A Wolf at the Door [2014] (orig. O Lobo Atrás Da Porta) [2014]

MPAA (UR would be R)  ChicagoTribune (2 Stars)  RE.com (3 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (3 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
Adorocinema listing*

AdoroCinema.com (B. Carmelo) review*
A Folha de S. Paulo (A. Agabiti Fernandez) review*
CinemaScope.com.br (L. Ramos) review*
O Globo (D. Schenker) review*

APUM (A. Núñez-Torrón Stock) review*
ChicagoTribune (K. Turan) review*
TheDissolve.com (M. D'Angelo) review
RogerEbert.com (P. Villaça) review
Slant Magazine (D. Costa) review
Twitch (C. Whale) review

A Wolf at the Door [2014] (orig. O Lobo Atrás Da Porta) [2014] [IMDb] [AC]* (screenplay written and directed by Fernando Coimbra [IMDb] [AC]) that played at the 2015 Chicago Latino Film Festival in may and more recently had a weeklong run at Facets Multimedia here in Chicago, is very, very well conceived, well shot, and again extremely well acted Brazilian domestic thriller / police story that plays on every parent's worst nightmare:

Set entirely in a sprawling / teeming, working-class part of Rio de Janeiro, Sylvia (played by Fabiula Nascimento [IMDB] [AC]*) an utterly average working-class presently unemployed housewife, comes to pick-up her cute-as-a-button, yet again, utterly average 7 or 8 year old daughter from school only to find that her daughter's teacher (played by Karine Teles [IMDb] [AC]*), haggard with a typically overcrowded yet still enthusiastic class of 3rd graders, had already handed her over to a "Shiela" who had introduced herself to her as "Sylvia's neighbor" coming by to pick her up as a favor to her (Sylvia).

Who the heck was "Shiela"?  Well, the little girl clearly knew, recognized and liked/trusted her.  The teacher, realizing, now, that OMG (!) she did something still _potentially_ terribly wrong, defends herself saying: "Honest to God, sweet Jesus, Mary and Joseph... I thought nothing of it.  Your criança (child) clearly knew her."   But Sylvia knew no Shiela ...

... 'Cept, Sylvia did quickly have someone in mind who could have done this -- Rosa (played magnificently by Leandra Leal [IMDb] [AC]*) a chatty, fairly good-looking "friend" of sorts who had come into her family's life in a somewhat odd (and now looking-back-at-it suspicious) way some time back.  Further, Sylvia did have her suspicions about her husband Bernardo (played by Milhem Cortaz [IMDb] [AC]*) a Rio de Janeiro municipal bus driver cheating on her.

So ... Bernardo gets called into the school, as do the the police.  Bernardo quickly admits to the police official (played by Juliano Cazarré [IMDb] [AC]*) present that, yes, he had _had_ an affair with said Rosa, and that he had received a strange somewhat threatening phone call to meet her at a train station "at 7 PM" that evening.  So he along with (plainclothes) police go to said station to see if she shows.  She does not, BUT ... of course Bernardo knows where she lives.  So, in relatively short order, Rosa gets brought in to the police for questioning.

But ... SHE has a story as well: She tells the police that YES she did pick the girl up at the school, BUT she did so at the behest of another women, named Beti (played by Thalita Carauta [IMDb] [AC]*) who was upset AT SYLVIA because SHE THOUGHT that SYLVIA was sleeping with her (Beti's) husband.  Rosa said that she gave the girl over to her and that Beti was just holding her for a while to scare Sylvia (and even Bernardo) straight.

Sigh / okay ... the police decide to follow-up on Rosa's story, 'cept ... it turns out that there's NO "BETI."  Rosa gets called into the station again, and here the Rio de Janeiro police official makes a rather remarkable statement/threat to her:

"Look Senhora, we looked for Beti, and there appears to be no "Beti."  So stop wasting our time.  Understand that yes, we (the Rio de Janeiro police) don't necessarily have the best of reputations, and yes, _every so often_ we end up beating-up someone who proves to be _completely innocent_ and THEN SOME DEPUTY FROM THE LEGISLATURE, OR SOME NGO, OR EVEN AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL ends up coming down here and gets all upset about this, BUT ... YOU'RE BEING ACCUSED OF ABDUCTING A KID, AND _NO ONE_ is going to be crying for you IF WE BREAK A FEW FINGERS OF YOURS or EVEN A FEW TEETH.  SO SAVE US SOME TIME AND START TALKING ... What actually happened?"

And so, facing being beaten-up there at the station, she starts talking ... and then the story she ends up telling is one heck of a story filled with LOT's of very, very tragic yet very human aspirations and ... failings.  And then both the street scenes as well as "indoor" / "at home" scenes in gritty BLUE COLLAR Rio de Janeiro are simply magnificent making the city itself an obvious character in the story.  One feels that one IS THERE. 

I do know that a lot of (North) Americans HATE subtitled movies but HONESTLY this is one subtitled movie worth seeing.  ALTERNATIVELY, this is one film that could be remade and reset in the United States (in English/Spanish) and would really work.

What I liked about the story is that the characters were NOT "rich people" or "important people" or otherwise "special people."  Instead, they were ALL profoundly REGULAR people from a blue-collar / working-class "inner city" neighborhood and they were ALL very, very well drawn, all with at least some goodness within them and all with some, at times, terrible, terrible flaws.

Great, well crafted story!


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser.  

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Jurassic World [2015]

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

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB () review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (M. Zoller Seitz) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review


As best as I can understand it, Jurassic World [2015] (directed by Colin Trevorrow story by Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, screenplay by Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Colin Trevorrow and Derek Connolly) is a "reboot / sequel" about making reboots / sequels, asking the question: How can one beat a movie about bringing a T-Rex back to life (Jurassic Park [1993])?

Well what can one do? (1) One can make a movie about bringing SEVERAL T-Rexes back to life (Jurassic Park II [1997]) or (2) one can make a film about bringing back, or heck, about just genetically engineering (creating), something EVEN BIGGER AND BADDER than the T-Rex (Jurassic Park III [2001] and now Jurassic World [2015]).  Then (3) hopefully, one can improve upon the special effects -- that's perhaps the most obvious thing that distinguishes the reboots of the 1960s era Planet of the Apes [2011] [2014] and Star Trek [2009] [2013] franchises -- and perhaps (4) one can dig a little deeper into the origins of the principal characters involved (the current film's screenwriters Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver certainly played with the latter in their POTA reboot).

The current film banks on #1 and #2.  #3 is iffy (the principal improvement promises to be simply that the film was shot in 3D -- at a cost of $3-4/family member going ... ouch!).  What about #4?  That will honestly be up to you Readers if you go.  I myself can not justify going to see this movie, certainly not a full price, let alone 3D price.  I did see value in the Planet of the Apes reboot as the special effects of the 1960s were still not up to the task of doing the story justice.  The Star Trek reboot I find a twitching A.D.D. embarrassment.  What made the original Star Trek series what it was, were the almost stage-play quality (dare one say almost "late-20th century Shakespearean level") dialogues.  I just can't see "a bigger, more monstrous dinosaur" worthy of the analogously more monstrous ticket price.

What does frustrate/ fascinate me is why Colin Trevorrow and Derek Connolly of lovely / excellent / award winning / SMALL, INTELLIGENT "indie" Safety Not Guaranteed [2012] fame took-on this project.  Perhaps it was an offer that they simply couldn't turn down, but honestly, big budgets aside, what a let-down. 

BUT I WILL CONCEDE ONE POINT regarding the current film, that being that ART DOES IMITATE LIFE HERE: When I was a kid, the wondrous attraction at our local Chicago-area Brookfield Zoo was its dolphin tank (We even read about it in 3rd or 4th grade about how they flew the dolphins out to Chicago wrapped in special wet blankets, etc, etc).  Twenty years later, the new Shedd Acquarium on the Lake added a tank featuring somewhat larger beluga whales.  And of course, the "Sea Worlds" around the world now have Orca whales (once, and perhaps once again known as "killer whales") as their principal (crowd drawing) attractions. 

"Bigger" sells ... And yet, honestly, at what cost, to the animals. and even to the spectators asked to shell-out ever more money on ever higher ticket prices?


* Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser. 

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Hard to be a God (orig. Трудно быть Богом) [2013]

MPAA (UR would be R)  RogerEbert.com (4 Stars)  AVClub (A-)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
KinoNews.ru listing*
KinoPoisk.ru listing*
Kino-teatr.ru listing*
Megacritic.ru listing*

Afisha.mail.ru (S. Orlov) review*
Chastniy Korrespondent (N. Bayman) review*
Chastniy Korrespondent (A. Grand) review*
Gazeta.ru (V. Lyashenko) review*
Film.ru (B. Ivanov) review*
Kinoafisha.ru (E. Savoyskiy) review*
KinoArt.ru (E. Stishova) review*
Kommersant.ru (L. Maslova) review*

APUM.com (A. Castro Tallón) review*
AVClub.com (I. Vishnevetsky) review
aVoir-aLire.fr (F. Mignard) review*
critic.de (N. Klingler) review*
electronicsheepmagazine.co.uk (P. Kapitaniak) review
Respekt.iHned.cz (K. Fila) review*
RogerEbert.com (G. Kenny) review
SoundOnSight (L. Palmer) review
Slant Magazine (C. Gray) review
Twitch.com (A. Vijn) review
Way Too Indie (C.J. Prince) review

KinoNews.ru viewer comments ;-)*
RIA.ru viewer comments*
IMDb message board

Hard to be a God (orig. Трудно быть Богом) [2013] [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KP.ru]*[KT.ru]* (directed and screenplay cowritten by Aleksey German [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]* [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KP.ru]*[KT.ru]* along with Svetlana Karmalita [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KP.ru]*[KT.ru]* based on a classic Soviet-era Russian science fiction novel by the same name [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]*[GR] [WCat-Eng] [WCat-Rus] [Amzn-Eng] [Amzn-Rus] by the Strugatsky brothers [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]* Arkady [GR] [Amzn] [IMDb] and Boris [GR] [Amzn] [IMDb]) is a PONDEROUS (nearly 3 hour long) LARGELY EXCREMENT COVERED (LITERALLY...) BLACK-AND-WHITE SCI-FI-ISH EPIC about a "cousin planet to Earth" whose CIVILIZATION NEVER SEEMED TO LEAVE THE MIDDLE AGES.  It has also been also critically acclaimed and won 7 Nika (the Russian equivalent of the Oscars) Awards (for best picture, director, actor, production design, costume design, cinematography and sound).

Adding to the film's mystique is that director Aleksey German [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]* [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KP.ru]*[KT.ru]* worked on this project for ANYWHERE BETWEEN FORTY (!!) and (merely) EIGHTEEN YEARS, including SIX YEARS OF SHOOTING, before DIEING while he was "in the editing phase" (the film was completed by his wife and son).

The film played recently at the Gene Siskel Film Center and is available for streaming for a reasonable price through the Amazon Instrant Video service.

What to say about the film?

First and foremost, the film is an adaptation of the FOURTH NOVEL of a SERIES OF TEN (10) SOVIET-ERA RUSSIAN SCI-FI NOVELS describing the "Noon: 22 Century Universe" [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]* imagined / created by the Strugatsky brothers [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]* Arkady [GR] [Amzn] [IMDb] and Boris [GR] [Amzn] [IMDb] during the Soviet (Communist) Era.

The story here takes place on a planet called Arkenar [en.wikip] [ru.wikip]* (its principal kingdom), which is inhabited by human-like beings BUT when first discovered by Earth appeared to be 800 years behind the Earth in its cultural development, that is, in the early stages of the Renaissance.  So Earth sent a team of 30 scientists to the planet to _observe_ what was expected to be the flowering of an Earth-like Renaissance on this cousin planet.  Yet to these scientists' surprise / increasing horror, the budding Renaissance appeared to be snuffed-out by a harsh "Reaction" against it.  The film's initial voice-over notes that first Arkenar's University was closed down and then most of its "knowledgable ones" (the writers, poets, talented artisans) were either arrested / killed or driven into exile in smaller outlying kingdoms/principalities.  As a result Arkenar was FROZEN in the Middle Ages.

What to do?  The Earthling scientists sent to the planet had been instructed to follow a "directive" similar to that of American Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek creation: NON INTERFERENCE in the development of alien worlds.  So the Earthling scientists, who as humans in a world inhabited by human-like creatures, took identities in the Arkenarian world, were required by their orders / code of conduct from Earth to simply _observe_ what was going on.  Okay, they could apparently seek to "protect" individuals who they deem to be potentially important to the planet's development, but even this was to be done in a discrete sort of way (above all, using the technology of the people at hand).

Well, for one of the scientists, Don Romata (played by Leonid Yarmolnik [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KT.ru]*) this proves to be increasingly hard to bear.  And eventually after spending much of the film searching for / surreptitiously protecting a potential "person of import" named Budakh (played by Evgeniy Gerchakov [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KT.ru]*) from the tyrannical Arkenar Kingdom's Prime Minister, Don Reba (played by Aleksandr Chutko [IMDb] [KN.ru]*[KT.ru]*), Don Romata reaches a breaking point ...

Now the key word in the last sentence of the plot description is "eventually."  The pacing of this film will probably upset many luke-warm movie-goers.  For the film's pacing is _intentionally_ if perhaps infuriatingly slow.  Why make a movie that is PONDEROUSLY SLOW MOVING?  Well...

(1) With almost no doubt, the film (as also the book series on which it was based) was at minimum intended to provide a Russian (and at least in the case of the original book series, Utopian Communist) alternative to Western (often American) Sci-Fi narratives.  American Sci-Fi narratives are often "shoot-em ups." British / W. European narratives, while less "gun happy" are generally faster-paced (and generally DON'T assume that "Communism won" ;-).   IN THIS STORY, there is a "Scientific Communism (or at least a kind of Utopian Rationalism to which Communist ideology aspired) won on Earth" assumption on which the actions of the Earthling characters in the story is predicated.  The Earthling character(s) in this film ACT SLOWLY because they ACT DELIBERATELY / RATIONALLY, etc.

(2) Putting aside pure-and-simple ideological reasons for making this film in a ponderous arguably neo-Soviet style ... the story RESPECTS the SCIENTISTS (the ANTHROPOLOGISTS) in the story.  Okay, these Earthling scientists came to this world expecting to be observing / reporting-on something nice -- the development of a Renaissance-like stage of cultural development on an alien world -- and instead found themselves observing / reporting-on a SHOCKINGLY / DISAPPOINTINGLY TRAGIC "ALTERNATIVE" to that stage of Earth's (or at least western civilization's...) history.  Yet, A SCIENTIST'S default training / instinct would be, in fact, TO OBSERVE / REPORT (where-ever "the experiment" leads one) rather than TO INTERVENE.

(3) Viewers get to appreciate why the film's central protagonist, Don Romata, FINALLY DECIDES TO ACT.  There's no short hand here.  We get to walk with this character for nearly 2 1/2 hours in the mud, grime of the world which he was inhabiting and get to experience the shocking-offense of that kingdom's rulers' "return to ignorance" campaign seeking to _keep their people_ LITERALLY "STUCK IN THE MUD" ... BASICALLY FOR ... FOREVER.

(4) The film itself becomes A THREE HOUR IMMERSION EXPERIENCE in the mud, grime of the Middle Ages, reminding us why it's generally a good thing that we've moved on ...

'Cept (5) HAVE WE, ALL (!!), really "moved on"??  This is the most fascinating part of this story: RUSSIA ITSELF, FAMOUSLY, NEVER WENT THROUGH THE RENAISSANCE / ENLIGHTENMENT.  Instead, it jumped basically from Feudalism to a kind of (Communist) Modernism, both of which proved very repressive AND even today Putin is trying _really hard_ to lead Russia once more in a pointedly NON-WESTERN (non-Libertarian) SORT OF WAY.
 
So as Russia appears to be entering into yet another period of cultural stagnation / oppression, the film shows (metaphorically), above all to Russia itself, what the alternative to Renaissance / Enlightenment looks like, and ... it's not pretty.

So while this is a ponderous three hour film, mostly through mud / possibly excrement, it is excellent. And it gives viewers many, many things to think about.  All in all, a truly excellent job!


 * Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser.  

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Icing (orig. Zakázané uvolnení) [2014]

MPAA (Unrated, would be R)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
CSFD.cz listing*
FDB.cz listing*
CineEuropa.org listing

Aktualne.cz (J. Gregor) review*
CervenyKoberec.cz (J. Kábrt) review*
CeskaTelevize.cz (M. Šobr) review*
iDnez.cz (M. Spáčilová) review*

Icing (orig. Zakázané uvolnení) [2014 [IMDb] [CSFD]*[FDB]*[CEu] (directed by Jan Hřebejk  [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDB]*[CEu], screen/stage play by Petr Kolečko [IMDb] [CSFD]*[CEu]) is a "Woody Allen meets Seth MacFarlane (Family Guy)" comedy that's part of the Annual (2015) Czech That Film Tour organized by the Czech Foreign Ministry / Ministry of Culture, which makes its stop this month (June, 2015) at the Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago. 

Set at the end of a stylish, story-book "location wedding" that's taken-place outdoors in the verdant / rolling hills of Northern Moravia between a young, good-looking and quite contemporary Czech couple Klára (played by Zuzana Stavná [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDB]* [CEu]) and Štepán (played by Ondřej Sokol [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDB]* [CEu] who even looks a lot like Seth MacFarlane) it is certainly NOT politically correct, but that's in good part the point: Štepán, as confident / unflappable and good-looking as he is, is actually an idiot, but as an idiot, he of course doesn't know that ... And "knock-out" yet far, far less secure Klára "has issues" as well.

Part of what "goes wrong" at the _end of the wedding_ results from couple's decision to be (goofily) "unconventional" about it.  For whatever reason, they decided to pick their witnesses _opposite_ "to the gender norm."  So Klára picks a looker if not particularly confident guy/ friend named Tomáš (played by Igor Orozovič [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDB]* [CEu]) while Štepán picks a sweet, perhaps "ever destined to be a bridesmaid" Slovakian friend named Iveta (played by Hana Vagnerová [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDB]* [CEu]).  Iveta turns out, of course, to have been "more than a friend" to Štepán, which does lead one to wonder whose idea was it exactly to go against the gender conventions for the witnesses at the wedding.  Štepán's completely unthreatened by Klára's choice of Tomáš as her "man of honor" -- he just assumes that Tomáš is gay, and NOTHING can convince him otherwise.  On the other hand, this "throwing of convention into the wind" allows him to have BOTH his lovely but otherwise very conventional bride and his (in his mind, _wildly_ exotic) mistress at the wedding.

Seriously, one of the funniest, if of course, utterly appalling, scenes in the film is one in which Štepán describes to (who he, of course, assumes is gay) Tomáš what it's like to have such an exotic mistress "from the savage wilderness of the Slovakian Tatra mountains."  One would think from his description that Iveta's great-aunt was somehow Austalopithecine Lucy.  And yet we viewers, of course, _know_ dear, sweet Iveta from the previous 45 minutes of the film and would love to have as a trusted best friend, neighbor or colleague and would happily go TO HER WEDDING sometime in the future.  But then Štepán's an idiot ... but an idiot who Iveta loves, and arguably more than Klára. Indeed, throughout the film,  Klára's a basket-case focused, above all, on the wedding, her wedding, turning-out "perfect."  And well, here, near the end, all seems to be falling apart ...

So, what could be "falling apart" so close to the end of the day??  Well, by local tradition, near the end of the wedding reception, the bride's supposed to be "abducted," usually by the "Best Man" and then the Groom is supposed to take a little time to look for her.  And then, having "found her" (again) ... the two are to run off to their wedding night / honeymoon 

Well, the "Best Man" in this case is "Best Woman," Iveta.  Yet "following tradition," Iveta "abducts her" and takes her then to a local out-of-the way (largely empty ...) "Sports Bar" at the edge of town.   Readers remember here that this is taking place in the Czech Republic, so the local "sports bar" is a "hockey bar" named "Lapatka" (the Czech name for a goalie's hockey stick).

The bar's run by a somewhat tougher / "butchier" woman named Vladana (played by Jana Stryková [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDB]* [CEu]) whose back story we find-out was that she was once a young struggling actress in Prague who once did a television commercial with a smiling, good-looking (and she insists _sensitive_) if MARRIED hockey player with whom she ran-off with.  Klára, of course, DOESN'T LIKE HER from the get-go (least of all on her wedding day...): "Don't you ever feel bad, that you RUINED somebody else's marriage?"  Well, Valdana replies: "If it makes you feel better, he ruined mine as well.  A few years later, he did an interview with someone on Czech Radio and ran-off with her ... And you know what's the worst.  Since she worked for Radio, I don't even know what she looks like ..." (Ba da bump!  I'm telling you folks, there is a Woody Allen quality to the film ;-) ;-)

So good, now ole (or at least older) Vladana's stuck running this Sports (Hockey) Bar (dedicated to her lout of an ex) at the edge of a Moravian hamlet at the edge of Nowhere (where her ex had presumably been from) pining to "one day return to Prague."

Anyway, the three sit there in the largely empty bar ... at the edge of Nowhere, where both Satellite and Cell phone reception is poor ... waiting for Štepán to arrive, find her (Klára) and then leave with her to go on their honeymoon.

And ... it starts raining ...  Štepán's delayed ... Much ensues ... ;-)

Now a word about the title for the film.  "Zakázané uvolnení" is the Czech term for the hockey term "Icing" ... In hockey, a team under pressure in their own end of the rink "ices" the puck (shoots it away to the other end of the rink) to relieve said pressure.  In English, this is called "icing the puck" and, of course, it is prohibited.  So after the other team retrieves the puck, officials blow the whistle, play is stopped, and the puck is brought back by the officials to the end where the action was taking place to resume play (there) again.

Now in Czech "Icing" is called "zakázané uvolnení" which literally means "prohibited easing."  As the three women -- "bride" Klára, "best-woman" Iveta and "hardened-a-bit by life / sports bar owner" Vladana -- wait there in a "sports bar at the edge of nowhere" (with poor reception and its raining) for "groom" Štepán to arrive much is "said" that once "said" can't really be "unsaid."  And one can't just "bat the ensuing problem(s) away ..." ;-)

So this is a clever / generally fun film ;-) ... though I would note that the Slovakian comments even if _intended to be exaggerated / appalling_ will probably needlessly offend many Slovaks.  And pointedly, Iveta, the _sweet_ if put-upon Slovakian character in the film was played ... by a Czech actress (apparently no Slovakian actress was willing to do the part).  And Czech reviewers also didn't give the film altogether high marks (averaging about 2-3 stars out of 5) in good part because its needlessly not-exactly PC nature.  Still, recognizing that Štepán's an idiot and Klára's a basket case, I found the film pretty funny ;-).


 * Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser.  

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Love & Mercy [2014]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (4 Stars)  RogerEbert.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (G. Kenny) review
AVClub (E. Adams) review  

Love & Mercy [2014] (directed by Bill Pahlad, screenplay by Oren Moverman and Michael Alan Lerner) is probably the first feature film of 2015 worthy of Oscar consideration.  It's a biopic about Brian Wilson the creative genius behind The Beach Boys. 

Like perhaps a great many of their more superficial fans, I've always liked The Beach Boys for the sunny optimism of many of their hit songs.  However perhaps also like a great many of such more superficial fans, I didn't necessarily respect them or their music in the way that I respected The Beatles, Pink Floyd, The Who (Tommy, Quadraphenia) and perhaps even The Doors.  In contrast to these "deeper" groups, The Beach Boys (or what I knew of them) felt like "popcorn," music to play when one was up / happy (or perhaps down and wanted to get out of the dumps and feel happier).

Well, of course, I had it all wrong.

First the The Beach Boys albums Pet Sounds (1966) [Amzn] and especially (!) SMiLE (left unfinished in 1967 and a version of which was released by Brian Wilson only in 2004) [Amzn] emphatically (!) prove that Brian Wilson was/is a true musical genius. 

Further, with the benefit of life-experience, it does not surprise ME much at all, NOW..., that the often impossibly optimistic songs that The Beach Boys were famous for were largely the product of a not particularly happy, indeed, at times very depressed, even troubled, Brian Wilson, who if not for the ENORMOUS commercial pressure resulting from the again ENORMOUS commercial success of  The Beach Boys' "happier songs" would have REALLY LIKED to go into "other (less manically happy...) directions" with his music.   It's ALL SO OBVIOUS ... now.

And so this film is about the very real (and quite AWFUL) suffering of Brian Wilson, in those years following The Beach Boys' initial success when Brian, AN INTROVERTED ARTIST (as opposed to a EXTROVERTED SHOWMAN) discovered that HE REALLY HATED TOURING but REALLY, REALLY LIKED COMPOSING ... and then REALLY EXPERIMENTING with what was BECOMING possible in the way of sound / music.

So the film portrays Brian Wilson at the two book ends of this terrible portion of his life, in 1966-67 (played in this period of his life by Paul Dano) as he was composing Pet Sounds (1966) [Amzn] and SMiLE (1967-) [Amzn] to the bewilderment / frustration / FEAR (for their financial fortunes) of his own band members / family -- remember that the group's original lineup consisted of brothers Brian, Dennis (played in the film by Kenny Wormald) and Carl Wilson (played in the film by Brett Davern) their cousin Mike Love (played in the film by Jake Abel) and friend Al Jardine (played by Graham Rogers), with the Wilson's RECORD PRODUCER dad Murry Wilson (played in the film by Bill Camp) looming large (and generally disapproving) in the background -- and then nearly 20 (!) years later in 1985 (played in this period of his life by John Cusack), two years after the tragic death of brother Dennis, when by chance he walked into a car dealership and met saleswoman Melinda Ledbetter (played in the film by Elizabeth Banks) who eventually pulled him out of his two decades long often life-threatening depression / funk.  The two married in 1995.

It makes for one heck of a story, that's both "rarified" (to some extent Brian's was "Michael Jackson" territory) and yet _also_ profoundly "familiar" (at its most basic level, The Beach Boys have always been "a family business," with all the attendant pluses and minuses ... with LOTS of people who DID CARE but perhaps DIDN'T KNOW HOW TO CARE as Brian broke down ... So by the 1980s a lot of the professional help that Brian was getting was from a "Hollywood psychologist" named Dr. Eugene Landy (played in the film by Paul Giamatti) and Landy turned-out to be a real control freak / a-hole...). 

So this is a film that's certainly A MUST for those who loved 1950s-60s American pop music.  But it's ALSO a film that could be understood as simply a quite compelling family drama.  It's very well done, and a film that deserves (even SCREAMS for) attention come Oscar time this year.


ADDENDUM:

Again for the 1950s-60s era pop-music lovers here, the recently/finally released documentary Wrecking Crew [2008] about the remarkable milieu of studio musicians living / working in L.A. in the 1950s-60s, many of whom Brian Wilson worked with during that time, could serve as an OUTSTANDING COMPANION PIECE to the current film reviewed here.


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Spy [2015]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RogerEbert.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (1 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (S. Wloszczyna) review
AVClub (J. Hassenger) review  

As far as James Bond-like spy spoofs go, the Melissa McCarthy vehicle Spy [2015] (written and directed by Paul Feig) is, with some clear problems / reservations (below), reasonably good.

It's a good part Steve Carell's Get Smart [2008], a good part Mike Myers' Austin Powers [1997] and perhaps even part Peter Sellers' Pink Panther [1963] with Melissa McCarthy playing the unlikely hero(ine).

Like Steve Carell's Maxwell Smart in Get Smart [2008], Melissa McCarthy plays a super-capable (here CIA) analyst (named Susan Cooper) who proves absolutely indispensable "behind the desk/computer monitor" somewhere in some hellish "undisclosed location."  One time even as she's leading her super agent Bradley Fine (played by Jude Law), who it's obvious that she's in love with (though he, or course, doesn't have a clue ...), through a particularly tricky assignment, BATS seem to burst through the ceiling of her "undisclosed location."  And so there she was, WITH ONE HAND on her computer mouse, leading her heart throb / agent through a maze of corridors and potential assassins, WHILE BEATING OFF _BATS_ WITH THE OTHER (HAND), all the while trying to "keep focused" on the "mission at hand" ;-).

She proved so indispensable that even though she was a certified field agent (well 10 years past ...), like Steve Carell's boss in Get Smart [2008], hers, Elaine Crocker (played by Allison Janney), didn't want to let her go into the field either.

But ... it turned out that while trying to stop a plot by a Bulgarian super-villain with a Rocky-and-Bulwinkle-ish name, Rayna Boyanov (played by Rose Byrne), from selling a lose suitcase sized nuke (HOW MANY of these "conveniently transportable nukes" ARE THERE??? ;-) to a random deep-pocketed terrorist, the identities of ALL of Elaine's available agents were compromised ... 'cept of course ... Susan Cooper.  So ... guess who got the gig, now, finally, after all these years?

Much, often LOL funny, yet also in typical Melissa McCarthy / Paul Feig fashion rather needlessly crude ...  ensues ... But let's try to put the accent on LOL funny, because it often is:

The "identities / cover stories" that poor, short, weight-challenged Susan Cooper is given are always sad / pathetic: Divorced middle aged mother of four in Europe because she won a trip there having been Indiana's "Amway salesperson of the month" several months running.  "Never married, cat lady" from Kentucky ("I have 10 cats?  How's that even legal?").  "Unemployed middle-aged  telemarketer from Akron" ("Oh come on, who'd take a passport picture with those glasses on ...?").

There's Rick Ford (played by Jason Statham) a super-gung-ho agent who's SO TOUGH that ONCE he "DEFIBRILLATED himself" ;-) ;-).   Yet brains definitely were definitely NOT his strong suit.  So he never seems to grasp that his identity has been compromised (and hence he REALLY SHOULD BE "off this case...").  As a result, he keeps clawing his way into now Cooper's operation, often at the worst possible times, forcing Cooper's handlers to keep changing _her identity_, giving her each time an even more frumpy "back story" than the last.

When Cooper finds herself in Rome, she's partnered with "Aldo" (played by Peter Serafinowicz) who's PROBABLY THE MOST PROBLEMATIC CHARACTER IN THE FILM.  Nominally an Italian driver / intelligence agent, he simply can't seem to keep his hands off of Susan's, well ... "Ts or A" ... through the whole of the rest of the film.  Now, I work in a parish with a significant Italian / Italian American population (I've celebrated bilingual English-Italian Masses for Weddings, Anniversaries and Funerals here as well as for Saint Anthony of Padua.  At our annual Easter Vigil Liturgy, we've had one of the Readings proclaimed in Italian now for years).   I've also spent three years in Italy during my time in the Seminary.  And I can't think of a single "Aldo" that I would have met during ANY OF THIS TIME.   So I find "Aldo's" character embarrassing, and knowing that there will be Italian American parishioners as well as Italian Servites back in Italy reading my review of this film, I FIND IT REALLY HARD TO RECOMMEND IT TO THEM, GIVEN "ALDO'S" PORTRAYAL.  PERHAPS a "saving grace" would be that LATE IN THE FILM (very mild spoiler alert) it is revealed that "Aldo" COULD BE either a MI-6 (British Intelligence) officer OR perhaps an Italian intelligence officer _pretending_ that he was an MI-6 officer playing an Italian intelligence officer (In "the spy game," things can get "pretty complicated" ;-).  Still, I do think that "Aldo" was a self-inflicted problem for the film.  Again, as a Catholic priest in a parish with a significant Italian American population, I find it difficult to recommend a movie that portrays an "Italian" so stupidly ...

And then there is the film's villain the Slavic "Bulgarian temptress" Rayna Boyanov (played by Rose Byrne) ...  I'm of Czech descent and one of the more amusing comments of a Prague daily, Lidovky's review of the recent Avengers movie* was that Hollywood seems to insist that "all Slavic names" HAVE to end with "ov" or "off" (note that while Czechs do put the "-ová" suffix to the end of women's last names, there's almost no Czech name that would end with "-ov" or "-off." So the ending's a Hollywood stereotype).  Then "Boyanov" is practically "Badinoff" of 1950s / Cold War Era Rocky & Bullwinkle [IMDb] infamy...  But okay, someone has to be a villain, and Russia's a bigger market than Bulgaria, so "why not make the villain, NOT Russian but 'Bulgarian' instead ..."  Note here, that (1) since 2004 Bulgaria's a NATO ally, (2) in the European Union since 2007, and (3) over the course of my writing this blog, I've reviewed THREE Bulgarian films, ALL OF THEM EXCELLENT, two of them Avé [2011] and The Judgement [2014] certainly Oscar worthy.  So, making fun of Bulgaria in this film (in as much as the film does so, though thankfully not THAT much ... "Aldo's" portrayed worse ...) is again, not particularly nice. 

Still, all things considered, Melissa McCarthy takes most of the film's jokes upon herself, and the film as a whole is a send-up of the impossibly glamorous "007 genre."  So it is (generally) a fun movie.

Just ... don't be Italian or Bulgarian ... sigh ...


 * Foreign language webpages are most easily translated using Google's Chrome Browser.  

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Entourage [2015]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  ChicagoTribune (2 Stars)  RogerEbert.com (1 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (D)  Fr. Dennis (1 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RogerEbert.com (B. Tallerico) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review  

Entourage [2015] (story, screenplay and directed by Doug Ellin based on the television series by the same name [2004-2011] [IMDb]) continues basically where said series left-off.  As such the film continues to simultaneously satirize and glamorize Hollywood excess.

The gang of four -- the ever wildly lucky / successful actor Vinny Chase (played by Adrian Granier) along with his decidedly less lucky / less talented older 1/2 brother Johnny "Drama" (played by Kevin Dillon) and buddies Eric (played by Kevin Connolly) and "Turtle" (played by Jerry Ferrara) all of once humble Brooklyn neighborhood roots -- is back.

And, well, Hollywood's been "very, very good to ALL of them" ;-).  Vinny's become a wildly successful movie star deciding here to take a stab at directing as well.  Eric's become his wildly successful manager (bagging / bedding two models, one blonde, one brunette, in a twelve hour period, fulfilling the Beach Boys' California promise of "Two girls for every boy...").   And even "Turtle" (formerly Vinny's driver) has become an independently successful "Tequila tycoon." Okay maybe it hasn't been so good to Johnny Drama, but at least his younger 1/2 brother Vinny still looks after him and continues to believe in him.   And in as much as there's any plot development in this film at all, given that everybody else's arrows seem to be going (wildly) up ... guess what happens to "Drama's" fortunes in this film?

Yes, the film may irritate some as basically a "pile it on" teenage-BOY's / teenage-BOY(at-heart)'s wish-fulfillment fantasy answering the "burning" question: "What would it be like IF EVERY CONCEIVABLE DREAM / FANTASY that one _ever had_ actually came _wildly_ true?" (Hint: It'd probably be PRETTY DAMN AWESOME ... ;-).  Yet, the film continues the series' charm of being SO GOOD NATURED (even as it certainly would NOT win any feminist film awards ... I don't think there's a single woman character in the film that was more than (again) some teenage boy's fantasy ...) THAT IT'S REALLY HARD TO HATE THIS FILM.

"Wouldn't it be nice?"  Well, YEAH, I return to the reality that for most men/boys (and I'm one of them ...) it'd be "pretty damn awesome" ;-).  I mean, this is a film that could have had even Osama Bin Laden humming "California Dreamin..." (with again about as much consideration given to the women in the story as an radical Islamicist would give ... And, well, bikinis, "birthday suits" and burkas do actually all start with the letter "b" ...).

I would just end that in Dante's Inferno, the ring for those who stripped the world bare in this life (the rapists, the sodomites and the usurers) was that of a scorching desert waste with a steady firey rain in the next.   For if one so thoroughly strip-mined this world for _all_ its potential for happiness, what would be left to experience in the next?

Still, it's hard to not like these guys or suspect that a fair number of the younger male Hollywood movie stars (Mark Wahlberg, Leonardo di Caprio, James Franco ...) are living pretty much exactly this dream... and one wonders, what if Osama Bin Laden had simply been "a better-looking / less awkward-looking guy" ...


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