Movie Review: Bird Box

Bird Box *** / *****

Directed by: Susanne Bier   

Written by: Eric Heisserer based on the novel by Josh Malerman.

Starring: Sandra Bullock (Malorie), Trevante Rhodes (Tom), John Malkovich (Douglas), Rosa Salazar (Lucy), Sarah Paulson (Jessica), Tom Hollander (Gary), Machine Gun Kelly (Felix), Danielle Macdonald (Olympia), BD Wong (Greg), Parminder Nagra (Dr. Lapham), Jacki Weaver (Sheryl), Lil Rel Howery (Charlie), Amy Gumenick (Samantha), Taylor Handley (Jason).

 

I always admire when a genre film has an utterly ridiculous premise, and refuses to try and explain the reasons behind it. Most movies that exist in some sort of strange, post-apocalyptic world twist themselves into knots trying to explain the unexplainable. In Bird Box, the weird premise is that people who are outside who see, well, something, go insane and try to kill themselves or others. If you don’t look, you’re fine – but if you do look, you’re done. What do they see? Why do they go insane? Who cares – the movie doesn’t. The movie just uses this admittedly ridiculous premise as a way get use into that post-apocalyptic world, and then to goose the scares in it when the people venture into the wider world. And as silly as it is – it works.

 

The film flips back and forth in time over about a five-year period. During the earlier time period, Malorie (Sandra Bullock) is pregnant, and worried about bonding with her new baby – she never planned on being a mother, and doesn’t know how she’ll handle it. She is talking with her sister (Sarah Paulson) – and we hear news stories about this weird rash of suicides and violence on the other side of the world, when suddenly it hits them as well. Malorie ends up in a big house with a group of survivors – the kind and sensitive Tom (Trevante Rhodes), asshole Douglas (John Malkovich), the kind and also pregnant Danielle (Olympia) – etc. as the world around them crumbles. In the present, Malorie and two five-year-old kids – who she calls Boy and Girl (gee, I wonder where they came from) are venturing out, down the river, wearing blindfolds, to try and get to a new safety zone. Since none of the other people in that house are with her, we assume that things will not work out for them – although we don’t know how it will all go wrong.

 

The film was directed by Susanne Bier – a Danish filmmaker, who has had an up and down career – with some great films (like the Danish language Brothers) and some awful films, like Serena – which somehow managed the trick of making a Bradley Cooper/Jennifer Lawrence movie completely without charm. She hasn’t really done a lot of genre work before – and maybe that’s why Bird Box is as effective as it is. Bier doesn’t try to goose the story along with obvious scare sequences, boo moments or set pieces. Instead, she places us inside this crazy world, and then just kind of goes along for the ride. The biggest asset she has is her excellent ensemble cast – lead by Bullock, doing very solid work, who help to elevate the material.

 

Bird Box is hardly a great film. It is too log at just over two hours, and while the lack of real scare set pieces is effective in one way, it also lends to the monotony of the film in another – eventually, everything starts to kind of feel the same. It also must be noted that while I am grateful the film didn’t try and explain its premise too closely – that doesn’t mean the movie doesn’t have more than its share of exposition in the dialogue. I also cannot help but think that the film missed the opportunity to do something really good with the people who see whatever it is and don’t kill themselves – they just become some sort of religious fanatic. There is something deeper there that the movie missed.

 

Ultimately, Bird Box is an effective little thriller. It does some different things than what I was anticipating in some very interesting ways. It doesn’t quite pull it all off – but you have to admire the effort.

Movie Review: Serena

Serena
Directed by: Susanne Bier.
Written by: Christopher Kyle based on the book by Ron Rash.
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence (Serena Pemberton), Bradley Cooper (George Pemberton), Rhys Ifans (Galloway), Toby Jones (Sheriff McDowell), Sean Harris (Campbell), Sam Reid (Vaughn), Blake Ritson (Lowenstein), Ana Ularu (Rachel), David Dencik (Buchanan).

It’s never a good sign when a movie is delayed more than once, and pushed out of not one but two different years. However, once in a while those oft-delayed movies end up being masterpieces – David Fincher's Zodiac, Andrew Dominik's The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and Ken Lonergan's Margaret spring immediately to mind. More often than not however, being delayed that often is a sign that the movie has problems. I first heard about Susanne Biers Serena following Silver Linings Playbook – as the film reunited the two stars, Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence, of that film. There were even images from the film posted. But then the film just didn’t come out – it was expected in 2013, and didn’t come out. It was expected on the festival circuit this year, and didn’t get there either (it did, finally, play one this fall). Now it has been delayed in America until 2015 – where it will go VOD and hit theaters at the same time. Oddly, however, the film is getting a fairly wide release in Canada. I went, more out of curiosity than anything else. And now I know why the film was so often delayed – it’s quite simply an awful film.

Set in 1929, in Carolina, the film stars Cooper as George Pemberton – a would be timber baron. But with the recent stock market crash, and the fact that the government may reclaim his land and make it into a National Park, things are on uneasy ground. George has some land in Brazil he wants desperately to log – but he needs to make money first, so he`ll do whatever possible to make it work. One day, he meets Serena (Lawrence), the daughter of a timber baron herself, who had her entire family wiped out in a fire when she was only 12, and immediately falls in love. Serena is as smart as she is beautiful – and starts to change George's business for the better. But from the start, there is something not quite right about her. She doesn’t seem to mind the girl, Rachel (Ana Ularu) that George knocked up before they met (and who, now that she is pregnant, George is virtually ignoring) – but she eyes her uneasily anyway – especially once she herself becomes pregnant. When Georges partner (David Dencik) threatens to expose his corruption, Serena goes full Lady Macbeth with George – but feels no guilt, and tries to push things farther.

All of that probably sounds rather interesting – like if nothing else, Serena would be a good soap opera. The ingredients are certainly there for this to be that kind of film – but that isn’t the film that director Susanne Bier has made. She takes the material far too seriously – and directs her actors to underplay everything. This is a subdued movie to the point where it’s almost comatose. With all the violence, sex and melodrama on display you would think things would be directed at a fever pitch – that the actors may in fact be in danger of going over the top. The reality is the opposite. Lawrence, who is normally a firecracker in her roles, has never been this quiet. She is capable of being subtle – her best work to date remains Winters Bone, which is her quietest great performance – but her she seems to be sleepwalking through the role – even as it requires her to go pretty much insane. Cooper is even worse – he looks dead inside here, which is perhaps where his character ends up, but certainly isn’t where he begins. Rhys Ifans is horribly miscast as the violent, psychopathic badass in the movie – a role his easy, funny charm just isn’t built for.

The film does look beautiful – set in the Smoky Mountains, the films cinematography certainly makes the most of its location. But the film doesn’t work on a dramatic or thematic level. Is the film supposed to be a There Will Be Blood like commentary on capitalism? A Gone Girl like thriller (without the satire), about a man who doesn’t know just how damaged the woman he married is? And old fashioned soap opera? I honestly have no idea, and I don’t think Bier did either. Bier is a talented director – Brothers, After the Wedding and her first English language film, Things We Lost in the Fire, are proof of that. But she has somewhat gone off the rails since winning an Oscar for the mediocre In a Better World (for foreign language film). Along with last year’s not very funny or romantic, romantic comedy Love is All You Need, this is two major whiffs in a row for Bier. Let’s hope she recovers for her next film – because Serena is one of the worst films of the year.

Movie Review: Love is All You Need

Love is All You Need
Directed by: Susanne Bier.
Written by: Anders Thomas Jensen and Susanne Bier.
Starring: Trine Dyrholm (Ida), Pierce Brosnan (Philip), Kim Bodnia (Leif), Paprika Steen (Benedikte), Sebastian Jessen (Patrick), Molly Blixt Egelind (Astrid), Christiane Schaumburg-Müller (Thilde), Micky Skeel Hansen (Kenneth), Bodil Jørgensen (Lizzie), Line Kruse (Bitten).

I understand why Susanne Bier wanted to a make a lighter film like Love is All You Need. Although her reputation is mainly built on her last four films, all of which are heavy dramas – Brothers (2004), After the Wedding (2006), Things We Lost in the Fire (2007) and her Oscar winning In a Better World (2010) – she made a few comedies before that. And those last four films are very, very heavy. When she’s at her best – like in Brothers, Wedding and Fire – her films are hard hitting, emotional gut checks, but when she’s at her worst – strangely the film that won her the Foreign Language Film Oscar, In a Better World, it’s almost comical how she piles up misery upon misery until you simply suffocate from it. So sure, Bier has earned the right to make a comedy – but did it have to be one so littered with clichés like Love is All You Need?

The film stars Trine Dyrholm, in a very good performance actually, as Ida – a Danish hairdresser who has just been informed that she has beaten cancer – although at the moment she is completely bald and has to wear a wig. She comes home to share the good news with her husband Leif (Kim Bodnia) – and wouldn’t you know it, she walks in on him having an affair with a much younger colleague. She is devastated, but has to pick herself up and head to Italy, where her daughter Astrid (Molly Blixt Egelind) is getting married. At the airport, she literally runs into Philip (Pierce Brosnan), who has already been established as a workaholic produce seller – who turns out to be her daughter’s future father-in-law. Philip is bitter and lonely – still not over the loss of his wife years before. If you cannot see what is going to happen between these two, than you have obviously never seen a romantic comedy before. These two characters drive each other crazy at first and then – well, you know, don’t you?

Love is All You Need is at least pretty to look at – most of the movie takes place at on a large estate in the Italian countryside – and is appropriately filmed in lovingly, sundrenched style. Like Ridley Scott’s similarly beautiful, but completely empty, A Good Year, this is a film that makes you fall in love with the location much more than any of the characters. So sit back and enjoy the sights – because there isn’t much else here.

I will say I found it strange that even in a romantic comedy like this, Bier adds in some rather heavy material – horrible mothers, bulimic daughters, sexual identity issues, etc. all come up during the running time of this film, but they are barely dealt with – just tossed off and the forgotten about.

It must be said that Dyrholm’s performance as Ida is actually quite good. I could never believe Brosnan’s performance – he’s far too one note in the film, and his demeanor never really changes whether he’s the stick in the mud or apparently the man in love. He’s sleepwalking through the film. And the supporting cast isn’t really given anything to play – the worst example may just be Benedikte (Paprika Steen) as Philip’s sister-in-law who makes a jaw droppingly harsh transition from delusional to downright cruel that makes no sense whatsoever. But through it all, Dyrholm does her best to keep the movie on an even keel – she doesn’t really succeed, but the fact that she comes close at times needs to be commended.

Perhaps I’m just too cynical for movies like this. I admit it – I’ve pretty much had my fill of romantic comedies – especially of this “wish fulfillment” variety on display in Love is All You Need. I’m much more forgiving of action or horror films that fully embrace the clichés of their genre than I am of romantic comedies. So, I guess that if you like the genre perhaps you’ll find something or worth in Love is All You Need. However, if you want something different – something intelligent or funny or heartfelt – than Love is All You Need fails.

Movie Review: In a Better World

In a Better World ** ½
Directed by: Susanne Bier.
Written by: Anders Thomas Jensen.
Starring: Mikael Persbrandt (Anton), William Jøhnk Jues Nielsen (Christian), Markus Rygaard (Elias), Ulrich Thomsen (Claus), Trine Dyrholm (Marianne), Camilla Gottlieb (Eva), Simon Maagaard Holm (Sofus), Toke Lars Bjarke (Morten), Kim Bodnia (Lars), Odiege Matthew (Big Man).

I have been an admirer of the films of Danish filmmaker Susanne Bier for a while now. Her original film Brothers (which was remade with Tobey Maquire, Jake Gyllenhaal and Natalie Portman), was a tragedy about two very different brothers, who love the same women, and how we all play the roles we were given. Her Oscar nominated After the Wedding, was a film about a man trying to reconnect with the child he never knew he had. Her underrated American debut, Things We Lost in the Fire, gave Benicio Del Toro one of his greatest roles. Her films edge over towards melodrama at times, but they work – tying together the third world and the first world, and throwing her characters into situations they are not sure they can handle because of tragedy. But her new film, In a Better World, which won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language film back in February, is her weakest to date in my mind. It is the type of film that had it been American, critics would have ripped it to shreds for being built too much on coincidences, for being too full of its own importance to actually be a great film. The film reminded me in ways of Paul Haggis’s Oscar winning Crash – except this film makes that one appear subtle by comparison.

As in her previous films, In a Better World plays like a moral puzzle – a kind of what would you do scenario placed in front of the audience, in which there may be no right answer, but there is a certainly a wrong one. The film involves two families, who undergo crises before the movie begins. In one, Claus’ (Ulrich Thomsen) wife dies of cancer, leaving him to raise their adolescent son Christian (William Johnk Juels Nielsen) by himself – although he is a busy businessman who spends most of his time in London, leaving his son in Denmark with his grandmother. In the other, Anton (Mikael Persbrandt) has cheated on his wife Marianne (Trine Dyrholm), and they are going through a divorce, which is hard on their son Elias (Markus Rygaard). Making it harder, is the fact that Anton runs a clinic in an unnamed African country, and is away much of the time.

Elias is picked on mercilessly at his school by a bully named Sofus (Simon Maagaard Holm). As the new kid, Christian doesn’t fare much better with Sofus, but unlike Elias, he is determined not to simply sit back and take it. After an ugly incident, where Sofus gets the best of both Elias and Christian, Christian vows revenge. When he sees Sofus follow Elias into the bathroom, he sees his opportunity – jumping Sofus from behind, beating him mercilessly with a bike pump, and threatening him with a knife. After that – although the school is not thrilled with what happened (but cannot prove Christian had a knife), Sofus leaves them both alone – and the two boys bond. Hence, violence seems to have acted as a solution to their problem.

But things are never that simple – as seen in the two other plot threads in the movie. One involves Anton getting into a confrontation with another father – in front of Christian and Elias – whether the other man, a bully named Lars, slaps Anton and instead of fighting back he walks away. Pressured by his son, and his son’s friend, for being a wimp, he takes the boys to see Lars at his garage to try and talk things out – but that doesn’t appear to be Lars’ strong suit. Christian, having gotten revenge once through violence, decides to try it again on Lars – this time on a larger scale. Elias is a mixed up kid, who doesn’t really want to get involved – but on the other hand, he doesn’t want to lose his one friend. The other plot thread takes place in Africa, where the area around Anton’s clinic is run by a psychopath known as Big Man – who when he sees a pregnant woman, enjoys betting with his men over what the sex of the baby is, and then cutting open the mother to see whose right. When he comes to the clinic, in need of medical attention, Anton has to decide whether or not to let him die, which undoubtedly would save lives, or following his oath as a doctor.

All of this sounds much more fascinating that it actually plays however. In a Better World, for the most part, is a muddled film that is weighed down by its own thudding sense of importance. It is a film that tries to speak out against the violence in which it portrays, but in doing so leaves the viewer with a sense of futility. After all, Sofus would not leave Christian and Elias alone had it not been for violence. Lars learns absolutely nothing for his conflict with Anton. And the world is a better place without the Big Man around. The authority figures in the movies – the teachers, the police – seem impotent and unable to do anything to curb the violence. The fathers, although they are well meaning and love their kids, are absent and do not really know how to get through to them. Christian and Elias are the lone characters in the movie that feel somewhat real – Elias especially, since he is a conflicted kid expertly played by Rygaard. Christian is a more complex character, and Nielsen is terrific in the role, which is all the more impressive, since the screenplay can never really decide on who Christian is. Is he a budding young psychopath, just one step removed from becoming a school shooter, or is he a sad, bitter kid because his mother died, just going through some preadolescent anger and rebellion? Bier goes to great lengths to draw parallels between the third world and the first world – something she accomplished much better in both Brothers and After the Wedding – but here, it comes across and preachy and somewhat pretentious. As the movie goes along, it starts to manipulate the audience’s emotions more and more – manipulations that feel like the filmmakers are simply trying to extract tears for us, rather than earning those tears.

All of this isn’t to say that In a Better World is an awful movie. It isn’t. A lot of the movie works, and it kept me fascinated throughout. But I walked away from In a Better World not knowing what Bier thought about her subject and feeling anger at the blatant manipulation on display in the movie. For me, Bier remains a talented filmmaker – one whose next film I will look forward to – but Oscar win or not, this feels like a misstep to me.