Fountain of Youth: Dumb fun at best

Fountain of Youth (2025) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for action violence and mild profanity

Available via: Apple TV+

By Derrick Bang

It’s hard to replicate the directorial panache, sharp writing and star charisma that made Raiders of the Lost Ark so entertaining, but — God knows — people keep trying.

 

Luke (John Krasinski, center left) and his team — from left, Charlotte (Natalie Portman),
Owen (Domhnall Gleeson), Deb (Carmen Ejogo) and Patrick (Laz Alonso) — marvel at
what has just been revealed by a particular painting.

Nicholas Cage did reasonably well, with 2004’s National Treasure, not so much with its 2007 sequel. Angelina Jolie stumbled with both of her Lara Croft entries — 2001 and ’03 — although Alicia Vikander fared better with 2018’s re-booted Tomb Raider. And the less said about 2008’s Fool’s Gold and 2022’s The Lost City, the better.

British director Guy Ritchie now has embraced the challenge, and — having done so well with his two Sherlock Holmes entries, his re-booted Man from U.N.C.L.E. and several stylish crime thrillers — hope sprang eternal.

 

Alas.

 

On the positive side, star John Krasinski brings a lot to the party: boyish enthusiasm, considerable charm, and a lot of well-timed flair for his character’s snarky running commentary. But co-star Natalie Portman is badly miscast; she has no sense of fun, never seems to know how to look or sound, and spends most of the film being a bitchy pain in the ass.

 

And while several of the action sequences are audacious and inventively staged, James Vanderbilt’s clumsy script leaves plot holes large enough to swallow the pyramid where our heroes wind up, in the final act.

 

Ritchie kicks off matters with a bang, as Luke Purdue (Krasinski) cheerfully maneuvers his motorcycle through Bangkok’s busy streets, pointedly ignoring incessant phone calls from somebody named Kasem. He’s then suddenly boxed in by several cars and motorcycles led by the aforementioned Kasem (Steve Tran), who turns out to be a lieutenant in a nasty Thai crime syndicate ... from which Luke has just stolen a painting.

 

Cue a lively, propulsively staged chase through city streets via car, motorcycle and on foot, as Luke finally eludes his pursuers and hops a train, his movements guided via satellite by colleague Patrick Murphy (Laz Alonso), safely elsewhere. Alas, Luke’s planned train getaway is interrupted by the mysterious Esme (Eiza González), who alsodemands the painting, and is accompanied by her own pet thugs.

 

Cue an equally inventive skirmish within the train compartment, employing fixtures, cutlery and everything else not nailed down. Luke once again escapes, this time finally reuniting with Patrick and Deb (Carmen Ejogo), the other member of his crew.

Star Wars, Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker: Breathless adventure

Star Wars, Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker (2019) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for sci-fi action and violence, and dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang

I’ve no doubt fans will be dazzled by this long-awaited concluding chapter in George Lucas’ original nine-part serial — how could they not be? — but this film will resonate even more strongly with those who were between the ages of 8 and 25 back when the original Star Wars debuted in May 1977.

With the remnants of the massive Death Star II towering against the pounding waves of
an oceanic moon, young Jedi Knight Rey (Daisy ridley, left) and the evil Kylo Ren
(Adam Driver) duel to the death with their light-sabers.

The sense of closure here will be far more emotionally powerful for that group. 

One generation of Harry Potter fans grew up with the books (1997-07) and subsequent films (2001-11), but followers of The Force have lived with these characters for 42 years. For those folks, the dramatic impact of this new film’s final 15 minutes defies easy discussion. Suffice it to say, we get laughter, tears, anxiety, relief, regret and — most crucially — satisfaction.

Along with the knowledge — bottom lines being what they are — that we certainly haven’t seen the last of this galaxy far, far away (as the new Disney streaming service’s The Mandalorian demonstrates).

Getting to this film’s finale, however, is almost too much to endure at times. Goodness, but our heroes suffer!

Director J.J. Abrams wisely plays to the faithful with this ninth “original series” installment, following the pell-mell serial format that Lucas established four decades ago. The best Star Wars entries always have relied on the “divide and conquer” approach, sending individual characters on crucial sidebar missions, while the core plotline inexorably advances toward an appalling outcome. This prompts cross-cutting between events, simultaneously building suspense in numerous directions.

We hit the ground running, as always, and the pace remains frantic. Everything is propelled by John Williams’ exciting orchestral score, blending long-familiar character themes with plenty of fresh cues.

Our current heroes — led primarily by apprentice Jedi Rey (Daisy Ridley), reformed mercenary Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac), and former First Order Stormtrooper-turned-good guy Finn (John Boyega) — learn that, horror of horrors, the “defeated” Galactic Empire’s evil-evil-evil Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid, returning to the role) still lives. Whether clone or spirit resurrected by foul Sith magic, the result is the same: Palpatine intends to resume his plan to dominate the universe.

To that end, he has overseen the construction of a massive fleet of First Order warships equipped with planet-killing cannons. Any world unwilling to be dominated … will be obliterated.

The Kitchen: Not much cooking

The Kitchen (2019) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rated R, for considerable profanity and bloody violence
By Derrick Bang

Strong performances can’t compensate for a weak script, no matter how much this film hopes you’ll think otherwise.

Are you talkin' to us? Claire (Elisabeth Moss, left), Ruby (Tiffany Haddish, center) and
Kathy (Melissa McCarth) find little to admire in the so-called men left to run the
Irish Mob in Hell's Kitchen.

Melissa McCarthy, Tiffany Haddish and Elisabeth Moss act up a storm, and their characters are solid; they easily hold our attention (although it’s probably a stretch to suggest that we ever sympathize with them). But too many key supporting characters are woefully underdeveloped, even when it’s crucial to understand them better.

Others have ethics that float like leaves on a stiff breeze. The sudden shifts can induce viewer whiplash.

Blame easily is assigned to first-time director Andrea Berloff, who also supplied a clumsy screenplay based on the eight-part 2015 comic book series by Ollie Masters and Ming Doyle. In her haste to mount a female-oriented crime thriller appropriately timed to the #MeToo movement, Berloff has forgotten the first rule of cinema: It’s always the story, stupid.

The setting is 1978 New York City, in the 20 blocks of pawn shops, porn palaces and dive bars squatting between Eighth Avenue and the Hudson River: aptly known as Hell’s Kitchen, and ruled by the Irish Mafia. The story hits the ground running, as gangsters Jimmy (Brian d’Arcy James), Kevin (James Badge Dale) and Rob (Jeremy Bobb) stage a hold-up, only to be interrupted by police and the FBI.

The result: three years in prison.

They leave families behind. Jimmy’s wife, Kathy (McCarthy), wonders how she’ll feed their two adolescent children. Kevin’s wife, Ruby (Haddish), is left in the company of her hateful mother-in-law, Helen (Margo Martindale), a spiteful-tongued shrew and neighborhood matriarch, who calls the shots behind the scenes. Rob’s battered wife, Claire (Moss), is grateful for his absence.

The Mob falls under the half-assed rule of Little Jackie (Myk Watford), whose promise to take care of the three women — because “we’re family” — proves woefully insufficient. Taking note of the general neighborhood dissatisfaction with Little Jackie, who demands protection money without offering protecting, Kathy and her friends decide to take matters into their own hands.

They’re initially nervous and unschooled in the ways of violence, but they learn quickly.

Star Wars: The Last Jedi — Galaxy-spanning excitement

Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for intense sci-fi action and violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.15.17

The newest installment in the Star Wars franchise certainly doesn’t lack ambition.

At 152 minutes, The Last Jedi is by far the longest chapter in George Lucas’ originally conceived three-trilogy ennealogy. (I had to look that one up.)

Having been sent on a desperate mission to the obscenely opulent gambling planet of
Canto Bight, Rose (Kelly Marie Tran) and Finn (John Boyega) have decidedly different
views on how to locate their quarry.

It’s also the grimmest, with an emphasis on the word “Wars” that echoes last year’s Rogue One. The middle chapter of a trilogy inevitably is the most dire, as was established in 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back. This new film’s solely credited writer/director, Rian Johnson, clearly took that precedent seriously. We hit the ground running, with few pauses for breath.

But they’re important pauses. Johnson understands the value of dramatic highs and lows, and — most crucially — of leavening dire doings with well-timed dollops of humor.

When last we left our various heroes, the Nazi-esque First Order — having risen from the ashes of the evil Galactic Empire — was eradicating the peaceful New Republic, world by world. Aside from wishing to dominate the universe, the evil Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis) employed the Darth Vader-esque Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) to seek out and destroy all traces of the Jedi order.

The plucky Rey (Daisy Ridley), imbued with the mysterious Force, has journeyed to the remote oceanic planet Ahch-To, in order to find and train with the long missing Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill). Former Stormtrooper-turned-good guy Finn (John Boyega), badly injured during a lightsaber battle with Kylo Ren, lies comatose in a medical stasis bed. Impetuous pilot Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) and his faithful droid, BB-8, joined the Resistance forces commanded by Gen. Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher), as they celebrated the destruction of First Order’s massive Starkiller Base.

If all this seems a voluminous information dump, it’s merely the tip of the iceberg; subplots and sidebar characters reference everything back to 1977’s very first film. Four decades later, it’s extremely difficult for new viewers to jump into this saga, and even longtime fans may need an Internet refresher course.

(This being the era of binge viewing, I suppose the tried-and-true are expected to power-watch the previous seven films before embracing this one. That’s asking a bit much.)

Goodbye Christopher Robin: Farewell, this film

Goodbye Christopher Robin (2017) • View trailer 
2.5 stars. Rated PG, for fleeting but graphic war images
By Derrick Bang

Brief portions of this biographical drama are endearing: precisely what fans may have imagined, when wondering how Winnie the Pooh was created.

To the complete surprise of his parents (Domhnall Gleeson and Margot Robbie), their son
Christopher (Will Tilston) is furious when confronted with a toy shop's massive cache of
stuffed bears in the likeness of his bear. The notion that the public soon will be able to
own such faux copies is more than the boy can stand.

Alas, the rest feels like character assassination, akin to the hatchet job done on Walt Disney and P.L. Travers, in 2013’s Saving Mr. Banks.

One must be wary of film biographies that are “inspired” by actual events, since this often is code for exaggeration and “made-up stuff.” Scripters Frank Cottrell Boyce and Simon Vaughan have succumbed to this temptation, in one case rather egregiously (apparently in service of “dramatic tension”).

Such embellishment can be excused when little is known about the subject(s) in question, but Boyce and Vaughan had much from which to draw: Alan Alexander Milne’s numerous essays, along with Ann Thwaite’s sterling biography; and — most particularly — Christopher Robin Milne’s own memoirs, The Enchanted Places, The Path Through the Trees and Hollow on the Hill.

Director Simon Curtis’ film certainly looks and feels authentic. Production designer David Roger has done a masterful job of recreating the sparkle and sophistication of 1920s London, along with the rustic, cozy and sun-dappled East Sussex countryside that A.A. Milne found so comforting.

Curtis even used actual locations, most crucially “Pooh Bridge” and Ashdown Forest, the wilderness adjacent to Cotchford Farm, where Milne’s son — Christopher Robin, who went by the nickname “Billy Moon” — spent his childhood. (The actual Cotchford Farm still stands, but was unsuitable for filming; a similar property nearby was used for exterior shooting.)

The problem is that this film’s tone is relentlessly dreary, even mean-spirited. Milne’s wife Daphne is portrayed as a cold-hearted, mercilessly self-centered monster: an interpretation that Margot Robbie nails all too well. We hate her on sight, and our opinion only lowers with time. Daphne lacks even a whiff of motherly instinct, having apparently lost interest in her child when he turned out to be a boy, rather than the girl she wanted.

Nor did she abandon that hope gracefully, insisting that her son be garbed in smocks and dresses throughout his childhood.

American Made: The satiric veneration of a scoundrel

American Made (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for relentless profanity and occasional nudity
By Derrick Bang

The only thing more unsettling than this film, is the possibility that the truth is even worse.

Barry Seal (Tom Cruise, left) hands an envelope stuffed with cash to Manuel Noriega
(Alberto Ospino, right), in exchange for a folder containing unspecified intel: merely one
of various questionable activities that Barry undertakes on behalf of the CIA.

The notorious Barry Seal’s jaw-dropping career has long screamed for big-screen treatment, and director Doug Liman’s American Made wisely casts the saga as a personality-driven dark comedy that transforms Seal’s illicit activities into the stuff of overstated burlesque. Tom Cruise is absolutely perfect for the role, his ear-splitting grin and smug swagger delivering the charisma that everybody acknowledged was Seal’s greatest asset.

At the same time, there’s no question that Gary Spinelli’s script — he acknowledges none of the existing books about Seal — sugar-coats a lot of bad things, time-shifts others, baldly fabricates events, and outright ignores some of his subject’s worst character deficiencies. The result would play well on a double-bill with Martin Scorsese’s Wolf of Wall Street, which similarly turned the heinous behavior of opportunistic swindler Jordan Belfort into the stuff of dark farce.

Both films are slick, fast-paced and thoroughly engaging: no question, a lot of fun to watch. Both also add an eyebrow-raising layer of sophisticated exhilaration to the illicit behavior of their respective subjects, as if to suggest they’re modern updates of E.W. Hornung’s debonair gentleman burglar, A.J. Raffles.

To be fair, Liman and Spinelli have the added advantage of what could be termed the “Barry Seal mystique”: the ongoing uncertainty that revolves around the degree to which his activities were — or weren’t — tolerated, if indeed orchestrated, by various U.S. intelligence, drug and government entities. No question: This film will be loved by conspiracy theorists, and particularly by those willing to assume the worst of the Reagan-era administration.

Spinelli goes all in, accepting and expanding upon rumors that Seal operated with the full awareness and cooperation of everything from the CIA to the DEA and those involved with Nancy Reagan’s “war on drugs.” Along the way, the saga suggests Seal’s intimate involvement with everybody from Pablo Escobar and Manuel Noriega, to Bill Clinton, Oliver North and the Iran/Contra scandal. Even a young George W. Bush gets a brief but telling moment (with a line of dialogue guaranteed to raise a smile).

Cruise’s distracting strut aside, careful attention must be paid to the way Liman constructs his film, most particularly with respect to the implications of his framing device. The bulk of the narrative may feel like an intoxicating roller coaster ride, but Liman carefully maintains an undertone of anxiety and outright danger.

Mother! — A nauseating miscarriage

Mother! (2017) • View trailer 
No stars (Turkey). Rated R, for strong and disturbing violent content, sexuality, nudity and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.15.17

I never would have believed that the same calendar year could produce another mainstream film as self-indulgently loathsome as February’s A Cure for Wellness.

Actually, this one’s worse.

As her companion (Javier Bardem) inexplicably tolerates the intrusive presence of ever
more strangers in their huge home, our increasingly helpless heroine (Jennifer
Lawrence) wonders — and worries — where it'll all end.

Darren Aronofsky has pushed the borders of good taste — and any semblance of rational narrative structure — ever since 2000’s Requiem for a Dream. When tethered to somebody else’s (reasonably) coherent script — as with The Wrestler and Black Swan — his worst tendencies remain checked. He also can be a gifted actor’s director, having guided stars to Academy Award nominations and victories.

But when Aronofsky directs and writes ... look out.

Case in point: Mother!

Whether allegory, parable or primal scream, this blast of wretched excess is overwrought, insufferably distasteful and — once we reach the dog-nuts third act — vile beyond words. This abomination is guaranteed to enrage patrons into demanding refunds, after which they’ll stumble home, scarred for life, and in desperate need of a shower. And a means to sterilize their brains.

Alas, some things can’t be unseen.

On top of everything else, Aronofsky is guilty of stretching facile symbolism way past sustainability. Mother! might’ve made a decent 25-minute short subject; as a 121-minute assault on viewer sensibilities, it’s an exercise in mind-numbing overkill.

I carefully avoid spoilers, because even bad movies — well, most of them — deserve a chance to impress or surprise. But there’s simply no way to discuss Mother! without revealing Big Secrets. For which I apologize, in advance.

No characters are named. Our heroine (Jennifer Lawrence) shares an imposing mansion — isolated in a field, surrounded by a forest, far from any semblance of civilization — with her husband/lover/keeper (Javier Bardem). The place is a fixer-upper; she paints, plasters walls, handles plumbing and wood-working chores. She has been working thusly for quite some time, essentially re-building what had been a fire-gutted ruin.

He’s a poet, suffering the damnation of writer’s block. She’s patient, sympathetic, nurturing. She prepares his meals, encourages him to try, try again.

The Revenant: Grim survival drama

The Revenant (2015) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for strong gory violence, dramatic intensity, sexual assault and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.8.16

Rarely has the rugged American West been portrayed with such grim, unforgiving brutality.

Hollywood seems to view the holiday season as the time for historical sagas of astonishing survival. Unbroken opened on Christmas Day 2014; In the Heart of the Sea occupied movie theaters during much of this past December. To their company we now add The Revenant, based in part on the gruesome event that defined the life — and legend — of early 19th century American fur trapper and frontiersman Hugh Glass.

Seasoned frontiersman Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) understands that he can't
necessarily trust some of his human companions. He also understands that far more
dangerous creatures roam the wilderness ... and none more volatile than an enraged
mother bear trying to protect her cubs.

This incident, and its aftermath, first hit the big screen in 1971’s Man in the Wilderness, with Richard Harris starring as “Zachary Bass” (the sort of dumb name-shift that made eyes roll, back in the day). Author Michael Punke subsequently employed Glass’ experiences as the backdrop for his fictional 2002 “augmentation” of the trapper’s life, The Revenant; director Alejandro González Iñárritu and co-scripter Mark L. Smith have based this new film on that novel.

While the bloodthirstier elements of Glass’ saga have been heightened here (and in Punke’s novel) for greater melodramatic impact, that isn’t as unreasonable as it might seem. Glass was guilty of exaggerating his exploits during his own lifetime, so we really aren’t able to separate fact from fancy ... except with respect to the seminal incident.

As the film begins, Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) is guiding a fur-trapping expedition led by Capt. Andrew Henry (Domhnall Gleeson), commander of the trading outpost Fort Kiowa, located on the Missouri River in South Dakota. The group is ambushed by an Arikara war party — once-peaceful Native Americans who, at this point in their history, are thoroughly fed up with having been repeatedly displaced by white settlers — that decimates Henry’s company.

The fleeing survivors regroup, with Henry accepting Glass’ suggestion of the safest — but hardest — route back to the fort. This decision doesn’t sit well with the outspoken John Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy), mostly because he neither likes nor trusts Glass. The latter doesn’t regard Fitzgerald as worthy of concern, which of course enrages our de facto villain even further.

Fitzgerald also is a vicious racist who despises the presence of Glass’ half-Native teenage son, Hawk (Forrest Goodluck). Although father and son are devoted to each other, the boy is withdrawn and fearful: forever traumatized by a childhood event that claimed his mother’s life (and which we experience, in brief chunks, via flashback).

The remaining trappers also include young Jim Bridger (Will Poulter), a name that should be familiar to those who remember their grade-school American history; Bridger would become one of our foremost mountain men and guides.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens — Everything old is new again

Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for intense sci-fi action and violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.18.15

No question about it: J.J. Abrams definitely is one with The Force.

The writer/director/producer who so smartly revived the Star Trek franchise has done the same with Star Wars.

With nasty First Order storm troopers hot on their heels, Rey (Daisy Ridley) and Finn (John
Boyega) do their best to survive long enough to get a valuable little droid into the hands of
good-guy Resistance fighters.

After the most recent trilogy prompted a blend of disappointment, disgust and outright hostility — Jar Jar Binks, anyone? — fans could be excused the raised-eyebrow wariness that initially greeted news of fresh doings in that galaxy far, far away. But maybe there really is something to the all-pervasive Force, because — for several months now — we’ve been part of an escalating global awareness that Something Great was in the offing.

Indeed.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens isn’t merely a 30-years-later continuation of the universe-spanning saga that (technically) left off back in 1983, with Return of the Jedi. Abrams and co-scripters Lawrence Kasdan and Michael Arndt have delivered a new chapter that simultaneously advances the ongoing narrative, while strongly evoking, echoing and honoring everything that we loved about that wonderful debut, back in 1977.

Abrams sought out the best: Kasdan will be recognized as the writer who worked on both The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi (not to mention Raiders of the Lost Ark). He lives and breathes this stuff; he also understands the delicate art of imitating Hollywood’s Golden Age serials — with their alternating dollops of melodramatic angst and cliff-hanging action scenes — without crossing the line into overly broad farce.

And, as befits the 30-years-later scenario, we’ve been granted a fresh — and fresh-faced — cast of new characters, possessing varying capabilities, and thrust into ghastly events with either reluctance or grim resolve. At the same time, fans will cheer the return of old friends, whether human, droid or Wookie.

It can’t have been easy to deliver a film that will please both newcomers and longtime fans with light-sabers drawn; Abrams and his crew pulled it off, and then some.

Brooklyn: Endearing coming-of-age drama

Brooklyn (2015) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, and rather harshly, for brief sensuality
By Derrick Bang

There’s a moment in this film when Eilis Lacey (Saoirse Ronan) pauses at the top of the stairs in her home in tiny Enniscorthy, Ireland.

Director John Crowley holds on this hushed and wordless tableau, as Eilis thoroughly scans her bedroom, and the room immediately adjoining. Ronan’s expression is intent and focused, her carefully composed gaze a blend of determination and regret.

Eilis (Saoirse Ronan, second from right) listens warily as Mrs. Kehoe (Julie Walters, center
rear) responds to some thinly veiled gibes from Patty (Emily Bett Rickards, far left) and
Diana (Eve Macklin, second from left). Given half a chance, Eilis knows, Patty and Diana
will make fun of her.

And we understand that she’s memorizing these rooms — this childhood haven where she grew up — certain in the knowledge that she’ll never return. The realization is heartbreaking: one of the most poignant leave-takings I’ve ever seen on the big screen.

Brooklyn is filled with emotionally powerful moments, most given additional heft by Ronan’s exquisitely sensitive performance. She has the added benefit of excellent material; Colm Tóibín’s acclaimed 2009 novel of the same title has been deftly adapted by Nick Hornby, an excellent novelist and screenwriter (About a Boy, An Education) with a strong sense of dialogue and interpersonal dynamics.

This is a gentle, simple tale: also an ironically timely one, given the current national — and international — furor regarding immigrants. Crowley and Hornby couldn’t have anticipated such real-world turbulence during production, and therefore cannot be credited (or blamed) for deliberately creating subtle advocacy cinema.

At the same time, it’s nice to be reminded of the American values that have made our “land of the free, home of the brave” such a cherished destination for so many people from throughout the world, and for so long.

Occasional cultural references pinpoint this story in 1952 and ’53. Eilis has spent her entire life in Enniscorthy; we meet her during a final shift at a local all-purpose shop run by Miss “Nettles” Kelly (Brid Brennan), a condescending harridan who clearly enjoys embarrassing her less refined customers.

Work is scarce throughout Ireland, and under ordinary circumstances Eilis’ prospects would be extremely limited. But she’s lucky; her older sister Rose (Fiona Glascott), with assistance from Catholic priests on both sides of the Atlantic, has arranged for Eilis to emigrate to Brooklyn, New York.

Departure is bittersweet at best; although Eilis is excited, the bond with her sister is strong, as is a shared concern for their somewhat frail and lonely mother (Jane Brennan), who never fully recovered from her husband’s death.

The ocean journey, though not without incident, is cleverly condensed by Hornby; it also sets up a “passing it forward” encounter that comes to fruition, quite poignantly, toward the end of the film.

Ex Machina: The perils of playing God

Ex Machina (2015) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for profanity, disturbing content, nudity and violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 4.24.15

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley would have loved this film.

Indeed, granted a time machine and access to today's technology, she likely would have made this film.

During one of the rare moments when he feels like showing off, Nathan (Oscar Isaac, left)
allows Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson) into the lab where all of the "bits" were created, which
eventually came together as a disarmingly personable robot dubbed Ava.

At its core, writer/director Alex Garland’s Ex Machina is an absorbing update of Shelley’s Frankenstein: a 21st century cautionary tale about the limits of humanity’s hubris, and the unintended consequences of science outstripping ethics and morality. Midway through the first act, we can’t help recalling the wonderful sentiment that has been paraphrased in so many sci-fi B-movies: “There are things we are not meant to know” (which likely originated, appropriately enough, with a line of dialogue from 1935’s The Bride of Frankenstein).

Garland’s film is thoughtful, methodical science-fiction: akin to Duncan Jones’ Moon, which made a well-deserved splash back in 2009. Like Moon, Garland’s narrative is an intimate character study that plays out in an isolated, claustrophobic setting. And, as with Moon, Garland’s storyline revolves around a core mystery that becomes increasingly disturbing as we move inexorably toward a chilling third act.

Along the way, we ponder questions relating to existence, consciousness and the nature of one’s soul: the big issues that always arise when contemplating the possibility of creating life. Heady stuff. But although Garland’s film is dialogue-heavy, it’s never boring ... in great part because production designer Mark Digby has crafted a fascinating, yet always persuasively believable setting for these events.

Not to mention the simultaneous creation of an amazing “subject” for what becomes an uncomfortably twisted psychological clash between two men.

Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson) is an unremarkable programmer employed by a Google-esque Internet search giant dubbed Blue Book (deliberately named after philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein’s 1930s-era notes for his class on the philosophy of language). He’s delighted one day to discover that he has won a company-wide contest to spend a week with Blue Book’s brilliant, über-wealthy and reclusive founder, Nathan (Oscar Isaac).

Nathan lives (mostly) alone in an imposing home/lab built into the remote heart of Alaska: reachable only by helicopter, and isolated from all of civilization’s trappings. Although uneasy from the moment he passes through the compound’s fortified front door, Caleb is too excited to worry about such things; he’s overcome by this opportunity of quality face time with a genius blend of Howard Hughes, Steve Jobs and Richard Branson.

Unbroken: A bit underwhelming

Unbroken (2014) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for war violence, brutality and fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.26.14

Depicting the human spirit’s strength and indomitable resolve can be a tough sell in the visual realm of the big screen, because so much of that ability is an inward, fundamentally mental challenge.

Dismayed to have come to the direct attention of sadistic concentration camp guard
Mutsuhiro Watanabe (Takamasa Ishihara, right), Louis Zamperini (Jack O'Connell)
is subjected to a series of increasingly brutal and humiliating ordeals.

And yet we’ve been blessed, this month, by two powerful films that convey precisely that heroic struggle: the first one devoted to a quiet academic who refused to yield — Stephen Hawking, in The Theory of Everything — and now the equally authentic saga of a scrappy athlete driven by equal measures of grit and stubborn fury.

As with Eddie Redmayne’s bravura performance in Theory, director Angelina Jolie’s adaptation of author Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken is fueled by equally riveting work from British actor Jack O’Connell, whose until-now obscurity on these shores is certain to vanish forever. O’Connell is the heart, soul and raw guts of this film, and he achieves the near impossible: He genuinely makes us believe that fresh-faced, Southern California-based Italian immigrant Louis Zamperini could have survived — nay, triumphed over — a series of heart-stopping ordeals that clearly would have felled, and killed, lesser men.

Hillenbrand is the meticulous biographer who in 2001 dazzled readers with her first book: Seabiscuit: An American Legend, which went on to become an equally popular 2003 film. Hillenbrand acknowledges that her research into that famed horse frequently uncovered references to another famous Californian who “could give Seabiscuit a run for his money.” That led to an eight-year “chat” with Zamperini, but only by phone; Hillenbrand didn’t want to meet him in the flesh until after her second book was published.

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption hit bookstores in 2010, subsequently spending 185 weeks on the New York Times hardcover best-seller list. It was a natural for film adaptation, and therein lay the challenge: how to bring Zamperini’s amazing story to cinema.

Jolie’s smartest move was casting O’Connell in the lead role, and the young actor absolutely rewards her faith. But while Jolie clearly approached this project with both passion and sensitivity, her directorial touch is too remote: We often feel like distant observers, rather than being intimately connected with these men, and their plight.

Calvary: Affirmation of faith

Calvary (2014) • View trailer 
4.5 stars. Rated R, for profanity, sexual candor, drug use and violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 8.15.14

This one should be required viewing for all filmmakers, particularly those residing in Hollywood.

During a conversation more candid than they've had for a long time, Fiona (Kelly Reilly)
admits that she'd be shattered if something ever happened to her father (Brendan Gleeson).
Sadly, this comes as disturbing news to the priest, who carries the knowledge of his own,
likely very impending mortality.

Not merely because writer/director John Michael McDonagh has delivered a powerful drama fueled by Brendan Gleeson’s heartbreaking and impeccably subtle starring performance — about which, more in a moment — but because McDonagh flawlessly demonstrates the proper way to breathe complex life into every single supporting character, even those glimpsed only briefly.

Too many lazy screenwriters give us one, perhaps two, maybe even three compelling characters; the rest, invariably, are little more than scenery. Wallpaper with a few lines of dialogue, but certainly nothing approximating actual people.

McDonagh, in great contrast, populates his newest film with what seems an entire small town’s worth of men, women and children who matter. Nor is this merely a function of crafting compelling personalities; McDonagh and casting director Jina Jay also found actors able to breathe life into each of these characters.

Every supporting player is introduced in a vignette that feels like its own mini-movie, with the quiet, sometimes raw power we’d expect from a live stage drama. Half an hour into this film, we’re transfixed, thinking Goodness ... this is how it should be done. And why doesn’t it get done this way more often?

All that said, Calvary is a deeply melancholy and quite disturbing drama that builds to a shattering conclusion: not an easy story to experience, and a difficult film to recommend capriciously.

It’s also a very brave film, with a narrative — and a revelatory point of view — all but ignored at a time when strident media overload indicts people and institutions, based on guilt by association.

Father James (Gleeson) is a Catholic priest in the tiny hamlet of Easkey, County Sligo, on Ireland’s craggy, wind-battered West Coast. The rugged pastoral setting, gloriously illuminated by cinematographer Larry Smith, is both verdant and curiously lonely, much of the action taking place against the brooding Knocknarea, a massive, table-shaped hill that dominates this land.

Father James is a good man: benevolent and patient, yet unwilling to suffer fools at all, let alone gladly. His sharply perceptive observations are perhaps his most visible flaw; he resents people who dissemble or otherwise avoid truths — mild or painful — and he’s not shy about saying as much.

About Time: Needs more ripening

About Time (2013) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rating: R, and quite stupidly, for fleeting profanity and mild sensuality
By Derrick Bang

At first blush, this fantasy rom-com seems to be about young love, and finding the perfect soul-mate.

Or maybe it’s a cautionary tale about missed opportunities.

Tim (Domhnall Gleeson, left) can't begin to grasp what his father (Bill Nighy) has just
confessed: that the men in their family have the ability to travel backwards in time.
Very soon, though, Tim will realize that he does indeed share this incredible talent ...
and he'll have plenty of fun — and not a little heartbreak — trying to get a handle
on what he can and cannot do.

No, wait, it might be a parable on the importance of embracing every single moment of life’s precious gift.

In the final analysis, though, writer/director Richard Curtis’ deeply personal film focuses on the indestructible — and loving — bond between fathers and sons. And alla that other stuff mentioned above.

One can’t help feeling that this is a valentine to Curtis’ own father: either a celebration of a happy relationship with the elder Curtis (who recently died), or a heartfelt wish that they could have enjoyed the affectionate bond that links this story’s Tim Lake (Domhnall Gleeson) and his father (Bill Nighy).

Which is interesting, since this bittersweet film is being marketed as a sweet, whimsical love story between Tim and Mary (Rachel McAdams). One gets the sense that Universal Pictures is approaching this publicity campaign very warily, not quite certain whether this creature is fish or fowl.

About Time is about all the elements cited above, of course, which is both its greatest virtue and underlying curse. As often is the case with a filmmaker’s long-gestating pet project, Curtis can’t quite get a handle on how best to articulate this unusual saga; as a result, his film wanders a bit, even stumbles at times.

This slightly unfocused approach is surprising — and disappointing — given that Curtis so unerringly kept a few dozen infatuated characters spinning quite successfully in his 2003 masterpiece, Love, Actually. This new film, in contrast, offers dozens of sparkling little moments, all charming in their own right, which wind up being greater than the sum of their parts.

And once we reach the climax, complete with a moral delivered with all the formality of a fable from Aesop, Curtis doesn’t know how to conclude; he stutters his way through a lengthy, didactic epilogue that dilutes much of what came before. We’re clearly intended to be left with a sense of radiant joy over life’s endless possibilities, but instead — at best — we part with Shakespeare’s sweet sorrow.

At worst, with deep regret over our own missed opportunities. Probably not the mood Curtis intended.