Tag Archives: Fred Hechinger

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Stop or My Grandma Will Shoot

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Thelma

by George Wolf

Within the first few minutes of Thelma, writer/director Josh Margolin establishes two important things: 1) 90+ year-old Thelma (June Squibb) and her twenty-something grandson Danny (Fred Hechinger) share a sweetly authentic relationship, and 2) we’re not here to simply laugh at old people eating hot wings or talking dirty.

The laughs are here, but they are lightly organic and relatable across generational divides, consistently peppered around a kinda sorta heist caper and the search for a getaway scooter.

After getting computer lessons from her helpful and patience grandson, Thelma receives a convincingly scary phone call. The boy on the line sure sounds like Danny, and he says he’s been arrested. Then an authoritative voice (Malcolm McDowell) takes over, telling Thelma to cough up $10,000 for her grandson’s quick release.

Danny, and his parents (Parker Posey and Clark Gregg) eventually sort out the scam, but not before Thelma has dropped the cash in a mailbox. The police don’t offer much help, so Thelma sets out to “borrow” her friend Mona’s (Bunny Levine’s) gun and her other friend Ben’s (the late Richard Roundtree) tricked out scoot, and go get her 10k back.

Yes, Ben worries that they’re “old, diminished,” and Thelma laments that most or her friends are “dead, got sepsis or moved to Cleveland.” But they’re not the only ones struggling with their current phase of life. Danny is full of anxiety about his move into adulthood, his parents can’t seem to let go, and Margolin makes sure the message here is that we all have our good and bad days.

“And what’s today?” Ben wonders.

“We’ll find out!” Thelma is quick to reply.

Squibb is an absolute delight (shocker!), and her pairing with the distinguished Roundtree makes for an irresistible duo of vigilantes. Posey and Gregg supply some effective slapstick, and Hechinger (so good in News of the World) impresses again as a young man who worries that caring for his grandma may be the only thing he’s really good at.

Thelma is Margolin’s feature debut, and it displays a fine flair for madcap comedy that comes with a crowd-pleasing, easily digestible message. You’ll be laughing with Thelma, not at her, and that’s an important difference that Squibb rides all the way to the ATM.

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Buffalo Stance

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Butcher’s Crossing

by Hope Madden

Nicolas Cage has done the wild West before. Of course, with 116 acting credits, he’s done most everything before. But he’s done this recently ­– earlier this year in The Old Way, and a couple of years back in Prisoners of the Ghostland. What’s new with Butcher’s Crossing?

Cage plays Miller, a buffalo hunter. He works for himself. And he knows the stragglers with their paper thin hides around these parts ain’t nothing compared to the majestic creatures he’s seen in the thousands over in Colorado territory. If only somebody’d pony up the dough, he could put together a hunting party and bring in the biggest haul this town’s ever seen.

Well, sir, that’s just what young Will Andrews (Fred Hechinger) wants to hear. He dropped out of Harvard in search of adventure, and this looks to be that.

Co-writer/director Gabe Polsky adapts John Williams’s gorgeous 1960 novel of bitter truth and American mythology. Visually striking, the film’s untamed beauty belies its meager budget. Creating an atmosphere with limited means is an instinct Polsky has shown since his impressive feature debut, Motel Life.

Miller, Will, the hyper-religious Charlie (Xander Berkeley) and the scoundrel Fred (Jeremy Bobb) head into the Rockies in search of buffalo. What they find, along with the beasts, is themselves, and that is not pretty.

Butcher’s Crossing becomes a descent into madness film. This should be where Cage excels. Madness is essentially his brand. The character isn’t written well enough to leave an impression and Polsky’s storytelling is too tight to let the veteran madman open up. Lunacy never materializes.

Hechinger, memorably naïve in News of the World, delivers well enough as innocence turned sour. Both Bobb and Paul Raci, as the bitter entrepreneur who warned the men against the hunt, add a bit of color to the story.

Butcher’s Crossing is an ugly story of greed. It’s an ugly story of America. The shots of bison carcasses make an impression – the photography throughout is impressive, but this sickening image is particularly something. Unfortunately, Polsky’s script and cast can’t quite match the visual clarity he gives the tale.

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Mighty Neighborly

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The Woman in the Window

by George Wolf

The Woman in the Window is a testament to the power of “all in.”

Like if you’re spying on your neighbors, get a zoom lens, take pictures! And if you’re modernizing Hitchcock, embrace that shit from the opening minutes and don’t f-ing look back.

For director Joe Wright and screenwriter Tracy Letts, that’s the play as they adapt A.J. Finn’s bestselling novel. And it’s a smart one.

Psychologist Anna Fox (Amy Adams, fantastic) has a shrink of her own these days (Letts), and plenty of prescriptions. Suffering from crippling agoraphobia, Anna will not leave her spacious Manhattan townhouse. She’s got her cat Punch and her downstairs tenant David (Wyatt Russell), but outside of occasional conversations with her ex-husband (Anthony Mackie), Anna spends most of her time watching her neighbors and old movies.

Then the Russells move in across the street.

Jane (Julianne Moore) comes over for an enjoyable visit, has some wine and admits that Alistair (Gary Oldman) can be angry and controlling. A later conversation with the teenaged Ethan Russell (Fred Hechinger) seconds that.

So when Anna sees Jane stabbed in her apartment, she’s sure Alistair is to blame. But with detectives (Brian Tyree Henry, Jeanine Serralles) looking on, a different Jane Russell (Jennifer Jason Leigh) appears, swearing that she’s never even met Anna before tonight.

For the entire first hour, Wright (Atonement, Darkest Hour, Hanna), Letts (Pulitzer winner for writing August: Osage County) and this splendid ensemble put the hammer down on a delicious mystery ride. Putting stairwells, doors, railings and more in forced perspective, Wright intensifies our relation to Ann’s small world while Letts’s crackling script draws us into the mystery and Danny Elfman’s staccato score hammers it home.

Is any of Anna’s story even real, or is it her meds and fragile psyche talking? This question allows the direct homages to classics like Rear Window and Vertigo to be filtered through a movie-loving unreliable narrator, becoming a wonderfully organic device that feeds this intoxicating noir pot-boiler.

As events escalate and Anna’s plight becomes more overtly terrifying, the novel’s pulpy seams begin to show, and the film stumbles a bit in transition. But Adams is strong enough to keep us rooted firmly in Anna’s camp, long enough for the darker side of Hitchcock to wrestle control.

Taking a story like this from page to screen successfully requires a strong, confident vision and a committed, talented cast. The Woman in the Window is overflowing with riches on both counts, landing as immensely satisfying fun.