Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty) organizes her entry into the poker ring in Molly’s Game.
Every director has to make a first movie. We’ve seen some great first-time directors this year alone between Jordan Peele (Get Out) and Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird). Even the greatest directors of all time like Orson Welles (Citizen Kane) and Quentin Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs) had to start somewhere to instill good faith in the moviegoing public. But as always, a director’s first movie is the best place to figure out what his strengths are and what could be done better, and as always that is the case with writer Aaron Sorkin (The Social Network) and his directorial debut: Molly’s Game.
Jessica Chastain looms over her empire in Molly’s Game.
Starring Jessica Chastain as real-life self-proclaimed “poker princess” Molly Bloom, the film tells the story of Molly’s game, hosting high-stakes poker games every week with Hollywood celebrities, athletes, business titans, and unbeknownst to her the Russian mob for the better part of a decade before she is arrested by the FBI for running an illegal poker game, which she kept claiming she was not as her poker game was completely legal. Or was it? I don’t know, the movie isn’t always clear on that. There’s a defining point where it’s definitely illegal, but before that it’s a little shady.
Jessica Chastain plans her next move in Molly’s Game.
And that highlights one of Aaron Sorkin’s strengths as a director. As a screenwriter, he understands story structure just as much as he breathes dialogue, particularly with natural progression deeper into the world unknown. He takes his protagonist on the classic hero’s journey, despite Molly not really being a hero. As she learns more about the game of poker, so does the audience, and therefore we also understand and relate to her confusion in other scenes. Sorkin’s quippy dialogue also stands out so much here you could organize it on a spreadsheet just as much as on a screenplay. And having Jessica Chastain carry your movie is nothing short of a recipe for Oscar gold as well.
Jessica Chastain is in defense mode in Molly’s Game.
So we’ve covered Sorkin’s strengths, including that he’s actually pretty good with actors. Now what are his weaknesses? Well, some of them tie into his strengths, and some of them are just that: weaknesses. For starters, Sorkin feels the need to explain everything to the audience, right down to the tiniest detail. In some scenes, that works, particularly those involving poker hands. The movie has a lot of ground to cover and not a lot of time, so the suspense in knowing who has what hand and what that means for the conflict of the game has to be conveyed rather quickly. The downside is that some scenes get long-winded explanations that don’t need it so much, particularly some of the opening scenes explaining Molly’s backstory. We don’t need to know the exact angle of the slope she’s skiing down, just what it means for her to trip over a stick.
Idris Elba (Thor) and Jessica Chastain argue on how to approach their story in Molly’s Game.
The editing is also a mixed bag. One could cite that the story slows down whenever it cuts to Molly explaining herself to her legal counsel (Idris Elba), but then you could also say it allowed for some time to breathe after taking in so much quips from Sorkin’s script. However, there were also a number of noticeable continuity errors. I’m not talking about plot holes, as the plot is rather tight in that sense. I’m talking about a scene where Kevin Costner (Dances with Wolves) is hugging Molly in one shot, not in the next with no transition to that, and then hugging her again in the very next shot. Things like that I was willing to forgive the first time, but they popped up quite a bit in this movie, so I gotta call it like it is. Aaron Sorkin needs to learn more about editing his movies the way he takes such meticulous care of his screenplays.
The bet has been called and raised in Molly’s Game.
But does that completely ruin Molly’s Game? Not even close. If anything, the rest of the movie is supported strongly enough by Sorkin and Chastain that the obvious flaws seem minor in comparison. It’s definitely a good time at the movies, and I would even say it’s a very good movie because of its strengths. But Sorkin needs to recognize where he tripped in this movie so he can avoid making the same mistakes in his future endeavors.
Christopher Plummer (The Sound of Music, Up) rushes to finish All the Money in the World.
There’s a very good reason most directors take their time in between movies. Because the director is in charge of everything from pre-production to post-production, they need time to plan everything out down to the most minute details. But every now and then you’ll see a director like Steven Spielberg (Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List) or Peter Berg (Deepwater Horizon, Patriots Day) release two movies in the same year, maybe even very different kinds of movies. In the few instances when this happens, the quality of the two movies is on a similar level. So when Ridley Scott (Blade Runner, Gladiator) released Alien: Covenant earlier this year and immediately moved on to All the Money in the World for a December 2017 release, many were understandably nervous as the former wasn’t exactly received with a warm welcome. So how does this last-minute movie hold itself together?
Christopher Plummer dominates every single scene in All the Money in the World.
Christopher Plummer stars as J. Paul Getty, the richest man in the history of the world. After publicly refusing to pay any ransom for the release of his grandson (Charlie Plummer), the boy’s mother (Michelle Williams) and one of Getty’s negotiating agents (Mark Wahlberg) race against the clock to rescue her adolescent son before his captor (Romain Duris) tortures and kills him.
Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain, Manchester by the Sea) hears the bad news in All the Money in the World.
There’s a very good reason I highlighted Christopher Plummer and nobody else because most of this cast is kinda just there. Although a few of them do have some standout moments (Michelle Williams and Romain Duris come to mind), the cast mostly exists to advance a plot surrounding Mr. Getty, who is perfectly cast and acted by Plummer. Even though he’s in a supporting role, his presence is felt throughout the entire film, even when you least expect it, and he has the most compelling arc in the film. There are a few great scenes involving a painting Getty buys that, without giving too much away, naturally flow through his arc while advancing the decisions he makes regarding the kidnapping. So much so that even one of his early scenes involving a model minotaur is crucial to the development of the story, even though it seems minute at the time.
From left-to-right: Mark Wahlberg, Ridley Scott, and Christopher Plummer on the set of All the Money in the World.
Credit must be given to Ridley Scott as well. This kind of film isn’t exactly in his wheelhouse, as many of his attempts at similar films result in Body of Lies (2008) or The Counselor (2013). But here he knows how to use his cast, which actors to emphasize in certain scenes, and how to get the most out of his signature scenery shots while moving the pace along. There’s a lot he had to fit into this film and he moved through it all while telling a compelling story in just over two hours. This might even be his fastest-paced film since Black Hawk Down (2001), which was also the last good movie Ridley Scott directed before The Martian (2015). Could this be a sign that Ridley Scott is back on his A-game? I’m willing to believe it as long as he stops making Alien prequels.
Christopher Plummer disapproves of this filter used for All the Money in the World.
If I had to pick a couple weaknesses with this movie, they all have to do with its strengths. For all the impressive cinematography by Dariusz Wolski (Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street), the dim grain filter that was held over the lens didn’t do anything for me. I guess Scott and Wolski were trying to create a certain mood, but that filter didn’t contribute to that at all. I saw the movie at night, so all it did was bore me a little, and I feel like a more vibrant color scheme would kept more viewers awake for those late night shows. I also want to reiterate that Christopher Plummer far outshines the rest of the cast, but that’s almost like casting Daniel Day-Lewis (There Will Be Blood, Lincoln) or Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty, Interstellar) in a movie. No matter how good the cast around them is, they’re always going to draw all the attention towards them, and that’s exactly what happens.
Michelle Williams and Mark Wahlberg (Boogie Nights, The Departed) face the press in All the Money in the World.
You won’t leave this movie thinking of Michelle Williams or even Ridley Scott, but rather of Christopher Plummer in what is sure to be an Oscar-nominated performance. And honestly, that’s exactly what you should remember. Now aren’t you glad I got you through this entire review without once mentioning Kevin Spacey?
Armie Hammer (The Social Network, The Birth of a Nation) and Timothée Chalamet (Interstellar, Lady Bird) debate culture in Call Me By Your Name.
Is it better to speak or die? This is a question asked often in Call Me By Your Name. The film has been widely praised by critics since its debut at the Sundance Film Festival, and audiences seem to have jumped on the bandwagon as well, even receiving numerous awards from the National Board of Review, American Film Institute, the Broadcast Film Critics Association, the Golden Globes, and will likely be a major frontrunner at the Oscars. Since the movie seems to suggest it is better to speak, I will take its advice. I hated this movie, and largely for moral reasons.
Why does everyone walk around shirtless all the time in Call Me By Your Name?
Set in the summer of 1983, it stars Timothée Chalamet as Elio, an Italian Jew who struggles with his sexuality between his girlfriend Marzia (Esther Garrel) and an American exchange student named Oliver (Armie Hammer). Since Garrel is not featured in any of the promotional material, I think it’s obvious who Elio chooses. There’s just one problem. Elio is 17 years old, and Oliver is a legal adult working on his Masters thesis.
Why would you give up your hot Italian girlfriend in Call Me By Your Name?
Now I know what you’re thinking, in Italy the age of consent is 14 years old, so a sexual relationship between a 17 year-old and an adult is okay. However, Oliver is from America, so it can easily be interpreted as Oliver traveling all the way to Italy to have sex with a child, especially since he admits that he had feelings for Elio from the very beginning. I bet you’re also thinking that I’m being hypocritical for giving The Shape of Water a pass since that’s about a romance between a human woman and a fish man, but that’s a fairy tale, whereas Call Me By Your Name tries so hard to be taken seriously as a drama set in complete realism, so the rules of our world apply more here than they do in fantasy films. I guess this is someone’s fantasy, since there’s a scene of Elio having sex with a peach, and then Oliver eats the peach, and… ugh, yeah, it’s pretty bad.
That handshake is about as artificial as anything else in Call Me By Your Name.
But let’s finally get to how and why I’ve picked apart these moral disputes: this movie is not engaging at all. The only thing this movie managed to accomplish is making a gay version of Fifty Shades of Grey (2015) that somehow got a ton of awards buzz. It tries so hard to be artistic with ancient naked statues that do nothing. The architecture looks nice, but that’s like the psuedo-liberal’s version of a Michael Bay movie. A nice-looking movie about an oppressed minority that’s not even being oppressed but is actually breaking a number of moral guidelines in numerous countries. It’s designed to check off the Oscar checklist, no matter the creative or moral cost, and despite there being a number of decent performances in the movie, it fails to truly engage outside of its political objectives.
List of things to never discuss over family dinner: religion, politics, sexuality, and Call Me By Your Name.
I realize this isn’t structured like a traditional review, but this is easily the worst movie I’ve seen in the last few months. Maybe everyone else sees something in it that I can’t, and if that’s the case, good for them. But for me, this is a miss that I hope misses out in the upcoming Oscar season.
Gary Oldman (The Dark Knight) woke up one morning and decided to make Darkest Hour.
Prestige biopics are a common staple of Oscar season, and what could be more prestigious than a British biopic? How about one where a critically-acclaimed and Oscar-less actor takes on a physically transformative role that completely masks him? No, not Daniel Day-Lewis, he has three Oscars and is retiring. Gary Oldman? Perfect, now the Oscar is as good as his! Apparently that’s all you need to make a movie, ’cause that’s all Darkest Hour is.
Kristin Scott Thomas (The English Patient) and Gary Oldman toast the inevitable in Darkest Hour.
The film stars Oldman as Winston Churchill in the first month of his time as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, during which he faced opposition in both the Opposition and his own party for his strong refusal to negotiate peace with Hitler and the Nazi regime. At the same time, he must find a way to fix the military disaster that resulted in 300,000 British troops being cornered on the beach of Dunkirk. Wait, have I seen this movie before? I feel like I have.
Gary Oldman as Winston Churchill misleading the public in Darkest Hour.
I think I just figured out the biggest problem with this movie. Every scene, every character, it’s all derivative of much better movies, many of which are Oscar winners themselves. The whole transformative performance thing was done much better by the aforementioned Day-Lewis in Lincoln (2012), much of the rest of the cast is straight out of The King’s Speech (2010), and the conflict is basically the fourth timeline of Dunkirk (2017). Maybe if this movie had come out ten years ago, it’d be much better on its own and possibly a serious contender for Best Picture. Instead, it feels like sloppy seconds of these other films.
Gary Oldman doesn’t need CGI to be unrecognizable in Darkest Hour.
But let’s compare the aspects of this film to those other films, since Darkest Hour is so keen to take from its much better counterparts, and we’ll start with Gary Oldman’s performance. Now that kind of performance is something that should be attempted more by the most skilled of actors, of which Oldman is one. But that doesn’t do the film any good if the character is flat and uninteresting. Abraham Lincoln was willing to play dirty to ratify the 13th Amendment, and there was actual stress inflicted on him and his family. He was smart, witty, and decisive, but he had genuine doubts and sacrifices to make in order to accomplish his goals and keep his loved ones. Churchill in this movie is never presented with such a personal conflict, and the professional conflict never changes or shifts in any way. The quality of Oldman’s performance is on par with anything Day-Lewis has done, but he’s barely given anything to do with that performance.
Lily James (Baby Driver) can’t keep up with Gary Oldman in Darkest Hour.
How about the supporting cast? Well, they’re honestly not that great. Lily James plays a heavily-discounted Lionel Logue and serves only to write down Gary Oldman’s random bursts and be an emotional connection to battlefield soldiers we seldom see. Kristin Scott Thomas only has one purpose, and that’s to remind Churchill that he’s special. This is in stark contrast to Helena Bonham Carter as Queen Elizabeth, who actually went out and got stuff done because she loved both her husband and her country. But the biggest offender in this film is Ben Mendelsohn (Ready Player One) as King George VI. Like the rest of the cast, he does very little, but because Colin Firth’s Oscar-winning performance exists, the comparison must be made. Firth mastered Bertie’s (in)famous stammer, and even maintained bits of it when his character’s speech improved through the course of the film. Mendelsohn doesn’t stutter once throughout this entire film, and his performance never leaves that monotone he used in Rogue One (2016). No dimension, no flaws, no purpose, meaning this supporting cast is under the shadows of Oldman and much better films.
I feel like Gary Oldman doesn’t really know what he’s doing in Darkest Hour.
And finally, there’s the setting. Not just that, but the film also tries fancy editing now and again, but to what effect? The editing in Dunkirk generated urgency and suspense, and was used with masterful skill to foreshadow perilous situations faced by the characters. In Darkest Hour, it just tries an Edgar Wright montage a couple times and calls it art, but with as much purpose as its supporting cast. Even the timeline feels like much of it could’ve been spliced with Christopher Nolan’s acclaimed epic. Can you imagine watching Dunkirk and then cutting back to Gary Oldman as Winston Churchill in the war rooms planning Operation Dynamo and executing it over the span of a month? Maybe, it’d certainly be a fascinating editing experiment if someone could obtain the raw footage of both, but then this film is so dull it might drag down the quality of a superior film. It’s a real shame because director Joe Wright (Pride & Prejudice) has tackled the Dunkirk evacuation before in Atonement (2007). One long take in the middle of that film ended up being more powerful than anything we saw in this movie, but maybe this proves that war films are much better when they’re following soldiers on the battlefield and not the politicians calling the shots.
Gary Oldman does not approve in Darkest Hour.
I wanted to evacuate myself from the theater, but I kept holding out hope that Gary Oldman’s phenomenal performance would make this carbon copy worth it. Instead, I got the same supporting cast, setting, editing, directing, and writing that I’ve seen before in much better (and sometimes more groundbreaking) films. This is the Gary Oldman show, and everything else plays sixth fiddle.
Kristen Wiig (The Diary of a Teenage Girl, The Martian) and Matt Damon (Saving Private Ryan, The Departed) look down on the odd men out in Downsizing.
I’ll just come out and say it. I am not a fan of Alexander Payne (TheDescendants, Nebraska). I know a lot of people think he’s a great director, and for the life of me I’ll never understand why. But aside from Sideways (2004), I’ve never been able to get invested in any of his films. But then again, what do you expect from the guy who wrote Jurassic Park III (2001)? So when I heard he was making Downsizing, I was hesitant to check it out, and I wasn’t surprised when it started getting mixed reviews, somewhat along the lines of what I think of his other work. It wasn’t until a good friend of mine invited me to see it with him that I finally conceded and bought my ticket. So, what did I think? Well, let’s just start from the beginning.
Matt Damon looks like he’s reading the script for Downsizing.
The film stars Matt Damon as Paul, a pretty boring guy with a pretty boring life who decides to shrink himself and his wife (Kristen Wiig) down to five inches tall. This is apparently a thing because of some crap about saving the environment, but the movie doesn’t care about that, so why should we? The only problem for Paul is that his wife backs out of the process and divorces him after the doctors in charge of the downsizing procedure shave one of her eyebrows (yeah, pretty lame excuse to leave your husband), so Paul is then eased into a small adventure in a big world with a partyboy from upstairs (Christoph Waltz) and one-legged Vietnamese human rights activist-turned-cleaning lady (Hong Chau).
Hong Chau (Inherent Vice, Big Little Lies) keeps Downsizing grounded emotionally.
So you’re probably thinking that sounds like a pretty good first act, and you’re right. The problem is this is only the premise, and the film never really does anything with it. It’s not until Christoph Waltz (Inglourious Basterds, Django Unchained) and Hong Chau enter the picture that any sort of plot begins to take shape, and that happens about halfway through. Before that, we’re stuck with Paul being boring, even for Matt Damon’s standards. After that, we’re stuck with a pretty generic story that doesn’t care about its characters being five inches tall and instead focuses on an obvious anti-Trump motif set in Mexican-style slums on the outer edge of a giant wall separating them from a far richer community. Then it also tries to work in a subplot about the world ending, along with a romance that comes out of nowhere (though this does result in my favorite line in the film), but none of these subplots actually go anywhere, they’re kinda just there.
Matt Damon probably regrets signing on to make Downsizing.
But sure, some movies are all about nothing, but they’re still made interesting because there are characters we connect with. The films of Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused, Boyhood) are especially good examples of how to do this right. The biggest problem with this film, however, is the protagonist. I get what they were going for, that Paul doesn’t really care about the bigger issues going on in the world, and that’s the arc he’s supposed to have as a character as he learns more about humanitarianism and the environment. However, none of that means anything if we as the audience don’t care about Paul, and even my friend who liked the movie didn’t care about Paul. He’s just an everyman with absolutely no qualities that make him unique or interesting, even when he’s five inches tall.
From left-to-right: Matt Damon, Christoph Waltz, and Udo Kier in Downsizing.
Fortunately, the supporting cast is there to pick up the slack, primarily Christoph Waltz and Hong Chau. Waltz, though slightly muted in this film, brings much needed energy to some of the dimmer scenes, and his facial expressions got the most laughs out of me and my audience. Hong Chau is getting a lot of awards buzz for this as the one thing people seem to universally like about this movie, and you could argue she deserves the praise. Much like how Waltz brings the levity, she brings the drama. She grounds the film in a reality that the characters can explore, which makes it even more shameful that the plot never dives deeper into the ramifications that these communities of the small would have on our economy, politics, and environment. I’m also not sure how authentic her accent is, as I’ve never met anyone from Vietnam, but it never bothered me and I think she’ll still draw laughs out of audiences, and maybe even a tiny tear or two.
This scene from the trailer isn’t even in Downsizing! Seriously! What the hell?
I wish Alexander Payne had enough confidence in his story to really dive into either the world or his protagonist, especially since he’d been working on this project for over a decade. Maybe he hit a creative bump in the road, or maybe audiences are finally catching on that his movies aren’t that great. Either way, Downsizing is a standard entry from Payne’s filmography and a pretty standard film on its own. It never aspires to be bigger than it is, even though the possibilities are endless.
Hugh Jackman (X-Men) modernizes The Greatest Showman.
If there’s one thing every biopic should get right, it should transport you to the time period in which it takes place. Even when modern filmmaking techniques are used, it is imperative that the overall aesthetic of the film feel like 1940s France or early 2000s Los Angeles, or whatever your setting is. The Greatest Showman completely subverts that from the minute we see the Disne- I mean, 20th Century Fox logo. The first time we see that logo, we get a very classical version of the fanfare that was played before Star Wars (1977) and Alien (1979), implying that the film is going to tell P.T. Barnum’s story in such a way that, though obviously glorifying his image, immersed you in his time and therefore the character. But then we instantly get a repeat of the modern Fox logo with chrome coloring and modern hip hop music playing over it. And this is our soundtrack for the entire movie.
From left-to-right: Austyn Johnson, Hugh Jackman, Cameron Seely, and Michelle Williams in The Greatest Showman.
The film very loosely tells the story of P.T. Barnum (Hugh Jackman), who famously gathered all the weirdos in the world here right now in New York City and eventually formed the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. I say “loosely” because there is almost no historical accuracy in the film’s portrayal of P.T. Barnum. Perhaps the most noteworthy of the film’s liberties is that no mention is made of Barnum’s treatment of the animals in the circus, to the point of only including animals in two scenes of the movie and outright stating that they were all set free during the burning of Barnum’s American Museum in 1864. I understand why the film would want to shy away from the truth, but blatantly stating the exact opposite of what happened is irresponsible, and I feel like there was a better way to write these parts of the movie to allude to the circus’s early treatment of animals without explicitly showing it. I’m not asking for 12 Years a Slave (2013), but the filmmakers at least owe us responsible filmmaking.
Zendaya (Spider-Man: Homecoming) and Zac Efron (Neighbors) fly through fiction in The Greatest Showman.
Other noteworthy liberties include the nature of the Jenny Lind (Rebecca Ferguson) tour, the complete omission of the Feejee Mermaid, and even creating new characters played by Zac Efron and Zendaya for the sake of adding additional songs and romantic subplots. So what does that do to the film, particularly Hugh Jackman’s performance as P.T. Barnum? Well, a lot of things, and there’s not a lot Jackman’s charismatic performance can do to make the movie memorable when this is all I’m thinking about. The film glorifies Barnum beyond belief, much like Barnum himself glorified the circus and everything in it. He was a con man, and in some respects the movie does admit to that. The parts of his show involving the world’s heaviest man show that he absolutely over-exaggerated the oddities of his acts. But the movie might’ve learned too much from Barnum and decided to con the audience into thinking he was a simple showman who got good at it, and that’s honestly not that interesting. It’s entertaining, and you’ll certainly enjoy it while watching it, but even I don’t remember much about it already.
The cast of The Greatest Showman poses like they’re taking on Broadway in 2017.
But since the filmmakers learned from Barnum, one would think they got into the essence of who he was and transported you into his headspace and time period, right? Well, maybe? I personally think not, and the modern soundtrack is the foremost exhibit of proof. Every song in this movie sounds like it was designed to be number one on the hit charts in 2012. You know, when dubstep was a big deal. Yes, a lot of the music in this movie sounds like dubstep and hip hop, and many of you are probably groaning in disgust right now. Some of those groans are warranted, but there are redeeming factors here. Two of the songs are memorable, and the rest are still fun to listen to. One of the reasons Les Miserables has worked so well across mediums (including a recent outing with Hugh Jackman) is that the songs sound like they could’ve been sung at the time the story takes place. The songs have a very classical tone that comes from the 1980s, but feels much older. These songs were made by 2017 for 2017, and I feel like they won’t last in the public consciousness for very long after 2017. Just because you can make it hip and new doesn’t mean you should.
Is it me, or do some of these heads in The Greatest Showman look like CGI?
Of course, this style is partly because the lyrics were written by Pasek and Paul, the same duo who wrote songs featured in smash hits Dear Evan Hansen (2016) and La La Land (2016). But let’s compare the two films in play here. La La Land had a wide variety of tones in its songs, ranging from pop to jazz to ballad. It was easy to tell the difference between “City of Stars”, “Audition”, and “Another Day of Sun” because they all had distinct styles, despite having the same instrumental setting. All the songs in The Greatest Showman are barely distinguishable from each other. Maybe I’m thinking about “The Greatest Show”, but it sounds exactly like “This Is Me”, which also sounds exactly like “A Million Dreams” and “The Other Side”. Again, some of these songs are good, but eventually you get bored of hearing the same thing over and over again, and that failed to capture the spirit of Barnum. Phineas Taylor Barnum was a con man, but he was like Phineas Flynn in that he could come up with something new and exciting every day if he wanted to. And if you don’t know who Phineas Flynn is, you’ll find much more ingenuity and entertainment value in watching that show than you will in The Greatest Showman.
Zendaya seduces the audience using brightly-colored makeup and hairstyling and glitter in The Greatest Showman.
I know it looks like I really tore into this movie and hated it, but there’s a great analogy I’m taking from Doug Walker (the Nostalgia Critic) that applies here. “[Don’t] complain in a puppet show that you can see the puppeteer, complain instead that you focused more on him than you did the puppet.” This happens because the puppet show wasn’t interesting enough to distract me from the puppeteer, who was painted in bright colors and covered in glitter. It’s not a bad movie, but the illusion wasn’t interesting enough to keep my attention away from the strings.
Adam Driver (Lincoln, Inside Llewyn Davis) looks down on the mechanical empire of the First Order in The Last Jedi.
A long time ago, in movie theaters very near to you, Star Wars (1977) became the single biggest cultural phenomenon of the 20th century. The original trilogy is one of cinema’s greatest, and has spawned everything you could possibly imagine. Toys, collectibles, TV shows, and even an anti-smoking commercial, all within its ever-growing mythos. The franchise got so big that prequels were in order to show how this galactic civil war came to be. They were, um, divisive. But let’s move on to the sequels that came as a result of the Walt Disney Empi- I mean, Company’s endless quest to conque- I mean, acquire all of the gala- I mean, Hollywood, starting with Fo- I mean, LucasFilm. When we got our first of these new films, people were excited to see Star Wars on the big screen again. Now that the intro to my review The Last Jedi is over, I’ll begin this spoiler-free analysis of why the second installment in the new Star Wars trilogy has become more divisive than George Lucas’s prequels.
Daisy Ridley (Murder on the Orient Express, Peter Rabbit) explores new possibilities in The Last Jedi.
The story picks up immediately after the end of The Force Awakens (2015), as General Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) and her Resistance flee across the galaxy from the clutches of the First Order, led by General Hux (Domhnall Gleeson), Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), and Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis). Meanwhile, the young Jakku native Rey (Daisy Ridley) finds an older and broken Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), who has now come to believe that it’s time for the Jedi to end. Also meanwhile, Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) resists the Resistance by aiding former Stormtrooper Finn (John Boyega) and mechanic Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran) in a side quest that serves no purpose other than to take up additional runtime, kinda like super extraneous words in a movie review blog. Wait…
A space battle commences in The Last Jedi.
I’m just as torn as the audience on this movie. On the one hand, there are some very good things about this movie, especially in the acting and overall look. But the story in Rian Johnson’s (Brick, Looper) middle chapter suffers greatly. I can’t go into much detail on any of these without spoiling anything (I will write a spoiler-filled editorial later), but I will talk about two of the ideas I did like while keeping spoilers to a minimum. Throughout the film Rey and Kylo Ren, who as far as I’m concerned are the two headliners of this new trilogy, find themselves caught in this telepathic bond courtesy of the Force. This is an idea that was explored briefly in The Empire Strikes Back (1980), and is now expanded upon to great effect, and those scenes (for the most part) were very well done. There’s also a scene where a character named DJ (Benicio del Toro) explains why we keep seeing galactic wars in these movies, and for a Star Wars movie it’s very mature. I do want to see this idea explored in Episode IX (2019) or future spin-off movies, but unfortunately it was never explored very well in this movie. And it doesn’t help that most of the other story points introduced in this movie either fall into that category or make no sense, or that the entire third act could’ve been cut out of this two and-a-half hour movie, especially since the action scene immediately before felt more climactic in nature.
Mark Hamill (Batman: The Animated Series, Avatar: The Last Airbender) is afraid of what he just witnessed in The Last Jedi.
So that’s the big problem with this movie, and it honestly does suffer a lot because of it. If you’ve seen the movie, it’s not hard to understand why its audience score on Rotten Tomatoes is currently at 57%. But that’s not even the only thing that kills this movie. The dialogue was rather cringeworthy. Now we probably shouldn’t be surprised considering that the dialogue in Star Wars was never that great, even in the original trilogy. But this specific film sure gives the prequels a run for their money. Without giving any lines or other details away, this movie was trying too hard to be like another property that Disney swallowed up years ago: the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I love the MCU, and I think the dialogue and humor in most of those movies is perfect for the MCU, but what works for Marvel won’t necessarily work in Star Wars, and this movie proves that. But when your movie opens with a “yo mama” joke and Domhnall Gleeson’s (Ex Machina, The Revenant) terrible performance (we’ll get to that soon), you know you’re in for something different, and not necessarily in a good way.
R.I.P., Carrie Fisher (Hannah and Her Sisters, When Harry Met Sally…).
Having said all that, there are still good things about this movie that, in my opinion, make it more tolerable than Jar Jar Binks and the M-word. For starters, most of the acting is very good, and a lot of it serves great characters. Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher own these characters more than the characters own them, and they both deliver touching tributes to Luke and Leia while also showing how they’ve grown since Return of the Jedi (1983). Since this is the last we’ll see of Princess Leia (not a spoiler), I think this was a good note for her to go out on. But then franchise newcomers Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver are also proving that they’re worthy of succeeding the old guard and ushering this franchise in a new direction. Their solo scenes are fun to watch, especially one in particular involving the former, but together they show the complexities of being lured towards both the Light and Dark Sides of the Force and the balance in between, something that was never explored in previous films.
John Boyega (Detroit, Pacific Rim: Uprising) and Gwendoline Christie (Game of Thrones, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay-Part 2) fight over who can give the blander performance in The Last Jedi.
But for every good performance, there’s a bad one, and this movie isn’t short on those. Domhnall Gleeson looks like they CGI’d his head onto another actor because he was on the toilet the whole time, and now I really want his character to die painfully if only so it’ll justify that face he’s making in literally every scene he’s in. I also wasn’t a fan of Andy Serkis (The Lord of the Rings, The Adventures of Tintin) as Snoke, but I am happy with the way they treated his character, which is more than I can say for Gwendoline Christie as Captain Phasma. John Boyega was great in the last film, but he had little to do here that was worth his acting chops, so his performance was a little stale. And finally, I did not like Kelly Marie Tran (About a Boy, Adam Ruins Everything) in this movie, and I mean both the actress and the character. She wasn’t nearly as intolerable as Hux, but her character was written only to create additional drama between Finn and Rey throughout the series, and also to try to create yet another strong woman archetype. You can tell the writers put effort into it, but I feel like more could’ve been done on Tran’s part to make Rose a more interesting character who’d be worth the inevitable love triangle.
The Resistance explosively tears up a salt planet in The Last Jedi.
Before I get cut in half by a lightsaber, what else is good about this movie? Well, the effects are pretty good. I didn’t like the way a lot of the CGI was used, but it all looked nice, and it’s still coupled with fun action scenes. Between this and a couple more interesting story elements, there’s an interesting motif running through this movie that it’s time to “let the past die”. In some respects, this movie follows through on that, going back to practical effects in a number of scenes and abandoning old tropes that worked in the 80s but not so much today. But then by that same philosophy, is it time to let some of these older franchises die peacefully? In recent years, we’ve seen plenty of franchises (Alien, Pirates of the Caribbean, Transformers) desperately try to hold onto life when they should’ve ended years ago. Should we have let Star Wars die after Revenge of the Sith (2005), or even after the original trilogy? Or can the ninth episode come out in two years and prove that it was all worth sitting through the prolonged battle that is public opinion of The Last Jedi?
Kylo Ren’s helmet lies shattered on the floor in The Last Jedi.
I have to end this review sometime soon, so I’ll say this. The Last Jedi is absolutely worth seeing. But that doesn’t make it a good movie. If you own a big enough TV, I recommend you wait until it’s on DVD before you cram yourself and your ten best friends into the front of the line to see it in theaters. If not, go see it. But be ready to have a long and heated discussion afterwards.
From left-to-right: Richard Jenkins, director Guillermo del Toro, and Sally Hawkins on the set of The Shape of Water.
Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth) is one of those directors that his fans seem to have a strong admiration for, to the point where many say he’s one of the most visionary directors of our time. On a visual level, they’re right. His creature designs are like nothing any other filmmaker has presented to audiences, and some of them have become icons of horror and fantasy cinema. But for every Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), there’s a Crimson Peak (2015), and sadly del Toro’s films have never been widely embraced by general audiences or even fellow filmmakers. However, that looks to be changing soon with The Shape of Water, as del Toro delivers not just one of his best films, but what might be the best film of a year where a few big risks were taken in the art of storytelling.
A brief glimpse of the fish man in The Shape of Water.
The story follows Elisa Esposito (Sally Hawkins), a mute janitor at a top secret government facility that happens to be keeping a fish man (Doug Jones) for research. When a bond is formed between beauty and beast, she begins a plan to free it from Colonel Strickland’s (Michael Shannon) captivity and torture. As far as del Toro’s stories go, this one is very basic. It’s an R-rated American update of Beauty and the Beast, which is funnier when you consider that tale originated in France and this film’s director is Mexican.
Doug Jones (Pan’s Labyrinth), as the fish man, snarling at a disturbance in The Shape of Water.
But it’s del Toro’s visual style that makes this film stand strong on its own. On the supernatural side, the creature design is nothing new, in fact it looks straight out of Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) and his own Hellboy (2004), but it acts like something we haven’t seen before. We never see this kind of creature walking on all fours like a chimpanzee, and that’s something most filmmakers wouldn’t think of. But del Toro also brings his sensibilities and flair to the human world’s aesthetic. Every set looks distinctly his, from Elisa’s apartment to the lab where she works, to even the bakery she and her neighbor Giles (Richard Jenkins) visit in one scene early in the film. The lighting also blends the natural with the supernatural in those scenes where the fish man isn’t present, creating that feeling that there’s always more around us than what we can process.
Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine) silently waits for her date in The Shape of Water.
This is also the best cast of del Toro’s films, and they all deliver. One of the signs of a truly great performance is when you stop seeing the actor and start to see someone you know. Sally Hawkins accomplishes that in the first five minutes of this film, and barely makes a sound throughout its entire runtime. Since her character is mute, she has to force people to just look at her when she’s trying to communicate with them, and you can clearly see the frustration that causes for her. This also allows her to be more relaxed during her scenes with the fish man, who “doesn’t know how [she] is incomplete”, but willingly learns communication from her anyway. And all throughout, you hear a voice struggling to break free from its cage, which sorta contributes to a payoff that I could spoil for you, but I guarantee you wouldn’t believe me if I did.
Octavia Spencer (The Help) and Sally Hawkins marvel at their co-star in The Shape of Water.
The rest of the cast is also great, particularly Richard Jenkins (The Visitor) and Octavia Spencer, but they all benefit from a great screenplay by del Toro and Vanessa Taylor (Game of Thrones). The dialogue is structured in such a way that allows a myriad of messages to get across in every scene, but without pandering to the audience. Again, it’s a very simple story, and given the setting of the 1950s simple seems to be the way to go. But just like The Iron Giant (1999), it revels in its simplicity and uses that stage to build up the visual aesthetic. My only quibble with the film is that there are a couple moments when characters seem too accepting of what’s going on, but that could almost be justified by society at large not accepting most of these characters simply for who they are.
Doug Jones and Sally Hawkins in an iconic shot from The Shape of Water.
Even in a strong year for cinema, The Shape of Water would be considered one of the year’s best. In a weak year such as this, it might actually have a shot at winning a few Oscars, including Best Picture. Blending fantasy with reality thanks to a firm vision by Guillermo del Toro and a strong cast, this is sure to leave you in silence for the entire film.
James Franco (127 Hours) keeps all the water for himself in The Disaster Artist.
I did not hate it, it’s not true! It’s bullshit! I did not hate it! I did naht. Oh hai, reader. Today we talk about The Room (2003) and the mystery that it is and has spawned, particularly about its writer, producer, director, and star Tommy Wiseau. The film is widely considered one of the worst movies ever made, but has also accumulated a cult following of fans (of which I am one) who endlessly quote it, but we still want more. To this day, much of his life and past remains a mystery. Even when it’s been explored to great effect in The Disaster Artist, we still shout to the heavens, “YOU ARE TEARING ME APART, TOMMY WISEAU!!”
Dave (21 Jump Street) and James Franco pinky swear to be insane in The Disaster Artist.
The story stars James Franco as our mystery character, and also stars his brother Dave as Greg Sestero, the actor who played Mark opposite Wiseau’s Johnny in The Room. The Disaster Artist follows their friendship as they meet in an acting class and move to Los Angeles to pursue careers in acting by appealing to agents and producers. They betrayed them, they didn’t keep their promise, they tricked them, and they don’t care anymore. So they finally decide to make their own movie to give themselves starring roles, that would eventually become The Room. What a story, Mark.
Not sure if James Franco or Tommy Wiseau is behind the camera in The Disaster Artist.
Tommy Wiseau was very dedicated to his vision in making his movie, and now so is director/star James Franco in making this movie. Starring as Tommy Wiseau, Franco goes all in with the hair and the accent that nobody has been able to quite place an origin for. He sheds light on the person, portraying him as still human despite being about as far outside the norm as outsiders can be. Even though we all make fun of him in real life and while watching this movie, you also empathize with the dreamer who wants to make his mark on the world. Just give Franco the Oscar now, because his dedication to this character and production gives us one of his best performances, and it shows even further through his recreation of several iconic scenes from Wiseau’s magnum opus (you can see those here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8HF_aUroS4). I just like to watch those guys.
From left-to-right: Seth Rogen, Dave Franco, and Paul Scheer in The Disaster Artist.
But despite Wiseau being very humanized for this film, he’s still very much a weirdo who just is without even trying, or no matter how hard he tries to be the opposite. So it makes sense to make this film a comedy. And thank God because this is freakin’ hilarious! Not just the scenes that show the infamous production of The Room, but even more so the build-up to that point. The chemistry between the Franco brothers helps out a lot here, since that paves the way for many of the biggest laughs, and even some easter eggs about the origins of many of the funny bits that made it into The Room.
From left-to-right: Dave Franco, James Franco, celebrity guest star Bryan Cranston, and Alison Brie on the set of The Disaster Artist.
If I had to pick one criticism, it would be the romance between Greg Sestero and Amber, of whom I’m not sure is a real person or not. It felt like a plot device inserted for the sole purpose of driving a wedge between Greg and Tommy or fueling some of Tommy’s more erratic behavior. That would be fine, but the problem is that Dave Franco and Alison Brie (The Post) don’t have any chemistry together, nor are they given an adequate amount of time to develop any amount of chemistry. If a lot of people love each other, the world would be a better place to live. But you don’t always need to show that in your movie. On the flip-side, the lack of time dedicated to the romance does keep this from being a huge problem. It’s just a plotline that’s there and goes nowhere. I got the results of the test back. I definitely have breast cancer.
The crew applauds a “perfect” take in The Disaster Artist.
If the weather permits you to drive to the theater, I encourage you to see The Disaster Artist immediately. If not, watch The Room first, and then go watch The Disaster Artist. It doesn’t matter. You will laugh and cry and have a good time, just don’t hurt each other. Anyway, how is your sex life?
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