Please Make Me Look Pretty (2020) ☆☆☆(3/4): Her lovely caricatures

Posted on June 24, 2022 by kaist455

South Korean documentary film “Please Make Me Look Pretty” looks into the plain but lovely artistry of one young disabled woman who simply loves to draw. While her numerous drawings are its main attraction, the documentary also presents a frank and intimate human portrayal to be appreciated, and we come to see her life and personality more besides her disability.

When the documentary shows us Jeong Eun-hye for the first time, we can clearly recognize her developmental disorder right from her distinctive appearance. Due to Down’s syndrome, she looks like a big chubby child with the apparent signs of relatively low intelligence, and she certainly depends a lot on the care and attention from her mother, who often has to handle Eun-hye tactfully whenever they begin another day of their life.

Because there was no one to give her a job after graduating from her special school, Eun-hye had no choice but to work as a janitor at a local kindergarten, but then she came onto something to interest her a lot. After watching those kids freely drawing pictures, she decided to try to draw for herself, and that was the beginning of her artistic passion.

While subsequently working at a local rehabilitation center for the disabled, Eun-hye started to draw caricatures of people at a local market which is held in her hometown once a month. While constantly accompanied with her mother or her carer, she quickly drew the caricatures for many customers willing to pay her a bit, and, what do you know, her caricatures became pretty popular within a short period.

Although she needed some more practice at first, it did not take much time for Eun-hye to improve and then hone her skills. As she kept drawing, her caricatures came to have more artistic qualities, and we see how she can draw one caricature within around 20 minutes. While she often becomes exhausted as she and her mother receive more and more requests, she keeps going nonetheless, and that is not changed at all regardless of whether it is too hot or cold outside. She remains mostly cheerful, and everyone in the market is happy to see her whenever she walks here and there in the market during her occasional free time.

When she came to more than 1,000 caricatures with her mother’s full support, Eun-hye had a little exhibition of her works. Although she and her mother clash with each other a bit on her attire for the opening event, they eventually come to the exhibition under good mood, and the opening event turns out to be fairly successful as many people come to see her works.

Meanwhile, as shown from the early part of the documentary, Eun-hye also applied for the workshop for disabled artists in Seoul. Fortunately for her, she got accepted into the workshop without much difficulty, and we subsequently see her cheerfully joining her fellow disabled artists. At one point, the camera shows her assigned to a little private place of her own for artistic activities, and she is certainly delighted about that.

After she advanced more with her artistic talent, Eun-hye came to have a joint exhibition along with several other disabled artists at an abandoned factory. At first, the factory merely looks dirty and shabby with all those broken machines and some other stuffs strewn around here and there, but then we see how its interior and exterior are changed step by step. In case one wall of the factory building, the big photographs of Eun-hye and one of her fellow disabled artists are pasted on it, and we can sense how special this exhibition is for them and several other disabled artists.

When the exhibition is opened to its visitors, the documentary looks around their various artworks for a while, and this reflective moment is further enhanced by the open performance of a local dance troupe. To be frank with you, I have no idea on how their dance is connected with those exhibited artworks, but it surely enhances the mood inside the factory, which looks and feels quite different from how it did at first.

One of the most touching moments in the documentary comes from when the camera shows how Eun-hye subsequently became much more active about her artistry after the exhibition. She eventually quit her job at that rehabilitation center for pursuing her artistic passion more, and then she begins to work at a little local art academy for young kids. We see her sincerely guiding one boy on how to draw his favorite superheroes, and I must say that I could not help but smile a bit as watching the final result.

On the whole, “Please Make Me Look Pretty”, directed by Seo Dong-il, is a plain but sincere presentation of one interesting artist to observe, and I admire how it handles its human subject with care and respect without any distracting condescension. As watching Eun-hye’s irrepressible artistic spirit and the wholehearted support and encouragement behind it, I came to reflect more on the importance of the social inclusion of the disabled, and the documentary is certainly all the more relevant considering how harsh and ignorant the South Korean society has been to the disabled for many years. In short, this is another good South Korean documentary of this year, and I assure you that you will want to get a caricature of yours from Eun-hye.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Good Luck to You, Leo Grande (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): Two different persons in the room

Posted on June 23, 2022 by kaist455

It is alternatively amusing and touching to observe the genuinely human interactions between the two very different lead characters of “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande”, which was released on Hulu in last week. Although most of the story is unfolded within one small place, the movie is constantly buoyed by the effortless chemistry between its two lead performers, and I appreciate how it deftly swings back and forth between comedy and drama from the beginning to the end.

Consisting of four chapters, the movie is about the relationship between a 52-year-old British widow played by Emma Thompson and a young handsome sex worker played by Daryl McCormack. As she confides to him during their first meeting, she, who presents herself as “Nancy Stokes”, has never experienced orgasm throughout her whole life in addition to having no fun or excitement with her deceased husband, and that is why she came to approach to this youthful sex worker, who works under the name of “Leo Grande”.

During her first meeting with Leo, Nancy often cannot help but become stiff and nervous for understandable reasons. Yes, she wants to explore sex and orgasm much more than she ever imagined before, but she was also afraid of only becoming silly and pathetic without success or satisfaction. As an experienced professional who has probably seen many women like Nancy, Leo tactfully and generously handles the situation while being ready for, uh, the next step, but she is still not so sure about whether this is really what she wants.

Anyway, though she keeps hesitating, Nancy manages to open herself to Leo bit by bit. Even before her unsatisfying married life with her rather boring husband, she was sexually repressed just like many other women of her generation, and she is also struggling with those cumbersome moral questions on her current circumstance. While she has really needed sex, she has also wanted to taste some youth, so that is why she hired Leo, but paying him to have sex with her still bothers her a lot.

In contrast, Leo is quite casual and confident about how he has earned his living. While not crossing the line between him and Nancy, he listens to Nancy with some care and understanding, and then, for leading Nancy more into her undiscovered territory, he comes to opens himself a little to her in response. Regardless of whether he is really sincere or not, he surely does as much as paid, and that eventually helps Nancy take her first small but significant step toward sexual pleasure and liberation.

As Nancy and Leo tentatively push and pull each other, the screenplay by Katy Brand often shines with wit and insight as carefully developing its two main characters step by step. I was particularly amused by how deliberately Leo uses some sophisticated words to impress and comfort Nancy, and I was also tickled a lot by how Nancy struggles to be more practical and straightforward about her sexual goals to be attained.

Under director Sophie Hyde’s skillful direction, a number of key scenes associated with sex in the film are handled with enough sensitivity and honesty. While you may laugh as observing Nancy fumbling after her growing desire, her bumpy quest for sexual quest is balanced well between humor and drama, and we come to care more about whether she can handle her tricky situation with Leo well enough to satisfy herself.

Things become rather complicated between Nancy and Leo when she is eventually quite enraptured as well as empowered by the happiness she has never experienced. She becomes more interested in getting closer to Leo in addition to getting more fun and excitement from him, and that is where Leo becomes a lot more guarded than before.

While it comes to lose some of its narrative momentum during its last chapter where it expands its small background a bit, the movie is still steadily held together by Thompson and McCormack, who dexterously complement each other’s acting without any misstep. As bringing considerable human qualities to her character, Thompson, who recently had her 63rd birthday, gives another stellar performance to be added to her long and distinguished acting career, and she also shows here that she can be as daring as, say, Helen Mirren. I will not go into details on one particular moment involved with nudity, but I can tell you instead that Thompson absolutely rules as conveying to us how her character comes to feel a lot better about herself than before.

On the opposite, newcomer Daryl McCormack is equally impressive as ably holding the ground for his co-star with graceful ease and confidence. Considering Thompson’s much more prominent status, it must have been pretty daunting for this young emerging Irish actor to act along with her in front of the camera, but he keeps surprising us as flawlessly interacting with Thompson throughout the film, and his character accordingly comes to us someone more than a hunky object of desire.

On the whole, “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande” is a delightful two-hander thanks to its two lead performers’ commendable efforts, and its frank and sensitive approach to its main subjects will surely remind you that sex matters to anyone regardless of age and gender. After all, it is never late as long as you are alive, isn’t it?

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Watcher (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): Is somebody watching her?

Posted on June 23, 2022 by kaist455

“Watcher” is a modest but effective psychological thriller film driven by one little insidious possibility. Although you will not be surprised much by what it will serve you along the plot, the movie did a fairly competent job of maintaining the sense of dread and anxiety till the expected climactic part, and I was entertained enough by that even though I could easily guess where the story is heading along with its terrified heroine.

The opening scene quickly establishes the circumstance surrounding a young married woman named Julia (Maika Monroe), who moves to Bucharest, Romania along with her Romanian American husband Francis (Karl Glusman) due to his company work. Although she cannot speak Romanian that much, she tries to adjust herself to this foreign environment as much as she can during her first several days in Bucharest, and she is also glad to live in a nice and cozy apartment along with her husband.

As her husband is often busy due to his work, Julia finds herself usually spending time in their apartment alone by herself. While she keeps trying to learn Romanian more, she is still a foreign woman frequently isolated by the language barrier, and the only consolation besides her husband comes from Irina (Madalina Anea), a young single woman who happens to be living right next to Julia and Francis’ apartment. Although their first encounter is not exactly pleasant, Irina later invites Julia to her residence, and Julia feels a little more relaxed than before thanks to Irina’s sincere hospitality.

However, Julia still cannot help but unnerved by something which has disturbed and annoyed her since her first day. Whenever she looks outside the big front window of the apartment after daytime, she feels like being watched by somebody out there, and this uneasy feeling seems to come from a mysterious figure living in the other apartment building facing hers. This figure simply stays still and quiet as looking outside, but Julia becomes more aware of this figure’s presence day by day, and her anxiety is all the more increased when she seems to be followed by this figure outside their neighborhood at one point.

Of course, Julia’s husband tries to be reasonable while calming her down as much as possible, but she only finds herself thrown into more anxiety and paranoia due to a certain dark possibility. Not long after she and her husband moved into the apartment building, one of the tenants, who happened to a young woman, was brutally murdered, and it looks like this terrible incident is connected with a certain local serious killer who has not been arrested yet. Is it possible that the figure supposedly stalking her is actually that serious killer in question? If so, is she actually the next target to be killed?

While the screenplay director/writer Chloe Okuno, which is developed from the story by co-producer Zack Ford, toys with these scary possibilities, the movie rolls out one creepy moment after another for increasing the level of tension around its heroine. In case of one suspenseful sequence unfolded outside the apartment building, we come to brace ourselves more and more as our heroine comes closer to possible dangers, and then there comes an unexpected moment of relief to our little amusement.

In addition, Okuno and her crew members including cinematographer Benjamin Kirk Nielsen gradually convey to us Julia’s increasingly isolated status whenever she is in her apartment, which looks quite open on the surface but then comes to feel more suffocating as she is more unnerved along the story. As watching her thrown into more panic and dread alone, you may be reminded of Roman Polanski’s several notable thriller films including “Repulsion” (1965) and many other thriller films influenced by them.

Although it becomes less engaging during the third act where everything is revealed and explained as expected, the movie still makes us care about what may happen in the end, and Maika Monroe, who is no stranger to being stalked and terrorized because of her breakthrough turn in David Robert Mitchell’s “It Follows” (2014), ably carries the film to the end. Besides conveying well her character’s accumulating fear and desperation to us, Monroe also fills her archetype character with enough presence and personality to hold our attention, and that is the main reason why the finale works despite some plot contrivance.

In case of the three main cast members surrounding Monroe, they are adequately cast in their respective functional roles. While Karl Glusman and Madalina Anea provide some necessary relief as required, Burn Gorman, who looks much more subdued here compared to his exaggerated comic supporting turn in Guillermo del Toro’s “Pacific Rim” (2013), exudes an ominous vibe right from his first appearance in the film, and you can easily discern why Monroe’s character is so disturbed by his character.

On the whole, “Watcher” is a solid genre piece which plays well in its familiar genre territory, and Okuno, who previously participated in horror anthology film “V/H/S 94” (2021), made a satisfying feature film debut here. As far as I can see from the overall result, she is a good filmmaker who knows how to handle genre elements well for our thrill and excitement, and it will be interesting to see whether she can scare and entertain us more in the future.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Mad God (2021) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): The mad imagination of Phil Tippett

Posted on June 22, 2022 by kaist455

To be frank with you, I don’t think I really understand everything presented in “Mad God”, but, boy, what a wild work of grotesque imagination it is. I must warn you in advance that there are lots of disturbing and gruesome moments to make wince or cringe more than once, but they are so striking in terms of mood and details that they will linger on your mind for a long time even though you wonder what it is exactly about.

The film, which is a stop-motion animation film mixed with some live action elements, is a longtime passion project of Phil Tippett, who has been known for many notable special effects including the Oscar-winning ones for Steven Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park” (1993). Although he actually started to work on this project from 1987, he later put it aside due to the rise of CGI via “Jurassic Park”, but, after two decades, he eventually came to resume the project thanks to the encouragement of his close colleagues, though it took another several years for him and his crew members to complete the film. According to him, he often had to depend on rather inexperienced volunteers willing to work for him during weekends, but he managed to draw the best efforts from them in addition to getting his projected partially funded by Kickstarter donations.

The overall result looks rather shabby and uneven at times, but Tippett and his crew members deserve all the praises they have received. It is more or less than a series of individual moments of sheer grotesque, but these individual moments, which all look deliberately ugly and hideous, are filled with mood and details to be savored, and I gladly go along with that even while struggling to follow its rather elusive narrative.

At first, the film shows a grim post-apocalyptic world ruined by some big war, and then it focuses on a diving bell slowly descending from somewhere up in the sky. The diving bell contains an unnamed humanoid figure, and the film follows this figure’s very long descent into the underground world, which is incidentally full of unnerving sights to disturb you in one way or another.

When the diving bell eventually arrives at the bottom of the underground world, the figure comes out of the diving bell, and the film continues to shock and disturb us more as following the figure. Along with the figure, we behold various sights and figures which will strike you hard with their outrageously and repulsively ungainly appearances, and I still remember a grisly moment which shows a bunch of masked figures constantly tortured as being bound on their torture chairs.

One of the most horrific sights during this part is involved with how tiny anonymous figures are exploited in one way or another. Once they are ‘created’, they are forced to do many kinds of risky works, and they are utterly expendable to say the least. I wonder whether this is the exaggerating depiction of the evil of capitalistic exploitation, but the movie does not tell or explain anything while letting us to process and interpret this and many other disturbing moments for ourselves.

It later turns out that the figure has a certain mission to be accomplished, but then the figure is taken to somewhere right before getting the mission accomplished. We soon see the figure savagely eviscerated by some mad doctor and his nurse, and the film goes all the way into blood and guts without hesitation. This is surely gory and horrendous, but it is presented via stop-motion animation at least, so we observe it with morbid fascination even while horrified by its extreme goriness.

Around that point, we see some human figures including the one played by Alex Cox, who has been mainly known for his several cult films including “Repo Man” (1984) and “Sid and Nancy” (1986). Cox’s character turns out to be the one who sent the figure down from somewhere up in the sky, but the film does not clarify whatever Cox’s character has actually tried to do, except that he has plenty of other figures to be sent down there.

We keep getting more of Tippett’s mad imagination, which continue to serve us one crazy grotesque moment after another as usual. At one point later in the film, Tippett and his crew members give us an unexpected moment of colorfulness to relieve us a bit, but, not so surprisingly, this moment does not last long as they strike us again with another disturbing moment. This and many other moments are certainly quite unpleasant on the surface, but they are driven by style and imagination besides having some naughty sense of black humor, and it is evident that Tippett, who handled many aspects of the production in addition to writing and producing the film, and his crew members had lots of fun together.

In conclusion, “Mad God” is a singular piece work to be admired for many reasons, and it is certainly something you cannot miss if you are looking for something different from usual Hollywood blockbuster animation films. Sometimes we overlook the fact that the world of animation is not just for kids, and those uncompromising adult animation films like “Mad God” remind us of why animation is still a fertile ground for more style and imagination. While I am not going to recommend it to young audiences for now, I hope they will check it out when they grow up a bit later.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Cha Cha Real Smooth (2022) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): When she comes into his aimless life

Posted on June 20, 2022 by kaist455

“Cha Cha Real Smooth”, which was released on Apple TV+ in last week, is your average Sundance film which will not impress you much if you are a seasoned moviegoer like me. As a drama comedy film revolving around one pathetic lad stuck in his aimless life, the movie has some charm and humor, but it frequently meanders and trudges just like its hero, and it does not recover from that much even when the story finally comes to have some focus later.

The early part of the film is about the uncertain current status of its hero Andrew, played by director/writer/co-producer Cooper Raiff himself. Since he graduated from a university, Andrew has been stuck in his family house where his mother Lisa (Leslie Mann) and his stepfather Greg (Brad Garrett) reside, and he still does not have any idea on what he will do next for his life. He is currently earning a bit via his menial part-time job, but he certainly hates that, and he has just been hoping to follow after his girlfriend someday, who recently left for Spain due to her study.

When he is asked to attend a bar mitzvah party by his younger brother David (Evan Assante), Andrew is not so eager to do that, but he eventually goes there along with David. At that bar mitzvah party, Andrew comes across a woman named Domino (Dakota Johnson) and her adolescent autistic daughter Lola (Vannesa Burghardt). When Domino asks him to make her introverted daughter dance a bit along with others, Andrew does not mind at all, and it does not take much for him to convince Lola to dance with him for a while.

Meanwhile, he also happens to find a job he can actually do pretty well while having some fun. After watching how effortlessly he energizes the party, several Jewish mothers at the party later approach to him for hiring him as the master of ceremony for their sons’ bar mitzvah parties. Andrew is certainly happy to accept their requests, and he and David even make a little promotion video for him later, though the result is not as cool as he wants.

When Andrew meets Domino and Lola again at another bar mitzvah party to be handled by him, he comes to interact with them more than before, but there comes a little problem due to Domino’s unexpected medical situation. For protecting Domino from any possibility of embarrassment, Andrew comes to concoct a silly but practical idea, and that is where we get one of the most amusing moments in the film.

As Andrew and Domino subsequently spend more time together in a cozy house where Domino and Lola live, we can sense some mutual feelings being developed between them, but neither of them is willing to go further for good reasons. While he finds himself smitten with Domino more and more, Andrew continues to hesitate, and his reluctance grows more when Domino subsequently reveals to him that she is actually engaged to some hot-shot lawyer.

Nevertheless, Andrew somehow finds himself getting more associated with Domino as he continues to meet her and Lola at the following bar mitzvah parties. As a matter of fact, he even comes to babysit Lola whenever Domino wants to spend evening time outside alone or with her fiancé, and Lola has no problem with being with him because he is nice to her in addition to accepting her autistic sides without any prejudice.

Of course, there inevitably comes a point where both Andrew and Domino become more serious about whatever is going on between them, but Raiff’s screenplay does not have enough narrative development for that. While he eventually comes to grow up a bit in the end, Andrew is a merely nice guy who does not have much personality from the beginning, and the movie also does not pay much attention to his increasingly frequent drinking behind his back, which may be a sign of alcoholism in my humble opinion.

Above all, as often occupied with its hero’s miserable status too much, the movie does not delve enough into who Domino really is – and what she discerns from Andrew. Although she explains a bit to him later in the story, that does not make us understand or empathize with her more, and, despite commendable efforts from Johnson, she only comes to us as a mild passive version of manic pixie dream girl character.

Like Raiff and Johnson, several other main cast members in the film do as much as they can with their respective roles. While Evan Assante brings some humor to his several scenes with Raiff, Vanessa Burghardt, who is actually on autistic spectrum in real life, renders some authenticity to her functional role, and it is a shame that the movie does not utilize well notable performers like Leslie Mann, Brad Garrett, and Raúl Castillo, who sadly does not have much to do except looking mostly stiff and distant.

In conclusion, “Cha Cha Real Smooth”, which somehow won the Audience Award from the U.S. Dramatic Competition when it was premiered at the Sundance Film Festival early in this year, does not click that well with me, but it was not a total waste of time at least due to some nice humorous moments. It often feels like being in the need of more rewriting in terms of story and characters, but, considering that this is only Raiff’s second feature film after “Shithouse” (2020), I sincerely hope that he will entertain me more in the next time.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Northman (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): A grim and brutal Nordic tale of vengeance

Posted on June 20, 2022 by kaist455

Robert Eggers’ new film “The Northman” attempts to push us into its strikingly brutal and barbaric world of Vikings in the Northern Europe of the 8th century. This is surely not a pleasant thing to watch at all, but it grabs your attention right from the beginning via its palpable mood and details, and you will admire its technical aspects even though you sometimes find yourself observing the story and characters from the distance.

While it is based on an old medieval Scandinavian legend about a figure named Amleth, the story will instantly remind you of William Shakespeare’s classic play “Hamlet”, which was actually inspired by that legend as reflected by its anagrammatic title. Not long after returning to his little island kingdom with his soldiers and newly captured slaves to be sold, King Aurvandill War-Raven (Ehtan Hawke) embarks on preparing his young son Amleth (Oscar Novak) for succeeding him someday, but, not long after having Amleth go through a hallucinogenic ritual along with him, he is ambushed and then murdered by his half-brother Fjölnir the Brotherless (Claes Bang). While Amleth manages to escape alone, Fjölnir quickly takes the control of the kingdom, and Amleth’s mother Queen Gudrún (Nicole Kidman) subsequently becomes his wife.

Several years later, Amleth, now played by Alexander Skarsgård, is now a big and fearsome warrior still raging for what happened to his father. As he and his fellow Viking warriors, who are as fierce and feral as him, attack a small Slavic village, the movie gives us a stunning long-take sequence full of cruelty and savagery, and we are more chilled by Amleth’s callous detachment to the equally horrible aftermath of the attack.

And then something happens to Amleth during the following night. He comes across a mythical entity played by Björk, and this entity tells him about his destiny toward the vengeance for his dead father in addition to what will happen at the end of his quest for vengeance. Although he later hears that Fjölnir recently lost his kingdom and then fled to Iceland along with his family and clan, that does not affect Amleth’s determination at all, and he soon starts a long journey across the sea while disguising himself as one of those Slavic slaves to be taken to Fjölnir’s area in Iceland.

While Amleth is taken to Fjölnir’s area as planned, we also see how things are not so good for Fjölnir and others around him. Without any hope for regaining his lost kingdom, Fjölnir and his men have no choice but to deal with the harsh environment surrounding them day by day, and they certainly need more slaves to work for them, though they are going to sell most of slaves as usual.

As Amleth works on his revenge plot step by step, the movie sometimes catches us off guard with a series of eerie scenes full of brooding qualities including his spooky encounter with a shaman. Regardless of whether these creepy moments are real or not, they contribute a lot to the moody atmosphere surrounding the characters, and cinematographer Jarin Blaschke, who was Oscar-nominated for Eggers’ previous film “The Lighthouse” (2019), did a superlative job of imbuing the screen with the gray sense of dread and desperation. We already know what will eventually happen in one way or another, and we can also feel that its main characters will never escape from their destiny no matter how much they try.

I appreciate the excellent technical efforts from Eggers and his crew members, but I also feel some distance from its story and characters for several reasons. Although I understand how much it is determined to push Eggers’ artistic vision to the extreme, the movie often seems more interested in shocking and repulsing us with violence and grime, and it is also a bit difficult for me to care about many of its main characters including Amleth. While they show some human aspects at times, they are still more or less than broad archetype characters simply following their rather simple nature and fate, and that sometimes makes the film feel as detached as your average nature documentary about those wild beasts.

At least, the main cast members are quite committed while playing their roles as straight as possible. Looking intense and beefy as required, Alexander Skarsgård firmly holds the ground with his darkly electrifying presence, and several notable performers around him have each own fun with their more colorful characters. While Ethan Hawke and Willem Dafoe are effective during their brief appearances, Claes Bang and Nicole Kidman have some juicy moments to be savored, and Kidman, who incidentally appeared along with Skarsgård in TV drama series “Big Little Lies”, is particularly terrific when her character finally confronts Amleth later in the story. As a Slavic slave girl who happens to be associated with Amleth, Anya Taylor-Joy, who has steadily advanced since her breakthrough performance in Eggers’ first feature film “The Witch” (2015), provides some warmth to the story while never compromising her strong-willed character.

On the whole, “The Northman” is often impressive thanks to Eggers’ dexterous handling of mood, story, and performance, but I just observed and admired its good aspects without fully emotionally involved in it. Although it does not surpass what was demonstrated in “The Witch” and “The Lighthouse”, the movie still reminds us that Eggers is indeed a talented filmmaker with considerable ambition and distinctive artistic vision, and I will certainly look forward to beholding whatever will come from him next.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Halftime (2022) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): The halftime of her life

Posted on June 19, 2022 by kaist455

Netflix documentary film “Halftime” examines what may be regarded as the middle point of Jennifer Lopez’s life and career, and it interests me to some degree. Although I am not that familiar with her music career, I saw several movies of hers including “Selena” (1997) and “Hustlers” (2019), and that is more than enough for me to see why she has been an enduring entertainer for more than 20 years. Besides having that distinctive star quality of hers, she is also a strong Latino American woman who is also very talented in many aspects, and that is the main reason why she has prevailed without losing any of her artistic integrity.

However, I cannot help but wonder whether I really get to know more of Lopez as a person or an artist after watching the documentary. Frequently alternating between two different narratives during 2019-2020, it does not delve much into its human subject, and, to my little disappointment, Lopez herself does not go beyond what she is expected to tell throughout the documentary. As a matter of fact, if you are one of her longtime fans, I doubt whether you will learn more than what you already know about her life and career.

One of these two different narratives in the documentary focuses on how Lopez and her crew members prepared for the halftime show for the 2020 NFL Super Bowl. Due to lots of race issues surrounding NFL ignited by a certain public act of defiance by Colin Kaepernick, NFL needed a popular pop artist to represent racial harmony, and, after several months of rumors, Lopez was officially chosen for the halftime show along with Shakira. Although she was not exactly pleased about not doing the show alone by herself, Lopez saw an opportunity to spread positive social messages in addition to expressing more of herself, and we soon see how she and her crew members started to work on what and how she would perform during several minutes allotted to her.

Meanwhile, Lopez also had the other important business to handle. In addition to playing one of its main characters, she also participated in the production of “Hustlers”, and she suddenly became a considerable Oscar contender after it received lots of positive reviews at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival. Considering that she did not have much critical success since “Selena” and “Out of Sight” (1998), the movie looked to her like a long-awaited chance for getting more respect from audiences as well as critics, and, as shown from the documentary, she really worked hard during the following Oscar season for getting the nomination.

Of course, as many of you know well, her hope was soon dashed step by step. Although she received the awards from a number of major movie critic associations including the LA Film Critics Associations, she did not win the Golden Globe award or the Screen Actors Guild award (Both of them went to Laura Dern of “Marriage Story” (2019), who deservedly won the Oscar as predicted by many people from the beginning), and she and others around her were quite disappointed when the nominees of the 2020 Academy Awards were eventually announced.

Probably because of its anti-climactic ending, this narrative looks rather trivial compared to the other narrative of the documentary, which could be more fascinating and interesting if the documentary only focused on this part. For example, a certain sociopolitical part of Lopez’s halftime show performance was initially approved without much problem, but then those rich and influential figures at the top of NFL, many of whom were incidentally associated with President Donald J. Trump, objected to this in the last minute, and the documentary unfortunately did not pay enough attention to how Lopez stuck to her artistic vision despite some compromise.

In case of the part showing the preparation process for Lopez’s halftime show performance, we surely get a bunch of raw and intimate moments as the cameras frequently hang around Lopez and her crew members, but that remains to be no more than mandatory services for her fans out there. Sure, she is quite passionate and dedicated as demanded, and she often talks about how much the show means to not only herself but also millions of fans and Latino people in US, but we can clearly sense that, like many other contemporary pop stars of hers, she is still controlling her public image instead of revealing more of herself and her artistry in front of the camera.

When the showtime eventually came, Lopez surely did not disappoint her audiences at all, but the documentary moved onto its epilogue part a bit too quickly. During this part, we see Lopez getting another notable highlight in her life and career, but the documentary does not provide much narrative ground for that, so it leaves a rather hollow impression on us in the end.

Directed by Amanda Micheli, “Halftime” is a fairly competent documentary, but it does not distinguish enough among many other recent similar musician documentaries ranging from “Gaga: Five Feet Two” (2017) to “Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry” (2021). In my humble opinion, Lopez and her undeniable artistic talent deserve something more insightful than this, and I certainly recommend you “Hustlers” or “Selena” instead if you have watched neither of them.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Downton Abbey: A New Era (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): Another nice encore

Posted on June 19, 2022 by kaist455

As watching “Downton Abbey: A New Era”, I was reminded again that I liked and enjoyed its numerous main characters more than I thought. Sure, that popular TV drama series preceding it was more or less than a friendly soap drama version of Robert Altman’s great film “Gosford Park” (2001), and I sometimes rolled my eyes for its many convenient plot twists when I watched all of its six seasons before watching the following 2019 film. Nonetheless, mainly thanks to its writer/creator Julian Fellowes, who also wrote the screenplay of “Gosford Park” and won an Oscar for that, the main characters are colorfully human enough to amuse and touch me, and I certainly came to root for them as they often struggled with each own matter of heart and life.

The story is set in 1928, one year after the ending of the 2019 film. As implied around the end of that movie, Tom Branson (Allen Leach) marries Lucy Smith (Tuppence Middleton), and everyone in Downtown Abbey is happy to see him find another good woman to love and trust after losing his first wife, who was the youngest daughter of Robert Crawley (Hugh Bonneville), 7th Earl of Grantham. As many fans of the TV series know, Tom and Robert often clashed with each other due to their sociopolitical differences, but Tom eventually adjusted himself to Robert’s aristocratic world for his baby daughter, and Robert is glad to see that Tom comes to solidifies his position in Robert’s family more via his second marriage. After all, Lucy Smith is the sole heir of Lady Bagshaw (Imelda Staunton), who is incidentally one of Robert’s cousins.

Meanwhile, Downton Abbey confronts another change to disrupt its usual daily life. When a movie director approaches for getting the permission to shoot a film at Downton Abbey, Robert is not amused at all for understandable reasons, but his eldest daughter Mary (Michelle Dockery), who has been the de facto head of the family, sees an opportunity for getting more finance for the maintenance of Downtown Abbey. A certain part of Downton Abbey happens to be in the serious need of repair, and, once he sees how serious that is, Robert reluctantly agrees to let those movie people into Downtown Abbey.

And then there comes another news for Robert and his family. It turns out that Robert’s dying mother Violet (Maggie Smith) will inherit a villa located somewhere in Southern France, and everyone wonders what happened between Violet and the dead owner of the villa, a French nobleman who once spent some time with her many years ago. Because it is apparent that they will have to meet and negotiate a bit with that French nobleman’s family members, Robert decides to come to that villa along with his several family members including his wife Cora (Elizabeth McGovern), and he is certainly relieved for not having to see Downton Abbey populated with those movie people.

In contrast, almost every servant and maid working in Downton Abbey cannot help but feel excited about those movie people with growing curiosity, and those movie people surely do not disappoint them at all. The two leading performers, Myrna Dalgleish (Laura Haddock) and Guy Dexter (Dominic West), exude their star quality right from their arrival in Downton Abbey, and their director Jack Barber (Hugh Dancy) is charming enough to draw the attention of Mary, who has felt rather bored and frustrated due to her second husband’s another continuing absence.

The movie has lots of fun with the following filmmaking process, and the most fun comes from when Barber and his crew and cast members suddenly face a big business problem not so from “Singin’ in the Rain” (1952). When it turns out that Dalgleish cannot speak that well, Mary finds herself unexpectedly being a part of the solution, and Joseph Molesley (Kevin Doyle), a former servant who is now a local schoolteacher, becomes an unlikely savior when the screenplay needs a lot more lines than before.

In that villa in Southern France, the mood is rather awkward at first, but Robert and his several family members soon get a bit more relaxed. The son of that dead French nobleman makes it pretty clear from the beginning that he has no qualms about giving the villa to Violet and her family as instructed by his father’s will, so it seems that all they will have to do is enjoying several sunny days of Southern France, but, of course, there comes a little personal issue which troubles Robert a lot.

It is not much a spoiler to tell you that all these and other conflicts in the story will be resolved in one way or another within two hours, but Fellowes’ screenplay does not hurry itself much as simply rolling its many characters here and there for more fun and entertainment. Under the competent direction of director Simon Curtis, the main cast members of the film effortlessly inhabit their respective familiar roles, and their solid ensemble performance keeps things afloat even when the movie trudges a bit.

On the whole, “Downtown Abbey: A New Era” is another nice encore for the fans of the TV drama series, and it did its job as well as intended within its familiar background. Yes, this is basically more or less than a special TV episode, but its production qualities are mostly good enough to watch on big screen, and it is surely something you cannot miss if you enjoyed the TV series and the following 2019 film as I much as I did.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Top Gun: Maverick (2022) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): Now that’s a real cinematic entertainment

Posted on June 18, 2022 by kaist455

We really have to admire and appreciate the enduring star quality of Tom Cruise, who is soon going to have the 60th birthday but has steadily given us a series of entertaining films during last several decades. To be frank with you, I often wonder whether his recent action films are actually his own way of handling middle-life crisis, but, if so, he has done that quite productively and entertainingly for us, and it is certainly awesome to observe how he magnificently carries “Top Gun: Maverick” from the beginning to the end.

As many of you know, the movie is the long-awaited sequel to late Tony Scott’s “Top Gun” (1986), which boosted Cruise’s growing stardom further after Paul Brickman’s “Risky Business” (1983). Although it is rather rote and corny in terms of story and characters, the 1986 film impressed audiences a lot via a number of excellent aerial action sequences, and it was subsequently Oscar-nominated in four technical categories in addition to having a huge box office success at that time (It won the Best Song Oscar for its iconic theme song “Take My Breath Away”, by the way).

Now more than three decades have passed, but Cruise demonstrates here again that he still has the same charm and charisma he confidently wielded in the 1986 film, and watching him taking the role of mentor in “Top Gun: Maverick” somehow takes me back to when he was sort of mentored by none other than Paul Newman in Martin Scorsese’ “The Color of Money” (1986). Seriously, at that time, who could have imagined that he would not only endure but also prevail long enough to be on the opposite side as a senior Hollywood star actor?

Just like the 1986 film, “Top Gun: Maverick” is mainly about a very, very, very risky military operation to be accomplished by a bunch of young, ambitious, and, above all, talented US Naval pilots. Their target is a uranium enrichment facility located inside a conveniently unnamed enemy country, and it is the job of Cruise’s character, Captain Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, to train and then prepare those young pilots for the operation within a few weeks.

However, Maverick is not so excited about his job because this will be probably the last hurrah in his long and illustrious career. As shown from the stunning opening sequence where he boldly pushes the limit of his latest test flight, he prefers to be active up in the air as long as he can, but, as an annoyed admiral played by Ed Harris sharply reminds him later, his time is ending due to many reasons including rapid military technology advancement. After all, using drones is usually far less risky and much cheaper than depending on human elements, isn’t it?

Anyway, Maverick demands his trainees to push their limits all the way, and his rather unorthodox training methods bring lots of headaches to his new direct superior played by John Hamm, who surely does not like Maverick much right from the beginning. In addition, one of Maverick’s trainees turns out to be the son of his old friend who unfortunately died in the 1986 film, and their official encounter is pretty awkward to say the least. While Maverick has always cared about him, Lt. Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw (Miles Teller) has resented Maverick for understandable personal reasons, and Maverick becomes more conflicted about whether he should include Rooster in the operation.

During this part, the movie serves us a number of vivid and spectacular aerial action sequences which will surely take your breath away right from their first few seconds. I am sure that they used a considerable amount of special efforts during these sequences, but I must admit that Cruise and several main cast members look quite real and convincing in their respective cockpits, and the movie palpably conveys to us a number of hair-raising extreme risks taken by their characters on the screen.

Meanwhile, the movie is also surprisingly engaging in several quiet personal moments, which remind Maverick of how things have changed during last several decades of his life. As Maverick’s old former lover, Jennifer Connelly clicks well with Cruise during several key scenes between them, and she and Cruise skillfully balance their characters’ rekindled romance well between humor and maturity. In case of the brief but memorable appearance of Val Kilmer, who played the main adversary of Cruise’s character in the 1986 film, it feels all the more poignant considering Kilmer’s recent medical problem, which was the main reason why he went into retirement several years ago.

In the end, everything in the story culminates to the expected climactic part where the operation is eventually executed (Is this a spoiler?), and the movie goes all the way along with Cruise while giving us a number of unexpected surprises for more thrill and entertainment. Director Joseph Kosinski, who previously directed “Tron: Legacy” (2010) and “Oblivion” (2013), and his crew members including editor Eddie Hamilton and cinematographer Claudio Miranda did a stupefying top-notch job on the whole, and I will not be surprised if the movie is Oscar-nominated in several technical categories in next year just like its predecessor.

Overall, “Top Gun: Maverick” is one of the more entertaining blockbuster films of this year, and it surely reminds me again of one of the main reasons why I go to movie theater. Like many of you, I am eager to be entertained a lot, and I was really energized by how “Top Gun: Maverick” boldly flies way beyond not only its predecessor but also many of less ambitious Hollywood blockbusters during last several years. Now that’s a real cinematic entertainment, folks.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Lightyear (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): A simple lightweight fun from Pixar

Posted on June 18, 2022 by kaist455

“Lightyear”, the latest animation feature film from Pixar Studios, is as funny and lightweight as you can expect. Although it is merely a spin-off story derived from “Toy Story” (1995), the film generates enough charm and spirit from its rather finite playground, and I am happy to report to you that it can actually work as a stand-alone story although it is not one of the better offerings from Pixar Studios.

As shown from its opening part, “Lightyear” is a sort of origin story behind one of the main toy characters in “Toy Story”. That toy character, named Buzz Lightyear, is actually a product associated with the valiant space soldier hero of a popular science fiction adventure film named, yes, “Lightyear”, and that film is mainly about how Lightyear (voiced by Chris Evans) tries to accomplish a certain important mission for not only himself but also many other space soldiers.

The early part of the story quickly establishes how they happen to be stuck in one alien planet. While their big spaceship is peacefully cruising somewhere far and far from the Earth, Lightyear and his no-nonsense commander Alisha Hawthorne (voiced by Uzo Aduba) decide to stop by that alien planet because it seems to be worthwhile to explore, but, not so surprisingly, its environment turns out to be a bit more hostile than expected. Right after getting back to their spaceship, Lightyear tries to launch the spaceship, but, alas, it only comes to crash on the ground due to his rather reckless decision, and, to make matters worse, the spaceship loses its main power source for its hyperspace cruise as a consequence.

At least, nobody got killed, and everyone tries to survive and then live under Hawthorne’s steady leadership. Thanks to their advanced technology, they can build their big safety zone within one year, and they also focus on making the new power source for hyperdrive cruise. Quite determined to compensate for his previous big mistake, Lightyear volunteers to be the test pilot for this urgent project, and we soon see him doing his first space flight outside the planet.

However, after the disappointing failure of his first space flight, Lightyear belatedly comes to learn of its irreversible side effect involved with time and space. While his space flight only takes several minutes, the time on the planet runs much faster in comparison, and he is shocked to find that everyone including Hawthorne have waited for his return for more than 4 years.

Nonetheless, Lightyear still does not give up at all, and we accordingly get the bittersweet montage sequence showing the quick passage of time as he tries again and again in the space. Whenever he returns, he always sees Hawthorne becoming older than the previous time, and there eventually comes a point where she is no longer there for him after living so many good years on the planet. After marrying a female colleague of hers, she had a happy life as seeing their son growing up to have his own daughter, and Lightyear is certainly saddened as watching the video message she made not long before her death.

Lightyear subsequently becomes more determined about accomplishing his mission, though his new commander notifies that he decides to abort the project for paying more attention to colonizing the planet. Fortunately, Lightyear’s robot cat Sox (voiced by Peter Sohn) reveals to him that there is actually a very good chance of success, so he soon goes all the way for what may be his last space flight.

In the end, Lightyear attains what he has hoped for many years, but there comes a big setback, and then he finds himself getting stuck with a trio of colorful characters including Izzy Hawthorne (voiced by Keke Palmer), who is, yes, Hawthorne’s granddaughter. She and her two comrades have been trying to save many others trapped inside the safety zone due to some mysterious menace, and Lightyear has no choice but to handle this new mission for himself after discerning how unprepared Izzy and her two comrades are in many aspects.

Now, not for spoiling any of your entertainment, I will be a bit more discreet from this point. As Lightyear and his accidental comrades bounce from one point to another, the film provides a fair share of fun and thrill, and it does not disappoint us when Lightyear finally confronts the main villain of the story, who has also been driven by a personal motive for years just like him. Often reminiscent of many other science fiction films including those Star Trek films, the film surely has plenty of goodies to amuse any science fiction movie fan, and it also brings enough life and personality to not only its hero but also several supporting characters around him.

While Chris Evans certainly has a ball with his character, the other notable main cast members of the film are equally entertaining in each own way. While Uzo Aduba and Keke Palmer provide some gravitas to the story, James Brolin, Taika Waititi, and Isiah Whitlock Jr. are also solid in their respective parts, and the special mention goes to Peter Sohn, who effortlessly steals the show his deadpan voice acting.

Directed by Angus MacLane, “Lightyear” feels like a minor footnote attached to the Toy Story franchise, but it is still a well-made product on the whole, and I enjoyed its competent technical aspects including Michael Giacchino’s energetic score. I must point out that “Turning Red” (2022), another Pixar Studios animation film of this year, is more enjoyable and impressive in comparison, but “Lightyear” has its own charm and personality to some degree, and I am okay with that for now.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment