Movie Review: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Directed by: Peter Jackson.
Written by: Fran Walsh & Philippa Boyens & Peter Jackson  & Guillermo del Toro based on the novel by  J.R.R. Tolkien.
Starring: Ian McKellen (Gandalf), Martin Freeman (Bilbo), Richard Armitage (Thorin), Ken Stott (Balin), Graham McTavish (Dwalin), William Kircher (Bifur), James Nesbitt (Bofur), Stephen Hunter (Bombur), Dean O'Gorman (Fili), Aidan Turner (Kili), John Callen (Oin), Peter Hambleton (Gloin), Jed Brophy (Nori), Mark Hadlow (Dori), Adam Brown (Ori), Orlando Bloom (Legolas), Evangeline Lilly (Tauriel), Lee Pace (Thranduil), Cate Blanchett (Galadriel), Benedict Cumberbatch (Smaug / Necromancer), Mikael Persbrandt (Beorn), Sylvester McCoy (Radagast), Luke Evans (Bard / Girion), Stephen Fry (Master of Laketown), Ryan Gage (Alfrid).

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is better than last year’s An Unexpected Journey if for no other reason than because we don’t have to spend nearly as much time in an vain attempt to introduce us to all the characters in the film. I’ve spent nearly six hours watching these two films now, and I still don’t think I could pass a test where I had to match the names to the faces of all the dwarves who Bilbo and Gandalf are accompanying on their journey to take back their homeland (I could get Thorin – and everyone else would be pure dumb luck). In An Unexpected Journey, we spent an hour trying to get to know them all – but this time, after a brief introduction, the film pretty much just kicks in with the plot and action sequences that will drive it for nearly three hours. Yes, like the last film, every scene seems to me to be a little too long – and Jackson seems a little too willing to let everything play out at length, and underline every emotion multiple times (I could have done with far few shots of Orlando Bloom staring at Evangeline Lilly with love in his eyes). It’s clear the Hobbit films will never live up to Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings films – a nearly impossible task – but while their over length hurts the films, it does not kill it. The films are still impeccably made, with great visual effects, and exciting action sequences. Now if only there was a little bit less of everything.

The film follows our hero Bilbo, the wizard Gandalf and the (not so) merry band of dwarves led by Thorin in an effort to retake their Kingdom, which lies under a mountain and was stolen from them by Smaug – an evil, fire breathing dragon, who sleeps on top of the treasure he has stolen. This time – after some adventures involving orcs, wood elves, white water rafting in barrels, a stop at a poor town ruled by the delightful Stephen Frye – our band of misfits actually arrive at their destination – but of course things don’t turn out quite as they planned it – if it did, there would be no third movie after all.

The film contains some magnificent action sequences – a fight with some incredibly large, vile spiders, the aforementioned white water rafting battle, where the dwarves and Bilbo fly down the river pursued by orcs – and elves – and the climax where we finally get a good look at Smaug. Like everything else in the movie, all of these sequences probably go on a little longer than they really should (in particular the barrels) – but they are also expertly crafted by Jackson and company and do give the movies a much needed jolt of energy at times.

Those jolts are necessary, because there are a few too many scenes where a few too many characters have to be introduced – this time, we have to be reintroduced to Bloom’s Legolas (who has a surprising amount of screen time considering he doesn’t do all that much), and Lilly’s Tauriel, the elf he is in love with, but is too lowly for the son of the King – alongside Luke Evans’ Bard – a bargeman who, of course, will play a much bigger role in the third film (at least one hopes considering how much time we spend with him this time). These scenes often drag the film to a halt – and pull focus away from Martin Freeman’s Bilbo – who is shunted off to the background for far too long in a movie where he plays the title character.

The Hobbit films are what they are – which like the Star Wars prequels is nowhere near as good as the original trilogy. That doesn’t mean the films are not good – or not entertaining or well made, or well-acted (by a few people anyway) – because they are. Watching them with lowered expectations help. Yes, Jackson could have easily have made one long (or even two semi-long) films and the storytelling would have been greatly improved – but what he has made is pretty good. If we’re disappointed, it’s because The Lord of the Rings films were a hell of a lot better than pretty good.

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 Crash Reel

The Crash Reel
Directed by: Lucy Walker.

The Crash Reel is a different kind of sports documentary, that tells the type of sports story we do not often see in the movies. Movies prefer inspirational sports stories – stories about athletes who defy odds, come back from adversity, or overcome injuries on their way to glory. The Crash Reel is about Kevin Pearce – who heading into the 2010 Winter Olympics was a medal hopeful in Half Pipe Snowboarding – perhaps the only one who could upset the heavily favored Shaun White. But on New Year’s Eve 2009 all that changed – during a training run in Park City Utah, Kevin tried out a new trick – and landed, badly – the full force of the fall was absorbed by his head. He was knocked unconscious, and it was touch and go for a while if he would even live through his injury – but eventually he does wake up. His doctors tell him he has had a traumatic brain injury – and he should never snowboard again. His family doesn’t want him to put himself in needless danger – once you’ve had one brain injury; it’s easier to get a second. But Kevin is determined to make a comeback.

In most sports movies, we would be cheering for Kevin to get back out there and snowboard. How many times have we seen a film when a group of naysayers try and talk the hero out of going after his dream, and he ignores them – and because he does, he ends up champion. The Crash Reel is different, because in this film you root against Kevin getting back on his snowboard. The film makes it clear just how dangerous the sport has become – and how it’s even more dangerous for Kevin. One fall, and he could kill himself. Why would he want to do that?

The sport of snowboarding has encouraged athletes to push themselves harder and harder. When it started, the half pipe was 6-8 high, and now it’s well over 20 feet. Combine the height of the wall with the height of the jumps, and you’re basically falling 40 feet if you mess up. From those heights, a helmet isn’t going to do you much good. But the additional height adds excitement to the sport – excitement draws in more fans, which draws in more money. And athletes being as competitive as they are, they want to do the bigger wall – and once they perfect one jump, they need to perfect something bigger and better – which is also more dangerous. The athletes take the chance of serious injury or death because they want to do it, they want to win and also because they don’t think that they’ll be the one who falls and hurts themselves – that’s something that happens to other people, not them. You can see this in the interviews with Kevin’s friends and teammates, who seemingly say differing versions of “What happened to Kevin was horrible, but…” throughout the movie.

Snowboarding is not alone in their disregard for their athlete’s safety of course. Every sport does it to one degree or another – the NFL just had to pay out $750 million to former players who suffered serious head injuries during their careers – some former NHL players just filed a similar lawsuit. Like those sports, a certain degree of risk is pretty much essential to snowboarding – you cannot take jumps out of the sport, just like you cannot take body checks out of hockey, or violence out of football. But what degree of responsibility does the sport have to protect their athletes – even if they are only protecting them for themselves? This is the question that hangs over much of The Crash Reel.

What is amazing about the film is that director Lucy Walker is able to explore all of this, without making the film sound like a sermon. She doesn’t moralize or scold, she simply lets Kevin’s story play out as naturally as possible. It is a fascinating story in part because of Kevin’s stubborn refusal to listen to anyone about how he needs to give up his dreams of returning to the sport he loves – even as years go by and he’s no closer to being able to compete. It’s also fascinating because of Kevin’s family – who love and support him, but do not want to see him go back to snowboarding. It’s quietly heartbreaking to see Kevin’s older brother David, who has Down syndrome, please with his brother to not snowboard anymore, and Kevin refuse to listen to him. He’s still convinced he’ll be fine.

The Crash Reel is still, in its way, an inspirational sports movie. But it’s inspirational in a completely different way than most are. It’s inspirational when Kevin finally accepts what has happened to him, and how he chooses to live with it for the rest of his life, and try to get better, rather than put himself at risk again. Is there another sports movie where the most inspirational moment comes when the “hero” finally gives up?

Movie Review: Laurence Anyways

Laurence Anyways
Directed by: Xavier Dolan.
Written by: Xavier Dolan.
Starring: Melvil Poupaud (Laurence Alia), Suzanne Clément (Fred Belair), Nathalie Baye (Julienne Alia), Monia Chokri (Stéfanie Belair), Susan Almgren (Journaliste), Yves Jacques (Michel Lafortune), Sophie Faucher (Andrée Belair), Magalie Lépine Blondeau (Charlotte), Catherine Bégin (Mamy Rose), Emmanuel Schwartz (Baby Rose), Jacques Lavallée (Dada Rose), Perrette Souplex (Tatie Rose), Patricia Tulasne (Shookie Rose), David Savard (Albert), Monique Spaziani (Francine).

What makes Xavier Dolan the most exciting young Canadian director working right now is his complete and utter fearlessness. At the age of 24, he has already made four acclaimed films, and while they are all undeniably his films, they are also very different in many ways as well. His debut film, I Killed My Mother (2009) was shot mainly with a handheld camera, and evoked the Dardenne brothers and other neo-realists. His follow-up Heartbeats (2010) was a stylized romantic comedy with echoes of Woody Allen. Tom at the Farm (2013), which I saw at TIFF this year, was a Hitchcock like thriller. His third film, Laurence Anyways, is an ambitious, three hour, decade spanning story about a man who wants to become a woman, and his complicated relationship with the woman he is with when makes the decision. The film is, undeniably, a little too long – and tries to cram too much in to its runtime – but it is also undeniably his most audacious film to date – an attempt make something that perhaps Rainer Werner Fassbinder would have done.

The film stars Melvil Poupand as Laurence Alia – a high school teacher who has dreams of becoming a writer. When we first meet him, he is a man, who is dating Fred (Suzanne Clement) – a woman who works as a costume designer for TV and movies. They seem happy together – at least Fred thinks so – until one day, seemingly out of nowhere, Laurence announces he wants to become a woman. He still loves Fred – he isn’t “gay” in that he wants to be with other men, and he hopes that Fred will understand and support his decision. Amazingly, she does try for a while to do just that. But just as Laurence cannot deny his feelings that he wants to be a woman, Fred cannot deny her feelings that she wants to be with a man.

The film is well acted by its two leads – especially Clement, whose Fred is confused from beginning to end in the film. She loves Laurence – in many ways they are perfect for each other, but she just cannot stay with him. Her attempts to go “straight” – with a wealthy man, in a big house in the suburbs – don’t really work either because it’s too conventional, too dull, too boring for her (you can track her progression by looking at how her fiery, dyed red hair changes throughout the movie). I think some of what Fred does late in the film doesn’t make a whole lot of sense – only someone who does not have kids could write some of the things Dolan has her say about her son – but Clement delivers an excellent performance throughout. For his part, Poupaud does a very interesting job with Laurence as well – he doesn’t change his voice, and he doesn’t become a wholly different character through the course of the movie. He remains Laurence – now, that just means he is a woman. Some will complain that the movie doesn’t really show his transformation – there are no surgeries, no hormones taken through the course of the movie – but I don’t think that was what Dolan was attempting to show in the film. He wanted to show this complicated love story, which is what he does. I also found it refreshing that Dolan didn’t feel the need to make Laurence into some sort of saint or martyr – he remains a complicated character – one that isn’t all that likable at times, but one we always understand. It takes Laurence’s decision at face value.

The film, it must be said, far too long. There isn’t a whole lot of plot to the film truth be told – it just seems like Dolan was a little too in love with his characters, and didn’t want to leave them, so the films clocks in at nearly three hours – and you feel that length in the film’s second half, as Dolan delays the inevitable for far too long. Yet the film is also a technical marvel – hyper stylized, full of garish colors and shots that also somehow manages to never go too far over the top.

The film feels like another step forward for Dolan. I still don’t think he has made a truly great film yet (and Tom at the Farm actually feels like a step backwards) – and yet the one thing that remains clear to me after seeing each one of Dolan’s four films to date is that one day he will make a truly great film. He’s got a lot of time to get there – he’s way ahead of any other 24 year old working right now.

Movie Review: War Witch (Rebelle)

War Witch
Directed by: Kim Nguyen.
Written by: Kim Nguyen.
Starring: Rachel Mwanza (Komona), Alain Lino Mic Eli Bastien (Commandant Rebelle), Serge Kanyinda (Magicien), Ralph Prosper (Le Boucher), Mizinga Mwinga (Grand Tigre Royal).

Writer/director Kim Nguyen makes an interesting decision in War Witch, which both helps and hurts the film. The film is centered on Komona, who is a young girl who is kidnapped from her home in Africa, forced to kill her parents, and is trained to be a child soldier. The entire film is told from her point of view – she is thrust into a war she doesn’t understand, and as such neither does the audience. I’m not sure what country the movie is supposed to take place in, or what the War Lord she is forced to work for is fighting for – and neither, I suspect, does Komona. The movie doesn’t offer us any insight into this aspect of its story – which might have worked had the film given us more a sense of Komona. However, she is so traumatized by what happens to her that she doesn’t make a very good entry point, even into her own story. Watching the film I was frustrated, because I felt that I was constantly on the outside of everything in the film.

The performance by Rachel Mwanza – who was only 13 when she shot the film – does an excellent job at conveying this trauma, and all her confusion. She is taken from everything she knows and forced to kill people for reasons she does not comprehend. She falls in love, in a way, with a slightly older boy – known as the Magician (Serge Kanyinda) – although her notion of what love constitutes is very childish. She becomes the favored “War Witch” of the Grand Tigre, the war lord who kidnapped her, because her dead parents appear to her in visions, and direct her away from danger. And when the Grand Tigre’s woman dies, he takes Komona as his “lover” as well – although what he does to her is clearly rape – until she exacts a fitting (and brutal) revenge on him.

I admired much of War Witch – the performances are about as good as they can be, given that the movie is locked into Komona’s point of view, and she doesn’t really understand herself, or anyone around her. The handheld camera work is impressive in that it never becomes vomit inducing, and keeps the action clear.

Yet, I cannot help but think that the film doesn’t quite work. There is an contradiction in the central character that I could never quite resolve – she sees so much, and grows up so fast in many ways, yet remains such a naïve child in other ways and I just never quite bought that.

The film was the most acclaimed Canadian film of 2012 – I put off watching it for far too long, unsure if the material was something I really wanted to tackle. I’m glad I saw the film – I think Nguyen is a talent to watch for in the future – but this time I cannot quite bring myself to add to the praise the film has received. It marks Nguyen as a talented filmmaker to watch – but for me, this time he never quite pulled off what he was aiming for.

My Answer to the Latest Criticwire Survey: 2014 Anticipations

Q: What are you most looking forward to, culturally speaking, in 2014?

Considering I still have some of my most anticipated 2013 films to see, I haven’t thought too much about 2014 yet. But I’ll list a few – Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar has to be near the top of the list, as does David Fincher’s Gone Girl, Bennett Miller’s Foxcacther, Darren Aronofsky’s Noah, and Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac. My two biggest ones have to be new films by directors named Anderson – Wes’ The Grand Budapest Hotel and Paul Thomas’ Inherent Vice – although given how much time Paul Thomas spends in the editing room sometimes, who knows if we’ll actually see that one this year.

Movie Review: The Unknown Known

The Unknown Known
Directed by: Errol Morris.

Errol Morris’ The Unknown Known makes an interesting companion piece to his Oscar-winning documentary The Fog of War. That film, which came out on the eve of the War in Iraq, was a feature length interview with former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara – the architect of the Vietnam War. In the 30 years that had passed between McNamara’s involvement in the war, and the interview with Morris, he had a lot of time to reflect on what happened – what went wrong and his own culpability in that. McNamara may not have been overly apologetic, but he was intelligent, thoughtful and had the ability to admit at least some his mistakes.

Now comes The Unknown Known, which takes the same approach as The Fog of War, except this time with Donald Rumsfeld – one of the architects of the war in Iraq. The film isn’t nearly as enlightening as The Fog of War was – and this probably because of two reasons – first, that not as much time has passed between Iraq and the interview, and second, and more importantly, Donald Rumsfeld is not as open as McNamara was. He deflects Morris’ questions, hides behind semantics and when Morris catches him in either a lie, or a misstatement of facts, Rumsfeld simply tells another lie, or laughs it off.

Through the course of the movie, you can tell Morris is becoming frustrated. He, of course, invented the infamous Interrotron, which allows his interview subjects to look directly at him and into the camera at the same time – as well as having the ability to throw up other information on a screen for the interview subject to read. This results in a much more direct communication between the subject being interviewed and the audience. For the most part, Morris likes to remain silent in his movie – he isn’t Michael Moore or Morgan Spurlock who thrusts themselves to the forefront of his movies – if he ever even appears on camera in one of them, I cannot recall it. He prefers to let his subject communicate directly with the audience. During the course of The Unknown Known however, we hear Morris’ voice far more often than usual. This is for a very simple reason – he knows Rumsfeld is lying to him, and he cannot sit there and let those lies go unchallenged.

The movie, therefore, does not really offer much new insight into the war in Iraq. Amazingly, Rumsfeld still feels content to tow the Bush party line on almost every issue, saying things that we all know are blatantly untrue – but damn it, he’s sticking to it. But it does offer an interesting portrait of Rumsfeld himself. This is a man who issued thousands of memos during his time as Defense Secretary – most of them now public – and Morris gets him to read some of them. The title comes from one such memo, where Rumsfeld details the differences between “known knowns” (things we know we know), known unknown (things we know we don’t know), unknown unknowns (things we don’t know we don’t know) and unknown knowns (things we know, but don’t know we know, or perhaps it’s the other way around – like with everything else, Rumsfeld doesn’t hesitate to change his mind whenever it suits him).

The portrait that emerges in The Unknown Known is that of a person who doesn’t seem to be bothered by just how badly things went in Iraq. Morris is obsessed with the details, and what went wrong, and why, but Rumsfeld doesn’t seem to care that much. He smiles, he laughs it off and basically tells Morris he’s too obsessed with this stuff. The film ventures back to the past to go over Rumsfeld’s political career – from his time in Congress, to working for Nixon and Ford, to the moment he loses out on being Reagan’s running mate to George Bush Sr. (this seems like the only moment that bugs him – although he doesn’t give Morris much more than a grim look). Rumsfeld basically skated through his time in politics – seemingly missed every scandal. He wasn’t much trusted by those around him – they know he was mainly self-serving -  but he was always a safe choice. Morris is never quite able to crack Rumsfeld – never able to get under his skin, to see who he really is behind the face he has shown over his political career. That makes The Unknown Known not among Morris’ best work, because normally he’s able to do that. But he can’t crack Rumsfeld. Maybe the reason is there’s nothing really to crack. What you see is what you get.

 
Note: I saw The Unknown Known at TIFF 2013, and as far as I know, nothing has changed since then. It is being released in New York and LA this week as part of an Oscar qualifying run – although since it didn’t make the documentary shortlist last week (although it should have), that doesn’t really matter. I’m sure the film will go wider at some point – Errol Morris is one of the few documentary filmmakers who can pretty much guarantee some sort of release of his films.