The statistics are familiar but still astounding. Take for instance the Academy Awards. In the ninety-year history of the Oscars only five women have been nominated in the director category and only one, Kathryn Bigelow, has taken a statue home. 85% of 2018’s Top 100 films were written by men. Women represent only one fourth of lead characters on the big-screen. A new documentary, “This Changes Everything,” showcases the statistics that show the female bias in Hollywood’s old boy network, but the film works best when telling the stories direct from the mouths of the women whose careers have been directly affected.
Using archival footage and interviews with a-listers like Meryl Streep, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson, Reese Witherspoon and Cate Blanchett, people who have been “otherized by men,” plus director Maria Giese, showrunner Shonda Rhimes and producer Lauren Shuler Donner, the film is a first-hand account of decades of discrimination.
Director Tom Donahue uses graphs and pie-charts to present the cold hard data but the movie’s beating heart is in its testimonials.
Tiffany Haddish recalls the sense of empowerment she felt watching a fight scene between “Dynasty’s” Alexis Carrington (Joan Collins) and Dominique Deveraux (Diahann Carroll). “This is the first time I saw a Black woman with money, wearing diamonds. She’s having conversations with white women like she’s not even Black. She slapped this white woman so hard and they wrestled. I was like, ‘What!’ She didn’t even go to jail.
Chloe Grace Moretz looks back at the making movies as a teenager. On one shoot her wardrobe included breast enhancement “chicken cutlets.” At just fourteen she realized that the industry saw her as an “actress” rather than an actor. It was a self-esteem destroying exercise in being regarded as an object of male gaze rather than performer.
Oscar winner Geena Davis, founder of the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, discusses her examination into gender inequality in Hollywood and the steps she has taken to generate the data that can affect industry-wide change. “I had been awakened to how women were portrayed in the media,” she says. “I realized we give them so few opportunities to feel inspired by the female characters.”
The presentation of the information is basic, talking heads, title cards and charts, but its retelling of the legal fights by the ACLU and DGA for equality coupled with the women’s personal stories make for a fascinating and compelling lesson.
“This Changes Everything’s” title is a tongue-in-cheek reference to the industry’s mantra that every successful female aimed project will lead to sweeping change. As the film makes perfectly clear that progress is being made, but there is still has a long way to go. “It is time for our business to wake up and realize it is good economics as well as the right thing to do,” says Witherspoon.
Fifty-four years after Julie Andrews made her debut as “the practically perfect in every way” nanny, who flew in (courtesy of her parrot-handled umbrella) and introduced magic to the lives of the dysfunctional Banks family, the beloved Mary Poppins character is back in “Mary Poppins Returns.” The new Disney musical-fantasy picks up 25 years after the events of the classic, with Poppins, played by Emily Blunt, returning to help the Banks children after misfortune befalls the family.
Set in 1930s London during the Great Slump, a city of gaslights and chimney sweeps, “Mary Poppins Returns” sees the kids from the original Michael and Jane Banks all grown up and played by Ben Whishaw and Emily Mortimer. Michael’s wife passed away the year before and now he, his kids (Pixie Davies, Nathanael Saleh, and Joel Dawson) and housekeeper Ellen (Julie Walters) live in the Banks’s family home on Cherry Tree Lane, the house made famous by P. L. Travers.
When the bank calls in the loan Michael took against the house the family risks losing everything. “Pay back entire loan on the house or it will be repossessed in five days,” cackles the lawyer who delivers the notice. On that very day Mary Poppins (Emily Blunt), the nanny who helped Michael and Jane as kids, and her magic bag come to the rescue. “Good thing you arrived when you did Mary Poppins,” says Jack (Lin-Manuel Miranda), former apprentice of Bert from the original film. Mary “I suspect that I am never incorrect” Poppins, helps the Banks family regain the joy and wonder that made their childhood years magical.
From the first song, “(Underneath the) Lovely London Sky”—“Count your blessings,” sings Jack. “You’re a lucky guy.”—the movie establishes its uplifting tone. It’s a frothy, satisfying concoction of nostalgia, music, fanciful visuals, elegance and optimism; a spoonful of sugar in bitter times.
Director Rob Marshall has made a full-on musical that mixes the best of old and new Disney. This thoroughly modern movie feels old-fashioned in the sense that it takes its time with the music, allowing the songs to breathe and the lyrics to sink in. But it isn’t simply an exercise in recollection. The smart new songs (written by Marc Shaiman with lyrics by Scott Wittman) refresh a familiar story, mixing seamlessly with snippets of songs from the original film blended into the score.
There are huge musical numbers, including a wild underwater spectacular, but the songs that work best are the more modest tunes like “A Conversation,” Michael’s requiem for his late wide. “These rooms were always filled with magic but that vanished since you’ve gone away.” It is heartfelt and heartbreaking. Ditto Mary Poppins’s “The Place Where Lost Things Go.”
Still, this is a movie that brims with joy. When the spunky Banks kids tell Mary Poppins (no one ever calls her Mary or Miss Poppins, its always first and last names) that they have “grown up a great deal in the last year.” She replies, “Yes. We’ll have to see what we can do about that.”
Like “Christopher Robin” from earlier this year, “Mary Poppins Returns” is ultimately about the importance of staying young at heart. The film essays Michael’s sense of loss and longing, his frustration at not knowing how to go on without his wife but it’s the upbeat attitude that gives it depth. “Everything is possible, even the impossible,” is a cliché but in context it is a call to believe, to have faith. If Michael believes in himself everything will be OK. That’s a potent message, delivered with a spoonful of sugar or not.
The cast impresses, delivering the film’s message with charm and verve. Emily Blunt brings a mix of strictness—“Sit up straight you’re not a flower bag,” she scolds.—and mischievousness to her character, effortlessly slipping into some very big shoes. Miranda provides a dose of musical theatre. Meryl Streep, as Mary’s eccentric cousin Topsy, offers a fun and funny lesson in perspective and Dick Van Dyke’s cameo as Mr. Dawes Jr. connects the old and new.
“Mary Poppins Returns” feels modern without sacrificing its nostalgic charm. There’s no “Supercallifragilisticexpialidocious” but, like the first film, there is plenty of heart.
Earlier this week Northern Michigan’s Lake Superior State University added the term “fake news” to its 43rd annual List of Words Banished from the Queen’s English for Misuse, Overuse and General Uselessness. According to dictionary.com those two toxic words, popularized by Donald Trump and adopted by, well, almost everyone, denote “false news stories, often of a sensational nature, created to be widely shared online for the purpose of generating ad revenue via web traffic or discrediting a public figure, political movement, company, etc.”
A new film, The Post, is a time capsule back to a time before exhortations of “fake news” created an atmosphere where the press is perceived as an enemy rather than the voice of the people.
Meryl Streep plays Katharine Graham, the first female publisher of a major American newspaper. With the paper bordering on insolvency she has tough decisions to make.
When the New York Times breaks the story of a massive cover-up and is shut down by the Nixon White House, hardnosed editor Ben Bradlee (Tom Hanks) sees an opportunity to scoop the Times and make a splash. “Are any of you tired of reading the news,” he asks his staff, “instead of reporting on it?” Trouble is, the story involves several people close to Graham, most notably former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (Bruce Greenwood), who prolonged the Vietnam War despite knowing it was a no-win situation.
Graham must make the decision to publish or not. Running the so-called Pentagon Papers would expose years of government secrets, make an enemy of President Nixon and could scare off the investors she’s been courting. Not reporting could endanger young the Americans who were still being drafted and sent to fight an unwinnable war. “The only way to assert the right to publish is to publish,” argues Bradley.
The Post is a historical tale that feels as timely as any front-page story in today’s paper. A high-stakes look at journalism before the age of fake news, it reminds us of the importance of objective, investigative reporting in an era of secrecy, lies, and leaks. It’s an ‘if you don’t know your past, you don’t know your future” message movie that shines a light on a watershed but mostly forgotten slice of our past.
The Pentagon Papers were a significant turning point in our recent history. They were proof of a credibility gap between what politicians say and what they are doing. For Bradlee, publishing these documents sent a message that the White House had no influence on what stories made the front page and which don’t. “The press must serve the governed not the governors.”
Combined, all these elements add up to a movie that aims to make a statement while avoiding preaching to its audience. Director Steven Spielberg and stars Hanks and Streep are entertainers first and foremost, and they do entertain here, but they also portray a period whose reverberations in the time of fake news are being felt stronger than ever.
The air of paranoia that hung over All the President’s Men, another movie centered on the investigative reporting of The Washington Post, is missing in The Post. Instead, Spielberg film’s is a fist-pump-in-the-air look at the integrity and importance of a free press. It’s a little heavy-handed but these are heavy-handed times.
The air of paranoia that hung over “All the President’s Men,” another movie centered on the investigative reporting of The Washington Post, is noticeably missing in “The Post.” Instead, the new Steven Spielberg film is a fist-pump-in-the-air look at the integrity and importance of a free press. It’s a little heavy-handed but these are heavy-handed times.
Meryl Streep plays Katharine Graham, the first female publisher of a major American newspaper. The socialite inherited The Washington Post following her husband Phil Graham’s death in 1963. “Kate throws a great party but she’s only here because her husband died,” harrumphs board member Arthur Parsons (Bradley Whitford). With the paper bordering on insolvency she has tough decisions to make.
Meanwhile hardnosed editor Ben Bradlee (Tom Hanks) is looking for a story that will help the paper break out of its local market and go national. “Are any of you tired of reading the news,” he asks his staff, “instead of reporting on it?”
When the New York Times breaks the story of a massive cover-up and is shut down by the Nixon White House, Bradlee sees an opportunity to scoop the Times and make a splash. Trouble is, the story involves several people close to Graham, most notably former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (Bruce Greenwood), who prolonged the Vietnam War despite knowing it was a no-win situation.
Graham must make the decision to publish or not. Running the so-called Pentagon Papers would expose years of government secrets, make an enemy of President Nixon and could scare off the investors she’s been courting. Not reporting could endanger young the Americans who were still being drafted and sent to fight an unwinnable war. “The only way to assert the right to publish is to publish,” argues Bradley.
No spoilers here, but the historical record shows that bombshell revelations were made and today The Washington Post is still a going concern.
“The Post” is a historical tale that feels as timely as any front-page story in today’s paper. A high-stakes look at journalism before the age of fake news, it reminds us of the importance of objective, investigative reporting in an era of secrecy, lies, and leaks. It’s a ‘if you don’t know your past, you don’t know your future” message movie that shines a light on a watershed but mostly forgotten slice of our past.
The Pentagon Papers were a significant turning point in our recent history. They were proof of a credibility gap between what politicians say and what they are doing. For Bradlee, publishing these documents sent a message that the White House had no influence on what stories made the front page and which don’t. “The press must serve the governed not the governors.”
Hanks and Streep, the two most trusted people in Hollywood, are solid as the two most trusted people in Washington.
As Graham, Streep is a woman who transcends the attitudes of her male advisors to do the right thing regardless of the repercussions. It’s a slow burn performance as she slowly sheds the weight of her socialite upbringing to embrace an outgoing and progressive point of view. As she grapples with publishing and possibly losing everything versus playing it safe, she becomes one of the film’s few characters with an arc.
Hanks plays Bradlee with bluster. As a noted collector of old school typewriters in real life, Hanks must have relished the chance to surround himself with the clickety-clack soundtrack of a newsroom in full tilt boogie. He is the movie’s reckless moral code, barking orders and making larger-than-life pronouncements on the importance of a free press. Hanks is at the Spencer Tracey stage of his career, an actor who brings with him an aura of decency and strength; the epitome of American exceptionalism made flesh. Despite the character being one-note Hanks breathes life into him, even if only as a spokesperson for the power of the first amendment.
“The Post” is propped up by good supporting performances, although fine actors like Sarah Paulson and Tracy Letts are stranded in roles that don’t give them much to do. Bob Odenkirk as Ben Bagdikian, one of the architects of the plan to publish the Pentagon Papers, fares better in one of the handful of roles expanded to full bloom.
The expected Spielberg touches are there as well. The Washington Post building shakes as the massive printing presses roar to life, a no-so-subtle metaphor of the upset the Pentagon Papers are about to cause in Washington.
Combined, all the elements add up to a movie that aims to make a statement while avoiding preaching to its audience. Spielberg, Hanks and Streep are entertainers first and foremost, and they do entertain here, but they also shine a light on a historical era whose reverberations are being felt today stronger than ever.
Baby Driver: Although it contains more music than most tuneful of movies “Baby Driver,” the new film from director Edgar Wright, isn’t a musical in the “West Side Story,” “Sound of Music” sense. Wallpapered with 35 rock ‘n roll songs on the soundtrack it’s a hard driving heist flick that can best be called an action musical.
The Big Sick: Even when “The Big Sick” is making jokes about terrorism and the “X-Files” it is all heart, a crowd-pleaser that still feels personal and intimate.
Call Me By Your Name: This is a movie of small details that speak to larger truths. Director Luca Guadagnino keeps the story simple relying on the minutiae to add depth and beauty to the story. The idyllic countryside, the quaint town, the music of the Psychedelic Furs and the languid pace of a long Italian summer combine to create the sensual backdrop against which the romance between the two blossoms. Guadagnino’s camera captures it all, avoiding the pitfalls of melodrama to present a story that is pure emotion. It feels real and raw, haunted by the ghosts of loves gone by.
Darkest Hour: This is a historical drama with all the trappings of “Masterpiece Theatre.” You can expect photography, costumes and period details are sumptuous. What you may not expect is the light-hearted tone of much of the goings on. While this isn’t “Carry On Churchill,” it has a lighter touch that might be expected. Gary Oldman, not an actor known for his comedic flourishes, embraces the sly humour. When Churchill becomes Prime Minister his wife, Clementine (Kristin Scott Thomas) makes an impassioned speech about the importance of the work he is about to take on. He raises a glass and, cutting through the emotion of the moment, says, “Here’s to not buggering it up!” It shows a side of Churchill not often revealed in wartime biopics.
The Disaster Artist: The key to pulling off “The Disaster Artist” is not recreating “The Room” beat for beat, although they do that, it’s actually about treating Wiseau as a person and not an object of fun. He’s an outrageous character and Franco commits to it 100%. From the marble-mouthed speech pattern that’s part Valley Girl and part Beaker from The Muppets to the wild clothes and stringy hair, he’s equal parts creepy and lovable but underneath his bravado are real human frailties. Depending on your point of view he’s either delusional or aspirational but in Franco’s hands he’s never also never less than memorable. It’s a broad, strange performance but it may also be one of the actor’s best.
Dunkirk: This is an intense movie but it is not an overly emotional one. The cumulative effect of the vivid images and sounds will stir the soul but despite great performances the movie doesn’t necessarily make you feel for one character or another. Instead its strength is in how it displays the overwhelming sense of scope of the Dunkirk mission. With 400,000 men on the ground with more in the air and at sea, the sheer scope of the operation overpowers individuality, turning the focus on the collective. Director Christopher Nolan’s sweeping camera takes it all in, epic and intimate moments alike.
The Florida Project: This is, hands down, one of the best films of the year. Low-budget and naturalistic, it packs more punch than any superhero. Director Sean Baker defies expectations. He’s made a film about kids for adults that finds joy in rocky places. What could have been a bleak experience or an earnest message movie is brought to vivid life by characters that feel real. It’s a story about poverty that neither celebrates or condemns its characters. Mooney’s exploits are entertaining and yet an air of jeopardy hangs heavy over every minute of the movie. Baker knows that Halley and Moonie’s well being hangs by a thread but he also understands they exist in the real world and never allows their story to fall into cliché.
Get Out: This is the weirdest and most original mainstream psychodrama to come along since “The Babadook.” The basic premise harkens back to the Sidney Poitier’s classic “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.” In that film parents, played by Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, have their attitudes challenged when their daughter introduces them to her African American fiancé. The uncomfortable situation of meeting in-laws for the first time is universal. It’s the added layers of paranoia and skewered white liberalism that propels the main character’s (Daniel Kaluuya) situation into full-fledged horror. In this setting he is the other, the stranger and as his anxiety grows the social commentary regarding attitudes about race in America grows sharper and more focussed.
Lady Bird: Greta Gerwig’s skilful handling of the story of Lady Bird’s busy senior year works not just because it’s unvarnished and honest in its look at becoming an adult but also, in a large degree, to Saoirse Ronan’s performance. I have long called her ‘Lil Meryl. She’s an actor of unusual depth, a young person (born in 1994) with an old soul. Lady Bird is almost crushed by the weight of uncertainty that greets her with every turn—will her parents divorce, will there be money for school, will Kyle be the boy of her dreams, will she ever make enough cash to repay her parents for her upbringing?—but Ronan keeps her nimble, sidestepping teen ennui with a complicated mix of snappy one liners, hard earned wisdom and a well of emotion. It’s tremendous, Academy Award worthy work.
The Post: Steven Spielberg film is a fist-pump-in-the-air look at the integrity and importance of a free press. It’s a little heavy-handed but these are heavy-handed times. Director Spielberg and stars Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep are entertainers first and foremost, and they do entertain here, but they also shine a light on a historical era whose reverberations are being felt today stronger than ever.
The Shape of Water: A dreamy slice of pure cinema. Director Guillermo del Toro uses the stark Cold War as a canvas to draw warm and vivid portraits of his characters. It’s a beautiful creature feature ripe with romance, thrills and, above all, empathy for everyone. This is the kind of movie that reminds us of why we fell in love with movies in the first place.
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri: The story of a mother’s unconventional war with the world is simple enough, it’s the complexity of the characters that elevates the it to the level of great art.
Wonder Woman: Equal parts Amazon sword and sandal epic, mad scientist flick, war movie and rom com, it’s a crowd pleaser that places the popular character front and centre. As played by Gal Gadot, Diana is charismatic and kick ass, a superhero who is both truly super and heroic. Like Superman she is firmly on the side of good, not a tortured soul à la Batman. Naïve to the ways of the world, she runs headfirst into trouble. Whether she’s throwing a German tank across a battlefield, defying gravity to leap to the top of a bell tower, tolerating Trevor’s occasional mansplaining or deflecting bullets with her indestructible Bracelets of Submission, she proves in scene after scene to be both a formidable warrior and a genuine, profoundly empathic character.
Overrated is the last word I would use to describe Meryl Streep as an actress or interview subject. Like everybody else I’ve admired her work from the early fresh-faced roles in films like Manhattan to the emotional catharsis of Kramer vs. Kramer, through her accent phase and beyond.
I’ve also interviewed her several times. In our conversations, as in her controversial speech at the Golden Globes, she’s always been forthright, fearless and nothing less than gracious.
Our first chat was eleven years ago at the A Prairie Home Companion television junket in Minnesota. I’ve done dozens, probably hundreds of these things and the only thing they have in common is the amount of time wasted sitting in hotel hallways, cooling heels until the stars are ready to speak. Experience taught me to always bring a book, the thicker the better, to pass the time.
I read until it was time to talk with Streep. With a list of questions and my book I sat opposite her under hot TV lights and the unblinking gaze of the cameras, familiar but formal territory. Then she did remarkable. Before my first question she asked me one.
“What book are you reading?” No actor had ever asked me about my ever-present book. She then asked me what I liked about it. As we chatted amiably I realized I was being seduced by the Streep charm.
She was working her magic, doing what she does in her work; taking our time beyond the professional and into the personal. She took a moment to make a connection with me before we got down to the task at hand. That bond to her audience and her characters is what makes her great, not just as an actress or speechmaker but also as a person.
According to a new biopic Florence Foster Jenkins left the world with these words on her lips, “People may say I couldn’t sing but no one can say I didn’t sing.” Meryl Streep plays the eccentric New York City songbird as a woman with a passion for music but an ear of tin.
The delightful story of a society hostess with a song in her heart but no ability to translate that into something tuneful, is twenty five minutes into its running time before Jenkins (Streep) lets loose with her atonal caterwauling. She’s a wealthy woman who has devoted herself to the musical life of her city. She’s a patron of the arts, giving money to legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini and others, a founder of clubs, a fixture of mid-twentieth century New York life.
When she attends a Lily Pons (Aida Garifullina) recital the fire to sing is ignited. “Can you imagine what that must feel like,” she says, “to hold 3000 people in the cup of your hand?” With the help of her husband St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant) she hires pianist Cosme McMoon (Simon Helberg) and Maestro Carlo Edwards, assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera, to whip her into stage shape in exchange for handsome paydays. Trouble is her vocalizing sounds like two cats in heat fighting in an alleyway. So wrapped up in the music, she has no idea of the terrible sounds coming out of her mouth. “There is no one quite like you,” the Metropolitan maestro says delicately.
Her performances are both remarkable and delusional. “A few wrong notes can be forgiven,” says Bayfield, “but singing without passion cannot.” Her husband, who loves her but has a younger girlfriend (Rebecca Ferguson) living in his downtown apartment, carefully manages who comes to her vanity performances, ensuring the audiences is stacked with well wishers. When Florence books Carnegie Hall for a charity concert for US servicemen, Bayfield does everything he can to protect her from the “mockers and scoffers.” When tickets to the show sell out faster than for Sinatra—megastars Cole Porter and Tallulah Bankhead even show up—the show becomes Manhattan’s social event of the year but is it a display of vainglorious egotism or passion?
“Florence Foster Jenkins” is one of those true-to-life bios that seems to prove the cliché that fact is stranger than fiction. In real life Jenkins’s awful singing sold out concert halls and the records she made were the biggest sellers Melotone Recording Studios ever had and have become collector’s items. She is the center of the action, the reason we are here, and Streep plays her with gusto. Like Jenkins who won audiences over with her enthusiasm, Streep wins us over with her passion to present her character as a real person and not a caricature of a talentless hack unaware that she was being laughed at. Afflicted with syphilis contracted on her wedding night, she fought to stay alive for 50 years, taking each day as it comes, inspired by her love of music to go on. Streep, as usual, finds the real humanity of her character and brings that to life.
But for once, Streep is not the star of the show. In a movie filled to the brim with great performances from Streep, Nina Arianda as a Judy Holliday-type with a loud mouth and Ferguson as Bayfield’s second fiddle, it is Grant who shines the brightest.
His Bayfield is courtly but tough, a maître d’ for Jenkins’s life. He protects her from the harsh realities of life, making sure their “happy world” stays that way. It’s the kind of effortless performance that made him a star but it isn’t all surface charm and wit. Under his furrowed brow is a real love for Florence that extends beyond the perks of being married to one of the city’s richest women. He genuinely loves her and that comes across every time he glances in her direction. If it’s not a career best performance for Grant, it’s very close.
“Florence Foster Jenkins” is a story of devotion, passion and off key singing that, unlike its subject, hits all the right notes.
There’s a noise I hear in my head when I’m watching dryly-presented historical dramas. It’s a faint scratching sound that always reminds me of sitting in Mr. Parkers history class, listing to him write thousands of words on the chalkboard before saying, “Copy this into your scribblers and read chapter 3 by tomorrow.” I was reminded of the sound during a recent screening of the new Carey Mulligan film “Suffragette.”
Set in 1912 London, the movie stars Mulligan as Maud Watts, a young wife, mother and laundry worker. It’s a tough life for the twenty-eight year old, who has worked at the laundry since she was a little girl. Long hours leave little time for her family, husband Sonny (Ben Whishaw) and son George (Adam Michael Dodd), but they are a loving trio, at least until she meets Violet Miller (Anne-Marie Duff), a disciple of Emmeline Pankhurst (Meryl Streep), Britain’s leading suffragette.
In 1912 women were considered to not “have the temperament or the balance of mind” to take part in the political affairs. Following years of peaceful protest for equal rights the suffragettes begin a campaign of civil disobedience.
“You want to respect the law?” says Violet Miller. “Then make the law respectable!”
Maud becomes involved with the cause, helping Edith Ellyn (Helena Bonham Carter) blow up a Member of Parliament’s house and winding up in jail. Prison time was a badge of honour for the suffragettes, but Sonny wants nothing to do with it and soon Maud is separated from her family. With no legal recourse to get custody of her son she throws herself into the movement, fighting to get the vote and rights for women.
For a movie about rebellion “Suffragette” contains very little rebellious spirit. It’s a straightforward retelling of the story, a piece of history right out of Mr. Parker’s class. The only thing missing is the sound of Mr. Parker writing it out on the chalkboard.
It is a well-intentioned retelling of an important and still timely story but director Sarah Gavron leans too heavily on the kitchen sink drama—and a dull visual palette of beiges and reddish browns—for the broader story of the fight for women’s rights to have the impact it deserves.
“It’s deeds not words that will get us the vote,” and Gavron shows us the deeds—including the infamous mailbox bombings and a truly hard to watch prison force-feeding—but by the time the end credits roll there are story threads dangling all over the place and while we’re left impressed by the performances, the story telling itself is less impressive.
The title of the new Meryl Streep movie, “Ricki and the Flash,” sounds like a comic book flick about a regular, but spunky teen and the DC Comic character known for super human speed. No, Streep hasn’t joined the ranks of elder actors lending credibility to superhero movies and there’s not a skintight red superhero outfit in sight. Instead, there’s the black leather and fringes of Meryl’s rock ‘n’ roll Ricki, lead singer of bar band The Flash.
Ricki is a rock ‘n’ roll road warrior who never cracked the big time. Twenty five years ago she left behind her comfortable Midwestern life and family—husband (Kevin Kline) and three kids (including Julie, played by Streep’s real-life daughter Mamie Gummer)—for a shot at stardom in Los Angeles. Her one album didn’t chart and now she staves off bankruptcy by day as a grocery clerk, by night playing Golden Oldie covers in a seedy San Fernando Valley bar.
Out of the blue her ex gives her a ring with bad news. Julie’s husband has left her for a younger woman and he’d like her to come to Ohio to comfort her distraught daughter. Despite not having seen Julie in years she returns. Cue the family drama as Ricki tries to make amends for choosing rock and roll over her family.
Streep may not be playing a superhero in “Ricki and the Flash,” but she does a superhuman job of carrying the movie. Ricki is a raw nerve who says what’s on her mind whether she’s on stage or off, and Meryl rocks it. She strums and hums her way through a contrived script by “Juno” writer Diablo Cody that doesn’t add much to the family drama or rock movie genres.
Kline, Rick Springfield and Gummer hit the right notes, but are saddled with dialogue that sounds melodramatically overwritten—“My heart is dead and rotten,” sobs Julie.—or like a Successstory platitude—“It doesn’t matter if you kids love you,” says Springfield, “it’s your job to love them.” Missing are Cody’s usual wit and director Jonathan Demme’s careful examination of his characters. Instead they’ve opted for a blandly crowd-pleasing movie that isn’t as crowd-pleasing as they might have hoped.
“Ricki and the Flash” is about the power of music to break down barriers and bring people together, but as well shot as the music scenes are—and they should be, Demme made one of the great music films of all time, “Stop Making Sense,” among many others—the movie hits the wrong notes when the music stops.
