Untouchable (2019) ☆☆☆(3/4): The rise and fall of Harvey Weinstein

Posted on September 27, 2019 by kaist455

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Hulu documentary film “Untouchable”, which was released in South Korean theaters yesterday, gives us an overview on the rise and fall of Harvey Weinstein, who was one of the most powerful movie producers in Hollywood before accused of a number of sexual assaults a few years ago. Mainly driven by the interviews from various people including some of his numerous victims, the documentary makes an effective presentation on how he got away with many heinous deeds during last three decades, and it also reminds us that there should be more change and justice in the system which has allowed and condoned many sexual predators just like him out there.

After the opening part briefly showing how briskly Weinstein got his eventual comeuppance after Ronan Farrow’s New York Times article on his long history of sexual predatoriness was published in 2017, the documentary moves back to his early business career during the late 1970s in Buffalo, New York. At that time, he was making considerable success in music business, but he aspired to become a movie producer someday, and, as several people who worked with him attest to us, he surely had enough ambition and tenacity for that. During the 1980s, he and his brother Bob Weinstein founded Miramax, and their company soon became a major player in the American independent film industry within next several years as releasing a number of acclaimed films such as “My Left Foot” (1989), “Sex, Lie, and Videotape” (1989), and “Cinema Paradiso” (1989).

Even during that period, Weinstein already began to his deplorable side as preying on any attractive woman who happened to be near him. Hope D’Amore, who worked with him during his music business years, recollects how he deliberately had her stay along with him in a hotel room during one night in New York City, and it is evident to us that she still feels quite hurt by what he did to her once they were together in that hotel room. In case of Kathy Declesis, who worked as a secretary under Weinstein in Miramax during its early years, she was quite angry and exasperated when she came to learn that her boss sexually harassed one of his female employees, and she eventually resigned with disgust and contempt toward him.

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Not so surprisingly, Weinstein got away with these and many other cases of bad behaviors because, well, he and his company continued to rise with more money and success. As his several former employees bitterly admit in front of the camera, they and others around him usually tolerated his mean, vicious sides while benefiting a lot from him and his brother, and they all willingly looked away from what some of his female employees suffered because of him.

During the 1990s, Weinstein advanced further and further as boldly reaching for Oscar, and he eventually reached to several highlights of his movie business career via a number of notable films released by Miramax. In 1997, “The English Patient” (1996) won no less than 9 Oscars including the one for Best Picture, and then there came “Life Is Beautiful” (1997) and “Shakespeare in Love” (1998), which won him a Best Picture Oscar in 1999 mainly thanks to his aggressive Oscar season campaign.

And he continued to prey on a lot of young actresses whom he lured with the promise of support and success. In case of Erika Rosenbaum, she was sexually harassed by Weinstein more than once, and she still remembers well how much she was scared when she happened to be alone with him in a private place even though she was already well aware of what might happen to her. In case of Rosanna Arquette, who is one of more prominent victims of Weinstein, she was relatively luckier in comparison, but she instead came to pay the heavy price for refusing to do more than personally massaging his naked body.

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Mainly through his former employee Zelda Perkins, the documentary tells us how thoroughly Weinstein silenced many of his sexual victims. When she happened to learn that one of his female colleagues was sexually assaulted by him, she promptly resigned as standing by her colleague, but then they soon found themselves cornered by his company and lawyers, who aggressively pushed them into a non-disclosure agreement which was pretty restrictive in many aspects. Not only they were demanded not to talk anything about the case in public, but also they were not allowed to discuss on that with anyone including their therapists, who, believe or not, also had to sign a non-disclosure agreement if that ever happened.

The documentary comes to lose its focus a bit during a part describing how Weinstein came to be exposed as he started to lose his power and influence after he and his brother handed over their company to Disney in 2005. A segment involved with his notorious public altercation with a couple of young journalists feels rather redundant, and I think the documentary does not delve that deep into how he was eventually exposed by Farrow and several other diligent reporters at New York Times, but it stays focused at least on those survivors who bravely talk about their painful experiences in front of the camera.

Overall, “Untouchable” is not entirely without weak aspects, and it could do better in my inconsequential opinion, but director Ursula Macfarlane did a good job of presenting her human subjects with considerable thoughtfulness and respect. As pointed out to us around the end of the documentary, a new era is beginning for many sexually victimized people out there, and I sincerely hope that there will be more talk about sexual assault and harassment in the future.

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Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (2019) ☆☆☆(3/4): As an era is being over

Posted on September 26, 2019 by kaist455

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“Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood”, the ninth work of Quentin Tarantino, wants to be a leisurely nostalgic tale about a bygone era of Hollywood, and I appreciate that to some degree, but I often could not help but feel rather distant to what was presented on the screen. While it is fairly engaging in terms of mood and details, the movie did not particularly excite or enthrall me mainly due to its inherent storytelling deficiency, and that made me more aware of its several notable weak spots during my viewing.

The story, which is set in Hollywood, 1969, begins with the introduction of a washed-out actor named Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt). While he was once one of the most popular movie stars in the town during the 1950s, Dalton’s career has been seriously going down during last several years, and now he is usually demanded to play guest roles in a number of TV drama series. As becoming more aware of getting older day by day with no bright future, he often feels insecure and miserable, and, not so surprisingly, that frequently drives him to drinking.

In case of Booth, he has also been going through his own career downturn since a certain incident which made him shunned by many other people in Hollywood, but he does not seem to mind that much while doing many other things for Dalton besides working as his stunt double. When his another day with Dalton is over, he goes back to his small shabby residence located near a drive-in theater, and we see how he spends his private time along with his pit bull, which gives us a small amusing moment as it patiently waits for Booth to prepare its dinner as well as his.

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In the meantime, the movie also pays considerable attention to Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie), a real-life actress who was married to Roman Polanski around that time. After coming back to her residence which happens to be right next to Dalton’s, she and her husband soon go to an evening party full of various figures including Steve McQueen, and they cheerfully throw themselves into fun and excitement just like many others around them.

As these three main characters go through the next day respectively during its second act, Tarantino’s screenplay doles out small and big episodic moments one by one, and some of them are wonderful while others are not so good in comparison. I enjoyed an unexpectedly humorous moment between Dalton and a precocious child performer who turns out to be a lot more serious about acting to our amusement, and I also liked a sweet, poignant scene where Tate watches her movie along with audiences at a local movie theater, but I was not amused by the silly fight scene between Booth and Bruce Lee, which is not funny at all and actually downright embarrassing in my trivial opinion.

In the meantime, the movie slowly injects some tension into the screen through a group of young people who initially seem to be innocuous hippie girls but eventually turn out to be associated with Charles Manson. At one point, Booth happens to take one of these girls to a remote ranch where she and her colleagues live, and the mood becomes a bit tense when Booth attempts to meet the owner of the ranch as being watched by these girls. I will not go into details into what happens during the final act of the movie, but I can tell you instead that there are several violent moments which are delivered as skillfully as we can expect from a Tarantino film.

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However, to be frank with you, I observed these and other things in the film without much enthusiasm. While I was considerably entertained by its vivid, authentic period atmosphere and details thanks to its first-rate crew members including cinematographer Robert Richardson, I also often noticed its rather flat storytelling and thin characterization, and I must point out that many of characters in the film are not as edgy or interesting or colorful as those memorable ones in Tarantino’s previous films.

Anyway, the three main cast members of the film are suitably cast in their respective roles. While Leonardo DiCaprio, who looks a little relaxed now after he finally won an Oscar for “The Revenant” (2015), is effective during several nice comic scenes including the one where his character struggles to deliver correct lines in front of the camera, Brad Pitt ably complements his co-star well with his understated performance, and Margot Robbie is also fine as another substantial part of the film. In case of the various supporting performers in the film including Emile Hirsch, Dakota Fanning, Bruce Dern, Damian Lewis, Brenda Vaccaro, Lena Dunham, Scoot McNairy, Clifton Collins Jr., Kurt Russell, Zoë Bell, Michael Madsen, James Remar, and Al Pacino, they merely fill their small spots as much as required, but the special mention must go to young performer Julia Butters, who effortlessly steals the show during her few scenes with DiCaprio.

In conclusion, I do not think “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood” is as great as some critics said, but I was not bored at least during its 161-minute running time, and I came to reflect on its weak and strong aspects for a while after watching it at last night. It is two or three steps below Tarantino’s better works such as “Pulp Fiction” (1994) and “Inglourious Basterds” (2009), but it is still an admirable work with a number of goodies to be appreciated, so I recommend it with some reservation.

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Under the Silver Lake (2018) ☆☆(2/4): A messy and insipid neo-noir piece

Posted on September 25, 2019 by kaist455

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David Robert Mitchell’s second feature film “Under the Silver Lake” bored me a lot. While I surely understand that it tries be a quirky neo-noir film as juggling so many different things together during its 139-minute running time, this messy and insipid neo-noir piece is utterly devoid of style and personality, and it is really depressing to see how aimlessly and tediously the movie drifts from one moment to another without leaving much impression on the whole.

When we are introduced to its young hero Sam (Andrew Garfield), he is languidly going through his miserable daily life in Silver Lake, California. While he has been unemployed for some time, he has also fallen behind in his rent for several months, and he is already warned that he will be evicted from his current residence after 5 days if he does not pay the rent as demanded. This is indeed a desperate situation, but he is not particularly willing to take care of this problem of his as hopelessly mired in frustration and desperation, and he is only interested in having a sneak peek on a female neighbor who does not mind being topless as taking care of her birds.

While he is watching on that female neighbor, someone else happens to draw Sam’s attention, and that is Sarah (Riley Keough), a young woman who recently moved to a nearby spot along with her roommates. When she comes to notice Sam watching her from the distance, she is not surprised or offended at all, and she even invites him to her residence, though their private moment does not turn out to be as long as he wants.

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It looks like Sam can get closer to Sarah in next time, but she is suddenly gone along with her roommates on the very next day. Understandably perplexed by this sudden disappearance, Sam tries to find anything which can lead him to wherever she is, but things only get more confusing for him as he comes across a bunch of weird things which, along with the recent mysterious disappearance of a famous billionaire, seem to imply that something insidious is going on around him. For example, there is a popular band whose certain song may contain some hidden message, and there is also an underground comic book series which describes a number of disturbing things including a masked female assassin and a guy killing dogs just for his twisted spite.

Sam later goes to the creator of that underground comic book series, who surely has lots of things to tell as your average paranoid. This guy has kept trying to find something hidden somewhere in their neighborhood, and he is also quite afraid of what may happen to him because of his obsessive search. According to him, many things in his underground comic book series are real, and he particularly emphasizes on that masked female assassin, who will kill anyone who dares to approach to the truth out there.

Sam gradually comes to realize the possibility of a big peril coming upon him, but he becomes more obsessed with finding hidden codes and messages from numerous things around him. At one point, he manages to extract a cryptic message from the aforementioned song, and that subsequently leads him to an outrageous moment of revelation involved with many popular pop songs. As expected, that famous billionaire’s disappearance turns out to be connected with what he has been investigating, and we later get a preposterous moment as he eventually finds a definite clue from an old cereal box.

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However, these and many other things in the story do not get mixed together well enough to hold our attention, and the movie often suffers from its thin narrative and bland characterization. Although Andrew Garfield is a talented actor as shown from “Boy A” (2007) and “The Social Network” (2010), his fairly good effort here in the film is frequently limited by his flat and uninteresting character, and it is also quite disappointing to see many of other performers in the film stuck in their cardboard characters who do not have much life and personality to engage us. While Riley Keough manages to acquit herself well at least, I must say that she and several other actresses in the film seem to be chosen mainly for their good-looking physical appearance, and the movie is sometimes unpleasant to watch as their supporting characters are presented as nothing more than the objects of desire for its hero.

In case of its technical aspects, the movie looks as slick and stylish as required on the surface, but Mitchell and his crew members unfortunately fail to bring enough tension or intrigue to the screen. While the cinematography by Michael Gioulakis surely fills the screen with some noirish touches, they mostly feel as blatant as numerous references to a number of classic films such as “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” (1956), and the score by Disasterpiece is adamantly overblown as trying very hard to emulate the scores by Bernard Herrmann and Angelo Badalamenti.

Overall, “Under the Silver Lake”, which had a premiere at the Cannes Film Festival early in last year but only got released in US more than 10 months later, is a major letdown compared to Mitchell’s previous film “It Follows” (2014), which I chose as one of the best films of 2015. While that movie is reminiscent of many other films including the works of John Carpenter as much as “Under the Silver Lake” reminds us of “Mulholland Dr.” (2001) and “Inherent Vice” (2014), it is pretty impressive nonetheless for its substantial style and personality, and, to be frank with you, I am now seriously considering revisiting it.

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The Third Wife (2018) ☆☆☆(3/4): A calm, sensuous period drama set in Vietnam

Posted on September 23, 2019 by kaist455

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Vietnamese period drama film “The Third Wife” is a calm, sensuous experience to be savored for good reasons. Set in a rural region of Vietnam around the late 19th century, the movie gives us a detached but vivid look into what its young heroine quietly endures in her small closed world firmly maintained by patriarchic customs, and there are several subdued but powerful moments of pain and sadness which are further accentuated by a number of utterly gorgeous visual moments unfolded on the screen.

At the beginning, we see a young adolescent girl named May (Nguyen Phuong Tra My) being brought to the house belonging to Hung (Long Le Vu), a wealthy landowner who is about to marry May although she is only 13 years old. While he already has a son from his first wife Ha (Tran Nu Yen Khe), Hung wants to have another son, and May is going to be his third wife as reflected by the very title of the film.

Once May arrives at Hung’s house, the movie patiently observes how they and Hung’s family members go through the wedding ceremony step by step. After meeting Hung’s aging father, May soon gets married officially to her husband in front of his family members and servants, and, via small nuances and gestures occasionally glimpsed from this scene, we gradually gather that not many of them are particularly pleased about her marriage although everyone sticks to their gentle and courteous attitude.

When the wedding night eventually comes, May is sent to her bedroom where she is going to spend her first night with her husband, and this rather uncomfortable moment is tactfully and tastefully presented with some interesting traditional details, while never overlooking how scared and nervous May is about her first sexual experience. At one point, an egg yolk is placed on May’s belly when her husband comes, and he promptly slurps it before embarking on his copulation with May. On the next morning, we see her standing beside an object announcing her loss of virginity to her husband, and that subtly but sharply reminds us of how thousands of women like May were frequently deprived of their physical autonomy throughout the human history.

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After her wedding night, May slowly gets accustomed to the social hierarchy among the family members. While Ha officially outranks Hung’s second wife Xuan (Mai Thu Huong Maya), Xuan has usually received more favors from Hung as a younger wife even though she has not produced any son for him yet, and May soon comes to discern that she may get a lot more attention from her husband than before if she gets pregnant.

Now the story looks like a variation of Zhang Yimou’s “Raise the Red Lantern” (1991), and the mood naturally becomes a bit tense as both Ha and May subsequently become pregnant, but the movie keeps maintaining its phlegmatic attitude as gently moving from one episodic moment to another. While there is an unexpected moment of surprise when May happens to discover what has been going on between Xuan and a certain character in the house, there are also lively moments as May often hangs around a bit with Xuan’s young daughter, who is bound to get married to someone older just like May within a few years.

However, the movie does not look away at all from what its female characters have to suffer under their patriarchic system, and that aspect is mainly represented by two different but equally sad episodes. When a male servant in the house gets caught for being too close to one female servant, he is punished with only several lashings, and he is also allowed to remain in the house while that poor female servant, who happens to be pregnant because of him, is forced to leave the house and then go to a Buddhist temple where she will probably spend the rest of her life. When Hung’s only son is about to get married, he refuses his young bride for a personal reason which has been eating him for a while, but his bride’s father only blames his daughter as refusing to accept the annulment of the wedding at all, and that eventually leads to a tragic consequence.

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While these and other things happen around her, May constantly maintains her docile façade, but thanks to the plain but nuanced natural performance by Nguyen Phuong Tra My (She was only 12 years old when she was cast for the film, by the way), her feelings and thoughts churning below the surface are clearly conveyed to us even though her tranquil face does not seem to express anything on the screen. As opening her eyes more to the world limiting her in many aspects, May becomes more suffocated and frustrated, and we are not so surprised when she attempts to follow what she thinks her heart wants at one point later in the film.

Although it initially requires considerable patience due to its slow narrative pacing and restrained storytelling approach, the movie still engages us as showing care and empathy toward its young heroine, and director/writer Ash Mayfair, who previously made several short films before making a feature film debut here, and her crew members did a superlative job to say the least. While the production design by Do Trong An and the costume design by Phuong Thao Tran are full of details to be appreciated, the cinematography by Chananun Chotrungroj often shines with crisp beauty, which is further accentuated by the ambient score by An Ton That.

In conclusion, “The Third Wife” is a notable debut feature film to be admired for its undeniably beautiful moments, and I was often touched by its small but precious emotional moments even though I usually observed it from the distance during my viewing. As your typical arthouse film, it is definitely not something you can casually watch on Sunday afternoon, but you will not forget it easily once you watch it.

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Diamantino (2018) ☆☆☆(3/4): A whimsical mixed bag

Posted on September 23, 2019 by kaist455

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Portuguese film “Diamantino”, which won the Grand Prize when it was shown in the International Critics’ Week section at the Cannes Film Festival early in this year, is a whimsical mixed bag which will alternatively baffle and amuse you. Although it is not wholly successful in its wild and broad satiric approach, the movie is at least seldom boring as busily hopping from one weird moment to another, and you may have a fair share of fun with it if you are willing to go along with its wacky joyride full of weird sights such as a bunch of big, fluffy dogs prancing in a cloudy pink background.

The movie opens with a soccer game during the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, and we see those big, fluffy dogs being imagined in the mind of Diamantino Matamouros (Carloto Cotta), a professional soccer player who is as famous and popular as real-life Portuguese soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo. Whenever he is about to get a goal for his team, he imagines himself surrounded by those big, fluffy dogs, and that has always made him feel both focused and comfortable enough for attaining goals.

While he succeeds again as usual during the last minutes of that soccer game, he is not so lucky during the following Finals. When everything depends on whether he kicks the ball correctly, Diamantino finds himself quite baffled as he cannot imagine those big, fluffy dogs as before, and that accordingly leads to a disastrous moment of failure and humiliation to be ridiculed via a bunch of online memes. Furthermore, his old father, who has been his trusted manager, suddenly dies around that point, and there is no one to guide and protect him now, so he feels quite miserable as being cornered and abused by his mean and greedy twin sisters.

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Further depressed by his crumbling status as well as the loss of his father, Diamantino decides to retire, and he also announces during his TV interview that he is going to adopt a refugee kid just because he was emotionally affected by his accidental encounter with a bunch of refugees who sailed across the Mediterranean Sea. As watching this TV interview, a secret service agent named Aisha (Cleo Tavares), who has been investigating whether Diamantino is involved in money laundering business, comes to get a rather crazy idea for her ongoing investigation; she will disguise herself as an adolescent refugee boy, and she may get a chance to delve more into her investigation subject once she gets adopted by him.

Aisha’s close colleague, who also happens to be her lover, is rather skeptical about Aisha’s plan, but, what do you know, Aisha succeeds in her disguise because Diamantino is too naïve and self-absorbed to discern that ‘Rahim’ is actually a woman, and we accordingly get a number of goofy moments while he clumsily tries to be a good daddy to Rahim at his huge and sumptuous mansion strewn with silly objects reflecting his big ego and juvenile narcissism. As Aisha embarks on her undercover investigation, it does not take much time for her to realize that Diamantino is too simple-minded to do money laundering, and, not so surprisingly, it soon turns out that his evil twin sisters are the ones doing money laundering behind their back.

In addition, Diamantino’s twin sisters has also been dealing with some shady biotechnology research institution, which is later revealed to be connected with the Portuguese government. There is a scientist who wants to extract what makes Diamantino so special as a soccer player, and this scientist’s clandestine research is fully supported by a powerful political figure who also wants to use Diamantino for driving the public opinion toward leaving the European Union. I must say this part of the movie is rather too blatant, but I will not deny that I was amused a bit by the blatant appropriation of a certain infamous campaign slogan in US.

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As things get more outrageous along its increasingly goofy narrative, the screenplay by directors Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt comes to lose some of its narrative momentum, and the whimsical mood in the film becomes a bit tiresome, but the movie continues to provide us enough amusement and bafflement to hold our attention. Although I am not so sure about whether the finale works as well as intended, I appreciate at least how willing the movie is to go for more absurdities, and the score by Adriana Holtz and Ulysse Klotz is effective mixed with a number of various pieces of music including Béla Bartók’s “Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta, Sz. 106, BB 114”, which is fabulously utilized during a scene which may take you back to a certain iconic element of Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining” (1980).

It helps that the movie is supported well by the enjoyable comic performance of Carloto Cotta, who did more than merely looking dazed and confused throughout the film. While willingly hurling himself into many absurd moments in the film, Cotta wisely avoiding playing his character like a mere jerk, and he is also supported well by several supporting performers including Cleo Tavares, who keeps her performance straight for more laughs just like Cotta and the other main cast members in the film.

On the whole, “Diamantino”, which deservedly received the Palm Dog at the Cannes Film Festival considering all those big, fluffy dogs in the film, is too weird for some of you, but it is surely something you cannot easily forget, so I recommend you with some reservation. I still think it could be edgier and wilder, but I was amused and entertained enough during my viewing, and I think you should give it a chance someday if you are really looking for something odd and different.

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Between Two Ferns: The Movie (2019) ☆☆☆(3/4): You’ll surely laugh…

Posted on September 22, 2019 by kaist455

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A few years ago, I watched several episodes of Zach Galifianakis’ web series “Between Two Ferns”, and I still remember well how much I was tickled by those hilariously awkward moments generated between Galifianakis and his celebrity guests. He is effortlessly funny as casually throwing truly inappropriate but undeniably uproarious questions to his guests, and his guests willingly go along with that during their mock interview between, yes, two ferns.

And that was why I was instantly interested when I belatedly heard about “Between the Ferns: The Movie”, which was released on Netflix last Friday. While it is more or less than a series of episodes hung together on a rather thin plotline, the movie provides plenty of good laughs from the beginning to the end, and it is certainly something you should not miss if you enjoyed Galifianakis’s web series as much as I did.

At the beginning, the movie shows us how things have not been that good for Galifianakis and “Between Two Ferns” for several years. Although he has managed to interview a number of various celebrity guests ranging from Keanu Reeves to Brie Larson since he drew the attention of his big boss Will Ferrell, he and his goofy band of production crew members are still stuck in a small local broadcasting network of North Carolina, and then they happen to be struck by an unexpected catastrophe while he is interviewing Matthew McConaughey, who definitely has a juicy fun with his public persona as keeping his face straight as much as possible in front of a number of outrageously insulting questions and surreal happenings.

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After that disastrous incident, it looks like everything is now over for Galifianakis and his production crew members, but then Ferrell, who is also having a blast with the overblown version of his comic image, directly approaches to him for giving an opportunity he cannot resist. He orders Galifianakis to produce no less than 10 episodes and then hand them all to him in LA within no less than two weeks, and, though he does not have much money and resource for that, Galifianakis agrees to do that mainly because he is promised that he will get his own prime time talk show to be broadcast over the whole country.

As Galifianakis and his production crew go from one spot to another during their long and bumpy journey from North Carolina to LA, the screenplay by director Scott Auckerman, who wrote the story with Galifianakis, doles out small and big moments to be savored for good comic timing and delivery. While I giggled a bit during the segment featuring a certain famous TV talk show host who manages to maintain his non-nonsense attitude in front of Galifianakis, John Hamm, who is mainly known for acclaimed TV drama series “Mad Men” but has also shown considerable comic talent via his guest appearances in TV sitcom series “30 Rock” and “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt”, is delightful in his brief comic appearance, and so are several other notable celebrity figures such as Tiffany Haddish and Paul Rudd, who is having a ball with his oddly unflappable attitude.

The most hilarious moment in the film comes from the unexpected appearance of a certain prominent female model, who comes to have a very intimate moment with Galifianakis after talking a bit with him at a bar. I will not go into details here in this review, but I want to tell you that I was really caught off guard by one funny reference to the 1970 short story “Button, Button” by Richard Matheson and Richard Kelly’s 2009 film “The Box” – and that I got more good laughs during the subsequent scene where Galifianakis happens to interview the last person he wants to face at that point.

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During the second half, the movie wears out its welcome a bit due to its repetitive narrative, but it keeps bouncing cheerfully along with Galifianakis and his few main cast members, and they gradually become sort of endearing to us despite their incorrigibly goofy aspects. As shown from his breakthrough supporting turn in “The Hangover” (2009), Galifianakis can be simultaneously clueless and likable, and we somehow come to root for him even while getting plenty of wry laughs from his numerous moments of idiocy and inappropriateness in the film. As a few crucial fictional characters surrounding Galifianakis in the film, Lauren Lapkus, Ryan Gual, and Jiavani Linanyao have each own small moment to shine, and Lapkus is particularly good when her character reveals more of her affection and dedication toward Galifianakis during their little private time on a lake.

And there are also those two ferns, which surely generate a substantial amount of chuckles as being more than background elements. Early in the film, we get a preposterous scene showing how much Galifianakis is obsessed with getting two ferns which look exactly like each other, and there later comes another nice moment for laugh as he insists on taking his precious two ferns along with him during the journey.

Although it lags a bit as arriving at its arrival point, “Between Two Ferns: The Movie” soon finds its groove back as presenting a series of blooper moments between Galifianakis and his interviewees during its end credits, and these moments surely show us how much fun Galifianakis and his interviewees had together in front of the camera. In short, this is one of funnier comedy films of this year, and I assure you with confidence that you will find yourself going through a string of guffaws like I did during my viewing.

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Jawline (2019) ☆☆☆(3/4): A young social media star chasing after his dream

Posted on September 22, 2019 by kaist455

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Hulu documentary film “Jawline” observes the quick ascent of an adolescent social media star who, as far as shown from the documentary, is a simple decent lad who just wants to chase after his dream. While it is often fascinating to watch how this likable lad and many other good-looking young people attain fame and popularity via the ongoing technology development of our time, we are also reminded of how brief and fleeting their success is, and you may pity him a bit especially when he comes to face some harsh reality in the end.

At the beginning, we meet a 16-year-old boy named Austyn Tester, and we see how he and his friend make his latest video clip posted on the Internet. Thanks to his handsome appearance and incessant positive thinking demonstrated via many of his video clips, Austyn has drawn thousands of online followers who are mostly young girls around his age, and they are all ready to send their love via thousands of ‘Likes’ whenever he puts himself on online live-broadcast.

Through his online fame and popularity, Austyn eagerly wants to go further outside his rural town in Tennessee while spreading more positivity around his enthusiastic followers and the outside world, and the documentary lets us discern how mundane and hopeless life is for him and others around him. While his mother frankly admits some of her personal problems in front of the camera, his older brother tells us how much he wants the same thing his younger brother has been enjoying, and we can clearly see that they live through Austyn’s online success to some degree as wholeheartedly supporting his aspiration.

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And it looks like Austyn is really going to move onto the next step toward his ultimate aspiration when he comes to have a savvy business guy named Michael Weist as his manager, who has already managed several other young online celebrities just like Austyn. We soon see them working in a nice and big house located in LA for whatever they are going to upload next on the Internet, and everything is thoroughly supervised and controlled by Weist, who is usually occupied with how much he earns through his young online celebrities everyday.

While pushed to here and there around the country along with his fellow online celebrities by Weist, Austyn comes to enjoy more of that sweet smell of fame and success. At one point, we see him and his fellow online celebrities presenting themselves in front of hundreds of girls eager to make a contact with them, and Austyn is willing to get closer to those girls because he genuinely wants to give them some positive influence. To many girls who are not so sure about themselves because of numerous reasons including bullying at school, he surely provides them some comfort and assurance through his optimism and positive thinking, and he really cares about what he is doing.

However, we cannot help but notice that he merely sells his youthful and confident appearance to those many young girls out there – and that there is really nothing else for him to sell besides that. As demanded more and more by Weist, Austyn comes to feel more pressured than before, and then he eventually decides to take a break from his work, but it does not take much time for him to realize how hard it is to maintain his social media status. Although he posts some photographs and video clips from time to time, he soon comes to lose his online followers day by day, and then he finds himself becoming less enthusiastic about his social media activity than before.

As more depressed about his ongoing decline, Austyn also comes to experience harsh reality in more than one way. Once Austyn does not seem to be a valuable asset anymore, Weist promptly walks away from Austyn, and he does not even give Austyn what Austyn has earned via his social media activity, while already ready to recruit younger boys who will be as popular as Austyn. In the end, Austyn has no choice but to work in a local shopping mall for earning his living, and, to his humiliation, he also has to go back to high school and then will have to study for several extra years for getting a diploma.

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And the mood gets a bit tense in his family house as he often conflicts with his mother and older brother. Both of them remind Austyn at times that things are now quite different than before, but Austyn still cannot get over from what he has inadvertently lost, and his only comfort comes from his pet cat and its three little cute kittens, which, in my inconsequential opinion, always steal the show whenever they are in front of the camera.

Nevertheless, as his older brother says around the end of the documentary, Austyn is still optimistic about whatever will happen next in his life, and it is clear that director Liza Mandelup, who won the US Documentary Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Filmmaker when her documentary was shown at the Sundance Film Festival early in this year, examines her human subject with care and empathy. When Austyn recites a poem to be posted on the Internet, the camera only watches him quietly, but it generates some sad poignancy, and you may find yourself hoping that nothing bad will happen to him in the future.

Overall, “Jawline” works as a cautionary tale about the fame and popularity on social media, and it made me reflect a bit on how I have interacted with many other people out there via Twitter and Instagram during last several years. Fortunately, I usually came across a number of wonderful people such as my late friend Roger Ebert, and, in fact, I am relieved that most of my online interactions have been fairly productive and beneficial. Although I observed his story with some critical thinking, I felt sorry for Austyn nonetheless during my viewing, and I will not deny that a certain phrase comes to my mind now: “There – but for the grace of God – go I…”

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Into the Forest (2015) ☆☆☆(3/4): Two sisters isolated in the apocalyptic world

Posted on September 22, 2019 by kaist455

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“Into the Forest” is a small but engaging survival drama about two young women who suddenly find themselves isolated in an apocalyptic situation. Although it can be said that the story does not break any new ground in its genre territory, the movie steadily holds our attention mainly thanks to the two strong lead performances at its center, and it is actually poignant as we come to see how much its two heroines have been changed and grown up around the end of the story.

At the beginning, the movie observes the cozy daily life of an adolescent girl named Nell (Ellen Page) and her older sister Eva (Evan Rachel Wood) at their family house located in some remote forest area of the West Coast region. Although their mother died a few years ago, they have taken care of well by their loving father, and everything looks all right for them as they go through another peaceful day in their family house.

But then something unexpected happens in the middle of that day. There comes a sudden TV news report about a massive power outage, and it does not take much time for everyone in the house to realize how serious the situation is. Electricity is promptly cut off, and, to make matters worse, they become isolated from the outside world for several days as their vehicle happens to have a battery problem due to Nell’s inadvertent mistake.

Anyway, Nell and Eva’s father manages to fix that problem in the end, so he and his daughters can go to the closest town to their house, but it turns out that things have become quite worse during last several days because of the prolonged absence of gas, electricity, and communication. While nobody knows what really caused that massive power outage, everyone has been driven to more despair and danger, and Nell and Eva’s father certainly becomes concerned a lot about his daughters’ safety, especially when they come across a bunch of menacing motorcycle gangs on the road.

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Meanwhile, Nell and Eva try to stick to their usual daily routines as coping with their drastically changed circumstance. While there will not be any audition in the future unless a miracle happens, Eva keeps practicing her dance movements, and Nell continues to study and read books even though her SAT test result is not useful anymore. As constantly reminded of their increasingly gloomy situation, they often clash with each other over trivial matters, but they still stick together under their father’s care, and it looks like they and their father will be all right for several months at least.

However, of course, their circumstance subsequently becomes more desperate after a tragic accident happens a few days later, and Nell comes to rise to the occasion for actively taking care of herself as well as Eva. While her sister is still occupied with her dancing practice, she works hard to maintain the status quo in their house, and, not so surprisingly, she finds herself clashing with her sister more often than before.

On one day, there comes a possible opportunity to get out of this seemingly hopeless situation. A lad who was once very close to Nell comes to the house, and he later suggests that they should try a long and risky journey to the East Coast region, which, according to rumors, might be safer in comparison. While Eva is skeptical, Nell seriously considers going along with him, and that accordingly generates another tension between her and her sister.

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Now I should be more careful about what will happen next, but I can tell you at least that director/writer Patricia Rozema’s screenplay, which is adapted from the novel of the same name by Jean Hegland, keeps its plot rolling in its small background while throwing a few unexpected dramatic turns. After Nell comes to make a crucial decision at one point, she and Eva become more aware of how much they depend on each other, and the movie shows some wry sense of humor when Nell must acquire a certain type of protein source necessary for her sister’s physiological condition later in the story.

Above all, the movie is supported well by Ellen Page and Evan Rachel Wood, who are indubitably two of the best actresses working in Hollywood. While Page, who drew my attention with her chillingly twisted performance in “Hard Candy” (2005) and then surprised me more with her lovable Oscar-nominated turn in “Juno” (2007), is convincing in her character’s gradual emotional growth and development along the narrative, Evan Rachel Wood, who has diligently advanced since her wonderful breakout performance in “Thirteen” (2003), is also terrific as deftly complementing her co-star, and they are constantly interesting to watch whenever their characters swing back and forth between affection and resentment. Although Nell and Eva sometimes does not get along that well with each other, their strong emotional bond is always palpable to us, and we are touched as they stick together more than they ever imagined around the climactic part of the story.

On the whole, “Into the Forest” may look rather modest in its achievement, but it is still worthwhile to watch for its solid mood, storytelling, and performance, and I particularly appreciate how it brings some feminist touches into its familiar genre territory. To be frank with you, I did not expect much at first, but the movie engaged me more than expected, and that is more than enough for recommendation in my humble opinion.

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Crooked House (2017) ☆☆(2/4): A pedestrian Agatha Christie mystery flick

Posted on September 20, 2019 by kaist455

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Watching “Crooked House” is one of the most joyless movie experiences I have ever had during recent years. Thoroughly flat and tedious in terms of storytelling and characterization, the movie bored me from the beginning to the end, so I came to observe its story and characters without much care or interest, and then I shook my head as watching its eventual finale, which is utterly devoid of dramatic punch despite what is revealed to us in the end.

The movie is based on the novel of the same name by Agatha Christie, who, as many of you know, wrote heaps of murder mystery novels known well for clever twists and tricks to be appreciated. While the novel is rather simple and straightforward compared to her other famous mystery novels such as “Murder on the Orient Express”, it was one of her personal favorites, and it is certainly one of her best works mainly thanks to a bunch of broad but vivid figures surrounding the murder case in the novel.

The adapted screenplay by director Gilles Paquet-Brenner and his co-writers Julian Fellowes and Tim Rose Price mostly stays close to the original plot of the novel with some notable changes. After an old rich man suddenly died in his big family mansion, his granddaughter Sophia (Stefanie Martini) comes to a private detective named Charles Hayward (Max Irons), and she asks him to investigate her grandfather’s death because she believes that her grandfather did not die naturally. Because the old personal history between him and Sophia, Charles is rather reluctant at first, but he eventually decides to take the case, and it does not take much for him to see how tricky the situation is. Chief Inspector Taverner (Terence Stamp), who was his father’s old friend/colleague, sternly warns him during their private meeting, and Sophia’s family members understandably do not welcome him much right from the beginning.

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As spending more time with Sophia and her family members, Charles comes to realize that everyone in the family mansion has motive and opportunity for killing Sophia’s grandfather, who was loved or hated by his family members for firmly holding everyone near him through his willpower and, yes, money. While his young second wife Brenda (Christina Hendricks) seemed to be happy with her husband, it later turns out that this self-absorbed woman has been rather close to a guy teaching Sophia’s two younger siblings Eustace (Preston Nyman) and Josephine (Honor Kneafsey), and it looks quite possible that she and that guy plotted together to murder her husband. In case of the old man’s two adult sons, Philip (Julian Sands), who is Sophia’s father, and Roger (Christian McKay), both of them have respectively had a fair share of resentment toward their father, and their wives, Magda (Gillian Anderson), who is Sophia’s mother, and Clemency (Amanda Abbington), do not have much affection for their father-in-law either. Compared to others in the mansion, Lady Edith de Haviland (Glenn Close), who is the old man’s sister-in-law and has virtually functioned as the matriarch of the family since his death, is pretty nice and gentle on the surface, but, like many of her family members, she has some streaks of ruthlessness as shown from her first encounter with Charles.

As Charles tries to delve more into the case, things get a bit more complicated than expected. While he and Sophia are still struggling with those old feelings between them, Chief Inspector Taverner is willing to take over the case especially after it is officially confirmed that Sophia’s grandfather was indeed murdered, and there is also a little problem involved with the will left by Sophia’s grandfather, which cannot be legitimate due to the inexplicable absence of his sign on the will.

And then it gradually dawns upon Charles that a certain family member really knows who murdered Sophia’s grandfather. He tries to get the truth from that figure in question, but, of course, something serious soon happens to that figure, and the mood surrounding him and others in the mansion becomes more ominous than before as a result.

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Now the plot seems to thicken, but we are not much interested as the movie tediously plods from one point to another without much narrative momentum, and we do not care much about its characters either as they are no more than monotonous cardboard figures. The main cast members of the movie certainly try as much as they can do with their respectively roles, but, unfortunately, there is not much to do for them from the beginning, and it is really disappointing to see their considerable talent being wasted on several annoying cases of one-note acting.

In addition, the movie considerably underachieves in technical aspects. Although I was a little delighted whenever the camera beholds the lovely appearance of the mansion in the film, I was quite dissatisfied with the overall production quality of the movie, and I must say that the movie often looks cheap and bland while riddled with a number of oddly clumsy moments including the very last shot of the film, which, to my disbelief, is simply followed by the mere announcement of the end of the story.

On the whole, “Crooked House” is a middling misfire which does not leave much impression in the end, and my only consolation comes from how quickly it evaporated from my mind once it was over. Maybe you want to check it out if you enjoyed Christie’s novel, but, believe me, you will have a far better time as reading the novel again instead of watching this pointless piece of work.

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Yesterday (2019) ☆☆(2/4): A middling Beatles musical comedy

Posted on September 19, 2019 by kaist455

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Danny Boyle’s new film “Yesterday” merely amused me from time to time, and that was all for me. While I enjoyed its comic fantasy premise to some degree, the movie quickly wears out its welcome due to its superficial narrative riddled with numerous plot contrivances, and it even does not utilize well many of those recognizable songs from one of the most legendary bands in the 20th century pop music history.

When we meet a young bloke named Jack Malik (Himesh Patel) at the beginning, he has seriously been considering giving up his lifelong dream of becoming a famous musician. Although he can sing fairly well, his few original songs do not draw much attention from others because they are particularly catchy or impressive, and he becomes more frustrated after another unsuccessful moment of his dwindling career.

At least, Jack has received the full support from his several friends including Ellie (Lily James), a young, plucky school teacher who has been his best friend since their childhood years and has also occasionally worked as his part-time manager. It is apparent to us that she has supported Jack’s dream because of love, but, not so surprisingly, our petty hero is too occupied with his ongoing failure to discern her deep affection toward him, and that certainly hurts her feeling.

And then something extraordinary happens. A mysterious global phenomenon occurs, and Jack, who gets himself hit by a bus right at that moment and then becomes unconscious for a while, is subsequently shocked to discover a number of small and big changes in the world. Several things have somehow gone out of existence, and it looks like Jack is the only guy in the world who is aware of this inexplicable change.

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Among these vanished things, one of them is none other than the Beatles. When Jack gives an impromptu performance of “Yesterday” to Ellie and his other friends at one point, they do not recognize it at all while understandably impressed a lot by its melancholic beauty, and it does not take much time for Jack to realize a certain opportunity coming upon him. Although he does not remember every Beatles song, he surely remembers many of them, and we accordingly get an amusing moment when he tries to remember and then write down Beatles songs as much as he can.

The most entertaining part of the movie comes from how Jack struggles to draw attention from others via several Beatles songs. Because of his meek and anonymous status, the songs do not instantly become popular, but then, what do you know, they happen to drawn the attention of a certain famous real-life musician, who has a little wry fun with playing himself on the screen. Thanks to that musician guy, Malik quickly rises to stardom within a few days, and he soon finds himself getting associated with a savvy American manager named Debra Hammer (Kate McKinnon), who is ready to go for what can be the biggest financial success in her entire music business career.

Jack’s preposterous overnight success through Beatles songs can be a rich ground for more laughs, but the screenplay by Richard Curtis, which is based on the story by Curtis and his co-writer Jack Barth, unfortunately meanders along its predictable narrative without much surprise. While you may chuckle a bit at a silly moment associated with “Hey Jude” or an absurd scene where Jack tries to remember the lyrics of “Eleanor Rigby”, the movie does not elicit any big laugh for us, and it is also disappointing to see how it lets its hero get himself off the hook too conveniently for its shamelessly sentimental ending.

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Moreover, the aforementioned songs and several other ones by the Beatles are not presented that well in the film, and that automatically took me back to Julie Taymor’s underrated Beatles musical film “Across the Universe” (2007), which, despite its inherent flaws in terms of story and characters, did a far better job of presenting the Beatles songs with considerable spirit and imagination in comparison. To be frank with you, while I still vividly remember several striking musical moments in “Across the Universe”, I cannot particularly recall any musical moment in “Yesterday” even though I watched it yesterday.

And it is all the more disappointing that the movie mostly under-utilizes many of its main cast members. Himesh Patel and Lily James are engaging performers, but both of them are frequently limited by their weak characters, and the same thing can be said about the other main cast members including Kate McKinnon, who certainly plays her broad supporting character with sheer gusto but does not get any opportunity to wield her comic talent as fully as she previously did in “The Ghostbusters” (2016).

Overall, “Yesterday” is not a total bore at least, but, considering how visceral and spirited some of Boyle’s previous films are, this is a major letdown on the whole, and I could not help but feel grumpy as walking out of the screening room at last night. Right after observing the hefty science drama of James Gray’s “Ad Astra” (2019), I wanted to feel lightened a little, but I only got more tired after watching “Yesterday”, and, seriously, I really want to revisit “Across the Universe” right now.

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