Weekly Movie Recommendations – Page 74

Stream of the Week: GEMMA BOVERY

March 8, 2016 by movie gourmet

Fabrice Luchini and Gemma Arterton in GEMMA BOVERY

In honor of Cinequest, here’s a highlight from last year’s fest. In the delightful dark comedy Gemma Bovery, Fabrice Luchini plays a guy who has left his Type A job in Paris to take over his father’s bakery in a sleepy village in Normandy. He gets new neighbors when a young British couple named Bovery moves in. The young British woman (played by the delectable Gemma Arterton) is named Gemma Bovery, and only the baker notices the similarity to Emma Bovary. But, like the protagonist of Madame Bovary, the young British woman is also married to a Charles, becomes bored and restless and develops a wandering eye. The baker rapidly becomes obsessed with the Flaubert novel being re-enacted before his eyes and soon jumps into the plot himself. Gemma Bovery, which I saw at Cinequest 2015, is a French movie that is mostly in English.

Fabrice Luchini is a treasure of world cinema. No screen actor can deliver a funnier reaction than Luchini, and he’s the master of squeezing laughs out of an awkward moment. For me, his signature role is in the 2004 French Intimate Strangers, in which he plays a tax lawyer with a practice in a Parisian professional office building. A beautiful woman (Sandrine Bonnaire), mistakes Luchini’s office for that of her new shrink, plops herself down and, before he can interrupt, starts unloading her sexual issues. It quickly becomes awkward for him to tell her of the error, and he’s completely entranced with her revelations, so he keeps impersonating her shrink. As they move from appointment to appointment, their relationship takes some unusual twists. It’s a very funny movie, and a great performance.

Gemma Bovery is directed and co-written by Anne Fontaine (The Girl from Monaco, Coco Before Chanel). Fontaine has a taste for offbeat takes on female sexuality, which she aired in the very trashy Adore (Naomi Watts and Robin Wright as Australian cougars who take on each other’s sons as lovers) and the much better Nathalie (wife pays prostitute to seduce her cheating hubby and report back on the details).

Gemma Bovery isn’t as Out There as Nathalie, but it’s just as good. The absurdity of the coincidences in Gemma Bovery makes for a funny situation, which Luchini elevates into a very funny movie. Gemma Bovery is available to stream from Amazon Video (free with Amazon Prime), iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

Movies to See Right Now

March 4, 2016 by movie gourmet

Cinequest hosts the world premiere of LOST SOLACE

I am completely absorbed with Silicon Valley’s own film festival, Cinequest. Check out my up-to-the-moment coverage both on my Cinequest page and follow me on Twitter for the latest. I especially recommend tonight’s world premieres of Heaven’s Floor and Lost Solace. Both films will screen again Sunday night. You’ll also have a final chance to Lost Solace on Thursday and Heaven’s Floor on next Friday.

In theaters:

The Oscar-winning Best Picture Spotlight – a riveting, edge-of-your-seat drama with some especially compelling performances.
The movie that should have won Best Picture, The Revenant, an awesome and authentic survival tale that must be seen on the BIG SCREEN. I predict that The Revenant will be the biggest winner at the Oscars.
The movie that I admired more than either of those, the Irish romantic drama Brooklyn, an audience-pleaser with a superb performance by Saoirse Ronan.
The deserved Oscar winner for Screenplay, The Big Short – a supremely entertaining thriller – both funny and anger-provoking.

The Coen Brothers’ disappointingly empty comedy Hail, Caesar contains some cool Hollywood parodies.

In honor of the opening of this year’s Cinequest, this week’s DVD/Stream of the Week is the Danish drama The Hunt from the 2013 Cinequest. The Hunt is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and to stream from Netflix Instant, Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and PlayStation Video.

Here are two very contrasting recommendations for movies playing on Turner Classic Movies this week. First, 0n March 8, we have a time capsule comedy from the master of movie silliness Richard Lester (Help, The Three Musketeers). The Ritz is a farce set in a gay bathhouse – in 1976, when this was a remarkably novel setting. Look for the not-yet-famous F. Murray Abraham, Treat Williams and John Ratzenberger. Then on March 10, TCM screens M (scroll down for comments), a proto-noir and a most darkly compelling serial killer movie from 1931.

Cinequest 2016 Festival Preview

March 2, 2016March 1, 2016 by movie gourmet

I’ve already seen over twenty offerings from Cinequest 2016, and here are my initial recommendations.

MUST SEE

The Memory of Water: This Chilean drama explores grief, its process and its impact and might just be most masterful filmmaking achievement at Cinequest 2016. Exquisite. March 2, 10, 11.

WORLD PREMIERES

Lost Solace: Highly original psychological thriller and a brilliant directorial debut. World Premiere March 4, 6, 10.
Heaven’s Floor: Absorbing and character-driven autobiographical drama about a most complicated woman and the choices that indelibly affect several lives. World Premiere March 4, 6, 11.

DRAMA

Demimonde: Sex, intrigue and murder in this operatic Hungarian period drama. U.S. Premiere March 2, 3, 9, 10.
The Daughter: Based on an Ibsen play, this Australian drama is Cinequest’s Closing Night film and packs a powerfully emotional punch. March 13.

ROMANCE

Fever at Dawn: Urgent period romance between Holocaust survivors, with an unexpected nugget at the end.

DOCUMENTARIES

Chuck Norris vs. Communism: The subversive impact of movies (ANY movies) on a culture-starved society. March 4, 6 and 12
Dan and Margot: A very personal look at schizophrenia from the schizophrenic’s point of view. U.S. Premiere March 6, 7, 8.
The Promised Band: A group of Israeli and Palestinian women seek to fight through the cultural, legal, political, military and security barriers between them by forming a girl band. World Premiere March 4, 6, 10.
The Brainwashing of My Dad: Personalizes the effects of right-wing media on mood and personality as well as on the political culture. US Premiere March 5, 6, 9.
Gordon Getty: There Will Be Music: Insights into the quiet passion and creative process of a most unusual classical composer. March 6, 11, 12.

SOMETHING YOU HAVEN’T SEEN BEFORE

Parabellum: This absurdist and trippy Argentine drama is set in a pre-apocalyptic near future; clearly everyone should be panicking, but no one is. March 2. 10, 12.

COMEDY

A Beginner’s Guide to Snuff: Broad, dark and shamelessly low brow comedy with a sparkling performance by an actress as an actress. World Premiere March 4, 6, 11.

WOMEN FILMMAKERS

This year, Cinequest presents the world or US premieres of sixty features and sixty-nine shorts. And of these 129 debut films, 64 were directed by women! These include Heaven’s Floor, The Brainwashing of My Dad, Dan and Margot and The Promised Band.

PREVIEWS

Several Cinequest films already have U.S. distributors and are planned for theatrical release later this year. I haven’t seen them yet, but you can see them first at Cinequest:

The Helen Mirren thriller Eye in the Sky on Opening Night, March 1;
The Wave (Borgen) March 2;
Ma Ma (Penelope Cruz) March 6;
Colonia (Emma Watson) March 10;
February (Shipka Kiernan from Mad Men, Emma Roberts) March 12; and
The Adderall Diaries (James Franco, who will be making a personal appearance) March 12;
The Little Prince (already spoken of as a contender for the 2017 Animated Feature Oscar) March 13.

Take a look at the entire program, the schedule and the passes and tickets. (If you want to support Silicon Valley’s most important cinema event while skipping the lines, the tax-deductible $100 donation for Express Line Access is an awesome deal.)

As usual, I’ll be covering Cinequest rigorously with features and movie recommendations. I usually screen (and write about) over thirty films from around the world. Bookmark my Cinequest 2016 page, with links to all my coverage. Follow me on Twitter for the latest.

Tomorrow: Cinequest insiders look at the 2016 festival

DVD/Stream of the Week: THE HUNT

March 1, 2016 by movie gourmet

In honor of the opening of this year’s Cinequest, this week’s pick is the Danish drama The Hunt from the 2013 Cinequest. Mads Mikkelsen plays a man whose life is ruined by a false claim of child sexual abuse. You’ll recognize Mikkelsen, a big star in Europe, from After the Wedding and the 2006 Casino Royale (he was the villain with the bleeding eye). He won the 2012 Cannes Best Actor award for this performance.

The story is terrifyingly plausible. The protagonist, Lucas, is getting his bearings after a job change and a divorce. He lives in a small Danish town where everyone knows everyone else, next door to his best friend. The best friend drinks too much and his wife is a little high-strung, but Lucas embraces them for who they are. He’s a regular guy who hunts and drinks with his buddies and is adored by the kids at the kindergarten where he works. He’s not a saint – his ex-wife can get him to fly off the handle with little effort.

A little girl hears a sexual reference at home that she does not understand (and no one in the story could ever find out how she heard it). When she innocently repeats it at school, the staff is alarmed and starts to investigate. Except for one mistake by the school principal, everyone in the story acts reasonably. One step in the process builds upon another until the town’s parents become so understandably upset that a public hysteria ensues.

Director Thomas Vinterburg had previously created the underappreciated Celebration (Festen). The Hunt is gripping – we’re on the edges of our seats as the investigation snowballs and Lucas is put at risk of losing everything – his reputation, his job, his child, his friends, his liberty and even his life. Can Lucas be cleared, and, if he is, how scarred will he be? The Hunt is a superbly crafted film with a magnificent performance by Mikkelsen.

The Hunt is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and to stream from Netflix Instant, Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and PlayStation Video.

Movies to See Right Now

February 26, 2016 by movie gourmet

Saoirse Ronan in BROOKLYN – it ain’t going to win an Oscar, but you should see it while it’s on the big screen

Here’s your last chance to watch the Oscar nominees before the awards broadcast:

45 Years with Charlotte Rampling’s enthralling Oscar-nominated performance.
The Revenant, an awesome and authentic survival tale that must be seen on the BIG SCREEN. I predict that The Revenant will be the biggest winner at the Oscars.
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 Big Short – a supremely entertaining thriller – both funny and anger-provoking.

The Coen Brothers’ disappointingly empty comedy Hail, Caesar contains some cool Hollywood parodies.

Silicon Valley’s own film festival Cinequest is around the corner – make plans now to attend between March 1 and March 13.

My Stream/VOD of the Week is DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD: The Story of the National Lampoon, which takes us through an engaging and comprehensive history of the groundbreaking and seminal satirical magazine. You can stream it from iTunes or the Showtime VOD service (and you can catch it on the Showtime channel).

The Movie Gourmet features Overlooked Noir, but Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity is anything but overlooked – it’s justifiably recognized as one of the two or three most iconic film noir. I’ve included it as the prototypical noir in my A Classic American Movie Primer. It’s about a guy who is just selling insurance until he meets a woman he can’t resist…Double Indemnity plays on Turner Classic Movies on February 28.

Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck in DOUBLE INDEMNITY. Check out her ankle bracelet.

Stream/VOD of the Week: DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD: THE STORY OF THE NATIONAL LAMPOON

February 23, 2016 by movie gourmet

DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD: The Story of the National Lampoon takes us through an engaging and comprehensive history of the groundbreaking and seminal satirical magazine. For those of you who weren’t there, the National Lampoon – ever irreverent, raunchy and tasteless – was at the vanguard of the counter-culture in the early 1970s. Once reaching the rank of #2 news stand seller among all US magazines, it may be the most popularly accepted subversive art ever in the US (along with the wry Mad magazine during the Cold War).

In a few short years, the Lampoon rose from nowhere (well, actually from the Harvard Lampoon) to a humor empire with the magazine, records, a radio show and a traveling revue. And, yes, the title DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD does encapsulate the arc of the Lampoon’s story.

Documentarian Douglas Tirola tells the story so successfully because he persuaded almost all the surviving key participants to talk. We meet co-founder Henry Beard, publisher Matty Simmons, Art Director Michael Gross and other Lampoon staff including P.J. O’Rourke and Christopher Buckley. You’ll recognize the first editor, Tony Hendra, from his performance as the harried band manager in This Is Spinal Tap. We see clips of two Lampoon originals who haven’t survived, co-founder Doug Kenney and resident iconoclast Michael O’Donoghue.

The National Lampoon’s live performance revue featured John Belushi, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Brian Doyle Murray, Gilda Radner and Harold Ramis. When Lorne Michaels hired the whole crew for Saturday Night Live, the hit television show instantly surpassed the magazine in cultural penetration. “The Lampoon lost its exceptionalism”, says one observer.

But the Lampoon made its mark on the movies by launching the entire genre of raunchy comedies with Animal House and spawning the careers of filmmakers John Landis and Harold Ramis, as well as the SNL performers. We also see a clip of Christopher Guest in an early Lampoon performance. On the other hand, I hadn’t remembered a less successful Lampoon project from its later era, Disco Beaver from Outer Space.

This is all, of course, major nostalgia for Baby Boomers. Before seeing DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD, I thought, yeah, I’ll enjoy the Blast From The Past, but will younger audience viewers dismiss this humor as quaint? After all, the Lampoon’s success came from puncturing the boundaries of taste, and it’s hard to imagine anything today that would be shockingly raunchy. But, after watching DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD, I have to say that the humor stands up today as very sharp-edged. After all, an image of a baby in a blender with Satan’s finger poised to press the “puree” button is pretty transgressive no matter when it’s published. The sole exception is the Lampoon’s over-fixation on women’s breasts, which comes off today as pathetically sophomoric – or even adolescent.

DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD: The Story of the National Lampoon has also vaulted on to my list of Longest Movie Titles.

I saw DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD at the San Francisco International Film Festival. This is an important cultural story, well-told and it deserves a wide audience. You can stream it from iTunes or the Showtime VOD service (and you can catch it on the Showtime channel).

Movies to See Right Now

February 19, 2016 by movie gourmet

Get ready for the Oscars by seeing these nominated films and performances, all on my Best Movies of 2015, all with some Oscar nominations:

45 Years with Charlotte Rampling’s enthralling Oscar-nominated performance.
The Revenant, an awesome and authentic survival tale that must be seen on the BIG SCREEN. I predict that The Revenant will be the biggest winner at the Oscars.
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 Big Short – a supremely entertaining thriller – both funny and anger-provoking.

The Coen Brothers’ disappointingly empty comedy Hail, Caesar contains some cool Hollywood parodies.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is the brilliant psychological drama 99 Homes, which illustrates the life-and-death stakes of our nation’s foreclosure crisis. It’s a topical film, but 99 Homes is emotionally raw and as intense as any thriller. The DVD is available to rent from Netflix and Redbox, and 99 Homes can be streamed from Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play, and Playstation Video.

For just a fun time at the movies, try Richard Lester’s 1974 The Four Musketeers, coming up February 21 on Turner Classic Movies. Watch Oliver Reed, Richard Chamberlain, Michael York and Frank Finlay swashbuckle away against Bad Guys Christopher Lee, Faye Dunaway and Charlton Heston. Geraldine Chaplin and Raquel Welch adorn the action.

Christopher Lee and Faye Dunaway in THE FOUR MUSKETEERS

DVD/Stream of the Week: 99 HOMES – desperation leads to indecency, then redemption

February 23, 2016February 16, 2016 by movie gourmet

Andrew Garfield and Michael Shannon in 99 HOMES

The opening scene of the brilliant psychological drama 99 Homes illustrates the life-and-death stakes of our nation’s foreclosure crisis. It’s a topical film, but 99 Homes is emotionally raw and as intense as any thriller. Dennis Nash (Andrew Garfield) is a working class single dad, down on his luck. He loses his home to foreclosure and then must make a Faustian choice about supporting his family. Can he live with his choice, and what are the consequences?

With capitalism, where there are losers, there are also winners who have bet against the losers. Rick Carver (Michael Shannon) has built a prosperous real estate business on legitimate evictions and flips, supplemented with schemes to defraud federal home loan agencies, housing syndicates and individual homeowners. His world view is defined in a monologue about this nation bailing out the winners, not the losers – a cynical, but perceptive, observation.

Director Ramin Bahrani is a great American indie director, with a knack for drilling into the psyches of overlooked subsets of our society – immigrants (Chop Shop, Man Push Cart, Goodbye Solo), industrial farmers (At Any Price) and now the victims and profiteers of the Mortgage Bubble.

As foreclosure inexorably approaches, Garfield’s Nash is absorbed by dread, then desperation and, finally, to panic. His mom (Laura Dern) takes a different tack, settling firmly into denial and then erupting in hysteria. That denial recurs again and again in 99 Homes among those about to be evicted. These are people who have bought homes and can’t believe/grok/internalize that one day they will actually be forced out of them. One of the strongest aspects of 99 Homes is the use of non-actors who have lived through the nightmare. Some of the individual stories, especially one with a confused old man, are so wrenching as to be hard to watch.

This may be Andrew Garfield’ strongest cinema performance. Dennis Nash is a decent man incentivized to do the indecent. Garfield takes this good man through an amazing internal journey. Nash is forced to accept the failure resulting from his attempts to do what is right, juxtaposed with the success from conduct that he finds repulsive. Bahrani’s arty shot of the reflection of a swimming pool shimmering in a sliding glass door makes it look like Garfield is under water – which he metaphorically is at this point in the film.

Michael Shannon, one of my very favorite actors, is superb as a guy completely committed to pursuing his own survival/prosperity strategy – no matter that it is based on ruining the lives of other humans. Unlike Nash, Shannon’s Carver has accepted the incentives to act badly and has overcome any qualms about either moral ambiguity or even stark amorality.

Veteran television actor Tim Guinee is remarkable as homeowner Frank Green. Laura Dern is excellent in a pivotal role. The character actor Clancy Brown proves once again that he can grab the screen, even when he’s only visible for a minute or two.

With its searing performances by Garfield and Shannon, 99 Homes is unsparingly dark and intense until a final moment of redemption. The DVD is available to rent from Netflix and Redbox, and 99 Homes can be streamed from Amazon Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play, and Playstation Video.

Movies to See Right Now

February 12, 2016 by movie gourmet

Still in theaters, here are five choices from my Best Movies of 2015, all with some Oscar nominations:

45 Years with Charlotte Rampling’s enthralling Oscar-nominated performance.
The Revenant, an awesome and authentic survival tale that must be seen on the BIG SCREEN. I predict that The Revenant will be the biggest winner at the Oscars.
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 Big Short – a supremely entertaining thriller – both funny and anger-provoking.

The Coen Brothers’ disappointingly empty comedy Hail, Caesar contains some cool Hollywood parodies.

My DVD/Stream of the Week is the entirely novel low budget, high quality horror film 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.

On February 15, Turner Classic Movies will broadcast the John Huston masterpiece The Treasure of the Sierra Madre with its superb performances by Walter Huston and Humphrey Bogart. And we don’t need no stinkin’ badges.

Walter Huston, Tim Holt and Humphrey Bogart in THE TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE

Alfonso Bedoya in THE TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE: Badges? We ain't got no badges. We don't need no badges. I don't have to show you any stinking badges. — Alfonso Bedoya in THE TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE: Badges? We ain’t got no badges. We don’t need no badges. I don’t have to show you any stinking badges.

Movies to See Right Now

February 5, 2016 by movie gourmet

Let’s begin with six choices from my Best Movies of 2015:

45 Years with Charlotte Rampling’s enthralling Oscar-nominated performance.
The Revenant, an awesome and authentic survival tale that must be seen on the BIG SCREEN. I predict that The Revenant will be the biggest winner at the Oscars.
Creed, the newest and entirely fresh chapter in the Rocky franchise; it’s about the internal struggle of three people, not just The Big Fight.
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 Big Short – a supremely entertaining thriller – both funny and anger-provoking.

Plus two more good choices:

The Hateful Eight, a Quentin Tarantino showcase for Samuel L. Jackson, Walton Goggins and Jennifer Jason Leigh, but a movie that’s not for everyone.
Carol – a vividly told tale of forbidden love.

I’m not a fan of Joy or The Danish Girl.

My Stream of the Week is the French drama In the Name of My Daughter, which uses three characters to probe the themes of obsession and betrayal. In the Name of My Daughter is available to stream from iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

It’s a really solid week at Turner Classic Movies. February 7 brings us Days of Wine and Roses, a hard-hitting and authentic exploration of alcoholism with Lee Remick and Jack Lemmon. On February 8, we can watch the Bogie and Bacall noir Key Largo with a career highlight performance by the Queen of the Bs, Claire Trevor. And on February 11, TCM presents TWO versions of the melodrama The Letter, the more famous 1940 version with Bette Davis and the rarely seen 1929 version with Jeanne Eagels, the emotions-on-her-sleeve actress who died from a heroin overdose just after filming The Letter.