OSCARS: As we head into the final stretch, Best Picture is down to the wire

(Searchlight)

In my Oscar column back on December 21 (as in, before even nominations were announced), I wrote the following:

The correlation between high nomination totals and who wins is undeniable, and indicates broadly that people vote what they know. And unlike Argo, which grossed hundreds of millions of dollars domestically, Boyhood is an extremely small film with a campaigner in IFC that is very new at this “awards” game. So I wonder: can Boyhood sustain its frontrunner status? … The only film that’s been performing well that will earn substantial nominations is Birdman. It’s a technical achievement with a deep cast – Michael Keaton, Edward Norton and Emma Stone all appear good for a nomination – and an inventive screenplay. But it’s also weird and atypical. No Oscar pundit is betting on Birdman for exactly what it is – a tone- and genre-defying mash-up rooted in satire. That doesn’t scream “Oscar!” but, then again, in this year’s climate not much does.

Perhaps I should have taken that a little more seriously. A vast majority of pundits, especially following wins at the Golden Globes and Critics’ Choice Awards, had lined up behind Boyhood as the likely Best Picture winner. And what could defeat it? Why, an agreeable historical biopic with the might of Harvey Weinstein behind it, in The Imitation Game.

Birdman is the only film other than Boyhood to aggressively and uniformly hit the precursor circuit (that is, earn acting, directing, writing and picture nominations). It was the frontrunner right under our noses – Too weird? It’s making more money than Boyhood. Too comedic? Its production values eschew any limitation there, considering Boyhood’s bare-bones approach – and, after a rather shocking Best Picture win with the Producers Guild of America (PGA), and a more-expected victory from the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), Birdman is, indeed, the movie to beat.

This race is far from over – though at this point, it looks to be between two films, as Imitation needed either SAG or PGA to demonstrate sufficient support – and there are a few keys to see just how far ahead Birdman is. We have two major guilds left to vote: the Writers Guild of America (WGA), where Birdman was ineligible, and the Directors Guild of America (DGA), where both Alejandro G. Inarritu and Richard Linklater compete. On the WGA side, a Boyhood win might actually be crucial; if it’s defeated by The Grand Budapest Hotel there, we’ll see that Boyhood is lacking overriding support from most every major area. As for DGA, Inarritu defeating Linklater – which suddenly makes a whole lot of sense, given the technical audacity of Birdman – will signify a “game over” much as Tom Hooper defeating David Fincher did in 2011. But Best Director feels like Linklater’s to lose, even if Birdman is out front – is a Picture/Director split ripe to occur for the third year in a row?

I had noted in that previously-excerpted column post that Birdman was the only movie among the frontrunners to appeal to a diversity of groups and earn a substantial amount of nominations (by previous winners’ standards). But that it won an award voted on by producers – the group that historically goes for the more conservative choice (King’s Speech) over the bolder one (Social Network) – is extremely significant. PGA has successfully forecast the Best Picture winner every year since 2007 – and has never been wrong since adopting a preferential voting method, similar to the Oscars – but, then again, DGA has done so successfully since 2006, and since 2001 excluding 2005 (Ang Lee, in the horrible Brokeback Mountain defeat). Birdman as a frontrunner could be a false narrative – Boyhood’s miniscule budget is not generally PGA-friendly and Birdman may have squeaked through an immensely-tight slate, while its cast was easily out front for SAG as American Hustle’s was last year – and WGA/DGA will tell us if this is for real. Until then, we’ve got a genuine race.

This is a good thing, because every acting category appears sewn up. Eddie Redmayne beat Michael Keaton at SAG, which, given his reputation among actors, is where he really needed to triumph. That Redmayne, a relative unknown, was able to overtake Keaton’s comeback narrative for an award given out by fellow actors is indicative of how strong he is here. Julianne Moore, J.K. Simmons and Patricia Arquette, meanwhile, are so dominant in their respective acting categories that at this point absolutely nothing could get in the way. Arquette’s speeches have been relatively sub-par – and by that, I mean, Simmons and Moore have been remarkably affable and genuine, speech after speech – but, luckily for her, the competition in Best Supporting Actress is especially weak.

The screenplay categories are really intriguing, though. The race to Best Original Screenplay only starts with the WGA winner; the Oscar contest will be between whoever that is and Birdman. Birdman seems like a logical choice, but this would be a great chance for the Academy to recognize Wes Anderson for the first time, in the same way they pulled out for Spike Jonze of Her even though American Hustle was a stronger player. Meanwhile, in Adapted Screenplay, the obvious pick would be the only real Oscar player in the category, The Imitation Game, but there’s plenty of room to surprise. Damien Chazelle is a type-A wunderkind with a beloved screenplay under his belt; I could see voters pulling for Whiplash in that category, if Imitation is ultimately weaker than early surveying seemed to suggest (which, given its blanking at every award ceremony left and right, is a definite possibility). The problem: Whiplash is chanceless at WGA, as it is competing in Original, so its strength is a big question mark. And given the preferential system of it all, could Paul Thomas Anderson soak up a bunch of #1 votes and drive into a major upset? It is, after all, what got him a surprising nomination.

And who knows how BAFTA could shake things up. BAFTA works best as a barometer of shifts in momentum, since it doles out awards weeks later than SAG and the Globes – this could be especially important in a year such as this. Will Boyhood support reignite? Is Birdman on an unstoppable roll? I’ll check back in after the dust has settled with final predictions, answering these questions with as much “evidence” as is available. But, blessedly, this might be a race that goes down unsolved until the Big Night. Wouldn’t that be a nice change of pace?

FEATURE: On the success of AMERICAN SNIPER and EMPIRE

/Variety

If network television is thought to be stuck, considering past ideas that are now ineffective (testing, pilot season) and trying out cable models that don’t translate well to the broadcast model (the “event” series, from Hostages to Gracepoint), studio moviemaking is embracing an unfortunate future. As has been written about extensively, whether in a recent, widely-shared essay by film historian Mark Harris or in critic David Denby’s acclaimed (and aptly titled) 2012 book Do Movies Have a Future?, executives aren’t investing in artistry because they don’t need to. All they need is to load up on comic book and young adult (YA) novel adaptations – some of which have merit, a majority of which do not – and they’ll see profits soar.

American Sniper has been intensely divisive in recent weeks along partisan and critical lines – this blog has contributed in its own way – and that has everything to do with its monstrous financial success. Clint Eastwood’s patriotic ode to American soldiers has broken box office records, and has generated so much word of mouth that a movie typically ill-fitting to the liberal Academy’s tastes scooped up a half-dozen Oscar nominations. But there’s a distinction that must be drawn. American Sniper has enjoyed fair critical success – its 73% Rotten Tomatoes score is the lowest of all 2014 Best Picture nominees, and lower than anything nominated last year – and has managed to, unlike just about everything else in the world, unite the opinions of Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.

Sniper’s opening weekend haul of $89.2 million ranks only below the following 2014 films (in order): The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1; Transformers: Age of Extinction; Captain America: The Winter Soldier; Guardians of the Galaxy; Godzilla; The Amazing Spider-Man 2; and X-Men: Days of Future Past. It doesn’t take a film scholar to understand the significance – every movie on that list aside from two is a sequel, with Guardians being the latest comic book adaptation and Godzilla the latest blockbuster Hollywood remake (for reference, ranking after American Sniper is another sequel in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, which comes in far lower at $72 million). And, conversely, look at the Oscar nominees: American Sniper, at $60 million, had more than twice the budget of any of the seven other Best Picture nominees – and second-in-line, The Grand Budapest Hotel, comes from an indie darling if there ever was one, Wes Anderson. Six of the eight nominees are considered, by the formal standards of Film Independent, independent films.

In short, Sniper bridges a divide, the only remnant of an artistically-minded Hollywood picture in this year’s race. Gone Girl was a big hit, boosted by its wildly-popular source material and Ben Affleck’s starry presence (and, yes, good reviews) – but it was too dark for the Academy, and its unprecedented success stands out as an anomaly. The other films close to a Best Picture nod were box office duds from well-reviewed auteurs – Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher and Dan Gilroy’s Nightcrawler – while expected contender Interstellar, from Christopher Nolan, disappointed critically and didn’t make as big a box office dent as expected. American Sniper is the success story Hollywood needs: it’s a movie from a distinguished director and invested in amply by a studio (though Steven Spielberg was originally attached, and walked out feeling $60 million wasn’t enough to make the movie) that fared exceptionally well at the box office.

On television, the success story right now is FOX’s Empire. From feature-film writer Danny Strong (of Game Change and The Butler) and Oscar-nominated director Lee Daniels (Precious), it’s a soapy, campy foray into the hip-hop world – and is also transgressive, both for its predominantly black cast (with Oscar-nominated stalwarts Terrence Howard, Taraji P. Henson and Gabourey Sidibe) and its depiction of gay characters. And that’s in both complexity and the actual visualization of love between people of the same sex; unlike in Modern Family, two men kiss by the end of episode one. Empire is a part of a larger conversation about shows casting black leads and emerging as breakout hits – ABC’s Black-ish is the one new sitcom to really break out critically and commercially, while the Shonda Rhimes-produced How to Get Away with Murder, starring Viola Davis, is a pulpy dramatic smash – but it’s outpaced everything else via its week-to-week-to-week ratings gains. It’s posting the kind of numbers, and boasting the kind of momentum, that broadcast networks have all but given up on.

I have screened the pilot of Empire, and it delivers on its promise as a profoundly-uneven, incredibly-fun fusion of Dynasty and King Lear that features an A-list cast at the top of their game. What really struck me, though, was its deft handling of Jamal (Jussie Smollett, a standout), the openly gay son of a hip hop mogul whose talents and aspirations had never been taken seriously (because of the historic animosity toward gay men within the black community). Where Empire can go over the top or a little preachy, Jamal is grounded as a fascinating, unique and human character, encountering prejudice and internalizing homophobia in a way very recognizable, yet hitherto hardly even skimmed over in popular art. The show has the trappings of a hit – it’s sexy, volatile and conflict-heavy – but, without question, its booming popularity is strongly correlated to its originality. Empire looks and feels like nothing else on television, and anyone thinking that has nothing to do with its mega-success is a little off.

Of course, qualitatively, Empire has found about as much favor with critics as American Sniper. The difference is in the audience – in why they’re successful. The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee has had to formally react to death threats against Arabs and Muslims that have come out of American Sniper viewings – similar vitriol has been thrown at small-scale critics of the film that don’t usually reach that wide (or that varied) of an audience, including Drew McWeeny of Hitfix. Reports have been clear that American Sniper’s box office bravado came to be because conservative moviegoers came in bunches, in the same way Christianity-themed films from last year including Son of God and Heaven is For Real overperformed. I’m less interested in that, however, than in the disconnect between general fans of the film and the critics in its favor. Consider Richard Roeper: “American Sniper isn’t some flag-waving political movie. It’s a powerful, intense portrayal of a man who was hardly the blueprint candidate to become the most prolific sniper in American military history.” Joshua Rothkopf of Time Out dubbed it “a superbly subtle critique,” while Steve Persall of the Tampa Bay Times said it was “Less concerned with action heroism than the consequences of deadly action, how it chips away at the living.”

Obviously, an audience does not have to like a movie for the same reason critics do, and praise that has gone Sniper’s way is substantially related to its ambiguity. But the audience defensiveness of American Sniper has been uncharacteristically strong and passionate – and in unusually large numbers – even as these readings of the film differ so sharply with professional criticism that has praised it. Viewers are looking at Bradley Cooper’s Chris Kyle as an American hero that dare not be insulted, even if that insult comes in the form of a harsh critique of the movie. I don’t mean to generalize, but American Sniper has undeniably risen from a hit to a mega-hit on these types of takeaways – the kind that actually devalue its artistry. This is the point, then: what does it take for a non-franchise, adult movie to really break box office waves now? Just last year, Gravity was an awe-inspiring piece of work, as big a hit as it was a risky investment. But the economy of Hollywood is changing, and worsening for artists needing substantial budgets, by the year. I wonder what it says: that Sniper was the only one to really break through, and that it did so not because of moviegoers transfixed by the film’s craft or methods or even story, but rather its real-life subject and perceived intent. And what does this say about the future of the Hollywood economy?

These kinds of conversations can range into pompous, irritating territory – but the arguments are important. It’s important to see how few movies have the chance to reach the success of an American Sniper as we push on further into this Century, and how few among them really reach “successful” numbers. Hollywood isn’t losing anything, businesswise, in this new moviemaking culture. And I don’t think Sniper points to it taking any steps in the right direction, either.

But look at Empire, and look at the explosion of possibilities on television still being tested out. Two people of the same gender, kissing affectionately in a Hollywood movie? Point to one in 2014. Of the Best Picture nominees – and, by the way, one is based on the life of an openly, active gay person – not one comes close. Nor do other “Oscar” movies that didn’t quite make the cut. But big hits on television, from Orange Is the New Black to House of Cards to now Empire (as well as more niche offerings like Transparent and Please Like Me) are going so much further than that, bending questions of race and sexuality and gender while also soaring in quality and execution (with House of Cards, for instance, the huge success of that show is totally unrelated to its treatment of Frank Underwood’s sexuality). But with Empire, its success is rooted both in its lavish and soapy exterior, and its fresh arguments about race, class and sex. And we’re seeing that all over television right now; we’re seeing TV go to so many new places. In bending form, HBO’s anthology True Detective was a breakout hit; in exploring women’s racial and sexual identities, Orange Is the New Black emerged as a phenomenon; and in tapping into very real geopolitical fears, Homeland’s debut season was a critical and commercial knockout.

And that’s the difference. The trending #Oscarssowhite generated a serious conversation not about Academy biases, but about industry issues. And television itself has a long way to go. But we’re seeing the two head in profoundly different directions – the Screen Actors Guild acting and ensemble award nominees sufficiently demonstrate that – and it’s made no clearer than by the current hits of the big- and small-screen, respectively. American Sniper is the only non-franchise, adult film to hit the top 10 in 2014 opening weekends – but it’s not encouraging anything. It’s stagnant, a success not for taking chances or probing artistically but for its appeal to moviegoers that tend not to flock to the cinema as frequently. Empire, however, is the latest to push television into exciting, vital and unexplored new territory. It is bringing in actors with diminishing film opportunities to sink their teeth into fantastic characters on TV. Right now, this is the place where original, innovative storytelling can not only be made, but be seen, and make a real dent in American popular culture.

Film review: NIGHTCRAWLER

/Indiewire

Nightcrawler, the debut feature from writer-director Dan Gilroy, situates a legitimate sociopath in an American institution that allows him to thrive: broadcast news. Louis Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal) is, from the outset, acutely-measured and emotionally-distant; that he’s not “all there” is a given from minute one, not a character revelation Gilroy wishes to tease out. Louis is defiantly disinterested in an ethical code, or in relationships that extend beyond something purely transactional – he lacks the moral and emotional capacity necessary to develop more sensitive ways of thinking. But he views his work as a typical vocation – making money, contending with competition, navigating office politics – and in Gilroy’s twisted world, he’s just the man to do it.

Nightcrawler maximizes on this innovative idea, while also, to some extent, squandering it. The movie is a pitch-black Los Angeles noir that builds in energy and in thrills, and maintains a magnetism from beginning to end courtesy of Gyllenhaal’s enthrallingly manic performance. And Gilroy’s work is polished and tight, stringing together a genuinely suspenseful thriller while also taking advantage of cinematographer Robert Elswitt’s (Inherent Vice) sublime contributions. Elswitt’s nighttime Los Angeles is a far cry away from his marijuana-tinted version of the city in Vice; his work here resists visual flourish. But Gilroy and Elswitt’s aesthetic evokes something impenetrably uncertain, mining light exclusively from surrounding police cars and fire trucks and often racing through the wide-open, post-midnight Los Angeles freeways with brazen intensity. Los Angeles is a breeding ground for subversive filmmaking; Elswitt has, in 2014, effectively spun the city in a new direction with Vice, and stripped himself to go for a murky, unsettling mood with Nightcrawler. Both efforts are terrific.

Nightcrawler is always involving – and occasionally breathtaking – for the sheer merit of its creative team. Between Gyllenhaal and Gilroy and Editor John Gilroy (father to Dan), the final product is so smooth and so expertly-calibrated that it’s hard to fathom a first-time filmmaker was at its helm. He had help: father John and brother Tony, most notably the director of Michael Clayton, are producers along with Gyllenhaal. After working in Denis Villeneuve’s Prisoners and Enemy – films of tremendous aesthetic merit – it’s not hard to imagine Gyllenhaal relaying a little bit of that experience to Dan Gilroy. And Tony Gilroy’s influence is similarly undeniable: Michael Clayton boasts a similar sleekness and meticulously-ratcheting tension.

In Nightcrawler, Louis Bloom enlists the help of a desperate, homeless young teen named Richard (Riz Ahmed, fantastic), and begins freelancing footage of local crime to a flailing news station. Its Director, played with biting wit and a long-departed soul by Rene Russo, throws more and more money his way as the footage’s effectiveness becomes clear. But Louis has set himself a higher bar: he’s suddenly messing with crime scenes, and eventually investigations, so his role as videographer can meet demand and maintain a vitality. The final forty minutes of Nightcrawler are its best: Louis withholds information about two murderers on the loose, fabricating a narrative through his footage and, thus, for the public. The steadfast brilliance of Gyllenhaal is the matter-of-factness with which he plays these scenes. Louis’ choices are directly responsible for the deaths of many, and yet, he’s just doing his job, completely removed from any moral dilemma; and Russo’s Director, on the “sane” end of the spectrum, doesn’t seem the least bit interested in how, exactly, he’s acquiring such irresistible footage.

Within Nightcrawler’s conceit is a potentially ravishing exploration of news-media and of suburban anxiety. It teeters around Network’s ruthless satire, with Russo going for slightly more villainy than – and just as much shamelessness as – Faye Dunaway; Louis’ surveying of the Los Angeles nighttime streets is, meanwhile, undeniably in the orbit of Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver. What separates those two, and others, from Nightcrawler is the levity that underscores their, respectively, satirical and suspenseful exteriors. Dan Gilroy’s work is comparatively hollow, without the serious inquiry that so often informed the work of Sidney Lumet, or still does inform Martin Scorsese’s filmography. The choices are unusual – the use of local news feels a tad misguided in today’s media economy, given the diminished stakes various networks are contending with. And we do live in the get-there-first culture, within it the Twitter-verse and the explosion of shoddy online journalism. Nightcrawler’s disinterest in this is okay – the movie, at its best, has a timeless, classical sensation – but the hyperbolic progression of the narrative doesn’t serve it especially well. Abstract moments that intently focus on Gyllenhaal’s character imply a rich conveyance, and yet not nothing is really being communicated. At the news station, for instance, he’ll stare at the photographed backdrop of the LA skyline and ramble, “It all looks so real from here.” But there’s no legitimate provocation here – just the thought processes of a madman.

Nightcrawler can also feel somewhat claustrophobic. At the news station, it’s usually Gyllenhaal and Russo, exchanging video and money with a deliberate lack of conscience. When it comes time for “Should we use this ethically-dubious footage?” Mad Men’s Kevin Rahm comes in to play what is exclusively an ethics talking head, rather pointlessly explaining the journalistic issues with what is being done. The hand here is just too obvious, Russo a monstrous negotiator on one end and Rahm a saintly preserver of journalistic integrity on the other.

There may be a false promise here; the media satire and nighttime surveying eerily calls to Network and Taxi Driver, a pair of 70s classics that Nightcrawler is most definitely not. The movie works best as a superbly-crafted thriller, and really, Gilroy’s overarching idea probes – and thus sustains – enough. He, with perfectly-portioned doses of humor and intrigue, comes to the conclusion that a sociopathic cipher like Louis can find a home and succeed in the broadcast news business, in a culture where story outweighs truth. The movie may not contend with this on a more serious level, or engage with it in more sociopolitical terms, but for a ride as engaging as Nightcrawler, that’s forgivable. And I like what the movie says about human value. Moments of real emotional weight occur between Louis and Richard, whose fate seems sadly destined. He comes from an area that Louis is told doesn’t matter – any place that doesn’t elicit fear in well-off suburbanites is not of interest to the local news business – and thus he’s an accessory. Nightcrawler intelligently asks questions about lives that seem to matter more than others; it’s the one area where Nightcrawler’s strength consistently extends beyond its skeletal virtues.

And when all else fails, Gyllenhaal is always a compelling, grounding force. He is the movie, and that’s a blessing for Gilroy – Louis Bloom is such a fascinating creation physically, mentally and emotionally, and Gyllenhaal simultaneously renders him an alien and an apt cog in a morally-obtuse machine. There’s an unpredictability to his ominous performance that elevates in dread; Gilroy and his team are terrific craftsmen, but it’s Gyllenhaal that provides the film with a deliciously twisted sense of humanity. And thus the movie, with Elswitt’s luminous lensing and Gilroy’s strong sense of pace in tow, is always working on some level. Even at its most hollow, Nightcrawler is richly-atmospheric noir.

Grade: B+

Review: NIGHTCRAWLER

Nightcrawler is Tony Gilroy’s – the brother of Michael Clayton director Dan Gilroy - debut film, a fun drive through the murky and hazy streets of nighttime Los Angeles, where loners and creeps and sociopaths feed the world violence on the local news circuit. Okay, it’s not a Network or Taxi Driver, even if the film feels like a synchronization of both. It’s more pulpy than intelligent, fantastical and thrilling rather than poignant and relevant commentary, riddled with odd skirmishes and adrift souls.

Louis Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal) is eager to learn about the culture of work, but he’s homeless and scavenges copper and metals anywhere he finds it. “We don’t hire thieves,” he’s told by the yard manager when he attempts to get hired. A central tension of the film – his desire to succeed and gain control – is planted here, coloring his next encounter with a burning car and a camera crew led by the gruff Bill Paxton. From him, he learns what freelancing video production is and, like a Travis Bickle, channels his inner emptiness and insomniac tendencies into this line of work.

He’s an obsessively confident fellow, with no ability to connect to others. He’s a Joycean figure, a Leopold Bloom, a man with no identity and affiliations, who eats “the inner organs of beasts and fowls” yet is as hollow as they come. Mr. Gyllenhall succeeds in crafting an unfeeling character, a tightly wound and ambitious sociopath, intent on filming what he wants, where he wants without even considering the moral lines he crosses to get the best footage.

The film plays out as a Travis Bickle fantasy. Instead of the adoration by Taxi’s end being in Travis’s head (arguably), Lou receives praise the harder he works for boss Nina (Rene Russo). His gutsy risk-taking and economical acumen, as well as his gonzo journalistic footage, draw her in further into his clutches.

We can say this movie is about obsessive media culture and sociopathy, but I honestly kept thinking Nightcrawler to be most fascinated with the nature of internships and work hierarchy. In the age of the unpaid internship, Nightcrawler comically gives us the boss you never want to have, an entitled monster who happens to be at once talented, greedy, manipulative and manic. Rick (Riz Ahmed) is a homeless man hired by Lou as an intern for his nightly roundabouts. With police scanners and a speedy red car, they work on getting the juiciest videos they can. Rick, like us, doesn’t know anything about this guy. He’s just so convincing, you actually think he is who he says he is.

Lou threatening Nina in a Mexican restaurant is the film’s most disturbing scene. Their sipping margheritas while anxiously waiting for their food is primetime for Lou to blackmail her for sex; he tells her that she needs him if she doesn’t want to lose her two year contract. She’s speechless, as are we, yet she’s unable to tell him to get lost. This is his leverage: even if he’s crazy, he gives her some can't-miss footage.

Gyllenhall’s articulation and agitated gait give him a levity and ease as he goes around town, filming the city. He videotapes a murder scene, undiscovered by police, without any regard for the bodies around him. He orchestrates a police shootout with the killers to get good footage. Some might say the critique Gilroy is making is not particularly relevant. Where I might to tend to agree, and where I think Nightcrawler overextends, are in the various scenes that occur in the newsroom between Nina and her boss (played by Kevin Rahm). Rather than complement the film’s insanity, they give it a Network vibe which doesn’t feel too inspired; despite lacking in convincing and engaging contemporary commentary, Nightcrawler embraces its vintage exterior with confidence (God, Robert Elswitt, what a year for you sir!). Some of its grander ideas and arguments about media and sociopathy, as I mentioned, are a bit underdeveloped, but, within the larger scope of the film, this doesn’t detract from the experience.

Technology is purposefully absent in this fantastical Los Angeles where your sharp wits and dirty tricks are the keys to success. Nightcrawler is a finely-conceived, tightly-structured and oddly-comical fantasy thriller. In other words, it’s everything Gone Girl isn’t.

And, as for the ending: let’s hope those interns find themselves in Lou’s good graces, or else!

Grade: B+ to A-

Film review: INTO THE WOODS

(Disney)

While Les Misérables (2012) is two and a half hours of torture, Into the Woods is good in its first half, overlong and dour in its second. Rob Marshall directed my favorite movie musical, Chicago, but has not managed to create a decent film since. Into the Woods showed a lot of potential in its first act – it was stylish, fun and catchy. The witch (Meryl Streep, always great) tells a childless baker and his wife that she will lift the curse of bareness if they find for her four items: a cape as red as blood, a golden shoe, a strand of hair as yellow as corn, and a cow as white as milk.

The problem is that the movie loses steam. Rob Marshall’s directing feels overly staged and constrained even if he manages to set the right tone at the beginning. But this mess of a film isn’t entirely his fault – it’s Sondheim’s story, which really does not lend itself to the screen at all, and songs which barely feel motivated. It’s a production which is all style and no substance, and the weakness of the source material comes out here. Its writing that attempts to be a clever fairy-tale retelling, but becomes nothing more than a slog by its final act.

Sondheim choices that come off as strange: the Rapunzel character, the death of Jack’s mother, the death of Little Red Riding Hood’s mother and grandmother. Into The Woods is supposed to be macabre, but it just feels lazy. Too many balls are being juggled where, by the time we’re farther along in the movie, everything happening feels too disjointed. The lack of coherency and the pushy melodrama prevent this film from rolling along in an entertaining manner.

The writing, therefore, does not merit any great performances. The immaculate Christine Baranski is hilarious as the evil stepmother. Emily Blunt and Meryl Streep eke out some solid performances from the thin roles they're given. Chris Pine is fine as the prince. Other than that, the casting feels uninspired. Johnny Depp’s cameo is bizarre and odd, resulting in an off number, which should be more more fun than it is. Daniel Huttlestone as a cockneye Jack is less grating than in Les Miserables but, nonetheless, his performance is one-note and outright annoying by the third act. Anna Kendrick proves that even good actresses, when given bad material, can be plain. If there’s one substantial criticism of the ensemble, it’s that they have no genuine chemistry.

I’m such a pissy pants. The musical has a little bit of charm. Stay for thirty minutes and then leave. But if you stay longer, be warned: it just gets longer and more pointless. I don’t know what I would have changed. I know the original is supposed to be more violent, but so what? It wouldn’t change the main problems. It never entirely falls apart, as David concludes in his brief. But the film adaptation is a flat and uninspired mess by the time the orphaned children gather around their new parents, losing its grasp on whatever it wanted to be.  

Grade: C-

FEATURE: American Sniper, American fascism

/Variety

American Sniper wants to sell conscientious jingoism. It’s attempting to appeal to both camps of viewers, people passionate about military intervention in the Middle East and people critical of over-zealous American foreign policy. Chris Kyle is a fervent patriot, but leaves the war damaged and wounded. He dedicated his life afterwards to assisting wounded veterans, and was killed by one on a hunting trip. He’s considered an American hero by many.

American Sniper has stirred a lot of controversy. As a result of our country’s conflation of support-our-troops-patriotism and conservatism, many have spoken out and called Eastwood’s Sniper pro-right propaganda. Seth Rogen and Michael Moore have slammed it; on the other side, Joe Biden reportedly was in tears by the end of the film. The ambiguous morality of Sniper reveals how much of a politician director Clint Eastwood needed to be to make this movie; in an industry dominated by liberals and a target audience comprising of conservatives, Eastwood found himself having to balance both perspectives. 

A fine line exists for war movies. Kathryn Bigelow – the master of the contemporary war picture – gave us Zero Dark Thirty and The Hurt Locker, two pieces which successfully balanced the costs of war with the pragmatism of the battlefield. But prominent liberal Bill Maher – the popular host of HBO’s Real Time – denounced Zero Dark Thirty for endorsing torture. Maher found himself ironically, on January 16, with Bigelow on his panel, discussing the glorification of the sniper in American Sniper: “I had some issues with it… this rah, rah, shit…” As a fan of Maher’s show (sometimes), I found his commentary on this issue incredibly inconsistent. Does that mean every war movie that depicts, without judgment, issues with which we are uncomfortable an immediate glorification? Isn’t the point of art to deal with what we find most upsetting, to give us that cathartic space to explore the moral ambiguities of the battlefield?

On the other hand, people find themselves obliged to defend this movie by any means necessary. This is disturbing as well. I am troubled by the casual force imposed upon these Iraqi citizens in Eastwood’s film. I am disgusted by its conflation of the enemies that came out of 9/11 and caused our invasion of Iraq. The film’s adoration of gun culture left me a little unsettled.

Despite all this, let’s get real: this is not one of Eastwood's better films. He does not handle his subject well, reveling in unsubstantiated ambiguity. It does feel political to some extent. Eastwood emotionally strangleholds you, forces you to have sympathy for his subject rather than exploring him.

David sums up my thoughts on American Sniper succinctly, even if I'm a little more negative on it. It is not well-observed, but sloppily structured: the fighting scenes feel like a video-game, and the whole thing amounts to something overwhelmingly bland. Honestly, I don’t really care about Chris Kyle. If he’s a good person or a bad person, I truly don’t care; the film didn't do nearly enough in that regard.

Not because of my politics. In spite of my politics. I shouldn’t be watching a movie about the Iraq War, an issue loaded with politics and controversy and meaning, and feel like I’m watching a movie made in 2004. Yet I did, and it happens to be more popular than ever. American Sniper broke box office records by earning $105 million in its first weekend opening. It got nominations in Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay. Jane Fonda was touched by the film, according to her Twitter account.

I can’t get behind a film – or defend it in any capacity – when an obligation exists to honor it. This is fascism. When people look at art as resource to justify their narrow perspectives on life and war, that doesn’t upset me. It’s when a seasoned director like Clint Eastwood purports his picture as a litmus test of patriotism. Depiction is not endorsement, but filmmakers that purposefully obscure and gloss over morally questionable choices are artists that I find to be incredibly suspect.

I am clearly not comparing Eastwood or Republicans, the Iraq War or George Bush, to Nazis; an equivalence does not exist there. (In any case, this idea applies irrespective of political leanings). The Nazis looked toward art – morally obtuse, intently solipsistic works of war art, purposefully apolitical as requested by the Fuher – to justify their narrow-minded and extraordinarily evil perspectives. Hitler believed art was separate from politics, and art served to portray the ideal world, the world as posited by Nazi philosophy.

American Sniper is not skittish. Its supposed conscientious jingoism sells a worldview, makes vague what many of us are forced to contend with. How did our involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan damage these communities? How does our intensely-patriotic culture fuel hatred and breed malice in the Middle East, a place we are purportedly supposed to be helping? 

That American Sniper is getting this amount of attention shocks me, mainly because of how little it says. The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty functioned as thought-provoking meditations on country and man, the mental and physical costs of war and obsession. They have original and thought-provoking perspectives, irrespective of who specifically is watching and what their political/military connections are. American Sniper invites you into its grey area, ignores an incredibly disturbing story and forces you to accept its moral preoccupations as patriotism. Give me something more, Clint: with American Sniper as is, this is something I cannot do.

Film brief: INTO THE WOODS

(Disney)

Is Rob Marshall a one-trick pony? His latest musical, Into the Woods, ostensibly gets the important stuff right. Despite being fashioned by Disney for family audiences, this adaptation retains the original production’s darker themes and plot twists, and consistently maintains an admirable faithfulness. But while the innovative and unique ideas successfully translate to screen, Marshall is unable to bring along the original Sondheim magic. He unwisely returns to his Chicago-style of staging and filming, one that favors fluidity over grandeur. It works alright in the film’s first half, alive with rich performances from Emily Blunt, Meryl Streep and scene-stealers Chris Pine and Christine Baranski – but, like the musical, there’s an abrupt restart in action and tone. Marshall is overmatched by the transition, resorting to the same tricks and unsurprisingly yielding fast-diminishing returns. Even in the opening minutes, Marshall can’t quite thread the musical’s many disparate parts together, an issue magnified as the film’s excessive running-time begins to wear. With impressive production design and a collection of actors at the top of their game, Into the Woods never completely falls apart. But it never completely works, either. C