Killers of the Flower Moon: Unforgettable

Killers of the Flower Moon (2023) • View trailer

Five stars (out of five). Rated R, for violence, grisly images and profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.27.23

This is a masterpiece. 

 

It’s the pinnacle of director Martin Scorsese’s career … which, obviously, needed no further burnishing. But there you go: 81 years old, and more visionary than ever.

 

William Hale (Robert De Niro, center) beams on the day his nephew, Ernest Burkhart
(Leonardo DiCaprio) marries Osage woman Mollie Kyle (Lily Gladstone) ... but
Hale's delight has very little to do with genuine affection.

I was reminded, while thoroughly engaged during this film’s (admittedly intimidating) 206-minute running time, of Roger Ebert’s Second Law of Motion Pictures: “No good movie is too long.”

True that. (But an intermission would have been nice.)

 

In adapting journalist David Grann’s 2017 nonfiction book of the same title, Scorsese and co-scripter Eric Roth have aimed a much-needed spotlight — particularly during these tempestuous times of revisionist classroom instruction — on a mostly forgotten slice of American history every bit as heinous as the two-day 1921 race massacre in the Greenwood district of Tulsa, Okla. (which this film briefly references).

 

Scorsese’s film is bookended by Osage cultural rituals, the first a melancholy “pipe ceremony” as the elders mourn the forced assimilation of their children into white American society. It’s the early 20th century, and a sudden silver lining erupts against this sad tableau: Oil is discovered on the Oklahoma reservation, located northwest of Tulsa. (Yep, Tulsa. Again.)

 

Within half a generation, members of the Osage community are, per capita, the world’s wealthiest individuals. They have automobiles, fancy clothes, plenty of glam … and servants. White servants. (Imagine how well that goes down.)

 

Even so, as per U.S. government-mandated reservation law, white “guardians” must manage each individual’s money. (Imagine how well that goes down.)

 

The story proper begins in 1919, as Ernest Burkhart (Leonardo DiCaprio) returns from WWI service, where he’s reunited with his brother Byron (Scott Shepherd) and uncle William Hale (Robert De Niro). The latter has an extensive cattle ranch on reservation land — no oil operations — and has, over time, been embraced as a staunch friend and benefactor to the Osage, speaking their language and participating in all important rituals.

 

Ernest’s initial “interview” with his uncle is revealing. Under Hale’s cheerful, fatherly probing, the younger man bashfully acknowledges his primary interests in money, whiskey and women. DiCaprio is sublime here, as Ernest radiates embarrassment over his limited intelligence; he’s quite unsophisticated, lacking the worldly wisdom that should have resulted from his war service. Unable to handle heavy labor due to a war injury, he gratefully agrees to serve as a chauffeur.

 

Jason Bourne: One helluva ride

Jason Bourne (2016) • View trailer 
4.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for intense action and violence, and brief profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.29.16

Wow.

Director Paul Greengrass certainly hasn’t lost any of his juice. This newest installment in the Bourne franchise is relentless: It hits the ground running, never lets up for two full hours, and is bookended by a pair of spectacular action sequences.

After learning that Nicky (Julia Stiles) has obtained proof of CIA black-ops programs that
relate to his past, Bourne (Matt Damon) arranges to meet her at an Athens plaza, where
they hope to blend into a melee between rioting civilians and local police officers.
Unfortunately, this chaos does nothing to stop the efforts of pursuing CIA teams.

I wouldn’t have thought Greengrass ever could top the mano a mano melees in 2004’s Bourne Supremacy, but he has ... and then some. Jason Bourne is a taut, breathtaking experience, its giddy momentum the result of equally fine work by editor Christopher Rouse, a longtime Greengrass colleague (and Academy Award winner, for 2007’s The Bourne Ultimatum).

Greengrass and Rouse also collaborated on the timely, ripped-from-the-headlines script, which references the “safety or security?” argument at the heart of the recent spat between Apple Inc. and the FBI. The players have been altered to avoid lawsuits, but there’s no question which side of the fence our filmmakers occupy. Having navigated conspiracy-laden waters for more than a decade, Greengrass clearly doesn’t trust government agencies to have their citizens’ best interests — or privacy — at heart.

And with paranoia running rampant these days, this film definitely captures the national zeitgeist.

When last seen, Bourne (Matt Damon) had successfully back-tracked his actual identity, along with those responsible for the CIA training that transformed him into a hardened assassin. The victory was pyrrhic, as it left him without friends or a country. Convinced that the CIA would have him “erased,” he simply vanished.

Having remained off the grid for nearly a decade, Bourne has become a ragged, rootless shell, subsisting on meager earnings from underground bare-knuckle boxing matches. Damon’s grim features are weary and despondent during this introductory montage: the quiet despair of a man lacking purpose.

Then, suddenly, a blast from the past: He gets a message from former CIA colleague Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles), who — also long on the run — has joined a hacking collective with the goal of exposing CIA dirty tricks. Her quest has borne fruit: 30 years’ worth of black ops files that include Operation Treadstone — which “created” Bourne — and something new called “Iron Hand.”

Even more damning, Nicky has uncovered additional details pertaining to Bourne’s actual identity — David Webb — along with the strong suggestion that his father, Richard (Gregg Henry), was directly involved with Treadstone. This revelation lends context to another of Bourne’s still fragmented memories: something having to do with a long-ago lunchtime meeting with his father.

Bridge of Spies: Riveting Cold War thriller

Bridge of Spies (2015) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated PG-13, for war violence, dramatic intensity and fleeting profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.16.15

Atticus Finch lives.

Harper Lee is known to have based the iconic hero of To Kill a Mockingbird on her own father, Alabama lawyer Amasa Coleman Lee, who — like the book’s character — represented unpopular defendants in a highly publicized (and politicized) trial.

As the trial that might send Rudolf Abel (Mark Rylance, left) to the gas chamber proceeds,
defense attorney James Donovan (Tom Hanks) is surprised to see his client remain so
calm. "Aren't you worried?" Donovan asks. Abel's response becomes the film's best
signature line.

How ironic, then, that at the same time Harper Lee was fine-tuning the novel that would make her famous, newspaper headlines across the United States pilloried the country’s most-hated lawyer, James Donovan, who had bravely accepted the assignment to defend captured Soviet spy Rudolf Abel.

I can’t help wondering if any of Donovan’s characteristics wandered into Lee’s depiction of Atticus.

Donovan’s name and historical significance have remained buried for decades, although Abel might ring a few bells. Sirens are likely to go off, however, when both men are linked to American pilot Francis Gary Powers, who was captured after his U-2 spy plane was blasted out of the sky during a photographic reconnaissance mission over the Soviet Union.

The interlinked saga involving Donovan, Abel and Powers has been resurrected and transformed into a thoughtful, fascinating and thoroughly absorbing period drama by director Steven Spielberg and scripters Matt Charman, Joel and Ethan Coen. It’s Cold War-era spyjinks right out of John Le Carre, except that these events actually took place: yet another reminder that truth can be far stranger than fiction.

(The film credits make no mention of Donovan’s well-received 1964 memoir, Strangers on a Bridge: The Case of Colonel Abel and Francis Gary Powers, which I find odd; it’s impossible to imagine that Charman and the Coen brothers didn’t read that book.)

Spielberg’s film is anchored by a commanding performance from Tom Hanks, who channels every dedicated and deeply honorable character ever played by Henry Fonda and James Stewart. At the same time, Hanks brings his own wry, subtle humor to this depiction of Donovan: a capable and hard-working family man caught up in events far beyond his imagining.

(Or so we’re led to believe. Given Donovan’s WWII service as General Counsel at the Office of Strategic Services, he may not have been as “ordinary” as this film suggests. But this portrayal makes for a better story.)