Monthly Archives: December 2022

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On With the Show

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Empire of Light

by Hope Madden and George Wolf

There are certain actors – you know the ones – who seem to put out a film every year right at awards season. The people who somehow never have a straight-to-VOD indie or a summer romp, just yearly Oscar vehicles.

For at least one of these people it is a welcome return visit, year after year.

Hello, Olivia Colman.

Seriously, is there anyone who does not love her? Any filmmaker, any actor, any moviegoer? Her performances are shamelessly, giddily human, authentic to a chilling degree. Her force of nature in Sam Mendes’s ode to the cinema, Empire of Light, is no different.

Mendes’s 2019 epic 1917 showed him a master of pacing, understated emotion and visceral thrill. Back in 2012, he made an almost Shakespearean Bond film, easily the strongest in the entire franchise with Skyfall. For Empire of Light, the filmmaker ­– who also wrote the script ­ – returns to the more sentimental content of his earlier career.

Colman is Hilary, the troubled, often melancholy manager of a coastal England cinema in the very early 1980s. A wonderful supporting cast – from the kindly Toby Jones to the prickly Colin Firth, the tender Michael Ward to surprising Tom Brooke ­– surrounds Colman with sparring partners up to the challenge.

Mendes’s tale, at its heart, revels not just in the magic of the movies, but of the movie house itself. Most of the patrons seem to come to the screenings alone, looking to escape the loneliness, the mundane, or the rising tide of extremism right outside those glass doors.

And though the crowds aren’t as large as they once were, the theater still has something to offer – as does Hilary. Her dutiful existence is shaken by the younger Stephen (Ward, outstanding) joining the crew, and together they start exploring some forgotten areas of the once majestic cinema.

The metaphor isn’t subtle, and the film’s tone is overtly nostalgic, but because Colman’s character is anything but typical, Mendes punctures his own sentimentality before it can become overbearing. Gorgeous framing from the great Roger Deakins doesn’t hurt, bathing it all in a grand beauty that reinforces what power can come from that certain beam of light.

The pandemic has drawn out no shortage of filmmakers who’ve been understandably inspired to assess their life’s work. With Empire of Light, Mendes is wearing his heart on his cupholder, imploring us to value what the theater has to offer.

This film can offer the exquisite Colman and a stellar ensemble, and that’s just enough. Through them, Mendes finds impact in his sweetness, rising above the moments that seem engineered for an ad that runs right before the one telling you not to talk or text.

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And the Tissue Goes To

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Spoiler Alert

by Hope Madden

In 2017, Michael Showalter directed the best romantic comedy of the modern age, The Big Sick. So, even though the majority of his filmography feels like a near miss – The Eyes of Tammy Faye, The Lovebirds, Hello My Name Is Doris – whatever he delivers, I want to open. Even an avowed tear-jerker, even the same week I see The Whale. I loved The Big Sick so much, I gladly signed up for two public displays of bawling.

And yet…

Spoiler Alert is Michael Ausiello’s (Jim Parsons) true tale of romance, loss and sitcom love. A TV Guide writer, Michael tended to look back on his tragic childhood as if it were an 80s sitcom, replete with life lessons and a laugh track.

Showalter stages these moments like they are right out of Gimme a Break or any of that era’s centrally located couch-and-hijinks programs. They stand out, not because they’re clever or funny, but because they don’t fit in a film that is otherwise a tender if traditionally structured tragedy.

The socially awkward Ausiello meets and quickly falls for gorgeous, fun-loving Kit Cowan (Ben Aldridge). This ushers us into the sweet and odd moments (Ausiello has an extreme Smurf collection) that mark the couple’s development.

Showalter works from Dan Savage and David Marshall Grant’s adaptation of Ausiello’s book. The writers have primarily done TV – a medium clearly suited to Parsons. And here’s where the film really stumbles. Spoiler Alert is, of course, not a TV show and only feels like a TV show on occasions that pull you out of an emotional moment. Rather than creating a narrative thread or even an interesting gimmick, the TV angle distracts – sometimes quite frustratingly – from what otherwise feels like a very honest and necessary look at love.

Showalter alum and all-American gem Sally Field brings needed authenticity to the film, and Aldridge often excels as the hot Oscar to Parsons’s Felix. Plus, the sometimes frank sexuality is more than welcome.

But none of it fits. The framework – Ausiello delivering his life story as if he’s recounting a favorite TV show – is distracting at best. It robs the film of its passion and guarantees the feeling of inauthenticity. It has its moments, but it never delivers any honest laughter or tears.

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Bulletproof

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2nd Chance

by Tori Hanes

Impurity, hate, forgiveness, rebirth. The repeated image of a man shooting himself in the gut may not seem like the ideal piece of media to use to examine these heavy themes, but 2nd Chance by Ramin Bahrani proves time and again that face value has no place in its 90 minutes.

2nd Chance delves into brazen shock value. At first, this feels cheap and unwarranted. The image of a man repeatedly shooting himself in his bulletproof vest, grimacing, then firing at undeserving coke bottles leaves a bitter taste on the tongue. 

It becomes apparent, however, that this is not shock for shock value. Instead, this is the jaw-dropping life that Richard Davis has led for the past 70 or so years. If anything, Bahrani’s mission is to make Davis’s massive eccentricity somewhat digestible and justifiable.

It doesn’t take much to revel in Davis’s contradictions: his passionate drive toward realizing the American dream makes him familiar, yet his twisted morals pose him as alien.

The structure we’ve come to know and expect with modern-day documentaries is, in a word, boring. 2nd Chance does little to stray from the usual twists and calculated catharsis of others in its genre. Where it differs and excels is in the conscious effort to avoid making the filmmaker an important character. While many documentarians crave that command, inserting themselves into the narrative, Bahrani takes a diligent backseat. He acts as a firekeeper, poking the embers to evoke flames while distancing himself from the heat. 

The film portrays Davis’s flip from eccentric business mogul to undoubtedly narcissistic sociopath. However, Bahrani gracefully captures Davis authentically in his moments of shortcoming. This light touch becomes especially gratifying as the largely unredeemable Davis himself twists that sympathy toward hatred. 

Among the twists and turns, Bahrani brings forth some of the most genuine moments of human catharsis perhaps ever shown on screen. The contradiction these moments deliver takes the film from intriguing to masterful.

You may not expect the inventor of bulletproof vests to deepen your connection to humanity. 2nd Chance delights in flipping your expectations and pulling the trigger, whether you’re protected or not.

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Please Stand Up

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I Am DB Cooper

by Rachel Willis

Writer/director T.J. Regan’s part-documentary, part-scripted drama examines the account of a man who claims to be infamous plane hijacker D.B. Cooper. Co-written with Sharmila Sahni, I Am DB Cooper, is another entry into the mystery surrounding the November 24, 1971 hijacking of Flight 305.

The film introduces Rodney Bonnifield, a career criminal who fills in details of the hijacking that supposedly only the perpetrator would know. Outfitted with a parachute, and carrying $200,000 dollars of ransom money, Cooper jumped into the night.

There is speculation that Cooper didn’t survive the jump. But there are those who don’t accept this, and Bonnifield makes the case that he is Cooper.

Enhancing the story with a scripted drama, Regan treats the audience to a visual retelling rather than limiting the story to interviews. While the film is composed primarily of documentary footage, the interspersed drama adds tension.

Ryan Cory plays Cooper of the 1970s. His charismatic and slightly sinister portrayal lends the film needed gravitas.

The parts of the film that don’t quite work are the actor-portrayed interviews with Bonnifield’s friends and family. It’s unclear if these are the words of real people or if they’re scripted pieces of Bonnifield’s story. This lack of clarity leads to questions about authenticity.

The dramatized moments add humor to a situation that’s not really funny at all. This is clearly the intention, helping to lighten the overall mood.

News footage from the time of the hijacking, including when a young boy uncovered $5,800 dollars of the stolen $200,000, adds depth to a history that contemporary viewers might not know.

However, sections of Regan’s film don’t quite fit with the scripted drama. The film takes Bonnefield beyond the hijacking into a relationship with singer Rita Coolidge (played here by Rainee Blake). If this addition is meant to cast doubt on Bonnifield’s story it isn’t really necessary. There are other reasons to wonder if the story is true. Talking with the actual singer/songwriter, though, would have been a fascinating and telling choice.

But the crux of Bonnifield’s story is that he claims he knows where the money is buried. Raising new questions and bringing a quaintness to the story of DB Cooper, Regan’s docudrama adds a new side to the original question: Who is DB Cooper?

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Trope-ic Thunder

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Black Warrant

by Daniel Baldwin

What do you get when you make an action film that combines Tom Berenger, Cam Gigandet, the director of The Gate, and a story by actor Michael Pare? You get an undercooked terrorism-themed actioner. You get Black Warrant.

The story follows two leads: Nick (Berenger) and Anthony (Gigandet). Nick is a long-since-retired CIA assassin that’s been pulled back into the field to take out three high-profile targets in Tijuana, Mexico. Anthony is a seasoned DEA agent following a trail of breadcrumbs toward the same sinister folks in the wake of a bust gone bad.

If you’re thinking the two are eventually going to come together to take out their mutual enemies, you’re right. If you’re thinking that the film also holds a really big & silly twist, you’re also right. This is bog-standard, trope-filled stuff that is content to never rock the boat throughout on a narrative level. You’ve seen this before and you’ve seen it done better.

The good news is that, even after 20 years of working in DTV action, Tom Berenger still isn’t phoning it in. He gives Nick doses of humanity that you don’t often see in films of this type. He manages to be charming enough in the role that one doesn’t mind as much that he’s clearly too old to be playing it. One would assume that an earlier version of the project was meant to star the aforementioned Pare instead. Given that he’s a decade younger than Berenger, he might have been a better fit on an action level, although perhaps not a performance one.

Gigandet is equally engaging as Anthony, giving the film another performance that it doesn’t really deserve. The movie also gets an extra bit of swagger in the form of a cameoing Jeff Fahey. The cherry on top, however, is Helena Haro as female lead Mina. A chef pulled into the middle of all of this insanity, she is the shining beacon of light at the center of this otherwise lackluster affair. Haro is beaming with excitement and charm in almost every scene. She’s a breath of fresh air and her chemistry with Gigandet somehow manages to make their poorly-sketched romance work.

If it weren’t for the cast, the writing and pacing issues would utterly sink this. Black Warrant may not be a terrible film, but everyone involved has done better work elsewhere. DTV action die hards might find things to like, but all others should steer clear.

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Cruel Yule

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Violent Night

by George Wolf

Maybe director Tommy Wirkola was kicking back with writers Pat Casey and John Miller one night, arguing about whether Die Hard was a Christmas movie. A few cold pops later, they’d swapped out John McClane for Santa Claus, added Die Hard 2 and Home Alone to the guest list, and Violent Night was born.

David Harbour is a hoot as a hard drinking Claus who’s not very jolly anymore. Kids are all greedy “little shits” these days, nobody believes, and maybe it’s time to hang up the sleigh.

But when he’s dropping off toys for bona fide nice list member Trudy Lightstone (Leah Brady, a cutie) on Christmas Eve, Santa becomes the monkey in the wrench.

Trudy’s grandmother Gertrude (Beverly D’Angelo, nice to see you) is obscenely wealthy, so the evil “Scrooge” (John Leguizamo) and his gang have invaded the festivities at the Lightstone compound. They want the millions hiding in the family vault, but they hadn’t planned on a red-suited party crasher and a little kid’s booby traps.

Santa’s not barefoot, but Wirkola (the Dead Snow films) and the Casey/Miller team (The Sonic the Hedgehog films) are not shy about re-creating sequences straight from the Die Hards and Home Alone. They do at least name check both films, and once the season’s beatings begin the film takes on a self-aware, R-rated vibe that’s plenty of ornery fun.

But what Trudy wants most this year is for her Mom (Alexis Louder, so good in Copshop) and Dad (Alex Hassell, The Tragedy of Macbeth) to get back together, and Violent Night can’t help undercutting its subversive streak with a nice, safe glass of milk and cookies.

The film backs away just when it could have been decking the halls with some raunchy hilarity, and that’s disappointing. This Santa likes his snacks with some “pre-War” brandy, and his hammers of the sledge variety. And when Violent Night is reaching into that brand new blood-soaked bag, it’s boughs of whiplash smiles.

The Screening Room

Screening Room: Violent Night, Eternal Daughter, The Inspection, A Wounded Fawn, Salvatore & More

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Violent Night, The Eternal Daughter, The Inspection, Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams, Nanny, The Harbinger, Amigo, A Wounded Fawn, Hunt, Four Samosas

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Lonely in Your Nightmare

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The Harbinger

by Hope Madden

What Andy Mitton’s The Harbinger does well is remind you how desperate the early days of lockdown were. How scary. How lonely. This was especially true for anyone quarantining alone. It must have felt like the world would just go on without you. You’d be forgotten entirely.

Mavis (Emily Davis) is alone, and she is not taking to lockdown well. Her dreams are terrifying and almost unending. When Mavis falls asleep, she doesn’t wake up, sometimes for days, trapped the entire time in a horrifying nightmare. Her friend Mo (Gabby Beans) leaves the comfort and relative safety of the home she shares with her father and brother because Mavis has no one else to call.

Mitton’s film combines collective trauma with existential dread, mirroring the kind of terror that caves in on you when you don’t work, don’t leave home, and fear everything: surfaces, people, the air in your building. It’s a true nightmare, and one you can’t wake up from.

The isolation, the stench of death, it all inspired any number of horror films. Mitton animates that collective ordeal as effectively as anyone working in the genre. He marries the graphic reality of the pandemic with an internal descent, reflecting more than a society’s fear of death. What he sees is the way lockdown, hivemind, misinformation and isolation made people forget who they were.

Davis delivers a solid turn as one wearied to the point of death by quarantine, but it’s Beans’s resilient, naturalistic performance that grounds the unreality in uneasy truth. Mitton’s script sometimes relies on tropes that feel too obvious for his unusual story, and in the end, it’s an overreliance on genre mechanisms that keeps the film from really cutting free from expectations and saying something truly fresh.

But there’s no question he hits a nerve because very few changes need to be made to the reality of 2020 for it to be a nerve-wracking horror show.