Heart of the Beast: A profound survival drama

Heart of the Beast (2025) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five); rated R, for violence, peril, dramatic intensity and fleeting profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.27.26

The potentially dire implications of this film’s fleeting prologue constantly hover, like a dark cloud, over the subsequent drama.

 

As they begin their long trek back to the safety of civilization, Belmont (Brad Pitt) and his
loyal dog Odin make a point of replenishing their water supply whenever possible.

That aside, and acknowledging the many other impressive aspects of director David Ayer’s survival drama, Cameron Alexander’s original story is a superlative tribute to the bravery, loyalty and nobility of military combat dogs.

And, it must be said, this saga is dominated by one of the all-time best movie dogs ever.

 

(Played primarily by a former search and rescue dog named Uber, with three of his offspring — littermates Ryker and Zika, and their younger half-brother Hondo — used as stunt or secondary doubles.)

 

Anyway...

 

Following the aforementioned prologue, we bounce back seven days, as James Belmont (Brad Pitt) smoothly pilots his pontoon plane to an isolated beach in the Alaskan wilderness. His sole companion, in the passenger seat, is a massive German Shepherd named Odin.

 

Both are retired from combat service, Belmont from a long career as a U.S. Army Special Forces officer, and military service dog trainer. Odin is his final combat dog, and now constant companion.

 

They’ve obviously made such trips many times before, to this or similar beaches. Belmont has the process down to a science: two large waterproof containers with everything necessary — tent, food, first aid supplies — along with a huge cooler laden with dozens of bottles of Belgian brown ale (for which he developed a taste, during overseas deployment). Odin has his own specialized “backpack,” with small pouches on both sides of his huge chest.

 

Belmont also carries an impressive rifle, but he’s not some capricious hunter; he respects life too much. The weapon is solely for self-defense, and he mostly uses its scope to watch moose, birds and other wildlife.

 

Belmont and Odin are completely at ease, and comfortable with each other’s company. The former clearly has nobody else in his life, and that’s the way he likes it.

 

But come nighttime, both often suffer from PTSD nightmares.

Juror #2: Motion to find this drama engaging!

Juror #2 (2024) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for dramatic intensity and occasional profanity

Available via: MAX

By Derrick Bang

Twisty courtroom thrillers have been scarce lately, and this one’s a corker.

 

Jonathan A. Abrams’ sharp script — an impressive screenwriting debut — is well matched with director Clint Eastwood’s capably measured approach. The first half hour sets up expectations of a feisty battle between prosecutor Faith Killebrew (Toni Collette) and defense attorney Eric Resnick (Chris Messina), possibly moving into 12 Angry Men territory, involving a lone hold-out during jury deliberations.

 

Justin (Nicholas Hoult, second from left in the front row) soon realizes that he likely knows
more than the rest of his fellow jurors. They include Harold (J.K. Simmons, two seats to
Justin's left.)

But no. Abrams’ plot is more twisty ... and while he does include a nod to that famous 1954 Reginald Rose stage play-turned-film, things move in unexpected directions.

The setting is Savannah, Georgia. Justin Kemp (Nicholas Hoult), a recovering alcoholic four years sober, writes for a regional lifestyle magazine. He’s married to Allison (Zoey Deutch), nine months into a high-risk pregnancy, after previous efforts failed. She’s understandably anxious and clinging, and the last thing she wants is for Justin to get tagged after showing up for a jury summons.

 

Their initial dynamic feels brittle, which Hoult and Deutch handle persuasively. She’s a fragile mess, and he’s patient and solicitous to an exaggerated degree. It becomes clear that, just as Allison doesn’t want to do anything to screw up her pregnancy, Justin doesn’t want to betray the second chance that she gave him, four years earlier.

 

Justin does indeed get selected, after an amusing exchange with Judge Thelma Hollub (Amy Aquino, always solid). It’s a murder trial, with James Michael Sythe (Gabriel Basso) accused of killing his girlfriend, Kendall Carter (Francesca Eastwood), after a nasty spat at The Hideaway, their favorite bar. 

 

As recounted in flashback — by several witnesses — a few details change, Rashomon-style. Even so, the core events seem solid: Sythe and Carter argued, and he broke a bottle; they continued to yell at each other outside, in the pouring rain; she left in a huff, walking down the darkened road; after a brief pause, he got into his car and followed her.

 

A hiker found Carter’s body the next morning, in a creek channel beneath a bridge along the same road.

 

Killebrew builds a solid case, based primarily on Sythe’s sketchy history and longtime aggressive behavior. But as Resnick subsequently points out, nobody saw his client kill Carter; the evidence is entirely circumstantial. As a sidebar, Killebrew has tied this case to her election campaign for district attorney; she can’t lose. This adds an unsavory note to Collette’s performance, as we wonder whether Killebrew’s judgment is compromised.

Red One: Too much naughty, not enough nice

Red One (2024) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, and rather generously, for scary violence, profanity and unnecessary earthiness

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang

This movie is a mess.

 

For awhile, it’s an entertaining mess. Scripters Chris Morgan and Hiram Garcia have fun blending numerous Christmas/Santa Claus myths, and their concept of the high-tech North Pole operation is a golly-gee-willikers smile. Production designer Bill Brzeski clearly went to town, and the visual effects folks do marvelous things with elves and Santa’s awesomely huge reindeer.

 

Having successfully filled in as a mall Santa for a day, the actual Mr. Claus (J.K. Simmons,
right) is escorted back to his reindeer-drivn sleigh by security chief Callum Drift
(Dwayne Johnson).

I’m also charmed by the notion that the actual Santa Claus, code-named “Red One” (J.K. Simmons, at his fatherly best) occasionally fills in for shopping mall duties, because he enjoys “mingling with the people.” This notion cheekily adds weight to a parent’s insistence, to a doubtful child, that yes; that fellow in the chair could be the actual Santa.

I also was willing to roll with a plot line that involves Santa being kidnapped by the evil Christmas Witch, aka Gryla (Kiernan Shipka), to prevent him from making the rounds on the all-important night, while replacing his gift-giving with her own nefarious scheme.

 

But by about this point, the script’s disparate elements begin to burst at the seams.

 

Backing up a bit, the first act establishes the longstanding bond between Santa and his head of security: Callum Drift (Dwayne Johnson), commander of the North Pole’s E.L.F. team (Enforcement, Logistics and Fortification). After centuries of faithful service, Callum has grown disenchanted with humanity’s rising willingness to behave badly — without concern — thus winding up on the Naughty List.

 

Santa, being Santa, has faith.

 

“Every decision,” he insists, in Simmons’ best, wise-guidance tone, “is an opportunity to do the right thing.”

 

Elsewhere, chronic gambler and expert “fixer” Jack O’Malley (Chris Evans) has helped an unknown party track an unusual seismic disturbance ... not realizing that it’s Santa’s reindeer taking off, after his shopping mall gig. Said unknown party turns out to be Gryla; Jack has unwittingly given her the means to find the concealed North Pole, and orchestrate the aforementioned kidnapping.

 

This absolutely horrifies Zoe (Lucy Liu), head of the Mythological Oversight and Restoration Authority (M.O.R.A.), an umbrella organization charged with protecting and defending the mythological world, from Bigfoot to the Easter Bunny. Santa’s absence, with only one day before Christmas, is a crisis of the highest magnitude.

 

Callum and his team quickly locate and enlist Jack, to help them recover Santa: a mission initially pooh-poohed by the skeptical mortal. (We briefly see his kid version in this film’s prologue, played by Wyatt Hunt, as a precocious disbeliever in Santa.) A brief encounter with Cal’s second-in-command, Garcia — a massive talking polar bear — soon sets that straight.

 

The Union: Spy VERY lite

The Union (2024) • View trailer

Three stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for violence, sexual candor, and occasional profanity

Available via: Netflix

By Derrick Bang

The bar is getting awfully low, when it comes to spy thrillers.

 

Writers Joe Barton and David Guggenheim didn’t do much to earn their keep; you won’t find a single original thought here. Their barely-there premise lifts clichés from countless other (superior) films, adding just enough plot to justify the requisite half-dozen action and chase sequences.

 

Although every attempt to stay ahead of countless unspecified attackers fails miserably,
Mike (Mark Wahlberg) and Roxanne (Halle Berry) always survive to fight another day.

This script couldn’t have filled more than a single sheet of paper ... and that’s pretty much what wound up on the screen.

Events kick off during a prologue, as seasoned operatives Roxanne Hart (Halle Berry) and Nick Faraday (Mike Colter) lead a team to capture a guy planning to auction a suitcase that contains a priceless whatzit. The operation goes south; Roxanne’s entire team is killed, along with their target, and unspecified Bad Guys get away with the suitcase.

 

(We never know who any of these adversaries are, or for whom they work; they’re simply Black-Clad Bad Guys who arrive in Black Cars and Black Helicopters.)

 

Turns out Roxanne works for The Union, which — stop me, if you’ve heard this before — tackles worldwide catastrophes that other U.S. government spy agencies aren’t able to handle.

 

(“The Union”? Seriously? That sounds like a labor organization. Would it have been asking too much, for Barton and Guggenheim to come up with a catchy acronym?)

 

The sought-after whatzit is a computer file that contains a list of every individual working for Western-allied agencies throughout the world: CIA, FBI, MI5 and MI6, France’s DGSE, and so forth.

 

(One wonders how such a list could have been assembled. Do they all subscribe to the same magazine? Share the same Amazon shopping account?)

 

Those in possession of the suitcase intend to sell it to the highest bidder, during a black-market auction. Union head honcho Tom Brennan (J.K. Simmons) hopes to put one of his own “friendly” bidders in play, to surmount offers from five international bad actors: China, North Korea, Syria, Russia and Iran. But since all active agents would be recognized — due to the aforementioned list — this “friendly” must be some sort of regular guy.

 

Which — and this is an awfully big leap — makes Roxanne think of her former high school boyfriend, Mike McKenna (Mark Wahlberg), who remained in New Jersey and is employed as a blue-collar bridge worker. Wahlberg doesn’t need to stretch, since such roles have become his signature: a hard-working, hard-partying good ol’ boy with a solid moral compass and limited ambition.

 

He's also sleeping with his seventh-grade school teacher: a “gag” that doesn’t begin to work (and suffers more from repetition).

Being the Ricardos: We still love Lucy

Being the Ricardos (2021) • View trailer

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

Available via: Movie theaters and (beginning December 21) Amazon Prime

By Derrick Bang

Writer/director Aaron Sorkin loves the crackling intensity of rapid-fire dialogue amid interpersonal conflict, as we’ve seen in earlier projects from TV’s The West Wing and The Newsroom, to big-screen efforts such as The Social Network and The Trial of the Chicago 7.

 

The stars of I Love Lucy — from left, Desi Arnaz (Javier Bardem), William Frawley
(J.K. Simmons), Vivian Vance (Nina Arianda) and Lucile Ball (Nicole Kidman) — rehearse
a scene wherein Ricky and Lucy Ricardo attempt to "re-unite" the bickering Fred and
Ethel Mertz.

When Sorkin is at the top of his game, the result is exhilarating: absolutely the word to describe this new film.

Being the Ricardos is set primarily during a tumultuous single week in late 1952, as the stars, writers and sponsors of I Love Lucy shape the second season’s next episode, prior to it being performed and filmed before a live studio audience. That said, frequent flashbacks reveal the early careers of Lucille Ball (Nicole Kidman) and Desi Arnaz (Javier Bardem), and how they met and married.

 

Those elements are fascinating, as Sorkin deftly sketches the ambition, shrewd intelligence and business savvy that — once they got together — transformed two B-movie contract players into industry visionaries: They co-created one of television’s all-time most successful shows (No. 1 in the Nielsen ratings for four of its six seasons) and then founded Desilu, one of the world’s top TV production companies at the time (and later the home of Star Trek, among many other hits).

 

Captivating as all this is — and the power couple’s many innovations almost are too numerous to take in, so quickly (a Sorkin trademark) — the film primarily focuses on three crises that erupt during this one week:

 

• A newspaper photo that leads Ball to believe that Arnaz is having an affair;

 

• Muckraking gossip columnist Walter Winchell’s bombshell announcement that Ball is a communist (!); and

 

• The revelation that Ball is pregnant with their second child, and her determination — with Arnaz’s support — to break television’s then-cultural taboo against showing pregnant women on screen.

 

While all these events are factual, Sorkin has “massaged” history — and heightened the intensity of his film — by having them occur simultaneously. (They didn’t. Most notably, Winchell’s radio bombshell wasn’t made until a few days after Ball’s second meeting with the House Un-American Activities Committee, in September 1953.)

 

Ergo, the cacophony of calamity is artistic conceit, but it’s a forgivable sin.

 

Verbal jousting is ubiquitous throughout, in the audacious manner of a 1930s screwball comedy: between Ball and Arnaz; between both of them and their three favorite writers, Madelyn Pugh (Alia Shawkat), Bob Carroll Jr. (Jake Lacy) and Jess Oppenheimer (Tony Hale); and between all five of them and the CBS suits (Clark Gregg, Nelson Franklin and Dan Sachoff) and Phillip Morris representative (Jeff Holman) who question, nitpick, challenge and argue over any line or act that might be considered controversial, risqué or offensive to American TV viewers.

 

It’s a revelation, to be reminded of the jaw-droppingly insane restrictions placed on TV shows, back in the day … and the long-suffering patience required of the stars, writers and directors who had to put up with such nonsense.

 

Alan Baumgarten’s editing, throughout, is as tight and quick as the rat-a-tat dialogue.

The Tomorrow War: Today's thrills

The Tomorrow War (2021) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for relentless sci-fi action and violence, and brief profanity

Available via: Amazon Prime

By Derrick Bang

This certainly is the best argument I’ve heard, for accelerating our finding a way to reverse the effects of climate change.

 

Dan (Chris Pratt, second from left), Dorian (Edwin Hodge, second from right) and Charlie
(Sam Richardson, far right) cautiously make their way toward the building that
contains an upper-floor lab, where a team of scientists awaits rescue.

Director Chris McKay’s slam-bang sci-fi epic is a suspenseful blend of 1996’s Independence Day and 1997’s Starship Troopers, with a cool time travel element added. Zach Dean’s original script balances edge-of-the-seat battle thrills with a well-cast roster of appealing characters who — in between breathtaking skirmishes — enjoy welcome opportunities for emotional development.

The plot chugs along in a series of distinct acts, each ramping up the tension while cleverly leading to the next. The entertaining result is thoroughly satisfying in a way that eluded soulless, world-shattering misfires such as Godzilla vs. Kong, Terminator: Dark Fate and Pacific Rim: Uprising.

 

Dan Forester (Chris Pratt), his wife Emmy (Betty Gilpin) and their adorable young daughter Muri (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) are hosting a World Cup soccer party, when the televised game is abruptly interrupted — in impressively dramatic fashion — by a squad of time-traveling soldiers who appear on the field. Taking advantage of the international viewing audience, they announce that they’re from the year 2051, when the entire human race is losing a global war against a terrifying alien species.

 

Our only hope lies with a most unusual conscription: transporting thousands of citizens from the present, forward in time, to join the battle. United in spirit against this common enemy, all the nations of the world participate.

 

For awhile.

 

But as months pass, and the horrific attrition rate gets progressively worse, international cooperation evaporates amid a grinding sense of helpless resignation. (Dean definitely has a bead on the uglier, selfish side of human nature.)

 

Forester, meanwhile, has his own long-simmering problems. He’s a reluctant high school science teacher dismayed by his inability to secure a more prestigious job; an Army Special Operations Command veteran with lingering traces of PTSD; and is burdened by serious rage issues involving his long-estranged father, James (J.K. Simmons). All of this has strained his marriage, which Muri morosely senses.

 

The family anxiety worsens when Dan’s draft number comes up.

 

Palm Springs: A cheeky nightmare

Palm Springs (2020) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for sexual content, brief violence, drug use and relentless profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.31.20

Some films shouldn’t be discussed ahead of time, because so much of the joy comes from being caught off-guard by the unexpected twists, turns and sidebar surprises orchestrated by an audaciously clever writer and director.

With nothing to do until the wedding ceremony begins in a few hours, Sarah (Cristin Milioti)
and Nyles (Andy Samberg) enjoy some quality time ... in a pool belonging to folks who
are out of town.

That’s definitely the case with this snarky rom-com, available via Hulu. Director Max Barbakow and writer Andy Siara play us like a fiddle. Considering this is the feature debut for both, that result is even more impressive.

So I’m inclined to simply say, Check it out; you’ll have a lot of fun — allowing for a tad too many F-bombs — and leave it at that. Because I can’t really say anything else, without giving too much away.

Still with me?

Okay then: On your head be it.

Barbakow and Siara open on a goat. Somewhere in the desert. 

It’ll be an important goat.

Elsewhere, Nyles (Andy Samberg) wakens to the petulant whine of Misty (Meredith Hagner), his self-centered Girlfriend From Hell. They’re in Palm Springs for the destination wedding of friends Tala and Abe (Camila Mendes and Tyler Hoechlin), taking place later this day at a fancy desert resort.

Nyles seems to subsist on beer and burritos; he has the scruffy, apathetic attitude of a failure-to-launch. Even so, his casual indifference — as the day proceeds — seems unnecessarily boorish. Couple this behavior with considerable vulgarity and profanity, and it feels like we’ve wandered into an aggressively crude Seth Rogen comedy.

Not so; just be patient.

Evening falls; the ceremony concludes; the microphone is passed around. Misty’s toast is absolutely ghastly and tone-deaf. The bride’s parents — Howard and Pia (Peter Gallagher and Jacquiline Obradors) — pass the baton to Tala’s older sister Sarah (Cristin Milioti), maid of honor and, one would expect, next to speak. But Sarah, tongue-tied and terrified — having consumed perhaps a few too many glasses of wine — stands silently, like a deer in headlights.

Enter Nyles, who snatches the microphone and saves the moment with a truly terrific speech. (Who’d have thought?)

Klaus: No coal in this stocking!

Klaus (2019) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG, for mild rude humor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.24.20

The holidays are weeks behind us, but — thanks to the recently announced Academy Award nominations — a little slice of Christmas warrants renewed attention.

Having failed in every effort to make a go of his forlornly empty local Post Office,
Jesper shares his woes with tiny Margú, who listens attentively ... despite not
understanding a single word.

Klaus garnered very limited theatrical release for a heartbeat in early November, just long enough to qualify for its well-deserved Oscar nomination; availability since then has been solely via Netflix, which certainly picked the right project for its debut animated feature film. Co-directors Sergio Pablos and Carlos Martínez López have delivered a marvelous seasonal bonbon that’s equal parts charming, snarky, sentimental and — ultimately — powerfully heartwarming.

Several earlier films — many of them not very good — have contemplated the origin of Santa Claus. (1985’s Santa Claus: The Movie is a particularly notorious stinker.) The approach generally involves a good-hearted fellow who enthusiastically accepts this noble responsibility; some films also acknowledge references to the fourth-century Greek Christian bishop now known as Saint Nicholas.

Pablos — assisted by co-writers Jim Mahoney and Zach Lewis — has taken an entirely different tack.

Postmaster General Johansen (voiced with regal bearing by Sam McMurray) has devoted his life to the service; he’s therefore dismayed that his ne’er-do-well son, Jesper (Jason Schwartzman), has distinguished himself as the Postal Academy’s worst student. Angered beyond words, Dad banishes Jesper to the frozen island of Smeerensburg, miles above the Arctic Circle.

The lad is given one year to deliver at least 6,000 letters, or he’ll be stuck there forever.

Justice League: And so it begins...

Justice League (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for sci-fi action and violence
By Derrick Bang

Seeing director Zack Snyder’s name attached to this film was not happy news, given the degree to which he ruined both 2013’s Man of Steel and last year’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Having responded to the bat-signal illuminated by Police Commissioner Gordon (J.K.
Simmons, far left), the newly formed Justice League — from left, Wonder Woman (Gal
Gadot), Cyborg (Ray Fisher), Batman (Ben Affleck) and The Flash (Ezra Miller) —
learn that Gotham City is, once again, in serious trouble.

Snyder has much in common with director Michael Bay, similarly notorious for the Transformers franchise. Both favor bloated, soulless, humorless slugfests that wreak havoc on landscapes and cityscapes, while casually snuffing hundreds (thousands?) of civilian bystanders. Their films are the very definition of mindless product over art.

On the other hand, I was cheered to note Joss Whedon as co-scripter on Justice League. As the writer/director of 2012’s The Avengers, Whedon established the template for solid, successful superhero epics. Fans have recognized Whedon’s gift since television’s Buffy slayed her first vampire, back in 1996: He has an unerring talent for blending action fantasy with a (frequently droll) human element, which eases our suspension of disbelief.

And is a helluva lot more fun.

It’s easy to spot Whedon’s touch in Justice League, which is most successful during its first and second acts, as the stage is set, and the players assembled. It’s equally easy to see that the third act belongs to Snyder ... but not entirely. Even here, we get the vicarious relief of the unmistakable Whedon touch.

Justice League picks up in the immediate wake of Batman v Superman. The latter is dead, having perished at the hands of a Kryptonian monster genetically engineered by the villainous Lex Luthor. The country (the world?) is sliding quickly into anarchy, humanity apparently having abandoned hope after losing its gallant symbol for truth, justice and the American way.

(Ah ... but is Big Blue really, truly dead?)

Bruce Wayne (Batman) and Diana Prince (the Amazon Wonder Woman) are doing their best to stem the lawless tide, but they operate in the shadows; they’re not “living symbols” in the manner of Superman. Worse yet, Batman has been encountering winged “parademons” — very hard to kill — that seem to be seeking something.

Mindful of the need for additional super-powered allies, in order to hold off whatever comes next, Bruce and Diana reach out to three promising individuals: Barry Allen (Ezra Miller), a twentysomething nerd transformed by a lightning strike into The Flash; Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa), dubbed Aquaman, and heir to the underwater kingdom of Atlantis; and Victor Stone (Ray Fisher), a once-promising college football player nearly killed in a horrific accident, and “saved” when his scientist father Silas (Joe Morton) employed alien tech to transform his son into the biomechanical Cyborg.

Patriots Day: Triumph snatched from tragedy

Patriots Day (2016) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for graphic violence, frequent profanity and some drug use
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.13.17

It seemed too soon.

Mounting a big-screen project based on a recent real-world tragedy carries the whiff of tawdry, opportunistic network TV movies, which almost always exploit such events in pursuit of viewership ratings.

As FBI Agent Richard DesLauriers (Kevin Bacon, left) and Boston Police Commissioner
Ed Davis (John Goodman, right) watch hopefully, veteran policeman Tommy Saunders
(Mark Wahlberg) scrutinizes area surveillance footage, trying to anticipate which
cameras had the best chance of recording a glimpse of the bombers.

Not quite four years have passed, since the Boston Marathon bombing. Transforming that ghastly — albeit, ultimately, victoriously bonding — crisis into a high-profile mainstream drama, this quickly, couldn’t help raising eyebrows.

Ah, but I should have trusted director/co-scripter Peter Berg. He demonstrated appropriate restraint and respect, while crafting last year’s Deepwater Horizon into a solid suspense drama, and the same is true here. Although he rather shamelessly yanks our tear ducts in the final few minutes, supplying on-camera interviews with the actual people depicted in the preceding film, by that point Berg has earned enough good will to get away with it.

And besides: The interviews are cathartic, and well deserved in their own right.

Berg and his four co-scripters wisely designed their film as a straight-ahead police procedural, emphasizing dogged, ground-level detective work — and, eventually, indispensable public support — while carefully handling the actual bombings. The result is a tribute to both the impressive resources brought to bear, in the aftermath, and the stirring “Boston Strong” solidarity that united the first-responders and investigative entities.

Events begin on April 14, 2013, the day before the marathon; onscreen time and location stamps introduce a wide variety of individuals soon to be linked by circumstance. Some are immediately recognized by name and/or reputation: Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis (played here by John Goodman), FBI agent Richard DesLauriers (Kevin Bacon), and marathon watchers Patrick Downes and Jessica Kensky (Christopher O’Shea and Rachel Brosnahan).

A few others are likely to remain a mystery, at first, to all but those who followed every detail of the unfolding situation, back in 2013: MIT policeman Sean A. Collier (Jake Picking), and Chinese-American college student Dun Meng (Jimmy O. Yang).

These preliminary sequences are casual, even light-hearted: Patrick tries to teach his wife Jessica how to speak with a proper Boston accent; Collier flirts with a couple of university women, trying to cajole them into joining him at an upcoming concert; Meng explains the virtues of a newly designed delivery app to a potential investor.

La La Land: (Mostly) breathtaking magic

La La Land (2016) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for brief profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.16.16

Ten minutes into this film, giddy with excitement, I couldn’t wait to see it again.

Ninety minutes in ... the enthusiasm had waned.

When Mia (Emma Stone) insists that she doesn't care for jazz, Sebastian (Ryan Gosling)
takes her to his favorite club, in order to demonstrate why true jazz can't just be heard,
but must be seen emanating from those who perform it.

At its best, La La Land sparkles with true magic. Writer/director Damien Chazelle’s romantic, music-laden fantasy is a true “sense of wonder” movie akin to Moulin Rouge! or Hugo: a dazzling tour de force that takes full advantage of the medium’s many elements.

It’s also an exhilarating throwback to classic American and French movie musicals, particularly Gene Kelly’s athletically graceful dance spectaculars: Singing in the Rain, An American in Paris, The Band Wagon and (most particularly) the sort of terpsichorean legerdemain he wove into a creaking floorboard and a stray section of newspaper, in Summer Stock.

Coupled with the luxuriously romantic atmosphere of Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.

Chazelle obviously loves all of these classics, just as he includes more than a few nods to Bob Fosse’s aggressively gymnastic choreography. Chazelle also understands music’s ability to transport us to ethereal elsewheres, and he lives and breathes the toe-tapping, finger-snapping intensity of jazz; he demonstrated that with his mesmerizing directorial breakout, in 2014’s Whiplash.

That film was a grinding endurance test for its young protagonist, as he clashed with a brutal mentor en route to becoming a master drummer. La La Land is a much gentler saga of dreams and dreamers: of young people drawn to Southern California in pursuit of fame and/or artistic satisfaction (not necessarily in that order).

The simple core story is told with the heady, tongue-tickling sparkle and fizz of expensive champagne, Chazelle masterminding a squadron of associates who operate on full throttle: from Linus Sandgren’s opulent cinematography to David Wasco’s enchanting production design, from Tom Cross’ whip-cracking editing to Mary Zophres’ retro-stylish costume design, and Mandy Moore’s breathtaking choreography.

The Accountant: Right on the money

The Accountant (2016) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for strong violence and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.14.16

Characters who defy expectations are a lot of fun.

Accountants toil in the back rooms of office obscurity, burdened further by a reputation for blandness: a pejorative they hardly deserve. The finest accountants are akin to ace detectives, concocting novel methods of financial wizardry, or uncovering corporate impropriety.

Having turned over the results of an analysis that required several months, Dana (Anna
Kendrick) is astonished to return to work the next morning, and find that Chris (Ben
Affleck) has cross-checked, enhanced and sourced the anomaly in question ... all
in a single day.

Link that profession with the savant and socially awkward characteristics of Dustin Hoffman’s Rain Man, or Christian Bale’s character in The Big Short, and the results can be captivating.

At first blush, Christian Wolff (Ben Affleck) fits the bill perfectly. We meet him assisting an elderly couple, Frank and Dolores Rice (Ron Prather and Susan Williams), through their tax prep, gently “steering” them into answers that formalize a home business with advantageous deductions. It’s a droll scene, all the more so because of Chris’ stoic, near immobility: his rigid posture, his failure to smile, his reluctance to meet his clients’ gaze.

We’re familiar with these signs: Chris is on the spectrum.

He returns home each evening to a stabilization ritual in the privacy of his bedroom: a bright light, ear-splittingly loud music, and methodical exercise, all timed to a specific schedule. Chris’ primary tic: He must finish anything he starts, otherwise he loses control.

Actually, the situation is more complicated. During flashbacks to Chris’ childhood — the character played here by Seth Lee, persuasively distressed — we see a boy in full-blown meltdown, unable to interact with an environment he finds too chaotic. Younger brother Brax (Jake Presley) watches helplessly, as their parents argue over treatment. Mom (Mary Kraft) favors intervention in the nurturing environment of a special needs school; Dad (Robert C. Treveiler), career military, insists that it’s more realistic to confront their elder son with a world that’ll never go out of its way to treat him fairly.

But wait: The situation is even more complicated.

Elsewhere, back in the modern day, U.S. Treasury Department Crime Enforcement Division head Ray King (J.K. Simmons), soon to retire, recounts an unlikely tale to recruit Marybeth Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson). King shares a shadowy photo trail of a mysterious somebody — known only as “The Accountant” — who gets hired, somehow clandestinely, whenever the world’s most dangerous criminal organizations need their finances vetted.

Somehow, even more improbably, this “Accountant” survives these encounters, remaining available for the next summons by, say, the head of a drug cartel.

King wants to know who this “Accountant” actually is, before he retires. Medina reluctantly accepts the assignment.