Tag: reviews

Movie review: The Brutalist

Adrien Brody

The Brutalist was the last of the Best Picture films still playing at the Spectrum Theatre that I had not seen. So, I attended the 12:15 matinee with eight others during the week before the Oscars. (There was no way I would see a three-and-a-half-hour movie at 6:50 p.m.) 

I really liked the opening and closing credits, which had the stationary text with the camera’s focus moving.

The first part was “The Enigma of Arrival,” a fictional account of a Hungarian immigrant named László Tóth (Adrien Brody) who comes to the United States.  He stays with a cousin from back home (Alessandro Nivola) who has Americanized himself. That works for a while until a seeming debacle.

Ultimately, though, he gets a commission from American tycoon Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce), who discovers Tóth’s genius. His beloved wife Erzsébet (Felicity Jones) finally joins him, unlike when he last saw her. 

I appreciated the intense portrayal of the immigrant experience, including their credentials from their previous country that were not applicable in the US. The movie showed how people can be marginalized and fall into traps of drugs and other problems because of their difficult situations.

Let’s take a break

Then there was a 15-minute intermission. I haven’t been to a movie with an intermission since Reds in 1981, and like that film, I thought the first half of the movie was far more substantial than the second. 

Even some critics who liked the film, 93% positive on Rotten Tomatoes, noted that “The Hardcore of Beauty 1953–1960” was a lesser part. “If The Brutalist stopped after the intermission, it would be a near-perfect film, an immigrant story in the vein of The Godfather Part II”. Russ Simmons of Kansas City radio station: “The film’s second half meanders and leaves us with dangling plot threads.”

A negative review by Brian Viner (Daily Mail UK): “There are many impressive things about this film, not least the acting, but for me it too often loses its narrative grip in the second act, veering off on tangents that feel unnecessary, distracting and self-indulgent.” Audiences were 80% positive. 

Afterwards, another patron asked me what I thought of the film.  I said I liked it but didn’t love it. He had been in situations where he was an artist with a patron, and he saw first-hand how the patron could try to take over the artist’s whole life, which he related to immensely. I can see that.

Movie review: Sing Sing

Unlocked

Since I saw the trailer months ago, I’ve been eager to see the movie Sing Sing. “Divine G (Colman Domingo), imprisoned at Sing Sing for a crime he didn’t commit, finds purpose by acting in a theatre group alongside other incarcerated men in this story of resilience, humanity, and the transformative power of art.” My wife and I attended a Monday night showing at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany.

From RogerEbert.com: “Writer-director Greg Kwedar and his script partner Clint Bentley developed the project after buying the rights to the 2005 Esquire article ‘The Sing Sing Follies,’ by John H. Richardson. But they didn’t just shrink-wrap a true story in Hollywood cliches. They did what good journalists would do and re-reported the entire thing by interviewing people from the story as well as various participants in the Sing Sing correctional facility’s theater program.”

Acting!

One interview of the directors of Ghostlight [a movie I highly recommend] and Sing Sing on their cinematic explorations of empathy via theater notes: “{Sing Sing] revolves around an original production called Breaking the Mummy’s Code, most closely following founding member John ‘Divine G’ Whitfield (Domingo) as he prepares for an upcoming clemency hearing. Divine G soon finds himself challenged, then befriended by newbie Clarence ‘Divine Eye’ Maclin (as himself), a lone wolf selling drugs who can intimidate someone in the yard one minute, then casually quote King Lear the next.” Mummy’s Code, BTW, is a wildly fascinating production, evoking, among others, Robin Hood, Freddy Krueger, Hamlet, and a Roman citizen.

The movie had the opportunity to be a canned feel-good story, but it didn’t because of the persona of the Domingo character and verisimilitude of the theater director (Paul Raci from Sound Of Metal); Divine Eye (Maclin), a newbie would-be actor in the play; and the other actors.

RTA

Hmm. Maclin’s IMDb includes Unlocked: The Power of the Arts in Prison, which “captures the unsparingly honest stories of formerly incarcerated men and women who participated in RTA’s prison arts program. The film offers a different model for criminal justice, emphasizing life skills that lead to success after prison.”

What is RTA? Rehabilitation Through the Arts. “RTA helps people in prison develop critical life skills through the arts, modeling an approach to the justice system based on human dignity rather than punishment.” Oh and here’s the Unlocked short film, which features Maclin and others I recognized from the movie Sing Sing! 

“Founded at Sing Sing Correctional Facility in 1996, RTA has provided arts-based workshops to thousands of incarcerated men and women, transforming lives and breaking the cycle of incarceration with proven results: less than 3% of RTA members return to prison, compared to 60% nationally. To learn more about our work, ask questions, or provide support, please contact us.”

The fact that this is based on a true story – clips from the original Breaking the Mummy’s Code shows up in the end credits – makes this even more compelling.

Rotten Tomatoes gives it a 98% positive rating with critics, 93% with audiences. One of the three negative critics’ takes misses the point completely: “The story itself presents a flawed notion of ‘serving time’ and becoming ‘reformed’ as a result of incarceration without unpacking the institutional violence that lands Black men behind bars at a disproportionate rate.” It’s just not THAT movie. The one that it is suffices.

Mac-Haydn: Next To Normal, The Full Monty

THEATRE!

Mac-HaydnIn this review of Next To Normal, Marc Savitt of Broadway World describes the wonder that is a local theater that he’s been to.

“Tucked away in the town of Chatham, NY, The Mac-Haydn Theatre has been producing regional productions of Broadway Musicals for over 50 years. The theatre was founded in part to preserve musical theatre as the one individually American theatre form…

“Mac-Haydn truly is a ‘hidden-gem’ that presents a series of 8-10 productions each summer. Strolling between the wooden buildings on the campus, I have often thought of it as a sort of hybrid that would occur if you combined summer camp with summer-stock. They do great work, and the program attracts seasoned professionals, and up-and-coming performers, along with newbies often young and from the local area. Readers may be slightly aware of one such youngster named Joe then. He is now better known as Nathan Lane.”

My family has been attending shows there for over a dozen years, though not during the worst of COVID. This summer, we saw four shows, A Chorus Line in June, Urinetown in July (mentioned here), Next To Normal, and The Full Monty in August.

What IS normal, anyway?

I knew next to nothing about Next To Normal, which was likely true of the theater-going public in the area where this was the regional premiere. The audience was about 40% smaller than most shows I have seen there.

I had heard about Brian Yorkey and Tom Kitt’s work because I tend to watch the Tonys. “It is considered a ‘rock musical’ the likes of Superstar or RENT.” Per Wikipedia, “The musical addresses grief, depression, suicide, drug abuse, ethics in modern psychiatry, and the underbelly of suburban life.”

The cast of six includes Beth Kirkpatrick is Diana, the “mother who struggles with worsening bipolar disorder and the effects that managing her illness has on her family.” Eric Van Tielen is her husband, Dan, trying to be supportive. They’ve both appeared on Broadway and are making their M-H debuts. They are excellent.

So is the rest of the cast, who are returning performers. Amber Mawande-Spytek as daughter Natalie, Kylan Ross as son Gabe, Andrew Burton Kelley as Natalie’s friend Henry, and Gabe Belyeu as Dr. Madden; he’s been at M-H off and on for at least a decade.

Next to Normal won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The reviewer noted: “Prepare yourself to be overwhelmed by the raw and exhilarating reality of what it means to care for yourself and one another.”

Unemployed in Buffalo

I saw the 1997 movie The Full Monty in a movie theater. “The film is set in Sheffield, England, during the 1990s and tells the story of six unemployed men, four of them former steel workers, who decide to form a male striptease act (à la the Chippendale dancers) to make some money.” The Rotten Tomatoes consensus reads, “Cheeky and infectiously good-natured, The Full Monty bares its big beating heart with a sly dose of ribald comedy.”

The 2000 musical Full Monty is a musical with the book by Terrence McNally and score by David Yazbek. “In this Americanized musical stage version…six unemployed Buffalo steelworkers” are in similar straits and decide on the same solution.

Jerry, who initiates the plan, is played by Xander James, who was back at M-H last year after a decade hiatus. Gabe Belyeu (Harold, the former factory foreman), Kylan Ross (Malcolm), and Andrew Burton Kelley (Ethan) also appear here. Tezz Yancey (Noah “Horse” Simmons) and Dean Marino (Jerry’s best friend Dave) are making their M-H debuts.

Holly Lauren Dayton (Pam, Jerry’s ex), Julia Hajjar (Georgie, Dave’s wife), and Erin Spears Ledford (Vicki, Harold’s wife) are strong, as are many of the other women.

Back in the spotlight

But the highlight is Monica Wemitt, who returns to the Mac-Haydn stage for the first time in three years, though working there behind the scenes as COVID compliance officer. Her Jeanette is “a perhaps second-rate, over-the-hill pianist who happens into the rehearsals and accompanies the gentlemen on their journey to show time. Jeanette is a no holds barred, tell ‘em what you think out loud, funny, self-deprecating bleach blonde with hair that is too big, even for the times, character.”

Despite being a ribald comedy, The Full Monty “also touches on serious subjects such as unemployment, fathers’ rights, depression, impotence, homosexuality, body image, working-class culture, and suicide.”

The Full Monty runs through September 4.

Documentary review: Ascension

Jessica Kingdon

I recently watched, on Paramount Plus, the documentary Ascension. The film shows that the people of China are also seeking their version of the American Dream.

Some of the workforce is enticed by factory jobs that may involve no standing, though other jobs require being upright. Lots of propaganda about being team players are sometimes administered harshly. The factory workers include women working on the exacting standards for sex dolls; make sure the color of the areola is right.

We see people training to serve the wealthy in their increasingly capitalistic country. Perhaps they would be servants in fancy homes that require fine dining; Downton Abbey was specifically namechecked. Or maybe they’ll become bodyguards, protecting their would-be employers from assassins.

There are lessons on how to smile, how to be positive that you’ll make lots of money. They too can become influencers. For good and for ill, today’s China is looking a lot like the United States.

Before I saw the film, I watched director Jessica Kingdon interviewed on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. He noted that there was no narration by someone trying to steer a particular point of view, which allowed the viewer to see the larger cultural shift.

Ascension is Oscar-nominated as one of the best documentary films of the past year. It’s a little slow in the beginning, but it proves to be a fascinating take on the economic rise of China.

Lynching Postcards

After I watched Ascension, Paramount Plus directed me to a short documentary Lynching Postcards: ‘Token of A Great Day’. Perhaps more unsettling than the lynchings of over 4,000 African Americans by white mobs were the public, festive occasions these murders became. Men, women, and children out having a picnic while watching a hanging and/or burning. The burnings were particularly popular in Texas.

These lynchings were commemorated through souvenir postcards. And people would send messages pointing themselves out in the crowd. ‘Hey, that’s me, third from the right” with the corpse hanging in the background.

One of the images from the film that caught my attention was The Dogwood Tree, a poem that begins
This is only the branch of a Dogwood tree;
An emblem of WHITE SUPREMACY.

The film is only about 15 minutes. Worthwhile.

Ragnarok, more MCU, Phase 3 films

save Asgard!

Thor.RagnarokI’ve now gotten to the part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe where the release dates and the chronology of the movies – or most of the films – diverge. And the various TV shows, none of which I ever saw save for a handful of SHIELD eps, fit in there as well. Fortunately, I’m going to mostly ignore those facts. The titles in italics I saw in July 2020.

Captain America: Civil War (2016). When I used to read comic books, the creative teams often developed fights among the superheroes. Sometimes it’d be a brief misunderstanding. Occasionally, it’d be a more elaborate brawl. Too often, though, the motivation seemed sketchy. Not here.

The Hero Registration Act, designed to limit the actions of superheroes, was embraced by Tony Stark/Iron Man, but Steve Rogers/Captain America balks. I found this film surprisingly emotional, especially with the big reveal. Why it’s a Captain America movie, I don’t know, since most of the combatants were Avengers, but whatever.

Doctor Strange (2016 ) -it was an origin that took too long to get going. And it felt formulaic. But I did like the weird dimensional stuff, walking on the sides of buildings.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017). Apparently, this takes place before Avengers: Age of Ultron, not that it particularly matters. Odd that despite the massive amount of comic book violence, the story was much more interesting to me than the first Guardians. Part of that is Kurt Russell as Ego, whose presence makes the Star-Lord character feel less of a Han Solo wannabe. I also like Sly Stallone’s appearance and the curious character of Mantis. And Baby Groot is cuter.

Heck, even when the music was too much on the nose – Fathers and Sons by Cat Stevens, really? – I found it touching. Speaking of music, it also featured my favorite Fleetwood Mac song ever, The Chain.

Dorky high school kid

Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) – There was a movie called The Birdman starring Michael Keaton as an actor pigeon-holed as someone who had played a superhero. I didn’t love it, though it reviewed well. Yet I projected that character onto his playing the Vulture in THIS movie, and it worked, especially his threat to Peter while the young man was on a date.

I’m starting to warm up to Tom Holland as this version of the web-slinger. His classmates are appealing, though incredibly patient with Peter. And while he’s hanging out with Tony Stark, he still feels like your friendly neighborhood dude.

Thor: Ragnarok (2017) – Despite the serious theme – save Asgard! – this turned out to be a very funny film, with great action to boot. Even Doctor Strange was fun in a cameo. Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) is as stubborn as the Thunder God. Hela (Cate Blanchette) appears invincible. The Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum) is very Goldblumesque. Did I mention the Hulk?

I take it that director Taika Waititi deserves some of the credit. Clearly, the best Thor film.

Black Panther (2018) – I saw it when it came out before I was aware of the events of Captain America: Civil War. This actually makes the accomplishments of this film more impressive. Because the real star of Black Panther is Wakanda itself.

Well, those last two Avengers films and a couple of others will have to wait until next time.

Ramblin' with Roger
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