Jay Kelly: A sublime character study

Jay Kelly (2025) • View trailer

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

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.14.25

The opening Sylvia Plath quote says it all:

 

“It’s a hell of a responsibility to be yourself. It’s much easier to be somebody else, or nobody at all.”

 

Flanked by publicist Liz (Laura Dern, center left) and best friend/handler Ron (Adam
Sandler, center right), Jay Kelly (George Clooney) cheerful interrupts his morning to
sign autographs for adoring fans.

Jay Kelly (George Clooney) has it all: a long and successful film career; a devoted entourage, including best friend and handler Ron Sukenick (Adam Sandler); and the admiration and respect of fans, friends and professional colleagues.

 

He is one with Gary Cooper, Cary Grant and Robert De Niro: shapeshifters and chameleons of identity, with faces that represent something personal to millions.

 

But.

 

Jay’s nature, even when the cameras are off, remains a pose; he has no sense of self. His relationship with daughters Jessica (Riley Keough) and Daisy (Grace Edwards) is strained at best, estranged at worst. They’ve grown up seeing him repeatedly forsake them for the work: another movie, another months-long absence. Their mother and Jay’s other exes are distant memories.

 

He takes Ron for granted, failing to recognize the strain this keeps putting on his family.

 

Jay is selfish … and he’s so far gone, he’s incapable of recognizing this.

 

To be sure, he’s affable, suave and generous with the public; he’s also wheedling and persuasive, and knows how to get his way. After all, he has been doing it for decades. (This is George Clooney, after all; the man exudes charm and savoir faire the way the rest of us breathe.)

 

And yet …

 

Of late, Jay has begun to relive past choices: confronted by ghosts from his past, awakened to the shallowness of his present. And with this rising awareness comes a feeling he can’t quite identify:

 

Regret.

 

This plays out in director Noah Baumbach’s masterfully composed film, which enchants from its initial scene: cinematographer Linus Sandgren’s stunning, single-take tracking shot that follows the set-up and shooting of Jay’s final scene in his new movie, Eight Men from Now. Baumbach’s script, co-written with Emily Mortimer, is a masterful blend of drama, gentle humor, angst and character dynamics, brought to life by richly nuanced performances from Clooney and Sandler. Both are sure bets for Academy Award nominations.

 

(I understand the eyebrow lift. Adam Sandler, in a subtly shaded straight role? Hey, watch this film, then get back to me.)

Mary Poppins Returns: Plenty of magic

Mary Poppins Returns (2018) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG, for no particular reason
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.14.18

Even in a Hollywood environment driven by short-term greed, some films have managed to remain revered, thou-shalt-not-remake-or-sequelize classics (although that hasn’t stopped people from thinking about it).

Having magically entered the world painted on the outside of a Royal Doulton china
bowl, Mary Poppins (Emily Blunt, center) encourages her companions — from left,
Georgie (Joel Dawson), Anabel (Pixie Davis), Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda) and
John (Nathanael Saleh) — to join her for what surely will be a remarkable ride.

Gone With the Wind, Casablanca, Some Like It Hot, Lawrence of Arabia and The Godfather come to mind. (The latter was OK, because Francis Ford Coppola handled the trilogy himself.)

It’s not merely a function of great cinema; such films also are a product of their time — where we were, as a country and as a people — which further complicates efforts to re-visit them.

Mary Poppins made that list, and deservedly so, for more than half a century … although Disney’s failure to capitalize on their 1964 hit likely had less to do with leaving well enough alone, and more to do with the fact that author P.L. Travers loathed the film, and — since she lived until 1996 — likely blocked any efforts to draw additional water from the well.

But tempus fugit, and a couple of decades further down the line, Disney decided to attempt the impossible — no doubt with fingers crossed and breath held — and thus we have Mary Poppins Returns.

The studio certainly took pains to assure success. Director Rob Marshall, a veteran of opulent stage-to-film translations of Chicago and Into the Woods, is an excellent choice as guiding hand. He shares scripting credit with David Magee (Finding Neverland, Life of Pi and the under-appreciated Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day) and John DeLuca. Truth be told, their shared vision hews much closer to the subversive edge present in Travers’ eight books, and which was missing from the 1964 film’s cotton candy tone.

The casting is equally choice. Emily Blunt steps primly, saucily and posture-perfectly into Julie Andrews’ immaculately polished shoes, and this saga’s three children — Anabel (Pixie Davies), John (Nathanael Saleh) and Georgie (Joel Dawson) — are every bit as precociously adorable, and talented, as the original’s Karen Dotrice and Matthew Garber.

Most crucially, Broadway phenom Lin-Manuel Miranda is bloomin’ terrific as Jack, the amiably optimistic lamplighter who stands in for Dick Van Dyke’s chimney sweep. The enthusiastic and athletic Miranda steals the show, and that’s no small feat; there’s much to admire in this ambitious and opulent musical fantasy. 

Marshall & Co. deliver a fresh, richly entertaining bit of razzle-dazzle, while honoring — and slyly referencing — the original.

The Bookshop: A melancholy read

The Bookshop (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG, for dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang

Director/scripter Isabel Coixet coaxes moments of sublime cinematic poetry in her thoughtful adaptation of Penelope Fitzgerald’s spare 1978 novel; the setting and characters — the sense of time and place — have been lifted lovingly from the page.

Beware the practiced insincerity of aristocratic hauteur: Not yet realizing that she has
been suckered into the spider's web, Florence (Emily Mortimer, left) thanks Violet
(Patricia Clarkson) for being invited to so lavish a gathering.

It couldn’t have been easy, in this instant-gratification social media era, to convey the unique warmth and comfort that derive from settling down — with no sense of time — to enjoy an absorbing book.

But viewers anticipating a typically light-hearted slice of eccentric, small-town British whimsy — a droll turn along the lines of, say The Closer You Get or The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain — are in for an unpleasant shock. Fitzgerald had much darker, class-conscious fish to fry, and Coixet has honored the subtext that unflinchingly skewers the small-minded malice of old-world aristocrats who — fully aware that they’re an endangered species — are determined to ruin the lives of their “lessers.” Simply because they still can.

To be sure, Coixet wields a brush of many colors; portions of her film are amusing, at times even laugh-out-loud funny. But such levity is subtly, mercilessly asphyxiated by the machinations of cold, calculated villainy; this is dark drama, not romantic comedy, and you will not exit the theater with a smile.

The setting is the small, East Anglican coastal town of Hardborough, Suffolk; the year is 1959. Florence Green (Emily Mortimer), widowed since losing her husband during World War II, decides to open a bookshop in a damp, long-abandoned building known as Old House.

It’s not clear how long Florence has been in Hardborough, although she seems a recent arrival. On the one hand, many of the locals greet her pleasantly enough; she’s familiar with the community, and aware that Old House has lain dormant for seven years. And yet there’s also a sense that she exists slightly out of phase with many of the townsfolk, who remain wary in her presence.

We do get a sense that Florence has emerged from a long period of grief, newly emboldened to give Hardborough its first bookstore as a gift, and as a means of sharing the special sort of magic that Fitzgerald described so well: “A good book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life, and as such it must surely be a necessary commodity.”

On a personal level, Florence intends the gesture as a means of preserving important memories of her husband: They met at a bookstore, and bonded over their shared devotion to its contents.

Her fatal mistake is the belief that this is a town that wants a bookstore, as much as she thinks it does.

Woe to those foolish enough to stroll public streets with their hearts worn so visibly on one sleeve: naïve idealists destined to become prey.

Hugo: A true sense of wonder

Hugo (2011) • View trailer for Hugo
4.5 stars. Rating: PG, and too harshly, for mild peril and dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.25.11


This Thanksgiving weekend is impressively stuffed with family films, and the best is the one you’ve heard the least about.

Hugo isn’t merely a great film; it’s a spellbinding experience: one of the most loving, heartfelt valentines to the art of movie-making since 1988’s Cinema Paradiso.

After Hugo (Asa Butterfield, left) finally wins the grudging tolerance of the train
station toy shop owner (Ben Kingsley), the older man delights the boy with
sleight-of-hand card tricks. As Hugo soon is to discover, this gruff gentleman
possesses a wealth of hidden talent.

It’s also stunningly gorgeous, from cinematographer Robert Richardson’s first sweeping pan of France’s Gare Montparnasse train station — the story’s primary setting — to the luxurious vistas of a postcard-perfect Paris. It’s the sort of heightened-reality Paris that never really existed, except in the minds of those who adore the city ... and in on-screen fantasies such as An American in Paris, Amélie and this year’s Midnight in Paris.

Indeed, director Martin Scorsese’s sparkling approach here strongly evokes the playful, exquisite oeuvre of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, who has granted us access to his creatively whimsical dreams in films such as Amélie, City of Lost Children and Micmacs.

I hesitate to explain too much about Hugo, because much of its charm derives from not knowing where John Logan’s captivating screenplay will go next. Those familiar with Brian Selznick’s 2007 Caldecott Medal-winning children’s book, The Invention of Hugo Cabret — on which Logan based his script — will know, but everybody else deserves an opportunity to be swept along for a truly enthralling ride.

Hugo is one of those rare films that truly exploits the medium. This isn’t merely radio with pictures; you’ll want to savor every frame, every inch of production designer Dante Ferretti’s opulent sets. Too few movies deliver a true sense of wonder; this one does.

The year is 1931: a time of euphoria for those who believed that “the Great War” had put an end to conflict between nations. The year also is significant as the last gasp of silent filmmaking, before talkies would take over: a fact central to this story.

The Gare Montparnasse hustles and bustles with arrivals and departures, the waves of humanity tempted to linger at the little shops, stalls and cafés deposited, almost capriciously, within the cavernous building’s maze-like corners and hallways.

High overhead, unobserved by all those below, young Hugo (Asa Butterfield) tends the station’s many clocks, making his way along a concealed rabbit warren of tiny corridors, narrow stairways and dangerous ladders in order to oil, wind and repair — as necessary — all the magnificently detailed clockwork mechanisms that help travelers reach their destinations on time.

Hugo has the scruffy, ill-kempt appearance of a boy on his own: a life to which he has become accustomed, for reasons we’ll eventually learn. He has the station’s rhythm down to a science, and has become proficient at the art of snatching warm croissants and the occasional bottle of milk.

Cars 2: Quite road-worthy

Cars 2 (2011) • View trailer for Cars 2
Four stars. Rating: G, and suitable for all ages
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.24.11


I never cared that much for 2006’s Cars, which lacked the Pixar spark (plugs) present in the animation studio’s other big-screen features.

With a bevy of bad cars in hot pursuit, our vehicular heroes — foreground, from
left, Lightning McQueen, Mater and Finn McMissile — race to save London
from a nefarious villain who is determined to prove that alternative fuels
are no alternative at all.

I simply couldn’t identify emotionally with the vehicular characters: a rather ironic confession, coming from somebody who had no trouble falling in love with bickering children’s toys, culinary rats and lonely robots. It felt like Pixar guru John Lasseter was letting his own boyhood fixation with cars — his father was a parts manager at a Chevy dealership in the late 1960s and early ’70s — interfere with his guiding mantra regarding the importance of a good story.

Besides, the characters in Cars looked and behaved far too much like the claymation creations Aardman (Wallace and Gromit) had developed for a highly successful series of TV commercials for Chevron: a campaign that had begun a decade earlier. For once, Lasseter was imitating an established archetype, rather than creating fresh ones.

Advance reports regarding the impending arrival of Cars 2 also weren’t encouraging, with suggestions that this sequel was greenlighted because the merchandising tail was wagging the artistic dog: Cars, among all Pixar films, had generated one of the most financially successful toy lines. Again, not a happy possibility for those of us who’ve appreciated Pixar’s customary narrative magic.

I should have had more faith.

While still not among Pixar’s best efforts, Cars 2 is miles ahead of its predecessor: better character development, a more engaging premise and a vastly superior storyline. The “vehicular community” gags, no matter how whimsical, seemed stifled in the enclosed environment of Radiator Springs; this time out, writers Ben Queen, Brad Lewis, Dan Fogelman and Lasseter have broadened their tapestry to span the globe.

And, ingeniously, to send up spy movies.

The Pink Panther 2: Pale pink

The Pink Panther 2 (2009) • View trailer for The Pink Panther 2
Two stars (out of five). Rating: PG, for cartoonish violence and mild vulgarity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.5.09
Buy DVD: The Pink Panther 2 • Buy Blu-Ray: The Pink Panther 2 [Blu-ray]


Following a theatrical run that stalled after two months in the spring of 2006, Steve Martin’s first stab at updating The Pink Panther tallied a rather unspectacular $82.2 million in the United States ... against an estimated cost of $80 million.

Hardly a result likely to make any reasonably savvy studio exec jump for joy.

The dim-witted Inspector Clouseau (Steve Martin, far right), believing that he
has "sol-vedd the case," attempts to apprehend the villain with a customary
lack of restraint; Clouseau's fellow detectives — from left, Pepperidge (Alfred
Molina), Vicenzo (Andy Garcia) and Kenji (Yuki Matsuzaki) — watch
helplessly and hope for the best. As do the rest of us...

Why, then, are we suffering through a sequel?

But yes indeed, Martin’s bumbling Inspector Clouseau is back on the case, this time in alliance with a “dream team” of detectives from various countries, all anxious to apprehend a criminal mastermind who has been stealing the world’s most priceless treasures.

It’s perhaps fair to admit that director Harald Zwart’s film is no worse than its predecessor, which was helmed by other hands; Zwart’s efforts on 2003’s Agent Cody Banks probably gave him all the experience he needed to stage-manage a similarly broad farce involving France’s most notoriously incompetent cop.

Besides, one rather doubts that Zwart controlled his star to any degree; this is Martin’s show — he also shares scripting credit with Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber — and he obviously wanted another crack at the character made much more famous by Peter Sellers, whose similarly slapstick antics were overseen by a far better filmmaker (Blake Edwards).

The trouble is, Pink Panther 2 also isn’t any better than Martin’s debut shot at this property. Sure, the family-friendly PG rating is valid; nothing here will annoy or offend, and younger viewers will adore the way Martin slams through — and gets slammed by — people, vehicles, buildings and assorted bits of stagecraft. This is elementary destruction-derby filmmaker: the broader the better.

For the old-timers in the audience, think Laurel and Hardy, but with a much bigger budget.

The frustrating part, though, is that at times this film hovers at the outer fringes of being better. Zwart and Martin simply don’t know when to let a potentially great gag exit the stage gracefully; they always push it three steps further, to the point of eye-rolling tedium.

When Clouseau insists on selecting a bottle of wine to match his dinner at a fancy restaurant, for example, the resulting chaos is brilliant: The large wine rack slowly tips, releasing bottle after bottle, which Martin adroitly fields and hurls to helpful waiters and patrons. It’s about a minute of impressively choreographed physical comedy. But then the gag’s giddy delights face, when Clouseau subsequent burns down the restaurant.

That’s not the icing on the cake; it’s a soufflé suddenly gone flat. And it happens again and again in this film.