My Week With Marilyn (2011)
DIRECTOR: Simon Curtis
CAST: Michelle Williams, Eddie Redmayne, Kenneth Branagh, Judi Dench, Emma Watson, Zoe Wanamaker, Dominic Cooper, Toby Jones, Dougray Scott, Julia Ormond, Derek Jacobi
REVIEW:
My Week With Marilyn is based on the memoir of Colin Clark, a production assistant on set of 1957’s The Prince and the Showgirl. It wasn’t until the 1990s that Clark, who passed away in 2002, published his account of his brief period of time spent with Marilyn Monroe. Adrian Hodges’ screenplay is a mostly faithful adaptation of Clark’s reminiscences and provides a window into both the making of a film, and his observations of a beloved but troubled starlet. Continue reading
J. Edgar (2011)
DIRECTOR: Clint Eastwood
CAST:
Leonardo DiCaprio, Armie Hammer, Judi Dench, Naomi Watts
REVIEW:
During his forty-eight-year reign as director of the FBI, John Edgar Hoover was regarded by many as the most powerful man in America. Continue reading
The Help (2011)
DIRECTOR: Tate Taylor
CAST: Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Jessica Chastain, Bryce Dallas Howard, Allison Janney, Sissy Spacek
REVIEW:
Perhaps the greatest value of The Help, like other films such as 12 Years a Slave or Selma, is in reminding those too young to have first-hand experience of just how oppressive large sections of the United States were to their African-American inhabitants only a few short decades ago. This is not some vague ancient history; people who grew up in the environment depicted onscreen are still alive today. While The Help is not as hard-hitting as the films mentioned above—nor, to be fair, is that really its intention, and at times it outright aims for “feel good”—and is somewhat weakened by a tendency to paint with broad strokes and deal in black-and-white (no pun intended), it’s still a worthy time capsule that is sometimes inspiring, sometimes moving, and sometimes illuminating. Continue reading
X-Men: First Class (2011)
DIRECTOR: Matthew Vaughn
CAST:
James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Kevin Bacon, Rose Byrne, January Jones, Caleb Landry Jones, Lucas Till, Edi Gathegi, Zoe Kravitz, Jason Flemyng, Oliver Platt
REVIEW:
Back when he wrote and directed 2000’s X-Men, Bryan Singer eschewed an origin story, jumping into the action with the X-Men already formed, deeming origin stories unnecessary and constraining. A decade later, Singer (who helped develop the story and served as producer here) and director Matthew Vaughn decided to tackle the ‘origin story’ after all, not only of the ‘first class’ of X-Men, but the friends-turned-enemies Charles Xavier/Professor X and Erik Lensherr/Magneto. While 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine failed to do anything interesting with its central character, Vaughn and company have righted that wrong here. First Class is easily ahead of The Last Stand, and might well top out X-Men and X2 for the best installment the series has produced so far. Continue reading
The King’s Speech (2010)
DIRECTOR: Tom Hooper
CAST: Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter, Guy Pearce, Jennifer Ehle, Michael Gambon, Derek Jacobi, Timothy Spall, Claire Bloom
REVIEW:
The King’s Speech from director Tom Hooper and screenwriter David Seidler is proof that the “buddy movie” formula can be applied to things other than cop comedy-dramas, even to a historical docudrama about a decidedly odd couple friendship between King George VI and his speech therapist. To that end, it’s a handsome, stately period historical drama bolstered by strong acting and strong chemistry and the dynamic between two very different men who under different circumstances would never have met.
Continue readingSherlock Holmes (2009)
DIRECTOR: Guy Ritchie
CAST:
Robert Downey Jr., Jude Law, Rachel McAdams, Mark Strong
REVIEW:
Devout followers of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s detective novels may be appalled at what director Guy Ritchie has done with Doyle’s creation, but those with open minds may find a surprising amount of Holmesian details emerge intact, and for all others, Sherlock Holmes is a rollicking ride with plenty of action and comedy and some style and wit along the way. Continue reading
Public Enemies (2009)
DIRECTOR: Michael Mann
CAST: Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Marion Cotillard, Billy Crudup, Stephen Graham, Stephen Lang, Jason Clarke, Stephen Dorff, Giovanni Ribisi, Lili Taylor, David Wenham, Leelee Sobieski, Branka Katic, Channing Tatum
REVIEW:
Public Enemies is not the first film to portray legendary bank robber John Dillinger, but it’s the most high-profile and the most accomplished, but certain elements keep it from gangster genre classic status, not least of which is that director Michael Mann (The Last of the Mohicans, Heat) elects to film the events in docudrama style instead of aiming for grandeur and glamor. It could be argued that Public Enemies is an independent art film masquerading as a gangster epic, and how audiences react to that will determine how absorbed they become by the film’s content. Continue reading
Doubt (2008)
DIRECTOR: John Patrick Shanley
CAST: Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Viola Davis
REVIEW:
Doubt, John Patrick Shanley’s film adaptation of his Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play, deals with various issues—the debate over whether the Catholic Church should stand firm to old-school doctrine or evolve with the times, the ways in which those too wrapped up in their own righteousness lose sight of compassion, more tangential questions of crisis of faith and (perhaps) sexuality—-but primarily it’s a battle between doubt and certainty, both as an external conflict between characters and within individual characters’ hearts. Its outwardly simple, straightforward premise steeps itself in ambiguity and leads us into a moral quagmire from which it never lets us emerge. Those who dislike ambiguity and expect a film to offer a clear-cut resolution with clear answers will not be satisfied. Different viewers will come to different interpretations, and Doubt is the kind of film (or play) that can inspire heated debates after the end credits have rolled or the curtain has fallen. Continue reading
Frost/Nixon (2008)
DIRECTOR: Ron Howard
CAST: Michael Sheen, Frank Langella, Kevin Bacon, Sam Rockwell, Oliver Platt, Matthew Macfadyen, Rebecca Hall, Toby Jones
REVIEW:
For the latest entry on an eclectic filmography, Ron Howard has teamed up with playwright/screenwriter Peter Morgan for this film adaptation of Morgan’s own play, a semi-fictionalized docudrama chronicling the 1977 interview pitting British talk-show host David Frost against former President Richard Nixon. To this end, they have managed the impressive accomplishment of turning what could have been a dry, stuffy subject into a powerful and compelling drama and character study, proving that slick cinematic craftsmanship, an intelligent script, and powerhouse acting can take something seemingly mundane—an interview—and make it intensely riveting.
Continue readingAustralia (2008)
DIRECTOR: Baz Luhrmann
CAST: Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman, Brandon Walters, David Wenham, Jack Thompson, Bryan Brown, David Ngoombujarra, Ben Mendelsohn, David Gulpilil
REVIEW:
Baz Luhrmann is an unabashed romantic and an equally unapologetic fan of big, grandiose, old-fashioned melodramas, and while Australia, Luhrmann’s simply-titled ode to his homeland, is a little more restrained (relatively speaking) than Moulin Rouge, it contains many of his hallmarks. It’s big, bold, and brash, painted on a sweeping canvas and recalling old 1950s romantic melodramas. Alas, a meandering overlong narrative and uneven tone leave it not having the sweeping effect it strives so hard for. Australia looks great and is not without entertainment value, but an inability to settle into a consistent groove leaves it weighed down by its own grandiose melodrama into a rather campy sudsy romance/adventure that’s as likely to induce eye-rolling as swooning. Continue reading