This past weekend I saw Once, the film. Earlier in the year I had seen the live play here in Toronto and enjoyed it. I had been exposed to Once, and the music from the Broadway cast (Tony Award winning) and Steve Kazee and his talent. I liked the music, and looked forward to seeing both of these. The musical theatre was alright, but I did not feel the chemistry between the two lead characters. She was driving him and his talent, but there was not a lot of sharing. But this is background.
May 8th 2015
Here is a review from Sietz at ebert.com Much of this I would agree with:
April 28th, 2015
This weekend was Hector and the Search for Happiness. I wonder why it wasn’t the “pursuit” of happiness but never mind. This was a TIFF film from last Sept which I picked up at the library. Hector played by Simon Pegg is a psychiatrist in London with the same dreary clientele. He has a girlfriend (Rosamund Pike) who I will speak of in more detail, but he is going through the motions. He wants to explore happiness. Pegg is generally very funny, but here that leaning and skill is little used. Hector goes on a journey on his own to quite random places. It becomes a travel log (Singapore? Nepal? Africa? LA?) There is struggles to make meaning of it all, while doodling on his pad and writing down nice sayings.
April 23, 2015
A belated review, from last week I saw A Most Violent Year.
It stars Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain. Isaac was a familiar face who I remember seeing first as Joseph in The Nativity Story. In that I thought that he was very good. Really how much is written about Joseph and how he reacted to all this? Isaac found a way to make him live, and be human and sympathetic. He also played the spoiled King in Ridley Scott’s failed Robin Hood experiment and the King who decides not to agree to the Magna Carta. He was more than a little over the top there.
Here he plays the owner of a New York/New Jersey home heating oil company. He is ambitious and street smart. He married well, and acquired a company from his Wife’s family. She played by Chastain is a daughter of a mobster (who is presently in jail). The roots there are strong and her inclinations lean backwards when things don’t go her way. Here there is a business deal that puts Isaac’s company in a vulnerable position and then bad things start to happen. It’s 1980s NYC when there were more murders and rapes than at any other time. It’s dangerous. But he is trying to run a legit business. By legit, that means “following standard business practices” which in those days meant that there were still some shady dealings and sharp practices for the consumers. The story travels a familiar arc, and it is the performances that are good. Isaac has real personality and presence. He has deep and penetrating looks and stares. He says a lot with his face (I kept thinking that there was more than a little of a young Pacino in him). The story seems a fair bit at times like The Godfather. It’s not on that plain or level but he is good. As for Chastain, she plays the wife well, and she shows the closeness in the relationship. I noted how the couple when they are meeting under stressful circumstances still ask “Are you okay?” It’s a little thing, but shows concern and support. There was thought around Awards time that this could be under consideration. It likely garnered a few votes, but just not enough. I cannot really remember it being in the theatres.
April 6th, 2015
A little belated but here it is for this past weekend.
March 9th, 2015
I have carried on a debate with people for some time about getting older, and whether in your old age you would rather lose your body or lose your mind? I have seen first-hand both sides. My Grammy, who lived into her late 90s, lost her body. Her eyesight failed with cataracts and she had poor results from surgery late in life. She had pain in her legs but refused pain killers because they made her “fuzzy”. In the end she was in constant pain. My other Grandmother, kept her body for the most part, but suffered from dementia. In the end she did not know her family nor where she was. She remained independent until the last moment possible, but had assisted living when she wandered the streets aimlessly from her St Clair condo. The movie Still Alice explores the whole issue from the latter perspective, and does so very poignantly.
February 17th, 2015
This past week has been a busy one to catch up on movies for the coming Oscars on Sunday night. I have all but American Sniper watched (and I finished half of that yesterday). I watched Boyhood last Thursday and then The Boxtrolls (animated nominee) and finally Selma last night.
February 9th, 2015
So based upon the favourable reviews, the number of nominations (including Best Picture) and the win at the Golden Globes and BAFTA awards for Eddie Redmayne for Best Actor I finally had a chance to see The Theory of Everything. I share in many of Alison’s views (previously shared) about biopics and the acting challenge that it requires. In the last 10 years, there have been 6 biopic Best Actors award winners and 4 non-biopic. The last six years it has been alternating between biopics and not. Last year was NOT with Matthew McConaughey. The year before was Yes for Lincoln. Then The Artist (No), Kings’s Speech (Yes), Crazy Heart (No), Milk (yes) and Last King of Scotland (Yes). If the pattern continues, and it will, this year we have a biopic winner. But history aside, what about the movie?
I had heard mixed reviews about the film. All the nominations quite frankly surprised me. The two key performances with Redmayne and the Wife (Felicity Jones) are solid. This is a story of remarkable resilience for a man who was given a death sentence (“two years to live”) early on in his life. We see his struggles and the brilliance of his mind. Much like Daniel Day Lewis with Christie Brown in My Left Foot, you have a physical transformation of the man as he succumbs to the disease. His body folds away underneath him and settles uneasily into a wheelchair ultimately. There is a scene of tremendous struggle where he tries to get up a flight of stairs to his bedroom with his young toddler son watching. Another after he loses the power of speech. Still, he has the love and support from his Wife. She is good as well. Although for the older scenes as she ages, she is just a little too young looking still. I was awaiting her Jennifer Connolly A Beautiful Mind moment where she explodes from frustration in dealing with her everyday life, but she doesn’t. Maybe that is a strength in the performance, but somehow I think that more range can be shown. Or perhaps it comes from the fact that this movie is based upon Jane’s own book of living with Stephen. It reminds me of The Affair (just begun for me to see on a plane this weekend – where perspective plays a huge roll and the same scene is shown to different eyes and lens). Maybe that is HER interpretation of events with him. Redmayne has to show range through his face, and body language as his character loses speech fairly early on. I did find it predictable as a story, and I cannot think of this as the Best Picture. I like Imitation Game and Birdman more than this –unfairly comparing completely different films. But back to Alison’s point, Professor Hawking is still alive. There is much footage about his life and his history. In many ways Redmayne is replaying old home movies. To that end, I am still backing Cumberbatch as a better performance and gets my vote for Best Actor. Redmayne will likely win. But to me, there is more to fill in (and act) for a character who was not as well known. In the end we will see.
Another film started but not finished for me was The Judge. Another TIFF film with Robert Duvall and Robert Downey is his most smart-ass like self acting as a lawyer separated by life from his family. They don’t get along, and he and his Judge father do not talk. But his Mom dies and he needs to pay his respects to this backwater town in Indiana to bury her. He meets up with younger and older brothers. He exchanges groans with Dad until Dad is charged with hitting a local everyman with his car and killing him. Step in Robert Downey and let the clichés rain on down. I did not even see the ending, but I know how this ends. Let’s just say the youngest brother in the family finds a way to film his way into saving the day! That is a total guess on my part so I cannot be said to give it all away. But I don’t feel the need to finish this film as it was going through the motions. Billy Bob Thornton is admirable as a cocky Prosecutor. And there is Vera Farmiga who should work more, and so should the woman playing her daughter. But I am glad that I did not pay $25 to see this film.
Incidentally, having seen Episode 2, 3 and 4 of The Affair that won best drama in TV for Golden Globes I am enjoying the story. I like the perspectives taken, and the intrigue. I will watch more episodes.
January 26th, 2015
Oscar season is upon us, and to that end there are a number of films for me to catch up on. I saw for a second time Imitation Game this weekend and re-confirmed what I had been thinking; that this is one of the Best Films of the Year. So far it is my pick. And although it is a biopic, and agreed on my part with Alison, that it isn’t as much of a stretch for an actor (here we have a man, Turing who has been dead since 1954). I like the various themes here, and the notion that it was women (not only Joan Clark but the receiver of messages on the wires) as well as this gay man who solved Enigma and shortened the war effort by a couple years.
I saw Birdman and also Cake this weekend.
Birdman was really good on a number of levels. Michael Keaton was really good and so was Edward Norton. I typically am not an Emma Stone fan, but she was also very good in a supporting role. It is an interesting view on fame, relevance, the theatre and critics. All at the same time. It is well acted, with some extraordinary interactions. It is beautifully filmed in NYC, and in a theatre with great use of lighting and colour. The music too adds much to the whole feel of the picture. Here we have a tortured narcissist and actor who had been a great comic book movie star, but has done little since. He is looking to become relevant by creating an original play for Broadway (writing, acting and directing). Norton re-affirms what I already knew about him; he is a great actor and needs to work more on quality projects. The interaction among the characters is its strength and it has great writing. Worthy of its’ many nominations (Best Film, Director, Actor, Supporting Actor and Actress).
Cake was okay. A rather simple story really of a woman in chronic pain after an accident of some kind. A fellow woman in pain therapy had taken her own life (Anna Kendrick) and that leaves this woman trying to understand herself and this other woman’s motivations. Can’t say that this was an Oscar performance, and Aniston was not nominated (although she got a Golden Globe nomination). It was a bit slow, and I can’t say that the acting (beyond showing pain) was over the top excellent. Here like Birdman is a protagonist who has internal voices, or those who speak to them that are not necessarily there.
Guess I need to see The Theory of Everything at some point.
January 5th, 2015
Welcome to the first edition in 2015 for Mondays. It was a great holiday break is year filled with many movies. Great times. And some time away from the office. For movies there was a lot of quality that was seen.
The Giver. Please, take it back.
Here was the joke from The Aristocrats that got me going:
For his audition, the pianist plays the most amazing jazz piece ever. The bartender is just floored. He sees that this pianist is going to triple his business. So the bartender asks, “Who wrote that?”
“I did,” says the pianist.
“Wow!” says the bartender. “What’s it called?”
“I fuck goats on Sunday,” replies the pianist.
The bartender does a double take, and almost throws the pianist out of the bar, but instead asks to hear another piece. So the pianist plays a magnificent classical piece that is sexy and suave at the same time.
“Wow,” says the bartender. “Who was that? Fuckin’ Mozart or something?”
“No,” says the pianist. “I wrote it! It’s called ‘Your mother is a two-bit whore but she gave me half off!'”
“Hey, man,” says the bartender. “Your stuff is awesome, but do you have anything without an obscene title?”
The pianist thinks for a minute, and then says, “Nope.”
The bartender thinks for a minute himself, then agrees to hire the pianist as long as he *never* tells anyone the title of his songs. The pianist agrees, and thus begins a wonderful relationship. The bar is packed, the pianist gets quite a following, it becomes one of the most happening places in town.
One day, the pianist is playing one of his particularly sexy pieces, and he sees an attractive girl at the bar eyeing him quite suggestively. So after finishing the piece, the pianist winks at her and heads to the bathroom. She follows him in, and gives him a blowjob. He finishes up, she gets up, leaves. A minute later, he heads back out to start playing again.
Everyone in the bar is staring at him. He thinks it’s because they all realize that he just hooked up with a really attractive woman in the bathroom. But then one of the patrons shouts out, “Hey, Piano Man, you know your zipper’s open, your dick’s hanging out, and there’s jism on it!?!”
The pianist grins widely and says, “Do I know it? I wrote it!”