Tag: Film

Samuel Beckett’s FILM and Buster Keaton’s THE CAMERAMAN This Weekend at Webster University

cameramanheader3

Samuel Beckett’s FILM and Buster Keaton’s THE CAMERAMAN  screen together this Friday through Sunday (July 29th-31st) at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium (470 E. Lockwood, Webster Groves, MO 63119). The program begins each evening at 8:00. 

Samuel Beckett, the celebrated author of Waiting for Godot, made one film, and it was called FILM and made in 1965. It’s in essence a chase film; the craziest ever committed to celluloid. It’s a chase between camera and pursued image that finds existential dread embedded in the very apparatus of the movies itself. The chased object is the silent film legend, Buster Keaton.

1924: American comedian Buster Keaton (1895-1966) plays a bungling projectionist in the film 'Sherlock Junior', which he also directed.

Keaton’s THE CAMERAMAN runs 70 minutes and is considered to be one of his very finest. The first picture he made after his newly inked contract with MGM, THE CAMERAMAN is generally considered to be his last masterpiece. It is reminiscent of some of his early slapstick works: there’s a pure anarchistic glee throughout that finally explodes in an incredible scene involving a monkey, a movie camera, and Keaton amidst a full-fledged Chinese gang war (!) that must surely go down as one of the most ambitious gags anyone has ever attempted. But the whole film is great fun and should make for a fascinating double bill with Samuel Beckett’s FILM and you’ll have the chance to catch these on the big screen when they play this weekend Friday through Sunday (July 29th -31st) at Webster University.

cameraman-theredlist2

Admission is:

$6 for the general public
$5 for seniors, Webster alumni and students from other schools
$4 for Webster University staff and faculty

Free for Webster students with proper I.D.

Advance tickets are available from the cashier before each screening or contact the Film Series office (314-246-7525) for more options. The Film Series can only accept cash or check.

The Webster University Film Series site can be found HERE

http://www.webster.edu/film-series/

STAR WARS: EPISODE VII – THE FORCE AWAKENS Blu-ray Review

swfa_img3

STAR WARS: EPISODE VII – THE FORCE AWAKENS

Wow. Just the sound of it rolling off the tongue… Who would have thought this would happen? We all dreamt about the possibility of the saga being taken further than six episodes, even if as secretly closeted fans, but did we ever truly believe it would happen? Now it has and I do not feel I am alone in saying it’s been worth the wait. Even those who found the film little more than average have to admit, this is something truly special, even generational, for some.

I’ve admired J.J. Abrams as an all-around, fully immersed filmmaker for some time now. From his original content on television and the big screen to revamping STAR TREK and now STAR WARS, he’s a special kind of movie geek. No one can argue that his heart and soul isn’t in every fiber of making a fantastic movie and doing it right. This, more than anything else, is why I personally have looked forward to being able to revisit this film at home, in depth and experience it on a more intimate level, separate from but equally thrilling as the experience of seeing it in a packed theater.

For some of us, the Saga took a heartbreaking turn to the dark side with the “prequelogy,” a time of lost hope and shattered dreams. An era we yearned for so deeply that, for many of us, ended up stabbing us so cruelly, so heartlessly in the backs. We had our strong moments, our proud moments in that clouded age of anger and disappointment, but the journey was long and wrought with banality and shame. One word… midichlorians. One name… Jar Jar Binks. Oh, the sounds still send shivers down my spine.

swfa_img2

If Star Wars were a religion, one could make the argument that Abrams is the messiah. That’s not my outlook, but I can see the case taking a solid foothold with a segment of the fandom. Every epic yarn has it’s peaks and valleys, a dark age followed by a renewed renaissance. Who better to usher up the new enlightened period than Abrams?

Wait… I can hear them now. I hear the groans and poorly annunciated digs on THE FORCE AWAKENS as simply being A NEW HOPE recycled. Fair enough. There is some merit in that argument, on the surface. I encourage those that feed on this, however, to look within the ancient lore that has so heavily influenced this and so many other modern fables and make a case that this is, at it’s core, a traditional and proven method of storytelling. The Buddhists believe in reincarnations. The Christians believe in the resurrected savior. Why not, then, can we not have our Jedi come in familiar cycles of discovery and enlightenment?

On with the story… darkness reigns and the secretive, ruthless Sith influence once again threatens freedom and peace throughout the galaxy. Once again, the bad guys have a nasty toy, only this time it’s way bigger and meaner. They call themselves the First Order, are eerily reminiscent of the Nazi Third Reich, and are led by a psychotic, ill-tempered sociopath who blames others’ for his own shortcomings. Kylo Ren has daddy issues as well as anger management issues, struggling to fit into grandaddy Vader’s big black boots. Meanwhile, a spunky young loner girl named Rey scrapes out a meager existence on a desert planet as an under-appreciated scavenger while the force lies dormant within her.

swfa_img5

Yoda, Qui gon and Obi-wan are dead, Luke has gone AWOL and there seems no hope of a Jedi resurgence to save the day. Instead, Princess Leia leads her rag tag resistance against unsurmountable odds until a cowardly storm trooper gets cold feet on his first day, helping the best pilot in the resistance escape captivity in the process of defecting and thus begins the dawn of a renewed fight.

All of this is shot in breathtakingly beautiful, larger than life scope and accompanied by yet another impressively iconic score from the legendary John Williams. Much to Abrams’ credit, the film utilizes as much practical special effects as possible and it pays off. The detail and immense realism, placing the audience amidst the action and eerily familiar foreign landscapes allows us the immerse ourselves deeper into the childlike fantasy of the Star Wars saga. Abrams understands this and succeeds in rekindling that youthful flame whereas the prequels were more focused on attracting the fresh young flickers while greatly ignoring the long-glowing embers.

Rich in color, design and detail, the sets and the locations alike are painstakingly evident when taking the time to study the blu-ray edition of THE FORCE AWAKENS. The initial home release of the film, which included both the blu-ray, the DVD and the digital copy, opens up the new chapter to fans in all it’s unencumbered theatrical glory. We need not be concerns about which version or re-edit we’re stumbled upon. It’s the one, the only, the intended version.

New creatures and characters, a fresh young cast, reminiscent of what we were given in the original trilogy, whereas these relative unknowns prove two things: first, that Abrams is a casting genius, and second, that these “rookies” nailed it, especially Daisy Ridley as Rey. Giving a jaw-dropping, fully convincing performance of emotion, physical ability and adaptiveness shows me we are in for a real treat as certainly she will pursue her connection with the force and train to become Jedi. When it comes to girl power, Rey is right up there with Weaver’s Ripley and Theron’s Furiosa. Converse to this is Finn’s unheroic reluctance to anything noble or courageous, but in contrast to Rey is strangely fitting and the two rub off an one another, leading Finn to have a change of heart and mind.

swfa_img1

THE FORCE AWAKENS is, in many ways familiar, but is in just as many ways fresh and invigorating as well. While this initial home release does contain some worthwhile extras, by the current modern standards is fairly basic. Certainly, future editions will reveal existing golden nuggets being held back in secrecy and new ones to be mined from the archives, a la Special Limited Anniversary Collectors’ Editions, et al. With that said, this one is far from bare-boned and has merit amidst it’s menus.

My own experience, having revisited the film at home on blu-ray with my boys, 11 and 8 years old, was a wealth of revelatory glory. Glued to the events unfolding on hi-def, these three pairs of eyes were, and as the film ended, I found myself not forsaken, but accompanied during my quest to conquer the bonus features by my 8-year old, equally glued to the documentarian escapades as myself, when he turned to me and said “we’re just a couple of movie geeks.” I wipes a tear from my eye and realized all is well in the world and Star Wars has returned in a way with which we can all be proud.

Bonus Features:

  • Secrets of the Force Awakens: A Cinematic Journey — Having originally premiered at SXSW to help promote the film, this documentary is as much a marketing tool as it is an engaging, light-hearted glance behind the scenes of the film. This documentary s longer than most made for home release, is not so long as to intimidate a viewer. The film also unveils some lesser realized casting choices that non-die hard fans may not have otherwise known. A good chunk of the film does feel a bit like collected junkets, but one ting that certainly was not lost on me while watching this was how grateful and humbled the cast and crew involved with this filmmaking experience are to the fact that this is a story of meteoric cultural significance and should be treated as such.
  • The Story Awakens: The Table Read — A rather truncated, brief but revealing feature that gives the audience a fascinating insight into the actors’ journey of discovering, adapting and becoming a role as part of a larger story.
  • Building BB-8 — Perhaps my favorite bonus feature of this release, the research, time and skill that went into bringing this little guy to life in awe-inspiring. Not since No,5 from SHORT CIRCUIT have a connected so fully with the cuteness of a self-aware robot.
  • Crafting Creatures — What’s a Star Wars film without the obligatory featurette about how they created the monster/creature makeup and effects? Nonetheless, well worth viewing as a standard option available on most similar genre films.
  • Blueprint of a Battle: The Snow Fight — Kylo Ren, Rey and Finn, and how they made this fight look so darn good! It takes a lot of practice time and hard work to perform a convincing, realistic, emotionally-charged, thrilling light saber fight and this helps to explain.
  • John Williams: The Seventh Symphony — Basically, a short, but well-deserved tribute to a living legend.
  • ILM: The Visual Magic of the Force — A short, but insightful glimpse into what ILM does and what puts them at the top of their game.
  • Deleted Scenes — There are only a handful of relatively short deleted scenes, but undoubtedly there are many more that may likely reveal themselves in future releases. With that said, these are some interesting omissions and are curious to consider.

STAR WARS: EPISODE VII – THE FORCE AWAKENS will be available on a Blu-ray/DVD/Digital Copy Combo Pack on Tuesday, April 5th, 2016

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

swfabr2

THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS Review

tginp_image

I don’t like speaking ill of the dead, especially icons who’ve defined an entire genre, but name-dropping is a marketing tactic best left for the living. Director Nick Simon’s newest feature film is titled THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS and I honestly believe I see Wes Craven’s name pop up in connection with this film more than Simon’s. Naturally, with Craven having passed in August of 2015, he’s likely to have had little [if anything] to do with the marketing of this movie, but it would certainly seem like he’s calling the shots from the gave.

Sadly, THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS is not the shining example of groundbreaking genre filmmaking for which the legendary master posthumously deserves credit. For a man so synonymous with influencing the slasher horror genre, the executive producer credit should have been given more of a backseat while the “For Wes” title card before the film’s opening was a much more appropriate touch. Regardless, the film does not do much to maintain the flame of the torch Wes Craven once helped to first set ablaze for moviegoers.

The story revolves around a young woman named Colleen (played by Claudia Lee) working as a grocery store clerk when she starts finding photographs of recently murdered women placed around her workplace. The images themselves are gory, but sloppy and nothing you would come to expect from more seriously devoted killers as we’ve become accustomed to in serial killer films. There is a level of ambiguity toward the pictures at first, as even the police are not certain if they’re genuine or elaborate fakes. Nonetheless, they begin to make the clerk nervous and she doesn’t seem to be getting any support of law enforcement. Convenient.

As the photographs begin to add up, one has to wonder where the film intends to go with the awkwardly devised setup. Does the killer have a special place in his or her cold heart for this young woman, or is she the key audience for which this twisted maestro creates such gruesome artwork? Coincidentally, neither seems to be the case as we’re introduced to Peter Hemmings, a cocky photographer, and his posse of models who show up as a result of the killers’ growing notoriety.

Kal Penn plays Hemmings with great effect. It’s just too bad it’s the wrong effect needed for the film. Penn as Hemmings is like a more arrogant, slightly nerdy Ryan Reynolds. Hemmings is sarcastic to a fault, self-involved and just plain disrespectful, He shows up claiming to be influenced by the killers’ work, hoping to find art of his own amidst the bloody chaos, and perhaps he does, depending on how loosely that success is defined.

Ultimately, Penn’s testosterone-fueled performance is over-the-top and unnecessary, taking away even more hope from THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS actually amounting to anything substantially rewarding. I found myself actually getting annoyed by Penn’s blunt abrasiveness and utter disregard for the film as a whole, instead perhaps mistaking this for yet another installment in the HAROLD & KUMAR franchise. Penn, more than any other element, drew me out of the story and disrupted the cinematic experience. This sort of faux pax is devastating to the horror genre as it feeds so much off an effectively engaged emotional feedback from it’s audience, one which is severely lacking in this example.

Stylistically speaking, THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS fails to take itself seriously enough to become a truly frightening film. The movie suffers from being a half-cocked idea driven by a potpourri of influences from other films and no real, clearly defined voice of it’s own. The one positive element, albeit not a strong enough perk to save the film, is how the killers are portrayed as sociopaths resembling a twisted, modern version of George and Lennie from John Steinbeck’s classic Of Mice & Men. This relationship is unnerving and creepy, but not quite menacing enough to measure up to other more diabolical recent films that nail the approach and stick the landing.

Overall Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS opens in theaters & VOD April 1, 2016.

tginp_poster

KILL YOUR FRIENDS Review

killyourfriends_image

Music is an ever-changing business and that business is fickle. Few lines of work are more cut-throat than the music biz and Hollywood loves to accentuate that about it’s sister industry. It’s a fascinating, frustrating free-for-all watching the players and heavy hitters crossing lines and breaking rules, all vying for the next big hit song or hot band. Ethics, morals, loyalty… these have no place here.

KILL YOUR FRIENDS is the newest film to examine these escapades, written by and based on John Niven’s novel, the film is directed by Own Harris, who cut his teeth making episodes of edgy television shows like Misfits and Black Mirror. Harris definitely brings an edgy style to the film, one that is both unique and influenced by modern masters, undoubtedly including Danny Boyle among a few others.

Nicholas Hoult (MAD MAX: FURY ROAD) plays Stelfox, an ambitious English A&R man trying to make his name during the height of the Britpop craze. From the get-go, it’s clear that KILL YOUR FRIENDS will not be the typical ride for American audiences. In fact, it’s much more typical of modern British cinema, heavily dependent on a slick, star-studded soundtrack and a keen sense of how to keep the camera and everything housed within it’s frame constantly on the move. For some this may prove too much, but for others it’s refreshing without being excessively nauseating.

KILL YOUR FRIENDS begins with Stelfox setting us up, detailing precisely how the film will make us simultaneously love and hate him simply for doing whatever it takes to succeed. He and his husky colleague are boozing and coking and living it up as they discuss thinly developed plans to land the next big thing. The true plot runs parallel to this as Stelfox orchestrates a betrayal and possible strategic takeover. Harris employs a subtle touch of fourth-wall breaking and narration from his filmmaking toolbox to help give the audience the sense they’re in on his master plan.

As the story progresses, Stelfox finds his luck ebb and wane on the status of his record label’s fluctuating staff, the interference of a starry-eyed detective and an assistant/secretary that’s even more cunningly ambitious than himself. KILL YOUR FRIENDS pits colleagues against each other in a battle royale for unsigned acts, where backstabbing is standard operating procedure and nothing matters but scoring the money maker. This is partially why we root for Stelfox, not because he’s a good guy, but because he’s a selfish, greedy prick, but he owns and embraces it unapologetically amidst a world full of others just as bad or worse. He does what he has to do and does it with a smile.

KILL YOUR FRIENDS is a colorful, vibrant low-grade ecstasy trip into the ugly world of the music business. It captures us visually and then maintains our high with the most primal of additions,,, the need to see others’ fail. Like tabloid journalism, we know it’s garbage but we must have more. In an intriguing, subdued blend of TRAINSPOTTING and AMERICAN PSYCHO, Harris leads us down an a-moralistic rabbit-hole where anything is fair game as long as something is on the table.

The film also stars Ed Skrein and Rosanna Arquette, in a cast perfectly in the with the dark comedy and violent tone of the story. KILL YOUR FRIENDS features a stellar soundtrack, on which the film relies on for more than just background music. Harris often utilizes the carefully-selected songs to emphasize or illustrate key moments in the film. Look for selections from Blur, Radiohead, Oasis and more in what may be one of the best movie soundtracks in years, at a time when movie tend to be more focused on original scores than utilizing popular songs.

KILL YOUR FRIENDS is a frenetic, mildly neurotic experience. It’s a black comedy, a murder mystery, and a work place thriller. Hoult is perfectly charismatic for his role and keeps the audience glued to his each and every move as he plots his way into what he hopes is a budding career as a music executive.

KILL YOUR FRIENDS Opens on April 1st, 2016

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

killyourfiends_poster

THEY’RE WATCHING Review

tw_image

Be honest. We’ve all done it. Some of us willingly and with no apologies, while others of us are closet fans, but those reality real estate shows are popular and addictive. Perhaps it’s because they tap into a core element of the American dream, but whatever the reason, they’ve made an impact on what television looks like these days. With that said, it only seems logical that some creative soul would take this phenomenon and mash it up with another modern cultural trend.

The graphic novelists and animators Jay Lender and Micah Wright have done just that, they wrote and directed this melding of reality-based home shopping shows with found footage, faux-documentary style horror-comedy. That’s right. No, I didn’t stutter or lose my mind. This is a thing. A real thing. I know, your reaction right now is probably quite similar to mine when I first heard of this film, but after reading a bit more about the plot and then watching the trailer, I saw an intriguing level of potential just under the surface.

THEY’RE WATCHING, despite our most instinctual better judgment, is actually a fun, smart and entertaining romp. Blending a filmmaking influence from the Raimi brothers with tongue-in-cheek humor and a subtle knack for the breaking of the fourth wall, the film makes fun of it’s multi-faceted genre base, makes fun of itself and makes for a good time. The story takes place in Moldova, which provides a setting and a backdrop combined with it’s sense of humor that will please any fan of Bruce Campbell’s THE MAN WITH THE SCREAMING BRAIN. I realize that’s a double-edged sword, but take you’ve got to take this film with a grain of salt and appreciate it for what it is, by design.

Stereotypes abound. Akin to Sasha Baron Coen’s BORAT, but less extreme, the Moldovan town folk in the film are simple, creepy and primitive in comparison to the western crew. The town’s constable is a stern, dictatorial man resembling Stalin and the town’s one and only real estate agent, aka “broker,” is an Eastern European mix of Johnny Bravo and Cousin Eddie from National Lampoon’s VACATION films. All the town folk are heavy drinkers and are afraid of the cameras, but in the end, they are merely play as pawns and fodder, as the plot slowly unveils their secret about a witch that must never be mentioned.

Becky (played by Brigid Brannagh) is the latest client on a popular real estate reality show, an artist who wishes to settle down to a simpler, slower life in Eastern Europe. Six months after Becky decided to buy a fixer-upper deep in the backwoods of a small, rural town in Moldova, the production crew of the show returns to shoot the second half of the episode and see what improvements Becky has made to the property. Fully expecting disaster, the crew arrives to find she’s pulled out a miracle and the property looks great. Seems like it’s going to be an outstanding episode after all…

That’s about the time things start getting weird. THEY’RE WATCHING is a title that has a duel meaning, referring both to the Moldovan town folk, and [of course] acknowledging the meta element of the film, about a reality TV show, that has an audience separate from those of us watching this film. Follow that? Anyway, Lender and Wright make no effort to be taken seriously. That’s not the goal. The entire film feels like an inside joke, and for the most part we get it. And it’s funny. The production looks like hi-definition digital video because it’s supposed to, and most likely is as it’s not a big budget film. On the other hand, it looks good, as good as any well-made respectable TV movie. This is higher caliber production than the Syfy Channel but not quite prime time. For the most part, the acting follows this same scale.

As the plot thickens and the tension increases — for the characters, not quite so much for the audience — THEY’RE WATCHING prepares for the money shots… or, shots, as the film’s final act is the cherry on top. Whatever minor flaws and discrepencies may exist are easily forgotten once the rib-jabbing jokes and cliche horror movie tendencies segway into the big showdown with the witch at the end.

If you thought witches were boring 17th century borefests or cheesy kids’ fare, beware. The film ends on a high note with a bloody, goretastic, over-the-top splatterfest that will make genre lovers proud, or sad, depending on what expectations you had going int the film. For those who enjoyed TUCKER & DALE VS EVIL and CABIN FEVER, you should most likely find THEY’RE WATCHING to be a satisfying, lower-calorie samplng of cinematic junk food.

THEY’RE WATCHING  — In Theaters and On Demand — March 25th, 2016

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

tw_poster

BACKTRACK Review

backtrack_image1

“Nothing haunts like the past.” It’s a catchy tag line that attempts to sum up writer and director Michael Petroni’s new film BACKTRACK, but there more to this mystery/thriller than can be summed up in a single breath. What begins as a moody drama about a troubled psychotherapist quickly reveals itself as a deeper tale of supernatural intervention into the darker underbelly of human nature.

Peter Bower, played with wrenching emotional finesse by Adrien Brody, is struggling with the loss of his daughter while barely holding together his practice and his marriage. Bower blames himself for his daughter’s death, while not entirely clear on what happened exactly. When not in sessions with his own patients, Bower seeks counsel from fellow psychotherapist Duncan Stewart, played by Sam Neill, which only leads Bower further down the twisted rabbit hole that will be come a truly unnerving revelation.

BACKTRACK is a ghost story of sorts, but at it’s core, the film is a highly internalized story of a man thrown up against his own emotions, his own inner demons, perhaps manifesting as tortured apparitions, or perhaps fueling an unwelcome opening in himself to another level of percieving the pain and grief that surrounds him on a daily basis. Whichever it is, the film merely suggests the possibility and leaves the audience to interpret the events as they unfold through our own filters.

The story truly shifts gears into an engaging, gripping mystery once a teenaged girl named Elizabeth Valentine shows up outside Bowers practice, unable or unwilling to speak. This sets Bowers off on a mission to understand driven by his own lack of certainty. From here, the energy and pacing of the film picks up and never lets the viewer go, pulling us in closer by a narrow thread, one tiny hand over another as we grow closer and closer to the morbid truth that awaits Bower.

BACKTRACK is an atmospheric film, shot with the visual tone to match the looming dread and sense of endless loss. The film looks dark and decayed, strangled of vibrant colors and replaced with a multitude of richly depressing shades of black, blue and gray. There is a gothic element to the film’s palette that maintains the tone, which is crucial as the film’s 90-minute running time doesn’t waste a beat after the initially slow but short opening sequence.

backtrack_image2

Sam Neill is splendid, as he usually is, but in a rather limited use. His character has minimal screen time, but serves as a crucial element in developing the plot, on a several psychological milestones for Bower as he pieces together the shattered puzzle that is his memory of what truly happened to spark the series of unfortunate events in which he finds himself involved. George Shevtsov provides an understated but impressive performance as Bower’s father, while Chloe Bayliss’ performance as Elizabeth Valentine is overshadowed by a slight overuse of questionably less than stellar special effects, but the level of distraction is minimal in comparison to the overall enjoyment of the film.

A particular achievement goes to the music in BACKTRACK from Dale Cornelius, providing a thick, robust injection of moody atmosphere to the film that truly sells the darkness. The score grabs the viewer by the ears and forces us to sit up and take notice right from the opening credits. It makes a statement, declaring something bad will happen and you do not want to miss out.

Michael Petroni draws on our innate human nature, or ingrained need to witness the horrible things that happen in others’ lives as if that somehow means our own lives will be immune of such tragedy. Petroni’s screenplay is definitely deserving of Brody’s committed intensity. While there is a temptation to over analyze the story as an extension of another previous film from 1999, I encourage the viewer to let that thought pass and remain open to the less superficial nature of BACKTRACK, which still carries some surprises of it’s own.

Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

BACKTRACK released in theaters and video on demand

on February 26th, 2016.

backtrack_poster

THE WAVE Review

thewave_image

If we were to take a little field trip 40 years or so back in time, we’d see a different type of blockbuster film dominating the big screen. Superheroes had not yet conquered Hollywood. Back then, Mother Nature was the big box office darling. From earthquakes and tsunamis to disastrous fires and devastating accidents, we wanted to see massive amounts of Avenger-scale destruction that only the elements could concoct.

Fast forward to present day and we now watch Thor and Hulk destroy cities in the name of the good fight. Even Godzilla has returned to the cinema to continue his rapturous reptilian rampage. Monsters and heroes are what we seek today, but what of the good ole days when Planet Earth herself was what we feared most? There have been the occasional attempts to bring back that old school tale of man versus nature. THE PERFECT STORM was a memorable outing and who can forget TWISTER?

Herein lies the dilemma. As an audience, we’ve become so desensitized to large-scale disasters on screen that they don’t feel real anymore. As we lose our taste, Hollywood feels the need to add more and more CGI and more insanely preposterous circumstances [a la THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW] in an effort to up the ante and draw us back into the mindless, adrenaline-fueled chaos. How far will our suspension of disbelief bend before breaking under the pressure of prolonged exposure to ridiculous premises?

I’ve said it once if not a hundred times. Regardless of the genre, a good film must have a decent story. I like my schlocky genre flicks as much, and likely more, that the next guy. There’s something to be said for movies so bad they’re good. On the other hand, that’s not a diet one can thrive on exclusively. So I ask, where are the fun genre films with story and character?

I would argue that THE WAVE is a prime example of a return to quality, story-driven disaster genre filmmaking. This Norwegian film (natively titled Bølgen) was directed by Roar Uthaug and combined the thrill of films like INTO THE STORM with a cautionary tale perspective more susceptible to storytelling techniques that keep the audience engaged in story and character, rather that what fantastical effects some talented nerd can conjure up in a computer suite.

thewave_image3

THE WAVE touts all the intensity we’ve come to expect from a natural disaster film, but backs that up with a refreshingly unexpected level of scientific authenticity that makes the film more than just a popcorn-munching thrill ride. Uthaug slowly develops suspense based on a simple question in the viewer’s mind… when will the wave hit? At no point is the audience wondering if the wave will strike. The marketing and the title of the film itself assure us of the ultimate payoff.

No, what Uthaug delivers is the promise of the money shot, but only after we sit willingly through the first hour of he film. With this committed attention Uthaug provides a slow-burn drama, focused around one man amongst a small clutch of geologists responsible for monitoring and studying the mountain standing high above the tourist town of Geiranger, Norway. THE WAVE actually relies heavily on and even features scientific details both to enhance the drama and realism, but also in turn [like it or not] even educates us somewhat. Oh, God! Not that!

Get over it. Uthaug actually does a remarkable job with taking what many of us would otherwise probably write-off as another boring PBS science special and crafts an engaging commentary and how we can get too comfortable sitting at the top of the food chain and feel a bit invincible, all the while forgetting that our one natural predator is Mother Nature herself. Uthaug tells a story that has human and family drama, but that also calls us out on our tendency to get lazy and apathetic in the face of how much we know versus how much we admit to not knowing.

Kristoffer Joner plays Kristian, a geologist on his way out of his current position as he and his family prepare to relocate. During their preparation, he finds himself drawn back into the mountains hold as he struggles to shake an uneasy feeling that something is not right. Joner is in the drive’s seat of this film, as his persistence and conviction nudge the plot along amidst countless skeptics and naysayers until the boy who called wolf turns out to have telling the truth all along.

thewave_image2

Ane Dahl Torp plays Idun, Kristian’s wife who works in the popular hotel on the water’s edge of the fjord that lies within the mountain’s shadow. Idun is eager for her family to move on and finds herself slightly impatient with Kristian’s reluctance to move on, but his gut tells him he’s needed in order to prevent a terrible disaster. While his efforts are valiant, once again, we know what the pay off is to be in THE WAVE, and it’s not watching it from a safe, dry distance. Seriously, I’m not spoiling anything.

While the first act of THE WAVE does take a bit of patience, it also develops some strong characters and introduces us to some basic science that is interesting, if not theoretically practical. It’s this attention to detail that adds to the film’s realism and believability. There are a few moments that scream typical genre fare, such as when they determine the large crevice in the mountain is contracting instead of expanding as they’d expected. Two of the geologists took this as an invitation to physically venture into the crevice for a closer inspection.

If this had been a horror movie, it would equate to the teenage jock responding to the blonde cheerleader hearing a strange noise by volunteering to go into the dark basement alone to check it out… and, we all know how that ends. Otherwise, the handful of other minimally questionable genre moments come during the catastrophic wave action in the final act of the film, but at this point we’ve delayed gratification so long that the payoff stands on it’s own, pleasantly underplayed CGI magnificence.

When it’s all over the the waters have cleared, THE WAVE stands tall amongst it’s predecessors, quite literally as the film’s antagonist is a massive 85-meter tall wall of rapidly-moving water propelled by the collapse of a mountainside into the fjord. If you’re a fan of the disaster genre, do yourself a solid and check out this very fluid, fresh take on a natural nightmare.

Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

THE WAVE opens in St. Louis on Friday, March 4th, 2016 exclusively at Landmark’s Tivoli Theatre.

thewave_poster

UNCLE NICK – The Review

unclenick_image

I’m not sure what your holiday traditions are, but in my family, it’s not Christmas until you’ve watched at least one movie that makes you realize your family is not that bad, because it could always be worse. I joking, of course, but let’s say “hypothetically” that I’m not.

For me, ever since I first saw National Lampoon’s CHRISTMAS VACATION at an age probably too early to be watching the film, I’ve had a special place in my heart for Clark Griswold. A man with a good heart and no sense to navigate in the world. Year after year, I watch that film like a big eyed, innocent child all over again, and when Clark finally loses his shit in front of everyone, chugging back the adult egg nog, inside I’m saying “Amen, brother!”

What the Hell am I babbling on about, anyway? In the past, holiday movie traditions have consisted of goodie-two-shoes, proper family friendly classics in black and white and stop-motion animated TV shorts. That’s all well and good, and I even partake in these still, but in today’s jacked up world, we need a little reality in our fiction to keep our heads sane. Give it to us straight.

UNCLE NICK is not a perfect film, by any means, but screw perfection. Who needs that kind of pressure? Written by Mike Demski and directed by Chris Kasick, this is the average Joe’s Christmas movie. For those of us who can do without the do-gooders blowing smoke out their butts in an effort to be politically correct and all-inclusive, and prefer a little punch in our Christmas punch, UNCLE NICK offers a welcome reprieve from the G-rated holiday favorites.

Brian Posehn plays Nick, a middle-aged fat, balding drunk with scarce manners and a dead-end career keeping his late father’s fledgling landscape business afloat. When he’s invited to spend Christmas with his younger brother’s family, he goes instead as an opportunity to hopefully score with his step-niece, if I’m interpreting that complicated in-law familial jigsaw puzzle correctly.

Beau Ballinger plays Cody, Nick’s 31-year old younger brother, who is a failure in life, but gets by on his good looks. Cody married Sophie, played by Paget Brewster, and therefor married her money and big house as well. It’s a packaged deal, so Cody also acquired two step-children. Marcus, played wittily by Jacob Houston, and his older sister Valerie, played by Melia Renee. Valerie would be the 20-year old step-niece who holds Nick’s perverts creepy uncle affection.

Enough of the dilapidated family tree. UNCLE NICK is perhaps the most enjoyable anti-Christmas holiday movie since Billy Bob Thornton dawned the red suit in 2003 for BAD SANTA. It’s not necessarily the utmost best made film, but it’s certainly enjoyable, in it’s own humorously depraved ways. On some levels, the film is like a watered down live-action episode of Comedy Central’s South Park doing an homage to shows like All in the Family and Married With Children. Posehn’s dry, deadpan style plays in contrast to the rest of the cast and in turn works to set him apart as the odd uncle, which in turn plays into the ironic turn of events that occur in the film’s conclusion.

Melia Renee is effective at playing the seductive, rebellious harlot who plays into Nick’s inappropriate delusions, acting as a sort of succubus leading him into temptation. UNCLE NICK is a family-themed movie that is not family-friendly, complete with lewd humor, profanity, some nudity, sex, excessive consumption of alcohol, some expected and arguably warranted fisticuffs and ultimately, a nice little moral twist to the ending, just for the grown-ups who stuck it out to the end of the film, because chances are, we’re the ones who have lived, or perhaps still live, some facet of this holiday family life.

The chemistry and pacing of the performances in UNCLE NICK aren’t always spot-on, but the humor is well-written, snarky but realistic and just plain fun. Marcus doesn’t get much of the spotlight but makes us proud in his role and Cody is far from likable in any way, which is by design. Sophie, surprisingly enough, is the most sane of the family, thanks to Brewster’s level-headed performance, allowing her final revelation in the end of the film to carry more weight.

Documentary filmmaker Errol Morris executive produced the film, which may not mean much to most, but helped draw me into seeing the film. As it turns out, UNCLE NICK showcased an unexpected influence from and/or homage to the modern legend of non-fiction filmmaking, as it begins and ends in a minor portion as an interview with Nick, Errol Morris First Person-style. In addition, the creative placeholder sequences between the segments of the story are filled with baseball scenes depicting the infamous 10-cent beer game between the Cleveland Indians and the Texas Rangers.

Baseball, and more specifically the Cleveland Indians, serve as a running metaphor in the film and a connecting plot mechanism. There are nine segments in the film, as there are nine innings in a game of baseball. Each segment is chaptered as an inning and each of them carries a baseball-themed title that serves as a double entendre for the family’s hijinks. Nick’s sister Michelle, played by Missi Pyle, is equally ill-mannered as Nick but easier to look at and she’s married to Kevin, played by Scott Adsit, who runs and obsesses over his podcast that’s all about the Cleveland Indians.

Once you’ve had your fill of Rudolph and Frosty, but aren’t quite ready for A CHRISTMAS STORY, and you want a reality check instead of A MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET, allow UNCLE NICK into your home and prepare for inappropriate white elephant gifts and off-key Christmas karaoke.

UNCLE NICK opens in theaters on Friday, December 4th, 2015.

Overall Rating:  3 out of 5 stars

unclenick_poster

THE WANNABE – The Review

wannabe_image

It’s rare that I find myself questioning the judgement of Martin Scorsese, but after having seen THE WANNABE, which he co-executive produced with Dean Devlin, it’s inevitable, even if it is short-lived. Directed by Nick Sandow, the film tells the story of Tom & Rose, an ambitious couple, but not well endowed with common sense or street smarts. The film is based upon real-life events that occurred around the trial of mafia boss John Gotti, an unusual case of celebrity obsession, if you will.

THE WANNABE, as silly as the title sounds, is just that. It’s the story of a social outcast who dreams of being a big-shot gangster and tried very hard in his own, pathetic way, to make those dreams a reality, when all it really accomplishes is chaos, death and destruction. On it’s own, this is a fairly generic, albeit not poorly made movie of average entertainment value. The film’s not bad, but it’s also not great. The performances are acceptable, but not inspiring. The direction and technical production are perfectly reasonable examples of what we’ve come to expect from a run-of-the-mill niche genre film such as this is, but there’s nothing that stands up and screams for our attention as a unique cinematic experience.

Tom, played by Vincent Piazza, is the brother of an Italian-American florist names Alphonse, played by Michael Imperioli, but Tom has his sights on a bigger, brighter future for himself. Every ounce of Tom’s being is fixated on John Gotti and the events unfolding as he awaiting judgement by the federal government trying him on charges related to organized crime. Indirectly, Gotti has holds influence over Tom, as a type of mentor or paternal figure.

Tom’s affection for Gotti is unwelcome and discouraged by the gangsters who disowned him and unnoticed by pretty much everyone else. My primary complaint about Piazza’s portrayal is that he’s too desperate, too needy, too pathetic. It’s difficult to imagine he managed to succeed on the relatively small and unimpressive level that he did. Piazza’s Tom feels like an exaggeration of the real-life character that must have been.

Tom is a good guy, but his delusion have misled him down a dark and unforgiving path of misguided hopes and dreams, which in turn lead to an equally dark and unfortunate path when his dreams don’t pan out and he takes the outlaw life into his and Rosie’s own hands without the necessary means to do so intelligently. In short, Tom & Rosie feel like entries in the World’s Dumbest Criminals collection, but we want them to be more like Robin Hood and Maid Marian.

Rose, played by Patricia Arquette, is a slightly older Italian-American woman with a similar mindset and tendency to habitualize drugs as Tom. Arquette’s portrayal of Rose appears to be more of a stereotypical manifestation of the character type than anything truly original or [hopefully] anything truthful to the real person on which the character is based. As a result, it becomes difficult to connect to Rose’s struggle and accept her as anything more than a tragic sidekick or accidental accomplice.

THE WANNABE’s biggest flaw, in my opinion, is that it double dips into source material that’s already been used too recently to justify another film. As they say, nobody wants sloppy seconds, but that’s what we end up with here in Sandow’s film. While other similar films may glamorize the lawlessness and violence, this film accentuates the ignorance of it’s central characters, or let’s just say it… it feeds off of the implied stupidity and festers within that notion, resulting in a two-dimensional cartoon that captures only a portion of the complete human being.

Ultimately, this movie feels like a tabloid version of the story, versus taking a more authentic, realistic approach to two actual human lives that, for better or for worse, made the decisions they made that led to the foreseeable consequences, all of which are predictable and written in modern history, but the audience loses out on what could have been a detailed character study with depth and detail.

In 2014, director Raymond De Felitta released his version of the same real-life story titled ROB THE MOB, a far superior interpretation and much more entertaining film than this, but it’s unfair to make such a comparison. So, I’ll do my best to consider THE WANNABE on it’s own merits and, if you’d like to read my review of ROB THE MOB [despite the equally cheesy title], you can do so here.

THE WANNABE opens in theaters on Friday, December 4th, 2015.

Overall rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

wannabe_poster

SHELTER (2014) – The Review

shelter_image

What does it mean to be home? A building with four walls and a roof? A place to feel like you belong? What does it mean to be homeless? One definition would be the lack of a permanent dwelling as protection from the elements. I would argue a deeper definition would be the lack of comfort.

Suppose home is not a place or a thing, but is instead a state of mind. What if home could be a relationship, whereas the sense of safety, comfort and belonging can all be had, regardless of the location? What if home isn’t where the heart is, but rather the heart is where we find our home?

SHELTER is an extraordinarily beautiful story of two homeless human beings brought together by chance and held together by a love fueled by a mutual need and understanding of the other. Written and directed by actor Paul Bettany, SHELTER is his debut as a filmmaker and shows Bettany has the triple threat of talent. Most recently known for his portrayal of Vision in AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON, Bettany has performed in a number of memorably eccentric roles, but SHELTER is a much welcomed human drama of a sincerely high calibre.

Anthony Mackie (who portrays Sam Wilson, aka Falcon, of the Marvel Cinematic Universe) plays Tahir, a Nigerian man in the United States without legal documentation. From the opening of the film, we are introduced immediately to his character. Tahir is smart and wise, fearless but calm and in control. Tahir conveys a sense of worldly experience. He is a survivor, but also a sinner. What we eventually discover is that Tahir also has an unsavory past, one which he carries like Atlas carries the weight of the world on his shoulders.

After being released from custody by local authorities, Tahir returns to the streets to find what few belongings he had collected and called his own had been pillaged by his fellow vagabonds. By chance encounter, or perhaps by fate, Tahir meets Hannah (played by Jennifer Connelly) after recognizing she possessed his jacket. What begins as a simple interaction between two strangers over a stolen article of clothing rapidly evolves into a deep connection between two lost souls seeking a light to lead them out of their darkness.

Jennifer Connelly (REQUIEM FOR A DREAM) pulls out all the stops as Hannah, a street smart, classically educated middle-aged woman with a heroine addiction and a tragic past who is living on the edge of sanity. As she and Tahir come to know each other more intimately, it becomes clear that their pasts are not only parallel in pain but bound to collide in happenstance only to emerge in rebirth like a phoenix from the ashes of sorrow and regret.

Connelly physically wears he role, having lost weight and pushed her body to extremes as to sell the heroine and hardship in her life. Emotionally, Connelly is equally dynamic, providing range and depth to develop Hannah into a textured, three-dimensional character with whom we can relate and empathize with throughout her ordeal. She is a sight to behold.

As a storyteller, Bettany focuses on the relationship between Tahir and Hannah, but in doing so never loses sight of what they represent. SHELTER is a story of hope and redemption, and of how even the smallest of communities, as small as two people coming together in support and love, can make a world of difference. SHELTER highlights how the slightest glimmers of humanity and kindness can still be found within a wasteland of apathy, selfishness and greed.

SHELTER juxtaposes Hannah’s nihilism with Tahir’s desperate grasp on his muslim faith to illustrate that life dwells within a gray area, that the human experience rarely gravitates toward the black and white extremities of the scale, but resonates within the wider space between. Hannah and Tahir are both misguided, but it takes them coming together to balance each other out and see the error in their ways.

Through suffering, SHELTER satisfies as an unconventional modern love story with fantastic performances guided by a director familiar with the actor’s journey.

SHELTER opens in theaters and VOD on Friday, November 13th, 2015.

Overall Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Shelter - theatrical poster (1)