Movie Review: The Visit

The Visit
Directed by: M. Night Shyamalan.
Written by: M. Night Shyamalan.
Starring: Olivia DeJonge (Becca), Ed Oxenbould (Tyler), Deanna Dunagan (Nana), Peter McRobbie (Pop Pop), Kathryn Hahn (Mom), Celia Keenan-Bolger (Stacey).

No one could deny that M. Night Shyamalan’s career hasn’t exactly followed the path anyone – least of all himself – could possibly have expected. He is a director who had a huge ego – but when he was on top of the film world, it almost seemed justified. After all, Time Magazine proclaimed him to be the next Spielberg, and he had several beloved hits in a row – starting with The Sixth Sense (1999) and moving onto Unbreakable (2000 – his best film) and Signs (2002). Then of course, things started to go wrong. He became known as “twist ending” guy, and every time out it seemed like he was trying to top himself with a more ridiculous twist. The Village (2004) made money, but got horrible reviews. Lady in the Water (2006) didn’t make money, and got worse reviews (I actually kind of like that demented fairy tale of a movie). By the time of The Happening (2008) Shyamalan had gone from Hollywood golden boy into a joke. He finally tried to do something different with his next two films – The Last Airbender (2010) and After Earth (2013) – and somehow ended up making even worse film. How the hell did an director with this much promise end up doing films this bad? His latest film, The Visit, isn’t exactly a return to form – but it is the best movie Shyamalan has made in a while, and damn good little horror/comedy to boot. It doesn’t rise to the levels of his best work, but the film works damn it – and even manages to pull off a truly surprising third act twist – so yes, it really does seem like Shyamalan still has some of the same old instinct left in him after all.

The movie is yet another entry in the “found footage” horror genre – one that has mainly been played out by now, but which Shyamalan injects some new life into. The footage isn’t exactly “found”, but is the work of teenage director Becca (Olivia DeJonge) who along with her brother (and “B Camera Operator”) Tyler is going to make a documentary about their visit to the grandparents they have never met. Her mother and them had a falling out when she left home as a 19 year old to marry their father – who has since abandoned the family. Their mother won’t be going with them – it will just be the two kids and Nana (Deanna Dunagan) and Pop Pop (Peter McRobbie) for a week, as their mother takes a cruise with their new boyfriend. Becca lectures Tyler about framing and mis-en-scene in amusingly pretentious diatribes – but it must be said that The Visit actually takes framing more seriously than most found footage movies. Shyamalan often films the action taking place entirely on one side of the screen – leaving the other side empty. This is, of course, a perfect opportunity to add something the characters do not see on the other side of the frame – which Shyamalan does sometimes, but not all the time (thus keeping the audience on its toes).

The Visit to the grandparents doesn’t, of course, go as planned. The grandparents are both strange – in very different ways – and both insist that the other is “sick”. Nana does very strange things during the night – causing all sorts of strange noises, which the kids investigate and find disturbing, but Pop Pop just says she is “sundowning”, which is normal for old people. Pop Pop on the other hand seems paranoid, and secretive – spending a lot of time in the shed, lashing out violently at a random man on the street he thinks is following them.

The movie is chock full of horror movie clichés, but to the film’s credit, it knows this and actually has some fun with them. It’s also full of horror movie references – from Psycho to Halloween, and many others, and also has fun with those. In fact, one of the best things about The Visit is something that Shyamalan hasn’t really shown before – a sense of humor. Even in his best films, he’s always been so serious that the films are somewhat marred because even as they get silly, they think they are profound. Not so in The Visit – which doesn’t feature any cameos by Shyamalan as a writer who will save the world, or film critics getting mauled to death, or anyone saying something as silly as “Swing away”. This is a Shyamalan who is having some fun. And it works – particularly because the two kids are such charming screen presences, and the grandparents hold nothing back, going deliriously over the top. In short, the film is ridiculous, but it knows it is.

The film is also legitimately scary – especially in the final act. Shocking, Shyamalan is able to pull off a twist ending that left me legitimately surprised (although it makes complete sense in retrospect, which is the best kind of twist). Shyamalan had been setting up a twist from the beginning, but he does so skillfully enough that he misdirects you from what he’s really doing.

It’s clear now that Shyamalan will not, in fact, be the next Spielberg. He may never make a film as great as Unbreakable ever again really. But The Visit at least shows a way forward for Shyamalan for the first time in a decade. No one is going to argue that it is a great film – but it is a hell of a lot of fun, and is legitimately scary. That’s what a horror movie is supposed to be – and it’s what Shyamalan pulls off with The Visit.

Movie Review: The Mend

The Mend
Directed by: John Magary.
Written by: John Magary and Russell Harbaugh and Myna Joseph.
Starring: Josh Lucas (Mat), Stephen Plunkett (Alan), Lucy Owen (Andrea), Mickey Sumner (Farrah), Cory Nichols (Ronnie), Louisa Krause (Elinor), Austin Pendleton (Earl), Sarah Steele (Sarah), Leo Fitzpatrick (Michael), Samantha Sherman (Jodi).

The Mend is about two brothers, one is obviously an asshole and the other who isn’t so obviously an asshole, but is one just the same. It is a largely plotless movie, that drifts from one thing to the next, as the pair of brothers – who, evidence suggests don’t like each other very much (then again, evidence also suggests that neither of them like anyone or anything very much) – but who, for a brief period of time, are sort of stick together. The film opens at a party being thrown by Alan (Stephen Plunkett) and his girlfriend Farrah (Mickey Sumner) for their artsy-fartsy friends. The party goes on for nearly a half hour of screen time, and drifts from one person to the next. At some point, Alan’s brother Mat (Josh Lucas) shows up – unannounced - and begins to do what he’ll do for most of the rest of the movie – mock everyone and everything around him. He’s an asshole, most people realize it, but no one much says anything to him. The next day, Alan and Farrah leave on vacation – not aware that Mat is still in their apartment, and doesn’t plan on leaving. He even invites his somewhat girlfriend Andrea (Lucy Owen) and her 8-year old son to stay with him. We’ve already seen these two together – in a series of quick scenes that has the pair, obviously living together, go from flirty conversation to sex to her screaming at him to get out, in the plan of 30 seconds or so. Alan eventually returns to the apartment – alone – and not wanting to talk about it.

Josh Lucas is an actor I haven’t much liked in the past, but he gives a fine performance in this film – easily the best of his career. He’s clearly a misanthrope, and not the kind of lovable one that indie movies often give us – the ones who say profane and hilarious things, before eventually revealing themselves to be big softies underneath. Lucas’ Mat is going to learn a lesson in the film – he isn’t going to find love with Andrea and learn that he has to grow the fuck up. He’s an asshole, and knows it, but doesn’t much care. Plunkett has the more difficult role as Alan, who outwardly anyone seems relatively normal, but reveals himself to be more like Mat than even thinks he is. In that opening party scene, we gradually come to realize how strained his relationship with Farrah is – with playful banter, turning more serious as Andrea seems on the verge of tears at one point, and Alan keeping his obvious anger bottled up. He told Mat he was using their vacation as an opportunity to propose to Farrah – but even before they leave, it’s clear it may not go as planned.

The Mend feels more real than most movies of this sort do – in part because the supporting characters feel like they have their own lives outside of what we see in the film. In particular, the two women in the movie – played very well by Own and Sumner – could well have been the focus of the movie itself, and the film would have been just as interesting. Both come and go in the film – and are gone for long stretches – but they are just as complex as the male characters in the film.

The Mend is not a great film – it is perhaps a little too obvious for that, particularly in the final act, which ends up going where we think it will – complete with an ending for Mat that is probably a little too similar to the end of one of the great misanthrope’s in movie history in Mike Leigh’s Naked. But what The Mend does feel like is the debut film of a great director – a director who is still finding their voice, and crafting something special. It is a little too obvious that both brothers are assholes in The Mend – and Mat simply has more confidence in himself to fully embrace his inner jerk, whereas Alan basically plays it safe and takes the path of least resistance. Of the two, Mat is perhaps the happier of the two – he has no delusions about himself, but he also is not filled with self-loathing – two things Alan certainly is. And there is a reason why each of them is with the woman they are with – both of whom are probably more like their partners that they want to admit. The Mend is an interesting one – and announces Magary as a major new talent. He hasn’t made a great film yet – but based on this one, he’s going to.

Movie Review: Heaven Knows What

Heaven Knows What
Directed by: Ben Safdie & Joshua Safdie.
Written by: Ronald Bronstein & Joshua Safdie inspired by a book written by Arielle Holmes.
Starring: Arielle Holmes (Harley), Caleb Landry Jones (Ilya), Buddy Duress (Mike), Ron Braunstein (Skully), Eleonore Hendricks (Erica), Yuri Pleskun (Tommy).

Francois Truffaut once famously said that it was impossible to make an anti-war movie, because no matter what you do, you would end up making war look glamorous. I think there have been a few movies that have proven Truffaut wrong, but the point is a valid one – it is hard not to make war look exciting. You could say something similar about movies about drugs – it’s hard to make a truly anti-drug film, because no matter what you do, you almost have to acknowledge that drugs use can be fun, or at least make you feel good for a time. Many drug movies include the inevitable slide into oblivion and death or jail, but it often comes after an hour of people having a hell of lot of fun on drugs. Heaven Knows What is somewhat different then – this could hardly be described as a glamorous or fun film, and none of the characters ever seem to be having much fun on drugs either. When the movie opens, everyone in the film is already at the point where they have stopped using drugs to make themselves feel good – they just continue to use them to prevent themselves from feeling horrible. The same thing can be said about the central relationship in the movie – between the main character Harley (Arielle Holmes) and her boyfriend Ilya (Caleb Landry Jones). They do not seem even to like each other much anymore, let alone love each other. But they’re stuck with each other regardless. They are stuck in a rut, but cannot move forward. There are as addicted to each other as they are to drugs.

The story of how Heaven Knows What was made is at least as interesting as the movie itself. Apparently the directors, Joshua and Ben Safdie, were researching a different movie when they bumped into star Arielle Holmes, and was immediately taken with her. She was beautiful, but obviously suffering. They encouraged her to write her story – which she did (apparently largely in Apple Stores), and the result was a book that ended up being the basis of the movie –with Holmes acting out scenes from her own troubled life. This is a risky gambit, but it pays off because Holmes has instant screen presence, and never overdoes it – never goes over the top into drug fueled craziness that many actors would. It is a performance of quiet intensity that holds your attention throughout. Holmes has apparently turned her life around – and has turned her stunning debut performance into a few other acting jobs – whether or not she can play something else, I have no idea, but she is brilliant in this film.

Her Harley is a heroin addict, who is in love with Ilya – who is angry with her as the movie begins (for reasons only eluded to). She says she’ll kill herself to prove her love to him, and he eggs her on to do just that – resulting in the kind of ill-fated suicide attempt that only makes sense to drug addicts. She survives, of course, but their relationship seems doomed. Instead, she takes up with Mike (Buddy Duress) for a time – which makes sense. He is a drug dealer, so getting her daily dose will be easier, and he also has connections to a place to stay. That’s really all Harley needs. Eventually though, she’ll drift back to Ilya – even though they’re probably better off without each other.

Heaven Knows What is a largely plotless film – which is befitting its characters. It drifts from one day to the next, where each day has the same basic problems that require different solutions. The movie concentrates on the various scams Harley and company pull off to try and get money – stealing mail in the hopes of finding something (their big score there? A Banana Republic gift card), or stealing a lot of Five Hour Energy Drinks from a pharmacy, and reselling them to a news stand. The film takes place in New York, but is about those areas of the city that are often hiding in plain site – where rich people walking their dog co-mingle with the likes of Harley – or where the place to go when it’s cold outside is the library until they kick you out. There is not a moment in the film that feels inauthentic. The Safdie’s get almost uncomfortably close to the actors, not letting them out of the frame, and blurring the background so we’re trapped with them. The brilliant use of electronic versions of Debussy songs is disorienting, and effective.

The problem with movie like Heaven Knows What is always in how to end them. If you don’t have much a plot, there’s really no way of winding it down. Heaven Knows What doesn’t really end, it just sort of stops – having come full circle once again, with nothing resolves, nothing learned. And that is precisely the sad point of it all.

Classic Movie Review: The Hitch-Hiker

The Hitch-Hiker (1953)
Directed by: Ida Lupino.   
Written by: Collier Young and Ida Lupino and Robert L. Joseph.
Starring: Edmond O'Brien (Roy Collins), Frank Lovejoy (Gilbert Bowen), William Talman (Emmett Myers). 

Ida Lupino was somewhat if a movie star in the 1940s and early 1950s – working on films such as Raoul Walsh’s High Sierra (1941) alongside Humphrey Bogart among many other films. But she left that behind when she founded her own company – The Filmmakers – and start to produce and direct a series of B-movies. This makes Lupino a trailblazer in a few different ways – as a filmmaker working outside the studio system at a time when few did that, and as a woman who wanted to direct at a time when very few women were making films. The Hitch-Hiker is probably her best – and best known – film, and is often referred as to as a film noir – although it’s really more of a psychological crime drama than a true noir. At just over 70 minutes, the film is tight and taut – exciting, and has three excellent performances at its core – especially a chilling performance by William Talman as the psychotic title character.

The film opens with a montage of Emmett Myers (Talman) as the Hitch-Hiker of the title, who kills the people who are kind enough to offer him a ride. The newspaper headlines track his crimes, and the manhunt that is resulting across the Western USA for the man – they know who he is, but because he is mobile, no one knows who he is. The film than cuts to Roy Collins (Edmond O’Brien) and Gilbert Bowen (Frank Lovejoy) – two old friends heading off on a fishing trip in Arizona. While Gilbert sleeps in the passenger seat, Roy makes the huge mistake of stopping to pick up a hitchhiker – Emmett Myers. It doesn’t take him long to produce a gun and take the two men hostage. He wants the two of them to take him the a city in Mexico, where he hopes to board a ferry and disappear. He needs the two men – but also lets them know that they will die at the end of the journey – it’s just a matter of when that is. The pair cannot wait until Emmett goes to sleep to escape – he has a bum eye that stays open even when he’s asleep – so they can never be sure when that actually is.

The film is at its best when it concentrates on these three men, driving along on desolate highways through the desert. There are numerous cutaways to the manhunt, which isn’t nearly as interesting – I really would have preferred if Lupino had simply stayed on the three men the whole movie. But that’s a minor complaint in an otherwise terrific movie.

The film is based on a real life case – of a troubled young man, who grew up in the foster system, who killed numerous people while hitchhiking – and ended up in the electric chair at the age of 24. Myers is obviously older than that, but the movie does at least allude to his troubled past. While Myers is clearly a remorseless psychopath, Lupino does give him at least at little bit of depth. And Talman delivers a brilliant performance – cold, hard yet also somewhat pathetic and human. It is a great performance. As Roy and Gilbert, O’Brien and Lovejoy make a well matched duo – they have different attitudes on how to survive, but they work well together.

The fact that the film is only 70 minutes is one of the best things about it. Aside from the few scenes of law enforcement tracking the trio, there is precious little time to waste in the film – and no unnecessary padding in it. It is lean, mean, cruel, heartless and suspenseful. Lupino was a fine actress – but as she proves with The Hitch-Hiker – she was an even better director

My Mini TIFF Preview

Last year, I was only at TIFF for two days, I saw 8 films, and I called it a Festival. I was on paternity leave at the time, so getting to go on something other than a weekend was impossible – and lack of money meant I had to commute to and from the festival both days, which adds approximately 3.5-4 hours to the day. This year, I’ve going three days – not quite my used to be normal 5 day trip where I would see 25-30 films (as I went full time 5 days, and part time on others) – but those were in the pre-children days. Now, it’s tough to leave my wife at home with two kids for too long, especially since as a teacher it already falls on one of her most stressful weeks anyhow. So, long story short, this year it’s 3 days and 13 films – which is pretty damn good I think. As with recent years, I mainly stayed away from the films that will be competing for awards later this year – not that I’m against them, just that I know I will get to see them soon enough, so why not embrace some others at TIFF, while I have the chance (there are two potential Oscar bait film that I am seeing, and another – Room – that I likely would have chosen, except for a strange scheduling conflict).

Anyway, here are the 13 films I will be seeing, with a little about each one, and why I picked them.

1.    Afternoon (Tsai Ming-liang) – Every time director Tsai Ming-liang makes a film, it becomes a major event in certain, esoteric film circles – and I’m often left out of the loop, as he’s not a filmmaker whose work gets wide releases in North America, and takes forever to reach home viewing options. I have skipped him in the past at TIFF to my own detriment – so when I saw I could fit his latest into my schedule, I jumped at the chance. This is a documentary – a conversation between Tsai and his frequent star/collaborator Lee Kang-sheng. It could be great, it could be very boring (honestly, I have found some of his films one of those – sometimes, both), but I’m certainly willing to give it a chance.

2.    Anomalisa (Charlie Kaufman & Duke Johnson) - Anomalisa combines two things that I love, that we do not get enough of – Charlie Kaufman movies, and stop motion animation. The film is apparently about a man “crippled by the mundanity of his life”, which sounds about right for Kaufman. His co-director is Duke Johnson, who did some great stop motion work for Community a few seasons ago. Synecdoche, New York was my favorite film of 2008 – and I’ve been waiting ever since for Kaufman to make a follow-up. Finally that movie is here. The reviews out of Telluride and Venice so far have been fantastic.

3.    Blood of My Blood (Marco Bellocchio) – Italian master Bellocchio has been making films since 1965’s Fists in the Pocket, and while he has been a below the radar talent most of his career, almost everything of his I have seen, I have liked (my most recent film of his I saw at TIFF was Vincere, a number of years ago, and that was quite good). Blood of My Blood is said to be a centuries spanning epic, with elements of the vampire movies, and the Inquisition, and multiple narratives, etc. Anything by Bellocchio is at least deserving of attention, so I’m looking forward to this one. And I am very much interested to see what the reviews out of Venice for this will be.  (The reviews came in today, and make me glad I made this choice)

4.    The Event (Sergei Loznitsa) – I missed Loznitsa’s last film – Maidan – from last year, about the protests in Ukraine following Russia’s actions. He follows it up just a year later with another, voiceover free documentary – this one about a failed coup in Russian in 1991, which signaled the downfall of communism. Loznitsa is a talented filmmaker – his features like My Joy and to a lesser extent In the Fog – show that, and Maidan was quite acclaimed, for such a little seen film. Here’s hoping this one is good. And if not, it’s only 74 minutes.

5.    The Forbidden Room (Guy Maddin & Evan Johnson) – Great Canadian auteur, Guy Maddin, returns with a film that I heard multiple people say could be his best feature to date at this year’s Sundance or Berlin Festivals. Maddin is always a treat to see – his love of old movies comes through as he twists and turns them to suit his needs. To be honest, I don’t know much about the film yet – I don’t want to know – I just want to see it, and knowing it’s Maddin is enough for me.

6.    Man Down (Dito Montiel) – To be honest, this is a little bit of a filler pick. I am familiar with Dito Montiel’s work, but haven’t become so much a fan of his that I seek out all of his work. Still, I like post-apocalyptic stuff, I love Gary Oldman and Kate Mara, find Shia LaBeouf somewhat fascinating, so even if I think Jai Courtney is the blandest actor around, so what? Plus, it’s in competition in Venice, so it has to be somewhat interesting, right? (Since I wrote this the reviews have come in, and they have not been good. We’ll see).

7.    No Men Beyond This Point (Mark Sawyers) – I’ll fully admit it – sometimes at TIFF, you have a spot to fill, and nothing much to fill it, so you take a chance. So it is with Mark Sawyers’ “wry mockumentary” about a future society where women no longer need men, so they are dying off. According to the program, it’s a smart take on gender relations, and perhaps it will be fun. It certainly fill in the spot I have. Sometimes when I fill a spot like this, it ends up being one of my favorites of the festival – more often, not – but I can dream.

8.    Rams (Grimur Hakonarson) – The winner of the Un Certain Regard section of Cannes this year (it’s a notch below the competition – but still highly regarded) about two Icelandic brothers, who live next to each other, and are both sheepherders, but who have not spoken to each other in decades. Great reviews of Cannes, made this a welcome addition to my TIFF lineup this year.

9.  Sicario (Denis Villeneuve) - I probably could have waited a few weeks to see this - but the only other movie I really wanted to see at this time was also coming out soon, and I could not resist, as I love Villeneuve, and the reviews for this have been great so far. Emily Blunt, Benicio Del Toro and Josh Brolin are all great, and I like border/drug films. Cannot wait for this one.
10.  Victoria (Sebastian Schipper) – Already a multiple prize winner, this German film about a “party girl” who tags along with three men on a wild ride that becomes a bank robbery has grown famous for being done all in one shot – even though it’s 140 minutes long. Personally, I don’t really care about that – it’s seems more a stunt than anything else – but the reviews have been great, so I’m certainly willing to go along for the ride.

11.  Where to Invade Next (Michael Moore) – I am not the Michael Moore fan I was in my college days – around the time of Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11 – but I still do quite like him as a filmmaking. I’m not overly happy I’m seeing this at TIFF – but that’s not the movie’s fault, that’s because the screening of Ben Wheatley’s High Rise I supposed to go to was cancelled, and this popped up it’s in its place, so I figured what the hell. Still, good or bad, you know this will be one of the more talked about films at the Festival – it’s a World Premiere, and a film Moore made in secret to boot.

12.  The Witch (Robert Eggers) – Many thought Robert Eggers’ horror film, The Witch, was the best film at Sundance (it won the directing prize, while the more “Sundance-y” Me and Earl and the Dying Girl won the competition). This film is set in 1630 New England, and of course, involves a witch, With horror more than most genres, I don’t like to know anything – so I haven’t read much. Still, this is one of my most anticipated of the fest.

13.  Youth (Paolo Sorrentino) – This is probably the one “Oscar bait” film I’ll see at the Festival – as Paolo Sorrentino, who last film The Great Beauty, won the Foreign Language Film Oscar, returns to English language films (he previously made the very weird This Must Be the Place with Sean Penn) – for this movie staring Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel, Jane Fonda, Rachel Weisz and Paul Dano. Reaction at Cannes was decidedly mixed – some walking away thinking they had seen a film that could be an Oscar contender, and some walking away thinking the film was awful (not that an Oscar contender has ever been awful before). I’m mixed on Sorrentino – I loved Il Divo, enjoyed the Wim Wenders-ness of This Must Be the Place, and was mostly bored by his Oscar winning Fellini homage that was devoid of what made Fellini so special, so I could end up going any number of ways on this one.

So that's what I'll be seeing next week. As usual, I'll provide a wrap-up when my trip is over.

Movie Review: The End of the Tour

The End of the Tour
Directed by: James Ponsoldt.
Written by: Donald Margulies based on the book by David Lipsky.
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg (David Lipsky), Jason Segel (David Foster Wallace), Joan Cusack (Patty), Mickey Sumner (Betsy), Mamie Gummer (Julie), Anna Chlumsky (Sarah), Ron Livingston (David Lipsky's Editor).

The End of the Tour has been met with controversy, as the family and many friends of the late David Foster Wallace object the very existence of a movie portraying him – saying that it would be the last thing he would want. To be fair, the portrait painted of the author in the movie kind argues for them – I find it hard to believe that the character of David Foster Wallace in the movie would want to a movie made about him, with someone else playing him, as he is very conscience of how he is viewed, and tells the interviewer there to write a profile on him that is wary – knowing full well that the writer can spin things however he wants, and make Wallace look however he wants him to look, and Wallace is nervous about coming across as an asshole in a piece he has no control over. It’s rare to see a movie that actually argues against its own existence, but The End of the Tour is one of those movies. What makes it interesting however is not so much the Wallace character, but the David Lipsky character – the Rolling Stone reporter played by Jessie Eisenberg who comes to interview Wallace. In his review of the film, Matt Zoller Seitz compares their relationship to the one at the heart of Milos Forman’s Amadeus (1984) – with the less talented person extremely jealous of the more talented one, and that makes sense. Throughout the movie, it’s made clear, again and again, that Lipsky doesn’t really understand Wallace – and is also seething with jealously at the man who has everything that Lipsky wants, and seemingly wants to reject it. Jason Segel has garnered most of the praise for his portrayal of Wallace in the film – and it is a good performance, even if I never really believed that the character he was playing was capable of writing a book like Infinite Jest (a novel I am currently reading). But it is Eisenberg who is the real star – playing another of his series of assholes who don’t realize that they’re assholes.

The movie opens with Lipsky at a reading of his novel – The Art Fair – which is sparsely attended. His novel isn’t going to be a bestseller, and he’s working at Rolling Stone to make ends meet, when he reads a review of Infinite Jest, saying that the year’s book prizes have been settled – as the novel is the type of once in a generation novel that could not be topped (that turned out not to be true – as the book didn’t win all those awards – although it’s critical reputation remains laudatory). Lipsky’s girlfriend suggests that if the book really is that good, than perhaps he should read it. Cut to him a few hundred pages in the books, muttering “Shit”. It really is that good. Lipsky ends up convincing his editor to allow him to follow Wallace on the last stop on his book tour to write a feature interview with him. He travels to Wallace’s small, Illinois hometown, and then onto Minneapolis, doing an interview with him. What he finds is a normal, soft spoken guy – who is full of opinions and thoughts and insights, but wary of all the praise he has received. He wants to keep his normal life – which is something Lipsky quite simply finds unnatural. Does he not realize that he’s a genius, and can do anything he wants? Why does he stay in his snowbound, small city, teaching at the small college near his home? Lipsky’s resentment of Wallace grows throughout the movie – until, inevitably, it leads to arguments.

The film was directed by James Ponsoldt, from a screenplay by Donald Marglies, based on the book Lipsky wrote years after the interview (and after Wallace’s eventual suicide). It’s not a bad movie, but it is a rather bland one in the Sundance kind of way. The film strains too hard to try and search for clues to Wallace’s suicide, more than a decade later. Segel, an unlikely choice to play Wallace, does a fairly good job with his performance – toning down his usual comic persona, for something more thoughtful and soft spoken. Eisenberg dives headlong in his, unworried about making his character likable or sympathetic – which he is neither. He is a little more than a vulture, invading Wallace’s space and taking advantage of him – doing things that probably cross the line of what a journalist should do, all the while insisting on competing with Wallace in a competition that he cannot possibly win, and which Wallace has no interest in competing in.

So, should The End of the Tour have even been made? I’m not entirely sure. On one hand, like all biopics it cannot possibly get the complete portrait of the man at its core – and I think the film realizes this.  And to a certain extent, it leaves Wallace more than a little bit of an enigma, as Lipsky is clearly too self-involved, to see anyone else, including Wallace, clearly. So, as a portrait of Wallace, I don’t think the movie really does any harm to his reputation or his appearance. As a portrait of Eisenberg’s reporter, it is far better. It’s not a bad movie per se – but I’m still not sure it should have been made.

Movie Review: Z for Zachariah

Z for Zachariah
Directed by: Craig Zobel.
Written by: Nissar Modi based on the novel by Robert C. O'Brien.
Starring: Margot Robbie (Ann Burden), Chiwetel Ejiofor (Loomis), Chris Pine (Caleb).

Z for Zachariah has a fascinating premise, that doesn’t get the attention it needs to become a fully fleshed out movie. It takes place somewhere in the rural United States, in an isolated valley, that has somehow remained immune for the nuclear event (or events) that has wiped out pretty much everyone else in America – and perhaps the world. In that valley, Ann (Margot Robbie), survives by herself by farming, and with whatever other supplies she can find. She is devout Christian, whose family all left to try and find other survivors, and never returned. Then, one day out of nowhere, someone else arrives. This is Loomis (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a scientist who was deep underground when whatever happened happened, and (conveniently) he and his team was working on a containment suit, which has kept him alive in the outside world. He comes across Ann, who helps him when he makes what could have been a fatal mistake. She nurses him back to health. He knows how to build things – thinks he may even be able to get electricity back in their small house – although it would require tearing down Ann’s beloved church for the wood. Unlike Ann, Loomis is a non-believer. They do not much talk about faith – although it’s there between them.

The movie is based on the book (unread by me) by Robert C. O’Brien – which I imagine worked as a book better than it does as a movie. The two main characters are meant as stand-ins for the debate between religion vs. science – and with only two people left in the world, that debate takes on significant implications. They need the wood for the Church – which Ann argues is desperately needed for their spiritual health, which to her is akin to survival. But Loomis needs to the wood to make a wheel, to provide them with hydro-electricity – which will help them physically survive. That debate is perhaps enough to fill a novel – and could, in a better movie, be enough for a film as well. But Z for Zachariah decides it needs to up the ante a little bit – and introduces a third character. This is Caleb (Chris Pine), who shows up a little while after Loomis. Loomis and Ann have already started to move towards a sexual relationship – and Loomis (correctly) sees Caleb as a threat to that. He is younger than Loomis – more of Ann’s age – and he is white (although race is only mentioned once specifically in the movie, it hangs over the entirety of it) – not to mention the fact that he is also Christian, like Ann, and of course that he looks like Chris Pine. The movie then becomes a series of tense conversations, where everyone knows what everyone else is thinking and feeling, although no one will come right and out and say it.

The biggest problem with Z for Zachariah is that the movie never solves the problem of how to make these characters into real people, and not just symbols. The film has cast three good actors, but the two most important performances don’t really click. Robbie, who was so good in The Wolf of Wall Street, and proved she can be as charming as anyone, going toe-to-toe with Will Smith in Focus, is essentially a blank slate in the film – passive and unreadable. She struggles with the accent a little bit, and cannot pull off the naiveté that the role calls for. Part of this is the screenplay’s fault – it doesn’t give her very much to do, and she doesn’t do it. Chiwetal Ejiofor, one of the finest actors working, never quite makes Loomis believable either, partly because the screenplay requires him to do too much (if Ann never changes, than Loomis is seemingly changing every scene). The only performance that truly works is Pine’s – and that’s probably because the role requires nothing of him except to show up and be superficially charming – which Pine can do in his sleep.

The film was directed by Craig Zobel, whose last film was the brilliant Compliance, which made my top 10 list a few years ago. What the movies share is a lack of judgment of its characters – an ambiguity that allows the audience to read into the movie what they want to. In Compliance however, that ambiguity worked – it challenged the audience in a very specific way. Here, the ambiguity is ill-defined. It’s not that the movie won’t tell us what to think, it’s that is seems to leave out so much that it’s not really ambiguous, but rather just vague, ineffectual storytelling. The film at least looks great – which you expect when the cinematographer is the great Tim Orr – but the film itself never really gets to the heart of the issues it raises.