The Secret Agent: Superlative in all respects

The Secret Agent (2025) • View trailer

Five stars (out of five). Rated R, for strong, bloody violence, sexual content, profanity and nudity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.15.26

Brazilian filmmakers clearly are drawn to unsettling dramas set during the 21-year military dictatorship that ousted the democratically elected president in 1964, both as a means of addressing their country’s recent past, and as an uncomfortable parallel to current events … particularly in the United States.

 

Armando (Wagner Moura, center, smiling) finds a safe and comfortable haven in a
group home, among fellow refugees.

Writer/director Kleber Mendonça Filho’s new film arrives hot on the heels of Walter Salles’ I’m Still Here, which hit our shores early last year. But while that film is heavily autobiographical, based on Salles’ mother’s memoirs, Mendonça Filho’s compelling drama is a fictitious, Hollywood-style production very much in the mold of 1970s American “paranoia thrillers” such as The Parallax View and The Conversation.

Indeed, Mendonça Filho admits to having emulated the style of directors such as Robert Altman, Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese.

 

This cleverly crafted narrative unfolds in tantalizing, teasing dollops. It’s a grimly melancholy study of how ordinary people become complicit in an ongoing atmosphere of corruption, by gradually accepting it as business as usual.

 

The year is 1977; we meet Armando Solimões (a note-perfect Wagner Moura) as he travels during the sweltering carnival holiday, driving a Volkswagen Beetle (which were ubiquitous in Brazil, during that decade). A stop for gas exposes both the jaw-dropping disregard of a recent violent encounter, and the casual corruption of a passing police officer who subjects Armando to an unnecessary “interview.”

 

He handles that quasi-interrogation with cool, mildly amused detachment, aware that this is a routine “game” that must be played. But, as we soon learn, Armando’s sang froid is a carefully crafted pose, because he’s a man on the run. He’s heading to the northeastern Atlantic Coast city of Recife, where his in-laws have been caring for his young son, Fernando (Enzo Nunes).

 

Armando’s wife, Fátima, is out of the picture. We don’t find out why, or how, for awhile.

 

He has been directed to a “safe house” run by Dona Sebastiana (Tânia Maria), a venerable former anarcho-communist who has given similar refuge to a gaggle of other political dissidents.

 

Maria is terrific in this role, giving Dona Sebastiana an adorable blend of feisty resilience, shrewd character judgement and sharp-eyed intelligence; this woman has seen it all, and survives to tell countless tales. Maria definitely should have garnered a Supporting Actress Oscar nod; she’s leagues above at least two of the actresses who did make the cut.

The Penguin Lessons: Waddles into your heart

The Penguin Lessons (2024) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for dramatic intensity, fleeting sexual candor and mild profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.30.25

Filmmakers are reading each other’s email again.

 

Just last August, we were graced with My Penguin Friend: a thoroughly enchanting drama, based on actual events, about how a Brazilian fisherman saved the life of an oil-covered penguin in the spring of 2011, after which the bird bonded with him.

 

The initially hopeless teacher/pupil dynamic shifts suddenly when Tom (Steve Coogan)
impulsively brings his penguin companion to class.

And here’s the follow-up: a similarly endearing handling of Tom Michell’s 2016 memoir, which depicts how he — as “a country boy from the gentle Downs of rural Sussex” — similarly saved a penguin while teaching in a boys’ boarding school in 1970s Argentina.

Director Peter Cattaneo and scripter Jeff Pope have taken a few liberties. Michell is played by 59-year-old actor/comedian Steve Coogan, who certainly can’t be termed naïve or unsophisticated. Sidebar characters have been added here and there, and the political context has been amplified in a manner that more pointedly mirrors current events throughout the world.

 

But the saga’s heart remains front and center, along with an aw-shucks level of cuteness ... but Cattaneo ensures that the tone never becomes mawkishly sentimental.

 

Coogan also supplies plenty of dry humor, delivered with his impeccable timing; his sarcastic one-liners are even funnier when contrasted with his bleak, deadpan expression.

 

The disillusioned Michell, carrying tragic baggage eventually revealed, arrives in Buenos Aires to teach at a prestigious boarding school that caters exclusively to the Very Wealthy. He’s greeted by sharp and severe Headmaster Buckle (Jonathan Pryce, appropriately stuffy), who insists on punctuality in all manners, and cautions that any discussion of politics should be approached with a small “p.”

 

That’s wise advice, because Tom — who expected an easy assignment — is chagrined to find the city in turmoil, with soldiers patrolling everywhere, and citizens understandably on edge. (Isabel Perón is shortly to be ousted via a military coup.)

 

Worse yet, Tom is dismayed to discovered that wealthy Argentinian boys are just as obnoxious as their British counterparts. Diego (David Herrero), Ernesto (Aimar Miranda) and Ramiro (Hugo Fuertes) are the stand-outs, with the most dramatic business.

 

Tom can’t begin to obtain control in his classroom, and his tendency to quote highbrow poetry and aphorisms doesn’t help.

 

His initial encounter with the school’s hard-of-hearing cook and cleaner, María (Vivian El Jaber) also goes poorly, much to the amusement of her adult granddaughter, Sofía (Alfonsina Carrocio), who works alongside her.

 

Tom’s sole ray of sunshine is erudite, Finnish-born fellow instructor Tapio (Björn Gustafsson), who — although intelligent and convivial — is hilariously incapable of understanding irony or sarcasm. As are Tom’s students.

September 5: Impressively powerful

September 5 (2024) • View trailer

Five stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity and dramatic intensity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.26.25 

Ingenuity under pressure is fascinating.

 

Director Tim Fehlbaum’s fact-based depiction of what occurred during the 1972 Munich Olympics — and how those events were broadcast to the entire world — is a suspenseful and riveting docudrama: a true, edge-of-the-seat nail-biter.

 

Members of the ABC News sports team — from left, standing, Jacques Lesgardes
(Zinedine Soualem), Geoff Mason (John Magaro) and Carter Jeffrey (Marcus
Rutherford) — surround translator Marianne Gebhard (Leonie Benesch) as she 
dictates an update from the Munich police radio frequency.

The suspense derives not from the terrorist attack itself — the details of which are well known, and remain seared into history — but the resourceful, behind-the-scenes scrambling by the ABC News sports broadcasting team, which allowed 900 million global viewers to witness this incident, in real time.

The key phrase in that previous sentence is “sports broadcasting team” ... as opposed to seasoned television news journalists. That distinction heightens this story’s drama.

 

Events begin quietly, following coverage of events taking place during Day 10 of the Olympics. Newbie coordinating producer Geoffrey Mason (played by John Magaro) is granted the opportunity to helm the next day’s coverage, thanks to a recommendation by Marvin Bader (Ben Chaplin), then vice-president of ABC-TV’s Olympic Operations. They both answer to Roone Arledge (Peter Sarsgaard), then president of ABC Sports (and later president of ABC News, from 1977 to ’98).

 

World-wide broadcast of the Games has been made possible, for the first time, thanks to new satellite technology.

 

The “thrill of victory and agony of defeat” sporting events aside, these summer Olympics are hugely important for political reasons: the first Games hosted by a German city since Adolf Hitler’s notorious 1936 Berlin travesty. The 1972 invitation was extended, in part, as a means of giving West Germany an opportunity to showcase its reborn democratic virtues.

 

This is tremendously important to the ABC team’s German translator, Marianne Gebhardt (Leonie Benesch), who wants the world to see her “new and improved” country.

 

(Unlike the aforementioned individuals, and a few others, Gebhardt is a fictitious character based on a composite of several translators.)

 

Everything goes pear-shaped at 4:30 a.m. September 5, when gun shots are heard from within the Olympic Village. They’re followed quickly by reports on the local police radio frequency — which Gebhardt translates — that armed individuals have invaded the quarters of the Israeli Olympic team.

The Holdovers: Acting, 10; story, 3

The Holdovers (2023) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity, drug use and sexual candor

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

The last time writer/director Alexander Payne and actor Paul Giamatti worked together, in 2004’s Sideways, the result was five Oscar nominations — including Best Picture — and a win for the film’s captivating script.

 

That won’t happen this time.

 

Angus (Dominic Sessa, left) and Professor Hunham (Paul Giamatti) are surprised to
discover that the school head cook, Mary (Da'Vine Joy Randolph) has prepared a
full-blown Christmas dinner.

Even so, there’s much to admire in this new film, which is based loosely on a 1935 French comedy called Merlusse. The always watchable Giamatti is well supported by co-stars Da’Vine Joy Randolph and Dominic Sessa, the latter a newcomer making an impressive acting debut. The chilly New England setting, time-capsuled in the early winter of 1970, is granted impeccable authenticity by cinematographer Eigil Bryld and production designer Ryan Warren Smith; it genuinely feels like we’ve stepped back half a century.

Indeed, the film even feels like a product of the early 1970s, in terms of tone and appearance.

 

The weak link is David Hemingson’s script.

 

Payne usually writes or co-writes his films, with memorable results that have included — in addition to Sideways — 2002’s About Schmidt and 2011’s The Descendants.

 

He should have done so this time.

 

The premise here, lifted mostly intact from Merlusse, is fine; the execution (alas!) is contrived, clumsy, lethargic and ultimately dull. The result does not deserve its protracted 133-minute length.

 

The setting is Barton Academy, a venerable boarding prep school that reeks of wealth and boorish entitlement. Giamatti stars as Paul Hunham, a veteran adjunct professor of ancient history. To call him misanthropic is the worst of understatements; Hunham regards his students with undisguised contempt. He isn’t merely stern; he’s downright nasty, routinely belittling his charges as philistines, reprobates, snarling Visigoths and (my favorite) “fetid layabouts” unfit to uphold Barton’s longstanding dedication to tradition and academic rigor.

 

That such descriptions are entirely accurate, with respect to many of the privileged little snots, is entirely beside the point. Hunham’s unceasing torrent of verbal abuse — delivered by Giamatti, it must be admitted, with considerable flourish — is an immediately insurmountable barrier that makes it impossible to sympathize with the man, as the story proceeds.

 

More to the point, although Hunham knows his field inside and out — and loves to hold forth with needlessly highbrow language — he apparently can’t communicate it. If everybody save one member of his class receives a grade of D or F on the semester final exam, then clearly Hunham is a terrible teacher. Bearing that in mind — as an adjunct professor lacking tenure, who can be fired at will — enraged wealthy parents would have demanded his departure long ago.

 

And they’d certainly have gained the support of Barton’s snootily officious headmaster (Andrew Garman, appropriately smarmy), who loathes Hunham.

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret — Absolutely marvelous

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret (2023) • View trailer

Five stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for thematically suggestive material, and mild sexual candor

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.28.23

Film adaptations of popular novels are rarely this faithful.

 

It’s not merely a matter of director/scripter Kelly Fremon Craig retaining all the crucial plot points of Judy Blume’s 1970 coming-of-age classic; it’s easy enough to check such boxes. But Fremon Craig also captures the book’s essential tone and atmosphere, along with the blend of eagerness, humiliation, humor, excitement and stubborn determination that fuels the young protagonist’s journey into nascent womanhood.

 

Margaret (Abby Ryder Fortson, right) — determined to purchase her first bra, but
horrified by the process (check her expression!) — gamely navigates a
fraught-with-peril visit to a department store, in the company of her sympathetic
and knowing mother (Rachel McAdams).

Kudos, as well, to Fremon Craig and the casting agents who found such talented young actors for all the key tween roles: most notably Abby Ryder Fortson’s totally endearing handling of the title character.

Everything — every performance, dramatic hiccup, youthfully exaggerated tragedy and excruciating embarrassment — feels authentic.

 

(The degree to which this is true became obvious quite quickly, during last Saturday’s preview screening, when Constant Companion, in a blend of amazement and horror, kept mumbling things such as “Oh, gawd,” “Just like it happened” and “That was me.”)

 

Although remembered primarily for 12-year-old Margaret’s desperate desire to experience her first period — the frequent subject of her chats with God, and the major reason Blume’s novel has long been the target of blue-nosed book-banners — the parallel plot line, touching on Margaret’s exploration of religion, is equally crucial.

 

The film retains the book’s 1970 setting, and events take place during Margaret Simon’s sixth-grade school year. As the story begins, in a sweetly fleeting montage, Margaret is shown having a blast at summer camp. She then returns to her New York City home, and the tightly knit family unit that includes her parents (Rachel McAdams and Benny Safdie, as Barbara and Herb) and grandmother Sylvia (scene-stealing Kathy Bates, blessed with impeccable line delivery).

 

Unfortunately, this happy reunion is tarnished by the news that her parents are moving them to a New Jersey suburb, leaving Sylvia — Herb’s mother — behind. Distressed by that, and the thought of never seeing her friends again, Margaret is crushed.

 

But she rebounds quickly, thanks to an immediate visit from new neighbor Nancy Wheeler (Elle Graham), a boldly confident girl who’s proud of her developing breasts, and somewhat astonished by Margaret’s, ah, lack of same. Upon learning that they’ll be in the same sixth-grade class, Nancy invites Margaret to become the fourth and final member of a “secret club” that includes Janie Loomis (Amari Alexis Price) and Gretchen Potter (Katherine Mallen Kupferer).

 

Although the latter two girls seem kind and pleasant enough, Nancy — as self-appointed club leader — frequently enhances her own ego, at the not-always-subtle expense of the others. It’s perhaps unfair to call Nancy a “mean girl,” since she never seems deliberately spiteful, but her audacious behavior often pushes the others — and particularly Margaret — beyond their comfort zone. 

 

Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game — Terrific bumper action!

Pinbal: The Man Who Saved the Game (2023) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Not rated, with PG-level sexual banter and mild profanity

Available via: Amazon Prime and other streaming platforms

By Derrick Bang

Who could have guessed that two fact-based films about gaming — Tetris and this one — would be released simultaneously?

 

Even less likely: Both are quite entertaining, in entirely different ways.

 

While Ellen (Crystal Reed) watches with delight, Roger (Mike Faist) gives her son,
Seth (Christopher Convery), some handy pinball tips.

Brothers Austin and Meredith Bragg — in an impressive writing/directing feature debut — have delivered a charming little film that’s practically its own category: equal parts docudrama, rom-com and (at times) mockumentary. 

However their film ultimately gets pigeon-holed, there’s no denying the gently whimsical touch that deftly balances established history, a charming romantic core, and droll meta touches that impishly poke fun at the making of this film, (supposedly) while it’s being made.

 

No less than New Yorker critic Richard Brody insists that “it’s better than all ten of the [2022] Best Picture nominees.”

 

I can’t go quite that far, but his enthusiasm is understandable.

 

The Brothers Bragg open their film as Roger C. Sharpe (Dennis Boutsikaris), circa today, is prepped in a studio chair, awaiting interview questions from unseen filmmakers. The topic: how he — Sharpe — literally “saved” pinball in New York City.

 

Sharpe demurs, insisting that he’s no more than a “footnote.” Yet he remains willing to tell the story, but only — sharp insistence, accompanied by Boutsikaris’ steely gaze — on his terms.

 

At which point we roll back to 1971, when a much younger Roger (now endearingly played by Mike Faist), while a student at the University of Wisconsin, has his first encounter with a true “pinball wizard.” Immediately intrigued by the possibility of prolonging a game for more than a quick couple of minutes, Roger becomes obsessed.

 

At which point the older Sharpe suddenly reappears, essentially looking over his younger self’s shoulder, in order to supply essential back-story. Boutsikaris continues to serve as on-camera narrator while the film continues: an initially disorienting device that quickly becomes an essential part of the story (thanks in no small part to Boutsikaris’ quiet sincerity).

 

Sharpe also occasionally interrupts on-screen events, insisting that the filmmakers are taking too much dramatic license in an effort to insert a “Hollywood touch.” Such objections noted, a given scene is re-staged to be more historically accurate.

 

(Wisely, the Brothers Bragg employ this gimmick sparingly.)

 

A few years pass. Roger graduates, moves to New York City, gets married, lands a job as an advertising copywriter, gets divorced — a lucky escape, given available evidence — loses his job, and loses most of his furnishings (such accoutrements having been supplied by his former wife’s family’s furniture store). Sleeping on a mattress on the floor, forced to improvise rough-and-ready plank bookshelves, Roger impulsively decides to become a journalist.

Mission Majnu: Thoughtful espionage caper

Mission Majnu (2023) • View trailer

3.5 stars (out of five). Rated TV-MA, for dramatic intensity and violence

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang

It’s always fascinating to see how different cultures embrace familiar cinema genres.

 

Director Shantanu Bagchi’s Mission Majnu is an engaging — if occasionally unlikely — take on the one-man spy flick, as typified by the likes of James Bond and Jason Bourne. Scripters Parveez Sheikh, Aseem Arrora and Sumit Batheja have employed an actual event — the mid-1970s nuclear proliferation crisis between India and Pakistan — as the backdrop for the usual blend of scheming politicians, double agents, double-crosses and dire consequences in the event of failure.

 

Covert agent Amandeep Ajitpal Singh (Sidharth Malhotra) has become convinced that
Pakistan is building a secret facility, in order to develop a nuclear bomb ... but where?
And how can he supply proof, to his handlers back in India?

Their angst-ridden hero, played persuasively by Sidharth Malhotra, is something of an outcast: sent on an undercover assignment overseen by a field supervisor who despises him.

The film opens with the successful completion of Operation Smiling Buddha, the code name (yes, seriously) given to India’s first successful nuclear bomb test, on May 18, 1974. Pakistan, still smarting from its quick defeat during the brief 1971 Indo-Pakistani War, objects globally to this development; India suspends further testing.

 

But Pakistan is being duplicitous. India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW, the equivalent of Britain’s MI6) receives reports that Pakistan is covertly building its own nuclear facility. But proof must be gathered, in order to expose this operation on the world stage.

 

At this point we meet Tariq (Malhotra), a cheerful Pakistani tailor with a talent for ingratiating himself with others. He meets and marries Nasreen (Rashmika Mandanna), a beautiful blind woman, during a somewhat jarring detour into Bollywood, complete with music, songs, colorful costumes and an elaborate wedding ceremony.

 

She becomes pregnant soon thereafter.

 

Ah, but this is all artifice. Unbeknownst to Nasreen, the lowly Tariq actually is Amandeep Ajitpal Singh, a RAW agent still haunted by the memory of watching his father commit suicide, after being accused of sharing Indian intelligence reports with Pakistan. Singh has spent his adult life determined to clear the family name, which makes him an ideal undercover agent in the eyes of RAW chief RN Kao (Parmeet Sethi).

 

This opinion isn’t shared by Sharma (Zakir Hussain), surely the most toxic field contact in the known universe, who verbally abuses Amandeep every time the poor guy checks in, most notably with repeated references to his father’s traitorous activity.

 

Sharma, convinced of the likely failure of Amandeep’s efforts to find proof of Pakistan’s nuclear activities, assigns another RAW agent — Sharib Hashmi, as the scruffy Aslam Usmania — to watchdog the situation.

 

To make matters even worse, India’s political winds shift. Operation Smiling Buddha and this covert operation were endorsed by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (Avantika Akerkar), who is replaced in the next election by Morarji Desai (Avijit Dutt). He has little use for RAW’s intelligence data; he also seems far too cozy with Pakistan’s Gen. Zia-ul-Haq (Ashwath Bhatt).

 

This doesn’t make Amandeep’s assignment any easier … or his life any safer.

The Phantom of the Open: Cheekily spirited

The Phantom of the Open (2021) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for brief profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

Not quite two months ago, The Duke treated us to the delightfully dramatized account of disabled pensioner Kempton Bunton, and 1961’s “mysterious” theft of a famed Goya painting from London’s National Gallery.

 

Maurice Flitcroft may have been even more eccentric.

 

With son Gene (Christian Lees) bringing up the rear as caddy, Maurice Flitcroft
(Mark Rylance) blithely trudges to the next tee, oblivious to the catastophic score
that he's racking up.

In 1976, with no golfing experience, Maurice — by claiming to be a professional — audaciously conned his way into the qualifying competition for that year’s British Open Championship. After all, the event was “open” … right?

His resulting score was — and remains — historic.

 

And, just as Bunton’s eventual court case prompted British law to clarify the distinction between “theft” and “borrowing,” Flitcroft’s escapade thoroughly annoyed the snooty aristocrats who ran the British Open; they quickly changed the rules, in an effort to prevent any further “incursions” by undeserving members of the lay public.

 

Not that that stopped Maurice, during subsequent years.

 

His unlikely saga has been made into a cheeky dramedy — in the irreverent style that British filmmakers do so well — by director Craig Roberts and screenwriter Simon Farnaby, the latter adapting sports journalist Scott Murray’s 2010 non-fiction book of the same title.

 

Their film is highlighted by yet another richly nuanced performance from Mark Rylance, whose impersonation of Flitcroft is flat-out astonishing. 

 

Rylance is, without question, one of today’s finest, most artfully accomplished actors. I’ve no doubt that watching him in everyday mundane tasks — such as purchasing groceries — would be just as captivating as what he does on screen.

 

Roberts and Farnaby begin their film with a prologue that sketches Maurice’s earlier days. He meets and marries Jean (Sally Hawkins), and adopts her son Michael; they subsequently augment the family with twin sons Gene and James. 

 

Years pass. Michael (Jake Davies) has grown up to become the mature, business-minded “sensible” son — read: buttoned-down twit with a stick up his fundament — while Gene and James (twins Christian and Jonah Lees), clearly more in tune with their father’s Walter Mitty nature, have become limber disco dancers.

Licorice Pizza: Quite warped

Licorice Pizza (2021) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated R, for sexual candor, drug use and considerable profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

Well, this one’s all over the map.

 

That’s no surprise, since we’re dealing with writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson; outré is his calling card. Who could forget the rain of frogs toward the end of 1999’s Magnolia, or the freakishly violent finale in 2007’s There Will Be Blood?

 

Alana (Alana Haim) surprises herself by agreeing to act as chaperone and driver for her
new "business partner," Gary (Cooper Hoffman), and his younger brother, Greg
(Milo Herschlag).

Anderson always is more concerned with atmosphere, attitude and location, than anything remotely approaching credible human behavior. And there’s no denying that Licorice Pizza nails its 1973 San Fernando Valley setting: the clothes, cars, strip malls, seedy pop-culture palaces, and the vibrant, awakening youth culture sense that anything was possible, and anything could happen.

Anderson also handles much of the cinematography here, alongside Michael Bauman; between them and production designer Florencia Martin, they’ve re-created the razzle-dazzle Valley vibe to a degree that’s almost spooky. That said, this is a heightened reality, laced with sidebar characters who usually are more burlesque than believable.

 

In fairness, though, this is a kinder, gentler Anderson: possibly because — in his typically outlandish way — he intends this film as a valentine to the area where he grew up. The on again/off again mutual crush that bonds this saga’s two primary characters is quite sweet at times … even as everything around them becomes aggressively weird.

 

(The film gets its title, by the way, from a once-famous chain of record stores that ruled Southern California from 1969 to ’85.)

 

Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman), a 15-year-old child star, meets cute with 25-year-old Alana Kane (Alana Haim) at his high school’s yearbook portrait day; she’s assisting the photographer. He boldly chats her up, much to her initially amused annoyance … but he’s so self-assured, so persistent, that she can’t help being curious.

 

Gary is an anomaly, in that all the adults in his orbit respect him as an equal (even if some roll their eyes when he leaves the room). He’s on familiar speaking terms with the manager at the iconic Tail o’ the Cock restaurant, who respectfully reserves Gary’s “special table” and also tolerates his presence at the bar (sipping only sodas, of course). Alana finds it hard to resist when he suggests that she meet him there, and it’s emotionally deeper than that; she surprises herself by accepting.

 

Although Hoffman’s Gary ostensibly dominates what subsequently transpires — frequently through sheer force of personality — this really is Alana’s story; she’s the character trying to figure out how to become a better version of herself, whereas Gary never really changes.

 

Alana is a failure-to-launch decades before that phrase became a thing, still living at home with her parents and two older sisters (Haim’s actual sisters, Danielle and Este), who also still are stuck with their parents. The high school photography gig obviously is just the latest in a long string of dead-end temp jobs that give Alana a reason to get up each morning.

 

Initially, she’s seduced more by Gary’s lifestyle and environment, than the boy himself. She agrees to become a combination chaperone/handler, leaving his mother Anita (Mary Elizabeth Ellis) more time to focus on the business side of his career. 

House of Gucci: Dressed to Kill

House of Gucci (2021) • View trailer

4.5 stars (out of five). Rated R, for profanity, sexual content, brief nudity and violence

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.26.21

These folks would have been right at home in the 15th century, living next door to the Borgias.

 

Ridley Scott’s cheeky depiction of the Machiavellian treachery, manipulation, avarice and grasping ambition that roiled the fabled Italian fashion empire for two decades, is a showcase of bravura acting chops by five high-wattage stars. The narrative approach is simultaneously giddy, sordid and occasionally laugh-out-loud funny, the latter due to the often arch script by Becky Johnston and Roberto Bentivegna, adapting Sara Gay Forden’s 2000 non-fiction book.

 

Patrizia (Lady Gaga, second from right) listens intently as Aldo Gucci (Al Pacino, far
right) waxes enthusiastic about his plans for the fashion empire, while — from left —
Paolo Gucci (Jared Leto), his wife Jenny (Florence Andrews) and Maurizio Gucci
(Adam Driver) listen, with varying degrees of interest.

Ah, the obscenely rich. They truly are their own repugnant species.

At its core, this is the saga of two fathers, two sons, and the scheming woman who — with impressive success — maneuvers them against each other. The latter is played by Lady Gaga, with a mesmerizing blend of dramatic intensity and voluptuousness rarely seen on screen since Marilyn Monroe’s reign. We hang on her every word, deed and sinuous shimmy; cinematographer Dariusz Wolski ensures that she’s framed and lighted — and frequently shadowed, within sinister darkness — for maximum carnality.

 

The setting is the late 1970s. Patrizia Reggiani is introduced working for her adoptive father, Fernando (Vincent Riotta), who runs a successful Italian trucking empire. Scott opens his film as Patrizia saunters to the trailer office on an average morning, in a form-fitting va-va-voom dress, deliberately teasing the drivers hosing down their rigs. It’s an entrance, by Lady Gaga at her most vampish, that tells us everything necessary about this woman.

 

Her family’s success allows Patrizia to mingle with the jet set; during a discotheque party, she chances to meet Maurizio Gucci (Adam Driver). He’s shy and bookish, clearly uncomfortable in this raucous, libidinous environment; Driver is oddly endearing in this stammering nerd mode.

 

Patrizia seems unlikely to give him a second glance; indeed, her initial approach is mildly taunting, which embarrasses Maurizio even further. But her attitude abruptly shifts upon hearing his last name; we can practically hear the click of opportunistic hunger behind her eyes.

 

She subsequently stalks him. He’s surprised and flattered, and succumbs all too quickly. Really, he’s no match for her.

 

Maurizio takes her to meet his father, Rodolfo (Jeremy Irons), who with his bother Aldo (Al Pacino) controls the Gucci empire. But although Rodolfo carefully safeguards his 50 percent, wholly expecting Maurizio — studying to become a lawyer — to one day take his place, he has little to do with business operations. He’s distant, withdrawn and distracted by ghosts from his past.

 

Even so, Rodolfo is a shrewd, steely eyed judge of character, and he sizes up Patrizia in a heartbeat. “She is not the girl for you,” he cautions, in a stern tone that matches the gravitas Irons summons for the moment. But Maurizio, hopelessly in love, ignores this counsel.

 

The aftermath is severe.

Uncle Frank: One of the year's best

Uncle Frank (2020) • View trailer

4.5 stars. Rated R, for profanity, sexual candor and drug use

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.27.20 

I haven’t been this nervous since Anne Hathaway reached for the microphone, in 2008’s Rachel Getting Married.

 

Although she has adored him her entire life, Beth (Sophia Lillis) begins to realize that
there's a lot more to her Uncle Frank (Paul Bettany) than he reveals to most people.

Writer/director Alan Ball’s Uncle Frank — an Amazon Prime original — is a deeply personal and sensitively handled character study, brought to life by an excellent ensemble cast headed by Paul Bettany, Sophia Lillis and Peter Macdissi. Ball deftly walks the razor’s edge that often separates comedy from tragedy, delicately developing circumstances that set up a third-act revelation/confrontation that raises our anxiety to the screaming level.

 

We know an emotional train wreck is coming.

 

A lengthy prologue — set in 1969, in tiny Creekville, S.C. — introduces the Bledsoe clan during a rowdy birthday party for elderly patriarch Daddy Mac (Stephen Root). Three generations are present: Daddy Mac, his wife Mammaw (Margo Martindale) and Aunt Butch (Lois Smith); adult children Frank (Bettany), Neva (Jane McNeill) and Mike (Steve Zahn); the latter two’s respective spouses, Beau (Burgess Jenkins) and Kitty (Judy Greer); and a rambunctious passel of grandkids.

 

Fourteen-year-old Beth (Lillis) stands out as a quiet observer, keenly attuned to the moods of others. Alas, she isn’t quick enough to prevent an irate Daddy Mac from explosively chewing out the younger kids: an eyebrow-raising moment that reveals a truly nasty temper.

 

We also don’t notice Frank right away; like Beth, he seems somehow removed from the noisy celebration. The exchange of gifts reveals a guarded dynamic between Frank and his unpleasant father. We assume it’s the former’s outsider status; unlike everybody else in the room, Frank long ago left Creekville for the Big Apple, where he has become a revered literature professor at New York University (NYU).

 

Frank escaped the vicious cycle of high school pregnancies that trap Creekville 16-year-olds into a lifetime of drudge jobs: a fate he hopes Beth also can avoid. He’s her favorite adult: the only one who treats her like a person, and not a child, listening attentively to her every word. But she fears her limited options, given family circumstances.

 

Don’t settle for who people expect you to become, he advises; become who you want to be.

 

That sentiment caps an achingly sweet and poignant chat on the porch, an entire world removed from the noisy clan on the other side of the wall: staged by Ball with carefully nuanced sensitivity, and delivered with touching persuasiveness by Bettany and Lillis.

 

This film is bookended by an older Beth’s off-camera narration, much in the manner of the adult Scout, in 1962’s To Kill a Mockingbird. (A bit later, Ball cheekily has Beth admit that Harper Lee is one of her favorite authors.)