56 UP 1/18/13

I am an inquisitive person who loves to hear and view the arc of people’s lives. I wonder what they were like as children, imagine them as teenagers, young adults, arriving at middle age, etc. Now that I am older I look back and see life as a narrative that has its high and low moments – surprises, delights, tragedies and emotional trajectories. Michael Apted the director of 56 Up took on this challenge with his Up Documentary series following a group of 14 individuals from differing backgrounds and regions of the United Kingdom from the age of 7 in 1964 – interviewing them and coming back to film them every seven years – so we are now in their 56^th year.

Expectations and regrets are tied up in this amazingly ambitious undertaking. I am in awe of the scope of this project that is astonishing in its wide-ranging breadth of investigation. Apted’s revisiting his subjects, viewed by some with ambivalence, and others with delight, or as an intrusion, can be both boring and mesmerizing. Depending on the interview-ee, a few were witheringly honest with the film-maker about the distortions (after editing and cutting) that the snippets/synopsis of the hours of footage of their lives, during these 7 year summary intervals, projected about their personal existence, often resorting to sound-bites without delving into a deeper understanding of how singular a life is lived.

Class distinctions were evident in the language, the clothes, the schools and Universities that the subjects did or did not attend. The World’s economic downturn impacted the working class much more than those who went to Universities, particularly the single mothers who had the hardest time coping to provide for their offspring, but had a resilience that was quite stirring and impressive. The family unit was a source of joy in almost every instance. The impact of how one’s life is lived is seen on their physiognomy as well. Some aged more attractively than others; life’s richness and disappointments are patina-ed and burnished on their faces and bodies. But what I found wonderful to experience is how some of the participants’ lives were more deeply realized at the age of 56 than they had ever envisioned.

I recommend this Documentary – despite Michael Apted’s often cursory and “pat” repetition of the same basic questions addressed to each subject. The gracefully edited flashbacks from previous films helped make sense of the years gone by, and were brilliantly interspersed with present-day footage.  This is a movie that reinforces the speed of life’s passing… time does go by quickly and unrelentingly which can be both depressing and invigorating. 

ZERO DARK THIRTY 1/13/13

Zero Dark Thirty directed by Kathryn Bigelow, is basically a penetrating film about a woman's  obsession and her part in the dramatic search for Usama Bin Laden (UBL).  The movie starts at the beginning of this country's pursuit of UBL and travels through time showing us the manpower, intelligence, interrogation and physical means used to eventually capture “the mastermind” of the September 11, 2001 attack on the USA. To say that this is a film about torture or condoning torture adulterates the vast scope of this massive and critical undertaking. Torture is treated realistically – not gratuitously and in the film is revealed to be both salutary and non-beneficial often resulting in false leads and baseless information. Though there is a documentary aspect to the film – we must not forget that this is an exciting, action MOVIE vividly and artfully dramatized. Time is capsulated, torture is distinctly displayed referencing images that were already familiar to most Americans  from the many photos we had seen at Abu Ghraib which “shocked” our nation around 2004-2006.  Water-boarding, dog collars, humiliating degradation of the detainees were all part and parcel of the news which captured the headlines daily.

The trail starts early - beginning with the attack on 9-11, we hear voices of the people who were trapped in the Twin Towers crying for help. There is a blank darkened screen with no visuals or gut-wrenching images of the coming tragedy.  We then proceed to meeting the young CIA operative, beautifully and cooly acted by Jessica Chastain, who becomes the film's focus. Her quest to capture UBL, which includes pursuing him by finding his associates and getting the intelligence that is needed to link to Bin Laden is her single-track preoccupation. Chastain is fixated on capturing Usama Bin Laden never deviating from her instincts. According to the film – it is her unyielding passionate certainty that propels the movie into the final apprehension and death of UBL. The storming of his compound is electrifying and stunning visually, and the resulting destruction is disastrous and as often happens, innocent lives are tragically lost.

This movie is not as emotionally wrenching as was The Hurt Locker, which fixated on the psychology of those fighting in Iraq and how that War penetrated their very beings and revealed who they were to themselves and their families. Rather this film is about the mechanics and methods used by a US Agency – CIA to carry out the biggest manhunt in American history. It is almost clinical in its depiction – we don’t get intensely involved with the individual characters, but rather we see a Government in action and the individuals who motivate, impel and drive the narrative to get what they feel they need to “protect” our country no matter how ruthless the struggle reminding us that war is hell.

THE PROMISED LAND 1/6/13

The Promised Land is a simplistic film which does not live up to any promise. It will be welcomed by those who are against "fracking", but it turns out to be purely propagandistic cinema - good vs. evil - starring MattDamon, a representative for a major Gas Corporation, who when we first meet him has been promoted to a high position in that company. Damon is so wishy-washy a character that I found him totally unbelievable having difficulty articulating his pro-fracking position as well as his shaky moral values. His partner in manipulating the populace is Frances McDormand - who is on her cellphone throughout most of the film, and does add a comedic presence to the movie, but not much more. I have heard better balanced anti and pro-fracking arguments on NPR than anything I learned in this conventional tale of righteousness.

The debate pits an ex-engineer, MIT graduate, greatly admired schoolteacher- Hal Holbrook as the voice of the fracking opposition who makes much more sense explaining the insidious consequences of fracking than poor Matt Damon who in his one intense scene speaks to local townspeople about "fuck-you" money which he doles out to farmers who allow the Gas Company drilling rights on their lands. The Fuck-You money Theory (if you have money then you can say "fuck you" to obtaining student loans for your kids, "fuck you" to having a mortgage, etc) speaks to money buying you that freedom. Damon's other "nemesis" is an "environmentalist" (John Krasinski) who starts a grass-roots campaign to make the townspeople aware of the dangers to their farms, their livestock and the drinking water, etc.

The plot is predictable with a predictable love story thrown in, and a narrative that has to resort to a "deus ex-machina" ending that is manipulative, unrealistic and totally out of character with the earnestness of Damon's early beliefs.

I was groaning and muttering under my breath, not only with the lame dialogue but with some of Gus van Sant's cinematic techniques that were so hackneyed that I could not believe that this was the same Director who did Drugstore Cowboy and My Own Private Idaho, films that I have loved in the past.

DJANGO UNCHAINED 12/27/12

I loved Django Unchained - my favorite film by Quentin Tarantino since Pulp Fiction. It is a "genre" film - as he has described his movies in a recent interview - this time taking the Italian Spaghetti Western and setting it in the South in 1858 - two years before the Civil War complete with music that is quirky and wide ranging including James Brown, Johnny Cash and the composer Ennio Morricone (he was the composer of many of those original Italian Westerns directed by Sergio Leone such as The Good The Bad and The Ugly and Once Upon A Time in America.)

This movie views slave culture as seen through the eyes of an "unchained" free-man Django and the man who "buys his freedom" and becomes his "partner" a German-born bounty hunter. The two are a terrific team. This movie gives us an un-expurgated brutal vision of overweening racism, the slaves and the plantation slave owners as well as a look into the hierarchy of slave society and their roles vis-a-vis their Masters. Employing the bitterly ironic humor, theatrical violence and over-the-top Tarantino style, the dialogue is often humorous and campy but deadly serious and always refreshingly original. This is very much a tale of revenge and of a love which will not be erased by horrific obstacles. It is beautifully acted by Jamie Foxx as a soft-voiced, never distracted from his mission Django ("The D is silent",) Leonardo di Caprio - the heinous slave owner, Samuel L. Jackson as the wily House slave who helped raise Di Caprio and is his advisor, and the sophisticated might-be considered a scoundrel German Christopher Waltz who tells Django the story of Brunhilda and Siefried cementing our hero's determination to fulfill his quest in spite of the most dire circumstances.

This movie is filled with choreographed violence - literal blood baths but the history of slavery was one of power and raging cruelty so it all fits together.

Great discussion on Django on NPR with Michel Martin and her weekly group called The Barbershop. Start listening to Podcast at 8:19 sec.

http://www.npr.org/2012/12/28/168202846/is-em-django-unchained-em-the-blackest-film-ever

THE HOBBIT 12/25/12

Very simply The Hobbit is a tale of a displaced people (in this case Dwarves) struggling to reclaim their Lonely Mountain Kingdom; in doing so wandering through the lands to reach that home. There are trials by fire and the "help of Wizards - one being Gandalf The Gray - subtly and merrily not-so-subtly played by the wonderful Ian McKellan and Galadriea the fairest and most powerful Maiden in Elve Land acted by the beautiful Cate Blanchett. I regretted not seeing more of her as she is such an aesthetic feast for my eyes.

That this adventure takes place in Middle Earth - prequel to The Lord of the Rings does not change a basic tale of mankind's journey and fight for their homeland. I found the early scenes in the Hobbitshire charmingly fairytale-ish and the dialogue between Bilbo Baggins ( a well-cast Martin Freeman) and Gandalf quite amusing and also touching on another universal theme - the quiet, unassuming home-body who goes on an adventure and steps out of his/her "ordinary" life and thereby changes him/herself and the "world."

I must admit to terrible boredom with fight scenes between goblins and various creatures on scary wolf-like animals and wait for those scenes to end-my only fascination with them is how they are choreographed.

The pivotal and most moving scene in the film is between the wonderful Andy Serkis as the schizophrenic Gollum (fighting between his dark and light side - evident by his eyes and facial expressions) and Bilbo who discovers more about his own character through this encounter.

This film also uses special effects, and all that CGI can do to make a small lovely book The Hobbit, into a 3 part movie - with all the money that it will rake in. So a day fairly well spent but not great by any means...though the spare ribs I had right afterwards were delicious and satisfied a rib yearning I had for a long time

ANNA KARENINA 11/24/12

I really disliked the movie Anna Karenina. Now I know why the Top Critics on Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 53%. It is a self-conscious, schizophrenic film that wants to be many things - true to the book, but also a stylized CONTEMPORARY work of "art" which cannot make up its mind.

Artifice, parody and Tolstoy do not work for me. The great romance between Anna Karenina and Vronsky is reduced to some "hot" clutching and lingering glances between a hungry yet anorexic looking Anna (Keira Knightly) and her puerile Shirley Temple curly-haired lover Vronsky.

The theatricality of the film was literally constructed through stage sets. Except for the naturalism of the outdoor landscapes in the sub-plot scenes dealing with the idealistic love affair between Levin (Tolstoy's alter ego) and his future wife Kitty, the rest of this movie had ladders and stage hands distracting us at critical moments moving throughout the set. I know a point is being made but I found it to be perplexing and disconcerting or just too obvious: "all the world's a stage...."

The movie does attempt to show the inequalities in the way women are treated, as opposed to men when they commit infidelity or break "God's law of marriage" - eventual banishment and social ostracism. Without a man's protection, they are helpless. Actually not so different from the way women are treated today in many cultures.

LINCOLN 11/18/12

Spielberg's LINCOLN is a film that is part history lesson - the machinations to get the 13th Amendment prohibiting Slavery through the House of Representatives, and part polishing the myth of the 16th President of the USA.
What was most interesting and novel to me was the forestalling of peace negotiations with the Confederacy -peace talks held hostage so that the Amendment would be voted on by a Congress that did NOT include the secessionist Confederate states which would have voted against it. More lives were lost due to the delay BUT an Amendment to the Constitution abolishing slavery was now "the law of the land."

Daniel Day-Lewis is wonderful as Abraham Lincoln - looks just like him with his lean stooped body reflecting the moral decisions and political maneuverings the job of leading a nation entails. He can be boring and long-winded and at the same time incredibly wise and human.

In this film, Mary Lincoln played by Sally Fields - finally a great part for her (the best since Norma Rae} seems to have a larger influence on the President's decision making than I was ever aware of. The wife of a President - one who is prone to deep depressions triggered by the loss of their 12 year old son William from Typhoid is a tedious job and Sally Field makes the most of it.

Tommy Lee Jones is terrific as the powerful Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, Representative Thaddeus Stevens, an abolitionist Senator whose "radical" views on the full equality of blacks - including voting rights, etc. must be pragmatically held in check in order fot the Legislation to pass.

There is comic relief furnished by James Spader and John Fawkes complete with prat-falls portraying latter-day Lobbyists arm-twisting and financial "give-aways" in order to get the needed votes.

This film is very contemporary in the way leaders and elected Representatives have to wrestle with their own ethical beliefs, and at the same time vote for issues that might be anathema to them. Yes -a good history lesson.