Movies Archives - Page 12 Of 25

June 20, 2019December 1, 2020

“Tales Of The City” Review!

As Pride Month draws to a close, you have just enough time still to binge-watch Netflix’s modernized reboot of the 1993 soap opera Tales of the City, which is in turn based off the 1978 novel by Armistead Maupin. But even if you don’t know the original series (I didn’t), this show somehow manages to perfectly convey the feeling of coming home – to the house on the hill at 28 Barbary Lane in San Francisco. That’s especially due to cast, social commentary and atmosphere, all of which intertwine in an almost intoxicating blend of nostalgia.

The cast includes series regulars Laura Linney and Paul Gross, along with the show’s main attraction, Olympia Dukakis, reprising her groundbreaking role as Anna Madrigal, the beloved elderly transgender landlady of Barbary Lane – this time around, she comes loaded with a dark backstory and a few scandalous secrets, not unlike the diverse group of characters, young and old, who live in her apartment complex. There’s Shawna (Elliot Page), supposedly the show’s protagonist, but whose story tends to get lost among all the intersecting threads and character arcs – or maybe it’s just because every time Shawna shares the screen with her girlfriend Claire Duncan (Zosia Mamet), the energy and vitality of the show grinds to a halt, while the two stare blankly at each other and mumble. Paul Gross returns as Shawna’s adoptive father, Brian Hawkins, while Linney is once again the naive, wide-eyed Mary Ann Singleton – but unlike in other iterations of the show, Barbary Lane is only temporarily seen from Mary Ann’s POV. Instead, the focus has wisely been shifted on the real, down-to-earth residents of San Francisco: interracial gay couple Michael Tolliver (Murray Bartlett) and Ben Marshall (Charlie Barnett); Asian-American twins and Instagram influencers Ani and Jonathan Winter (Ashley Park and Christopher Larkin); Hispanic transgender/genderqueer nurse Jake Rodriguez (Garcia) and his lesbian girlfriend Margot Park (May Hong); and especially Black cross-dressing nightclub owner Ida Best (Caldwell Tidicue), who has one absolutely awesome scene in Episode 9, donning a silver wig and high heels while leading a troop of Rainbow Warriors into battle against injustice. It’s really not that surprising that Elliot Page gets swallowed up by this rich, diverse cast – his performance is good, but far too low-energy to make him stand out in the crowds of witty drag queens, nursing home troublemakers, and nasty dinner guests.

These people are the products of a brilliant, flamboyant, free-spirited society in the streets of San Francisco: not only its beautiful vistas, sunsets, parks, high-rises or even its oases like Barbary Lane, but also its darker, grittier side. This is made especially clear in Episode 8, an extended flashback to Anna Madrigal’s early life in the city soon after her transition: here, Madrigal attempts to navigate her dangerous new existence as a transgender woman in 1966, and finds herself having to do anything possible to survive. Her “house on the hill” wasn’t built by goodwill and fortune-cookie wisdom alone, as it turns out. The show has an interesting, thoughtful commentary on the history and progression of the LGBTQ+ Rights Movement, from Anna’s flashback to one intensely awkward conversation about the privileges of gay men who survived the AIDS crisis. Characters like Ysela (Daniela Vega) and the everyday struggles we see briefly through her eyes as she protects the city’s homeless, show us that no matter how far we’ve come, we have to keep going. And Anna, when she is interviewed, sums it up best when she explains that the city hasn’t changed very much at all since the 1960s – people still make mistakes, and they still have to deal with the consequences and try to make things better.

This commentary would make for one pretty grim show if it weren’t for the fact that Tales of the City actually has a really hard time balancing its two main narratives – the show tries as best as it can to give equal screentime to the family-drama and the LGBT crime thriller that make up its plot: considering that both of these stories literally operate out of the same house, this should have been much more seamless than it ended up being. But if I have one complaint about the show, it would be that – not only is the story lopsided, it can’t even figure out which way it wants to…lop (is lop a word? What is a lopside?) at any given time: one of the most bizarre examples is when a humorous but suspenseful car-chase abruptly turns into a mother/daughter quarrel. Throughout the middle of the show, there are interminable arguments about relationships, parenting, interactive art, etc, etc, and the show begins to get lost – along with many of its characters, who either randomly disappear around the midpoint, or just wander around in the background to give the illusion that they’re doing something relevant as the family-drama plot increasingly narrows in on Mary Ann, Brian and Shawna, while also trying to spare just enough time on Michael and Ben to still give a gay viewpoint on the story.

And then, in the last three episodes of the show, the family-drama stuff basically gets thrown out the window, in place of the crime story – which, honestly, is much more interesting. The finale neatly wraps up that storyline, in a weirdly cartoonish but still entertaining fashion – literally, in fact. Many of the storylines explored in the family-drama plot, however, are left open to interpretation.

Which brings me to a sentiment I expressed early today in an Instagram post, where I said that I need more Tales of the City content. There is ample opportunity for spinoffs and sequels about these characters: I think this show maybe bit off more than it could chew, but a smaller-scale, more intimate series about one of the show’s supporting cast could be very satisfying – for goodness sake, I’d be willing to watch an entire show about DeDe Day’s butler!

I don’t know if I’ll write a Spoiler Review for this show, but there is definitely a lot to talk about regarding the series – so leave your thoughts in the comments below!

Season Rating: 7.9/10

June 19, 2019

First Look At Greta Gerwig’s “Little Women”!

Greta Gerwig, visionary director of the 2017 critical darling Lady Bird, is teaming up again with her Academy Award-nominated star, Saoirse Ronan – but now they’re heading all the way back to the 19th Century for a romantic historical-fiction romp. And this time, Gerwig’s status has allowed her to muster an impressive cast alongside Ronan, including Beauty & The Beast‘s Emma Watson, screen legend Meryl Streep, actress and director Laura Dern, Oscar-nominee Timothée Chalamet (also from Lady Bird), and rising star Florence Pugh. The ensemble of stars will be donning petticoats, sunbonnets and dainty pastel outfits for their outing in Gerwig’s adaptation of Little Women, a book that has been adapted to the big screen precisely ten-thousand times – fine, seven, but that’s still too many.

Even though the first photos released today have all the misty-eyed stares and tidy drawing-rooms that are stereotypical of all adaptations of 19th Century romances (literally, every adaptation of a Jane Austen novel ever), don’t expect the movie to be as blatantly prim and pristine as it appears on the surface: Gerwig has made it clear that, during her research on Little Women author Louisa May Alcott, she became deeply interested in the period’s gender norms and views on feminism, especially – issues that were also close to Alcott’s own heart, and which naturally appear in the film, in the form of subtle social commentary: Gerwig even seemed to imply that Ronan and Chalamet’s androgynous appearances made them perfect for the kind of story she’s telling, one in which her protagonists will throw out the restrictions of their heteronormative lifestyle in favor of a more relaxed semi-platonic relationship and free love. All that is fine, but when Gerwig described the main characters as an “intellectual hippie family”, I’ll admit that’s what truly perplexed me, and got me thinking: who wants a Little Women adaptation when we could have Little Women Go To Woodstock?

Ronan will portray the novel’s heroine, Josephine “Jo” March, in the film: March’s rebellious spirit and relentless determination made her one of literature’s earliest great female role models, and I can’t think of a better fit for the role than the equally inspiring Irish actress. Emma Watson, on the other hand, will be perhaps trapped in the role of Meg March, whom critics have often derided for being an introverted and unambitious character who steadfastly remains devoted to her home and husband. Hopefully Watson can get past those criticisms with a stellar performance. Eliza Scanlen and Florence Pugh are the young sisters, Beth and Amy respectively, who are nearly identical when the story opens: Beth, shy, diplomatic and gentle-tempered; Amy, artistic, delicate and pampered.

First Look At Greta Gerwig's "Little Women"! 3 — vanityfair.com

And of course we can expect Meryl Streep to be the powerhouse that she is, in the role of Aunt Josephine (not to be confused with the Aunt Josephine of A Series of Unfortunate Events). The cranky and discouraging widow with a heart of gold, her archetypal character will probably have a large number of scene-stealing moments – thankfully, the rest of the cast ensures (or should ensure, at least) that Streep doesn’t end up stealing the entire movie.

So what do you think? Are you excited for Little Women? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!

June 17, 2019

So…A “Hunger Games” Prequel Is Happening…

Ever since the Hunger Games franchise left theaters back in 2015, Lionsgate Studios has been trying to find a replacement for what was, along with the Twilight Saga, their largest film property: their top three highest-grossing movies are still The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1, and The Hunger Games. Sadly, the studio has not had much luck doing that: stand-alone films such as Robin Hood (remember that? No?) flopped, and the Divergent series fizzled out. John Wick has recently begun to fill the role that Hunger Games once held, thanks to the sudden frenzy of interest surrounding star Keanu Reeves, but now it looks like Lionsgate doesn’t need to move on from its young-adult dystopian thriller roots at all.

That’s right: today, accompanying news that Hunger Games author Suzanne Collins will be releasing a prequel to her best-selling book series in May 2020, Lionsgate Studios wasted no time announcing that they are communicating with Collins about “the movie”. Apparently there’s not even any doubt or hesitation about this project – there will be a movie prequel to The Hunger Games, whether you want it or not.

Don’t expect Jennifer Lawrence to be reprising the role of Katniss, however, and don’t expect many (or possibly any) familiar faces. The prequel novel will be set 64 years before the first book in the original trilogy, and will probably explore the origins or early days of the Games themselves, in a time when the world of Panem was still recovering from the scars of war; what Collins calls “the Dark Days”. Setting it so long ago in her world’s past will presumably give the prequel some freedom to breathe: traditionally, with prequels, they’re set in the time period directly before their successors, so that they can include hundreds of unnecessary cameos from, for instance, the parents of our original protagonists, or the backstories of recognizable antagonists. This is almost always a bad idea: rather than selling us on the premise of the novel that we’re currently reading, these types of prequels instead get bogged down while trying to remind us that we’re actually not getting the full story – to understand that, you’d have to stop by your local Barnes & Noble and pick up an expensive hardcover copy of the book you should be reading.

This, of course, extends to movies as well: Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit trilogy fell into this trap, by wasting time on tie-ins and unsubtle nods to his original Lord of the Rings trilogy (for instance, making The Hobbit into a trilogy to begin with, and then throwing in Legolas, and trying to make the characters at his disposal into carbon-copies of existing ones from Lord of the Rings).

Now, simply setting it 64 years in the past doesn’t necessarily mean the Hunger Games prequel won’t do the same thing: The Hobbit was set 60 years before the Lord of the Rings (though, that particular story also deals with extremely long-lived and in some cases immortal characters, so I’ll let that slide). J.K. Rowling’s Fantastic Beasts prequels to the modern world of Harry Potter, however, while great movies (yeah, I said it), are set in the 1920s and still manage to include an inordinate amount of inexplicable cameos from characters who really shouldn’t be alive yet in her timeline, most notably Professor McGonagall. Let’s not even get started on that, though.

Anyway, we will be getting both a novel and a movie set long before Hunger Games, and presumably Lionsgate will try to turn this into a huge franchise, just as it was back in 2013, when Catching Fire grossed 865 million dollars worldwide and became the 18th highest-grossing movie of all time in North America. Will they be able to do it? More importantly, will they be able to do it and also make a good movie in the process? They have it in them: all four of the movies in the franchise received Fresh ratings on Rotten Tomatoes, with the first two even reaching Certified Fresh status. Setting the prequel long before the events of the original trilogy also helps, since we can assume (for now) that it will have its own distinct atmosphere and story, rather than leaning too heavily on the books that came before.

Let the Games begin.

June 15, 2019

“Murder Mystery” Review!

Where to start with this review? Well, how about this: the movie does not begin on a dark and stormy night – but that’s one of the very few mystery-story cliches it does not tackle in its surprisingly short, swiftly-paced runtime. And I mean, one of the very few: this is a movie that comes packed with all the requisite elements of a classic mystery; from the suave British host to the alluring city-streets of Monaco, illegitimate children of English nobility, enigmatic French detectives and lethal Indian daggers. Every overdone trope gets its moment of melodrama in the spotlight – before it is inevitably wrestled to the ground by hilarious, heartfelt satire.

But no, our story begins in New York City, with our protagonists: lazy NYPD detective Nick Spitz (Adam Sandler) and inquisitive, bookish hairdresser Audrey Spitz (Jennifer Aniston). The couple are bored and tired in their middle-class American lives, until their wedding anniversary, when Nick agrees to take his wife on a long-awaited European vacation – a honeymoon fifteen years in the making. On the plane, they run into the aforementioned suave British gentleman, Charles Cavendish; elegantly portrayed by Luke Evans, Cavendish is immediately suspect even before Audrey openly states that, with a name like his, he would be the bad guy in a mystery story. Nevertheless, he politely invites Mr. and Mrs. Spitz to be his guests on a private yacht rather than have to spend their honeymoon traveling on a crowded tour bus learning about aged Italian ham.

Naturally, the mystery begins there.

The usual suspects are all present. Aside from Charles, we are presented with prospective-heir-to-a-magnificent-fortune Tobias Quince (David Walliams), Charles’ ex-girlfriend Suzi Nakamura (Shioli Kutsuna), the Maharajah Vikram Govindan (Adeel Akhtar), grizzled war hero Colonel Ulenga (John Kani), the celebrity race-car driver Juan Carlos Rivera (Luis Gerardo Méndez), and the silent Russian bodyguard known as Sergei (Ólafur Darri Ólafsson), plus the film’s most lavish star aside from the three leads, Gemma Arterton, playing…well, the film’s most lavish star, actress Grace Ballard. The actors all get a chance to take themselves far too seriously, as their caricature characters clash (try saying that one three times fast) in a desperate attempt to win the love – and magnificent fortune – of the elderly, steely-eyed tycoon Malcolm Quince. Terence Stamp gives a brief, but almost Christopher Lee-like performance as Mr. Quince, before he is dramatically slain with, you guessed it, the Indian dagger. The scene immediately preceding his death, in which Mr. Quince realizes that he has two unexpected (and decidedly civilian) guests in Mr. and Mrs. Spitz, is absolutely hilarious – Aniston and Sandler are brilliant in their roles, and somehow sell the premise that they are, in fact, the odd ones out on this high-end French yacht full of celebrities and moviestar personalities.

After Quince’s sudden demise, just when the film should really take off, the movie suddenly jolts in the opposite direction – or maybe “jolt” is too strong a word. Our protagonists sort of just…idle, while the plot stands still around them, allowing for a handful of genuinely funny moments, most of them provided by our French detective, Inspector de la Croix (Dany Boon). But while he can blow an impressive smoke-ring, Hercule Poirot he is not. To make matters worse, Sandler’s characters suffers with sleepiness throughout the movie, but seems to get especially lackadaisical just when things get interesting. With a little less than an hour left, the movie suddenly remembers that it is, in fact, supposed to be entertaining: like a crimson Ferrari gunned into action (that metaphor will make sense later), the story gets fun, fast. We’re treated to another death, an obligatory escape-out-the-window scene in a luxury hotel, and hysterical humor. From that point on, except for some unnecessary marital drama, Murder Mystery gleams. Most of the film’s best material is packed into the last thirty minutes.

The high-points of the movie are the performances, and the finale: Aniston, Sandler and Evans are all exceptional – Evans does grow less so as the movie progresses, and his dashing elegance is, unfortunately, never shattered with comedic precision, but his charm is enough to make up for that. Many of the smaller roles are enjoyable to watch: Akhtar’s Maharajah is delightfully cool; Arterton is blessed with a large enough role in which to show off her range; and, as previously noted, Stamp gets one delectably funny scene, which he dominates. Only Ólafsson and Méndez are forgettable in their roles.

As for the finale – well, I did not actually guess the murderer’s identity correctly. But I loved the way that, even in its closing minutes, the movie had time to turn the tables on one more mystery cliche: and it’s a good one, too. There’s an excruciatingly funny car chase as well, involving one beautiful red Ferrari – I was not expecting goats, but I got goats, and I loved them. The film’s final scene can be read as either a tease of sequels down the line, or just a loving nod to the genre; an apology, of sorts, for all the mischief and madness committed in the name of mystery.

So, is Murder Mystery worth seeing? Well, if nothing else, it will definitely have you smiling and probably laughing out loud in its best moments – it’s not brilliant, and it’s not even the most brilliant use of satire, but it is heartfelt and heartwarming. Sandler and Aniston make a great duo, and have a fun supporting cast. So if you’re an insomniac on a dark and stormy night, why not check it out?

Movie Rating: 6.5/10