Tag: coming-of-age

WHITE BIRD – Review

Helen Mirren as Grandmère in WHITE BIRD: A WONDER STORY. Photo Credit: Larry Horricks. Courtesy of Lionsgate

Helen Mirren stars as a French Jewish grandmother who survived the Holocaust in the family drama WHITE BIRD. Concerned about her grandson Julian (Bryce Gheisar), a boy who is struggling to fit in at his new school after being expelled from his previous one for mistreatment of another student, Grandmere (Mirren) recounts her youthful experiences, a story of her past he has never heard, to teach Julian about the lasting power of kindness. In flashback, the grandmother’s story takes us to WWII France, to her old French village in the woods, where the kindness of a non-Jewish boy saved her life.

Also starring Gillian Anderson, WHITE BIRD is a moving, beautifully-shot and sensitively-told family drama from director Marc Forster, who also directed NEVERLAND. The film is essentially a young adult tale, offering a coming-of-age, historical drama about a grandmother teaching her troubled grandson valuable life lessons about bravery and kindness, by using her own experiences surviving the Holocaust. The screenplay by Mark Bomback is based on a graphic novel by R.J. Palacio, “White Bird: A Wonder Story,” which is a composite of several true stories that are lightly fictionalized. This coming-of-age family drama is part of a series, “Wonder films,” which aims to inspire hope, kindness and humanity.

Rather than the usual historical drama, WHITE BIRD has an unexpected element, which is a hint of Brothers Grimm fairy tale in how this grandmother recounts her wartime experiences to her grandson. Starting with voice-over by Mirren, the film begins its travels to the past by describing the place where she grew up like something out of those Grimm fairy tales: an ancient French town with an old castle at its center and surrounded by deep, dark woods. As a young girl, Sara was afraid to go into the woods, for fear of wolves. The one exception is in the spring, when she and her parents picnic in the woods where the bluebells bloom. Mind you, the tone here is Brothers Grimm, not Disney, with those darker stories’ pattern of a peaceful life falling under darkness and evil but with some light emerging in the end.

The film moves back and forth in time a bit, as storyteller Grandmere Sara weaves her own history into a lesson for her troubled grandson. Young Sara (Ariella Glaser) is a beloved only child, a bit spoiled, the daughter of a doctor father and a math teacher mother. They have a comfortable life. At school, bright Sara also shows a talent for drawing, and is encouraged by her teacher. Sara has a crush on a handsome boy, Vincent (Jem Matthews), but like most of the students, she ignores another boy, who had polio and now walks with a crutch and a leg brace, although some students target him for taunting and bullying.

When the Nazis arrive, nothing much changes at first, even for French Jewish families like Sara’s, because the town is in “unoccupied” France. Then things do start to change, with signs banning Jews going up in shop windows and Jewish people losing their jobs, including Sara’s mother. When Nazis come to the school to round up the Jewish students, Sara manages to escape and hides in the school. She is unsure what to do, until the boy with the crutch, whose name is Julien (Orlando Schwerdt), offers his help. Julien smuggles her out and takes her to his parents’ farmhouse, where his kind-hearted non-Jewish parents hide her.

Sara is hidden in the barn, because Julien’s kindly parents, Vivienne (Gillian Anderson) and Jean Paul (Jo Stone-Fewings), worry that their nosey neighbors might be Nazi sympathizers and might expose her. Hiding her puts them at risk too but Vivienne especially is warm and supportive of the frightened girl. Thoughtful Julien brings Sara food, but also drawing materials and books, and tutors her in school work, so she can keep up. In the barn, they two young people grow close, escaping into a world of imagination by using an old car to pretend to travel, making up stories of adventure.

As expected, Helen Mirren is charmingly winning as the lively, artist grandmother. The bulk of the film is the historical flashback, and there both Ariella Glaser and Orlando Schwerdt excel in their roles as Sara and Julien, with an especially good performance from young Schwerdt. Gillian Anderson is very good as Julien’s warm, supportive mother but it is really the young actors who shine at the center of this drama.

As the tense story of the Jewish girl hidden in the barn unfolds, director Forster skillfully weaves in a message of hope and human empowerment into this sensitively-told wartime drama. The story mirrors many of the true stories of hidden children or families aided by their non-Jewish neighbors. The Nazi threat is always looming, and increased when a group of local boys, including Sara’s crush Vincent, join the Nazis as a town militia. Yet Forster’s storytelling puts an emphasis on the power of human kindness, and bravery in the face of cruelty. The film is, by turns, tense and dramatic or touching and inspiring, portions that Forster skillfully balances. Part coming-of-age tale, part war drama, the film also looks at friendship, budding romantic feelings, and focuses on the power of imagination and art.

This is an emotionally powerful film, that is mostly very well-told, apart from one scene, with wolves in the woods, that leans a bit too heavily into the Grimm’s fairy tale aspect. Overall, WHITE BIRD is a moving, hopeful tale of courage that has the benefit of being a rare survivor’s story film that one is told in a manner appropriate for younger people (preteens, although not the very young) while still teaches some valuable lessons about the power of human kindness in overcoming evil. As the grandmother says near the film’s end, paraphrasing Martin Luther King, “You cannot fight darkness with darkness, only with light.”

WHITE BIRD opens Friday, Oct. 4, at Landmark’s Plaza Frontenac Cinema.

RATING: 3 out of 4 stars

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES – Review

(L-R): Noa (played by Owen Teague), Soona (played by Lydia Peckham), and Anaya (played by Travis Jeffery) in 20th Century Studios’ KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES. Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios. © 2024 20th Century Studios. All Rights Reserved.

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES continues the “Planet of the Apes” science fiction saga that was rebooted from 1968’s THE PLANET OF THE APES with Charleton Heston into a trilogy that started with RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES. The last two films in that trilogy, DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES and WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES, directed by Matt Reeves and starring the great motion-capture actor Andy Serkis as lead ape Caesar, reached soaring, almost Shakespearean, storytelling heights, while also wowing audiences with the realism of its technically advanced motion-capture acting and special effects.

That’s a hard act to follow, but KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES does not even try to match the heights reached in the last two “Apes” movies, instead offering more of a coming-of-age and hero’s journey adventure tale set several hundred years after the last of that previous trilogy.

Gone are both director Matt Reeves and the great Andy Serkis, but KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES still delivers an entertaining action-adventure tale in the “Planet of the Apes” world.

Wes Ball, who helmed the MAZE RUNNER trilogy, directs and the story features all new characters. The film is filled with excellent world-building for the apes’ post-human environment or vine-covered human-built ruins, and even more impressive and technically advanced motion-capture,. Unlike the 1968 original, the actors do not wear masks or make-up but gear for advanced motion-capture technology, which films and translates the actors’ performance, their facial expressions and movements, on to digitally-created apes, with even more incredible detail and subtle effect than in previous films using mo-cap. From a technical aspect, this film is incredible.

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES returns us to once again explore the world where enhanced apes and diminished humans battle for the dominance. In the previous trilogy, a lab-created virus gone wrong gives apes the power of speech and enhanced intelligence, while it kills off humans and leaves the remaining humans without speech and mentally diminished. In that trilogy, it was the human’s world that the apes lived in, but now things are reversed and it is the apes’ world that humans inhabit.

KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES is a coming-of-age story, in which a young ape goes on an unexpected adventure of discovery, revealing long-forgotten history and hidden secrets. In this future time, Caesar (the ape leader of the previous films) is a distant, barely-remembered figure. This world is filled with little villages of apes – chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans – who have formed their own clans, and are going about their peaceful low-tech lives in the vine-covered shadow the remains of the human built environment. Humans themselves are are largely absent, a rarely seen wild animal – mute, feral and dim-witted – who are so scarce they are almost mythic. In the village of the Eagle Clan, they are called “echos.”

After a brief scene of the funeral of Caesar, we leap forward several hundred years. Noa (Owen Teague) is a young chimpanzee in the leafy village of the Eagle Clan, the son of the clan leader who is also the trainer and guardian of the clan’s eagles, which help them with hunting. Noa and his friends Anaya (Travis Jeffery) and Soona (Lydia Peckham), are approaching their coming-of-age ceremony, where they will get their own eagle, but first they must climb steep cliffs to steal the eagle eggs from the precariously perched nests. Noa is a brave and skilled climber, but his jokester friend Anaya less so, yet both boys are encouraged by enthusiastic adventure girl Soona. Noa is bold but he is also the one who reminds the others to remember the rules – the laws – of their traditional village, laws based on the teaching of Caesar. Noa has high standards for himself, and tries hard to please his somewhat intimidating father.

As the young apes eagerly await the ceremony that marks their entry into adulthood, tragedy strikes, Their village is attacked by a strange group of apes, who often invoke the name “Caesar” during their brutal attack. The attack propels Noa onto a journey, one which leads to new discoveries that upend his view of the world.

Along the way, Noa encounters a quirky, erudite and talkative orangutan named Raka (a delightful Peter Macon), who is the last of group devoted to keeping the memory and teachings of Caesar alive. Raka tells Noa many surprising things and also shows kindness to a human woman who has been following Noa, dubbing her Nova. As Noa’s journey continues, we eventually learn that the attackers were followers of a gorilla named Proximus (Kevin Durand), who styles himself the new Caesar and the king of the apes.

Further description risks spoilers, but there are twists and surprises ahead, an upending Noa’s idea of the world, and a pointing to a new direction for the series, leaving a door open to, possibly, another trilogy.

Although Caesar is a distant figure, almost a legend, his presence dominates throughout the film. There are some impressive action sequences, starting with the one where the young friends are trying to steal eggs from eagles’ nests. The feel of the film is more like the director’s MAZZ RUNNER series but it works for this hero’s tale adventure. Still, the journey part gets off the a rather slow start and things drag a bit before a turn when the travelers encounter more apes, and the film again sags a bit later on before launching into its final, thrilling action sequence.

Character development is not as complex as in the last two Apes films, but that is not surprising for a hero’s journey adventure tale. However, the acting is very good and further advances in the mo-cap technology make the detail and nuances of expression on the digital apes’ faces breathtaking at times.

The cast is very good, starting with Owen Teague as Noa. Andy Serkis, who very much invented mo-cap acting, starting with his role as Gollum in the LORD OF THE RINGS movies, actually coached Teague for this role, and also worked with some of the other actors as well. All the actors had to participate in training in ape movements, although these apes, as they advance in language, also tend more to walk upright like humans as they rapidly evolve.

The amazingly convincing translation from the actors face to that of a digital ape is more impressive than if they were playing some kind of made-up alien, as we all know well what apes look like, making the risk of either images that ring false or enter the “uncanny valley” a higher possibility. But the technical work is outstanding, and one of the joys of the film.

Acting is strong throughout, with nice work particularly from Kevin Durand as the smooth-talking, self-styled king Proximus, and the very entertaining Peter Macon, who adds a needed droll humor.

But the standout in this adventure film is the technical side, which is a joy. While not reaching the heights of the previous trilogy, the sequel/reboot KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES delivers enough satisfying adventure entertainment on its own, with new characters and an open door to new directions set it up well for a new trilogy, creating a little intrigue but not leaving things unfinished

THE KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES opens Friday, May 10, in theaters

RATING: 3 out of 4 stars

EARTH MAMA – Review

(L-R) Ca’Ron Jaden Coleman, Tia Nomore, Amber Ramsey. Credit: Gabriel Saravia/ Courtesy of A24

Sundance break-out EARTH MAMA spotlights to struggles of a pregnant Black young woman who is trying to regain custody of her two children from foster care, in a quiet, moving indie drama by former Olympic athlete turned writer/director Savanah Leaf. Set and shot in the San Francisco Bay area, this impressive feature film debut for the British-born, under-30 writer/director has garnered awards and promising buzz. Unlike other similar dramas, EARTH MOTHER has a remarkable realism and touching cliche-free drama along with a surprising artistry.

Gia (Tia Nomore) is in drug treatment for a drug addiction that led to her two children being placed in foster. The young single mother has a part-time job with a mall photographer and attends the mandated parenting and other classes yet never seems to quite get on top of all the things required to regain custody. She is frustrated and worried because the clock is ticking on her being able to get her kids back, just as it is ticking on the arrival of her new baby, due in a few weeks.

Gia’s love of her son and daughter is plain to see, when she has her supervised visits, and she is gentle with both her clingy son (Ca’Ron Jaden Coleman), who wants to go with her, and her angry daughter (Amber Ramsey), who resists even looking at her mother.

Outside, Gia lives a life on the edge, with a precarious living situation and very little help from family and no father for the kids in the picture. We follow the heavily-pregnant Gia as she goes through her days, meeting with caseworkers, going to work, attending classes and struggling to make ends meet. From time to time, she relaxes with friends Trina (Doechii) or Monica (Sharon Duncan-Brewster). What emotional support she finds comes from her friends, who have their own messy lives and issues, but mostly she is just coping day-to-day.

Writer/director Leaf cast non-professional actors for her feature debut, adapted from a short film she made with Taylor Russell, and starring popular Bay-area rapper Tia Nomore. While this is Leaf’s first feature, she grew up with a mother who was an animator and set decorator on animated films such as WALL-E, BABE: PIG IN THE CITY and RED. At 97 minutes, Leaf’s drama is as efficient as it is is moving.

A palpable feeling of realism, and a real individual. sets EARTH MAMA apart from any number of dramas about struggling impoverished young Black mothers caught up in the foster care system. Gia is not a flawless person – she makes mistakes, screws up, loses her temper, and sometimes her own worst enemy, but it is always clear she loves her two children and is truly determined to get them back. And Gia’s flaws are not cute little, easily forgivable ones, even though they are humanly understandable, but her determination to keep trying and her love for her kids are her most admirable traits, leading us to care about her.

Likewise, the people who either help and frustrate Gia in achieving her goal of regaining custody are not two-dimensional cliches either, neither angels nor demons, just people trying to help but not always succeeding. Gia faces false assumptions about herself, as well as overcoming her own pride and immaturity, and making her way in a landscape where survival is a daily struggle.

The description above might make this sounds like a grim film but it really isn’t despite its real world grittiness. In a way, EARTH MAMA is a coming-of-age film, where Gia, in her mid-20s, has to find a way to grow up and take control of her destiny, and be the mother she wants to be for her kids. We do see the many challenges Gia faces but we also see her determination to regain her kids, and there is a more hopeful turn later in the film. This affecting drama’s incredible realism is aided by the fine lead performance by Tia Nomore and Leaf’s sure direction and thoughtful, well-researched script.

The title might suggests someone living close to nature but Gia lives in an urban landscape where nature feels absent. The only hint of nature is in her dreams, where her inner life is revealed as she escapes to a peaceful world, and we see her surrounded by quiet forests or tranquil beaches, dressed in soft fabrics, sometimes with her bare pregnant belly displayed. These beautifully-shot, dream-like sequences show the hidden side of Gia hidden, as she grapples with her hard life. Dream-like sequences featuring close-ups of a cooing infant effectively transmit motherly feeling.

While all the characters are presented as fully rounded, good or bad, the flaws in the foster care system and the obstacles it creates for Gia are plain to see. At one point, Gia is pressed by her caseworker to work more hours, causing the young woman to angrily explode, saying she can’t take more hours because she has to go to so many required classes. She is also being required to fill out forms but given little guidance or assistance doing that. Gia’s pride gets in the way too, refusing to ask the caseworker for help.

As Gia’s due date approaches, a social worker more attuned to what Gia is experiencing, Miss Carmen (Erika Alexander) approaches her with the idea of adoption. Gia initially rejects it, even angrily, but as her situation becomes more precarious and the chance grows that her newborn will go straight to foster care, she reconsiders. Gia wrestles with the idea, meets a potential adoptive family, a Black family she selected, but continues to be ambivalent and indecisive. Her dilemma creates a tension in the drama, which culminates in a emotional scene with one of her best friends.

At one of her parenting classes, which Gia initially rejects the idea, even angrily. As her situation becomes more precarious, and the chance grows that the foster care system will take her newborn, she returns to that idea, with open adoption on the table, but still remains conflicted.

Tia Nomore gives a strong performance as Gia in her first acting role, projecting an appealing quietness and a sense she is holding things in and holding it together. Nomore’s steady, open gaze directly into the camera helps us connect with and care about Gia.

Leaf drew on her personal life as the older sibling to an adopted younger sister but the film is not autobiographical The director has said that she means the film as “an ode to mothers,” and she succeeds well in that. With this strong debut film, we look forward to more good films from both director Savanah Leaf and star Tia Nomore.

EARTH MAMA opens Friday, July 28, in select theaters for a limited run.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5 stars

THE FABELMANS – Review

Gabriel LaBelle as Sammy Fabelman, in THE FABELMANS, co-written, produced and directed by Steven Spielberg. Photo credit: Courtesy of Universal

In his semi-autobiographical film THE FABELMANS, director Steven Spielberg looks back on growing up and how he fell in love with movie-making, a remembrance told through the lens of his parents’ marriage. Of course, “semi-autobiographical” means not everything we see is true but the story is by turns funny, touching and heartbreaking, as Sammy Fabelman, the stand-in for young Spielberg, grows up while his determination to make movies also grows, and his parents’ marriage falls apart. The film features a stellar cast, including Paul Dano, Michelle Williams, Seth Rogen, and Judd Hirsch with a nice cameo by David Lynch. Spielberg co-wrote the script with Tony Kushner, who also co-wrote “Munich” with the director, and with music by John Williams, the stage is set for something wonderful – and we get exactly that.

There seems to be a spate of partly-biographical films from big-name directors in the last couple of years, maybe partly due to reflection during pandemic lock-down or just to reaching an age for looking back (Spielberg is now 75). This one joins Kenneth Branagh’s semi-autobiographical “Belfast” from last year and Sam Mendes’ partly-biographical ode to his mother, “Empire of Light.”

THE FABELMANS starts out with the family in 1950s New Jersey, as we meet 6-six-year-old Sammy Fabelman (Mateo Zoryon Francis-Deford) while he is standing in line with his parents Mitzi (Michelle Williams) and Burt (Paul Dano) to see his very first movie. However, young Sammy is not too sure about this experience because he is afraid of the dark. It does not help matters when his mother, in an effort to reassure him, describes movies as “like dreams” – which Sammy quickly notes can sometimes be scary. But his parents tell him the movie is about the circus, and Sammy loves the circus and clowns (in an earlier era when clowns were seen as harmless and funny rather than scary). And the movie? Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Greatest Show On Earth.” If you have seen this epic, you know it is less a light, happy comedy than a dramatic epic, with a showstopper scene of a circus train wreck.

Sammy’s parents obviously expected a more light-hearted movie (and what parent hasn’t made this kind of mistake?), so they are nervous about Sammy’s reaction after the show. Sammy does indeed seem stunned afterwards, but it is because he wants to know how they did that train-wreck scene. But Hanukkah is coming, and the lighting of the menorah candles, and Sammy gets an electric train set, one car at a time until the final piece, the transformer to power it all. Yup – train-wreck re-enactment is inevitable, and when his mother hands him a home movie camera so he can record it, the pattern is set.

Sammy’s fascination with making movies is encouraged actively by his artistic mother Mitzi, who even gives him his first movie camera, but it puzzles his science-inclined father Burt. The film follows Sammy’s early efforts at making movies, along with growing up with his three sisters (one a baby) and his parents. His brilliant engineer/inventor father Burt (Paul Dano) is working on the cutting edge of the nascent computer industry, developing the machines that will drive the future. His mother Mitzi (Michelle Williams) is a talented pianist but gave up her dreams of the concert stage to raise her family.

Scenes of little Sammy crashing his train and filming it with his dad’s home movie camera give way to more movie-making, often starring his older sisters, who seem to enjoy the process nearly as much as their brother.

Burt Fabelman’s soaring career takes the family from the suburbs of New Jersey, to Arizona, and then to northern California. Tagging along is fellow computer engineer Bennie Loewy (Seth Rogen), a family friend who is kind of an uncle to the kids as well as Burt’s co-worker in early computer research.

For anyone who grew up making little movies (or knew someone who did), this film is pure catnip. At the same time, this is a universal coming-of-age story for anyone who grew up in the later half of the 20th century. The film-making sequences are among the most fun, and punctuate the family’s story as well as illuminating young Sammy’s growth as he approaches adulthood. This beautifully constructed family story has humor and heart-break, and a winning coming-of-age story.

While scientist Burt is supportive of his son, he sees his son’s movie-making as a hobby, and something he will grow out of. It’s pretty clear Burt wants his son to follow in this footsteps but as much as Sammy loves his quiet, kindly father, he is just not the same. As a sister points out, Sammy doesn’t even like math, but he sure loves making movies. Dad’s gentle efforts to interest his son – in fact any of this children – in his world of science is often undermined by jokes by ever-present pal Bennie. Although Bennie is in the same nascent computer field as Burt, his playful, jokester temperament is more like Sammy’s mom Mitzi.

While the family’s Jewish identity is clear, it is not always at the forefront in the story and instead is integrated into it in a pleasingly natural way. Interestingly, the Fabelmans never seem to live in neighborhoods with many other Jewish families around, as they move from place to place. In New Jersey, they drive home after in winter through a subdivision full of houses decorated with Christmas lights, until they reach their own unlit house. Yet later, we see a festive menorah in the window, as extended family gathers to celebrate Hanukkah. Later in Arizona, we see both grandmothers visit them, Mitzi’s warm mother Tina Schildkraut (Robin Bartlett) and Burt’s more critical one, Hadassah Fabelman (Jeannie Berlin). But by the time the family reaches northern California, as Dad’s career is reaching the top, the family finds itself in very different territory, a place where, as Sammy comments, “there are hardly any Jews.” Here Sammy is confronted by open antisemitism, in the form of a hate-filled fellow student in high school.

Both Michelle Williams and Paul Dano are marvelous as Sammy’s parents, two good but mismatched people. Michelle Williams is particularly brilliant as Sammy’s artistic mother, in one of her best performances in a career of them. Mitzi is encouraging to her son while frustrated in her own life, and the two do not always get along. Paul Dano is surprisingly good in the less-showy, more-challenging role as Sammy’s quiet, kind, steady, more reserved father. Dano manages effectively the difficult job of portraying a man who, while not understanding his creative son’s passion for movie-making, ever-hopeful that he will grow out of it, and fearing for his financial future if he doesn’t, is still supportive and kindly towards him, even if he doesn’t understand, In fact, both actors present these people as good parents who put their children first, even as things between them are breaking down.

Two young actors play Sammy Fabelman, Mateo Zoryon Francis-Deford as little Sammy, and Gabriel LaBelle as the teenage Sammy. The former is cute but newcomer Gabriel LaBelle does a truly impressive job, delivering a fine, strong performance often laced with a dry humor. Also very good are the girls playing Sammy’s two older sisters, his companions in movie-making in his early attempts. Both Julia Butters as Sammy’s sister Reggie and Keeley Karsten as sister Natalie give appealing, effective performances.

Other supporting roles offer humor and more. Seth Rogen plays Bennie, a part largely based on Spielberg’s favorite uncle. Rogen’s Bennie is often silly but role isn’t always comic, as his constant presence sometimes disrupts serious Burt’s attempts to connect with his family, and Rogen does well in the part. Yet Bennie encourages also Sammy’s movie-making ambitions along with Mitzi, and he plays a crucial role at a pivotal moment for the budding director. Judd Hirsch plays Mitzi’s oddball Uncle Boris, who comes to visit at one point, telling tales of working in early movies, and having a profound effect on Sammy. Hirsch’s bit as crazy Boris is short but a comic highlight. Another actor notable in a smaller role is Jeannie Berlin, who is dryly funny as Burt’s disapproving mother Haddash Fabelman. “This is brisket?” she asks after marching into Mitzi’s kitchen and opening her oven door to inspect the meal.

Spielberg recreates his own earliest films – which include a dentist horror one, a Western, and a war movie – but the director has admitted in interviews that he improved them over the originals, as he found the originals too embarrassing to show. And why not? The admission is its own kind of charming for fans and film buffs, and more of that catnip for the childhood movie-makers among us.

“The Fabelmans” is a lovely love letter to film-making, and to Spielberg’s family, with a message about good parenting and what matters in life. This film is very well-constructed, weaving together Sammy’s movie-making and growing up, with what is happening to his parents’ marriage, in a cohesive tale of family life. It is film that is entertaining but has something real to say about growing up and following dreams.

“The Fabelmans” is a wonderful cinematic Thanksgiving treat, particularly for those who dabbled in movie-making as kids.

RATING: 4 out of 4 stars

THE TENDER BAR – Review

BEN AFFLECK and TYE SHERIDAN star in TENDER BAR Photo: CLAIRE FOLGER © AMAZON CONTENT SERVICES LLC

Every family has some quirkiness but this one more than most, with Ben Affleck as a bartender uncle who guides the young J.R. (Tye Sheridan) to adulthood, in the comic coming-of-age tale THE TENDER BAR. Based on J.R. Moehringer’s memoir of the same name, George Clooney directs this story of a fatherless boy stumbling towards career and love, with the help of a colorful assortment of relatives, particularly Uncle Charlie (Affleck) who offers advice and support in a bar that is pretty much home.

Mixing affection, youthful adventure, and humor, THE TENDER BAR is a charmer, that features not only Affleck but Christopher Lloyd as J.R.’s grouchy grandpa and Lily Rabe as his beloved hard-working, emotionally-overwhelmed mother, working so hard that J.R. hardly sees her. But while J.R.’s hard-drinking, unreliable father may be absent, the boy has no shortage of colorful working-class father figures eager to help the boy out, and especially see that he has some fun too. Affleck’s charismatic, self-educated Uncle Charlie dispenses whiskey, classic books and advice from behind the bar at a neighborhood pub named for Charles Dickens in Manhasset, Long Island. The whole family lives together in Grandpa’s rambling, decaying old house, much to Grandpa’s dismay.

Affleck is having a very good year. Here, he delivers one of his most appealing performances in years, a kind of working class tough guy with the highest of ethical standards and an insistence that his nephew always do the right thing and be his best self. It is a wonderful follow up the to actor’s against-type performance in THE LAST DUEL, a complete opposite role where Affleck plays a charming but treacherous nobleman, one of the film’s villains, who encourages bad behavior and is a corrupting force rather than an ethically elevating one.

THE TENDER BAR tends to have a story that wanders a bit, reflecting J.R.’s own journey towards career and romance. Daniel Ranieri plays the very young J.R., who longs for his absent father, while Tye Sheridan plays the teen and adult J.R. Winning a scholarship to Yale, J.R. goes off to college, determined to be a writer, no small feat with no money to support him. He meets the girl of his dreams, although the young woman’s upper-middle class bi-racial family greets him coolly and the young woman herself blows hot and cold. Things seem to get off to a good start with a dream job but life proves difficult after all.

There are plenty of comic moments in this film, particularly with the younger J.R., taken under to wing of an assortment of Uncle Charlie’s barfly buddies who take the youngster along on trips to baseball games, bowling and trips to the beach. One of the most memorable and entertaining moments in the film involves one of trip to the beach, where Uncle Charlie collects young J.R. in his vintage turquoise green convertible, and drives all over town picking up his pals, rearranging the seating arrangements as they go, until the laden car finally arrives at the beach. That description does not begin to convey how funny this sequence is, as it is all in how the actors use this material, but it is a comic gem. A riveting dramatic high point centers on a scene with J.R. and his father (Max Martini), in one of the father’s occasional attempts to reconnect with his son, a scene that serves a pivotal moment in both the film and J.R.’s life.

There are equal measures of heartbreak and triumph in this honest, down-to-earth and thoroughly charming film. Although he is not the central character, Affleck’s Uncle Charlie is the heart of the film, just as he is the linchpin in J.R.’s life, and Affleck’s standout performance makes this warming, winning, quirky charmer of a coming-of-age film.

THE TENDER BAR opens Wednesday, Dec. 22, in theaters.

RATING: 4 out of 4 stars