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Gonna Shout It Everyday

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The Glorias

by Hope Madden

“The path up is always a jagged line.”

Gloria Steinem always could articulate the struggle toward progress. Filmmaker Julie Taymor certainly understands that sometimes the best way forward is not straight ahead. The daring filmmaker (Across the Universe, Frida, Titus) puts four Glorias on a bus heading nowhere and everywhere to help us see Gloria Steinem, backward and forward.

The Steinem we best recognize—trailblazing feminist and human rights advocate of the 60s, 70s and onward—is played by the always excellent Julianne Moore. Wise and just a little weary, Moore’s version brings Steinem’s warm soul to the screen.

She’s joined in the role by Alicia Vikander, who plays Steinem in her 20s and 30s; Lulu Wilson as teenaged Gloria; and Ryan Kiera Armstrong, portraying Steinem as a child. Though Vikander stumbles with the flat Ohio accent, each performance establishes something that grows from one era to the next: resolve, openness, vulnerability, courage.

Timothy Hutton shines as Steinem’s father, Leo, and Bette Midler commits outright larceny in her scenes as Bella Abzug. A host of minor roles—Dorothy Pitman Hughes (Janelle Monae), Flo Kennedy (Lorraine Toussaint), Wilma Mankiller (Kimberly Guerrero), Dolores Huerta (Monica Sanchez) and more—fill out a picture of early feminism far more vibrant than history sometimes remembers.

Taymor’s characteristic flourishes sometimes work well to enrich a tale fit for a legend. At other times, they seem like filler in a film that’s far broader than it is deep.

It is exhilarating to watch these pioneering advocates spar and support, dodge and demand, and most of all, speak up. It’s heartbreaking, too. There’s exhausting tragedy in all that promise left unfulfilled, and real terror in the face of what we now stand to actually lose.

But a cameo from the legend herself may be enough to reaffirm anyone’s resolve. As she says, “The constitution does not begin with ‘I the President.’ It begins with ‘We the people.’”

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Do the Work

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Scare Me

by Hope Madden

Writer’s block—it is a common theme in all writing, especially horror. Think about The Shining, for example. Fred (writer/director/star Josh Ruben) certainly is. And at first, writer’s block is what the writer/director in Ruben leads you to believe Scare Me is all about.

Fred takes a cab to a wintry cabin. He tries to dodge questions from his driver, who, like Fred, fancies herself a bit of a writer. A short time later, Fred stares at a laptop screen. He’s not typing.

A power outage and a chance encounter with “real writer” Fanny (Aya Cash) lead to an evening of telling scary stories. And just like that stormy night so long ago when Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley out-storied her companions Percy Shelley and Lord Byron, the male ego is more easily wounded than any fictional character.

At its best, Scare Me offers an intriguing look inside the mind of privilege. What is it like to be a decent-looking white guy who has to resolve himself to the fact that he actually has no claim to that top spot on the totem pole that he’s always been told is his?

At its worst, it’s an overlong bit of self-indulgence.

As Fred’s nemesis/love interest(?)/frenemy Fanny, Cash is straightforward, merciless, funny and full of insight—as is Ruben’s script. Scare Me has no time for entitled, lazy writers.

For any of the real tensions of the film to work, we have to recognize and, to a degree, empathize with—even root for—Fred. Thanks to a smart script and an eerily recognizable performance, we do.

Ruben does an excellent job of wading those familiar waters, sort of likable and loathsome, sympathetic and toxic. Fred is kind of a good guy, or he sees himself as a good guy. Of course, he also sees himself as a writer.

The film hits its high (pun intended) when pizza guy Carlo  (SNL’s Chris Redd) joins the storytelling. It’s not quite enough to save a second act that simply goes on for too long. But a bloated midriff doesn’t spoil Scare Me entirely, a savvy piece of storytelling in itself.

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Going Once…Going Twice…

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Public Trust

by George Wolf

Do we really need another documentary showcasing greed as one of America’s most identifiable traits, “rigged” as our favorite path to winning, and Donald Trump as one of our biggest mistakes?

Check the calendar. Yes, we do.

Director David Byars, whose 2017 debut documentary No Man’s Land profiled the fight over Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife refuge, returns to environmental concerns with Public Trust, a deep dive into an ongoing battle for ground.

That ground is a swath of some 640 million acres of public land, currently held in trust by the federal government and “owned” by every American citizen. Cut to the chase: conservatives have been trying to privatize these National Parks, forests, grasslands and refuges for decades (since Reagan – shocker!), and the lunatic now in office makes something as unthinkable as selling off the Grand Canyon seem like it might be on the table.

As good documentarians do, Byars humanizes the issue through people invested in the subject. From a journalist in the trenches to a climate change warrior to a Native American tribe fighting for their livelihood, we feel how these lands are tied to identity and common good on one side, and industry profits on the other.

With Robert Redford on board as executive producer, the lack of narrative flash here comes as little surprise. But while Public Trust‘s case building is workmanlike, the rallying cry is no less urgent.

Vote, before it’s too late.

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Home A Clone

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LX 2048

by George Wolf

Well, you’ll save money on sunscreen.

Because in the near future world of LX 2048, the only way you can venture out in the daylight is by going full hazmat. In fact, the sun has become so lethal that clone technology is needed to meet the demand for augmented dayworkers.

Once the clones arrive, the unintended consequences are sure to follow. And Adam Bird is getting an up close look at some of them.

Things are not going well for Adam (James D’Arcy). His tech company is on shaky ground, and he hasn’t been taking his LX “mood stabilizers” which could help with the really bad news: his heart is failing and he doesn’t have long to live. Though his relationship with wife Reena (Anna Brewster) and the kids was already on the rocks, Adam is worried about securing their future.

Then, through frequent flashbacks, writer/director/producer/editor Guy Moshe fills in the backstory. Though virtual reality has taken over by 2048, “the chip” is the next big thing. There’s been a massive decline in population. And the Premium 3 insurance plan allows you to “tailor” your spousal replacement clone in the event of death.

What luck for Reena! The Birds are Premium 3 plan holders.

Moshe’s overly cheesy opening credits lower the expectations of what’s to come, but there are engaging visuals and some solid sci-fi ideas here, albeit ones fighting to overcome stilted dialog and tonal swings.

Adam’s conversations with unseen VR avatars are overly explanatory only for our benefit, sometimes bringing a wince-worthy phoniness to D’Arcy’s performance. And yet, when Moshe suddenly introduces moments of absurdist humor, you wonder if either tract was intended.

Delroy Lindo’s cameo as cloning tech legend Donald Stein instantly raises the stakes. Lindo’s natural gravitas make Stein’s musings about what it means to be human and the wages of playing God land a tick higher on the scale of standard sci-fi existential crises.

This is a film that often feels adrift and in need of an anchor. It’s neither as smart as it wants to be, nor as dumb as you fear early on. Much like its main character, LX 2048 has heart, but you’re never sure how long it can hold out.

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Unexpected Turns

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The Swerve

by Hope Madden

Life takes unexpected turns, no matter how tirelessly you prepare.

Writer/director Dean Kapsalis explores a horrific side of this notion in his confident feature debut, The Swerve.

The film nestles into suburbia where Holly (a phenomenal Azura Skye) lays awake, waiting for the alarm. Her face is a mask of resignation and obligation. As the morning rituals rush themselves toward a day at work and school for Holly, her two teenage boys and her husband, Rob (Bryce Pinkham), it’s clear that Holly lives inside herself. In her home she observes and facilitates but is almost never regarded, reached out to. She’s barely even there.

The film takes us through one week in Holly’s life. Her sister (Ashley Bell) returns home, stirring resentment and jealousy. Her husband works late. There’s a prescription bottle. There’s a mouse. There’s a boy at school, another boy on the highway. Some of this is likely imagined. All of it is leading somewhere, and as inevitable as that destination is, it will still hit you right in the gut.

The Swerve busies itself with too many catalysts. The film could have benefitted from slightly less. But there is no escaping Skye’s performance. As a woman on the verge, her delicate state, the way she fights against her own tendency to submit to misery, is devastating.

Skye is not alone. Pinkham is excellent in a role that too often is a throwaway, one dimensional bastard. The likeable authenticity he brings to the performance makes the character and the situations so much more frustrating. Likewise, Bell and Zach Rand (The Woman) bring life and complexity to their roles as well as Holly’s dilemma.

In its most authentic moments, the tension the film generates is almost unbearable. As small mistreatments build, Skye’s posture and dead-eyed stare say everything you need to know about Holly’s whole life. Skye delivers half of her stunning performance without a single word.

Kapsalis’s understatement as a director capitalizes on Skye’s still, unnerving descent. Together they deliver a climax that will haunt you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmEYyYu3JC8

The Screening Room

Screening Room: Antebellum, The Nest, The Secrets We Keep & More

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Antebellum, The Nest, The Secrets We Keep, Alone, Lost Girls & Love Hotels, Residue, Spiral, I’ve Got Issues, Blackbird, H is for Happiness, Luz the Flower of Evil, Cuties, Summerland

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Leave No Trace

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Residue

by Matt Weiner

Residue begins as a wry bayonetting of gentrification, but the film slowly unfolds—languidly, and then with a dizzying crescendo—into one of the most powerful films to come out this year.

Director Merawi Gerima’s confident debut traces summertime in a fast-changing D.C. neighborhood, where the new white arrivals don’t so much coexist with the area’s long-time black residents as much as they pursue parallel existences. For one group, the area is the latest in affordable rentals.

But for Jay (Obi Nwachukwu), Q Street is home. Or was home, before Jay moved to California. Now grown and an aspiring filmmaker, he decides to visit his parents and childhood friends to collect material and, in his words, “give a voice to the voiceless.” (Gerima himself is a D.C. native who moved to California for film school.)

Not all of Jay’s friends welcome him back with open arms though. As Jay reconnects with friends— some still in the same house, others in prison or dead—he is reminded, forcefully, that the white speculators buying up investment properties and yuppies blissfully smoking pot without fear of long prison sentences (or worse) aren’t the only ones taking advantage of Q Street.

Gerima’s critiques are unsparing, but his direction is achingly beautiful. It’s a mournful sort of beauty—Jay’s washed out recollections of summer in the District, where the sounds of children yelling, fireworks and go-go beats take on a physical texture, only drive home how rootless everything is in the present.

As Jay lapses in and out of these reveries and confronts what has replaced them, elegy turns to horror. There’s a creeping dread with every new encounter, and we’ve seen enough videos on social media this year alone to know that there can be as much danger in Jay’s exchanges with police as with a dude named Josh.

When learning of Jay’s motivations, one of his old friends simply replies, “Who’s voiceless?” Gerima lets Residue speak for itself, an essential statement not just on everything happening right now but on film and art.

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Risk & Reward

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The Nest

by George Wolf

If you saw the quietly unnerving Martha Marcy May Marlene nine years ago and have had the name Sean Durkin filed away since then, you’re not alone. Good news for both of us then, as Durkin finally returns as writer and director with The Nest, another precisely crafted examination of family dynamics.

This time, though, it’s a nuclear family, one that’s slowly imploding before our eyes.

It is the late 80s, and hotshot commodities trader Rory O’Hara (Jude Law) has news for his wife Alison (Carrie Coon): they need to move. Business in New York is drying up, but his native London is “booming.” Alison isn’t loving the idea of uprooting their two kids – and her horse training business – for the fourth time in ten years, but can’t help but be impressed by the 15th century manor Rory has secured in the English countryside.

The place is legendary (“Led Zeppelin stayed here!”), and huge. And from the moment the O’Haras move in, the spaces between them only grow larger.

Though it lacks the sinister edge of MMMM, Durkin’s storytelling here still carries a chill, assembling precise details with a subtlety that often betrays a focused narrative. With a microscope trained on the minutiae of finding a work/life balance, Durkin gives his stellar leads plenty of room to dig indelible, often heartbreaking layers.

Law shows all the easy charm that makes Rory an office favorite, while slowing revealing the cracks in his entitled, high roller facade. Pretending can be harder to sustain than success, and Rory is wearing down.

And Alison – thanks to a wonderful performance from Coon – becomes the weary embodiment of a last nerve exposed. She’s facing the reality of who her husband really is – and grasping for the best way to react. Fortunately, not giving a fuck is one of the options, and Coon makes all of Alison’s frayed edges irresistible.

Still, even as this family breaks down before us like some sort of clinical exercise, Durkin brings a darkly humorous undercurrent to the O’Haras’ way forward that feels like a first step toward honesty.

A house isn’t always a home. The Nest may rarely be comfortable, but it’s strangely inviting, and once you’re inside, plenty hard to look away.

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Issue Related

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I’ve Got Issues

by George Wolf

Toward the end the nearly 20 vignettes that make up I’ve Got Issues, a mournful woman proclaims, “The world is absurd. I’ve lost all my humor. But I must continue.”

That’s when you realize how deeply the lede has been buried.

Because that’s exactly what writer/director Steve Collins serves up: a host of absurdity that soldiers on, no matter how few laughs are generated.

Featuring occasional narration from Jim Gaffigan, bare bones production values and an ensemble of actors in ever-changing roles, the film wallows in the lowest of keys and the shaggiest of dogs. From a KKK recycling program to a self-help guru who’s of very little help, from a woman caught on a tilt-a-whirl to a singer sending out a demo tape addressed only to “Hollywood,” this film strings together segments on absurd futility that begin to make the title feel more like a cry for help.

Those with a very particular sense of humor may enjoy this film very much. God bless them.