“The Walk Back,” a new drama from “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World’ director Peter Weir, is a sprawling epic with a very personal focus. Set against the backdrop of war, inhumanity and an almost insurmountable challenge, it is about that most personal of things, survival.
Based on a controversial memoir written by Slavomir Rawicz, the film begins with Polish solider Janusz (Jim Sturgess) sent to a hellish Siberian gulag in 1941 on trumped up charges. Sentenced to ten years—a term he knows he won’t survive—he and a group of prisoners, including a grizzled American soldier (Ed Harris) and a violent Russian criminal (Colin Farrell) make a break for it. Their goal? Freedom. The obstacle? A 4000 kilometer walk through the harsh terrain of Mongolia, China and Tibet on the way to India and a new life. Along the way they pick up one more traveler, a young girl (Saoirse Ronan) whose camaraderie helps bond the ragtag band of escapees.
“The book was published in 1956 and called The Long Walk by Sławomir Rawicz,” Peter Weir said on a recent stop in Toronto to promote the movie. “There is no question from documents that later appeared after the fall of the Soviet Empire when KGB documents were briefly available, that yes, Rawicz had been in a gulag. But did he go on the walk or not? Question mark.
“So the first thing I said was, ‘I can’t do a true story called The Long Walk, but I can fictionalize it based on, or inspired by the book and based on true events if I can prove the walk actually happened.’ We got that proof and I felt comfortable going around the Rawicz question and not saying it’s his personal story.”
To add detail to his fictionalized tale Weir says he became deeply immersed in the subject.
“I became somewhat obsessed with it I think, even though I was fictionalizing it,” he says. “[I learned] through deep background reading, through accounts of those who had gone through the situation in one form or another, including Polish prisoners and soldiers who had been caught up, rather like my central character. I then interviewed survivors in Moscow and Siberia and in London and I just crammed as much as I could into the screenplay.
Weir says that while he strove for absolute authenticity in the film, he had to temper the depiction of life in the gulag for the big screen.
“I did restrain myself from what I was finding in research. Obviously in the worst situations there was a commandant who was a sadist and there were, to a degree, worse situations. So I chose something that I felt was reasonably representative of a number of these hundreds of camps and gulags.”
At the heart of the film is Jim Sturgess as Janusz, the determined and kind-hearted leader of the escapees.
“I’d seen Jim Sturgess for the first time in Across the Universe and thought how well cast he was as a young Beatle as it were,” says Weir. “He has that kind of guilelessness and openness that I needed for my character.
“He’s one to watch. In my film firstly,” he laughs, “and in whatever else is coming up for him.”
In “Crazy Heart” Bad Blake, played by Jeff Bridges in what will likely become his fifth Oscar nomination, is Willie Nelson if the IRS had their way with him, or Kris Kristofferson if he hadn’t written “Me and Bobby McGee.” “I used to be somebody,” he sings at one point, “but now I’m somebody else.” That someone else is a broke, drunk country music has-been whose idea of a great gig is playing a bowling alley where he isn’t even allowed to run a bar tab.
In a story that echoes “The Wrestler” “Crazy Heart” follows the tail end of the career of a man who once had everything but threw it away. Bad Blake was a big country music star whose life seems ripped from the lyrics of a hurtin’ Hank Williams song. On the road he’s so lonely he could die, so he fills his time with groupies; women who follow him back to his seedy hotel room, remembering the star he once was and not the sweaty, drunk wreck he has become. His downward spiral is slowed when he meets Jean Craddock (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a journalist and single mother who becomes his anchor.
“Crazy Heart” is an average movie buoyed by a great central performance. We’ve seen stories like this before but Bridges’s performance and the film’s details make this a recommend.
First the details. As a general rule most movies about fictional musicians get the most basic thing wrong—the music. Forgettable songs have ruined many a music movie but “Crazy Heart” and composers T-Bone Burnett and Stephen Bruton (who died of cancer before the film was released) nail an authentic country sound. The songs sound Grand Ole Opry ready and once filtered through Bridges’s weathered vocal chords could be echoes from any small town honky tonk or dive bar. It’s hurtin’ music and is spot on.
Beyond the music there are the small details that add so much to the film. There are the nice shards of dialogue like Bad’s flirty remark to Jean as they do an interview in a dingy motel room, “I want to talk about how bad you make this room look” and the accurate portrayal of small town bars and bowling alleys.
It all helps to elevate the predictable story, but none of it would matter a whit if Jeff Bridges wasn’t firmly in control. His Bad Blake is pure outlaw country, a hard drinking and cigarette smoking poet who breathes the same air as Waylon Jennings and Merle Haggart. Bridges throws his vanity out the window, allowing his gut to peak out from behind his guitar and wrinkles to peer out from the sides of his aviators. More than that, however, he nails the troubled charm that made Bad a star and then brought him to his knees. It’s complex work but Bridges, with his smooth, relaxed way with a character makes it look easy. Don’t be fooled; this is the work of a master who is often underrated.
“Crazy Heart” has some major flaws but is worth a look for the performances from Bridges, Gyllenhaal (although she seems a tad young for the part) and Colin Farrell in a small un-credited part as Bad’s former protégé.
Think about it; Las Vegas is the perfect place for a vampire to hang out. There are no castles or creepy forests but there are lots of potential victims who don’t go out until the sun goes down. It’s a town that lives at night which makes it the perfect place for Jerry (Colin Farrell) the new vampire in town.
Based on Tom Holland’s 1985 camp classic original of the same name, “Fright Night” sticks to the basic plot of its namesake but this isn’t a traditional vampire thriller. It’s more “True Blood” than “Dracula.”
High school senior Charlie (Anton Yeltin) doesn’t believe his childhood friend Ed’s (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) claim that Jerry, the new guy on the block, is a vampire. Doesn’t believe him, that is, until their friends start to go missing. With the help of his girlfriend Amy (Imogen Poots) and a swishy vampire expert named Peter Vincent (David Tennant in the role Roddy McDowell made famous) Charlie tries to put a stake through Jerry’s reign of terror.
Even though “Fright Night” starts as a high school horror, this ain’t “Twilight.” It’s more concerned with thrills and chills and laughs than romance or teen ennui. This is a horror film, and a pretty good one too once it gets past the set up.
The first hour threatens to get bogged down by deliberate pacing and a slowish unveiling of the plot points but is rescued by engaging performances by Yeltin and Poots, and an eerie turn by Farrell. At the sixty minute mark the horror hits, the pace picks up and the blood starts spurting.
“Fright Night” is popcorn horror with just enough bite to appeal to horror audiences and more casual vampire fans.
This one is being marketed all wrong. MGM is selling this as a Bruce Willis action film, which isn’t exactly accurate. This is more like Hogan’s Heroes without the laughs or The Great Escape without the action. Hart’s War takes place in a German POW camp and revolves around a court martial case. Although Bruce Willis’ (who actually manages to keep the smirks down to a minimum) photo is front and center on the movie poster, he doesn’t have that much screen time, this is really Colin Farrell’s piece. As the spoiled Yale trained officer he is intense and winning. There is more character growth here, particularly with Farrell and nasty Nazi Colonel Visser played by Marcel Iures, than in ten John Wayne war flicks. Hart’s War is an interesting film, one that examines racism, honour and heroics.
As you may have guessed from the title “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” is an odd movie. Directed by Terry Gilliam, it is the strange tale of a mysterious immortal who complicates his life by making deals with the devil. Complicating Gilliam’s life during production was the unexpected death of his star Heath Ledger but, the show, as they say, must go on and here we are after the untimely January 2008 passing of the young actor, with a completed film. How did Gilliam finish the movie? A new credit, “A Film from Heath Ledger and Friends” tells the tale. Three of Ledger’s buddies, Johnny Depp (seen dancing on a leaf!), Colin Farrell and Jude Law, stepped in to play “through the looking glass” versions of the late actor.
Set in present day London the film begins with a look at Doctor Parnassus’s (Christopher Plummer) bizarre traveling show which offers people a chance to step through Dr.P’s magical mirror into an alternate reality. He’s selling imagination, but his gift of mind’s eye manipulation came with a heavy price. Eons before he made a trade with the devil (Tom Waits)—remarkable power in exchange for his first born daughter on her sixteenth birthday. That anniversary is now days away but with the help of a mysterious stranger named Tony (played by Ledger, Depp Law and Farrell) and the magic mirror Dr. P just may be able to save her.
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” is more a piece of surrealist art than a traditional movie. Imagine watching a Salvador Dali painting come to life and you’ll get the idea. Gilliam, who co-wrote the script as well as directed, has allowed his imagination to run riot. While the story meanders to and fro he fills the screen with unforgettable images; Old Nick dangling Dr. P from the end of a branch or a multi-eyed hot air balloon shaped like a man’s head or the ensemble of skirt wearing, dancing Bobbies. Visually it’ll make your eyeballs do the Watusi.
The story, however, may leave some a bit baffled, but so what if it warps the brain a bit? The film oozes Gilliam’s trademarked anarchic spirit—he might be the only filmmaker who could replace his leading man with three other actors and actually pull it off—and is the most original movie of the year.
First here’s all the stuff from the Miami Vice television show that you won’t see or hear in the movie version: pastel jackets with t-shirts underneath, Elvis the alligator, Jan Hammer’s distinctive theme song, or Phil Collins. In short, all of the stuff that made the “MTV cop” show a hit.
This isn’t your Dad’s Miami Vice. Director Michael Mann, who created, executive produced, wrote and directed the original series has turfed everything except the two main characters in his attempt to update the 1980s classic for the big screen. Sonny Crockett, now played by Colin Farrell still hasn’t figured out how to use a razor, but aside from that it’s a whole new game. In fact, only about half the movie actually takes place in Miami.
In Mann’s new version of Miami it’s always night and danger seems to lurk around every corner. Shooting in grainy digital video, the director transforms the Sunshine State’s biggest city into a menacing paradise where both life and drugs are cheap. It is a world where the good guys don’t always win and the bad guys don’t completely lose.
Mann has loosely based the film on one of the television show’s most famous episodes, Smuggler’s Blues. The story begins with a sting operation gone bad which costs two federal agents their lives. It appears there’s an information leak in either the FBI or DEA or ATF and it’s up to Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs (Jamie Foxx) to put a plug in it. Working deep undercover, posing as drug transporters they begin by infiltrating the network of a mid-level trafficker called Yero. Yero will be able to hook them up with the drug kingpin, Montoya, and from there they should be able to bring down his entire empire.
It’s not exactly the most original story we’ve seen at the movies this year, but the beauty is in the telling of the story, not the story itself. Mann has a way with this kind of material. Miami Vice, like his best work in the crime genre—movies like Thief and Heat—is dripping with cool atmosphere, enough to make up for the by-the-book story.
Less successful is the casting. Jamie Foxx and Mann have worked together three times now—on Ali, Collateral, which nabbed an Oscar nomination for Foxx—but this has to be their least inspiring outing. Foxx and Farrell don’t seem to have much chemistry, which is crucial to their roles as partners who would do anything for one another, but worse than that, Foxx isn’t given much to do. The character of Tubbs is so stoic and no nonsense that all he is required to do is stand there and look good. He does that well, but it feels like he is holding back.
Not so for Farrell who gives a performance of mock seriousness that sometimes borders on camp. He barks his tough-guy lines in a way that would knock the pastel off the original Crockett, Don Johnson. Johnson’s Crockett was unhappy and angry, but in the movie seems to have turned his life around. Now he’s angry and unhappy.
Miami Vice on the big screen isn’t a remake of the television series; it’s more than that. It’s the maturation of it. Mann has made a demanding but interesting film that reflects where he is now, not where he was when he created the television series.
Watching The New World is akin to experiencing a dream on screen or seeing a poem come to life. Dreamy, visually sophisticated and nonlinear The New World isn’t for everyone, but there are great rewards for viewers who stick with the film. Terence Malick, the film’s director who has made only four films in a thirty-two year career, uses film as a canvas to tell the story of Pocahontas (Q’Orianka Kilcher), the Native American princess who fell head over heels for Captain John Smith (Colin Farrell), was exiled by her father, and became the devoted wife of a tobacconist played by Batman Begins star Christian Bale.
The film has several scenes that are unforgettable. Malick excels when he uses pictures to tell the story and the film’s best bits are non-verbal. For example, the first meeting between the Native-Americans and the Europeans is beautiful and strange and sticks hard and fast to the first rule of filmmaking—show me don’t tell me. In one beautifully directed sequence with no dialogue we learn all we need to know about the fear and curiosity that the natives felt towards the strangely dressed visitors from Europe.
This isn’t a traditional film, and certainly if you are a fan of the animated Disney version of Pocahontas you may find The New World a little frustrating. There are no talking lions or giant apes, just lyrical storytelling and compelling characters.
Angry corrupt cops who “bleed blue” and speak with heavy Brooklyn accents are nothing new at the movies. We’ve seen them for years, decades even, in everything from Serpico to last year’s We Own the Night. The trick to keeping audience interest is to add in some new elements to shake up the old formula. Pride and Glory, written by the son of a cop and starring Edward Norton and Colin Farrell, attempts this by telling a multi-generational story of a family of policemen.
Ray and Francis Tierney (Noah Emmerich and Norton respectively) are New York police officers at very different stages of their careers. Francis, like his father and namesake (Jon Voight) before him, is a well thought of commanding officer, while Ray, a former hotshot, now a traumatized ex-street cop, is currently riding a desk at Missing Persons. At the urging of his father Ray is lured away from the relative safety of his desk to investigate the murder of four cops at a failed drug bust. When Ray’s investigation leads him to believe that his brother and brother-in-law (Colin Farrell) may be involved he is forced to choose between his family and his brothers in blue.
Pride and Glory doesn’t reinvent the wheel, and even the intergenerational twist isn’t that new—just ask James Gray, the director and screenwriter for We Own the Night—but it does a good job of presenting the moral quandary that arises when telling the truth is going to have serious consequences for the ones you love.
Ed Norton convincingly portrays Ray’s conundrum. He’s a bubbling caldron of bile that threatens to boil over at any moment, and if you’re Colin Farrell you might not like him when he’s angry. Norton expertly conveys anger, confusion and remorse often in the same scene. It’s a nicely calibrated performance that is better than the rest of the movie.
If you could describe Norton’s performance as finely tuned then only the opposite can be said of Farrell’s work. As dirty cop Jimmy Egan he is kind of one note, but it’s a good note. He plays the out-of-control cop as a delightfully unhinged man who will do anything—including menacing a baby with a piping hot iron—to get what he wants. It’s a performance that borders on camp, but Farrell keeps it on the right side of the line and his passion adds some much needed gusto to the film’s slower scenes.
Jon Voight, Noah Emmerich and the rest of the cast hand in solid performances, although there’s nothing nearly as memorable as Farrell’s wild ride.
In many ways Pride and Glory is little more than a slightly above average cop drama, but its willingness to splash around in the grey areas of cop morality and loyalty plus the commanding performances of Norton and Farrell earn it a recommendation.
There have been many movies about writer’s block. Screenwriters love to write about the affliction that affects everyone who puts fingers to keyboard for a living. So Martin McDonagh, the writer director of “Seven Psychopaths,” isn’t treading new ground here, but he does it entertainingly and with way more guns than you usually find in movies about writers.
Colin Farrell is Marty, an alcoholic screenwriter whose mental state hovers somewhere between depression and suicide. Blocked, he can’t seem to get past the title of his latest screenplay, “Seven Psychopaths.” Trying to pull him out of his funk, his (not always) helpful friend Billy (Sam Rockwell) places an ad in the newspaper asking for certified psychopaths to contact Marty. In exchange for their stories, he might make them famous in the movie. Meantime Billy is working a side job with Hans (Christopher Walken), stealing dogs only to “rescue” them for the reward money. The scheme puts all of them in contact with Charlie (Woody Harrelson), a sensitive psychopath who cries at the thought of his lost dog, but doesn’t mind killing people to get it returned.
As you might imagine from a movie titled “Seven Psychopaths,” there is a great deal of antisocial behavior on display. It’s occasionally gruesome—heads are detached from their bodies, throats are cut—but it is the performance style that you’ll notice. Rockwell has rarely been this twitchy, but it mostly works, and Farrell and Harrelson bring considerable charisma to their roles, but it is Walken who is memorable.
Everybody loves Walken, and there’s no denying he fills the screen, but his idiosyncratic vocal mannerisms are so exaggerated here it’s almost as if you are watching someone do an impression of the actor, rather than the real thing. He’s entertaining, but his performance here is just inches away from self-parody.
In a way that’s appropriate for a film that is so inward looking. McDonagh has taken all the bits and pieces of thriller and turned them on their heads. Early on Marty says he doesn’t want his screenplay to be “about guys with guns in their hands,” sending an indication that the film-idea-within-the-film may be telegraphing the action (or lack thereof) that we’re about to see.
The film subverts its own story to make ironic comments on the collaborative nature of filmmaking when not all the creative agree on the story’s direction, plot structure and role of women in action movies, (“You can’t let the animals die in movies, just the women.”). It almost works except that the cleverness of the idea—making an anti-movie—feels a bit labored in the final third of the film.
“Seven Psychopaths” gets lost in its own idea, but only temporarily. What’s left is solid fun.
“The Walk Back,” a new drama from “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World’ director Peter Weir, is a sprawling epic with a very personal focus. Set against the backdrop of war, inhumanity and an almost insurmountable challenge, it is about that most personal of things, survival.
