understood to be grade-school kids (say 4th or 5th graders) then I'd say that it's an excellent age appropriate story.  A fourth grader would probably not understand much of Schindler's List [1993] to say nothing of Sophie's Choice [1982] but would almost certainly understand this story about a little girl, his/her age, growing-up on a quaint little street near the edge of a very average German city like Stuttgart during the Nazi era / World War II.  And the story is woven so nicely that pretty much all the notable (and awful) aspects of growing-up in Nazi Germany are portrayed ... and yet in an age appropriate manner:

The reader/viewer learns that all kinds of people were persecuted under the Nazi regime, including Communists (among them the original parents of Liesel and her brother, who dies early in the story) as well as, of course, Jews, among them Max (played magnificently by Ben Schnetzer) who comes to Hans, Rosa and Liesel's door in Stuttgart in need of help in 1938 in the aftermath of Krystallnacht.  Why did he come to Hans' door?  Because Max' father had saved Hans' life during the First World War (one of the most bitterest memories of many Jewish Holocaust survivors was that many of their German Jewish parents had been proud German patriots prior to the rise of the Nazis and had fought with distinction IN ALL OF EUROPE'S / THE U.S.'s ARMIES during World War I).  Hans therefore takes Max in, and 10-11 year old Liesel is given the very, very adult-beyond-her-years responsibility of NOT TELLING ANYONE, ANYONE AT ALL, that Max was hiding in their house.  IMAGINE BEING A 10 YEAR OLD TASKED WITH THAT KIND OF RESPONSIBILITY (This was absolutely _beautifully_ portrayed in the film).

Then Liesel was portrayed going to school, having school-time/neighborhood friends like Rudy (played again excellently by Nico Liersch), and others from school/the neighborhood like Franz (played by Levin Liam) who she didn't particularly get along with.  This was Nazi Germany, so all the little boys and girls were expected (in reality forced...) to belong to / wear the black uniforms of the Hitler Jugend (boys) / brown uniforms of the Deutscher Madchens Bund (girls), which aside from not really having a choice, all the kids found quite natural (to this day grade school kids in the United States generally enjoy wearing their Catholic school and/or their boy/girl scout uniforms).

Still it was _very nicely_ (and I would say _realistically_) portrayed that the kids did not necessarily understand what these _mandatory_ Nazi indoctrination groups were about:  Rudy, who prided himself being "the fastest kid on the block," is shown pretending quite sincerely to be the African-American sprinter Jesse Owens (!) who was one of the great heroes of the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games (Americans to this day take pride that Jesse Owens "showed-up" the Nazi dogma of Aryan racial superiority ... forgetting of course, that when Owens came home, he couldn't even eat at the same lunch counter or go to the same bathroom as "white people" in much/most of the United States....).  Anyway, Rudy gets reported and his father, a low level Nazi party member, is told _in no uncertain terms_ by a local Nazi authority (whose job it would be to look after such neighborhood matters, sort of a Nazi precinct captain) to teach/punish his son that as "a good Aryan boy" he's NOT to pretend that he's someone of a "lower race."   And so it is.  Rudy's father whacks him a few times and tells him basically to "not embarrass the family" in this kind of way again.  (Rudy both understands ... "don't pretend to be Jesse Owens again" ... but also does not ... "I kinda liked him.").  Such is life growing-up in any dictatorship / authoritarian system.  There are arbitrary rules that are to be rigidly observed so as not to put one's family / loved one's in trouble.  Regimes like that of the Nazis (and also the Communists) simply had _more of these rules_ and punished people far more severely when occasionally some "fell out of line."


Among the rules to be observed was to "put out the flag" (the Nazi era flag) on Hitler's birthday, and a great scene is presented with Hans being shown looking about the cellar trying to find where he "put the darned thing" while Rosa nervously reproves him, noting that "all the other neighbors already have their flags up" and "it's going to be noted" if their flag's not up soon.  THIS BRINGS TO MIND A GREAT STORY IN MY OWN FAMILY WHO HAD LIVED IN COMMUNIST ERA CZECHOSLOVAKIA WHERE I REALLY DID HAVE AN UNCLE WHO WAS "REPORTED" IN THE 1980s (!) FOR HONESTLY FORGETTING TO HAVE THE CZECHOSLOVAK / SOVIET FLAGS UP IN FRONT OF HIS HOUSE DURING SOME VISIT OF SOME RANDOM SOVIET OFFICIAL.  His family lived on EXACTLY THE SAME KIND OF STREET as that portrayed in this film ... NO ONE EXCEPT FOR SOME NOSY LOCAL OFFICIAL WOULD HAVE EVER KNOWN THAT MY UNCLE'S FAMILY'S FLAGS WEREN'T UP THAT DAY.  But my uncle had to go to the local police station and APOLOGIZE for making the _honest mistake_.   Having been jailed in his college years by the Communists, and always therefore "somewhat suspect," he _knew very well_ to "have the flags up" on the right days.  Here he had forgotten ... and SOMEBODY (from the neighborhood...) REPORTED HIM.  Again, such is life in a very paranoid / totalitarian system ...

Celebration of Hitler's birthday (as that of any "great leader" with AN ENORMOUS fawning/butt-licking security force behind him) involved more than just "putting up flags" however.  The Communists would have parades.  The Nazis had street gatherings and bonfires.  The requisite firebrand (to the point of screeching) / paranoid speeches were given there by local party leaders and, this is where the "Book" part of the story's title (and even the "Thief" part of it actually) comes from ... said Nazi bonfires offered occasions for local Party officials / communities to "show their loyalty" by burning "subversive books."

Now Liesel, who had been picked-on in school for having originally come from _a lower-class_, Communist sympathizing family (and hence at the beginning of the film ... _unable_ to read) finds the Nazis fetish with burning books "odd."  After all, she had been previously picked-on for not being able to read well, and now those above her own teachers were encouraging the people to burn books.  (Imagine yourself as a 10 year old ... what a crazy contradiction: Which is it?  Do you want us to read or not?)  BEAUTIFULLY AS A TEN YEAR OLD STILL REMEMBERING BEING PICKED-ON FOR NOT BEING ABLE TO READ, THE FILM SHOWS HER COMING OVER THE PILE OF LARGELY BURNED BOOKS AT THE END OF ONE SUCH RALLY and DISCRETELY PUTTING ONE OF THOSE STILL SMOULDERING BOOKS UNDER HER COAT ;-).

And by performing this little act of defiance (though she doesn't even know that she was being defiant) she's "noticed" but here by the wife of the local burgermeister (a member of the old German aristocracy) whose _intellectual_ son apparently had been arrested (and presumably taken off to Dachau where German intellectuals during the Nazi era were often held).  She invites Liesel over to her manor house nearby, surrounded by a lovely garden, shows Liesel her family's lovely library of books and tells her that she "could come over _any time_ to read if she liked."

The rest of the story continues in this very gentle (in the midst of terrible awfulness of dictatorship and war) manner.  And by the end of the story, one honestly sees everything that a 10 year old growing-up in Germany during the war years would have seen, including, yes, tellingly obvious glimpses of the Jewish Holocaust, but also the bomb raids that eventually (something of a SPOILER ALERT) _level_ good old Himmel Strasse by the story's end.

What a gentle, lovely and sad story recalling an truly awful time in human history ... and presented in a manner that even a 10 year old could understand!  EXCELLENT JOB!


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Philomena [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (L)  Irish Times (5/5 Stars)  Entertainment.ie (3.5/5 Stars)  Movies.ie (4/5 Stars)  RE.com (3.5/4 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (4/4 Stars)

IMDb listing

Irish Times (D. Clarke) review  coverage
Entertainment.ie (R. Cashin) review
Movies.ie (P. Byrne) review

CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review

LA Times (K. Turan) review
RE.com (S. Wloszczyna) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review

Philomena [2013] (directed by Stephan Frears, screenplay by Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope, based on the book The Lost Child of Philomena Lee by Martin Sixsmith) tells the true story of Philomena Lee (played in the film as a teenager by Sophie Kennedy Clark and as an older woman by Judy Dench) who finding herself unwed and pregnant as a teenager in Ireland in 1962 was sent to the Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary convent at Seán Ross Abbey, Roscrea, Co. Tipperarary, Ireland, where in return for her stay at the abbey during her pregnancy she relinquished all rights rights to her child (who was subsequently put up for adoption, usually to parents coming from the United States) and then required to work in what's come to be known as a "Magdalen Laundry" (for "fallen women") operated by the nuns at the abbey for four more years to pay off her debt to the sisters.

Such was the situation of many unwed and pregnant teenage girls in Ireland up until quite recent times (far more recent -- look at simply the year of Philomena's case 1962 ... -- than many would hope or believe).

At the same time, the stories of the "Magdalene Houses" or "Magdalene Laundries" have been picked-up in recent years and used by anti-Catholic propagandists to beat-up the Catholic Church again as somehow _uniquely evil_ in this regard, when the Catholic League for Civil Rights notes that the first Magdalene Laundries for "fallen women" in Ireland were NOT even run by Catholics (nuns or otherwise) but by Protestants.  Indeed even before finding and reading the Catholic League's report "Myths of the Magdalene Laundries," I was going to note here that abuse of women in crisis goes back to at least the time of Jesus (with the Pharisees presenting him with the "woman caught in the very act of adultery").  And as any junior high or high schooler who's read Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter [IMDb] (set in Protestant/Puritan New England) or Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre [IMDb] (set in 19th century so very righteous/Protestant England, and still keeping Catholic Ireland down ...) abuse and denigration of young women in crisis was certainly not an Irish thing.  Indeed, honestly ARGUABLY THE IRISH LEARNED THE CONCEPT OF THESE MAGDALENE LAUNDRIES FROM THE BRITS.  Finally, even current editorializing in the West regarding Muslim treatment of women (often gleefully crossing the line into flat-out anti-Muslim propaganda) ought to be tempered with the reality that to be a woman ANYWHERE 30, 40 years ago, to say nothing of 100-200 years ago meant facing all kinds of marginalization and abuse. 

That said, Philomena and her son's stories ARE BOTH AWFUL AND TRUE and hence need to be aired.  How else to atone, make amends, rebuild and go on?  Hence, I honestly encourage readers to follow the Irish Times' years long / continuing coverage of the issue of the Magalene Laundries.

To the film / Philomena's story: No one except her family and friends would have ever known of Philomena Lee if not for a series of coincidences:

On what would have been her child Anthony's 50th birthday, Philomena, by then living as a senior citizen in England, was caught weeping by her daughter with whom she now lived.  Asked why she was weeping, Philomena told her daughter (presumably in her late 30s / 40s and presumably for the very first time) the story of her first child Anthony, who had been put up for adoption (to the United States).

Some time later, Philomena's daughter, who worked as a caterer for various moneyed/"important" people events overheard Martin Sixsmith (played magnificently in the film by Steve Coogan) former BBC reporter, former press official in Tony Blair's administration, feeling sorry himself at one of these events (over having been forced to resign over something) and telling those around him that he was looking to "possibly get back into journalism again" (that or "writing a book on Russian History").  Philomena's daughter decided to come  up to him and tell him that she had a story for him (that of her mother) ...

Initially good ole Martin Sixsmith politely (actually not so politely) "declined" telling her that as a "real journalist" who's been stationed in places like Washington and Moscow and did, after all, only recently work for Tony Blair, he simply didn't do "human interest stories."  But after cooling down / having some time to think about it, he realized that this "human interest story" would actually be a very interesting one: "A little old lady, looking for her long-lost son, snatched away to America by the 'evil nuns' of Ireland of yore."  So he persuaded the newspaper that he was working for to let him pursue the story... probably THE BEST DECISION OF HIS LIFE.

The nuns certainly did their part ... by refusing to cooperate.  Coming back to Seán Ross Abbey, Roscrea, Co. Tipperarary, Ireland, and greeted by an African nun (vocations are down in Ireland as elsewhere in Europe ...), Philomena and now journalist Martin Sixsmith, are told by the (still white ... though now in a modified habit) Mother superior that tragically all records of Philomena's son's adoption papers "were lost in a fire" a few years back.  Interestingly all that seemed left from said fire was Philomena's little typewritten statement relinquishing all rights to any information about her child that she had signed back in 1962 when she had arrived to the convent "in crisis," a copy of said statement handed to her with the pertinent parts dutifully highlighted in oh so contemporary florescent orange in case she missed the point. 

But Martin Sixsmith didn't get to be a top BBC reporter stationed in Washington and Moscow and later getting a job working for Tony Blair by being a sop.  Over some Guinesses at the local pub, he's told by the villagers there the nun's "fire" that destroyed all those records was more like a "bonfire" set in the back of the Convent some years back because _no one_ recalled any fire damage repairs ever being done at the place (and this is the kind of stuff that villagers knowing _everybody's business_ would tend to know).

Hmm, so with no information to go by in Ireland, Martin and Philomena head off to the U.S. to see if they had better luck there.  Did they ever.  Having a picture (Philomena's) of 3 year old Anthony before he was adopted out of the Convent and knowing a little about the special circumstances of his adoption (that he was adopted by an American family along with another little girl from the place) Sixsmith was able to find who little Anthony became ... and what became of him.

I'm not going to say much more about the plot here except that it turned out that Philomena's son had ALSO gone back to the Sisters asking for help in tracking down his mother.  And he ALSO had been stone walled.

Well, "little people" get stone-walled and otherwise mistreated by all kinds of more powerful people all the time.  Except it turns out that Philomena's son turned out to have been "not so little / insignificant" after all.

To go further would really enter into SPOILER TERRITORY but honestly, Martin (played again magnificently by Steve Coogan) must have thanked (over and over) his lucky journalistic stars that he made the decision to "stoop down" and take-up this seemingly "inconsequential human interest story."

The blood-curdling question that the film lifts up, of course, is WHY?  Why would a group of Nuns (and really A LOT OF CATHOLIC NUNS of yore) endowed with RELIGIOUS POWER, would have CHOSEN to treat weak, marginalized people SO BADLY?  And let's be honest, our parents and grandparents ALL have stories of sadistic nuns hitting kids with rulers and so forth.  Not all nuns were so sadistic, but "the Nuns" were allowed (AND OFTEN CHOSE) to strut their POWER over the weak like that.  Again, why?

The answer that the film gives is predictable and laced with the religious justification of the time: The nuns saw themselves as "chaste" while these "fallen girls" were _not_.  So "they got what they deserved."

But I'd (again perhaps predictably) say it's more basic than that: PEOPLE (ANY PEOPLE) ENDOWED WITH POWER (ANY POWER) WILL BE TEMPTED TO USE THAT POWER SELF-SERVINGLY /  BADLY.  Why?  Simply: BECAUSE THEY CAN.  In this regard, I've been a many, many years-long Dilbert fan and in Parish life I've _always_ been a fan of distributing power across many, many committees to minimize the coalescing of power in ANY ONE PERSON OR GROUP.  Why?  Because power really does corrupt.  And various psychological studies conducted in the 1960s-70s to prove the point, including famous the Stanford Prison Experiment (which randomly divided a class into 'prisoners' and 'guards' soon found the randomly chosen 'guards' abusing the randomly chosen 'prisoners') and the Milgram Experiment (which tested the capacity of an 'instructor' to inflict ever increasingly painful 'electric shocks' on a 'test subject' even after the 'test subject' was heard _screaming_ simply because he (the 'instructor') was being told by a higher authority to do so).

In any case, the nuns of this little abbey in south central Ireland did terrible harm to both Philomena and her son, as well as to many, many others.  And they weren't alone.  Do we ban nuns?  No.  Even Philomena, portrayed as a life-long Catholic, would seem to not be for that.  But we need to learn from these mistakes and work on building / maintaining governing structures (both in Church and outside) that keep power distributed and not centralized where the temptation to use it self-servingly / badly could continue to cause harm.

Great film.


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The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug [2013]

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

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (S. O'Malley) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug [2013] (directed and screenplay cowritten by Peter Jackson along with Fran Walsh, Philipa Boyens and Guillermo del Toro) is part two of a three part series of films based on J.R.R. Tolkien's [IMDb] novel The Hobbit [Amazon] planned to be released over the course of the next several years.

Part I, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey [2012], caused controversy among many movie critics who questioned the value of expanding Tolkien's relatively short work here into a three part film of the scale of Jackson's earlier effort/triumph putting (also in three parts) Tolkien's far larger Lord of the Rings [Amazon] trilogy on screen.  Putting the LOTR on screen in three part made sense, the argument went, as Tolkien himself wrote the story that way.  In contrast, The Hobbit was written in one volume and was shorter than any of the three volumes of the LOTR trilogy.  Commercial motives (ya think ... ;-) were suggested expanding Tolkien's original The Hobbit [Amazon] into Jackson's three part big-time Hollywood-backed cinematic opus.

As I wrote in my review of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey [2012] I REALLY DON'T CARE: "If one was at all enamored by (or perhaps more fittingly here, _enchanted_ by ;-) the LOTR series, then just bask in the opportunity to spend a few extra hours in the "Middle Earth" of these films because the New Zealand location, the CGI and the cinematography in general are once again simply AWESOME.  I saw the cheapest possible version of this movie that I could see (the 2D and presumably 24 frame/sec version) and I still was awed.  And I would imagine that _this time_ the 3D, 3D IMAX and 48 frames/sec versions would be _well worth the price_."  And I continue to stand by that assessment including that the 3D here would probably be worth the additional price (whereas in so many other cases, the 3D is IMHO largely/just a price gauging gimmick).

IMHO more interesting questions involve how closely do Peter Jackson's films follow Tolkien's original and where they depart.  Here I would encourage parents to have their kids read The Hobbit in either Kindle or Paperback version (perhaps as part of a deal of going then to see the film in 3D ...) or read the book to them if your kids are still too small to read such a book.  I write this because most of the key scenes in the films do come straight from the book:

Gandalf [IMDb]'s (played by Ian McKellen) "unexpected invitation" to hobbit Bilbo [IMDb] (played by Martin Freeman), the adorable "guess how many dwarves are suddenly over at Bilbo's for dinner" scene as well as the "let's now put aside the silliness and sing our haunting ballad of the Lonely Mountain" scene that ends that dinner present in the first film to say nothing of Bilbo's encounter with the Gollum [IMDb] (played by Andy Serkis) as well as their initial encounters with goblins and trolls all come from the book.    And this second film includes passing through a dark enchanted wood, encounters with a shape-shifting Bear-Man, giant spiders, wood elves, the "barrel scene" (those who've read the book will know what I mean) and eventual travel to "Lake Town" before finally reaching the dwarves' former lair at "The Lonely Mountain" which the Dragon Smaug had conquered and now occupied.   

On the flip side, additions (both positive and negative) include: more, arguably incessant, fighting (with Goblins) in Jackson's Part II of the story that was present in Tolkien's original.  Further, both the Wood Elves and the people of Lake Town are more developed in Jackson's films than in Tolkien's version.  In particular, Lake Town's resident Bard (played by Luke Evans) who plays a significant role in Tolkien's original is given a family (a wife and kids) and Galadriel [IMDb] (played by Cate Blanchett) a female wood-elf is painted into a story which in Tolkien's original version contained almost no female roles (except for occasional reference to Biblo's long deceased grandmother who apparently belonged to a clan of rather adventurous hobbits).  There's also an interesting (and perhaps questionable) addition in Jackson's portrayal of some of the "politics" present in Lake Town.  Apparently, the rather despotic (Medici / Macchiavelli-like?) leader of Lake Town (which looks a lot like Middle Earth version of Venice) had instituted a rather tight regime of "gun control" in the town, making the town's people feel rather defenseless against, well, such beasties as the Dragon Smaug ...

With the exception of that somewhat silly "gun control" addition to the story, I continued to find the story very entertaining and certainly if seen in a manner which included reading Tolkein's original either before or after going out to see the film, overwhelmingly positive fare for families especially ones with small boys.  (To families with small girl's I'd probably recommend Disney's recent release Frozen [2013] instead ;-).  In any case, it's certainly a film worthy seeing as a family this time of year.


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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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