Movies to See Right Now

Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne in THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING
Felicity Jones and Eddie Redmayne in THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING

We’re in Movie Prime Time – with fine Holiday movies big and small.  Here are the best:

  • The Theory of Everything is a successful, audience-friendly biopic of both Mr. And Mrs. Genius.
  • Set in the macho world of Olympic wrestling, Foxcatcher is really a relationship movie with a stunning dramatic performance by Steve Carell.
  • I really don’t want anyone to miss the brilliant comedy about personal identity, Dear White People.
  • The cinematically important and very funny Birdman; and
  • The best Hollywood movie of 2014, the thriller Gone Girl, with a career-topping performance by Rosamund Pike.
  • I liked the droll Swedish dramedy Force Majeure, which won an award at Cannes and is Sweden’s submission for the Best Foreign Language Oscar.
  • If you want a stark and grim look at the Old West, there’s Tommy Lee Jones’ feminist Western The Homesman.
  • J.K. Simmons is brilliant in the intense indie drama Whiplash, a study of motivation and abuse, ambition and obsession.
  • Bill Murray’s funny and not too sentimental St. Vincent.
  • I liked the meditatively paced nature documentary Pelican Dreams.
  • If you’re in the mood for a brutal, brutal World War II tank movie, there’s Fury.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is still the singular Dutch thriller Borgman – a smart and relatively non-gory horror film for adults.

Yesterday I wrote about the late filmmaker Mike Nichols, and his films The Graduate and Primary Colors.  Turner Classic Movies is airing The Graduate and two mother Nichols classics tomorrow, December 6.  Primary Colors is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant, Vudu and Xbox Video.

THE GRADUATE
THE GRADUATE

Mike Nichols: a belated remembrance

Mike Nichols
Mike Nichols

I didn’t get a chance to weigh last week on the passing of the seminal filmmaker Mike Nichols, but on this Saturday Turner Classic Movies is airing three of Nichol’s movies: The Graduate, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Carnal Knowledge. The superb Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was Nichol’s directing debut. Imagine, as a rookie director, handling the world’s two biggest movie stars, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, at the height of their media circus celebrity, tempetuous relationship and individual willfulness. Three quick reflections on Mike Nichols:

1. It’s easy to recognize the greatness of The Graduate today, but it’s hard to appreciate how groundbreaking it was – all because of Nichol’s directorial choices. Dustin Hoffman’s performance was central to the success of the film, yet he was a nobody at the time and Nichols had to fight for him – the studio preferred a conventionally handsome leading man. Nichols sure wasn’t copying anybody else when he put the Simon and Garfunkle songs in the soundtrack. And the final shot – where Nichols kept his camera lingering on Hoffman and Katherine Ross until the actors became uncomfortable – is one of cinema’s best.

2. Nichols was still at the top of his form in 1998 with the Bill Clinton story Primary Colors. We can see his continuing comedic mastery when Allison Janney’s teacher union president emerges in a Walk of Shame from the candidate’s hotel room. And when the Hillary character explains the “momma” phenomenon where the Bill and Carville characters are weeping about their mommas. Primary Colors is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant, Vudu and Xbox Video.

3. And this precedes his movie career, but it occurs to me that Mike Nichols’ comedy sketch collaboration with Elaine May was really the precursor of the 50’s becoming the 60’s in America. Just search on YouTube for “Mike Nichols Elaine May” and watch some clips – you’ll see why.