Tag: movies

Movie review: Fences, based on August Wilson’s play

Denzel Washington and Viola Davis were Tony winners in the 2010 Broadway version of Fences.

The movie Fences is quite extraordinary. Some critics said it may be the best self-directed film ever, with Denzel Washington as not only star and director, but producer as well.

Troy Maxson (Washington), a garbage collector in 1950s Pittsburgh, who had dreams, and arguably the talent, to have been a major league baseball player, had integration in the sport come sooner. His wife Rose (the magnificent Viola Davis) tries to keep him and their working-class family ship afloat.

Fences is an adaptation of August Wilson’s Pulitzer-and-Tony-award-winning play. James Earl Jones and Mary Alice also won Tonys in the 1987-1998 Broadway production. Washington and Davis were Tony winners in the 2010 Broadway version which also won the award for best revival of a play.

Interesting video comparison between Jones’ and Washington’s performances here or here. Jones’ reading is sterner, while Denzel’s reading is garnering laughs.

I had seen a production of Fences at Capital Rep in Albany during the 1990-91 season with John Amos (Good Times, Roots) in the lead role, and that iteration, as I dimly recall, seemed less intense early on.

Denzel in the movie, though, is as ferocious as James Earl Jones was on the stage; that scene does not garner guffaws. Is it the different media, or six years that have passed that got him to revisit the character, or both, I can’t say. But what it does do is make the chinks in his armor even more profound.

The rest of the cast of Fences, the movie, is also strong. Stephen McKinley Henderson as Troy’s good friend Jim Bono, Jovan Adepo as Troy’s younger son Cory, Russell Hornsby as his grown son Lyons, and Mykelti Williamson as his brother Gabriel creates a fine ensemble.

I knew fellows like Troy Maxson and his friends growing up, mostly the men of the church where I grew up. It stirred some strong emotions throughout. There’s a bit of my father there, for sure.

The Wife and I saw Fences on Martin Luther King’s actual birthday, naturally at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany. The less you know going in, the better. Recommended.

Movie review: Lion – A Long Way Home

The director of LION, Garth Davis, in his feature debut, used the animated film WALL-E as part of his template.

The story in the 2016 movie Lion, based on the non-fiction book A Long Way Home, with a screenplay by Luke Davies, is harrowing, even before the event that catapults the plot. Saroo (the amazing young Sunny Pawar) and his older brother Guddu (Abhisek Bharate) sneak onto trains, steal coal, then jump off the moving transport to exchange it for milk. Their mother Kamla, (Priyanka Bose) does menial tasks as well.

The boys arrive at a train station to look for recoverable items. Saroo loses track of his brother, and boards a train which departs the station. Saroo cannot get off until he arrives in Calcutta, hundreds of miles away, where almost everyone speaks Bengali, but he does not. Saroo somehow survives on the streets until he ends up in an orphanage.

He gets adopted by an Australian couple, Sue (Nicole Kidman) and John (David Wenham), who lives in Tasmania, and a year later they adopt another boy, Mantosh (Keshav Jadhav).

Twenty years later, Saroo (Dev Patel) heads to Melbourne and meets some new friends – Saroo Lucy (Rooney Mara), Prama (Pallavi Sharda), Bharat (Sachin Joab), Sami (Arka Das), and Annika (Emilie Cocquerel). “As they dine on Indian food, Saroo heads into the kitchen and observes things that cause him to reminisce about his childhood. He confides in his friends that he was adopted and Prama advises Saroo to use Google Earth to search for his hometown.”

All of this is rather well documented in the trailer, or in the description of the book, so it is in the TELLING of the story that makes the movie work. And it does. It’s a feel-good story about a most improbable journey of Saroo Brierley’s real life.

Yet I was far more engaged in the first, harrowing, half of the tale, than the somewhat overwrought second act. Maybe it’s that it’s inherently more interesting. There’s a lot less dialogue early on, and that works in the film’s favor. The director, Garth Davis in his feature debut, used the animated film WALL-E as part of his template.

Still, the last pictures on the screen are real tearjerkers, well earned, and I’m glad to have seen it. Incidentally, the title of the film does not show up in the opening credits, only at the end, when it is explained.

Of course, the Wife and I saw Lion at the Spectrum in Albany, because that’s just what we do in January.

Movie musical review: La La Land

The La La Land cast watched the MGM film Singin’ in the Rain every day for inspiration.

I really liked the movie La La Land, which the Wife, the Daughter and I saw in late December 2016 at the Spectrum in ALB. The opening credits promised CinemaScope! – I didn’t adequately explain to the Daughter why that made me laugh.

The opening number during a Los Angeles freeway traffic jam I enjoyed – I thought it was a hoot – and it was the most standard musical piece in the bunch. A smattering of the audience applauded. The choreographer was Mandy Moore, not the singer.

In the traffic snarl, Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), nightclub keyboardist who aspires to play good jazz, and Mia (Emma Stone), a barista/would-be actress, meet not so cute, but they keep showing up in each other’s orbit. They eventually get together, but they both have dreams that might tear them apart.

One of the complaints – Ken Levine makes it, e.g., – is that Gosling and Stone can’t sing. I’ll grant you they don’t have traditionally big musical theater voices, but they are, at worst, serviceable, and are absolutely correct for this story. Gosling, who has a singing background, learned to play piano for the role, and he and Stone both learned dancing.

The tension in the third act is required to avoid a pat conclusion. There’s a song near the end – I think it’s called Audition – and I was surprised to discover a tear running from my eye. The ending is a satisfying payoff.

La La Land looked fabulous. The art direction and the cinematography were spectacular. The film was written and directed by Damien Chazelle, who did the same on 2014’s Whiplash; that movie’s Oscar winner, J.K. Simmons, plays a bit part here.

John Legend also stars as a musician from Sebastian’s past is in the film, and HE learned how to play guitar for the role. There is some fine jazz in this film as it veers away from the traditional musical. It would be easy to predict a number of Oscar nominations for this wonderful picture.

One of the snarkier reviews suggested that it was “a well-intended tribute to the fabulous MGM musicals of the great Vincente Minnelli, made by people who have never seen one. I don’t know about the Minnelli pics, but Gosling claimed the cast watched the MGM film Singin’ in the Rain every day for inspiration, and he spoke fondly of the late Debbie Reynolds.

One last thing – I swear La La Land received a PG-13 rating, rather than PG, for the use of a single f-bomb.

Disney movie review: Moana

I could have just used Ken Levine’s review and edited it down.

The family attended a Sunday matinee of the new Disney movie Moana.  It was showing several places, but we will always opt for our favored venue, the Spectrum 8 in Albany.

I noted that it reviewed well. After I saw it, I was struggling with my feelings about it. I’ve pushed back against the reductivist that all the Disney princesses are, ethnicity aside, largely clones of each other.

The good:
This movie, fortunately, avoided even a hint of romance
Use of an original tale from Polynesian mythology
The opening, which I found fascinating
A very specific bit of girl power/rebellion that I rather enjoyed
Some funny coconut villains, although they reminded me of certain little characters in a Star Wars movie
A couple of good songs, including one by a villain, called Shiny – I LOVE the Disney villain songs – and You’re Welcome sung by The Rock Dwayne Johnson as the demigod Maui, who is not bad in the role
Maui’s tattoos, which may be my favorite character
The post-credit scene was funny

The not-so-good:
Why do the two main characters, both have names that start with M, Moana, and Maui? Maybe it’s authentic, but it was confusing to some
Someone has studied just how alike almost all of the Disney princesses are, the girl in Brave excepted, with the same large eyes
The character that dies (doesn’t that ALWAYS happen?) reminds me of that wise tree in Pocahontas
A stupid animal that specifically reminded me of the none-too-bright creature in Finding Dory
Most of the other songs, co-written by Lin-Manuel Miranda of Hamilton fame, were OK, but I don’t much remember them – here they are
The story resolution reminded me of another Disney short

Actually, I could have just used Ken Levine’s review and edited it down.

Auli’i Cravalho is quite good as Moana, and the other voice actors were fine. It looks good like a decent Disney movie should, and maybe I shouldn’t state that as a given. In fact, the water scenes look GREAT.

But this is the most damning bit: The Daughter asked The Wife to check the time. I told The Wife that I thought the movie was nice but inessential, and she agreed.

If you’ve never seen a Disney film, you will be in awe of this. If you have seen several, and I have, you’ll likely enjoy it well enough, even as you may have a sense of deja vu. Or maybe, like SamuraiFrog, you’ll really enjoy it.

The preceding seven-minute short, Inner Workings, addresses how the body parts – the heart, the stomach – rebel against the responsible man’s brain. Man just wants to have fun v. do the responsible thing.

It reminded me a little of Inside Out with its internal struggle. It was pleasant, but I wasn’t drawn in as much as other Disney shorts. I liked it well enough, especially the ending, which actually happens in the closing credits. Here’s the Inner Workings trailer.

Movie review: Moonlight, from Barry Jenkins

The adult THINKS he’s figured out his path.

I didn’t notice until after The Wife and I saw the movie Moonlight at the Spectrum. The poster for the film is a triptych, as was the movie itself. Moonlight is billed as a “coming-of-age story,” with three distinct, but related, tales.

In the first portion, Little, the black youth (Alex Hibbert) is living in a down-and-out section of Miami. He’s constantly running from the bullies, who pick on him, though he really doesn’t understand why. Little is living with his single mom, Paula (Naomie Harris), a drug addict. He has but one friend, Kevin (Jaden Piner), and falls under the influence of a neighborhood drug dealer named Juan (Mahershala Ali) and Juan’s girlfriend Teresa (Janelle Monáe).

The second segment is Chiron, where the 16-year-old (Ashton Sanders) continues to deal with his difficult life. The third part is Black, the adult (Trevante Rhodes) who thinks he’s figured out his path. The movie also stars Duan Sanderson, Jharrel Jerome, and André Holland in these segments. Despite the three lead actors over time, the narrative does NOT feel episodic.

The movie is adapted from Tarell Alvin McCraney’s play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue by screenwriter and director Barry Jenkins. It was filmed in the Liberty City section of Miami, where Jenkins grew up.

As Steven Rea of the Philadelphia Inquirer writes, “‘Moonlight’ is and isn’t a story of Jenkins’ life. Like Chiron’s mother in the film, Jenkins’ mother was an addict. Like Chiron’s father in the film, Jenkins’ father was nowhere to be seen. But it is McCraney, the Miami-born and -raised playwright, whose sexuality is reflected in Chiron.”

Moonlight is a well-regarded film. Brian Tallerico writes in rogerebert.com, “‘Moonlight’ is a film that is both lyrical and deeply grounded in its character work, a balancing act that’s breathtaking to behold.” While you may have seen elements of this story in other films, in its totality, it’s unlike any movie I’ve seen.

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