Adam: Tender beginnings

Adam (2009) • View trailer for Adam
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, for brief profanity and mild sexual content
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.28.09
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Advocacy cinema takes many forms, the most effective examples often arriving stealthily, as quiet, consciousness-raising little dramas that call attention to disenfranchised members of society.

Writer/director Max Mayer's Adam is just such a film: a sweet, poignant character study about a young man with Asperger's Syndrome — a form of high-functioning autism — and a sympathetic young woman who falls in love with him, and attempts to expand his sheltered, withdrawn lifestyle.

Unless confronted directly, Adam (Hugh Dancy) prefers to ignore other people,
having learned that he frequently misinterprets what they say. This initially
puzzles Beth (Rose Byrne), but she gradually discovers that an honest soul
lurks beneath her neighbor's reserved exterior.

The film is being marketed as a romantic comedy, which seems misleading; although certainly laced with amusing moments — most derived from the title character's tendency to take statements and actions at face value — Mayer's script is rather too serious to be lumped with inconsequential fluff such as The Proposal.

But calling Adam a sensitive "message movie" probably would be the box-office kiss of death, so I can't really fault Fox Searchlight's approach.

For the most part, and especially when he concentrates on his story's two primary characters, Mayer's film is thoughtful, absorbing, poignant and gently informative: a clearly sympathetic portrait of a man trying his best to cope with a condition that makes him utterly helpless in social and interpersonal situations, which the rest of us casually take for granted.

At times, though, Mayer's tone is disrupted by the intrusion of a secondary plot line — and the needlessly over-the-top performance of a supporting actor — that are unnecessary and out of place, and rip us right out of the core narrative.

I find this mis-match surprising for an individual (Mayer) who has directed more than 50 new plays Off-Broadway and around the country, and is a veteran director for TV shows such as Alias and The West Wing. I'd expect Mayer to have a better understanding of balance, and recognize how he damages his otherwise delicate film with occasional "Hollywoodizing" elements.

Fortunately, most everything else pales alongside the excellent work of Hugh Dancy (The Jane Austen Book Club, Confessions of a Shopaholic), who delivers as carefully shaded a performance as I've seen since Cliff Robertson (Charly) or Dustin Hoffman (Rain Man).

Post Grad: Post-mortem

Post Grad (2009) • View trailer for Post Grad
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, and much too harshly, for brief profanity and sexual candor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.27.09
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Much like its central character, this movie undoubtedly thought it knew what it wanted to be when it grew up ... but things didn't work out that way.

Kelly Fremon's "original" screenplay, blatantly derived from the dysfunctional-family sub-genre recently popularized by Little Miss Sunshine and Sunshine Cleaning, apparently transitioned into something else when star Alexis Bledel got involved.

It's that perfect moment -- the posed graduation photo -- when grabbing the
entire world still seems possible to Ryden (Alexis Bledel, second from right)
and her longtime friend Adam (Zach Gilford, far right). Alas, nothing will work
out quite right from this point onward, in part due to the involvement of,
clockwise from left, Ryden's father (Michael Keaton), grandmother (Carol
Burnett), mother (Jane Lynch) and younger brother (Bobby Coleman).

Bledel's strength — demonstrated time and again by TV's Gilmore Girls and both big-screen Traveling Pants adaptations — is as a winsome, mildly vulnerable romantic lead, which is pretty much the approach she takes in Post Grad.

Trouble is, the rest of the cast is making some other movie, and Vicky Jenson — an art department veteran and animation director (Shrek, Shark Tale) making her live-action directorial debut here — hasn't the faintest idea how to blend these two disparate halves.

The result is clumsy and unintentionally funny. Bledel's Ryden Malby reminds me unerringly of the role Beverly Owen played on TV's The Munsters back in 1964, as the conventionally attractive (i.e. "normal") teenage daughter who was such an outcast among her hilariously weird parents, grandfather and younger brother.

But this clearly isn't the tone Post Grad is seeking, as is obvious from the way Fremon's script proceeds.

The disconnect is unfortunate, particularly since Jenson opens the film cleverly, with Bledel's Ryden taking us through her computer-based networking activities to supply the necessary backstory. This quite engaging prologue sets up definite expectations, none of which are met as the film continues.

Ryden, having just graduated from college, is all set to sell herself during an interview for what she has regarded as a dream job her entire life: an entry-level position at a Los Angeles publishing firm, where she'll eventually rise to reader and associate editor, and then make her rep by discovering the world's next hot author.

Alas, the job is snatched by condescending college nemesis Jessica Bard (Catherine Reitman, daughter of Ivan Reitman, one of this film's producers), and Ryden's carefully orchestrated post-grad career path is shattered in an instant.

District 9: An enthusiastic 10

District 9 (2009) • View trailer for District 9
Five stars (out of five). Rating: R, for profanity, violence and gobs o' gore
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.21.09
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This one has it all.

Part scathing social commentary, part eye-popping speculative fiction, part kick-ass action flick, South African filmmaker Neill Blomkamp's District 9 is a ferociously engaging film: the sort of impressively original work that shapes popular entertainment for years to come.

Wikus van der Merwe (Sharlto Copley, left), assigned to serve "eviction
notices" to the unappealing aliens that have been crammed into a slum for 20
years, naively believes that the "virtue" of his task will be enough to ensure
his safety while within the fenced compound known as District 9.

Blomkamp and cinematographer Trent Opaloch also make excellent use of the "found footage" style of filmmaking that has become so common these days; this drama unfolds as a blend of faux documentary, on-the-street guerrilla footage and — when necessary — "traditional" camerawork that allows us access to scenes that couldn't be obtained any other way.

Point-of-view purists may kick up a fuss, but who cares? Blomkamp and editor Julian Clarke assemble all the pieces brilliantly: You'll be hooked from the very first scenes.

It's important to note that some genuine thought and planning went into this manner of storytelling; it's not just the usual irritating excuse for jiggly camerawork that mars most recent flicks taking this approach. Blomkamp puts us right into this pell-mell saga, and gives it a sense of immediacy that makes District 9 the genius cinematic equivalent of what Orson Welles did so cleverly with radio, back when he frightened the hell out of listeners with his 1938 adaptation of War of the Worlds.

More to the point, this sucker moves.

Blomkamp and co-writer Terri Tatchell waste no time in setting the stage, beginning their tale with a series of on-camera interviews apparently being conducted after the fact: This both establishes the necessary back-story, while suggesting that these events — whatever they were — went very badly.

The time is an unspecified point in our near future, the setting Johannesburg, where for 20 years the city's residents have lived uneasily alongside a rather unusual refugee camp. Two decades earlier, a huge extra-terrestrial "mother ship" came to rest above Johannesburg and then ... did nothing. With the world's eyes on this South African metropolis, local forces finally broke into the vessel and discovered countless malnourished aliens, all apparently too helpless to do anything.

Ponyo: Style over substance

Ponyo (2008) • View trailer for Ponyo
Three stars (out of five). Rating: G, and suitable for all ages
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.20.09
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Japanese animation impresario Hayao Miyazaki's Ponyo is gorgeous, lyrical, poetic and deeply moving at unexpected moments.

It's also slow and very, very strange.

Despite the magical Fujimoto's desperate efforts to "calm" his unusual daughter
back to her normal state, Ponyo -- originally a goldfish -- has tasted the
delights to be experienced as a human being. Then, too, she has made a
land-based friend in the world above: a little boy who already wonders what
has become of his new companion.

To a degree, the latter can be excused by the stylistic disconnect between Western and Japanese fairy tales. Miyazaki, who both wrote and directed this film, relies far more heavily on visual storytelling than narrative exposition; while U.S. directors John Lasseter, Brad Lewis and Peter Sohn clearly tried to clarify details for this English-language version, much remains oblique and only minimally explained ... if, indeed, explained at all.

The broad strokes are easy to discern, though, and other issues can be excused if "magic" is accepted as the reason for various events. Even so, adults likely will emerge with dozens of questions that simply don't have answers.

Children, on the other hand, may be completely satisfied with the core relationship between a 5-year-old boy and the rather unusual goldfish he rescues one day.

The would be Ponyo, introduced as a mute, reddish goldfish: a bit larger than her hundreds of sisters, and all of them carefully sheltered by Fujimoto (voiced by Liam Neeson), a wild-haired, undersea mad-scientist type who mutters dire imprecations while carefully pouring various colored potions into the oceans, in an effort to maintain a harmony constantly under attack by pollution from the lands above.

Ponyo, having grown old enough to be curious, hitches a ride to the surface on an obliging jellyfish: an act that very nearly ends her life, when she is scooped up by a massive dredger and gets stuck in a discarded jam jar.

Fortunately, she's spotted by young Sosuke (Frankie Jonas, yes, of that Jonas family), who quickly rescues the little fish and makes her a pet. He does this by filling a bucket with tap water, which might raise eyebrows among viewers savvy enough to understand the distinction between fresh water and sea water ... but this is the first of many, many details we simply must roll with. As far as this story is concerned, water is water; it's magic, remember?

The Time Traveler's Wife: It flies

The Time Traveler's Wife (2009) • View trailer for The Time Traveler's Wife
3.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, for profanity, fleeting nudity and sexual candor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.14.09
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Many patrons will start bawling 15 minutes into director Robert Schwentke's swooningly romantic adaptation of Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, and they probably won't stop until the lights come up.

If then.

Even though she understands -- has always understood -- the severe problems
resulting from her decision to fall in love with Henry (Eric Bana), sometimes
Clare (Rachel McAdams) finds the situation more than she can endure. Briefly
walking out of a room, to return and find him vanished, is bad enough; having
no idea how long he'll be gone ... ah, that's the crippling part.

Screenwriter Bruce Joel Rubin's understated, impressively compact handling of Niffenegger's popular novel is further buoyed by quietly layered performances from stars Rachel McAdams and Eric Bana, who credibly sell their characters' highly irregular relationship. The gimmick is presented in such a refreshingly matter-of-fact manner — this is the situation; deal with it — that we can't help embracing it, just as these two tragic protagonists live for the moments when they can embrace each other.

The Time Traveler's Wife is an unapologetic romantic fantasy, very much in the mold of 1943's A Guy Named Joe, remade in 1989 as Always, or 1998's Meet Joe Black. As with those earlier films, this one must be accepted on the story's own terms: If you can't get beyond the premise, then don't bother; audience members who whole-heartedly fall under this film's spell will look unfavorably upon anybody snickering on the sidelines.

Things begin quietly enough, as young Henry enjoys a late-night car ride with his mother. Although seemingly innocuous, Schwentke and cinematographer Florian Ballhaus frame the scene in such a manner that we quickly sense impending disaster. Indeed, the inevitable accident is horrific, but for more than one reason: Henry's mother's last sight is that of her son, inexplicably vanishing — being wiped away from reality, much like sand dissolving through an hourglass — seconds before the crash.

The boy pops back into existence just as unexpectedly, close enough to witness the crash, and tightly hugged by a man who also appears out of nowhere ... and explains that he's Henry's older self. The older man lingers just long enough to assure the boy that everything will work out; he then vanishes as quickly as he materialized.

Leaving his clothes behind.

Young Henry has, for the first time, manifested the ability that will haunt him from this day forward: an uncontrollable "gift" for jumping forward or backward in time. We never see the adolescent Henry again, Rubin's script instead focusing on the man (now Bana) who has come to terms with his "talent" as best he can.