Monthly Archives: October 2019

2019, Recent Reviews, Reviews

The Death of Dick Long (2019): Dark Comedy-Thriller with a Secret

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After friends Zeke (Michael Abbott Jr.; Loving), Earl (Andre Hyland; The 4th), and Dick (Daniel Scheinert) finish band practice, Dick asks them, “Wanna get weird?”. Since this is a film directed by Daniel Scheinert (one half of the duo behind Swiss Army Man), the answer is most definitely “Yes”. The three go all out drinking, smoking, and setting off fireworks, until the film cuts to Zeke and Earl carrying a bleeding Dick to a hospital emergency room before leaving without a trace. Later, they discover that Dick didn’t survive the night.

Visually, the film is less interesting than Scheinert’s previous work. Swiss Army Man featured creative production design and artful practical effects that would have fit in a Michel Gondry film. Scheinert shows elements of that aesthetic in the film’s opening wild night, but mostly focuses on creating the grounded setting, even down to its music choice. The soundtrack features bands like Creed and Nickelback that are regularly ridiculed in mainstream press but are successful in rural areas. The film’s visuals may not be particularly imaginative, but it does carry an authentic backwoods country vibe.

The opening wild night is the most visually exciting part of the film.

Scheinert straddles a difficult line between thriller and comedy. The death, and its horrific cause, give the film a slightly dangerous edge. Zeke and Earl are not only trying to hide their involvement with whatever led to Dick’s demise, they won’t even mention what caused it. This casts suspicion over their actions. If it was an accident, what would they have to hide? It seems unlikely that they would deliberately harm their friend, but why else would they deny their involvement? What other sort of illicit activities could have happened that night? Zeke and Earl’s behaviors raise questions about their culpability.

The comedy comes from their reactions to the situation and their poor attempts at hiding their connection to the death. Zeke and Earl argue about movie references while cleaning bloodstains out of a car and awkwardly hide the facts from their significant others. Their position becomes increasingly complicated as they run into the two local police officers at inconvenient times and have to weasel their way out of the interactions. It isn’t overtly going for laughs the way a regular comedy would, but the film’s incompetent leads get themselves into several difficult, but humorous situations when avoiding being caught.

The end result of the strange balancing act is an enjoyable film, but one that doesn’t exceed expectations in either area. The film isn’t quite a thriller, but the central mystery is still involving. It isn’t necessarily tense, but Scheinert is able to maintain enough intrigue to keep the audience tuned in. The humor isn’t gut-busting, but there is enough of it to amuse. When the story finally unravels with an answer that is shocking beyond belief, something out of the territory for a resolution to most stories, it provides ample reason for all of the preceding behavior. The Death of Dick Long is a dark comedy-thriller that, given its subject matter, balances tones enough to entertain the audience until it reaches its outrageous reveal.

3/5 stars.

2019, Recent Reviews, Reviews

The Day Shall Come (2019): Failed Satire

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Chris Morris (Four Lions) returns to cinema with another satire in a setting that doesn’t seem appropriate for humor. While his previous film followed terrorists, The Day Shall Come flips the script and centers on a team of FBI counter-terrorism agents in Miami. The agents, featuring Anna Kendrick (Pitch Perfect), have their eyes on the leader of a small religious group named Moses (Marchánt Davis).

Morris has spent most of his career deriving comedy from subject matter that should be off limits. He was thrust into the spotlight when making jokes about pedophilia on British TV then again when he made Four Lions, a comedy about four would-be suicide bombers. With Four Lions, there was an initial period of discomfort when faced with the idea of laughing at their lethal behavior, but it quickly dissipated after realizing how incompetent and misguided they were. Morris was able to deftly balance viewing the farcical nature of the ideology behind suicide bombings, the damage they cause, and the fragile mental state that allows regular people to become expendable tools in other people’s wars.

Moses has his own goals, but isn’t the violent terrorist the FBI wants him to be.

The Day Shall Come doesn’t share that level of nuance. Despite a great cast that is, in other works, very likable, the proceedings are in bad taste. Unlike the terrorists from Four Lions, Moses and his followers pose no real threat. He talks about an mutiny against the oppressors but is unequivocally against using guns, turning them down when offered. Furthermore, he has no actual power. His group has only a handful of people and they are dirt poor. They can’t afford rent for their run-down home and his wife goes dumpster diving to provide food for his followers and his children. He has goals of starting a revolution, but will clearly never be able to. His group has outlandish beliefs like being able to summon dinosaurs with an air horn or that Moses has telekinetic powers showing that he is delusional, but not harmful.

This is what creates the dilemma of the film. The FBI agents aren’t interested in actual counter-terrorism. Their work shown in the film consists of them hiring actors or blackmailing other convicts to set up possible criminals and have them engage in an illegal activity. In some cases, these are actually violent people intending to do harm, but that seems inconsequential. The agents appear to only want to increase their own notoriety by racking up convictions to advance their career. After they botch a potential arrest, they become more desperate and use Moses as their next target. As they try to get him to participate in illegal activities, he makes things difficult for them by not actually being a criminal. He goes to the FBI to report that others are trying to engage in arms trafficking, hoping to prevent the act as well as earn the reward money needed to pay his rent. In moments like this, where someone not committing a crime is viewed as a hindrance to the FBI agents and their purely self-serving goals, the film crosses the line of satire and the characters become despicable. This doesn’t appear to be a failure to achieve Morris’s intended goals, he may have wanted the agents to be received this way, but it is a creative misfire. The film is a failed satire, unable to sustain humor in the face of its reprehensible characters and their shameful, short-sighted manipulation.

2/5 stars.

2019, Recent Reviews, Reviews

Jojo Rabbit (2019): Nazi Comedy

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Using the increased clout afforded to him after revitalizing a Marvel franchise with Thor: Ragnarok, Taika Waititi (Hunt for the Wilderpeople) has gone to much riskier material. Jojo Rabbit is a comedy set in Germany near the end of WWII. Jojo (Roman Griffith Davis) is a boy who is obsessed with Hitler and fully indoctrinated by his ideals. His world becomes more complicated when he discovers his mother is hiding a Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie; Leave No Trace) in their home.

Waititi gets great work from his main cast. As Jojo, Davis has the wide-eyed look of an innocent, but easily impressionable kid and it allows him to get away with reciting Nazi propaganda. While what he says is hateful, it is obvious that he is only a child repeating what he has been mislead to believe is true. McKenzie brings a surprising amount of strength to her role. As the lone Jewish character, reduced to hiding in the walls of a house, it would have been easy for her to be a victim, but instead she comes off as resilient and bold. Her use of Jojo’s misconceptions to terrify and control him are an unexpected treat as she deliberately moves like a ghost in a horror movie to play into his fears. Scarlett Johansson (The Avengers), as Jojo’s mother, is warm and loving, but has an hilariously antagonistic side. Since she secretly despises Nazi beliefs, she subtly teases Jojo to get him to understand that his beliefs are wrong by telling him about the importance of love while also gently taunting him by calling him “Shitler” or tying his shoelaces together.

The supporting roles have their moments as well with Yorkie (Archie Yates) deserving high praise. As Jojo’s chubby, bespectacled second-best friend, Yorkie is the film’s funniest character. His sweet nature and complete obliviousness to the events around him are hilarious. Every moment he shares with Jojo is heartwarming and cute as he finds himself inexplicably resilient and makes his way through one precarious situation after another.

Waititi uses overly exaggerated facial expressions that detract from the humor.

The exception to the excellent casting unfortunately comes in Waititi himself. A self-described “Polynesian Jew”, Waititi playing Hitler is, in theory, a perfect fit. He is a talented comedian and the idea of casting a non-white Jewish actor as Hitler is in itself appropriately insulting to Nazi beliefs, but Waititi overacts in the role. It’s important to distinguish that this is not Hitler, but rather a 10 year old’s imaginary version of Hitler, so he only has the mental faculties of a little boy. This leads to some moments of levity as Waititi is confused by things a child wouldn’t understand, but his facial expressions are often too much to handle. He spends most of his screentime trying to make funny faces to get easy laughs, but this is distracting and undermines much of the humor leading to a film with jokes that miss as often as they land.

Setting a feel-good comedy in Nazi Germany is not a normal premise and it has understandably offended some. Jojo Rabbit doesn’t portray Nazis as good-hearted, but it does make them seem like incompetent buffoons in an aesthetically pleasing Wes Anderson-like world that only lightly touches on the atrocities they were so efficient in executing, which is a tonal mistake. That being said, the Nazis themselves are not the focus of the film. Jojo Rabbit, like many of Waititi’s works, is a coming of age story, this time in the midst of warped society. It is ultimately about a child learning to embrace love over hate and disregarding the alleged differences between various people. It doesn’t have the sustained laugh rate it aims for, but Jojo Rabbit is still enjoyable for its lead cast, goofball humor, and a few poignant moments.

3/5 stars.

2019, Recent Reviews, Reviews

Parasite (2019): High-class Infiltration

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With his first film to be made fully in Korea in a decade, director Bong Joon-ho has created his best work since Memories of Murder. Parasite is the story of a poor family living in a basement apartment . The father (Song Kang-ho) was a driver but, like the rest of his family, is unemployed and barely scraping by. The son gets an offer from his friend to substitute as an English tutor for a rich girl, despite his lack of a college education, and enters into a completely different world. Using the English name “Kevin”, he meets the Parks, an affluent family that pays him a sum that is inconsequential to them, but life-changing for him.

The film begins as a comedic con movie. Kevin (Choi Woo-sik; Okja) tricks his way into the wealthy household on his friend’s recommendation, but the film becomes increasingly ridiculous as he, and each subsequent member of his family, devise ways to get their loved ones a job, even if that job is already taken. They set up elaborate schemes to put the existing staff out of work that, while unfair to the innocent employees, are hilarious in their audacity. The rich mom appears kind, but gullible, or “simple” as Kevin’s friend puts it, and falls for their innocuous line of recommendations. Slowly, the entire Kim family becomes employed by the Park family and their clumsy attempts to hide their relationships become a great comedy of errors.

The poor Kim family does odd jobs like folding pizza boxes just to survive.

Without spoiling anything, their deception escalates with unforeseen consequences. This is where the plot thickens and the film’s themes begin to show themselves. While the Parks seem kind and welcoming at first, the disparity between their lives and the lives of the Kim family comes into focus. During a heavy rainfall, the Park family, in their walled off home above the city streets, are largely unaffected, with their son even camping outside during the storm. The Kims however live in a partially underground apartment. The rain leads to their home being flooded to chest-high levels of sewage water, drastically impacting their lives in a way the Parks are not even aware of. In the subtle way they treat their employees, the Parks show their aversion towards the Kims and their lower class life, gradually changing how the Kims, and the audience, view them. The Parks may be the victim of deception, but their attitudes create a moral gray area.

Bong is known for his skillful blending of genres and tones, but Parasite is remarkable even by his high standards. The film works on so many levels. It’s a thriller, a farcical comedy, and a commentary on class, all without conflicting tones or sacrificing the strength of one genre for the other. As the film dives into unexpected territories, it feel completely controlled and reaches surprising levels of emotional significance. Bong uses the film to comment on class privilege, but also the sacrifices and glass ceilings of the lower classes. He shows what the poor must struggle through, what they dream of, and what their realities are without completely absolving them of blame. He isn’t afraid of showing multiple perspectives. Parasite is masterful blend of genres and a tonal juggling act featuring a complex look at wealth disparity in modern society.

five stars

5/5 stars.

2019, Recent Reviews, Reviews

Wounds (2019): Bland Thriller

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After an incredible debut with Under the Shadow, writer-director Babak Anvari’s second feature can only be considered a disappointment. Based on the novella The Visible Filth by Nathan Ballingrud, the story follows Will (Armie Hammer; The Lone Ranger), a bartender in Louisiana, that leads a steady, but happily aimless life drinking heavily and enjoying himself. After breaking up a bar fight, he picks up a cell phone left by some college students and accidentally takes it home. He finds some alarming text messages asking for help and, believing it to be a prank, tells them to come back to the bar to pick up the phone. Soon the texts become dangerous and he discovers horrifying pictures and videos of body parts and what appears to be torture. He decides to give the phone to local police officers that frequent his bar, but the pull of the phone and its transgressive material begins to seep into his life.

Hammer continues to be an actor that looks the part of the leading man, almost to a ridiculous degree, but doesn’t have the acting talent to match. His deep voice lacks nuance in his delivery and his attempts at inflections during dramatic moments feel forced and stilted. He struggles to emote with his monotone diction and doesn’t have enough material to support him. Will, as a character, is mostly hollow. Some of this is in keeping with the themes of the story, but it doesn’t make him an engaging presence. He is never given enough background or motivation to add depth to his character and the supporting cast is similarly vacant.

Hammer can’t display the level of emotion required for the role.

While Anvari’s first film was a demonstration of complete directorial control, Wounds is lackluster. The film never maintains any level of sustained tension and struggles to even produce fleeting moments of suspense. Under the Shadow featured many scenes of poised camerawork that was fraught with impending peril as well as creative compositions, but none of that skill is present here. The majority of the film is shot with fairly standard blocking, sorely missing any personal style. There are a few jump scares, but they appear randomly and too briefly to have any effect. Worst of all, they have no relation to the story. For example, a close-up of a loud, dusty air conditioning unit is spliced in between two random scenes as a jump scare, but it only produces confusion. Decisions like this raise questions about the director’s judgement and vision in creating the film.

Some of the poor results can be blamed on the source material. The Visible Filth is an intriguing story, but one that may not have been a good fit for the big screen. Moments of tension created by unknown, potentially sinister text messages and voicemails work well on the page, but in cinematic form this becomes images of adults looking at their phones which doesn’t carry the same level of dread. This failed translation is especially harmful in the film’s conclusion. It resolves little for those who held on hoping for a worthwhile reveal for the story’s struggling mystery. The ending, while true to the source material, is so bland visually that Anvari resorts to mediocre computer generated effects to obscure the screen and hide its banality. Wounds isn’t an offensively bad film, but it is a bland and forgettable one which, given its pedigree, makes it profoundly disappointing.

2/5 stars.

2019, Recent Reviews, Reviews

Pain and Glory (2019): Late-life Autofiction

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With a filmography that spans almost  40 years and numerous genres, it could be said the Pedro Almodóvar (Talk to Her) is approaching the end of his career, but instead of retiring he has created a film that explores this very topic. Salvador (Antonio Banderas; The Mask of Zorro) is a famous director who has recently retired from filmmaking, citing his poor health. He decides to reconcile with the lead actor from an early film to appear together at a special screening and begins to recollect his childhood and the parts of his life that have shaped the man he is today as well as his life’s work.

As the director’s alter ego, Banderas is incredible. He sports a mostly-white beard and a tussled hairstyle mimicking Almodóvar’s own look, but his mood is his most striking feature. Banderas, now approaching  60, is no longer a young man, but in Pain and Glory he is weary beyond his years. He lists his various ailments that have left him unable to direct a feature and barely able to leave the house and it seems as if his life is coming to an end. He states that he doesn’t know what to do if he isn’t filming, but at the same time behaves as if he is a spent firework, lacking the necessary fuel to maintain a flame. Banderas brings an incredible restraint to his performance. Salvador tells his actor friend that actors shouldn’t cry and should instead be on the verge, fighting back the tears and he follows his own advice. When Salvador meets a former lover, the joy he feels from the reunion as well as the pain from knowing it will be short-lived are apparent in his watering eyes. The subtlety of Banderas’s performance adds integrity and humility to the material as Salvador is shown as a flawed and frail figure, grappling with his own existence.

Banderas displays complex emotions with ease.

Like most of Almodóvar’s work, Pain and Glory is filled with the bright hues of pop art. Salvador’s condo looks like it could be a museum with its vibrant decorations. His kitchen cabinets are bright red with contrasting teal tilework and most of the modern portion of the film shares this colorful palette, making even simple framings burst with style.

The beauty of this film is how its obscure subject matter becomes immensely relatable. As a personal memoir, it had the potential to become self-indulgent as Salvador’s mother tells him “I hate autofiction!”, but Pain and Glory never feels that way. Salvador’s unusual upbringing, living in an underground home in a small village or his immense success as a film director in his adult life are not experiences most people will relate to, but the emotions on display are so vivid that is impossible to not lose yourself within them. Each memory feels authentic, almost revelatory, as Salvador tries to understand himself through recollecting his childhood and it becomes clear that not only is this film part memoir, so is the majority of Almodóvar’s filmography. With Pain and Glory, Almodóvar has taken the deeply personal and transformed it into emotions that are universal, resulting in one of the most nuanced, and intensely felt films of his career.

4/5 stars.