In the light but smart comedy Goodbye to All That, a guy (Paul Schneider) is slobberknocked when his wife demands a divorce. Trying to right himself, he takes on post-divorce co-parenting and modern-age dating. Amusing episodes ensue.
Our hero encounters a slew of well-acted female characters who provide him with a menu of challenges; the cast includes Amy Sedaris, Melanie Lynskey, Heather Graham and Ashley Hinshaw. There’s a particularly hilarious scene with his wife’s steadfastly partisan therapist (Celia Weston).
But the funniest role is played by Anna Camp (Pitch Perfect, Caitlin D’arcy in The Good Wife and Gwen in The Mindy Project) – a bipolar nymphomaniac evangelical Christian. I still chuckle when I think of “I’m Debbie Spangler!”
This is the directorial debut of Angus McLachlan, the writer of the delicious Junebug. It’s not as good as Junebug, but it has the same sharp observation of human foibles. Goodbye to All That is available streaming on Amazon Instant, iTunes, YouTube, Google Play and Xbox Video.
The superbly written drama Calvary opens with a startling line, which kicks off the unsettling premise. Brendan Gleeson (In Bruges, The Guard, The Grand Seduction) plays a very good man who is an Irish priest, Father James. In the confessional, a man tells him that – in one week – he will kill Father James. Having been molested by a priest (now dead), the man will make his statement against the Church: “There’s no point in killing a bad priest. I’m going to kill you because you’re innocent.”
Who is the man? (Father James figures it out before the audience does.) Will the execution really happen? Will Father James take steps to protect himself? Tension builds as the days count down.
The character of Father James is wonderfully crafted. Having come to the priesthood in midlife, after being married and having a secular career, he is seasoned and unburdened by high expectations of human nature – and has a wicked sense of humor. Yet he is moral in the best sense and profoundly compassionate. And Gleeson – always excellent – nails the role. It’s one of the finest leading performances of the year.
We know that the killer comes from a very limited pool of villagers and would-be parishioners, played by Chris O’Dowd, Dylan Moran, Aidan Gillen, M. Emmet Walsh, Isaach de Bankole and Orla O’Rourke. Their feelings for Father James range from fondness to indifference. Their attitudes toward the Church, on the other hand, range from indifference to hostility. (Moran is the best – playing a man grappling with his unhappiness, despite enjoying a fortune built by exploiting others. )
None of these characters is a stereotype. It’s a quirky bunch – but not CUTE quirky. There’s a lot of buried rage in this village – and dry humor, too. Referring to his wife, one casually says, “I think she’s bipolar, or lactose intolerant, one of the two”.
But it’s not the villagers that Father James must deal with. He gets a visit from his occasionally suicidal adult daughter (Kelly Reilly, who is ALWAYS good); he loves and welcomes her, but she often contributes more stress. He doesn’t love his roommate, an idiotically shallow priest David Wilmot (the thug in The Guard who hilariously couldn’t figure out if he was a psychopath or a sociopath). Then there’s a seriously twisted imprisoned killer (the star’s son Domnhall Gleeson), a foreign tourist numbed by a sudden tragedy (Marie-Josee Croze) and a scheming bishop (David McSavage).
Writer-director John Michael McDonagh (The Guard) gets the credit for populating his screenplay with enough unique and original characters for an entire film festival, let alone one movie. After The Guard and Calvary, I can’t wait to see his next movie.
As one should ascertain from its title, Calvary ain’t a feel-good movie. It plumbs some pretty dark territory. But as we follow Brendan Gleeson’s extraordinary performance as a good man navigating a grimly urgent situation, it is mesmerizing. Calvary is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant, iTunes, YouTube, Google Play and Xbox Video.
Elisabeth Moss and Jason Schwartzman in LISTEN UP PHILIP
The dark indie comedy Listen Up Philip features perhaps the most self-involved character in cinema (and that’s really saying something). The young novelist Philip Lewis Friedman (Jason Schwartzman) believes that his writing talent entitles him to simmer in permanent rage and to crap on every one in his path. To the credit of writer-director Alex Ross Perry, this supremely unsympathetic character is very fun to watch. (And, unlike in most mumblecore movies, Philips’s self-absorption is not accepted as an aspect of normal life, but treated as appallingly aberrant and cruel.)
Philip is living with his photographer girlfriend (Elisabeth Moss), whose career is beginning to eclipse his. It’s pretty clear that their home will soon be tossed on Philip’s trail of relationship carnage.
Just when Philip might have to face the natural consequences of his behavior, he meets the WORST POSSIBLE mentor – an older famous novelist (Jonathan Pryce). The older guy, who has his own collection of relationship wreckage, is ready to enable, nurture and magnify all of Philip’s worst tendencies.
Perry cleverly moves the story’s focus from one character to another and adds a hilarious voiceover narration that parodies the tone of many modern American novels. Be sure to watch for the faux book covers during the final credits.
Listen Up Philip is smart and funny, but plenty dark. It’s available streaming on Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.
The Imitation Game – the riveting true story about the guy who invented the computer and defeated the Nazis and was then hounded for his homosexuality.
Set in the macho world of Olympic wrestling, Foxcatcher is really a relationship movie with a stunning dramatic performance by Steve Carell.
J.K. Simmons is brilliant in the intense indie drama Whiplash, a study of motivation and abuse, ambition and obsession.
My DVD/Stream of the week is the smart and hilarious The Trip to Italy, which showcases the improvisational wit of Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, along with some serious tourism/foodie porn. The Trip to Italy is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from iTunes, YouTube, Google Play and Xbox Video.
On January 6, Turner Classic Movies brings us War Hunt, a 1962 film about Robert Redford joining a Korean War unit as a new replacement, with John Saxon as the platoon’s psycho killer. Along with Redford, Sidney Pollack and Francis Ford Coppola are in the cast, making War Hunt the only film with three Oscar-winning directors as actors. Don’t blink, or you’ll miss for Coppola as an uncredited convoy truck driver.
Tomorrow night, TCM is airingRequiem for a Heavyweight(1962). Anthony Quinn is Mountain Rivera, a fighter whose career is ended by a ring injury by Cassius Clay (played by the real Muhammed Ali). His manager, Jackie Gleason, continues to exploit him in this heartbreaking drama. There’s no boxing in this clip, but it illustrates the quality of the writing and the acting.
Mr. Turner, Mike Leigh’s biopic of the 19th Century British landscape painter J.M.W. Turner, is visually gorgeous, is centered on a career-topping performance by Timothy Spall as the title character, and is just too damn long.
It kills me to say that, because I’m a huge admirer of Leigh’s films, especially Secrets & Lies and Another Year;. But it’s 150 minutes long, and there’s only 120 minutes of compelling story in there. I took a party of several seasoned art house film goers to a screening at the Mill Valley Film Festival, and EVERYONE agreed that Mr. Turner dragged.
That’s too bad, because it wastes a stunning performance by Leigh regular Timothy Spall. Turner was driven by his artistic passions, distracted by his carnal appetites and didn’t invest much energy in getting along with most people. Spall uses a palette of grunts, not as a gimmick, but as a means to reveal what this guy – otherwise trying to be so contained – was thinking or feeling. (So heartbreaking in Secrets & Lies, Spall is most recognizable as Peter Pettigrew/Wormtail in the Harry Potter movies.)
As in any Leigh film, all the acting is excellent, but Dorothy Atkinson turns in an especially noteworthy and vanity-free performance as Turner’s long suffering maid.
The real Turner was a groundbreaking genius in his use of light. Leigh’s greatest achievement in Mr. Turner is visual – evey exterior shot looks like it could have been painted by Turner. It’s a remarkable visual achievement.
Alas, the stunning photography and two great performances weren’t enough to keep my mind from wandering.
Actor James Shigeta, who along with writer-director Sam Fuller, broke ground in 1959’s The Crimson Kimono, died in July at age 85. Shigeta’s first movie role was in The Crimson Kimono, another sensationalistic and deliciously exploitative cop noir from the great Sam Fuller. Always looking to add some shock value, Fuller delivered a Japanese-American leading man (Shigeta), an inter-racial romance and a stripper victim. The groundbreaking aspect of The Crimson Kimono is that Fuller’s writing and Shigeta’s performance normalized the Japanese-American character. Shigeta’s Detective Joe Kojaku is a regular hardboiled, jaded and troubled film noir protagonist. Of course, Fuller certainly relished the fact that many 1959 Americans would have been unsettled by a Japanese-American man’s intimate encounter with a white woman – another groundbreaking moment in American cinema.
We’re going to miss some other cinematic masters. Some icons. And some that we were expecting to create yet more film treasure:
Gordon Willis: groundbreaking behind the lens as the Prince of Darkness.
Malik Bendjelloul: At 36, just after winning an Oscar for Searching for Sugar Man.
Harold Ramis: How many filmmakers have written two films as good as Animal House and Groundhog Day?
And Philip Seymour Hoffman: His heartbreaking death was a punch to the gut on Super Bowl Sunday. That’s the thing about addiction – not everybody makes it.
Myrna Loy in THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES – the second best wife ever
Happy Anniversary to The Wife, also known as Lisa The Love of My Life!
This year, I cherished sharing my VERY BEST movie experiences with her – my top two movies Boyhood and Ida, along with the very moving Alive Inside. (She loves to catch me weeping at a movie.)
She tolerated my spending huge chunks of time at Cinequest, the San Francisco International Film Festival, Noir City and French Cinema Now. She even accompanied me to four Cinequest screenings (The Grand Seduction- YAAY!) and sat through the looooong Mr. Turner at the Mill Valley Film Fest.
Without her pressing me, I wouldn’t have seen Gone Girl, and that would have been a big loss for me. It was even HER glorious idea to settle in for a Bogie double feature of The Maltese Falcon and The Big Sleep!
She’s the biggest fan and supporter of this blog, and I appreciate her and love her. Happy Anniversary, Honey!
Eller Coltrane, Ethan Hawke and Lorelei Linklater in BOYHOOD
Visit my Best Movies of 2014 for my list of the year’s best films, complete with images, trailers and my comments on each movies. My top nine for 2014 are:
Boyhood
Ida
Dear White People
Birdman
Gone Girl
Locke
Force Majeure
Calvary
Alive Inside
The other best films of the year are: True Detective (the HBO mini-series), A Coffee in Berlin, Borgman and The Grand Seduction.
I’m saving space for these promising films that I haven’t seen yet: A Most Violent Year, Inherent Vice, Selma, American Sniper, The Overnighters and Two Days, One Night.
The smart and hilarious The Trip to Italy showcases the improvisational wit of Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, along with some serious tourism/foodie porn. As in The Trip, the two British comics are sent off on a hedonistic road trip to review spectacular restaurants – this time in Italy’s most stunningly beautiful destinations. Along the way, they needle each other and virtually any occurrence can trigger a very funny riff. As in The Trip, they compete for the funniest Michael Caine impression; but this time, their funniest impression is of a harried Assistant Director trying to give notes to the mask-wearing Tom Hardy in The Dark Knight Rises.
And – if you enjoy travel and fine dining – the restaurant scenes are unsurpassed. The Trip to Italy is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Netflix, iTunes, YouTube, Google Play and Xbox Video.
Now here’s an amazing true story: those ubiquitous but creepy images of waifs with exaggerated eyes were created by painter Margaret Keane, but the credit for them – and income from them – were taken by her con man husband Walter Keane. In the entertaining Big Eyes, the couple is played by Amy Adams and Christoph Waltz.
Adams’ performance is perfectly tuned, so we can understand how Margaret could be charmed and bullied into such a disadvantageous situation. Waltz does a good job in the first two-thirds of the movie, when he depicts Walter’s charm and chutzpah; but his performance in the final third of the movie seems very broad. Big Eyes also features especially fun supporting turns by Danny Huston and Terence Stamp.
Big Eyes does a good job of illustrating the overt sexism of the pre-Women’s Lib 1950s. And the serious issue of domination and control in a relationship lurks in the background. But Big Eyes has been distilled down to a simplistic Good Gal/Bad Guy story.
Denizens of the San Francisco Bay Area will enjoy the familiar Bay Area locations, especially the recreation of North Beach in the Beat Era and Woodside in the Sunset Magazine 1960s.
Bottom line: Big Eyes is a satisfying audience-pleaser, but not a movie I’ll be thinking about tomorrow.
