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:

Across the Universe

Starring Jim Surgess, Evan Rachel Wood, and Joe Anderson
Directed by Julie Taymor
Year: 2007
IMDB / Wikipedia

Let it never be said that I do not like musicals. Though not a fan, I do seek out musicals on stage and on film that interest me. But I come to find that the musicals I like are a niche, referred to as a Jukebox Musical, using popular pre-published music to set the story. Though not a new trend, they have exploded in popularity in recent years with movies like Mamma Mia and the upcoming Rock of Ages, as well as stage shows like Rock of Ages, Jersey Boys, and Movin’ Out. Since I’m a huge Billy Joel fan I drug my wife to see Movin’ Out when the touring company came through town. So, because I enjoy musicals like these, I was interested in our film today.

Across the Universe is a  film as ambitious as its namesake song but fails to deliver the audience to those same great heights. What is evident on screen is that the tired old cliches of both cinema, art, and the perception of life is still alive and kicking. It seems that a writer or filmmaker cannot set a story in the 1960s without Vietnam, hippies, and the tired vehicle of older generations “not getting” the younger one. Sure, all of those things helped define the decade, but you can have a film set in the 1960s and mention other things. This film went back to the well too many times and use the music of The Beatles to weave together a paper-thin plot.

The story of young Brit Jude (Sturgess) who comes to America to find his estranged father takes a turn when he meets up with Max (Anderson) and then falls for Max’s sister Lucy (Wood). The socio-economic conflicts, along with the angst building up ion the world around them drive them together, then apart, and then together again (oops, spoiler). All of this is done while supplanting what culd have been a great script with renditions of Beatles classics and coy in-jokes based on Beatles lyrics (“Where’d she come from?” “Oh, she came in through the bathroom window.” *facepalm*).

What upset me the most was this movie struggled so hard to find direction. As soon as it appeared that the story would find its legs and share something interesting to say, another character would break into song disrupting the flow of the moment. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’d love for a lot of movies to forgo their shitty dialogue in favor of Beatles music or anything more interesting, but this movie used it as a crutch so often the legs seemed to wither and die. Coupled along with all of the cliches of the 1960s that have been romanticized and over-saturated for the last 30 years, this movie doesn’t have much of anything to say. Interestingly enough, the only lingering parts of the movie are the songs, and I already have them all.

I had high hopes for this movie and everyone in it. I wanted to like this but there wasn’t much to like. The music was great, but I knew that before I started watching. I wanted something fresh and new, like the Beatles were in those days. Instead, I’m left with the husk of a movie with great potential but absolutely no follow-through. Ain’t that a shame?

Most Valuable Actor: Jim Sturgess as Jude. Much like Moulin Rouge, the male lead was the strongest of the cast. Sturgess could have chewed the scenery with this role but chose to play it in a very civil and understated tone, which fit the character quite nicely and supported the fact that the rest of the characters seemed drawn to him. An excellent casting choice.

1776

Starring William Daniels, Howard Da Silva, and Ken Howard          
Directed by Peter H. Hunt
Year: 1972
IMDB / Wikipedia

It’s weird watching this movie all in one sitting. This another one of those movies that came into my consciousness because it was shown in class. In fact, I watched this movie three times in high school in classes helmed by two different teachers. But when I watched this movie all those times I had to watch it parceled out in 45-minute chunks. I would like to have said that such abrupt stops and starts would be a detriment to the flow of such a story, but that was never the case. Merrily, I picked back up every time without missing a step.

But it’s a curious piece of film making for sure. Yes, there have been adaptations of stage musicals set for the silver screen, but this is the only one that I know of  that takes place in a historical setting with actual fervor and uncanny historical accuracy. Such a very odd combination that, in my mind, does very well for itself. The story is quite well put together, the songs are magnificently memorable, and there’s just enough humor to make it family friendly without betraying the subject matter. Sure, there’s the need to suspend your disbelief for some of the longer musical scenes (I doubt that Ben Franklin and John Adams performed a waltzing tag-team on Martha Jefferson in a courtyard) but that’s not the standout of this production.

By itself, without the music, it’s a wonderfully acted and photographed representation of the Tony Award-winning play. The main cogs of this production are certainly John Adams (Daniels) and Ben Franklin (Da Silva), but the supporting company of players that really make everything come together. From John Hancock (David Ford) to the secretary (Ralston Hill) to the lowly courier (Stephen Nathan). And though the ending is known, it is the journeythat makes the film so satisfying.

But I would be remiss without mentioning the political gravity of this film coming out when it did. Much like Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible focusing and paralleling  the events of McCarthyism and the Salem Witch Trials, this play and film take aim at the partisan dissension in the country in the late 60s and early 70s. The question of the need for an unpopular war to emancipate the colonies from the grip of British rule is set against a back drop of another unpopular war and the motives the conservative establishment has always taken up that war is what the Founding Fathers would have wanted. This film shows that no, war was not a popular answer and not everyone was on board to give Britain the boot. This film’s production was so controversial that Nixon himself asked producer Jack L. Warner that the song “Cool, Cool Considerate Men” be taken out of the final cut of the film because it showed the true colors of the conservative movement that has not evolved much since this country’s inception. It was removed but later restored on the DVD version of the film and I was happy to see it put back in as it gave additional depth to the film.

I may be alone in my feelings of this film, but I enjoyed it. Legendary film critic Roger Ebert slammed it decrying everything from the portrayal of the Founders to the songs he found to be unmemorable. The truth is the actions and the wishes of the Founding Fathers rest in what they wrote. There are no recordings of their words, there is no video of the Congress, and there is no definitive way to know, for sure, their hopes or wishes would have been almost 200 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. To say these portrayals are insulting is insulting in itself. If I were part of something as monumental as this, I would be honored to be remembered at all and no be so picky about how I was remembered.

But this film will still be shown on rainy days in classrooms all over this country because it is not only educational but also entertaining. I remember sitting in one of my education courses in college hearing that students will only absorb information if it is entertaining; a thought that is remnant of the film Dead Poets Society and it is largely true. But, if the images of our Founding Fathers our nation’s youth remembers are those in this film, I would be OK with that. I would just be concerned with those who say that Ben Franklin’s greatest accomplishment is his singing voice.

Most Valuable Actor:  Donald Madden as John Dickinson (PA). Many would agree that the antagonist roles in films are some of the most challenging and the most rewarding in film and on stage. Madden did a splendid job playing John Dickinson, a congressman who followed his on conscience on the matter of Independence much to the chagrin of others around him. His was a conservative view but, like anyone who holds true to their principles in the face of adversity, he should be remembered as a man of conviction and not as a dissenter.