movie gourmet

MACBETH: Shakespeare’s study of ambition, more medieval, more psychological and sexier

December 16, 2015 by movie gourmet

Marion Cotillard and Michael Fassbender in MACBETH

Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard star in Justin Kurzeil’s take on Shakespeare’s Macbeth – sexier and more psychological than most versions and very medieval.

In interviews, Fassbender has said that his Macbeth suffers from battlefield PTSD. As we see in this version of Macbeth, medieval warfare consisted of muddy guys rushing each other to hack, stab and bludgeon each other to death. Mostly, it seems, to hack. The soldiers wear facial warpaint that looks like it would if smeared on by men just before a battle.

Macbeth comes already damaged. Unlike Richard III, a Shakespearean villain who is just deliciously evil to the core, Macbeth is troubled, a man whose “dreams abuse the curtain of sleep.” But, as he is haunted by his own atrocities (especially killing his most loyal friend Banquo after Macbeth has already obtained the crown), Macbeth decompensates.

Lady Macbeth is the prototype of social climbers and strivers, pushing her hubbie to the forefront no matter the requisite carnage. Cotillard’s Lady Macbeth uses sex to persuade him on a course of action, and he exhales a post-orgasmic “settled” in agreement with her plot. After all, what’s sexier than power? Hearing Macbeth’s “I have done the deed” gets Lady Macbeth breathing really hard.

Both of them have fits in which they wander the windswept highlands in their sleepwear. Even with her over-the-top ruthlessness, Lady Macbeth starts out more stable and functional, trying valiantly to distract the court from gauging Macbeth’s ever more tottering sanity. But finally, the totality of their misdeeds becomes too heavy for even her to bear. Fassbender and Cotillard are excellent. So are Paddy Considine as Banquo and Sean Harris as Macduff.

All of the classic Macbethisms are here – “the be all and end all”, “out, damn spot!”, “unsex me here”, “the poisoned chalice” and “vaulting ambition”. That last term – the central subject of Macbeth – is a marvel of precision because ambition requires one to vault over and past other people. Ruthlessness is acting without or despite empathy for others. Those who are not sociopaths can be haunted by their own vaulting acts of ruthlessness. Kurzeil asks us to make that assessment of the two lead characters.

I really like Shakespeare movies because there are ways to advance Shakepeare’s stories that you just can’t do on stage. Realistic medieval filth is one. Large battle scenes, partially in slow motion is another. And Macbeth and Banquo are able to quietly reflect on their foretold futures while bedding down on the battlefield, not while pacing the stage and speaking loud enough for a live audience to hear. The soundtrack is filled with reedy drones that evoke bagpipes and covey dread and moral bleakness. (See my Best Shakespeare Movies – I’ll be adding this movie to that list.)

In just his second feature, Australian director Justin Kurzeil consistently make superb choices. Instead of novelties, the witches are spooky and mostly silent witnesses to the story; when Macbeth’s fortune is complete, they turn silently and melt away. I prefer the traditional way that Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane Castle over Kurzeil’s solution, but’s that’s just me. The final shots are wholly original and leave us with a remind of the historical consequences yet to come.

Kurzeil’s Macbeth is well-crafted and thought-provoking, and one of the very best Shakespeare movies.

HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT: essential for serious movie fans

December 15, 2015 by movie gourmet

The documentary Hitchcock/Truffaut is a Must See for cinéastes. In 1962, Francois Truffaut spent a week in Hollywood interviewing Alfred Hitchcock. These interviews formed the basis of Truffaut’s seminal 1966 book Hitchcock/Truffaut. At this moment, Truffaut was the hottest new thing in international cinema. He was horrified that Hitchcock was viewed in the U.S. as only a genre director and pop celebrity, but not as the master of cinema that influenced Truffaut and the rest of the French New Wave. Vertigo, now rated by many as the greatest of films, had only broken even at the box office four years before.

Filmmaker Kent Jones took the audiotapes and stills from those 1962 interview sessions and adds what Truffaut could not – illustrative clips from the Hitchcock films themselves. Because Truffaut is no longer with us, Jones also provides commentary from directors like martin Scorsese, David Fincher, Peter Bogdanovich and others. The result is an insightful celebration of Hitchcock’s body of work.

I had thought that I had a pretty fair grasp of Hitchcock, especially his love of surprise and the MacGuffin, his subversion of convention in Psycho and obsession with blonde actresses. But Hitchcock/Truffaut gave me a much richer understanding of Hitchcock’s visual sensibilities, his mastery of overhead shots, and his very limited expectations of his actors, as well as his compression and expansion of time.

Hitchcock/Truffaut will be interesting to any audience, but essential to serious movie fans.

VERY SEMI-SERIOUS: glimpsing inside The New Yorker cartoons

December 14, 2015 by movie gourmet

If you’re like me and you worship the cartoons in The New Yorker, then the documentary Very Semi-Serious is a Must See. Very Semi-Serious takes us inside The New Yorker for a glimpse inside the process of creating and selecting the cartoons, chiefly from the perspective of cartoonist and currently Cartoon Editor Bob Mankoff. You will know Mankoff from his cartoon with the caption, “How about never? Is never good for you?”.

We also meet rick star cartoonists that include Roz Chast and George Booth, along with The New Yorker Editor David Remnick and some aspiring cartoonist newcomers. We are boggled by the tens of cartoons each cartoonist pitches each week and the hundreds that Mankoff must review. Rejection is a major part of the cartoon life.

We also learn how Mankoff scientifically studies the eye movements of readers to see how/when/if we “get” the jokes. And we get to laugh again at HUNDREDS of cartoons.

I saw Very Semi-Serious in May at the San Francisco International Film Festival, and now you can see it beginning tonight on HBO. Set your DVRs.

THE SPYMASTERS — CIA IN THE CROSSHAIRS: Can we kill our way out of the War on Terror?

December 14, 2015 by movie gourmet

In the thought-provoking documentary The Spymasters — CIA in the Crosshairs, we hear from all twelve directors of the CIA, from George H.W. Bush through current Director John Brennan. They weigh in on the agency’s role in the War Against Terror, including harsh interrogation, drone warfare, the Kill List and “signature strikes”. They disagree among themselves on torture, with Iraq War era directors George Tenet and Porter Goss, taking especially belligerent positions. But there is a unified answer to this fundamental question about the War on Terror, “Can we kill our way out of it?”

The Spymasters — CIA in the Crosshairs showcases the decisions that a CIA Director must make, Leon Panetta poses one situation that he actually faced – do you take a rarely available missile shot at a terrorist who has just killed nine of your agents – when you know he is with his wife and kids? And several directors address the question, “What keeps you up at night?”

Besides the directors, we get to know a CIA operative with experience in Afghanistan, along with the agency’s chief of counter-terrorism. And we meet a most colorful character, the CIA’s former clandestine operations chief, Jose Rodriguez, who openly admits destroying the videos of CIA waterboarding.

The Spymasters echoes another talking head documentary The Gatekeepers, with the retired directors of the Shin Bet, Israel’s super-secret internal security force. I recommend a double feature with these two companion films. The Gatekeepers is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and for streaming on Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and Flixster.

The Spymasters — CIA in the Crosshairs is currently playing on Showtime.

CREED: superb refreshing of a storied franchise

December 13, 2015 by movie gourmet

Michael B. Jordan and Sylvester Stallone in CREED

Rocky Balboa returns in writer-director Ryan Coogler’s superb Creed. Creed is the story of a young man, the posthumous son of Rocky’s rival and friend Apollo Creed, who seeks out Rocky as a mentor. Played by Michael B. Jordan (star of Coogler’s Fruitvale Station), the young Creed must face off against his own demons, as imposing as any opponents in the ring. Stallone’s Rocky Balboa is still a lovable galoot, humble and adoring the long-dead Adrian. Tessa Thompson (Dear White People, Selma) plays the younger man’s love interest. Creed isn’t just about The Big Fight – all three of the main characters must overcome a distinct nemesis within each of them.

There’s not that much actual boxing in Creed, and folks who don’t like boxing will still enjoy the movie. The boxing scenes, however, are brilliant. The opponent in the climactic fight is played by real pro boxer Tony Bellew.

The most impressive scene, however, is mid-movie when Rocky’s protegé is tested against a local up-and-comer (the actor Gabe Rosado). The three-minute rounds are photographed as uninterrupted action (no cuts are apparent) from WITHIN the ring. We feel like we’re in the ring with the fighters – right at shoulder-level. It’s a tour de force by veteran cinematographer Maryse Alberti (most of her work has been in documentaries).

Stallone’s performance is excellent. Even though it’s the zillionth time he’s played this character, he’s not just mailing this in for a paycheck, and he’s justifiably getting some award buzz. Johnson and Thompson again prove themselves as rising talents. Phylicia Rashad is excellent as the young fighter’s mother figure.

Coogler is the brilliant young Bay Area filmmaker whose brilliant debut was the indie docudrama Fruitvale Station, which was #8 on my Best Movies of 2013. (Fruitvale Station is available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon, Vudu, Google Play, YouTube and Xbox Video.)

Coogler gets lots of credit for breathing freshness and originality into a movie franchise that had grown tiresome. Creed is an exploration into the internal struggles of three people – and it’s also irresistibly entertaining.

DON VERDEAN: money changers in the temple

December 13, 2015 by movie gourmet

Don Verdean is a dark comedy from filmmakers Jared and Jerusha Hess (Napoleon Dynamite), a smart and cynical take on the faux scientists embraced by the Christian Right. Sam Rockwell plays the title character, a Christian “archaeologist” of dubious credentials and ethics who keeps “discovering” Biblical relics and marketing them to gullible true believers.

Verdean and his assistants (Amy Ryan and Jermaine Clement) find themselves entangled with rival pastors, both charlatans. One is a former convict (Danny McBride) with a former hooker wife (Leslie Bibb); the other is a former Satanist (Will Forte) with his own bogus academic henchman (Sky Elobar). The cast is all good. Sam Rockwell sounds like he is channeling a TV preacher version of Sam Elliott.

But the real revelation is Jermaine Clement of Flight of the Conchords, who plays Verdean’s Israeli fixer, Boaz. The Hesses start Boaz out as a footnote and then gradually develop him into one of the lead characters. Clement imbues Boaz with an unintentional sneer, a sometimes puzzling Hebrew accent and ascendant venality. Clement even gets a very funny dance bit (less extended and sidesplitting than the one in Napoleon Dynamite but funny nonetheless).

Jared and Jerusha Hess are the team behind Napoleon Dynamite, a pretty solid comedy credential. The Hesses know of what they write. They’re not just Hollywood religion-mockers – both attended BYU.

Here’s an example. The Hesses gave Clement’s character the name of Boaz. Those who know the Old Testament story of Ruth (we’re only talking Jews and Fundamentalist Christians here) will recognize Boaz as a major Good Guy. Some may even know that Boaz was an ancestor of both David and Jesus, who some scholars see as a “pre-figure” of Christ. But Boaz is a Biblical name that nobody gives their kid – so you never meet a Boaz today. Given the arc of the Boaz character in Don Verdean, the name is brilliantly ironic.

There are more cynical chuckles here than there are gut-busting guffaws. In one particularly inspired touch, the Hesses inserted Put Your Hand in the Hand into the soundtrack. Don Verdean is a little movie that’s sure to be overlooked during the big Holiday movie season, but there aren’t many good comedies in theaters now, so it’s a good choice for those looking for a dark indie comedy.

CHI-RAQ: Spike’s plea for peace with justice…and a sex comedy

December 12, 2015 by movie gourmet

Chi-Raq is Spike Lee’s impassioned plea for peace with justice in the inner city. The Chi-Raq of the title is Chicago, where there have been more gun deaths in the past 15 years than there have been Americans killed in Iraq and Afghanistan combined – a shocking and wholly unacceptable statistic that opens the movie.

Lee has adapted the Aristophanes play Lysistrata, where the ancient Greek women withhold sex until their men negotiate an end to war. Here, it’s the women of today’s Chicago who suspend the sexual privileges of their gang-banging boyfriends. Lee stays pretty close to the original Lysistrata, with lines sometimes in rap verse and with increasingly dapper Samuel L. Jackson as a one-man chorus who comments directly to the audience.

In a particularly inspired tactic, the men try to soften the woman’s resolve with Oh Girl by the Chi-Lites.

Lysistrata herself, the women’s ring leader, is played by Teyonah Parris, who pulls off the responsibility of being in virtually every scene. In her skanky outfits and massive Afro, Parris is unrecognizable as the controlled and restrained Sterling Cooper secretary Dawn Chambers in Mad Men.

John Cusack plays a bleeding heart priest, whose diatribe against the systems that breed violence is the weakest part of the movie (not Cusack’s fault – it’s the writing). Samuel L. Jackson, Jennifer Hudson and Angela Bassett are all excellent. Overall, Chi-Raq is pretty watchable.

another look at SPOTLIGHT

December 13, 2015December 12, 2015 by movie gourmet

I’ve been forced to take another look at Spotlight, a movie that I really liked and admired, but in which I incorrectly found a flaw. I didn’t like Mark Ruffalo’s performance as the real life Boston Globe reporter Michael Rezendes. Ruffalo plays Rezendes as high-strung, intensely fidgety and perpetually restless. I wrote:

“Ruffalo has the most showy part, as a frenetic and volatile reporter, and his scenery-chewing put me off.

But then I played some poker. It turns out that several guys in my monthly poker game KNOW Michael Rezendes from his time with a Bay Area newspaper. They report that, in Spotlight, Ruffalo completely captured Rezendes’ characteristics and persona. So my initial criticism of Ruffalo’s performance for his nervous demeanor was as valid as criticizing Anthony Hopkins for playing Hitler as too evil.

As a result, I’m taking Spotlight up a notch higher in my own rankings, and I’m pretty sure it will end up on my Best of the Year list.

Movies to See Right Now

December 11, 2015 by movie gourmet

The Big Prestige Movies are starting to roll out, including several big openings this weekend. Of the ones I’ve seen, I’m highest on Brooklyn, Spotlight and Creed – the newest and entirely fresh chapter in the Rocky franchise. I’ll write about Creed this weekend, but don’t wait for my post. Here are my other top picks:

The Irish romantic drama Brooklyn is an audience-pleaser with a superb performance by Saoirse Ronan.
Spotlight – a riveting, edge-of-your-seat drama with some especially compelling performances;
The Martian – an entertaining Must See space adventure – even for folks who usually don’t enjoy science fiction;
Bridge of Spies – Steven Spielberg’s Cold War espionage thriller with Tom Hanks, featuring a fantastic performance by Mark Rylance.
Trumbo – the historical drama that reflects on the personal cost of princliples.
Spectre – action and vengeance from a determined James Bond.

My DVD/Stream of the week is Amy, documentarian Asif Kapadia’s innovative biopic of singer-songwriter is one of the most heart-felt and engaging movies of the year. It’s available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming on Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

DVD/Stream of the Week: AMY – emotionally affecting and thought-provoking

December 8, 2015 by movie gourmet

Amy, documentarian Asif Kapadia’s innovative biopic of singer-songwriter is one of the most heart-felt and engaging movies of the year.

In a brilliant directorial choice, Amy opens with a call phone video of a birthday party. It’s a typically rowdy bunch of 14 year-old girls, and, when they sing “Happy Birthday”, the song is taken over and finished spectacularly by one of the girls, who turns out to be the young Amy Winehouse. It shows us a regular girl in a moment of unaffected joy and friendship, but a girl with monstrous talent.

In fact ALL we see in Amy is footage of Amy. Her family and friends were devoted to home movies and cell phone video, resulting in a massive trove of candid video of Amy Winehouse and an especially rich palette for Kapadia.

We have a ringside seat for Amy’s artistic rise and her demise, fueled by bulimia and substance addiction. In a tragically startling sequence, her eyes signal the moment when her abuse of alcohol and pot gave way to crack and heroin.

We also see when she becomes the object of tabloid obsession. It’s hard enough for an addict to get clean, but it’s nigh impossible while being when harassed by the merciless paparazzi.

Amy makes us think about using a celebrity’s disease as a source of amusement – mocking the behaviorally unhealthy for our sport. Some people act like jerks because they are jerks – others because they are sick. Winehouse was cruelly painted as a brat, but she was really suffering through a spiral of despair.

The Amy Winehouse story is a tragic one, but Amy is very watchable because Amy herself was very funny and sharply witty. As maddening as it was for those who shared her journey, it was also fun, from all reports. Everyone who watches Amy will like Amy, making her fate all the more tragic. It’s available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming on Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.