4/19/15: The Game of Life

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2014 Academy Awards, 87th Annual Academy Awards, Alan Turing, Alex Lawther, Alexandre Desplat, Allen Leech, arrogance, Óscar Faura, based on a book, based on a true story, Benedict Cumberbatch, Best Actor nominee, Best Actress nominee, Best Adapted Screenplay winner, Best Director nominee, Best Film Editing nominee, Best Original Score nominee, Best Picture nominee, Charles Dance, cinema, code-breakers, crossword puzzles, cryptography, dramas, early computers, Enigma machine, film reviews, films, flashback narrative, flashbacks, Graham Moore, Headhunters, homophobia, homosexuality, Jack Bannon, James Northcote, Keira Knightley, life during wartime, Mark Strong, mathematicians, Matthew Beard, Matthew Goode, MI6, Morten Tyldum, Movies, multiple award nominee, mystery, Oscar nominee, persecution, race against time, romances, Rory Kinnear, Russian spies, secrets, set in 1940s, set in 1950s, set in England, spies, The Imitation Game, thrillers, Tom Goodman-Hill, Turing machines, war films, William Goldenberg, World War II

True heroes, unlike their cinematic counterparts, rarely receive the appreciation that they deserve. Oh sure: they may be honored, feted and immortalized via statuary but this is usually long after they’ve ceased drawing breath on this particular plane of existence. The reason for this, in most cases, is that true heroes…the kinds who save tens of thousands, if not more…usually operate in the shadows, away from the spotlight of public scrutiny. They’re the doctors and scientists who discover new cures and immunizations on a regular basis…the engineers who continue to craft safer buildings, bridges and roads…the unsung politicians, bureaucrats and civil servants who toil away behind the scenes, not for power, money or glory but because they honestly don’t want to see their citizenry starving or freezing to death in the streets. Cinematic heroes are a lot more thrilling, sure: watching Batman punch the living shit out of garishly clad supervillains is much more thrilling IMAX fare than watching Jonas Salk develop a Polio vaccine. When it comes down to brass tacks, however, it’s kind of obvious that Salk has saved at least a few more folks than Batman has, albeit with much less panache.

Morten Tyldum’s multi-Oscar-nominated The Imitation Game (2014) takes a look at one such unsung hero, the prickly, brilliant mathematician/cryptologist Alan Turing. Aside from being responsible for the Turing machine, a proto-computer that would be a nice enough feather in anyone’s cap, Turing was also one of the British code-breakers responsible for cracking Germany’s infamous Enigma machine during World War II, allowing the Allies to move the war into its endgame. Estimates put the number of lives saved by ending the war early at around 14 million, give or take: in other words, not bad for a guy who wore a sweater and slacks to  work instead of a spandex suit. Along with being a world-class code-breaker, however, Turing was also a gay man during a time period when sexual orientation was illegal. Years after his triumph over the Engima machine, Turing was prosecuted and found guilty of indecency: choosing chemical castration, Turing would go on to commit suicide roughly a year after his “therapy,” at the tender age of 41.

Similar to The Iron Lady (2011) and The Theory of Everything (2014), The Imitation Game takes the real facts of Turing’s life and expands, folds and manipulates them into something altogether more “cinematic,” if arguably less factual. By employing a flashback structure, Tyldum runs three simultaneous timelines: the “present-day,” circa 1951; the “war years,” circa the 1940s; and Turing’s childhood, circa the late-’20s. While the meat of the story takes place during the war, the “present-day” material opens the film and sets up a mystery (of sorts) that the school and war eras will attempt to “solve.”

In the present day, we follow Detective Robert Nock (Rory Kinnear) as he investigates a mysterious break-in at the home of Prof. Alan Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch). As Nock investigates the incident, with a minimum amount of support and help from the prickly Turing, he becomes stymied by the reclusive professor’s redacted military record. This leads us into the film proper, with Turing attempting to offer his services to the British government as a decoder, despite a complete lack of interest in politics, social disorder or even a rudimentary understanding of the German language.

As Turing butts heads with his rigid, disapproving commander (Charles Dance), he also manages to tick off the other code-breakers that he’s supposed to be working with, labeling each of them as “worthless” in each own, indomitable way. He does, however, manage to find a kindred spirit in Joan Clarke (Keira Knightley): their friendship eventually develops into an engagement, albeit one inherently doomed by Alan’s homosexuality. We then get the third part of our little “triptych” as we journey back to Turing’s boyhood years and witness the young genius (Alex Lawther) as he’s introduced to the world of cryptography and falls in love with his classmate, Christopher (Jack Bannon). As these three timelines move and maneuver around each other, we gradually develop a more complete picture of Turing as the quintessential outsider, a man tasked with saving the social order that , ultimately, condemns and hates him. You know: pretty much the definition of the selfless hero.

While the historical details behind The Imitation Game are certainly up for debate (as they were in the aforementioned biopics) the film, itself, is a much sturdier, well-made and entertaining affair than either The Iron Lady or The Theory of Everything. Credit certainly must go to Cumberbatch, who tears into the role of Turing with complete and absolute gusto: while he gets several “big” scenes, it’s all of the small, almost invisible personal tics and quirks that really make the character come alive. While there’s nothing here that’s completely foreign to Cumberbatch’s work with the new Sherlock series (aside from a new-found sense of vulnerability that would fit the smug detective as poorly as a reverse-mohawk), he’s pretty effortless as getting across the commingled pain, hubris and awkwardness that seemed to be at the heart of the character. Cumberbatch is an actor who understands how important it is to listen: there’s a rare joy to be found in watching an almost endless cycle of emotions sail across his expressive face, from boyish mischief to hopeless defeat. Rather than simply indulging in mimicry (as with Streep’s take on Maggie Thatcher or Redmayne’s performance as Stephen Hawking), Cumberbatch does it the old-fashioned way and just acts.

As befits this type of large-scale production, Cumberbatch has quite the cast to back him up. While Keira Knightley has never especially blown me away, I quite enjoyed her low-key performance as Joan: the bit where she tells the obnoxious Turing that, as a woman in a man’s job, she “doesn’t have the luxury of being an ass,” like him, is subtly (but witheringly) delivered but as sturdy as concrete. There’s also good work coming from Matthew Goode, Allen Leech, Matthew Beard and James Northcote as Turing’s put-upon co-workers, with Goode getting some especially nice moments. If Charles Dance and Low Winter Sun’s Mark Strong come off more stereotypical and clichéd (as the stodgy commander and sneaky MI6 agent, respectively), chalk this up to roles that serve more as plot-points than to any deficiencies in the acting, which are top-notch.

From a filmmaking perspective, The Imitation Game mostly works, although I’ll admit to not being a fan of the flashback structure. For my money, this would have worked much better as a more traditional narrative, moving from Turing’s childhood up to his indecency conviction: the constant cutting between eras often has the effect of pulling us out of the moment, making it difficult to ever get fully invested in the structure. The “present-day” material also exists solely as a contrived “mystery,” especially since the final emotional resolution occurs via screen-text after the film has actually ended. Running it chronologically (with, perhaps, a return to the childhood-era for the final revelation/emotional wallop) would have kept the focus on Turing, eliminating the unnecessary mystery element. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t mention that the various newsreel cutaways and war scenes, while de rigueur for this type of film, really stick out like a sore thumb: they never feel authentic or, to be honest, even particularly well-integrated.

While The Imitation Game would go on to rack up an altogether impressive array of award nominations (including a win for Best Adapted Screenplay), there were also plenty of critics who decried the film’s various historical inaccuracies and seeming desire to minimize Turing’s homosexuality. From my perspective, I didn’t necessarily find this to be the case. While it’s certainly true that the film makes certain deviations from the historical record (including creating characters and conflicts that never existed), it would be difficult to find a cinematic biopic that doesn’t do that: certainly, The Imitation Game seems no more guilty of this than does the similarly lauded The Theory of Everything, which managed to paint its subject in such glowing terms that the whole thing seemed more than a bit fanciful and overly romantic. The Imitation Game is a much more gritty, down-to-earth film, albeit one with a foot planted firmly in the kinds of historical biopics that multiplex audiences will be more than familiar with.

I also felt that Turing’s homosexuality was portrayed in a much more organic way than many films like this might opt for: the silly “mystery” angle notwithstanding, the childhood and war-era storylines opt for a refreshing “show, don’t tell” mentality that never feels forced. While the final text does seem like a bit of a cop-out (for the most part, the entirety of the film’s equality message is shoe-horned in right before the credits roll), there’s enough subtle characterization and commentary, throughout, to get the message across loud and clear.

Ultimately, The Imitation Game is a suitably sturdy, well-made character study, although I certainly didn’t find it to be the best film of 2014 (or even one of the best, to be honest). While Tyldum is an assured hand with the material here, guiding the film’s many tense setpieces with a ruthless sense of efficiency, there’s also very little that stands out, aside from the excellent performances. For my money, Tyldum’s previous film, the astounding Headhunters (2011), was a much more impressive, mind-blowing piece of art: The Imitation Game, while more important and “serious,” is certainly the lesser of the two, in close comparison.

Despite its (decidedly minor) issues, however, there’s no denying that The Imitation Game is a solid, powerful and well-crafted film. In an era where the LGBT community still fights for the rights, respect and understanding that has been sadly absent for too long, there’s no denying that this is a story that definitely needs to be told. As long as any person is forced to go through what Alan Turing was put through, all of humanity collectively suffers. Here’s to hoping that, in the future, our children will look back on the events depicted in The Imitation Game as an example of a petty, small-minded and terrible time that no longer exists.

True heroism, after all, isn’t about making the world better for yourself: true heroism is about making the world better for everyone, regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, nation of origin, religion (or lack thereof), political-leaning or personal wealth.

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2/22/15: Growing Up, Moving On

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2014 Academy Awards, 87th Annual Academy Awards, absentee father, abusive relationships, Andrew Villarreal, Barbara Chisholm, Best Director nominee, Best Film Editing nominee, Best Original Screenplay nominee, Best Picture nominee, Best Supporting Actor nominee, Best Supporting Actress winner, Boyhood, Brad Hawkins, brother-sister relationships, Cambell Westmoreland, Cassidy Johnson, Charlie Sexton, cinema, coming of age, divorced parents, dramas, dysfunctional family, Elijah Smith, Ellar Coltrane, Ethan Hawke, father-son relationships, film reviews, films, Jamie Howard, Jenni Tooley, Jessi Mechler, Libby Villari, Lorelei Linklater, Marco Perella, mother-son relationships, Movies, multiple award nominee, Patricia Arquette, relationship, Richard Linklater, single mother, Sinjin Venegas, Steven Prince, Tom McTigue, Zoe Graham

From the outside, indie film wunderkind Richard Linklater’s Boyhood (2014) seems like a pretty impossible endeavor: filmed over the course of 12 years with the same cast, the film purports to follow young Mason (Ellar Coltrane) from his childhood all the way to his 18th birthday, as he leaves for college. Along the way, we get to witness Mason (and his family) growing up before our very eyes, the passage of time marked by such, real-world indicators as growing taller, sprouting facial hair or any of the endless ways in which children become adults. It’s an impressive bit of filmcraft, no two ways about it, the kind of thing that would, no doubt, earn an appreciative thumbs-up from an experimental filmmaker like Terrence Malick. While the final result ends up being no different from a thousand other coming of age tales, it does nothing to take away from Linklater’s achievement: as the press states, there really hasn’t been another film like this and it’s doubtful there will be another quite like it in the future.

Structured in a loosely chronological manner, albeit one devoid of any easy time demarcations (there are no “Two years later” notes, time/date indicators or anything so obvious, although the use of pop music and culture helps to ground the film’s time-frame in a thoroughly organic manner), we follow young Mason, his slightly older sister, Samantha (Lorelei Linklater), his single mother, Liv (Patricia Arquette) and his absentee father, Mason Senior (Ethan Hawke), as they all go about the process of living their lives. Samantha begins as a shrill, obnoxious kid and grows into a smart, droll and laid-back young woman. We watch Liv’s journey as she progresses from divorced, single mother to new college student and, later, college professor: along the way, she bounces from one bad, abusive relationship to the next, first with her alcoholic professor/husband, Bill (Marco Perella), later with a damaged, former soldier (Brad Hawkins). We see how Mason Senior moves from an aimless, perpetually restless, politically-active roustabout to a centered, responsible fellow with a new family and a desire to get it all right, at least the second time around.

The majority of our focus, of course, is reserved for the film’s subject, young Mason. We follow him through all the vagaries of childhood: first love, schoolyard bullies, family problems, sibling rivalries, making (and losing) friends, developing his own interests and viewpoints (albeit with more than a little influence from his father’s fiery rhetoric) and, finally, leaving the nest to strike out into the world and make his own mark. Through it all, Coltrane proves to be a more than capable actor, as comfortable with the film’s bigger emotional beats (the abusive home situation) as he is with the subtler ones (the scene where he hangs out in an abandoned house with older boys and talks about girls, for one). It’s to Coltrane’s great credit that the young performer always feels authentic: there’s an inherent danger with child actors that they’ll come across as stiff or unrealistic but that’s never a problem here.

To be honest, aside from the over-familiarity of the film, there’s very little to complain about here. The acting is uniformly solid, even if none of the performances really distinguish themselves from the others: while Arquette won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance here, all of the acting is similarly realistic…there were no real standouts, at least from my perspective. The film looks great, with some nice, vibrant colors and the sound design is quite exceptional: the film is very music-oriented (as is much of Linklater’s output) and the use of pop music to establish the time-frame is nicely realized.

Personally, I’ve never been the biggest Linklater fan: I’ve always found Slacker (1991) to be thoroughly underwhelming and Dazed and Confused (1993) has always placed well behind Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) in my personal playbook. To be honest, my favorite Linklater film is actually Bernie (2011), which is probably the least representative film in his canon. My major issue has always been that his films seem more content to keep up a constant verbal barrage than to actually mean anything: it’s always come across as a ridiculously pompous combination of Kevin Smith and John Cassavetes, at least to my non-discerning ears. While Boyhood is less guilty of this than past films, there’s still plenty of wheel-spinning, especially once we get to Mason’s numerous “philosophical” discussions with girlfriend Sheena (Zoe Graham).

Ultimately, I enjoyed Boyhood, although I certainly wouldn’t rank it as one of the best films of 2014: minus the “twelve years” gimmick, there really wasn’t anything here that I hadn’t seen before, certainly no great “insights” into growing up. In many ways, this was very much a basic coming-of-age film with a slightly glossier top-coat. I was also rather unhappy that Arquette’s character, essentially, was summed up by her various bad relationship choices: it seems slightly mean-spirited that the film allows her to progress from single mother to student to college professor, only for her to keep making the exact same relationship mistakes at each and every turn. It’s almost as if the film is saying that no matter how much Liv progresses, learns or grows, she’s still just a woman who needs a guy in order to feel complete…and can’t even pick a “good” one, to boot. Her final breakdown seems even more reductive, in this light, as if her entire life is defined by others, whether husbands, boyfriends or her own kids.

There’s a lot to like here, without a doubt: very rarely has a family/relationship drama felt this realistic and the actors all have tremendous chemistry together. At the end of the day, however, Boyhood is not appreciably better (or more insightful) than any number of similar films: at the end of the day, I have to wonder…was it worth the twelve years?

3/18/14: The Faint Spark of Hope

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Alan Parker, Americans abroad, Angela's Ashes, auteur theory, based on a book, based on a true story, Best Adapted Screenplay winner, Best Director nominee, Best Original Score winner, Best Picture nominee, Best Supporting Actor nominee, Billy Hayes, Bo Hopkins, Brad Davis, buddy films, cinema, college student, critically-acclaimed films, dark films, drama, drug smuggling, drug trafficking, electronic score, Erich, escape from prison, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, Giorgio Moroder, Hamidou, homoerotic tension, homophobia, Irene Miracle, jail-break, Jimmy Booth, John Hurt, legal nightmare, Max, Midnight Express, Mississippi Burning, Movies, multiple Golden Globe winner, multiple Oscar winner, Norbert Weisser, Oliver Stone, Oscar nominee, Oscars, Palme d'Or nominee, Paolo Bonacelli, Paul Smith, prison films, Randy Quaid, Rifki, The Wall, Turkish prison, Vangelis

We’ve all done stupid things: that’s the one constant across humanity, regardless of age, race, gender, creed, nationality, income level or relative place in the historical timeline (cavemen did stupid things, too). Part of the human experience is learning and one of the best ways to learn something is to royally screw it up. Touch the open flame once and you know not to touch it again. Poke the tiger? Not twice, you won’t. We’ve all said and done things that were stupid: many of us may have even done things that were stupid and illegal (never a great combo). For the most part, any and everything is a good excuse for a learning opportunity: after all, many of the most powerful and respected people in the world have pasts that are littered with everything from petty crimes to outrageous public declarations. As long as your stupidity doesn’t actively hurt someone else and you’re given the opportunity to learn and grow from the situation, what’s the big deal? In fact, the whole point of youth is to be stupid, make mistakes and learn from them: it’s the “entry-level-fast-food-job/internship” phase of life, setting you up for the “responsible career” phase that’s to come.

But what if you make that one stupid mistake and, rather than a learning experience, it becomes a game-ender? Normal, average people make stupid choices and screw things up everyday: what if your “mistake” was so serious that it landed you in prison? What if you were a young, naive American college student, facing a life sentence in a harsh, barbaric Turkish prison? If you were Billy Hayes in the 1970s, these wouldn’t be questions: they would be facts. Alan Parker’s critically acclaimed Midnight Express takes viewers into Billy’s world and shows how the stupidest actions can have the most dire of consequences. In the process, it also shows us that most miraculous of human traits: the ability to hold on to hope, even when all hope seems lost.

Midnight Express begins with Billy Hayes (Brad Davis) making one of those aforementioned stupid decisions: he opts to smuggle (or attempt to smuggle, as it were) hashish out of Turkey. Even better, he does this in the dawning years of the 1970’s, during a time when Turkey and the Middle East were experiencing particularly high levels of terrorist attacks. As such, authorities are ever vigilant and Billy…well, he’s a bit of a dumb-ass. After sweating, stuttering and barely inching his way past airport security, he ends up on an Amtrak track that, unfortunately, passes through a security checkpoint. A cursory pat-down reveals the dope and our poor schmuck begins his journey down a very long, dark, grim pathway.

After a failed escape attempt, Billy winds up in a Turkish prison, where he promptly runs afoul of head guard Hamidou (Paul Smith), one of the vilest cinematic creations ever shat unto the big-screen. Hamidou beats Billy senseless for having the temerity to take a blanket and, when he comes to, he’s being cared for by a trio of prisoners: crazy-eyed Jimmy Booth (Randy Quaid), strung-out philosopher Max (John Hurt) and gentle Erich (Norbert Weisser). They quickly show Billy the ropes and cue him in on a few important facts: Steer clear of Rifki (Paolo Bonacelli), a nasty prisoner who rats out other prisoners for money; be careful of the children who run around everywhere, since they’re as untrustworthy as the guards and Rifki; all foreigners and homosexuals are considered scum but almost all prisoners practice homosexuality when no one is looking; for the right price, the Turkish legal system can be bought and sold; and, perhaps most importantly: once you’re inside, you’re probably not getting outside.

In due time, Billy’s life becomes a waking nightmare of harsh conditions (the prison is like a squalid, rat-trap hotel where the concierges occasionally beat you so bad that you herniate), a bizarre, nonsensical legal system (Billy can’t even understand the language during his trial, much less offer any useful defense) and the constant, terrifying notion that he’s doomed to spend the rest of his days in this living hell. When his original “generous” sentence of 4 years is over-turned for a more “reasonable” 30-year sentence, Billy finally decides to jump onto Jimmy’s crazy train and attempt a prison breakout. As expected, this doesn’t go quite as planned, leading to more confrontations with Hamidou and Rifki, as well as a long-in-the-making mental breakdown for Billy. After a certain point, Billy’s life seems completely hopeless. If he can just manage to keep his head above water, however, there just might be a light at the end of the tunnel after all.

In certain ways, Midnight Express is a strictly by-the-book prison film, one of those myriad productions where a “good” person ends up in the pokey and must adapt to survive. The Turkish setting is certainly novel, although anyone who grew up on any of the faceless, Philippine-set prison films of the late-’60s and ’70s won’t find much to be surprised by here. The setting certainly does give the filmmakers ample opportunity to play up the disparity between the Westerners and the native Turks but, more often than not, it devolves simply into “complex Westerners” vs “feral, rabid, caveman Turks.” In hindsight, there really aren’t any positive portrayals of Middle Eastern characters in the film: they’re all either vicious, sneering sadists or bumbling, incompetent Keystone Kops. Since the screenplay is written by Oliver Stone (for which he won a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar), I wasn’t particularly surprised by this but it was, nonetheless, fairly tiresome. By the time we get to Rifki hanging a cute kitten and Hamidou attempting to violently rape Billy, the “villains” don’t resemble humans so much as fairy-tale ogres. Since the actual Billy Hayes has complained about the negative portrayals of Turkish characters in the film, this seems to be a problem that at least a few folks have had.

Since the film tends to be a fairly standard “men-in-prison” film, it also features plenty of familiar beats: the newbie getting instructed on the lay of the land; the intricate escape plans; the scene where a friendly character is falsely blamed for something; the homoerotic tension between cellmates; the rat; the vicious head-guard. None of these are particularly unique and the only aspect that has the potential to bear interesting fruit (the homoerotic tension between Billy and Erich) is dispensed with pretty quickly. Since this is a film adaptation of a true story, I wasn’t expecting anything particularly “tricky,” as it were, but much of Midnight Express seemed rather old-hat to me Perhaps my opinion would have been different had I seen it when it was released (you know…when I was 1) but decades of prison films since have neutered its impact a bit. Don’t get me wrong: the film is still intensely grim — the scene where a screaming Randy Quaid gets dragged out to be beaten so bad that he’ll lose a testicle is not something that anyone will forget easily — but it’s also not something inherently “fresh” or shocking.

My other major complaint with the film definitely revolves around the musical score by Giorgio Moroder, which inexplicably won an Academy Award for Best Original Score. There are times when the score seems unobtrusive (not high praise, mind you) but, for the most part, it sticks out like a sore thumb. One of the silliest moments has to be Billy’s initial escape from police custody, before he reaches the prison. His escape attempt is scored by some truly ludicrous electro music, complete with laser sound effects: not only does it do nothing to create tension, the score actually made me burst out laughing, which (presumably) wasn’t the desired effect. Later on, Billy mopes about the prison grounds as a moody electronic score plays: I’m pretty sure the intent was something similar to Vangelis’ score for Blade Runner but, again, the execution just doesn’t produce anything but groans. I’m actually a big Giorgio Moroder fan and was pretty excited when I saw his name in the credits: this, however, was like getting coal for Christmas.

On the other hand, the things that work in Midnight Express work fairly well. The performances are uniformly good, with special praise due for Quaid and Hurt’s rock-solid turns as Billy’s only friends. Quaid’s performance is a good reminder that, once upon a time, he was an actor to take seriously. Paul Smith and Paolo Bonacelli are absolutely phenomenal as Hamidou and Rifki, with Bonacelli especially noteworthy. Truly detestable villains are hard to pull off and Midnight Express’ pair of baddies are almost an embarrassment of riches. The only “main” character that seems to get short shrift is Billy’s girlfriend Susan, played by Irene Miracle. Miracle does just fine with what she’s given but she’s not given much: the emotional climax of her character is definitely the moment where she bares her breasts for Billy during a jail visitation but Brad Davis ends up doing most of the heavy lifting. Likewise, Mike Kellin, playing Billy’s dad, is pretty much a non-entity, his participation in events essentially boiling down to the moment where he tells Hamidou to “take good care of (Billy), you Turkish bastard.”

Overall, Midnight Express exists as one of those “critically over-acclaimed” films that can’t help but be a bit of a disappointment, especially when one considers previous films in director Parker’s canon, films like Pink Floyd’s The Wall, Mississippi Burning and Angela’s Ashes. As your standard “men in prison must escape” film, Midnight Express is good but nothing legendary. When the film is more understated, it works quite well, although it too frequently lapses into melodrama and overwrought theatrics (the scene where Billy breaks down in court is particularly over-the-top).

As I stated earlier, however, it’s a little hard to fully get behind Billy’s plight since his own stupidity got him there in the first place. It was much easier to sympathize with Jimmy (in prison for stealing two candlesticks from a church) and Max (a heroin junkie) than it was to support Billy: the others were people caught in bad situations, whereas this dumbass college student put himself there…big difference. As a study in people making bad decisions, Midnight Express has to be one of the most on-the-noise. As a prison film, it’s pretty standard fare. As a character study, however, it just doesn’t seem like it has a lot to say.

2/26/14: When You’re Here, You’re Home (Oscar Bait, Part 10)

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2013 Academy Awards, 86th Annual Academy Awards, alcoholism, Alexander Payne, auteur theory, Best Actor nominee, Best Cinematography nominee, Best Director nominee, Best of 2013, Best Original Screenplay nominee, Best Picture nominee, Best Supporting Actress nominee, Bob Odenkirk, Boogie Nights, Bruce Dern, cinema, Citizen Ruth, dementia, Election, estranged family, Film, Film auteurs, film reviews, growing old, grown children, Heartland, indie comedies, indie dramas, June Squibb, Midwestern, Movies, Nebraska, old age, road movie, road trips, small town life, snubbed at the Oscars, Stacy Keach, sweepstakes, The Descendants, Will Forte, Woody Grant

Realistically, there’s no such thing as a “perfect” anything, much less a perfect film. After all: one person’s concept of “amazing” is always someone else’s notion of “played-out.” That perfect hamburger? How do you know? If it were truly perfect, would it ever actually end? Wouldn’t that perfect sunset just continue on into infinity? Can humans, inherently faulty as we are, ever actually make something perfect? Could robots? What does “perfect” even mean? Is it as meaningless as “awesome” and “epic” in the Aught Tens? I bring up these points for one simple reason: I consider Alexander Payne’s Nebraska to be, essentially, a perfect film. I believe this through and through, even though all of the evidence points to how impossible it is. There is nothing perfect, although Nebraska is as perfect as it comes. This makes absolutely no sense…and I’m totally okay with that.

Some films hit me on a more pure, elemental level then other films. One of the best examples of this I can think of is PT Anderson’s Boogie Nights. I’ll never forget seeing that for the first time, in the theater, and just sitting there in stunned silence. I felt like I couldn’t even process the film on the first viewing: I could only sit back and absorb it. Immediately afterward, I bought another ticket and stayed for the next showing. To this day, I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve seen Boogie Nights but it never fails to impress me and lift my spirits: the film is a complete masterpiece and was from opening night. My first experience with seeing Nebraska was nearly identical to my experience seeing Boogie Nights. I was immediately, completely and totally in love with the film from the jump and this impression gradually broadened and deepened into something approaching blind faith: I not only loved what I was currently seeing but I was positive I would love everything still to come. And I did.

Payne, one of modern filmmaking’s brightest talents, is no stranger to the prickly ways in which humans, particularly relatives, interact. His filmography may not be huge but it is ridiculously deep: Citizen Ruth, Election (another of my favorite films), About Schmidt, Sideways, the Descendants (another Oscar favorite) and Nebraska. Any of these would be a bright star in most writer/director careers but Payne’s CV is quite the embarrassment of riches. With Nebraska, however, he’s managed to hone the “Heartland shiv” of Election and Citizen Ruth into a merciless edge while adding in the richly textured familial issues of The Descendants. In the process, he’s crafted his best, most enduring film (thus far).

In a cinematic universe of “difficult” people, Woody Grant (Bruce Dern) might be their supreme leader. Hard-drinking, stubborn, suffering from the first pangs of dementia and brutally honest, Woody is the kind of person who seems to exist solely to vex his loved ones. And vex them, he does. His long-suffering wife, Kate (June Squibb), and grown sons David (Will Forte) and Ross (Bob Odenkirk) have had just about as much of them as they can take: Kate, in particular, has taken to treating Woody like a flop-eared hound that won’t quit piddling on the rug. The thing is: Woody is one genuinely difficult dude. Not just prickly, mind you: genuinely difficult. When he receives one of those ubiquitous “You may already be a winner!” sweepstakes notices, he decides to walk from his home in Montana all the way to Lincoln, Nebraska, to claim his “winnings.” Rather than have his father drop dead on the side of the road (and unable to convince him of the truth behind the sweepstakes), David decides to go with his dad and make it a father-son bonding trip. The stage is set for a sweet, nostalgic, heart-warming tale of reconciliation and family…except Woody couldn’t give two shits about his family and certainly doesn’t look forward to being stuck with his square son David. Tempers flare, hard truths are learned and David learns the most important lesson of all: You can’t always pick your fights and you can never pick your family. But, sometimes, that’s okay.

Picking out one individual aspect of Nebraska to laud is not only nearly impossible but unnecessarily reductive. The individual aspects of the film truly shine but it’s the sum of these parts that makes Nebraska an unmitigated classic. Right from the get-go, with the gorgeous black-and-white cinematography and the hauntingly simple but beautiful bluegrassy theme, the film felt timeless. Indeed, the film was so stunningly filmed that I was certain it would be a lock for cinematography, Gravity be damned. The camera-work in Gravity was flawless and head-scratching (how the hell DID they do that?) but the cinematography in Nebraska is beautifully evocative and so cinematic that it hurts. This was a film that looked as good as it “felt,” a perfect synthesis of form and function.

As is standard in Payne’s films, the acting is absolutely superb. In fact…here comes that word again…it’s pretty much perfect. Will Forte, so good as a comic, is a complete revelation as David. At once sympathetic, sweet and slightly pathetic, David is a fully realized, complex character, someone who all of us know (if we aren’t actually him, that is). Bob Odenkirk is marvelous as brother Ross, likewise reigning in his comedic tendencies to portray a character who’s equal parts fatigued snark and genuine compassion. It’s as far from Saul Goodman as possible and never less than 100% authentic. Stacy Keach has a terrific part as Woody’s former friend, Ed, a loutish civic leader who browbeats Woody mercilessly yet manages one of the most heartbreaking displays of emotion I’ve ever seen in a film: the part where he mockingly reads Woody’s letter to the bar is powerful stuff but the changing expression in his eyes as he realizes what he’s done to Woody is the stuff of legend. Keach has been far too scarce in films these days (I actually thought he was dead!) and it’s a tremendous shame: someone get this guy some more roles STAT!

In a cast this excellent, this perfect, however, there are still two standouts, two performers that brought completely indelible characters to life. June Squibb, as Kate, is a complete revelation, an actress so watchable, so absolutely compelling, that I find myself wondering why I never noticed her before. Kate is a real person: an honest-to-God flesh and blood creation. I know several people like Kate: many of them are also my family members. You know many people like Kate: some of them are likely your family, as well. As a character, she’s flawed, sometimes reveling in a level of nasty “honesty” that’s breathtaking in its cruelty. The scene where she visits the family cemetery with Woody and David is amazing, one of those scenes that film fans should remember in the same way that they do the “Hold it between your knees” scene from 5  Easy Pieces. As she walks about the graveyard, Kate keeps a constant running commentary about their interred relatives: this one was a slut, that one was an idiot, this other one always wanted to “get in her pants.” In the piece de resistance, however, Kate stops before the grave of a former beau, hikes up her skirt and stands before the tombstone: “See what you could have had if you didn’t talk about weed all the time?!” It’s a vulgar, hilarious, awesome moment, one of those bits that deserves to go down in cinematic history. While I was happy to see Nyong’o win Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars, Squibb was, hands-down, the best of the four performances I saw (sorry Julia: Osage was a bit hard to get ahold of).

And then, of course, there’s Bruce Dern. To be honest, I’m not sure how much acting Dern did for the film: perhaps that’s why he ended up losing to McConaughey (who also completely deserved the award, ironically). Perhaps this is how Dern really is. Perhaps he’s nothing like this. At the end of the day, there’s only one thing I knew: this was the single most perfect acting performance of the entire year. The whole thing. Better than McConaughey (who was astounding), better than Ejiofor. Better than anyone, actually. At no point in the film did it ever feel like Dern was acting. Nothing felt inauthentic, every beat and facial expression was well-earned and it was that rarest of modern acting performances: a stellar turn that did not revolve around flawless mimicry (sorry, Meryl). Perhaps it’s because of my own experiences with an elderly father but I completely identified with everything about both Woody and David: I experienced the same measure of heartwarming/breaking that I did in real life. If you have no experience with elderly parents, perhaps you won’t be affected as deeply. With acting this masterful, however, I’m betting you will.

So we have a great looking/sounding film and amazing performances. What else is there? Well, how about the funniest, freshest, funkiest script in ages? While Nebraska is anything but a joke-a-minute laughathon, it is shockingly funny, more so than any indie “dramedy” I’ve yet seen. Much of the humor definitely comes from the verisimilitude of the absurd situations (I laughed like an idiot during the scene where David’s yokel cousins mock him for taking so long to drive there, since I’ve had that exact same conversation with similar idiots in the past) but there’s just as many great one-liners and exchanges flying around. One of my favorite scenes has to be the one where Woody, Kate and David eat lunch in a small diner. Woody spends an inordinate amount of time studying the menu. When Kate asks him, “What are you having, old man?” he resolutely replies “Meatloaf.” Her exasperated comeback could have come straight from my childhood: “You’ve been staring at that menu for ten minutes…where does it say meatloaf?”At another point, David tells Woody that “All of your brothers are coming over.” “Some of them are dead.” David looks at Woody, for a beat, before replying: “The dead ones won’t be coming over.” Classic.

All of these various elements would be impressive enough but the one thing uniting them all is the most important: heart. Nebraska has a big heart, much bigger than the gently mean sarcasm would have you believe. You can see the genuine emotion creeping at the edge of every frame, sneaking into each scene like an insistent boom mic. The emotion isn’t always on the forefront but, when it is, the film burns with an almost palpable sense of pain. If you don’t feel something when Kate sits as Woody’s bedside, you probably don’t have much to feel. If you don’t tear up at the end, as David lets him father drive triumphantly through town, you’re probably already dead.

In the end, Nebraska is that most impossible of films: a scruffy, mean, hilarious, heartfelt celebration of the Heartland and all of the people who inhabit it. There are no characters here, only real people reacting with the same pain, humor, bias, hatred and love that we all do. Whereas every other film that I saw for Oscar season (including the otherwise incredible Dallas Buyers Club) struggled with notions of authenticity, Nebraska was the only one that I bought part and parcel. Like I said before: I know these people. I grew up with them. I probably love and hate them with equal fervor. If there were major flaws with the film, I couldn’t find them. If you can, I’m guessing we’ll probably never see completely eye to eye. That’s okay, though: there are no perfect films, so you, but Nebraska is just perfect enough for me.

2/25/14: Lost in Space (Oscar Bait, Part 9)

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2013 Academy Awards, 86th Annual Academy Awards, Academy Award Nominee, Alfonso Cuaron, All Is Lost, astronauts, auteur theory, Best Actress nominee, Best Cinematography winner, Best Director nominee, Best Film Editing winner, Best Original Score winner, Best Picture nominee, Best Sound Editing winner, Best Sound Mixing winner, Best Visual Effects winner, Children of Men, cinema, disaster films, Ed Harris, Emmanuel Lubezki, Film auteurs, film reviews, films, George Clooney, Gravity, lost in space, marooned, Movies, multiple Oscar winner, outer space, rescue mission, Sandra Bullock, sci-fi, space shuttle, special-effects extravaganza, thriller, trapped in space

My Oscar-prep viewing for the last week of February continued with Alfonso Cuaron’s Gravity. Of all of the nominees, I was probably (initially) most excited to see this one, since I’m a huge fan of Cuaron’s previous film, the wonderfully dystopic Children of Men. After waiting seven years for a follow-up, how would Gravity stack up? And did it really earn all ten of its Oscar nominations? Read on, gentle readers…read on.

As a boy, my twin loves (above and beyond anything else that I loved) were dinosaurs and outer space. If there was a book about the subject(s), I read it. if there was a show or movie, I watched it. I’ve always been fascinated by huge, open expanses but my inability to swim has always rendered the deep-sea about as terrifying as diving into an active volcano. Space, however, was a different story. As frightening as the notion of all of that vast emptiness was, I never ceased to be fascinated and drawn to it. As time went on and I got older, my former obsession with dinosaurs gradually faded into my childhood, although I remember being fairly agog when I first saw Jurassic Park in the theater. My obsession with space, however, has never waned. If anything, I find myself more fascinated by it now then I ever was: we truly live in a glorious time for anyone who’s ever wondered about what might be “up there,” since we seem to get word of astounding new galactic discoveries on a fairly regular basis. If there’s one thing me and my boyhood self would agree on, it’s this: outer space is pretty damn amazing.

Interestingly enough, however, my lifelong love of space hasn’t really translated into a love of sci-fi films. I’ve found many, over the years, that I really enjoy and a few that I even love: 2001; Alien; The Black Hole; Event Horizon, to name a few. For the most part, however, I’m not really drawn to the space shoot-em-ups of stuff like Star Wars or Battlestar Galactica. I’m much more interested in low-key, intellectual films like Moon, Europa Report, 2001 and Solaris. Part of the appeal of space, to me, has always been the inherent mystery of it: the best sci-fi films manage to preserve this sense of mystery while still giving something to thrill along to.

Gravity could certainly be said to exist in the same company as the aforementioned “intelligent” sci-fi films, but it’s not quite the same thing. There is nothing lunk-headed or especially clumsy about the film but its heart is definitely more interested in action (sometimes so non-stop as to almost seem real-time) than it is in wonder or inquiry. There’s nothing wrong with this, mind you, but it immediately puts Gravity into a slightly different category and is one of the reasons why I couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed after the whole thing was over.

Story-wise, Gravity is simplicity itself: Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) and Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) are American astronauts on a routine spacewalk when disaster strikes. The Russians have accidentally bombed one of their own satellites, which has caused deadly space debris to travel into the Americans’ vicinity. Too late to avoid the bombardment, Stone and Kowalski find themselves adrift in space, no contact with Earth and only their connecting tether keeping them from spinning away into the vastness of forever. Using every ounce of their strength, courage and cautious optimism, the two must do everything they can to make it back home, lest the far reaches of space become their frigid tomb.

In a nutshell, that’s pretty much it: just slightly over 90 minutes of Bullock trying desperately to get back home. In many respects, Gravity and All Is Lost (Redford stuck at sea on a sinking sailboat) are kindred spirits. Both are claustrophobic, quick-paced thrill rides that feature one protagonist (it’s no spoiler to say that Bullock spends the majority of the film alone), almost no supporting characters or additional actors and minimal locations. While I heartily enjoyed Gravity, I’ll have to give the edge here to All Is Lost for one very important reason: it didn’t dilute its impact with unnecessary emotional baggage. In All Is Lost, we end up knowing as little about Redford’s character as possible: he doesn’t even get a name. This isn’t to say that there’s no character information whatsoever: through a few small, subtle scenes, we find out enough about Redford’s character (wife and kids back home, well-to-do older man) to become invested in his struggle. At no time, however, does the film wring unnecessary mileage out of the emotional beats: they’re just there to humanize the character.

In Gravity, however, Ryan’s back-story directly influences her actions in the film and, at times, is used as the sole emotional ballast. For my money, this wasn’t the best way to humanize the character and, to be honest, had a bit of the opposite effect for me. At times, I found myself questioning Ryan’s actions: she would be unthinkingly swift and decisive one moment, curled in a fetal position and looking “lost” the next. While this might be a natural reaction for any normal person caught in the situation, it still had the effect of dragging down the film and injecting a maudlin, overly emotional tone that was at odds with the film’s more clinical inclinations. It’s almost as if Cuaron was unsure if the audience would be fully invested in the actual things happening to Bullock’s character (who the hell wouldn’t find being lost in space terrifying and thrilling?!), so he decided to hedge his bets by piling on a tragic back-story for her to overcome. It’s a reductive measure and, effectively, boils down Ryan’s entire experience in space to “overcoming personal adversity.” It’s equivalent to Ripley coming at the Mother Alien with the robot suit only to end up shaking hands and hugging it out. This is particularly puzzling since, aside from the too obvious back-story and some beats with Clooney’s character, there isn’t anything obvious about the actual film. This was a pretty big disappointment for me, since it seemed like a concession to what modern audiences expect from films, not what filmmakers actually intend. I keep wondering how amazing this film would have been as a non-stop, tightly-shot, A-B-C thriller and it makes the final product even more disappointing.

But, let’s be absolutely frank here: most people going to see Gravity won’t be going for the character development, the writing or anything of that nature: they’ll be going to experience a huge, eye-popping visual smorgasbord. And on that count, Gravity absolutely does not disappoint. In fact, I daresay that I really have no appropriate words to describe how utterly, sumptuously amazing the film looks. There isn’t one frame that didn’t look meticulously composed and I still have no idea whatsoever how many of the shots were achieved. As far as I can tell, Cuaron took a small crew into deep space and filmed: that’s about the best explanation I have for a lot of the film. The SFX are seamless, the space visuals are so stunning that I got teary-eyed (really) and the sound effects put you right in the thick of everything. If there’s one part of the filmmaking I didn’t care for, however, it would definitely have to be Steven Price’s intrusive, too-obvious score. Something more minimalist and  moody would have helped the film but I felt like the score tried to be too leading: I’m not a fan of hand-holding between filmmakers and the audience and the score was definitely that. As far as the technical awards and the Best Cinematography statue, however? There was simply no other film in the running after this one: even discussing other films’ effects as being equitable is absolutely ridiculous.

At the end of the day, perhaps my own unreasonable expectations led me to be disappointed by Gravity. Don’t get me wrong: I enjoyed most of the film as I was watching it (save for the overly emotional bits referenced above). I was even stunned at several points, especially that jaw-dropping opening. It was a fun, exquisitely crafted film with a rock-solid performance by Bullock (not Oscar worthy, IMHO, but damn close), a very Clooney-esque performance by George C and a totally awesome reference to my favorite scene in Jaws. It was also, unfortunately, a rather slight film, almost more of an effects exercise then anything else. I remember how much I found myself pondering and returning to Children of Men after I first saw it. After watching Gravity, my only thought was, “Damn: shoulda seen it in the theaters.” While Gravity was a good Cuaron film, it looks like I might have to wait another seven years for a great Cuaron film.