Rian Johnson’s Knives Out is the pick of the week
As I look over this batch I realize it’s not one of my favorite groups of films- the last few were stronger. But of these, I would say Knives Out is probably my preferred choice, so be sure to see that one. Enjoy!
JOKER * * (Dir. Todd Phillips)
The movie’s a cultural phenomenon, but it wants so badly to be an art film
Does the Joker need an origin story? I’ve never thought so, as the supervillain is so intrinsically linked with the Batman mythos that a standalone focusing solely on him would inevitably lead to a self-pitying backstory about a victim of “society’s evils” who had no choice but to become what he became. I was not surprised that Todd Philipps co-wrote this exact plot when he fashioned his standalone Joker film, but I was annoyed by just how pretentious and self-consciously referential I found that film to be, especially when its core is essentially hollow- this is Taxi Driver window dressing. Most of Joker is tedious and repetitive, with long sequences of cringeworthy embarrassment while observing the pathetic, mentally ill Arthur Fleck- a man with a history as a victim of child abuse, brain trauma, and a condition that causes him to spontaneously break into fits of cackling laughter. The discomfort is ramped up the max, but these scenes are meant to showcase Joaquin Phoenix at his showiest- he’s talented, but his performance is indulged by the director, who’s never had an actor of this caliber to work with and takes the chance to linger in slow motion over his gaunt body and physical, bizarre body language. He’s in awe of the seriousness of it all and thinks we should be too, but I can’t forget this is comic book material. Phillips seems to think we should extrapolate real world lessons from all of this, ala Taxi Driver and The King of Comedy (there are overt references to both of those films, and the movie is set in early 1980’s Gotham City that might as well be New York, so he’s aping from some very superior templates). But the movie is muddled in its messaging and throws a hodgepodge of issues on the screen. The only clear one is the glorification of the Joker as a folk hero- he inadvertently becomes a warrior for the lower class when he murders three Wall Street guys who are beating him up on the subway and is celebrated for it. He’s such a victim of the big bad world that the movie undoubtedly wants you to cheer his transformation into an agent of chaos and you can’t help but do so- once he becomes the Joker the movie finally picks up steam and feels like it has some life in it. The last twenty minutes are undeniably effective, especially a surreal sequence where he goes on a late night talk show and has his ultimate supervillain moment- it’s surreal, creepy and disturbing, in all the ways it should be. But the movie still wants to have it both ways and refuses to show Joker murdering anyone who could be construed as an “innocent” person- everyone he kills seemingly had it coming for being a jerk to him. Would the audience be rooting for a guy whose rampages include innocent bystanders and random civilians, women, children and everyone the comic book villain has actually victimized in the pages of Batman over the years? Without the hero to counterbalance the narrative, Joker can’t be too bad, just wrongheaded. But still cool. And that’s a wrongheaded approach to take, not to mention cowardly.
MARRIAGE STORY * * * (Dir. Noah Baumbach)
Divorce gets ugly, but the kid in this movie remains a prop
Marriage Story is a portrait of a divorce between a theater director (Adam Driver) and an actress (Scarlett Johansson), who at first want to separate amicably but inevitably go on to an ugly fight over custody and where their 8-year-old son will live (he wants them to stay in New York while she wants to move to Los Angeles for her TV career). Noah Baumbach wrote the screenplay that was roughly inspired by his own messy divorce from Jennifer Jason Leigh, but with certain changes that omit the bigger factors in that split (involving his now partner Greta Gerwig). The most impressive parts about this movie are the performances- Adam Driver gives the best one of his career so far, exhibiting a natural sympathy in his ability to convey an everyguy quality, even though his Charlie is a successful artist who’s just been given a “genius” grant to continue directing plays- somehow we feel his frustration and hurt at how he sees himself being victimized in this situation. It helps that his character is more fully developed than Nicole (Johansson). Baumbach writes the story from Charlie’s point of view, although he does try to give Nicole a character and a perspective of her own. The beginning of the film gives Johansson (also very good in this) an extended monologue where she expresses how she felt she had no identity in her marriage, and suppressed her desires for his, but it comes so early that if feels like an attempt to get her out of the way so the rest of the movie can focus on Charlie. It also feels a bit underwritten, falling back on the somewhat cliched “I need to have something of my own” dilemma, which goes all the way back to Kramer vs. Kramer as a motivation for women feeling oppressed by their husbands and choosing to leave. One wonders if the reason Baumbach couldn’t come up with a more original explanation for the wife’s feelings and actions is because he was hiding the true reason for his own break-up. The result is that Nicole’s feelings don’t seem to provide a strong enough explanation for her actions, and allow for a note of optimism or hope at the end of the process, which feels a bit dishonest. Even though the depiction of the divorce process itself is sharply rendered, and superbly acted by the attorneys involved (Laura Dern, Ray Liotta and Alan Alda), you can’t help but feel the whole story of this particular marriage isn’t quite being told.
I LOST MY BODY * * * (Dir. Jeremy Clapin)
A look back at 1990’s France
I Lost My Body is a lovely meditation on disappointed hopes and truncated lives, a beautifully animated, yet remote piece of work that follows a disembodied hand as it tries to get back to its owner, making its way out of the hospital where it was presumably severed, and through the streets of Paris, as it experiences flashbacks to its life as the essential appendage of Naofel, a French immigrant whose parents died in a tragic childhood accident. We come to know Naofel, as he spends his twenties trying to find some source of fulfillment and happiness, romancing a girl and finding a job in carpentry after failing at pizza delivery. This is a mournful, somewhat philosophical look at life’s disappointments, tragedies and quests for meaning- although I will confess that the symbolism of the severed hand and its journey was a bit lost on me. Director Jeremy Clapin has fashioned at first a kind of mystery as you follow the hand through its various obstacles, but the film is more of a ponderance, and leaves lingering messages up for interpretation. It is one of the more original films of the year.
KNIVES OUT * * * (Dir. Rian Johnson)
Daniel Craig hams it up as a special investigator
A classic whodunnit is more a staple of literature than film. Sure, there’ve been many adaptations of Agatha Christie books from page to screen, but be honest, how many of them really soared? It’s difficult to make them work, and even more difficult to come up with an original story that puts all the pieces together just right so that the audience doesn’t feel manipulated, and so that the plot twists and revelations actually stand up to scrutiny. So I applaud Rian Johnson for accomplishing the very difficult, if not impossible, with Knives Out, a deliciously entertaining holiday treat that hits every bullet point, and does so with an irreverent sense of humor and even some relevant political commentary. He structures it like a classic Christie novel- Daniel Craig plays a Hercule Poirot-esque private investigator, Benoit Blanc (complete with ridiculous name and indecipherable accent), hired to discover whether the suspicious suicide of multi-millionaire Harlan Thrombie, the patriarch of a family filled with lying, narcissistic leeches, was all that it appeared to be. We meet the various members of this family, all potential murderers, and then find out fairly early on that this is going to be more of a “how” than a “who” dunnit, as Johnson cleverly flips the script on what happened on the night in question. Ana de Armas stars as the wide-eyed and innocent Marta, Harlan’s longtime nurse and daughter of an undocumented immigrant who tolerates the family’s prejudices and ignorance and now serves as the unwelcome center of a murder mystery as the plot unravels itself further. The film moves rapidly and you do have to pay attention, but the plot isn’t so complex (the real villain of the story is obvious fairly quickly), and the unquestionably noble motivations of its main character perhaps do a disservice to the film’s ability to surprise you in the end. Nevertheless, the movie is so polished, well-acted and fun to go along with, that there’s no question it leaves the audience satisfied. For pure entertainment value, it’s impeccable.
THE TWO POPES * * * (Dir. Fernando Mereilles)
A two-hander with a couple of gifted actors
Like this year’s The Irishman, The Two Popes gives the audience the pleasure of watching two seasoned veteran actors simply interacting with each other- in this case it’s Anthony Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce as Pope Benedict and Pope Francis, having a series of conversations over two days, the year before Benedict renounced the papacy, becoming the first pope to do so since 1248. Anthony McCarten’s screenplay is entirely fictionalized of course- there’s no way to know if this happened or what Joseph Ratzinger and Jorge Bergoglio have ever discussed in private, but you can imagine it, can’t you? McCarten is fascinated by the what-if of it all. That’s the allure of wondering what two outsized figures might have to say to each other in person, especially two people who ostensibly disagree with one another on every major issue that could be important to them and to the future of the establishment they lead- in this case, the Catholic Church. This movie could go harder and deeper than it does, however. As it is it barely skims the surface, grazing over the hot button issues, especially the child molestation scandals that have driven people from the church in recent years. Fernando Mereilles directs this film with a quick kinetic energy, perhaps not necessary to the kind of chamber piece it is, but there’s less time spent in rooms with these two men than you might think. In fact, as it goes along, set on a day when Bergoglio is intent on retiring from the priesthood and Ratzinger refuses to entertain the notion, we are treated to flashbacks of Bergoglio’s life in Argentina and path to the papacy, and it’s clear that McCarten and Mereilles are far more interested in Pope Francis than in Pope Benedict. The movie is a very flattering portrait of the man now considered to the most progressive pope in generations, and Pryce provides a subtle, nuanced and empathetic take on him, perhaps the best performance of his career. Hopkins’ Ratzinger, he of the Hitler youth past and disturbing cover-ups, remains far more shrouded in mystery. Even the moment of confession regarding his supposedly darkest sin, the protection of the disgraced pedophile priest Marcial Maciel, is faded out so that we can’t even hear what he said about it. There’s something too easy about this, too forgiving, as the message of the movie wants us to agree that we should talk to those we disagree with, even on the most important issues. But as enjoyable as it is to watch these two acting titans go at it, hearing that kind of message in this kind of time feels out of another era, one we wish we still lived in.
STAR WARS: EPISODE IX- THE RISE OF SKYWALKER * * (Dir. J.J. Abrams)
Rey’s journey is now complete (thank god)
When it comes to Star Wars, it’s hard to parse what about these movies anymore makes them “good” or “bad.” Everyone has their own idea of what Star Wars should be and no one can seem to agree on anything, what with all the various entities since the original trilogy being more or less despised and picked apart from one quarter of fans or another, but all for different reasons. The prequels are widely maligned, yet there is a generation that grew up on and was introduced to this universe through those films. The Force Awakens to me was nothing but an oppressive nostalgia trip that was trying way too hard to be a carbon copy of 1977’s A New Hope, and the previous entry, The Last Jedi was extremely divisive and splits people into two camps- the critics who admired its artistic deviation from usual formula and the fans who hated it for exactly those reasons (and several racist/sexist ones). I happened to belong to an entirely separate category who didn’t like The Last Jedi because it felt like a bloated, overstuffed mess, calling to mind something more akin to the detested prequels. So going into this third one, I really had such a low bar that the return of JJ Abrams’ quick pace and snappy tone was a slight relief from Rian Johnson’s wacky experimental touch, especially because this time he doesn’t overdo it on the nostalgia fest. Perhaps having to deal with the varying story directions his predecessor left him with meant there was less time to wallow in fan service (though there’s plenty of that in here as well). Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac are back as Rey, Finn and Poe, and the third movie finally tries to force these people into the trio they never got to be the first and second time around. It’s a little too late for all that at this point, but following a more cohesive unit from start to finish gives the movie slightly more to hang its hat on. It does bring back the best part of Rian Johnson’s movie, the oddly seductive force connection between Rey and Kylo Ren (Adam Driver, still by far the best actor and most compelling screen presence in this new trilogy), so there is something of a payoff to that storyline, but most of this movie is about planet hopping journeys to locate a McGuffin like “wayfinder” that will lead them to the planet where Palpatine (the returning Ian McDarmid) has apparently been hiding out this whole time, pulling the strings. Palpatine’s return is literally established in the opening crawl, having happened offscreen between the last movie and this one, leaving one with the impression that Johnson’s quick dispensal of Snoke, this trilogy’s Emperor-like figure, left them without a villain, so why not resurrect the original, completely without explanation? This movie is filled with weird story choices you can pick apart for days. What on earth is the point of random new characters like Keri Russell’s Zorri or Naomi Ackie’s Jannah, who add nothing and mean nothing to the story, and why bring in new people in the final chapter at all? Was poor Kelly Marie Tran Jar-Jar’ed out of the movie due to the racist and misogynistic fanboys who attacked her very existence online in the last one? Was there any point in bringing back Billy Dee Williams’ Lando and why has he been wearing the same clothes for 40 years? The endless lightsaber duels and space battles are now old hat and have a blunted impact in this age of CGI action movies that come out every couple of months, so the special effects in a franchise that were once considered truly special go all but unnoticed, and yet…I suppose there’s something to say for a movie that moves fast enough to not let you think about this stuff until after it’s over. It doesn’t mean much to me afterward (it actually starts to confuse me more), but at least I wasn’t bored while I was watching it. It’s a slight uptick on the first two.
