Movie Review: The Founder

The Founder

Directed by: John Lee Hancock.

Written by: Robert D. Siegel.

Starring: Michael Keaton (Ray Kroc), Nick Offerman (Dick McDonald), John Carroll Lynch (Mac McDonald), Linda Cardellini (Joan Smith), B.J. Novak (Harry J. Sonneborn), Laura Dern (Ethel Kroc), Justin Randell Brooke (Fred Turner), Kate Kneeland (June Martino), Patrick Wilson (Rollie Smith). 

 

There is a darker movie hiding somewhere in The Founder, that pokes its head out every once in a while and makes you wish the filmmaker had followed that path a little bit further. This is a film that had the potential to be something like Martin Scorsese’s The Wolf of Wall Street or Adam McKay’s The Big Short – films that were deliberately fun for a while, until they weren’t – and that’s when you got angry. The character at the center of The Founder is Ray Kroc – played by Michael Keaton – the man who took McDonalds and turned it into an empire. But despite the legend he built for himself, he wasn’t the founder of McDonalds – that would be the McDonald brothers – who Kroc squeezed out of the business eventually, because he knew how to make it big, and they were holding him back. Keaton excels in the film, making Kroc into a guy we first kind of like, and will eventually grow to hate – and for essentially the same reasons. His performance is better than the movie itself – that seems to be confused about what precisely it is.

 

When the film opens, Kroc is a travelling salesman – trying, unsuccessfully, to sell a multi-mixer – a machine that makes five milkshakes at the same time – something it seems very few businesses need. The one exception is this little restaurant in San Bernardino in California – who needs eight of them. Curious as to why they need to make 40 milkshakes at the same time, Kroc heads West to see the restaurant. It’s run by two brothers – Dick and Mac McDonald (Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch) – who gladly give Kroc a tour of their restaurant – the first fast food place around. Their secret is a small menu and as much automation and uniformity as they can get. Kroc knows immediately this needs to be franchised – and somehow talks the brothers into letting him run with it. This is the latest in a series of get rich schemes Kroc has had – and he’s not letting this one go.

 

When we first meet Kroc, we cannot help but kind of like the guy. He’s sort of sad in the way of Shelley Levine in Glengarry Glen Ross – a salesman selling something no one wants (he hasn’t been quite beaten down as much as Levine – but he’s getting there). He wants to be successful – and has tried his whole life to get there. But he’s now in his 50s, has a wife (Laura Dern) who does little but nag him, no kids and nothing to show for his life. When he starts trying to franchise McDonalds, he knows this is it – this is his last chance to succeed big time, and he pours everything he has into it. It doesn’t matter if his contract with the brothers say they maintain control over everything about the restaurants and their food – Kroc is the one out there hustling to make it a success. Eventually, he’ll stop arguing with the brothers, and just start doing whatever the hell he wants to – even over their objections. They threaten to sue – and Kroc knows they would probably win. But he also knows that he has become so big – and the company he founded to lease the restaurants so powerful – that he can last longer in an extended court battle then they can. So, what really, can they do to stop him?

 

The film really is about how Kroc ends up screwing over the brothers – how he goes from a hustling into a cut throat businessman – and how, perhaps, there really is no difference. Kroc was an asshole at the beginning of the fil – and remains one at the end – the difference is that at the beginning he had no money or power, so he had to eat the shit fed to him – and by the end, he can force others to eat the shit. Still, the movie does seem to perhaps make that turn too abruptly – the scene where he ends his first marriage is crueler than we’ve seen him before, and there’s a few others like that as well. Keaton, to his credit, does nothing to try and soften the character – and essentially plays him the same way. It’s another fine performance from him. Perhaps even better is Offerman and Lynch as the brothers – I don’t think the film sees them as clearly as the actors do. They are, in their own way, businessmen themselves, after the same dollar Kroc is – he’s just better at it than they are, because he’s more cutthroat.

 

The film was directed by John Lee Hancock – an odd choice for the film. He’s the director who made Saving Mr. Banks a few years ago – another film about a powerful mogul (Walt Disney) who gets his way over the person who actually created something (Emma Thompson as the creator of Mary Poppins). That film was a lot lighter than this one – although I have a feeling Hancock sees them in the same way. After all, in both films, the business screws over the “artist” – but in the process, they end up making something beloved, so can they really be that bad? Hancock doesn’t seem to quite get how bad some of the things Kroc ends up doing are – and he undercuts the impact they could have, by not hitting them harder.

 

The Founder is still a good movie- but I think a better movie could be made out of this same material. This film almost plays like an ad for McDonalds for a while, grows a little dark, than plays like an ad again – I doubt McDonalds will be all that unhappy with the film. A better film about this material would, could and should make them more upset.

Movie Review: Saving Mr. Banks

Saving Mr. Banks
Directed by:   John Lee Hancock.
Written by: Kelly Marcel and Sue Smith.
Starring: Emma Thompson (P.L. Travers), Tom Hanks (Walt Disney), Annie Rose Buckley (Ginty), Colin Farrell (Travers Goff), Ruth Wilson  (Margaret Goff), Paul Giamatti (Ralph), Bradley Whitford (Don DaGradi), B.J. Novak (Robert Sherman), Jason Schwartzman (Richard Sherman), Lily Bigham (Biddy), Kathy Baker (Tommie), Melanie Paxson (Dolly), Andy McPhee (Mr. Belhatchett), Rachel Griffiths (Aunt Ellie).

I wish it were possible that a studio other than Disney to have made Saving Mr. Banks – simply because this is a story about two people who have pretty much the complete opposite ideas, and both of whom are pretty much 100% right, and I find that fascinating. P.L. Travers resisted Disney’s offer to buy the film rights to her series of Mary Poppins books for year because she feared that Disney would do pretty much exactly what he did to them – make them schmaltzy and cartoony – fill the film with cheesy songs and animation and the creation that meant so much to her would become forever linked with Disney – more so even than with her. On that, she was correct – that was pretty much exactly what Disney did to her book. Walt Disney wanted to buy the books because he knew that he could make a great musical comedy out of them – and make generations of young filmgoers fall in love with the film – and he was also pretty much 100% right. I don’t think too many serious film buffs would argue that Mary Poppins is the best film of 1964 – but now, 49 years later, it is inarguably the most enduringly popular. Who hasn’t seen Mary Poppins? What child doesn’t love it? What adult still cannot sing some of the songs by heart? Disney may well have “ruined” Travers books – but in doing so, he ensured that her creation would be remembered forever.

Saving Mr. Banks is a supposed feel good comedy about the stuffy Englishwoman Travers coming to Hollywood in 1961 to see what Disney has planned for her books – and to determine if it meets with her impossibly high standards so that she’ll actually sell the rights. She has little money, and doesn’t have all that much choice in the matter, but damn it, she’s going to ensure they don’t ruin her creation. About a quarter of the film takes places in flashback – in the early years of the 20^th Century in Australia, where a young Travers watches her fun loving father slowly succumb to his alcoholism – and how that experience altered her life, and inspired Mary Poppins.

The film, it must be said, basically a commercial for the magic of Disney. Tom Hanks plays Uncle Walt as a fun loving, informal guy, who insists everyone calls him Walt. He steamrolls over everyone in an effort to get his way, but he’s also kind and thoughtful – willing to bend over backwards to make Travers happy. Emma Thompson is Travers herself – a stereotypical uptight British woman, although one the movie allows a little humanity in those flashbacks scenes which shows why she may be how she is. They are, in different ways, both delightful performances. Hanks still has that everyman quality that made him a star, even when he’s playing someone as well-known as Walt Disney – it’s impossible not to like Hanks, and impossible not to like Disney. Thompson may be a boring old British lady – but she’s whip smart, clever and often hilarious in her putdowns. They are surrounded by a fine supporting cast who do some very good work – Paul Giamatti and Colin Farrell in particular are very good, in roles that sneak up on you a little bit.

No matter how good the performances are – and how amusing the screenplay is, and the delight of the period details are – it never did leave my mind that I was basically watching a commercial, whose ultimate message was that Disney knows best. Which is why I wish some other studio could have been allowed to make the film (impossible given that Disney has the Mary Poppins rights in their iron grip) so that perhaps the film could have been slightly more complex in its examination of this conflict. As it stands, the movie is an enjoyable little romp – fine performances and some good music, but also immediately forgettable. You’ll most likely have fun with Saving Mr. Banks – unless you’re a complete cynic – but you’re also likely to forget it soon after the end credits role. This fascinating story deserved better.

Movie Review: The Blind Side

The Blind Side ***
Directed By: John Lee Hancock.

Written By: John Lee Hancock based on the book by Michael Lewis.

Starring: Sandra Bullock (Leigh Anne Touhy), Tim McGraw (Sean Tuohy), Quinton Aaron (Michael Oher), Jae Head (S.J. Tuohy), Lily Collins (Collins Tuohy), Ray McKinnon (Coach Cotton), Kim Dickens (Mrs. Boswell), Adriane Lenox (Denise Oher), Kathy Bates (Miss Sue).

I have no idea how true to reality The Blind Side is the story of Michael Oher, who went from being pretty much homeless in high school to be a first round pick of the Baltimore Ravens last year and becoming an instant millionaire. And to be honest, I don’t much care. Movies have to work unto themselves, and shouldn’t take too much effort to be true. And The Blind Side works remarkably well as a movie. It is an inspiring sports movie without being so sickly sweet that it rots your teeth.

Michael Oher (Quinton Aaron) lives in Memphis, but he doesn’t really have a home. His mother is crack head, and he has been in and out of foster care for most of his life. When the movie opens, he is staying with a friend, but that doesn’t last long. He gets into a private Christian school, but just sits there in class and doesn’t do anything. He doesn’t say much of anything to anyone really. One day, Leigh Ann Touhy (Sandra Bullock) and her family are driving home when they come across Michael. He is cold and alone, so she invites him to stay at their place for the night. They night turns into two, and then more, and soon they come to see Michael as part of their family.

Michael is a gentle giant of a man. At around 6’4 and well over 200 pounds, he is huge, which makes people think he will good at football. He brings his grades up enough to qualify for the sport, but when he gets on the field, he doesn’t like to hit people. But his protective instincts are phenomenal. In the movie, all it takes to turn Michael from a marshmallow into a star Left Tackle is for Leigh Ann to tell him to think of the football as his family, with the quarterback being her. He is to protect him from any harm, just like he would protect her.

In many ways, The Blind Side is a classic sports movie story, about the underdog made good. It takes a kid with no real advantages in life, and turns him into a star athlete overnight. All he needed was for someone to believe in him. The movie has come under fire in some circles, because it is yet another story of a poor black kid who plays a supporting role in his own story, while the white star of the movie – in this case Sandra Bullock – is given the lead. And while to a certain extent this is true, I can’t help but think that in this case at least, this was the right choice.

Oher, the character not necessarily the person, is in a lot of ways an enigma throughout much of the movie. He is quiet in the extreme, barely mumbling a few words together for pretty much the first two thirds of the movie. He lets his action speak louder than his words ever could, in scenes like when he protects the Touhy’s youngest son when they get into a traffic accident, or on Thanksgiving when the entire Touhy family goes to eat dinner in front of not one but two TVs showing a football game, and he quietly goes into the dining room by himself at first – until Leigh Ann drags the rest of the family in there with him. By focusing on the brash, outspoken Leigh Ann for much of the movie, writer/director John Lee Hancock finds a way to tell Oher’s story in a way that will not alienate audiences. In doing so, he gives Bullock what just may be the role of her career so far.

Bullock so often disguises her talent in the lackluster romantic comedies she makes. That she is better at these movies than pretty much any other actress in the world right now is really beside the point. In The Blind Side, she doesn’t play a character that far removed from those romantic comedy roles. She is good looking, charming, driven, sassy and fun. No matter what movie she is in, you know she will almost always get her way. Here, her talents are put to good use, as she plays *gasp* a Republican and Christian woman, not to mention a member of the NRA, and isn’t painted as a heartless villain, but rather a good woman who takes Michael in, because it is the right thing to do. We like her pretty much immediately. Michael needs someone like Leigh Ann to bring him out of his shell, and that she does. Quinton Aaron is quite good as Michael, making him lovable and sweet, without pouring it on too heavy, and making us feel the sickly sweetness of the story too much.

The supporting cast is a mixed bag. Tim McGraw is fine as Bullock’s supportive husband, who seems to have learned from all their years together not to fight her, but to just smile and roll with the punches. She’s going to get her way anyway, so why fight it? The other Tuohy kids, Collins, played by Lily Collins and SJ, played by Jae Head, are underwritten, and in the case of SJ, seems rather cartoonish. Kathy Bates as the tutor Miss Sue, that the Tuohy’s hire to help Michael get his grades up, is really not given anything to do.

The Blind Side is what it is – an inspiring sports movies – with all the good and bad clichés that go along with that. It doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but then again it doesn’t have to. It does what it does well, and the result is a highly enjoyable little movie.