Words like confrontational, controversial and audacious have often been used to describe director Spike Lee. Now those same words, and more—think boisterous and dynamic for a start—and can be applied to his new film, “Chi-Raq,” a modern day adaptation of the Greek play “Lysistrata” by Aristophanes, first performed in 411 BC.
Set in modern day Southside Chicago a.k.a. Chi-Raq, the update sees the neighbourhood torn apart by gang violence. Rapper Chi-Raq (Nick Cannon) and his girlfriend Lysistrata (Teyonah Parris) are at the center of the action, a glamour couple affiliated with the Spartans. Across town Cyclops (Wesley Snipes, complete with glittering eyepatch) leads the Trojans. A nightclub shooting at one of Chi-Raq’s gigs, arson at his home and the death of a young neighbourhood girl caught in the Spartan v. Trojan’s crossfire pushes Lysistrata to find a solution to the violence that plagues her home. Her outlandish plan is simple but ingenious. She convenes the wives and girlfriends of all the gang members, Spartans and Trojans alike, and urges them to withhold sex from their men until the guys agree to put down the weapons and sign a peace treaty.
That’s the story in broad strokes. There’s more, including a seasoned community activist played by Angela Bassett, Jennifer Hudson as a grieving mother, John Cusack as a fiery priest and Samuel L. Jackson’s flowery-tongued one-man Greek chorus named Dolmedes but the pieces are stitched together with such daring creativity that paragraphs of description won’t prepare you for the cheeky experience of watching “Chi-Raq.” Lee mixes and matches powerful anti-violence statements, large-scale dance numbers and outrageous comedy in an olio of social commentary that shouldn’t work, but does.
When Irene (Lawrence) scrubs her daughter’s blood from the street, pouring water on the stain only to watch it spread and grow bigger, Lee effectively and lyrically makes the metaphorical point that no matter how hard you scrub, the bloodshed will increase.
Later as the women are holed up at the National Guard Armoury the men use romantic songs broadcast over loudspeakers to break their will. Just as they begin to swoon to the smooth sounds of “Oh Girl” by The Chi-Lites, Lysistrata provides them with earplugs and the sex strike goes unbroken.
The tone is all over the place, made all the more bizarre by the dialogue, which is all in verse. “The situation is out of control,” says a strip club owner (Dave Chappelle) after his employees join the strike, “and I’m in front of an empty stripper pole.” It’s today’s language filtered through Aristophanes, Tupac and Kendrick Lamar, vital and bold.
“Chi-Raq” is a heady experience. Lee is fearless in his handling of the material (he co-wrote the script with Kevin Willmott), taking chances narratively and visually, to tell the timely and hot button story of a “self-inflicted genocide.” It is powerful, preachy, maddening but ultimately unforgettable.
“The Program,” a biopic of disgraced Tour de France racer Lance Armstrong begins like a fairy tale, although one with doping and cancer, but ends as a Shakespearean tragedy.
Ben Foster plays the cyclist as an athlete obsessed with winning. A rising star on the race circuit, he looks to Dr. Medecin Michele Ferrari (Guillaume Canet), an Italian doctor with a “scientific” approach to training to create a routine—the program—involving exercise, growth hormones, erythropoietin, cortisone and testosterone patches that will turn him into a champion. “You just tell me what to do,” Armstrong says eagerly, “and I’ll do it.” The doctor tells Lance that under his care you’ll, “no longer confined to earth now you can fly.”
In other words: OK Racer + Performance Enhancing Drugs = Great Racer.
When his career momentum is slowed by testicular cancer it seems as though everything will be lost but he beats the disease and comes back stronger than ever. Almost too strong. Sunday Times sports reporter David Walsh (Chris O’Dowd) notes that during one race Armstrong is moving so quickly he has to use his brakes…going uphill. “He recovered from cancer and turned into Superman,” he says. Suspicious, he puts Armstrong and his team, the U.S. Postal Service Pro Cycling Team, under a journalistic microscope. “I have no interest in watching chemists racing up a hill,” says Walsh.
As Armstrong and Co begin a streak that will eventually see them win seven Tour de France races Walsh raises an “unwelcome question,” Is it real or is it dope? Meanwhile Armstrong becomes an American hero, supporting cancer research through his charity, all the while denying any wrong doing in the dope department.
As the pressure increases so does his ego. He starts referring to himself in the third person—“Will he passed every test?” he says. “Yes he will because he doesn’t use performance-enhancing drugs.”—and launches lawsuits against the Sunday Times and Walsh in an effort to intimidate them into silence. It isn’t until a former teammate, Floyd Landis (Jesse Plemons), comes clean about the doping that Lance’s empire crumbles.
Like its subject “The Program” moves quickly. So quickly, in fact, it plays like a montage, never settling on one thing long enough for the audience to care. Racing scene! Doping scene! Inspirational chatter like “Say to yourself, I’m flying”! Director Stephen Frears races through Lance’s life—his cancer is dispensed with in minutes while in another scene he meets a woman and in the next they’re walking out of a church, married—touching down here and there on the greatest hits of the man’s life. It’s a face paced but unsatisfying way to learn about the rise and fall of the most famous bicyclist in the world.
That he was a doper and a cheat is not in question but what got him there? Winning is everything to Lance, but why? Is it hubris? The movie doesn’t let us know. It is content to zip through the details without too much commentary on how or why we got there. It’s a story of hubris, heroics and hypocrisy that is more interested in broad strokes of how Armstrong created his own legend than the details.
“The Program” falls somewhere between a biopic, sports movie and the investigative reporting of “Spotlight,” but never gels as any one thing. Foster is fine in the lead role but the film doesn’t allow him to really inhabit the ski of his character. For a more complete and interesting look at Lance check out Alex Gibney’s documentary “The Armstrong Lie.”
Sometimes it can be hard to be a Terrence Malick fan. At their best the director’s poetic films are soulful investigations of the human spirit. His greatest movies—“Tree of Life,” “Badlands”—are masterworks of spiritual introspection but his worst work crosses the lane into pretention in a way that makes Kanye West’s Twitter account look humble. It can be a struggle to actually enjoy some of his work, but never have I battled with a Malick movie the way I did with “Knight of Cups.” Fought to stay in my seat until the end. It’s a cure for insomnia not unlike watching expensive, glossy paint dry.
Broken into chapters with titles like Judgment, Death and The Hanged Man, the film stars Christian Bale as Rick, a successful but desperately unhappy Hollywood screenwriter. Like an extended episode of “Seinfeld” were nothing happens, Rick wanders around the screen accompanied by a series of beautiful women—Cate Blanchett, Natalie Portman, Isabel Lucas, Teresa Palmer and Freida Pinto—but ultimately cannot find joy with any of them. He strolls through life with a sad sack expression on his face that makes Sad Keanu seem jubilant, moving from woman to woman, rueing, “All of those years living a life of someone I did not know.”
Apparently inspired by the 1678 Christian allegory “The Pilgrim’s Progress” and the passage “Hymn of the Pearl” from “The Acts of Thomas,” “Knight of Cups,” is, I suppose supposed to be a dreamy look into one man’s life, but is this a sense memory visualized for the big screen or is it just the self-indulgent ramblings of an auteur? As Helen (Pinto) tells Rick, “Dreams are nice but you can’t live in them.”
Part of the problem is Malick’s storytelling, or more rightly, lack thereof. The film follows Malick’s trademarked impressionistic style but seems to have been assembled by a Random Shot Generator. Indiscriminate images of Los Angeles flood the screen—wild parties, an Antonio Banderas cameo, earthquakes, palm trees, movie studio back lots—accompanied by mumbled dialogue and Bale’s grim face.
It’s hard to feel compassion or anything else for Rick as he stumbles through relationship after relationship because we are never given any clue as to who he is. He’s a cipher, the walking conundrum with an attitude. If I wanted to spend two hours watching someone having a mid-life crisis I’d look in the mirror rather than spend another minute concerning myself with Rick’s troubles.
I gave “Knight of Cups” one out of five stars because there is something there. I’m just not sure what it is and I’m not sure Malick does either. Tedium, thy name is “Knight of Cups.”
I have a few people to thank today! Firstly, Sunday night I hosted the Facebook Fishbowl Lounge at the Canadian Screen Awards red carpet. Really fun. Thanks to Marc Dinsdale for shooting and posting everything we did and thanks to everyone who stopped bvy the booth to answer questions from my Facebook Random Question Generator. It was a fun way to get things started last night.
Then I moved on to host the Press Room. We had great guests down there and I’d like to offer thanks to everyone who asked questions.
In Born to Be Blue, a stylish new biopic about the turbulent life of My Funny Valentine trumpeter Chet Baker, Miles Davis tells the horn player, “You haven’t lived enough” to be a great musician.
When I ask Hawke if great art can be created without life experience, he says, “My take is that there are no rules, but you don’t become Nelson Mandela without suffering. There is a huge myth around Mozart that he was just divinely inspired, in truth he worked really hard. He was obsessed with music from a very young age.
“You could make the case that Michael Jackson suffered immensely and that is part of what drove him. I think the service of the artistic community is to translate our lives back to us and hopefully to lend some understanding. You need to participate in life and feel life to be able to do that. But you know lots of people suffer without a gift or talent to translate it into a beautiful painting.”
Baker took Davis’s comment to heart and set off on a life long self-destructive bender that saw him fall into drug addiction, even pawning his instruments to support his drug habit.
“In the arts, self destruction is a real enemy,” Hawke says. “If you eliminate self-destruction, if you get out of your own way, give yourself permission to have respect for yourself and treat yourself like someone that you love, your chances of success quadruple. That’s really hard.
“It sounds so simple. The documentary I made [Seymour: An Introduction] is all about how hard that is. The joys of life are actually really simple. We think they are going to be, ‘Oh I’ll be happy if this, that and the other thing [happen].’ In truth it is pretty awesome that the sun comes up and if you stay focussed on that things go OK. As soon as you take your eye off that, life gets really weird and tricky.”
Hawke shares Baker’s rough-hewn good looks and does a convincing job of imitating the fragile beauty of his singing voice. More importantly he apes the addict’s temperament. Charming one minute, petulant and or incoherent the next, he plays Baker as a talented train wreck; a man whose tragic life experience fed his art. Unsure which of his proclivities are his angels and which are his devils, he’s a conflicted guy who tries to do well by those around him but often fails. Hawke may resemble the musician but the similarity is only physical. He is comfortable in his skin in a way Baker never dreamed of.
“It’s strange, I’m turning forty-five this year,” he says, “and I have been professionally acting for thirty years. When I was young I was really afraid that I wouldn’t get to do it. That was a big part of my identity as a young person. Even if a movie did well that I would think, ‘Is it over?’ Will I ever get to do it again? It’s how I imagine baseball players and professional athletes feel. Do they ever really know when their last game is? With acting, I’m working on my King Lear now. I’ll be able to do this until I am old no use to people anymore. In athletics it’s not that way.”
Los Angeles is a sun-dappled utopia with a Mediterranean climate, palm trees as far as the eye can see and only 35 days of precipitation annually. It’s a sprawling Garden of Eden, with pockets of paradise connected by an interweaving series of freeways. Think year-round sun tans, flip-flops and driving the convertible with the top down.
So why, when such natural beauty surrounds it, does Hollywood seem obsessed with stories about the end of the world? Could it be it’s because they live above the San Andreas Fault, an inner earth rupture that issues occasional rumblings that threaten to drop much of Southern California into the Pacific Ocean? Perhaps it’s because it’s the home of Kim, Kourtney and Khloé, an alliterative television family who seem to be a harbinger for the dissolution of society.
Whatever the reason, in movie after movie Hollywood hands us terrifying visions of what the world will look like when the Kardashians are done with it.
This weekend 10 Cloverfield Lane, which producer J.J. Abrams calls a “blood relative” but not a sequel to his 2008 monster flick Cloverfield, sees Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) trapped in an underground bunker with a sinister survivalist played by John Goodman. Outside, he says, an attack is about to leave the world uninhabitable. “Something’s coming,” he hisses.
What exactly is happening outside the bunker’s walls is unclear. Whether it’s nuclear fallout, an unexpected ice age or a zombie holocaust that brings about the end, the post apocalyptic feel of 10 Cloverfield Lane is just the latest attempt by the film biz to tap into the world’s general feeling of unease.
In 1959 bright and sunshiny Hollywood offered up a scary story that set the date for the end of the world just after World War III in 1964. In On the Beach, nuclear war has destroyed all life on the planet save for a small enclave in Australia, but even they will succumb once the radiation clouds drift by. As doomsday dramas go this one is particularly depressing — for example people gobble up “suicide pills”— but its Cold War commentary led one writer to label it “the most important film of our time.”
Not all end-of-the-world scenarios are as grim as that, however. Seeking a Friend for the End of the World’s set up sounds bleak but it’s actually amusing and inventive.
Three weeks before a giant asteroid is scheduled to collide with earth, Dodge (Steve Carell) and his flaky downstairs neighbour (Keira Knightley) head out of town, looking for meaning in a world that soon won’t exist. It’s a low-key movie that could have been a broad comedy, but instead chooses for a more modest, heartfelt approach.
Sometimes the end of the world is appealing; cute even. WALL-E, the story of a lonely, but adorable, robot who inadvertently gives humankind a second chance, is aimed at kids but doesn’t look like any other kid’s movie you’ve seen. Don’t expect the same old from Pixar. It’s ambitious and beautiful like 2001: A Space Odyssey for children.
With such a range of dystopian stories to mine it seems sunny Hollywood just might produce dark visions of our planet until the end of the world comes for real.
The idea behind “The Brothers Grimsby” was to make an outrageous comedy with all the earmarks of an all-out action flick. “The Transporter” helmer Louis Leterrier knows his way around a car chase and can blow things up real good, but can Sacha Baron Cohen provide the laughs to go along with the action?
The “Borat” star plays Grimsby native “Nobby” Butcher, a lager-loving football hooligan from northern England, with a Liam Gallagher hairdo and eleven kids. He hasn’t seen his baby brother Sebastian (Mark Strong) in twenty-eight years and has no idea his long-lost sib is now a high-powered MI6 agent. When they do reunite Nobby inadvertently puts in motion a series of events—including almost killing a World Health Organization ambassador for peace in the Middle East—that see the estranged brothers team up to do battle with a deadly assassin, travel the world and hide inside an elephant (you read that right, that is NOT a typo) in an effort to save the world.
“Yesterday I was down at the pub having a regular day with my mates,” says Nobby. “Today I’m with my brother, running, swimming, jumping and doing all sorts of cardio.”
If “Borat” and “Bruno” made you laugh like a hyena on a nitrous oxide binge you’ll know what to expect from “The Brothers Grimsby.” The new film doesn’t have the same cutting edge innovation as Baron Cohen’s best-known work, but it still has plenty of edge. It’s the kind of movie that uses a blocked toilet as a plot point and finds delight in HIV jokes, registered sex offender gags and too many bodily fluid quips to count. It should be a bonanza for those who enjoy their humour on the gastrointestinal side.
Nobby is Baron Cohen’s least developed character yet, a comedy concoction who feels like he might not be that out of place in a particularly raunchy “Carry On” movie. He uses Nob’s idiot temperament to make some social comments—“I understand why you like guns so much,” Nobby says after shooting a gun for the first time. “They completely detaches you from the guilt of your actions.”—but the character has none of the danger and few of the interesting quirks that came along with his mockumentary creations.
Mark Strong waffles between his action man pose and wild slapstick and pulls off both but I’m afraid the image of him covered in elephant ejaculate will stay with me the next time I see him trying to play it straight in a dramatic role.
The guys are given plenty of screen time and some fun stuff to do, which cannot be said for the women in the cast. As Nobby’s wife the usually hilarious Rebel Wilson is wasted, reduced to a fat joke and Penélope Cruz’s character makes her recent turn in “Zolander 2” look like Lady Macbeth.
Like all the best spy movies “The Brothers Grimsby” has international locations like South Africa, Chile, Jakarta and some good action scenes, but like all Baron Cohen’s films it is outrageous lowest common denominator stuff. It may make you laugh, but those laughs come along with a certain amount of shame at finding some of this stuff amusing. At least at a scant eighty-five minutes it doesn’t overstay its welcome.
“Something’s coming,” hisses Howard (John Goodman) in “10 Cloverfield Lane.” But what?
When we first meet Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) she’s packing up and about to hit the road to get away from her fiancée. In her car she answers a call from her ex, and, like a PSA about distracted driving, promptly has a car accident that leaves her unconscious. When she wakes up she’s trapped in an underground bunker with sinister survivalist Howard (“He’s like a black belt in conspiracy theories.”) and sweet-natured motor mouth Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.). Outside, he says, an attack is about to leave the world uninhabitable.
“What are you going to do with me?” she asks.
“I’m going to keep you alive,” he replies.
The bunker has all the conveniences of home, just don’t flush when you don’t have to. What exactly is happening outside the bunker’s walls, however, is unclear (NO SPOILERS HERE!). Whether it’s nuclear fallout, an unexpected ice age, rabid Donald Trump supporters or a zombie holocaust that brings about the end, “10 Cloverfield Lane” is a modern day episode of “The Twilight Zone” played out on the big screen. Dynamics develop between the trio as Michelle struggles to make sense of the situation but discovers the mystery only deepens the longer they stay sequestered underground.
“10 Cloverfield Lane,” doesn’t share a city, characters or situation with the 2008 mighty monster flick “Cloverfield,” but can be considered a spiritual cousin. Nor can it rightly be considered a horror film. It’s more a psychological thriller with a twist. There are creepy moments. Director Dan Trachtenberg (J.J. Abrams produced this time around) makes good use of the soundtrack, using jarring hums and thuds as a soundtrack to the daily life in the underground. Add to that an anxiety inducing score by Bear McCreary and a small collection of well chosen pop songs, including the ironically appropriate “I Think We’re Alone Now,” and you have a movie that uses sound as effectively as dialogue and story.
The bulk of the film could be recreated on stage with virtually no changes. Screenwriters Josh Campbell, Matt Stuecken and Damien “Whiplash” Chazelle carefully control the story, doling out details in dribs and drabs, tightening the vice with every scene. Howard’s backstory is slowly revealed, but we’re never sure what’s real and what’s not. For his part Goodman gives nothing away. He is masterful, toggling between compassion and rage, riding the line of sanity in his concealed kingdom, ruling over his “family” with an iron fist.
Goodman is the star, but Winstead has the most screen time and emerges as a formidable action star who will likely get co-opted in the Marvel or DC universes before you can say J.J. Abrams three times, fast. Also strong is Gallagher Jr. who brings a goofy charm to Emmett.
“Cloverfield” and “10 Cloverfield Lane” are two very different films linked only by their name and their ability to keep audiences on the edge of their seats. Gone is the original movie’s wobbly camera work and sprawling cast, replaced by a film with just three characters and a healthy respect for classic filmmaking. Best of all the new film is fuelled by the jittery times we live in when Howard’s rantings about attacks—whatever the cause—don’t sound completely far fetched.
Children’s films don’t get much more magical, or grown up, than “The Little Prince.” A film about wonderment and tragedy, about belief and the importance of dreams, it has important messages for kids, no matter how old they are.
The story begins with an overprotective mother (voice of Rachel McAdams) buys a new house so her daughter (Mackenzie Foy) will be eligible to go to the Werth Academy, the best school in town. Mom is a Type A personality who has an intricate life plan for the little girl who she calls, “My Senior VP.” The house is perfect, trouble is, it’s next-door to a ramshackle home inhabited The Aviator (Jeff Bridges) an eccentric old man who introduces himself by revving up his backyard airplane and sending a propeller shooting through their living room wall.
This inauspicious intro doesn’t bode well for the new neighbours but soon, as The Aviator begins to tell The Little Girl the story of The Little Prince, a boy who lived on the planet scarcely bigger than himself and who is in need of a friend, she is won over and risks a visit with the old man in the mysterious house.
He continues the story of his encounter with The Little Prince until Mother forbids her daughter from spending any more time with the old man. When he is rushed to the hospital, however, the girl is inconsolable. Determined to reunite The Aviator with his old friend the Prince she goes on an adventure into the asteroids.
A mix of computer and otherworldly stop motion animation, “The Little Prince” is a work of art that brims with creativity and emotion. “Kung Fu Panda” director Mark Osborne has adapted Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s classic novella for the screen without losing the magic that made the book so special.
It’s a gently told story that should spark young imaginations and remind older viewers of the importance of hanging on to childhood memories. “Growing up is not the problem,” says The Aviator, “forgetting is.” It’s a potent message when seen through the eyes of a young, unhappy girl being pushed by her Mother to grow up too quickly. As the metaphorical stories unfurl, she learns a new, fantastic way of looking at life.
“The Little Prince” would make a nice companion piece to “Inside Out.” They are very different kinds of films—“Inside Out” is more frenetic, less metaphorical—but both strike a chord in their unique becoming an adult.
