Weekly Movie Recommendations

DVD/Stream of the Week: DEADFALL – dysfunctional families converge just in time for Thanksgiving

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Charlie Hunnam and Olivia Wilde in DEADFALL
Charlie Hunnam and Olivia Wilde in DEADFALL

Deadfall is a solid recent thriller that has flown flew under the radar. Eric Bana and Olivia Wilde are brother and sister running for the Canadian border after a casino heist. They wreck their car and split up. The brother sets off overland, leaving a trail of murderous carnage. The local cops are on the alert, including the sheriff’s deputy daughter (Kate Mara). Meanwhile, a bad luck boxer (Charlie Hannum of Sons of Anarchy and The Lost City of Z) is released from prison, impulsively commits another crime and is headed for his parents’ (Sissy Spacek and Kris Kristofferson) remote northern cabin. The sister hitches a ride with the boxer. Everybody converges at the boxer’s parents’ place for an extremely stressful Thanksgiving dinner.

An essential element of this thriller is that all of the families are dysfunctional. The siblings have survived a hellish upbringing, from which the older brother has rescued his little sister; unfortunately, he has emerged as a psychopath himself and has infantilized the sister. The relationship between the boxer and his father has been poisoned by a long-festering dispute. The sheriff resents and belittles his bright and highly professional daughter while doting on her idiot brothers.

The core of the movie is the evolving relationship between Wilde’s sister and Hunnam’s boxer. Neither knows that the other is on the lam. She cynically seduces him because he is useful. But then she starts to fall for him, and, by Thanksgiving dinner, her loyalties are uncertain.

Sissy Spacek is brilliant as the boxer’s mom, who must steer over the wreckage of the relationship between her son and her husband, and who must then serve a Thanksgiving dinner to a volatile killer who is holding a shotgun on the other guests. She is a great actor, and she’s as good here as in any of her signature performances.

The cinematography, characters, acting and the directorial choices by Stefan Ruzowitzky are excellent. What keeps Deadfall from being one of the year’s best is some trite, TV movie level dialogue along the way. Still, it’s a good watch. Deadfall is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and can be streamed from Netflix Instant, Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

Note: This is NOT the 1993 Deadfall, with Nicholas Cage even more over-the-top than usual.

Movies to See Right Now

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Jennifer Jason Leigh and Woody Harrelson in LBJ

In theaters now:

  • I liked LBJ, an effective Cliff Notes history lesson, with another fine performance by Woody Harrelson.
  • Murder on the Orient Express is a moderately entertaining lark.

The highly acclaimed Novitiate, Lady Bird, Last Flag Flying, Darkest Hour, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri and The Square have reached the Bay Area, but only in a few theaters. Of these, I’ve only seen The Square, an ambitious satire that I liked, but which is not for everyone; I’ll be posting about it soon. Stay tuned.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is the smart and bitingly funny dramedy Smoke Signals, a film about Native Americans written and directed by Native Americans. The film won the Audience Award and the Filmmakers Trophy at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. Smoke Signals is available on DVD from Netflix and to stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

On November 20, Turner Classic Movies will broadcast the top heist film ever, the pioneering French classic Rififi: After the team is assembled and the job is plotted, the actual crime unfolds in real-time – over thirty minutes of nerve-wracking silence.

RIFIFI

Movies to See Right Now

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Melissa Leo in NOVITIATE

So the highly acclaimed Novitiate, Lady Bird, Last Flag Flying, Darkest Hour and The Square have reached the Bay Area, but only in a few theaters.  The festival audience favorite Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri arrives next weekend.  Of these, I’ve only seen The Square, an ambitious satire that I liked, but which is not for everyone; I’ll be posting about it soon.  I liked LBJ, an effective Cliff Notes history lesson.  I’ll also soon be writing about LBJ and Murder on the Orient Express.  Stay tuned.

IDA

Because the big Prestige Movies are arriving in theaters and Oscar campaigns are being launched,  I’m giving you a movie that you can compare to 2017’s Oscar Bait. The Polish drama Ida won the 2015 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Picture and the International Critics’ Award at the Toronto International Film Festival. Ida was my pick as the best film at Cinequest, where it won the Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature.  Ida is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant, YouTube, Google Play and Xbox Video.

On November 15 , Turner Classic Movies presents the Otto Preminger masterpiece Anatomy of a Murder (1959). This movie has everything: Jimmy Stewart’s portrayal of a wily lawyer, content to underachieve in the countryside, Stewart’s electrifying courtroom face-off with George C. Scott, great performances by a surly Ben Gazzara and a slutty Lee Remick, a great jazz score by Duke Ellington and a suitably cynical noir ending. That jazz score is one of the few movie soundtrack CDs that I own. The music perfectly complements the story of a murder investigation that reveals more and more ambiguity as it proceeds. Stewart’s character relaxes by dabbling in jazz piano, and Duke himself has a cameo leading a bar band in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan (of all places).

James Stewart and George C. Scott tangle in Anatomy of a Murder
James Stewart (right) and George C. Scott (seated) tangle in ANATOMY OF A MURDER

DVD/Stream of the Week: IDA – something to compare with this year’s best

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Ida

The big Prestige Movies are arriving in theaters and Oscar campaigns are being launched, so this week I’m giving you a movie that you can compare to 2017’s Oscar Bait – the recent Polish drama Ida.

The title character is a novice nun who has been raised in a convent orphanage. Just before she is to take her vows in the early 1960s, she is told for the first time that she has an aunt. She meets the aunt, and Ida learns that she is the survivor of a Jewish family killed in the Holocaust. The aunt takes the novice on an odd couple road trip to trace the fate of their family.

The chain-smoking aunt (Agata Kulesza) is a judge who consumes vast quantities of vodka to self-medicate her own searing memories. But the most profound difference isn’t that the aunt is a hard ass and that the nun is prim and devout. The most important contrast is between their comparative worldliness – the aunt has been around the block and the novice is utterly naive and inexperienced (both literally and figuratively virginal). The young woman must make the choice between a future that follows her upbringing or one which her biological heritage opens to her. As Ida unfolds, her family legacy makes her choice an informed one.

The novice Ida, played by newcomer Agata Trzebuchowska, is very quiet – but hardly fragile. Saying little, she takes in the world with a penetrating gaze and a just-under-the-surface magnetic strength.

Superbly photographed in black and white, each shot is exquisitely composed. Watching shot after shot in Ida is like walking through a museum gazing at masterpiece paintings one after the other. Ida was directed and co-written by Pawel Pawlikowski, who also recently directed the British coming of age story My Summer of Love (with Emily Blunt) and the French thriller The Woman in the Fifth (with Kristin Scott Thomas and Ethan Hawke). He is an effective and economic story-teller, packing textured characters and a compelling story into an 80 minute film.

Ida is also successful in avoiding grimness. Pawlikowski has crafted a story which addresses the pain of the characters without being painful to watch. There’s some pretty fun music from a touring pop/jazz combo and plenty of wicked sarcasm from the aunt.

Ida won 2015 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Picture and the International Critics’ Award at the Toronto International Film Festival. Ida was my pick as the best film at Cinequest, where it won the Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature.

Ida is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant, YouTube, Google Play and Xbox Video.

Movies to See Right Now

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Humphrey Bogart and Martha Vickers in THE BIG SLEEP

I haven’t yet seen The Florida Project, and other than that, your best bets are on video this week. I really can’t recommend Mark Felt – The Man Who Brought Down the White House.

If you’re following special prosecutor Robert Mueller’s probe of the Russian election hack and collusion by the Trump campaign, you’ll be interested in Get Me Roger Stone, which can be streamed on Netflix Instant. The recently indicted Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort is a character in this documentary.

My Halloween Stream of the Week is the indie ghost story The House on Pine Street. I saw The House on Pine Street at Cinequest, and now it can be streamed from Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

I also wrote about the documentary 78/52: Hitchcock’s Shower Scene, the podcast Inside Psycho and the classic Psycho itself.

On November 4, Turner Classic Movies presents Humphrey Bogart as Raymond Chandler’s hard-boiled LA detective Philip Marlowe in The Big Sleep. Bogart’s performance is iconic, and The Big Sleep is famous for its impenetrably tangled plot. It’s also one of the most overtly sexual noirs, and Lauren Bacall at her sultriest is only the beginning. The achingly beautiful Martha Vickers plays a druggie who throws herself at anything in pants. And Dorothy Malone invites Bogie to share a back-of-the-bookstore quickie.

Dorothy Malone and Humphrey Bogart in THE BIG SLEEP
Dorothy Malone and Humphrey Bogart in THE BIG SLEEP

Stream of the Week: THE HOUSE ON PINE STREET – does she really see a ghost?

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Emily Goss in THE HOUSE ON PINE STREET
Emily Goss in THE HOUSE ON PINE STREET

So here’s the thing with every movie ghost story – either the ghost is real, or the protagonist is crazy enough to hallucinate one. The beauty of The House on Pine Street is that the story is right down the middle – ya just don’t know until the end when the story takes us definitively in one direction – and then suddenly lurches right back to the other extreme.

Jennifer (Emily Goss) is a very pregnant urbanist, who reluctantly moves from her dream life in Chicago back to her whitebread hometown in suburban Kansas. Unlike Jennifer, her husband hadn’t been thriving in Chicago, and Jennifer’s intrusive and judgmental mother (Cathy Barnett – perfect in the role) has set up an opportunity for him in the hometown. They move to a house that is not her dream home AT ALL, “but it’s a really good deal”. Jennifer overreacts to some crumbling plaster.

Jennifer is pretty disgruntled, and, generally for good reason – her mom’s every sentence is loaded with disapproval. Her mom’s housewarming party would be a social nightmare for anyone – but it’s too literally nightmarish for her. One of the guests, an amateur psychic (an excellent Jim Korinke), observes, “the house has interesting energy”.

Then some weird shit starts happening: knocks from unoccupied rooms, a crockpot lid that keeps going ajar. And we ask, is the house haunted, or is she hallucinating? Her sane and sensible and skeptical BFF visits from Chicago as a sounding board, and things do not go well.

Co-writers and co-directors Aaron and Austin Keeling keep us on the edges of our seats. Their excellent sound design borrows from The Conversation and The Shining – and that’s a good thing.

The Keelings also benefit from a fine lead – Emily Goss’ eyes are VERY alive. She carries the movie as we watch her shifting between resentfulness, terror and determination.

The total package is very successful. I saw The House on Pine Street at Cinequest, and now it can be streamed from Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

Movies to See Right Now

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Janet Leigh in PSYCHO and 78/52: HITCHCOCK’S SHOWER SCENE

Slim pickings in theaters this week.  I’ll be writing about Mark Felt – The Man Who Brought Down the White House, which I really can’t recommend.  I haven’t yet seen The Florida Project.

I have written this week about the documentary 78/52: Hitchcock’s Shower Scene, the podcast Inside Psycho and the classic Psycho itself.

My pre-Halloween DVD/Stream of the Week is Unfriended. It’s on both my lists of I Hadn’t Seen This Before and Low Budget, High Quality Horror of 2015.  Unfriended is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and Flixster.

October 30 on Turner Classic Movies, we meet Robert Young as one of cinema’s least sympathetic protagonists in They Won’t Believe Me (1947). A decade before Father Knows Best and two decades before Marcus Welby, M.D., Young plays a weak-willed and impulsive gold-digging womanizer. He’s married for money, but he also wants his girlfriend (the rapturous Jane Greer) AND his second girlfriend (a gloriously slutty Susan Hayward) AND his wife’s money. He’s making every conceivable bad choice until, WHAM BANG, circumstance creates a situation where he can get everything he wants …until it all falls apart. They Won’t Believe Me has one of the most ironic endings in the movies.

Robert Young and Susan Hayward in THEY WON’T BELIEVE ME

DVD/Stream of the Week: UNFRIENDED – run from your webcams!!!

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UNFRIENDED
UNFRIENDED

In the very satisfying horror film Unfriended, it’s the one-year anniversary of a teenage girl’s suicide, and her bullying peers convene via webcams on social media. But their computers are hijacked by an Unknown Force who starts wreaking revenge. The kids become annoyed, then worried and, finally, panicked for their lives.

Here’s something I’ve never seen before: the entire movie is compiled of the characters’ screenshots. The critic Christy Lemire says that “Unfriended is a gimmick with a ridiculous premise, but damned if it doesn’t work”, and she’s right. Writer Nelson Greaves and Director Levan Gabriadze came up with this device, and their originality pays off with a fun and effective movie.

It’s on both my lists of I Hadn’t Seen This Before and Low Budget, High Quality Horror of 2015. Unfriended is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and Flixster.

Movies to See Right Now

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Harry Dean Stanton in LUCKY. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures

This weekend, I’m going to try to catch The Florida Project and Mark Felt – The Man Who Brought Down the White House. Of the movies that I HAVE seen, I like the often funny and stealthily profound Lucky, starring the late Harry Dean Stanton.

My DVD/Stream choices of the week are Woody Harrelson’s overlooked gems. The best, Rampart, is available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Netflix Instant, Amazon, YouTube and Google Play. But check out The Messenger, Zombieland and True Detective, Season 1, too.

As they say, life begins with fifty Gs.  On October 22, Turner Classic Movies presents Raw Deal (1948), with some of the best dialogue in all of film noir, a love triangle and the superb cinematography of John Alton.

Claire Trevor in RAW DEAL
Claire Trevor in RAW DEAL

DVD/Stream: Woody Harrelson’s overlooked gems

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Woody Harrelson in RAMPART

Woody Harrelson has come a long way from his cheerfully amiable dunderhead bartender in Cheers.  As an actor, Woody swings for the fences and is attracted to larger than life roles.  He’s also famous/notorious as an off-screen provocateur.

And Woody works a lot.  This year, he’s featured in War for the Planet of the Apes,  Wilson, The Glass Castle and LBJ.

Here are some of Woody’s overlooked gems:

  • Rampart: In a sizzling performance, Woody plays a corrupt and brutal LA cop trying to stay alive and out of jail. If you’re looking for Woody Harrelson’s best performance, you should try this movie.  Available on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Netflix Instant, Amazon, YouTube and Google Play.
  • The Messenger: Woody plays a veteran soldier helping a younger one (Ben Foster) through his new assignment: visiting military next of kin to inform them face-to-face of their loved one’s death in combat; Despite the challenging material, most people will appreciate Woody’s brilliant performance.  Available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon, iTunes, YouTube and Google Play.
  • Zombieland: Woody plays a master zombie killer is this riotously funny satire of zombie movies. Zombieland also features performances by Emma Stone, Jesse Eisenberg, Amber Heard and Abigail Breslin very early in their careers, and a priceless cameo from Bill Murray).  Available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.
  • True Detective, Season 1: It’s a dark tale of two mismatched detectives – each tormented by his own demons – obsessed by a whodunit in contemporary back bayou Louisiana.  Woody is very good – but Matthew McConaughey’s performance may have been the best on TV that year. Available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from HBO GO, Amazon, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.