Many of the best moms in the movies tend to carry a tune (Mamma Mia!, The Sound of Music), pack a punch or a wallop (The Terminator, Aliens) or be played by Sally Field. Joining this hallowed pantheon is Fernanda Torres as Eunice Paiva, the matriarch who keeps a brave face despite her dissident husband’s forced disappearance during the military dictatorship regime of 1970 Brazil in the Walter Salles film I’m Still Here (Ainda Estou Aqui) (B+). The film does a masterful job setting up the idyllic seaside metropolitan life of its real-life family, with ominous foreshadowing of imminent dangers. Torres is towering as the woman who finds her agency and strength especially when the walls of her world come crashing. Her character’s dignity makes for one of the awards season’s best performances. Selton Mello deftly portrays the loving husband and father and former politician whose actions appear furtive to the ruling class. Salles mixes panoramic shots, home movie style camera storytelling and chilly claustrophobic interiors as the family gets systematically expelled from their Eden of Rio. Beyond the central couple, it’s a bit harder for viewers to get to know all of the family’s joyous offspring, played by multiple actors over the decades, but everyone is roundly committed to the narrative. The cautionary tale of censorship and watch lists and jailing one’s enemy and stoking the embers of resistance are all resonant in this gripping story. But it’s Torres as the mama chameleon commanding the screen who emerges as the film’s VIP.
Similar stylistically to the way the under-seen Saturday Night movie chronicled the manic real-time energy and high-stakes high jinks of the first SNL telecast circa 1975, Tim Fehlbaum’s authentic historical drama September 5 (B+) showcases pivotal broadcast news events with panache and expert detail; and in this case the stakes aren’t laughs but lives. This sturdy thriller transports viewers to the titular day in 1972 Munich, Germany, when an ABC Sports crew found itself the makeshift coverage team for a terrorism act in progress as Palestinian militant group Black September kidnaps and threatens the lives of Israeli athletes in Olympic Village. Peter Sarsgaard, equipped with the rapier wit and studied precision he leverages for many of his film characters, artfully plays the president of the TV network’s sports division; he’s at the center of the ensemble, but there are at least three others who make a big impact in their roles. John Magaro is a standout as the head of the control room. Leonie Benesch is authentic and dialed in as the intrepid translator for the crew who singularly understands both German and Hebrew. And Ben Chaplin as the wily head of ABC operations is such a cantankerous chameleon in his role he’s fairly unrecognizable from his bumper crop of ’90s performances. Every detail in the movie feels lived-in: the rows of rotary phones, the coveted “bird” for satellite feeds, the darkroom for printing photos, block letters applied by hand to identify talking heads on the newscasts and lots of black coffee and cigarettes. Real footage is wisely integrated when appropriate for the you-are-there vibe. The film’s topics deeply resonate today as many of the geopolitical conflicts presented certainly still loom large. It’s also an instructive showcase of news judgment; as each imperfect executive, segment producer, camera person or anchor makes tough calls in real time, viewers see the consequences play out before their eyes. The drawback to this format is that you’re not in the room where the real events are happening; but Fehlbaum makes a case for the thrill of the race to go live and to “follow the story where it goes” via the voyeurism of live cameras and a feed to the world. For a film largely set in rooms with men talking and outcomes many will know from real life, Spielberg’s 2005 Munich or the 1999 documentary One Day in September, it’s an engrossing crackerjack production.
Faithful to its source material about Beat Generation postmodern author William S. Burroughs’ self-imposed exile to Mexico, Luca Guadagnino’s Queer (B) casts Daniel Craig in the central role of the controversial author cruising for sex and coping with a lifelong heroin addiction as he nurtures twin obsessions with romance and magical drugs promising extrasensory perception. Guadagnino is undoubtedly the right match for the off-kilter material, with sumptuous historical period art direction and an uncanny knack for capturing mood. And Craig proves to be a bit of a revelation in a role cast against type from his James Bond image; as “Lee” (a stand-in autobiographical nickname of the author), his every turn of phrase feels like inventing a peculiar new language. The loose, limber and impressionistic narrative gets even more opaque as the film changes venue and the Naked Lunch type imagery gets increasingly surreal. Drew Starkey is solid as the object of the protagonist’s affection. Jason Schwartzman is also memorable as a schlubby fellow bar denizen. There are moments of incredible sensuality and sentiment and many others which may leave casual moviegoers scratching their heads. The film is a must for fans of the iconoclast writer and a sterling showcase for a daring lead actor.
In the spirit of CODA and Sing Sing, here’s a sleeper indie about how performing arts can rescue a life sliding out of control. Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson’s Ghostlight (B) focuses on a burly construction worker (Keith Kupferer) coping with tragedy. The actor’s real-life wife and teenage daughter Tara Mallen and Katherine Mallen Kupferer play his similarly struggling and idiosyncratic family, and Dolly de Leon (always a delight) is the leader of a theatrical troupe conveniently located beside our protagonist’s work site. Soon a role in a Shakespeare play becomes its own form of therapy. Too many on-the-nose moments of convenience in the first reel bog down the story, but patient viewers will find this is an extremely emotional and fulfilling work. All three actors in the grieving family are superb, and there’s a lead actor performance here worthy of awards. The music is good too, with some nice use of several “Oklahoma!” chestnuts. The colorfully drawn and authentic characters and several engaging final reel subplots help transcend the formula.
Wow, what a missed opportunity! Writer/director Steve McQueen’s promised epic Blitz (C) contains many stunning crafts, lush cinematography and powerful sound but is largely hollow at the center with generally passive primary characters not given much to do. With a WWII backdrop of air raids in 1940 England, a mother (Saoirse Ronan) and her biracial son (Elliot Heffernan) are separated, and a variety of Dickensian episodes take place as collective hopes of them being reunited are protracted. Ronan has rarely had such a minor performance, with little set-up to earn all the feels. The script does newcomer Heffernan little favors, a shame since his is a POV rarely described in history nor depicted on film. Harris Dickinson appears briefly with little to do; thankfully another supporting actor Benjamin Clementine gets some tender moments as a kindly Nigerian law enforcement officer mentoring the lost child. An opening sequence of fire hoses tangled like dueling snakes and a mid-movie moment with disaster in a nightclub seem to portend a stronger narrative impact, but most of the film simply feels old-fashioned and rote. There are near-musical numbers with little lift and a flood that looks like it was filmed in the bygone Catastrophe Canyon of Disney parks. This glimpse into history doesn’t live up to the creativity or vision from McQueen’s previous works or build on the template of Hope & Glory or Empire of the Sun; it’s a rare misstep from the auteur, lacking intended immersion and emotion.
Nicole Kidman famously made a pledge to work frequently with female directors, and the erotic drama Babygirl (B+), helmed by Helena Reijn, demonstrates exactly why such collaboration is so potent. From the first frame to the stirring conclusion, this movie successfully explores the long-simmering carnal desires of a powerful woman. As a CEO who becomes embroiled in an extramarital age gap relationship with one of her company interns (Harris Dickinson), Kidman is dynamite, showcasing vigor and vulnerability in intriguing doses. The movie is fascinating in its portrait of sexual and power dynamics, with many elements shocking and surprising. Amidst the foreboding and forbidden, there’s also fun and flirtation; and for children of the ’80s there are excellent montages set to INXS and George Michael tunes. Reijn leaves room for Dickinson to make distinct choices in his role-reversed portrayal; he’s fairly mesmerizing in his part. Only Antonio Banderas playing the oblivious husband strikes some curious notes, and there are also a few beats at the end of sequences when our heroine darts a silent soliloquy with her eyes that remove her from the realism. Despite the playful title or the perceived promise of conventional thrills, this is a serious film about the importance of female sexuality: frank, raw and insightful.
Director Clint Eastwood, career action star turned elder statesman of the thinking person’s dramatic film, returns to the scene of the crime — and punishment — in the sturdy and somber Georgia-set procedural Juror #2 (A-). Nicholas Hoult plays a novelist and expectant father serving as a juror in a prominent murder trial and finds himself struggling with a serious moral dilemma capable of swaying the verdict and potentially convicting or freeing the accused killer. Hoult is fantastic in the nuanced role, relatable and believable in service of a somewhat far-fetched premise. Many of the tropes of courtroom thrillers are present in the story but presented with multiple points of view as the scales of justice prove to be complex forms of measurement. Eastwood artfully and efficiently dispatches the story with wonderful performances all around, including Toni Collette as a showy district attorney, Gabriel Basso as the accused and J.K. Simmons as a wily colleague in the fraught deliberations. The movie quietly observes and subtly exposes vulnerabilities of the justice system and hearkens back to the director’s other Savannah-set feature Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. It’s an excellent companion piece to some of his best and most thoughtful morality plays such as Million Dollar Baby, Sully, Unforgiven, American Sniper and The Hereafter. It is old-fashioned on the surface but resonates splendidly in modern times and is highly recommended fare for adults and thoughtful teens who want to see (along with other films like Conclave and The Brutalist) what it used to look like in Hollywood’s heyday to craft and consume a deft and deliberate drama.
Bob Dylan is lit — literature, in fact, to those lauding this iconic poet laureate of the folk music scene. But James Mangold’s moribund biopic A Complete Unknown (C) gives scant clues about what inspires and motivates the musician and man of mystery. What we are left with in a reverential but otherwise by-the-books look at the artist as a young man in 1960s New York is a very lived-in imitation by Timothée Chalamet in terms of voice and vibe. The talented actor capably inhabits the role of the rebel but not the cause: Watershed events ranging from violent global uprising to civil rights upheaval to high-profile assassinations are simply static on TV and radio snippets, and there’s nary a connection to why the troubadour is tuning into the pulse of any of this for inspiration. A few tepid love affairs (with squandered actresses Elle Fanning as Sylvie Russo and Monica Barbaro as Joan Baez), some minor conflict with festival organizers (including a sunny Ed Norton as Pete Seeger) and a petulant penchant for not playing what his crowds want to hear comprising most of the film’s run time. Oddly for the same director as Walk the Line, Mangold casts Boyd Holbrook as Johnny Cash, a spiritual guardian of Dylan’s transition from eclectic to electric. And there’s an unnecessary framing device offering little extra clarity. Some of the movie’s music sequences contain verve, but the whole enterprise is strangely one-note save the uncanny authenticity of the central performance. The film’s seeming thesis of not giving in to expectations is thwarted by never being all that grounded in any rules in the first place. Nothing dusty or gusty is blowing in the blustery wind of this interpretation. Instead of this feckless non-origin story, consider watching Martin Scorsese’s documentary No Direction Home.
Malcolm Washington didn’t choose the easiest adaptation — nor did he make much cinematic sense of it — with his directorial debut, The Piano Lesson (C), based on the August Wilson play. Instead of simply or conventionally translating a work already imbued with storied drama, the new director experiments with form and frenzy to unearth a bevy of resonant themes, and the overstuffed result doesn’t strike a consistent chord. A family clash over the heirloom of the title pits brother and sister — he hopes to sell it, the she refuses to give it up — sets the stage for a story unleashing haunting truths about how the past is perceived and who defines a family legacy. Unfortunately abrupt tonal shifts, a decision to open up the story with ghost story and horror motifs and a veil of fussiness between flashbacks and dialogue scenes continually obscure the workmanlike skills of an impressive acting ensemble. There’s interesting craft on display in terms of cinematography and music, but the symbolism is often heavy-handed. John David Washington and Danielle Deadwyler are the standout siblings whose tense reunion is a catalyst to conflict and discussions centered on tradition and collective memory of historical trauma. Ray Fisher is also fantastic in a hard-working and stacked cast. The actors do an outstanding job even though the film’s awkward approach doesn’t always do them justice.
A classic adage proclaims the art of writing about music is akin to dancing about architecture; conversely, critiquing a movie featuring a modernist minimalist designer upending conventions is a particularly apt parallel for unpacking Brady Corbet’s ambitious 215-minute period piece The Brutalist (A). Filmed especially for 7O millimeter VistaVision large-screen formats including narrative divided into two acts and a well-placed 15-minute intermission, this is a consummate cinematic banquet and in nearly all ways an absolute masterpiece. Like the iconic building style of its title, the film’s characters captured by Lol Crawley’s creative cinematography are angular and exposed, and the movie’s lens on the historic American immigrant experience bitingly bleak. Escaping postwar Europe, fictional visionary architect Laszlo Toth (Adrien Brody) emigrates to rebuild his life, his career and his marriage to Erzsebet (Felicity Jones) in the US of A. On his own in a strange new land (Pennsylvania), Laszlo encounters industrialist magnate Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) who recognizes his talent. There are twists and turns along the journey, which is consistently imagined in full. The film’s length and one-two punch structure adds to the epic nature of watching the main character’s vastness of experiences across decades. The production design by Judy Becker evokes authenticity in the story’s primary epoch of the 1940s through ’60s, and there are some stunning building and room configurations on display in the story, worthy of the titular architect. Daniel Blumberg’s urgent music adds to the intrigue and pageantry. The performances are roundly amazing with Brody in career-best mode as a complex man who is both optimistic and mercurial. This film is a grand experience, and even the loose ends from its labyrinthine plot will stimulate conversations. This will be a movie categorized with some of the great modern classics such as There Will Be Blood and The Power of the Dog.
The palace intrigue and visual effects both get mighty upgrades — albeit with fewer iconic declarations of dialogue — as Ridley Scott returns to the ring for a highly enjoyable Gladiator II (B+). While many of the story beats represent a retread of the Best Picture winning 2000 original film, Paul Mescal steps comfortably into the sandals of the protagonist role and draws viewers in as his character watches Roman emperors (Pedro Pascal among the leaders) conquer his homeland before he endeavors to return a legendary land to glory. As an empire-adjacent antagonist, Denzel Washington is also a highlight as a complex power broker with constant surprises around every turn. His scenery chewing rivals Joaquin Phoenix from the first film. The sequel’s action set pieces including a clash of warriors on ships within a coliseum are stunning. After one questionable sequence involving fake CGI monkeys early on, the film’s visual effects are roundly glorious. There’s a lingering feeling of wanting just a little more emotionally from this film, but it’s hard to argue with the brutal bacchanal of pulpy violence and vengeance on display here. Overall the film is a marvelous and rousing adventure.
There’s probably a brilliant movie to be lensed using a stationary camera affixed on one single room of a house and chronicling what happens in that space on earth from prehistoric to pandemic times. Director/co-writer Robert Zemeckis hasn’t landed on the brilliant part of his cinematic science project. His Here (D+) is a filmed carousel of progress with some occasionally lovely compositions but an absolutely inert set of artificial storylines. It has the effect of an old vacation slide show presented by your most cringe-worthy relative. The nostalgic object lessons, told out of order in a taxonomy of themes, include vignettes of Native American rituals, Benjamin Franklin’s relatives, a crackpot inventor, a greatest generation couple, boomers delighting and struggling with modern family life (Tom Hanks and Robin Wright in various dreadful levels of de-aging effects) and the African-American family of the here and now. The only surprises along the journey are the effective use of pictures-in-picture delineated by rule lines, a late-breaking mirror effect and clever dissolves. Sometimes windows gracefully overlapping with the wilderness of bygone times or a novel show running on the family TV provide a welcome distraction from the human doldrums. The punishing pageant of various still lives accompanied by soaring Alan Silvestri music are comprised of such basic tropes that any moments of genuine drama are robbed of their gravitas. Latter stage Zemeckis films have been preoccupied with visual effects to the detriment of story, and this particular film finds little focus except for that omniscient camera in the same damn place the whole time. The film manages to be maddening and melodramatic when it was meant to be meaningful.
