2015: The Year in Film: "The Martian" Review

Remember that scene where Cersei Lanniser's body double was forced to walk the streets naked while weird pseudo-nuns whipped her and chanted "shame"? That's how I feel about posting movie reviews two months late.

So "The Martian", originally self-published by Andy Weir, was one of the more exciting and nerdtastic books I've read in recent years. Meticulously researched and nerdy to its core, the book tells the tale of a near future where NASA has begun manned missions to Mars. On one such mission, through a horrible accident, an astronaut is left behind and forced to survive on the barren surface while desperately trying to figure out how to get home. It's Apollo 13 meets Robinson Crusoe. So when it was announced that the book was going to be adapted for the screen in short order by none other than Ridley "Alien/Blade Runner" Scott, it was cause for some excitement. Throw in a tremendous cast (Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Kate Mara, Michael Pena, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sean Bean and more) and all the effects and production value money can buy, and you're just about guaranteed a sure thing.

Mark Watney, a botanist, is part of an 'Ares' mission to Mars when a sandstorm results in his being stranded, alone, on the planet's surface. He's forced, through his intellect, know-how and plucky resolve, to figure out a way to stay alive on a planet that's utterly devoid of life.

The Good: The book is already written like a Hollywood blockbuster, so the main challenge here was simply not screwing up the adaptation. And if anything, the film actually improves on the book, both through the gorgeous shots of the immense Martian landscape and by streamlining the narrative. The film, despite a runtime of over 2 hours, feels taut and tense throughout, with the climatic scene especially leaving you on the edge of your seat. The film also, admirably in this day and age, doesn't shy away from the hard-science of what Watney is doing to stay alive. He's trying to make water, preserve oxygen, stay warm and grow food, and the film doesn't hold your hand about any of it, rather taking a chance and treating science as fun and exciting. (Which it is!) They hit the casting out of the park as well. If Watney isn't charming enough to be compelling while he's alone in a dome, the movie falls flat from the jump. Matt Damon is probably the most personable "big" actor working today, and he instills his character with humor, charm and a human reliability. The supporting cast is strong as well, and while this film is Damon's first and foremost, the rest of the cast proves themselves more than up to the task, with Jessica Chastain and Chiwetel Ejiofor especially standing out. The book stumbles a bit through the third act, but the film fixes many of those issues, and I much prefer the film's ending.




The Bad: by and large, the film is otherwise good enough to overcome this shortcoming, which is also present in the book, and that's that this is an engineer's drama. It contains virtually no emotional or psychological depth beneath the ever-present problem facing the characters right in the face. That's not a huge problem, but it is a potential missed opportunity that keeps the film from reaching true greatness.

In all, this flick is the best space movie since Apollo 13. Its realistic setting, likable characters, tremendous production value and science-friendly ethos make it a fun, tense, eminently watchable modern sci fi classic. Damon, Ridley Scott, and everyone involved knocks it out of the part. Check it out, you won't regret it.

8.5/10

2014: The Year in Film: "Interstellar" Review

I think it goes without saying that I'm a pretty big Chris Nolan fan, readers and followers. From Memento to Batman Begins, Inception, The Dark Knight, The Prestige and The Dark Knight Rises, literally every single one of his films has been memorable, visually stunning, and utterly singular.  He's been called the second coming of Stanley Kubrick, and while I'm not sure that's accurate, the fact that the comment isn't absurd on its face kind of says it all.  While his take on Batman has its detractors, most notably among certain members of the hipster online commentariat, there shouldn't be denial among rational, adult members of society that his Dark Knight trilogy is a watershed moment in modern culture that honestly shaped the decade. We've also seen over the last two years a renaissance of sorts, a McConaissance, even, which has seen one of the more disappointing and underachieving members of the Hollywood A-list, Matthew McConaughey, turn himself into a legitimately great actor. From Mud to True Detective, Wolf of Wall Street and Dallas Buyer's Club, McConaughey had a stretch like no one else in recent memory.

So when it was announced that Nolan and McConaughey would be teaming up for their next film, Interstellar, a film that was shrouded with the typical Nolan secrecy prior to its release, the internet could barely contain its excitement. Add in a strong cast that includes Ann Hathaway, Nolan regular Michael Caine, Matt Damon and John Lithgow with an imaginative hard sci-fi premise, and I was sold from the jump.

Interstellar introduces us to an indeterminate point in the near-future when disease, blight and environmental degradation has nearly rendered the earth uninhabitable. Repeated crop failures have made the situation on earth desperate, and what's left of NASA seeks to send a mission to the stars in a desperate attempt to ensure humanity's survival.

The Good: As should be expected from Christopher Nolan by now, the film combines stunning visuals with an ambitious and thought-provoking plot. The story, of a very real human catastrophe forcing humanity to turn to the stars, is the sort of high-minded science fiction that we don't see much of any more. As America's greatest achievement, its space program, becomes an underfunded afterthought, this film can and should serve as a reminder of the hope, wonder, and species-uniting progress that space once represented and could again. Far from a fanciful futuristic story set more in fantasy than reality, this is a space saga that's very much grounded in reality, with technology and space travel that feels all too real. The film makes significant efforts to ground its space travel and voyage of exploration in scientific reality, using relativistic time as a plot device, for example, and relishing what far off worlds may in fact look like. The combination of racing against the clock to save humanity and voyaging through the endless void of space creates an interesting blend of suspense-style pacing and an explorer's sentimentality. All of this is grounded in its characters, as the film focuses on two father-daughter pairs, Cooper (McConaughey) and his daughter Murph (played as an adult by Jessica Chastain) find their bond tested, strained, and ultimately redeemed by the endless distance between them, and the incredibly high stakes are given a human dimension through their relationship. The cast is strong, and even if character isn't always Nolan's strong suit, McConaughey and Chastain both turn in moving and powerful performances. Despite the long runtime, the pacing is strong, and if anything, the film felt TOO short.




The Bad: For all of its efforts at making an intelligent and scientifically sound version of what mankind's first voyage into interstellar space may look like, at times the film falls into sentimental nonsense. I'm not docking the film TOO much for this, because I don't believe Nolan set out to film a hyper-realistic look at space travel, but it was jarring. There are times the science and the implications therein take a backseat to the plot, and while that's not always a bad thing in and of itself, at times it felt almost lazy, which is really unfortunate. I would have liked to have seen the ending fleshed out more as well, although the film already had a 3 hour runtime. Finally, everyone has criticized it, so I must mention it, the sound mix is bizarre. There are times that it was literally impossible to hear what was going on because of the combination of score and space craft noises. I respect the desire to demonstrate the inside of a spacecraft, but maybe don't have actors trying to give dialogue overtop of a booming score AND rocket engines?

In all, this film represents, while not perfection, certainly an exceptionally ambitious vision that is to be commended. At a time when Hollywood studios take fewer and fewer chances and focus their attention on established properties, big-budget original stories are important and valuable. This film joins the pantheon of great sci-fi films, and is honestly a must-see, despite its flaws.

8.5/10.

2013: The Year in Film: "Zero Dark Thirty" Review

Kathryn Bigelow, a director who had no-doubt action movie bona fides, shocked the world with "The Hurt Locker", a brutal military thriller that took the Oscars by storm three years ago. Established as one of the few in Hollywood who can handle politically explosive issues in an even-handed and honest way, that made her a no-brained to handle the potentially controversial story of the CIA's hunt for Osama Bin Laden leading up to his death in May 2011. This flick rested on potentially contentious ground, being released amidst a highly charged partisan political climate and being seen as potentially bolstering an incumbent president. In addition, the flick featured unprecedented access by the film crew to sources linked to the mission itself, promising as real a look at the largest manhunt in human history as possible from a major studio picture.

The film focuses on a small, elite group of CIA operatives tasked with finding the world's most notorious and wanted man, Usama Bin Laden, following 9/11. The trail gets hot and cold through multiple wars, but one agent stays the course - Maya. (played masterfully by Jessica Chastain) Of course, we all know the ultimate ending, so the question becomes whether or not the film succeeds in providing the necessary tension and intrigue to justify its lengthy runtime. No worries, the answer is a resounding "yes".

The Good: The cast, especially the leads, are great. Chastain, whether or not she ultimately wins Oscar, is a revelation. She does the bulk of the lifting here, and bears the pressure and determination of the decade-long hunt for a ghost masterfully. Jason Clarke (minor boy), Kyle "Coach Taylor" Chandler, Mark Strong, Joel Eddelston and others flesh out the cast and are all extremely effective, especially Clarke, but make no mistake, this is Chastain's show. By centering on her character the film puts a human face on the manhunt, and as we see Maya struggle against forces working against her the chase takes on real stakes. The plot moves crisply, effectively moving through the years and from Pakistan to Afghanistan to CIA black sites to Washington DC in a way that ramps up the intrigue and keeps things interesting while never feeling jumbled or confusing. This is no small feat. The cinematography and filmmaking is, quite simply, near-perfect. The film feels hyper-real, the brief scenes of punctuated action are simply brutal and the final raid on Bin Laden's compound is one of the more suspenseful scenes I've seen in recent year. Considering we all know what happened, that's obviously an impressive performance. The script is filled with enough insider language and jargon that you (or I, at least) feel like an insider without it being so dense that the goings-on are incomprehensible. Bigelow again successfully walks that line of showing without judging or commenting, choosing to let the film speak for itself. This is the treatment this story deserves. A partisan hack could have mangled it and made something fleeting, instead Bigelow is clearly devoted to creating a quality product, and it shows.

The Bad: there is very little bad here. One criticism I have is that the film, with its massive cast, made some questionable choices. I love Chris Pratt as much as anyone and respect Mark Duplass, but casting them as a Navy SEAL and CIA analyst seem questionable at best. Another criticism is that the film by and large entirely glosses over the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. While I understand that it has a mission, to tell the story of the Bin Laden manhunt, the fact that those conflicts consumed countless resources that could have been used to crush Al Qaeda and Bin Laden seems highly relevant.

In all, this is an important film. It's masterfully crafted, alternately funny, brutal, but always honest, and features a near-perfect performance at its heart. From the African embassy attacks in 1998 (really, you could argue starting with the first WTC bombing in 1993) through his death in 2011, Bin Laden was US public enemy #1. The triumph of a small group of Americans is a story that's simply essential. I've started calling it "The Social Network" for geo-politics.  It's a character-driven thriller with stakes that would reverberate worldwide. Far from being a jingoistic rah-rah piece it's an important piece of social commentary. If you remember 9/11 and the war on terror, see this movie. If you don't, you should see this movie even more. See this movie, it's the best of 2012, plain and simple. This is filmmaking at its finest.

9.5/10.

[As an aside, I'd like to comment on the silly contention that the film condones torture that's been circulating among some. Plain and simple, this film pursues no political agenda. It passes on innumerable opportunities to score points with one side or the other, pursuing a cold, almost documentarian touch over more emotional or exploitative options. It depicts torture because torture happened. Pretending it didn't would be doing the story a disservice. If anything, the film condemns violence as brutal and soul-sucking for all parties involved.]

2012: The Year in Film: "Lawless" Review

Ugh. I'm the worst, you guys. I saw this one weeks ago and just never got around to reviewing it. My apologies, football season + work and so on has just left me in a perpetual state of sleep deprivation and unable to muster the energy to review crazy person arthouse flicks like I've got in the hopper. But let's do it, shall we? We're headed into fall, and with it, Oscar bait, so my movie seeing schedule will likely pick way up and I'd like to be on top of it when I see say, "The Master". (can't wait...) So let's see about "Lawless", shall we?

 

Author/musician/screenwriter/crazy person Nick Cave and director John Hillcoat collaborated on 2005's "The Proposition", which is brutal and pretty much great, so I was excited about this one from first trailer on.  First, sometimes the marketing does a flick absolutely no favors. From watching the trailer and seeing the posters you'd think that this is a bang-bang shoot 'em up featuring hero bootleggers against a corrupt system. And while it's KIND OF that, it's mostly approximately 15 other things. This is no "Goodfellas" or grand crime drama, it's an arthouse flick infinitely more concerned with showing and ruminating than with its narrative or symbolism.  This is a time and a place that echoes today perhaps louder than ever before.. and through the lens of these larger-than-life people we can perhaps glean a thing or two about humanity... isn't that the greater purpose of art, after all?

 

It is the early 1930s in Franklin County, Virginia, in the midst of the Great Depression and Prohibition.  Franklin County, deep in the backwoods of western Virginia, was at one time referred to as "the wettest county in the world" due to the prevalence of bootlegged moonshine and illegal moonshine stills.  Based on a book by the grandson and great-nephew of the main characters, the flick focuses on the three Bondurant brothers, Jack, Forrest and Howard, notable and feared local characters and prolific bootleggers.  The Bondurant brothers, violent, stubborn, oddly principled and fiercely loyal, find themselves pitted against corrupt law enforcement as Franklin County becomes a gangland war zone.   

 

 

 

The good:  this flick looks and sounds great.  The sets, costumes, shots and sounds are all extremely artfully done, and blow away a lot of what you'll find in films with blockbuster-sized budgets.  This cast is extremely talented, with Tom Hardy and Jessica Chastain especially doing simply amazing work.  Hardy may well be the most talented actor under 40 working today, and it will be a damn shame if he doesn't walk away with at least an Oscar nom from this one.  His Forrest Bondurant is a dynamo... simply owning scenes and creating a nuanced and layered character out of whole cloth.  Jason Clarke is underrated and under used and is always, always good.  Guy Pearce and Gary Oldman in supporting roles?  Hot.  In addition, the flick treats its subject matter with respect and dilligence, the rural feel comes off as extremely authentic and gritty, and it doesn't shirk from the brutal violance associated with crime.  There's something beautiful and insane about the fact that it takes two Australians to make the most authentic modern depiction of depression-era 20th century rural America I've seen on film. 

 

The bad: Shia LaBeouf is simply out of his league here.  The role isn't especially flattering and is quite difficult, as a young, foolhardy, brash younger brother comes of age and searches for love, but Tom Hardy has more talent in one of his grunts than Shia has in his entire coked-out body.  It's not entirely Shia's fault... I'm not sure who honestly could have held a candle to Hardy in this one... Gosling, maybe?  But Shia is definitely outshined and out done and comes off as a weak-link.  Considering he's the main character, that's bad.  In addition, just what the shit is going on with Guy Pearce?  I get that he's supposed to be a strange outsider... but how would he rise to his position being THAT strange?  It strains credibility.  The plot is occasionally un-focused and tends to meander without seeming focus or aim.  I understand that it's not a plot-driven film, but at the same time some people (cough, Gary Oldman, cough) are simply criminally under-used while some seemingly unimportant parts and scenes are given too much play.  I don't know if that's an editing issue, a directing issue or a script issue, but it knocks something that could have been a classic down a couple of notches. 

 

In the end, this is a violent, sincere depiction of a fascinating group of people and a story well worth telling.  Come for the beautiful shots and Tom Hardy alone.  Well worth a watch, but unfortunately just a few notches short of true greatness. 

 

7.5/10.