Apollo 13

Starring Tom Hanks, Gary Sinise, and Ed Harris
Directed by Ron Howard
Year: 1995
IMDB / Wikipedia

During the summer months you may have the opportunity to see a movie in the park. If it’s as good as this one, I suggest you do not pass up on the opportunity. 

Films like this tend to remind me that real life can be as dramatic as anything we can imagine. Watching this in the park amongst families with small children, I wondered how many of these kids will have their minds blown when their parents explain to them later that this actually happened. There were three astronauts on a “routine” mission to the moon and their capsule suffered a catastrophic explosive failure; then, the combined efforts of those three and hundreds of people back on Earth helped get them home safely. A truly remarkable story of the power of people in intense situations.

And it is the realism that makes this movie great. Much of the the dialogue of the astronauts in the capsule was taken verbatim from transcripts and recordings made during the flight though some of the sub-plots were embellished for dramatic effect. And the actors didn’t try and over-act in scenes, they let them manifest organically. The feeling of this film was almost that of a documentary at times but it was still a wonderful piece of historical drama. Yes, there’s the theme of human perseverance and teamwork but those seem like by-products in a film that focused on the events and the people rather than slipping on the historical rose-colored glasses and telling a syrupy-sweet story. This is how history should be captured on film.

Most Valuable Actor: This is a real head-scratcher because there are so many deserving candidates for this honor. The obvious choice of Tom Hanks would be good, Kevin Bacon is another fascinating choice, as is Ed Harris as the flight director Gene Krantz, and even Kathleen Quinlan as Marilyn Lovell but I think Gary Sinise as the left-out astronaut-turned idea-cog Ken Mattingly gets the nod here. Sinise is good at making sure his performance fits the role and not the other way around. His grounded portrayal of Mattingly was sincere and powerful without becoming a focal point or a burden on the movie. Truly a fine performance.

Trailer:

Babel

Starring Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, and Rinko Kikuchi
Directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu
Year: 2006
IMDB / Wikipedia

I received this movie a few years ago as an Easter present from my folks. I didn’t know it at the time but they presented me with a horribly depressing film about death and human misery as a way to celebrate Christ’s Resurrection. I don’t want to read too much into it, I just thought it would be an interesting factoid. Another interesting factiod about this movie: Pitt and Blanchett are the two least-interesting characters in this entire marathon of celluloid agony. Two wonderful actors sharing screen time with a story that is limp, lifeless, and only seems to exist to make the other stories connect in some way.

Much like the other film of his I watched, 21 Grams, Inarritu weaves seemingly disconnected stories together to show how the actions of one can have international repercussions. The film follows two Moroccan brothers, an American couple, a Mexican maid, and a young Japanese girl in a story about accidents, character, humility, and forgiveness. This film does a good job at making a simple point long and the resolution on all the stories are left wanting, but that is the trademark of Inarritu. To follow these stories to their end would probably result in a much longer feature and, I guess, not knowing makes a statement, unfulfilling as it may be. Not the kind of movie I will yearn to watch repeatedly but it was a nice piece of cinema for a lazy day.

Most Valuable Actor: Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi turned the most memorable performance in the film as the sullen deaf-mute teen girl who is looking for some sort of attention and affection following the tragic suicide of her mother. Her work was so fine, in fact, that she became the first Japanese woman in over 50 years to be nominated for an Oscar for this role.

Trailer:

Field of Dreams

Starring Kevin Costner, Ray Liotta, and James Earl Jones
Directed by Phil Alden Robinson
Year: 1989
IMDB / Wikipedia / Trailer

During the summer months you may have the opportunity to see a movie in the park. If it’s as good as this one, I suggest you do not pass up on the opportunity. 

It’s been a few weeks since I actually sat in a north Boulder park and watched this film with about 50 other people, but I can still write about this film with all of my emotion because I have seen it so many times. It was a landmark film, it touched everyone’s life–even if you didn’t like baseball, because it was so much more than just a film about a man who builds a baseball field in his corn field so the late, great “Shoeless” Joe Jackson‘s spirit could play baseball again. It’s a story of recapturing the past, cherishing it, and learning to believe in yourself as you look forward into the future.

Part of Costner’s unofficial baseball trilogy that includes Bull Durham and For Love of the Game, this story, like those, transcends sports and that’s part of what makes it great. It is about finding what we love about baseball inside of all of us. Some like the rhythm of the game, some like the aura of the past, while others see it in more quantifiable terms, regardless if it’s in dollars and cents or in batting averages and ERA. Baseball has a connection to everyone, whether they are a passive observer or a rabid fan, everyone can come away from this film with something. Watching it on a grassy field on an evening after fathers played catch with sons and people gathered in a picnic-style atmosphere, it was almost too perfect. Almost.

Most Valuable Actor: James Earl Jones, for many reasons, but mostly for this.

The Grey

Starring Liam Neeson, Dermot Mulroney, and Frank Grillo
Directed by Joe Carnahan
Year: 2011
IMDB / Wikipedia

Every now and then, I will find it necessary to break protocol to tend to my extremely large Netflix queue. This is one of those times.

This film is not what you expect it to be yet exactly what it needs to be at the same time. Director Joe Carnahan’s way of taking any kind of story and turning it into something that you don’t expect but enjoy nonetheless. Carnahan took a story of roughnecks who survive a plane crash in the Alaskan wilderness and makes it into a deeply personal and moving character study under the guise of a survival action/drama. What makes this a great film is that there is plenty of action and drama to satisfy even the pickiest movie fan. 

It does help that Carnahan leans on one of the best dramatic actors in the business in Neeson, whose character is as rugged and unsuspecting as the wilderness he and his tenuous companions traverse to escape the pack of vicious wolves. His supporting cast was chosen, not for name recognition (Mulroney and Dallas Roberts were the only other two people I recognized) but for their ability to truly encapsulate their characters and make this film downright hard to watch at times because of its brutal realism. But, the journey was worth the payoff and the film ends with Carnahan’s usual understated elegance. 

Most Valuable Actor: Carnahan has a knack of getting the best from every actor under his command and Neeson also seems to take it up a notch. The definite bookend of the film, Neeson’s chemistry and ability to “act small” in a dramatic situation and then turn and be big and dominant in an action sequence the next moment is quite remarkable. Dare I say, his work here eclipses his work in Taken.

Trailer:

The Aviator

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchett, and Alec Baldwin
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Year: 2004
IMDB / Wikipedia

It’s easy to joke about how batshit crazy Howard Hughes was when it came to every aspect of his life, but Scorsese and DiCaprio do their best to try and humanize the larger-than-life figure in this ambitious biopic. The film begins while Howard is trying to finish his war film Hell’s Angels and shows his meticulous side and how it influences his entire life, from his relationships to his aviation endeavours, to how he copes with his Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder that eventually turns him into an eccentric recluse.

The most interesting thing about this film is about how every aspect of Hughes’ life was intertwined with the next. There was no separation of his personal and private lives and each played for or against the other his entire life and in every facet. But, above it all, the film showed that despite how “crazy” he was he was exceedingly brilliant, focused, and he had the money to back up every dream he had. This film is a wonderful character study of a man everyone claims to have known but really didn’t.

Most Valuable Actor: One of the more focused arcs of Hughes’ story was his relationship with actress Katherine Hepburn, played wonderfully by Cate Blanchett. Though people not familiar with Hepburn’s style would see Blanchett’s portrayal more as a caricature, being familiar with her I find it a fitting homage to the late actress and a performance that does everything short of killing the titular character to steal the show.

Trailer:

Australia

Starring Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman, and David Wenham
Directed by Baz Luhrmann
Year: 2008
IMDB / Wikipedia

With every Baz Luhrmann movie you get the sense that this is an epic film revolving around a common story because, let’s be honest, that’s what he does. Everything in his films is too fake to be real yet too real to be faked; drawing a sense of emotion from within you for something you know to be fiction and that is where his talents lay. In this film, Luhrmann tells the story of English socialite Lady Sarah Ashley (Kidman) who travels far from home to her husband’s small cattle farm in northern Australia only to find him dead and an entire world left in her care from the clutches of the evil cattle baron King Carney (Bryan Brown) and his ruthless lackey Fletcher (Wenham). To aid in her quest to keep her land, she enlists scruffy Drover (Jackman) and a young mixed-race child and together they find pride, love, and family in the unforgiving Australian outback.

But this movie is too much to take in all in one sitting. Both times I have seen this film I took a break in the middle because it’s really two films rolled into one. Never let it be said that Luhrmann ever told a simple story because every plot device available to Luhrmann was instituted to its full effect. The story is solid, the plot is well-crafted, and the emotion is there, but the film does seem to weigh heavy on the viewer. Plus, with a 165-minute runtime you feel every minute of it as Luhrman takes his time, builds the story, and leaves with an ending that is more satisfying and gripping that you may expect solidifying Luhrmann as a director that tells his stories well though you may have to be patient for the payoff.

Most Valuable Actor: Brandon Walters as the young mixed-race Aboriginal child, Nullah who is the heart of the story. The entire second and third acts of the film revolve around him and, though more passive audiences may find him a but too sweet and too charming, he plays his role well. Not destined to be a Hollywood player (as evidenced by his sparse IMDB listing) his one major film role is one that young actors should learn from and study.

Trailer:

August Rush

Starring: Keri Russell, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, and Freddie Highmore
Directed by Kristen Sheridan
Year: 2007
IMDB / Wikipedia

Most music is not about having all the notes and putting them in the one right order, it’s about taking the notes you do have, arranging them in the way you like, and see who else can feel the connection. This film, while it is not original in pretty much any way, is like music: the notes are familiar, the ending is certain, but there is an arrangement and a tone that makes it unique in its own way.

The story is a telling of Oliver Twist with the orphan boy (Highmore) who goes searching for his parents only to end up in a band of street musicians organized and brutalized by The Wizard (Robin Williams). The entire time his parents, a concert cellist (Russell) and a rock icon (Meyers) spend one night together, fall madly in love but, because of social differences, are torn apart. The separate but intertwined journeys these three take to try and find their way back to one another is almost too serendipitous at times but the film warms the heart nonetheless. Plus, the music is good, so that’s not bad. The thing you must realize when watching this film is that sometimes the journey is better than the destination, and that rings true here.

Most Valuable Actor: It’s hard with this one because, while the acting is well done, there isn’t one character that really stands out. Pressed to it, I think that Terrence Howard‘s social worker character, Richard Jeffries gets the nod because the part is almost tailor-made for Howard and it is the lynchpin cog in this story that makes everything work and, believe it or not, plausible.

Trailer:

Argo

Starring: Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, and Alan Arkin
Directed by Affleck
Year: 2012
IMDB / Wikipedia

Every now and then, I will find it necessary to break protocol to tend to my extremely large Netflix queue. This is one of those times.

Those who know me and have read this blog know I’m not a fan of Ben Affleck. This saddens my wife because she enjoys his work (a bit too much, but that’s another post) so when she got this from Netflix I shocked her by saying I wanted to watch it with her. Despite myself, I broke down Affleck’s career and I find myself liking his work more than I’m willing to admit. After seeing this film, I feel two things: he got robbed of a Best Director Oscar nomination (and probable win) and Affleck is probably better behind the camera than in front of it. That last one’s not a dig, it’s the truth.

The movie tells the true story of how a CIA operative helped free six American Foreign Services worked trapped at the Canadian diplomat’s house in Iran in 1980. The mission hinged on building a cover for the operative and the six Americans behind a fake movie location scouting mission. The story could have been cut-and-dry showing only the plan and its details, but Affleck did a good job on his end showing the complex emotional and political strife happening on both sides of the issue and the underlying cause of it all. Though some details were embellished for the sake of drama, the movie is a cohesive drama that delivers in both action, suspense, thrills and, most importantly, reality.

Most Valuable Actor: Alan Arkin makes any movie he is in better. He has a way to play a role that seems larger than life but does not pull focus from the film itself. Playing the role of aging Hollywood producer Lester Siegel, he plays the “juice” behind the fake movie to make it all seem plausible. If you watch this film and don’t believe he was the best part, you can Argo-fuck yourself.

Trailer:

The Words

Starring Bradley Cooper, Zoe Saldana, and Jeremy Irons
Directed by Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal
Year: 2012
IMDB / Wikipedia

Every now and then, I will find it necessary to break protocol to tend to my extremely large Netflix queue. This is one of those times.

Every once in a while I find myself watching something, reading something, listening to something, and am become immediately inspired to write. Like, something about watching or experiencing someone else’s creative process is inspiring, but not for the way you may think. No, I’m a very arrogant bastard when it comes to several things, especially writing (don’t judge me solely on my blogs) so when I see someone else creating something, especially writing, I get inspired because I figure I can do it better than that person.

The Words is a movie about someone who circumvents the creative process to find his hit. The tale is of a struggling writer, Rory (Cooper) who finds an old manuscript in a vintage portfolio he purchased in Paris. He is so enthralled with it he decides to pass it off as his own and gain the critical acclaim that comes along with it. However, it also comes with the price of his dignity and his ethics as an artist, especially when the story’s true author (Irons) comes to pay him a visit.

I find myself in a love/hate relationship with films like this because I want so badly to hate it. The story is intriguing but the plot outline is almost too simplistic and too perfect to be believable. However, despite that, it comes off as heart-wrenchingly genuine as films come. The three-act structure of the film and the device used to frame the story (Cooper’s story is actually from a book titled The Words written by a character played by Dennis Quaid and is read aloud to an audience).

But what kills me is the ending of the story because, though it is as a true-to-life ending as you will ever find in cinema, it is wholly unfulfilling and creates more questions than it answers. After the film was over, my wife and I spent almost 30 minutes going over what happened in the last 10 minutes of the film and how the story actually played out. Good stories should make people talk, think, and even debate but when it leaves you incredulous it becomes bothersome. But, there again, even this could not bring me to dislike this movie.

For being an almost direct-to-DVD release, it was well crafted and evoked memories of 2000’s Wonder Boys, another film about writers and their strife that, on the surface seem indulgent and masturbatory, but can make for a good story. Now, I’m going to go dust off my old writing machine (thankfully, not a Smith-Corona) and settle in to follow the inspiration this film has set before me.

Most Valuable Actor: In a film with such great actors even in small roles it is hard to pick one, unless it’s Jeremy Irons’ portrayal of The Old Man, a character that is so rich and vibrant in his dialogue, his word choice, and his story that he runs away with the film. His is the most enduring character though not the most realistic.

Trailer:

Apocalypse Now [REDUX]

Starring Martin Sheen, Marlon Brando, and Robert Duvall
Directed by Francis Ford Coppola
Year: 1979 (REDUX 2001)
IMDB / Wikipedia (Redux article)

A few months ago I read Joseph Conrad‘s novella Heart of Darkness, the original story from which this movie was made. While watching the REDUX version of the film I couldn’t help myself from trying to find the parallels between the source and the film. On the surface, there’s a good bit of similarity–everything from character names to some of the symbolism to many of the motifs Conrad used–but these, in their respective hearts, are two very different stories.

At this point, I’m going to post a Spoiler Alert for both the film and the book because it is essential to break down all of the events therein to give a good comparison. However, if you are not familiar with how the film ends (especially with Brando’s utterance of Kurtz’s  famous last words) it means it is quite possible you have lived under a rock for the past 30 years or so.

I started to write about my gripes about the film but, as I wrote my thoughts I found I was pushing myself toward the inevitable conclusions and connections made by the screenwriters of the film. Everything in the film is a mirror to the book–save the ending–and the motifs and points made in the book were meticulously inserted into the film. With as many re-writes and revisions made during the filming, it’s a wonder they got it right (watch the Hearts of Darkness documentary to get a better perspective on this).

The only gripe I would have about the film is the main thing that kept the plot grounded in conflict: the Willard/Marlowe character (Sheen). In the book, it was really his own curiosity that sent him looking for Kurtz (the Company men saw this and took advantage in lieu of being ordered) and it was only to find out what happened in self-interest (would he share Kurtz’s fate on the river?). In the film, Willard was sent by the military to find and eliminate Kurtz as he was seen as a threat to National Security and to the harmony of the military operation in Vietnam. At the end of the book, Kurtz wanted to be taken away from the Inner Station and the life he built because of illness (he kept having a liter bear him down to the steamer) wherein the movie Kurtz’s want of rest and peace was only insinuated by Willard (though confirmed when Kurtz did not fight back when Willard slaughtered him). Perhaps this was to keep in with the war/battle-motif established by the film, but it seemed more natural and logical the way Kurtz died in the book, coming to a self-realization on his deathbed about the horrors he has seen and perpetuated, and then dies a less than noble death in a cot.

But, does having a knowledge of the original source detract from the film’s experience? Absolutely not. The film is certainly a masterpiece and the REDUX is the only version I will watch. There were a lot of holes and missing events that the REDUX restored meticulously and beautifully. Every scene had a purpose, every line had bearing on the plot and character development and, as a whole, the film became more like a tapestry of a story rather than a series of events. There is no passively watching this film because everything matters. If it weren’t R-rated and violent as all get-out I would recommend every high school US History and Literature class view this film in tandem with the reading of the novella to explore a wonderful story told in two very stark but relatable ways.

Most Valuable Actor: It’s hard to deny Brando’s brilliant performance in the film (the “How does it smell to you, soldier?” scene is as chilling as anything else in the film) or Sheen’s sacrifice for the sake of the film (he had a massive heart-attack on set) but I feel that the role Frederic Forrest played as Chef was the best because his character was the audience placed inside the story. His character was the best drawn of all of the boat’s crew, he had some great lines, and his demise was the hardest to take, not just because of the method used but because he was truly the last sane person in the story at that point. Take him out and you lose the moral compass needed to tell the light from the darkness in this story, something that is desperately needed.

Trailer: