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The Man Who Laughs

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Joker

by Hope Madden and George Wolf

Todd Phillips, director of the Hangover trilogy among other comedies, recently told Vanity Fair that he had to get out of comedy because woke culture made it impossible to be funny.

That sounds like a butthurt white guy nobody thinks is funny. Doesn’t that actually make him the perfect person to reimagine Joker?

Directing and co-writing with Scott Silver (The Fighter), Phillips offers an origin story that sees mental illness, childhood trauma, adult alienation and societal disregard as the ingredients that form a singular villain—a man who cannot come into his own until he embraces his inner sinister clown.

It’s a dangerous idea and a dangerous film, but that doesn’t make it a bad movie. In many respects—though not all—it is a great movie. This is partly thanks to an ambitious screenplay, Lawrence Sher’s intense cinematography, solid directorial instincts with some beautifully staged violence and constant (indeed, fanboy-esque) nods to Scorsese.

But let’s be honest, it’s mainly because Joaquin Phoenix is a god among actors. His scenes of transformation, his scenes alone, his mesmerizing command of physicality, and in particular his unerringly unnerving chemistry with other actors are haunting.

Phoenix is Arthur Fleck, (or Afleck, if you were giving points for Batman references) wannabe standup comic and put upon outcast in 1981 Gotham City. The garbage strike has everyone testy. Rich, entitled Thomas Wayne (Bruce’s dad) isn’t helping matters with his bid for the mayor’s office and his disdain for those who are struggling.

Since Phillips genuflects to both Taxi Driver and King of Comedy, it is appropriate that Robert DeNiro, with some snazzy new teeth, participates as Murray Franklin, the late night legend that Arthur and his mother (Frances Conroy) watch every night.

More than once, Phillips does not trust his audience to stay with the direction he’s taken, and it’s unfortunate. These “look what I’m doing here” scenes drag the film, but as long as you never take your eyes off Phoenix (and who could?), you’re not likely to notice.

A pivotal moment where Arthur crashes a posh screening of Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times is Phillips’s less-than-subtle reminder that it has always been the clowns in this world who reflect society’s reality back to us. It’s a wise move to make this an alienated-to-the-point-of-violence white guy who takes his frustrations out not on the powerless, but on those with power, thus becoming a kind of hero himself.

Of course, the inclusion of Chaplin could also be read as a direct admission that Joker is a comment on our modern times. Superhero universe? Fanatical throngs blindly following a sociopath? Checks out.

But similar to Phillips’s approach with War Dogs three years ago, an uneven tone lessens the intended impact. Alongside the straightforward Scorsese homages are left turns into Oliver Stone territory a la Natural Born Killers. That black comedic satire is a tough nut regardless, even more so if comes in fits and starts.

Credit Phillips for a damn the torpedoes vision that’s damn near palpable, but it’s impossible to imagine this all meshing as well as it does without Phoenix. His presence is completely transfixing, always convincing you that he is here to fulfill this legendary character’s destiny.

Remember when we thought Nicholson could never be topped? Then Ledger did it. And now Phoenix makes this the darkest, most in-the-moment Joker we’ve seen.

And it’s chilling.

So, Phillips succeeded in making an anti-comedy and anti-comic book movie because bro culture totally rules and comedy is dead and that’s not a privileged cop out at all. But then, it is possible to separate art and the artist.

We all still love Rosemary’s Baby, right?

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Snitches Get Stitches

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Low Tide

by George Wolf

If you’ve been waiting for the perfect time to pitch your idea of re-making The Town as a coming of age drama, too late.

Writer/director Kevin McMullin beat ya to it with his first feature Low Tide, a nifty debut that leans on plenty of heist tropes cleverly downsized for teenage conspirators.

Alan (Keean Johnson) and Peter (IT‘s Jaeden Martell) are New Jersey brothers with roots in the fishing district. Mom has passed on so while Dad’s away working a boat, Alan breaks into houses with his goofy friend Smitty (Daniel Zolghadri from Eighth Grade) and scary pal Red (Alex Neustaedter).

The gang ropes young Peter in for his first job as lookout, but somebody snitched. Sergeant Kent (the always reliable Shea Wigham) gives chase just as they’re leaving the latest B&E, and not everyone gets away.

Not everyone knows about the very valuable score some of the boys found in that house, either, which leads to plenty of suspicion among thieves.

Plus, one honest to goodness buried treasure.

McMullin blends his genres well, creating an ambiguous time stamp that can resonate with various demographics, and indulging in some noir fun without collapsing into full Bugsy Malone territory.

We’ve been watching the talented Martell grow up since his St.Vincent breakout five years ago, and his thoughtful turn as the smart, cautious Peter shows his transition into adult roles should be a smooth one. The kid’s just a natural.

And it’s not just Martell. There’s not a weak link in this ensemble, giving McMullin plenty of room to pursue his vision with inspired confidence.

If you’ve seen even a few heist dramas, the only things that may surprise you are the age of these bandits and how little you fault the film for its familiarity.

Attempting to define the moment when a young life chooses the path it will follow is not exactly a new idea. By wrapping his teen characters in recognizably adult archetypes, McMullin keeps the drama just a hair off-kilter, rewarding our continued investment.

As Sergeant Kent tells one of the boys, “This is your origin story. You gonna be the good guy, or the bad guy?”

Low Tide makes it fun finding out.

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Posse of One

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Wrinkles the Clown

by Hope Madden

It’s fun to scare kids.

Oh, wait, is that illegal?

Documentarian Michael Beach Nichols (Welcome to Leith) looks at just about every side of that unusual argument with his sly documentary Wrinkles the Clown.

Ostensibly, Beach Nichols digs into the story of the man behind Wrinkles, a shady older gentleman living in a van in Fort Myers who failed as a traditional clown, so he improvised. Placing stickers around town with his masked face, clown name and phone number, Wrinkles offered to frighten your misbehaving children for a fee.

Yes, it is sort of genius.

As we ride around the beach town for the aged in a lived-in conversion van, we’re privy to the voice mails recorded at the Wrinkles number. Reprobate that he seems to be, Wrinkles is still considerably less frightening than the parents hoping to take advantage of his behavioral services.

Says one father, his child wailing in the background, “I want you to eat her.”

Wrinkles’s response? “My favorite kind of scares are the ones that pay the most.”

This kind of dry, deadpan humor fuels a film that explores the most peculiar sociological experiment.

Who would call? How will their children react? Why are clowns so effing scary in the first place? A solid documentarian, Beach Nichols understands that these are the deeper questions to be addressed. Admittedly, continually flashing the image of a grampa-faced clown holding balloons and peeking into your sliding glass door late at night is his excellent way to keep your interest as he digs into these concerns.

We hear from folklorists (with still-packaged action figures mounted to their office walls, so  you know they’re legit), child psychologists, pro-Wrinkles parents, anti-Wrinkles parents and one traditional clown.

Poor Funky. “There’s a whole generation growing up with no positive image of a clown whatsoever,” he laments, happy face in place.

It’s a fascinating look at the function clowns have served since their medieval beginnings, as well as the internet’s way of amplifying folk tales.

And while Beach Nichols, like the great showmen, performs his own sleight of hand, the film itself is more interested in the primal, collective unconscious tapped by those Wrinkles wrinkles.

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Set a Course for Adventure

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Harpoon

by Hope Madden

There are a limited number of reasons people become and remain friends. Some of those reasons are just nonsense. And yet, three friends of dubious worth to one another gather to repeat their familiar patterns, which land them on a yacht for an apology daytrip.

Richard (Christopher Gray) —  brash, spoiled and quick to anger— is apologizing. Jonah (Munro Chambers – Turbo Kid!) —bruised and bloody—is probably too quick to forgive. Sasha (Emily Tyra) has plenty of reason to be tired of both boyfriend Richard and bestie Jonah.

The fact that Jonah and Sasha bring along Richard’s birthday gift clarifies how little anyone in this triangle has learned.

And so, Sasha, Jonah, Richard and Richard’s new harpoon set off on an unplanned, ill-advised, seafaring jaunt.

Drinks all around!

Co-writer/director Rob Grant keeps events snarky with a voice-of-God narration (assuming God’s a sailor) performed by a brilliantly deadpan Brett Gelman. As far as this nameless narrator who inexplicably sees all is concerned, the dangers facing this volatile threesome have less to do with their pathological history and more to do with the sailing omens they ignorantly flout.

Give an irrational drunk prone to fits of rage the gift of a pointy projectile weapon? Meh. But bring bananas on board—now that’s really pushing things.

The darkly silly commentary adds some tang to the friends’ foolhardy adventure, but Grant’s themes are not entirely comedic. He strands the trio at sea for days on end, their survival instincts overtaking their petty sniping as they find a new reason for friendship: the common good.

Grant offers a nice balance here between dark humor and genuine tension born of realistic performances. Chambers, Tyra and Gray offer frustratingly recognizable characters, the kind that make idiotic choices, less because it forwards the action of the script (although it does) and more because people are stupid and they fall into familiar roles.

The film makes more than a few convenient moves, but it packs a lot of surprises and showcases very solid performances.

Who knew redheads were bad luck?

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Hillbilly Elegy

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The Death of Dick Long

by Hope Madden

Director Daniel Scheinert (Swiss Army Man) walks an amazing tight rope between hillbilly stereotype and sympathetic character study with his latest, The Death of Dick Long, a crass comedy with deeply human sensibilities.

Zeke (Michael Abbott Jr.), Earl (Andre Hyland) and Dick (Scheinert) work on some Nickelback covers for their band, Pink Freud. Band practice out at Zeke’s ends late, long after Zeke’s misses (Virginia Newcomb, excellent) and their daughter (Poppy Cunningham, also excellent) head off to bed.

The fellas get a little weird, things get out of hand and let’s just say Pink Freud won’t be touring.

Yes, we have all witnessed films situated within the world of dive bar cocktail waitresses and their paramours. Tailer parks, mullets, giant prints of tigers, they’re all here. But what makes Dick Long kind of miraculous is how generous Scheinert, writer Billy Chew and the whole cast are with these characters.

Really, generous to a degree unseen in a comedy of this sort—which is to say, the sort of comedy built entirely on the idiocy of its white trash characters.

As Scheinert slowly unearths the details of the mystery, a lesser filmmaker might wallow in inbred, backwoods, banjo pickin’ gags. Not this guy. The more unseemly the subject matter, the more bare the soul. Abbott’s inevitable vulnerability is almost alarmingly heart wrenching given the comedic tone of the film and the actual crime committed.

Likewise, Newcomb mines her character and this situation for something honest enough that you wonder what the hell you would do if you were to find yourself in this situation. Her performance has the texture of a long and comfortable relationship suddenly and irreparably busted.

Hyland’s Earl, on the other hand, is straight up hill jack comic gold, but even this performance sidesteps broad strokes and finds a recognizable, human soul.

There’s not a single performance in the film that isn’t a welcome surprise. And underneath it all, Dick Long reimagines small town masculinity, isolation and loneliness.

Daniel Scheinert follows up on the promise of the crowd favorite madness of Swiss Army Man with a crime caper of a wildly, weirdly different sort. I’m all for his brand of lunacy.

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The Shapes of Water

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Aquarela

by George Wolf

“We swam out through the trunk!”

Those are six of the very few spoken words in Aquarela, and they quickly establish the stakes in Victor Kossakovsky’s immersive documentary. His aim is to get you startlingly close to the world war between man and water.

There is power, there is beauty, there is death. And there’s some death metal, which isn’t as out of place as you might think.

In case you haven’t noticed, this is a great time to be a documentarian, and thus, a fan of documentaries. This year alone, we’ve seen technological breakthroughs make possible the wonders of Apollo 11, They Shall Not Grow Old and Amazing Grace.

Like those, Aquarela (“watercolor” in Portuguese) employs cutting-edge wizardry for an experience that begs for the biggest screen you can find.

Monstrous ocean waves build and crash, huge chunks of ice fall prey to rising global temperatures, and a hypnotic narrative emerges. Mankind has battled the shapes of water for centuries, in hopes of lessening its dangers and harnessing its power, and Kossakovsky feels it’s time to hear from the other side. The few humans who speak feel like party crashers.

Don’t expect explanations, you won’t get any. What you will get in Aquarela is an utterly astounding profile of a living, breathing, dying force of nature.

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Born in a Trunk

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Judy

by George Wolf

Call it a comeback, a re-introduction or a friendly reminder, but Renee Zellweger’s channeling of Judy Garland is an awards-worthy revelation.

Since winning an Oscar for Cold Mountain over fifteen years ago, Zellweger’s resume has been scattershot and curious enough to make seeing her name on top of the marquee a rather nostalgic blast from the past.

But here, she’s just a blast, bringing a can’t-look-away magnetism to every moment she’s on screen, and leaving a noticeable absence when she’s not.

Based on Peter Quilter’s stage play The End of the Rainbow, Judy shows us a legend struggling to get work and fighting to retain custody of her children. By the late 1960s, daughter Liza was off starting a career of her own, but Judy’s two young kids with producer Sid Luft needed a stable home that Garland could not provide.

Accepting a lucrative offer for a string of concerts in London, Judy leaves her son and daughter with their father in hopes that the British engagement will give her the resources needed to take them back full-time.

Focusing on this late, sad period in Garland’s life is a wise move by director Rupert Goold (True Story) and screenwriter Tom Edge (The Crown). A limited scope can usually provide biopics with a better chance for intimacy, and true to form, Judy’s false notes arrive with the flashbacks to Garland’s days as a child star.

Showcasing her mistreatment as a young cog in the MGM studio system is well-intentioned but unnecessary, the blunt forcefulness of this thread adding little more than jarring interruption.

Zellweger is all we need to feel the tragedy of Garland’s fall. Her portrayal comes fully formed, as both remarkable outward impersonation and a nuanced glimpse into a troubled soul. Nary a movement seems taken for granted by Zellweger, and her delivery of Edge’s memorable dialog is lush with an organic spontaneity.

And though she barely sang publicly before her training for Chicago, Zellweger again shows impressive vocal talent. Of course she can’t match the full richness of the real Judy (who could?), but Zellweger’s style and phrasing are on-point bullseyes, never shrinking from Goold’s extended takes and frequent closeups during some wonderfully vintage musical numbers.

In one of the film’s best moments, Judy joins two male superfans (Andy Nyman, Daniel Cerqueira) for a late night dinner at their apartment. I won’t spoil what happens, but have some tissues handy. It’s a beautifully subtle and truly touching ode to Garland’s status as an early gay icon, and to the universal pain of loneliness.

Ironically, this brilliant performance should bring Zellweger the second act that Judy didn’t live long enough to enjoy. I’m guessing she’ll appreciate it, and I know she’s earned it.

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Do You Want to Pet a Snowman?

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Abominable

by Rachel Willis

Writer/director Jill Culton has crafted a sweet, magical children’s tale with Abominable.

The film opens with a man-sized yeti escaping from a laboratory at the sinister Burnish Industries. While being hunted through the streets of a big city in China, the yeti is injured. He hides on the roof of a building and seems to be safe – for the time being.

The opening scene is dark and a little scary, which explains the film’s PG-rating. This is fare for older children, which isn’t a knock on the film, but it isn’t the cute romp one might expect for the 3 – 6-year-old crowd. The opening hints at more terrifying moments to come as Burnish Industries is not willing to let its latest discovery go without a fight.

The film switches gears, and we’re introduced to Yi (voiced by Chloe Bennet), a teenage girl who rushes through life doing odd jobs to make money. She’s estranged from her mother and grandmother, who don’t understand her attitude. As we follow Yi through a typical day, we are given small pieces of information to help us understand who she is. Not only is she distant from her family, she is mocked by her peers, and her only friend is a younger boy named Peng (Albert Tsai).

On the roof of her apartment complex, Yi has a hideaway where she stows a map of China, an old violin, and a dream of visiting several places across the country. It’s here that she discovers the hidden yeti.

Reminiscent of How to Train Your Dragon (another DreamWorks production), Yi slowly forms a bond with the beast she names Everest. While the development of the bond between Toothless and Hiccup in HTTYD is a slow process, the connection between Yi and Everest feels rushed. And like Toothless, Everest has behaviors similar to a cat or dog as he navigates this new world.    

The few minor similarities aside, Culton manages to craft a film of her own that explores the value of friendships, family, and the beauty of the natural world. It’s a lot to explore in a children’s film and while some of it is handled well—particularly the friendships between Yi, Everest, and her friends—other aspects are neglected.  

The film drags a bit during the second act. As Yi, Peng, and Peng’s cousin, Jin (Tenzing Norgay Trainor) try to keep Everest out of the clutches of Burnish Industries, there are a few montage moments that slow the film’s pace and will have even the most devoted viewer twiddling their thumbs waiting for the action to resume.

However, Abominable is a film that, while predictable, has a few good laughs and plenty of heart.

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Keep the Change, Ya Filthy Animals

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Rambo: Last Blood

by Hope Madden

For those who’ve followed the Rambo franchise, Rambo: Last Blood (please, God, please say it is so) will look familiar.

Stallone is here. The deeply brutal violence is here. The one man against a depraved world is here. But in place of the broken heart of a soldier mistreated and forgotten by his government, of the prodigal son bringing US Military chickens home to roost, is something far less complex.

Rambo: Last Blood is basically Taken meets Home Alone, only racist.

No, John Rambo isn’t turning his training on the rotting center of the military industrial complex at home or in Burma. He’s actually a pretty relaxed, aging cowboy on the Rambo family horse ranch in Arizona, sharing a cordial friendship with his housekeeper and raising her teenage niece as if she were his own.

John Rambo’s teenage daughter. Oh my God, can you imagine a bigger nightmare?

Stallone can. Co-writing along with Matthew Cirulnick and Dan Gordon (who’s wearing a camo vest and AK in his imdb photo), Sly shows Gabrielle (Ybvette Monreal) exactly why adolescent girls need to squelch their own sense of agency.

Gabrielle wants to go to Mexico to find her deadbeat dad. She’ll be leaving for college soon and she just wants to clear the air. And so, against Rambo’s wishes she secretly heads south of the border. And you know what’s in Mexico?

Well, in the undulating sea of thugs, gang bangers, drug lords, rapists and sex traffickers is a lone investigative journalist who seems like very good people. She has three scenes.

Director Adrian Grunberg crafts a film that mercifully requires little attention to dialog as Stallone mumbles indecipherably through his own pages. The 73-year-old nabbed his second Oscar nomination for acting in 2016, revisiting the old war horse Rocky in a supporting role.

Every 30 years or so, Sylvester Stallone gives a good performance.

Creed was three years ago.

But you don’t go to a Rambo movie for the acting! You go for the carnage, and hoo boy, Last Blood does not skimp.

People give horror a hard time because of all the slicing, dicing, arterial spray and virgins in peril, but in nearly every instance, we are meant to recoil at the violence. In this film, we are meant to celebrate it: every decapitation, dismemberment, gutting, castration, every head blown clean off a blood-spraying, still standing body is our own vicarious victory.

Earlier this year, after another mass shooting in the US, Hollywood shelved the Craig Zobel horror film The Hunt because they wanted to send a message that gun violence shouldn’t be celebrated. This weekend, they released Rambo: Last Blood.

The Hunt is the story of wealthy Americans kidnapping poor people to hunt them down, but the tables are turned and the poor people kill all the rich people.

Rambo: Last Blood, on the other hand, is a MAGA fantasy come to vivid, bloody fruition.

Weak.