In “Arrival,” a new humanistic sci fi film from future “Blade Runner” director Denis Villeneuve, Amy Adams plays a woman who sees life on a fractured timeline, like a Tarantino movie where the beginning is the end and the end is the start.
Adams is Dr. Louise Banks, a linguist recruited by the U.S. Military to communicate with giant alien heptapods—think Kang and Kodos from “The Simpsons”— who have landed in Montana and eleven other sites worldwide. Are they scientists, tourists or warriors?
“What do they want?” asks Colonel Weber (Forest Whitaker). “Where are they from?”
With voices that sound like a Didgeridoo mixed with an out-of-tune electronic tuba and a written language that resembles “The Ring” logo, no answers are immediately forthcoming. Working with theoretical physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) Banks slowly forms a bond with the multi-legged ETs. In return she receives a gift from them that changes everything.
“War of the Worlds” this is not. Based on the short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang, this is an alien invasion film with more in common with the heady sci fi of Andrei Tarkovsky and the crowd-pleasing emotionalism of Steven Spielberg’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” It’s more about the importance of communication—“Language is the first weapon drawn in conflict.”—than alien technology or “Independence Day” style Martian marauding. It’s a deliberately paced, contemplative film that suggests an alternative to the old ethos of shooting first and asking questions later. Questions are asked, few are answered but the result is an intelligent but dreamy story that never lets the scene get in the way of the film’s emotional core.
That core is supplied by Adams. As Dr. Louise Banks she dominates the movie. Everyone else, including Renner and Whitaker, are basically window dressing for a performance that bristles with wonder, sadness and yes, even scientific method. Banks may be methodical but Adams isn’t. She wrings every bit of sentiment from a script that tries to balance its cool social accountability with a story that delves into the soul of its main character.
I can’t reveal more about how or why Banks goes about deciphering the alien intentions. The film plays with timelines and by the time the end credits roll “Arrival” has offered the audience an explanation that is both spacey and grounded.
Imagine falling in love with someone, getting married and having a baby or two. For many people that is the dream but for Richard and Mildred Loving it was a nightmare of racism and injustice.
Based on a true story, “Loving” begins with Mildred Jeter (Ruth Negga), an African-American woman, telling her white boyfriend Richard Loving that she is pregnant. The place is a small county in Virginia, the year is 1958 and because the state’s anti-miscegenation laws made interracial marriage illegal, the pair skipped to neighbouring Washington, DC to tie the knot. “There’s less red tape there,” Richard says.
Soon word spreads and the pair are arrested in the middle of the night, rousted from a deep sleep for the crime of being married. “You know better, don’t you?” asks the Sheriff (Marton Csokas). “Maybe you don’t.” In exchange for a one year suspended sentence they either must divorce or leave the state and not return, together, for 25 years. “All we got to do is keep to ourselves for a while and this will blow over,” says Richard.
Reluctantly they leave for DC but when they return home to have their baby in secret they are arrested a second time. Told, “Cohabitating as man and wife is against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth,” the pair leave Virginia permanently. Years later Mildred, inspired by the civil rights march on TV, writes a letter to Robert Kennedy, then the Attorney general, asking if he can have a look at their case. Kennedy forwards the letter to Bernie Cohen (Nick Kroll), a young American Civil Liberties Union lawyer, who formulates a risky plan to move the fight from a racist Virginia country court to the Supreme Court in a case that would alter the constitution of the United States. Richard eloquently and potently sums up the defense in one simple sentence: “Tell the judge I love my wife.”
“Loving” is an important slice of American history told in a quiet, heartfelt way. Director Jeff Nicholls doesn’t clog up the story with dialogue. Instead he follows the first rule of filmmaking, show me, don’t tell me. For instance, when Mildred and Richard leave Virginia for the less-than-bucolic DC, the looks on the actor’s faces tell the tale, no words required. He allows the performances to underscore the potency of the story. Watch the way Mildred and Richard respond to one another physically after the arrests. Their tentative public displays of affection shows the fear that comes along with being told your relationship is illegal and wrong. It’s subtle, beautiful acting.
In private they can be themselves. A recreation of a Life Magazine photo of the real couple sitting together, laughing, watching TV is charmingly realized. It’s warm and intimate, the very picture of a happy couple who have put their hardships aside for a fleeting moment.
“Loving” is a understated movie. Some have suggested it may have benefitted from a bit more anger, but that, for me, would feel like a betrayal to the characters who fight the good fight with dignity and love.
The movie is simultaneously a powerful look at a different time and, when it asks, “What is the danger to the state of Virginia from interracial marriage?” a timely and universal reminder that Loving v. Virginia was just one of many steps humanity has to take before everyone is afforded fundamental rights.
It may be a warmer than usual November, but at the movie theatres, it’s already Christmas. It’s not a Christmas miracle, it’s a movie hoping to grab double digit grosses to go along with the month’s double-digit temperaturesDanny Glover is Walter, the recently widowed patriarch of a large family. Retired and lonely he invites his four children, daughters Rachel (Gabrielle Union) and Cheryl (Kimberly Elise) and sons Christian (Romany Malco) and Evan (Jessie Usher) and the extended family home to Birmingham, Alabama for the holidays. “This is our first Christmas without your mother,” says Walter. “Just five days for you all to act like a family.” It’s not the twelve days of Christmas, it’s five fraught filled days as the family tries to get along. Cheryl and Rachel can barely stand being in the same room together for reasons neither of them can remember and Christian can’t seem to stop working long enough to enjoy the visit. “We’re not going to make it to Christmas are we?” “Not a damn chance,” sighs Aunt May (Mo’Nique).
“Almost Christmas” is like a Bollywood movie. There’s action, tragedy, a dance number, comedy, romance, humour, infidelity and even a slightly risqué bit of slapstick. It has something for everyone and if you can hold on tight as it rockets between heart warming and humourous with the speed of Santa’s sleigh on Christmas Eve, you’ll have a pretty good time.
It’s barely a movie in the strictest sense. It’s more a collection of moments strung together as old ghosts rear their ugly heads during the few festive days the family spends under the same roof. It’s episodic but melodramatically likable as it careens toward a funny and over-the-top dinner scene that involves everything from hurt feelings and guns to Danny Glover’s most famous line from “Lethal Weapon.” The siblings—and everyone else—learn that despite their differences they are stronger together than individually.
Not that you need to be told that. The story telegraphs everything that’s going to happen—there are no surprises under this Christmas tree—but does so in a way that is as sweet as the Potato Pie the family enjoys at dinner.
Anyone who grew up in the 1970s will remember The Trolls. The vinyl creatures with DayGlo Eraserhead coifs and big goofy smiles invaded pop culture, decorating everything from rear view mirrors to teen’s bedrooms. Unlike modern day internet trolls, these creatures were joyful, hug-happy little things with more personality than your average Pet Rock and a ubiquity that made them one of the symbols of a kinder and gentler time.
Then they, like other 70s fads like disco music, streakers and Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific shampoo, they faded into obscurity, banished forever to the Retro section of your local junk shop.
Now they’re back in Trolls, an animated adventure from the makers of Shrek Forever After and Mr. Peabody & Sherman that aims to spread some cheer amid a fraught election season.
Co-director Walt Dohrn says he hopes the film’s message of optimism in the face of adversity will be “an antidote to the madness of the world.”
“When Walt and I set out to make this film,” says co-director Mike Mitchell, “we did want to make a film about happiness because the news and the media is so scary. And not just for kids, adults too. The internet is so judgemental and snarky.”
“The world is kind of a difficult and dark place,” adds Dohrn, “so putting something out there that talked about happiness, where it comes from, what happens when you lose it…”
“…will get people discussing the power of a positive attitude and happiness,” says Mitchell, finishing his friend’s sentence. “I’m hopeful this will start a trend of, It’s OK to be happy. It’s cool. Especially with this clowny, weird election going on.”
Trolls the movie is as eye-popping as the psychedelic creatures that inspired it. Mitchell and Dohrn have made a movie that is possibly the weirdest and most colourful kid’s entertainment since H.R. Pufnstuf. They had the freedom to do so because the beloved 1970s toy Trolls came with no backstory.
“That’s what was cool about working on this,” says Mitchell. “Even though these Trolls had been around forever and ever, there was no story. No mythology to it so Walt and I got to make a whole world. We could create a whole new world you’ve never seen before, create whole new characters.”
They created a realm where the Trolls (voiced by Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, Zooey Deschanel, Russell Brand, James Corden and Gwen Stefani) make a daring escape from the Troll Tree in Bergen Town. The Bergens are snaggletooth ogres, as miserable as the Trolls are joyful. True happiness for the glum townies only comes with eating Trolls, obviously a huge problem for our heroes.
“Walt and I are huge fans of old fairy tales,” says Mitchell on the inclusion of the Troll-eating Bergens, “and those stories always had someone going down, having their heart taken out.”
“We’re finding the younger viewers don’t have a problem with it,” says Dohrn. “It’s the parents trying to protect them.”
The cheerful co-directors finish one another’s sentences and have a camaraderie that suggests they have taken the movie’s messages of friendship to heart.
“He’s an optimist and I’m a pessimist,” says Mitchell. “That’s kind of how we approached directing this film. We had a balance. In making it I discovered the power of a positive attitude.”
As everybody knows The Avengers exist to save the planet from physical threats like rogue sentient robots and red skulled Nazis. But who protects us from metaphysical danger? Apparently a guy in a crazy cape who looks a lot like Sherlock Holmes.
If you’re not familiar with Stephen Strange, “Doctor Strange,” the fourteenth film in the Marvel Universe introduces you to the neurosurgeon who goes from saving lives to saving planets.
When we first meet Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) he’s a gifted surgeon, a good-looking mix of ambition, charm and arrogance. When a car accident leaves him with severe nerve damage in his hands, he feels he has lost his best asset. The fingers that one’s free-handed complicated nerve surgery cannot now even hold a pen.
His search for a cure leads him to Jonathan Pangborn (Benjamin Bratt), a paraplegic who regained use of his hands and legs. “You came back from a place there is no coming back from,” says Strange. “I’m trying to find my way back.” Pangborn tells the desperate man of a place in Kathmandu, Nepal where he can experience a spiritual journey of healing.
In Nepul he meets the Ancient One (Tilda Swinton) an immortal Celt and Sorceress Supreme who teaches Strange some weird new tricks. With her guidance and his photographic memory, he quickly learns how to re-orient the spirit to heal the body. He also discovers who to teleport himself form one place to another and control the very fabric of time. Nifty stuff.
His lessons come in handy when Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen), a former student, returns to steal a single page of an ancient text. The spell contained on the page would give him a power over time that would make Dr. Who envious. His endgame is to join our world with the Dark Dimension, a place beyond time, thus ensuring life eternal. With the very essence of time at stake can Doctor Strange take a licking, but keep on ticking?
Despite a plot that deals with horology and the metaphysical make-up of the universe, “Doctor Strange” doesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s an origin story, pure and simple, that breaks up the interdimensional gobbledegook with bits of levity. Add to that a running gag with Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies” and some very trippy visuals and you have a movie that feels fresh despite being yet another origin tale.
Cumberbatch’s take on Strange echoes Marvel’s Tony Stark character. He’s arrogant and quick with a line, but where Stark had an air of unpredictability about him, Strange has none. He’s driven by ego and a need to get his life back, not the darker, and more interesting urges that propelled Stark’s world-saving.
Instead the movie focuses on bringing his experience to vivid life. As Strange begins his mystical journey director Scott Derrickson fills the screen with kaleidoscopic images. The trippy pictures entertain the eye and lend an authentic comic book feel to the movie that is sometimes missed in these big screen adaptations. Who knows how many pixels were harmed to create the hallucinogenic M.C. Escher-esque folding landscapes. Imagine the shifting terrains of “Inception,” but on steroids and you get the idea.
It takes some doing to stand out amid the film’s psychedelic visuals but Tilda Swinton as the Ancient One and Chiwetel Ejiofor as mentor Karl Mordo stand head and shoulders above the fray. Swinton sidesteps early criticism of character whitewashing—in the comic books the Ancient One is generally portrayed as a Tibetan man—by handing in an androgynous character who identifies as Celtic.
“Doctor Strange” is a lively mix of mysticism and mirth that breathes some new life into the Marvel Universe.
Anyone who grew up in the 1970s will remember The Trolls. The vinyl creatures with DayGlo Eraserhead coifs and big goofy smiles invaded pop culture, decorating everything from rear view mirrors to teen’s bedrooms. Unlike modern day internet trolls, these creatures were joyful, hug-happy little things with more personality than your average Pet Rock and a ubiquity that made them one of the symbols of a kinder and gentler time.
Then they, like other 70s fads like disco music, streakers and Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific shampoo, they faded into obscurity, banished forever to the Retro section of your local junk shop.
Now they’re back in a big screen adventure from the makers of “Shrek Forever After” and “Mr. Peabody & Sherman.”
In this new, updated story the Trolls make a daring escape from the Troll Tree in Bergen Town. The Bergens are snaggletooth ogres, as miserable as the Trolls are joyful. True happiness for the glum townies only comes with eating Trolls, obviously a huge problem for our heroes. Led by King Peppy (voice of Jeffrey Tambor) the colourful creatures relocate to a place with “clean air, freshwater and great acoustics” they truly live in harmony. On the 20th anniversary of their emancipation from Bergen Town they do what they do best, throw a wild, loud party that attracts the attention of the head Troll Hunter and cooker of Troll Treats (Christine Baranski). The Bergen party crasher stomps into Troll Town, making off with dozens of citizens, leading Princess Poppy (Anna Kendrick) to lead a rescue mission to deep into the heart of darkness, Bergen Town.
“Trolls” the movie is as eye-popping as the psychedelic creatures that inspired it. Possibly the weirdest kid’s entertainment since “H.R. Pufnstuf.” More sensory overload than narrative, “Trolls” is a fun ride but it is more concerned with entertaining the eye than the brain. In a blur of neon the story unfolds with a mix of kid friendly pop songs, supervised by Justin Timberlake, and psychedelic story telling that allows strange characters—like a stoner cloud (Walt Dohrn)—to inhabit a weird and wonderful place for eighty-five quick minutes.
“Trolls” doesn’t have the impact of “Frozen” or the messages of “Zootopia” but it is a brightly coloured, optimistic and chirpy way to spend a Saturday matinee with the kids.
“Hacksaw Ridge,” a new war film from director Mel Gibson, is much like the man himself; blustery, loud, occasionally profane and with a muddled moral core.
The film opens with grim imagery, soldiers with their faces blown off, engulfed in flames, before jumping back in time sixteen years to tell the tale of real-life pacifist Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield). Growing up in podunk Virginia Desmond is a high spirited boy who almost kills his brother during a play fight spun out of control. When his mother (Rachel Griffiths) tells him the most egregious sin of all is the taking of another person’s life, he allows the potent words to sink in and take root.
Later, after a whirlwind romance of the, “Today I met the girl I’m going to marry,” type he enlists in the army, despite the protests of his WWI vet father (Hugo Weaving and his fiancée (Teresa Palmer). A conscientious objector, Desmond refuses any kind of weapons training, insisting instead to go into battle as a medic. In boot camp his fellow cadets treat him like a pariah while his superiors (Vince Vaughn and Sam Worthington) threaten him with a court martial. “I’m not off up above,” he says pointing to his head. “I just believe what I believe.”
“Hacksaw Ridge” is the kind of movie that presents the main character as an underdog, but you know by the end of the film someone will say, “That crazy SOB was the bravest man I ever met,” or words to the effect. And so it goes. On Hacksaw Ridge, an impossibly tall cliff on the Japanese island of Okinawa, his mettle is tested when his platoon is attacked and overwhelmed. Without firing a shot, or even touching a gun, Desmond dodges death in the form of Japanese soldiers, bullets and grenades to bring aid to his colleagues.
This is a morality tale about a man whose noble intentions are misunderstood by everyone. Based on real events, it nonetheless has the feel of Hollywood fiction. Perhaps it’s because of our cynical times, but stories of the indomitable spirit seem to take on a corny edge no matter how much gruesome stuff—legs turn in the hamburger meat, rats eating corpses—the director uses to paint the screen.
That may be unfair, but there is an undeniable aw-shucks vibe that permeates the air. Gibson clearly respects the moral high ground his main character takes, but allows Garfield to play Doss as a hokey cliché, with one hand on the bible and a goofy grin plastered on his face. It’s amiable enough work but when the “hellfire of combat” kicks in he tends to get lost amid the action.
And there is a lot of action. By the time the movie shifts location to the titular warzone Gibson goes full tilt with skilfully shot, hardcore battle scenes. For a film about pacifism he doesn’t hold back, bringing his usual subtlety (think “Braveheart,” “The Passion of the Christ” or “Apocalypto”) to scenes of dismemberment and even a glimpse of ritual Seppuku. It’s wild and woolly and often very effective. A slow speed chase sequence in one of the cliff’s tunnels has tension and a couple of good jump scares. It’s solid filmmaking, if just a little safe. There’s nothing here as oddball or challenging as the use of arcane languages in his last two films or “Passion’s” female Satan. Instead he’s made a conventional, if somewhat gory inspirational biopic that suggests, come for the old time religion, stay for the blood and guts.
It’s hard to separate Mel Gibson from his films. “Hacksaw Ridge,” despite its lack of his usual eccentric flourishes, still feels like it could only be made by a man torn between deeply held faith and a wild side that sometimes runs free.
By 1973 Iggy and the Stooges had imploded, leaving behind three commercially unsuccessful records and a slug trail of decadence and unfulfilled expectations across two continents. “Gimme Danger,” Jim Jarmusch’s grotty documentary about the life, death and influence of The Stooges is a first hand account of what the director calls “the greatest rock and roll band ever.”
The Stooges’s story is the stuff of rock and roll legend. Jim Osterberg a.k.a. Iggy Pop started his musical career as a drummer in Ann Arbor garage rock bands like The Iguanas and The Prime Movers but switched from drums to front man when he got tired of looking at people’s bums. As a singer he formed an avant garde rock band originally known as the Psychedelic Stooges. Early experiments with homemade instruments like rigged-up vacuum cleaners and oil drums, lead to a more streamlined, although not commercial sound, that is now seen as the noise that birthed punk rock.
Three albums—a self-titled debut produced by former Velvet Underground bassist John Cale, “Fun House,” and “Raw Power”—and a handful of now classic songs like “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and “No Fun” established their legend, even if the band almost drowned in a sea of sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll clichés.
“Gimme Danger” is an affectionate look at a band of rebels. A tour through 70s rock and roll landmarks and legends like the Chelsea Hotel, Elektra Records, Nico and Andy Warhol, who asked Iggy, “Why don’t you just sing what’s in the newspaper,” it paints a picture of a band on the outside of the mainstream looking in. They wanted to make hit records but guitarist James Williamson says, “We were delusional. We really only liked the things we liked.”
Along the way we learn that John Wayne almost ran Iggy over in Los Angeles, that his “25 words or less” lyrical style was inspired by Soupy Sales and that one time manager Tony DeFries wanted Iggy to play Peter Pan on Broadway. DeFries suggested it, Iggy rejected it. He thought he should play Charles Manson.
Iggy Pop tells the tale, a rock and roll survivor who surprisingly outlived most of his band. He’s eloquent, funny and has a surprisingly good memory for a sixty-nine-year-old who lived on the edge for most of his life. The doc is perhaps a little too slickly made to really flaunt it’s garage rock ethos but Pop is an engaging storytelling who has always walked his own path, and that is the stuff of legend.
“I don’t want to belong to the glam people,” he says at the end of the film. “I don’t want to belong to the hip hop people. I don’t want to belong to any of it. I don’t want to belong to the TV people, alternative people. I don’t want to be punk. I just want to be.” Amen.
Salman Rushdie once wrote, “Now I know what a ghost is. Unfinished business, that’s what.” It’s a quote that resonates throughout “Lavender,” a new psychological thriller starring Abbie Cornish as a woman whose ghostly, fragmented memories haunt her.
In this elegant and eerie movie from “The Last Exorcism II” director Ed Gass-Donnelly, Cornish stars as Jane, a photographer who snaps pictures of old, dilapidated homes. One house in particular seems to have a draw on her, but after photographing it she has visions, one of which cause her to run her car off the road. Suffering memory loss, she undergoes therapy to stimulate repressed memories, a treatment that works all too well. Soon strange boxes appear, seeming to be clues to a past she had long ago left behind. Jane’s unfinished business comes flooding back in the form of long forgotten memories of a tragic and unsettling event.
“Lavender” is a hallucinatory study of the hidden horrors of the mind, a look at false memories and how they can be used as a shield from madness. It follows a well-trodden path—previously explored in mind movies like “Rosemary’s Baby” and “The Shining”—but Gass-Donnelly’s deliberate, almost trance-like direction lends plenty of atmosphere to the story. He effectively milks an emotional response with an anxiety inducing score by Sarah Neufeld and Colin Stetson and an assured performance from Cornish.
Cornish is at the very center of “Lavender,” grounded and eerie at the same time, she’s a sympathetic character with a hint of menace. This character driven story gives Cornish the chance to explore the psychological implications of a woman uncovering her uncertain past.
