The Sapphires

Deborah Mailman, Shari Sebbens, Jessica Mauboy and Miranda Tapsell in The Sapphires

*** out of ****

The Sapphires is an Australian film, which has found distribution through The Weinstein Company in the states and can be seen in theaters now. This is one of those crowd pleasers bound to appeal to a broad audience. I’d heard nothing of it until a week ago.

The movie is a light-hearted drama surrounded by some heavy subject matter. Set in the late sixties, it is inspired by the true story of a group of Australian Aboriginal girls from the same family who are recruited to sing to the U.S. troops in Vietnam.

The ladies come to the attention of an Irishman named Dave, played by the goofy yet charming Chris O’Dowd (the cop in Bridesmaids). His character is living a near gutter existence in the outback as a hard-drinking talent scout visiting small music venue dives and playing keyboard to accompany singers.

When these indigenous ladies show up to a music contest and sing quite beautifully, he is one of the few people in a room filled with white people (mostly racists), who cannot deny their power. Aware of auditions for a gig in Saigon, they discuss with him their options to increase their chances. Their preferred music is American Country-Western, but he thinks he can get them to sing Soul, a genre that not only fits what American G.I.’s might expect from women of their color, but also exudes a feeling of hope.

Dave quickly transforms the ladies into a Soul group, which happens a little unrealistically fast and could have been improved with different pacing. I think this movie couldn’t wait to get these girls singing great Motown standards, which in their wonderful performances are a strong element in the film.

After nailing the audition, where they name their group, The Sapphires, they excitedly go to Saigon while not so aware of how terrible things are becoming in the surrounding area they will tour. Leading the pack, is the oldest, Gail (Deborah Mailman) whose pride of family and heritage drives her protective and stubborn behavior. Naturally, her character constantly clashes with Dave and the band members, providing the more entertaining banter of the movie.

They travel around the country to sing, while encountering the wonder of being abroad for the first time and conversely, the horror of a terrible war. There’s romance, laughs and tragedy. Like I say, it aims for a broad audience and it deserves one. Its director, Wayne Blair, makes a decent cinematic debut following a career in Australian television. The film’s co-writer, Tony Briggs, is the son of a real-life member of The Sapphires.

This is a movie with a very clear formula but plenty of fun, and more importantly, people worth caring about. These girls are worth admiring for the strength they’ve shown surviving the time of “the stolen generations” and all the hardships from unjust racist laws, which tore apart families.

That is the amazing heart of this film. Despite a story that conforms to everything you can expect about the ups and downs in a music group’s relationship, it is the foundation of a family’s emotional survival that makes this film meaningful. It is a very admirable story.

The music is awesome too.

Evil Dead

 

Jane Levy in Evil Dead, the remake of The Evil Dead

**1/2 out of ****

My recommendation for the new Evil Dead is only marginal and aimed only at fans of gory horror. The movie certainly delivers in that department. For everyone jaded by obvious CGI spatter effects in current day horror films, you can delightfully prepare yourself for a movie filled with good ol' messy prosthetic and makeup work that will make you cringe! 

Where this movie falls flat for me, is in its great amount of missed opportunities to make real horror through characters for whom we can fear. But, like in so much gore porn, we only have a superficial understanding of this group of fresh meat and we are unfairly teased with a fantastic concept of a possessed girl who is going through heroin withdrawl and all the interesting thematic directions such an idea could take.

Don't get me wrong, these aren't terrible characters. The actors aren't so bad either, except for Shiloh Fernandez, the possible hero of the story, who plays his role like a male model with uninspired boring banality. Jane Levy, Jessica Lucas and Lou Taylor Pucci all do decent jobs with the kind of characters who are only developed enough for horror fans who expect them to be ready for potential slaughter. That's not good enough for me. Even the most savage of horror movies play it safe by keeping an emotional distance from the terrorized characters. I find it much more disturbing when very humanized characters are in danger.

While this tangent may seem as though I don't get the point of Evil Dead, I will remind you that I'm not referring to the campy low budget nature of the 1981 original. This movie doesn't aim for that kind of fun (although there are plenty of fan-service references provided). It's taking a more serious angle through a more serious production -and as long as that is the approach of this film, I will judge it on those grounds.

In general, this was a watchable horror movie, and I was amused by the quality in the technique of its visuals, but it was too self-conscious as a horror movie for me to really feel involved.

Here's the Half in the Bag review. 

IN RETROSPECT: Jurassic Park -NOW IN 3D

Of course it looks good in 3D!

***1/2 out of **** 

Still in theaters, Jurassic Park can be seen in 3D. While I don’t take a big interest in post-conversion 3D – or even 3D for that matter - I cannot deny, it looks really good this way.

3D is an added element to many movies these days, but that extra dimension is nothing compared to the classic experience of a big picture and big sound of equally high quality. Quite often, a movie’s cinematography doesn’t seem very compatible with the 3D, especially with older films. You can also guarantee that a 3D image will be dimmer than 2D.

Thankfully, Jurassic Park is very compatible with the format. It was originally shot with a spherical lens keeping most of the screen’s content, foreground and background, in focus, and cinematographer Dean Cundey (The Back to the Future Trilogy) aimed for a dim ambient look rather than one of high contrast.

Obviously there are plenty of shots when dinosaurs sweep by the screen, but I was just as impressed with scenes involving humans, like the film’s best dialogue scene, set around a dinner table where slide projector beams of Jurassic Park ads pass between the characters.

The movie’s sound is maybe even more impressive. When it was first released, Jurassic Park pushed theaters all over the country to upgrade to digital surround sound. The new sound mix on the 3D edition, makes the one I remember hearing back then, sound pre-mature. As dinosaur roars echoed through the surround speakers, accompanied be John Williams’ breathtaking score, I got the nostalgic chills.  

I will never forget the satisfaction I felt as a twelve-year-old back in 1993, when I had spent most of the year anticipating a new movie from Steven Spielberg that promised to show dinosaurs in a way we had never seen them.

My Dad took me to Showcase Cinemas on Bardstown Road, where I was overwhelmed by a suspenseful high-tech movie being presented in a new high-tech process. My favorite part of the movie was (and still is) the well-paced scene when our heroes see the dinosaurs for the first time. To me, it’s this beautiful moment that happens in movies occasionally, when the characters onscreen are absolute surrogates for the audience. We were all there to see the dinosaurs and so were they. The look of awe on every character’s face was shared with excited audience members.

While I like the rest of the movie, the scene I’ve described is the peak of Jurassic Park for me. Even critics who agreed they were impressed by the film, noted that for a Spielberg film, it sure fell into the formula of a monster movie and shouldn’t have teased us with a few grand moments that appreciated the majesty of the extinct creatures that most people have found fascination with at some point in their lives.

Like all films written by David Koepp, Jurassic Park is full of exciting scenes and compelling ideas, but leaves us with a few unanswered questions and not much of an ending. I was accepting of this, and still consider the movie to be a fun ride but wish it had taken off as a franchise where the faults of the first entry could have been corrected with more interesting characters and a little expansion on the mysteries of the previous film.

I thought the second movie was an absolute disappointment for its aimless collection of good and bad action scenes while suggesting profound revelations would come -but never did. Spielberg, right after finishing Schindler’s List didn’t seem as invested in a dinosaur adventure the second time around, and I don’t blame him. Joe Johnston’s third movie was hardly a step in the right direction with a sad excuse for a plot, but felt comparatively redeeming for its B-movie spirit. Still, this is a movie series that should have grown and never did.

The first one is still a classic of a rare kind like Star Wars and the original King Kong. It ushered in a new method of special effects, but was so well mastered in its debut it took a long time for any imitators to catch up with its quality. Seriously, how often do you see computer-animated creatures that look so good, -even today?

Another Reason I Love Movies: Roger Ebert

When I was a kid, my dad started collecting the annual publication, “Roger Ebert’s Movie Yearbook”, which worked well as a reference for movies to rent at the video store. With this book series, I started by looking up movies I loved, such as the “Star Wars,” “Star Trek” and “Back to the Future” films to get his take on them. He shared thoughts on what made these movies work so well, through his down-to-earth reactions to the vast complexity of any given movie, in a way that even a child could follow. I started to learn a lot about film.

“It’s not what a movie is about, it’s how it’s about it.”

Those are words I’ve lived by whenever I explain movies to people. I normally resent the synopsis process when talking about a film. Roger Ebert’s famous words are simple and meaningful. Form was more sacred to Roger than the content. There are too many people who are mistaken on why they love or hate certain movies due to cheap associations they make from the movie stars who are in them to the genre it claims to be.

Film criticism is currently undervalued and Mr. Ebert held a lot of that value. There are many great critics out there still. I love the educated opinions of Nathan Rabin, Scott Tobias and Tasha Robinson at the A.V. Club. David Edelstein, Bob Mondello and Kenneth Turan write for separate publications and can be heard on NPR. There are also a lot of good critics on Aint It Cool News. My current favorites are the informed yet informal Jay and Mike of Red Letter Media. These are all people seeking out eccentrics like myself, but Ebert achieved at reaching broad audience for many years -along with his co-host Gene Siskel- on television where his perception of movies was expressed. He used this power with respect for the people who made them down to average person who paid to view them.

He wasn’t inclined to alienate his viewers and readers because he was at heart, a teacher to anyone who enjoyed movies from cheap thrills to high-art in an exploration of why we feel the way we do when we’re in the cinema -or watching something at home. I recently found an old episode online where he and Gene re-evaluated “Home Alone” weeks after giving it the old “two thumbs down” and explored reasons for its success and questioned if they may have been wrong about it.

I respected Ebert even when he hated a movie I liked, such as “The Usual Suspects.” He still managed to explain the film well enough to intrigue someone who might find it interesting. He was fair.

When I felt alone in my love for a movie and discovered that Ebert loved it too, it was always gratifying. John Patrick Shanley’s “Joe Versus the Volcano,” and Kathryn Bigelow’s “Strange Days.” come to mind. Those movies failed at the box office, but Ebert stood up for them as if to plea for people to give them a chance while giving their talented directors (who would find great success later in their careers) the message, “Keep up the good work!” 

On April the 4^th, after months of little to no activity by the man himself on his website, it was announced that Roger Ebert had succumbed shortly after his cancer returned. He had spent the past decade battling the disease of different types. After a surgery left him without the ability to speak, he kept writing with strong ambition and managed as well as an autobiography that I read last year, allowing me to know for the first time, everything else he had to say about life that didn’t revolve around a particular movie.

Getting to know his personal life allowed me to understand a lot about the values and discipline behind his perception of film and I respected him all the more for a rich and brave life that made his opinions valuable.

I have too much to say and cannot possibly organize my thoughts about this man. There is no way that this piece can express what he meant to me and to others. The most important thing is that his legacy shouldn’t die with him. Movies are worth discussing just as much as any art form that evokes bold thoughts and feelings. I feel like we’re left with a world now where people still see movies but rarely discuss them in a productive way, and as a result, cinema’s evolution is slowing down.

Spring Breakers

Rachel Korine, Selena Gomez, Ashley Benson, James Franco and Vanessa Hutchens in Harmony Korine's shameless Spring Breakers

*** out of ****

Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers is pointless filth aimed at an MTV audience -yet simultaneously captivating. Like all his films, it is a gorgeously made piece of art that embraces human ugliness. In this film, he utilizes the teen-star fame of Vanessa Hutchens and Selena Gomez for box office draw to a film that is decadent to the max.


Spring Breakers is steeped within the superficial minds of a group of college girls obsessed with having the ultimate Florida spring break adventure filled with excessive partying, drugs and sex. Their funds are dramatically short and they resort to terrorizing the patrons and employees of a late-night diner with squirt guns (made to look like real guns) and rob the place before hitting the road.

Their debauchery leads them to meeting a sleazy (understatement) G-dog rapper/drug dealer named Alien, played with terrifying hilarity by James Franco who wants the girls to be a part of his life. The grill on his teeth, the braided hair, tattoos, and giant sunglasses all come together to make Franco into perfect sleaze. I’m still wondering what he was doing in Oz the Great and Powerful. He wasn't effective in that. He’s awesome in this. 

Spring Breakers is a movie that made me feel despair for the human race. Korine’s cinematic approach is too nihilistic to even bother taking a stance on the material. I felt a sense of hatred as I watched it, but as I got further into it, there was nothing to do but laugh -constantly.

The lighting, cinematography, editing, and music all culminate into the trance-inducing greatness I have come to expect from Korine projects. It all achieves a non-linear drugged-out state of mind portraying the world of party-girls and criminals to such a ridiculous degree, you feel as though you are being presented this movie’s wet-dream of itself. This is one of the most negative films I’ve seen in a while, but I can honestly say I wasn’t bored for one minute.

Stoker

Mia Wasikowska and Matthew Goode in Chan-wook Park's disappointing Stoker

** out of ****

Chan-Wook Park’s first English Language film, Stoker, is a dark and violent psychological thriller that had my enthusiastic attention until I could tell it had nothing interesting in store for its conclusion. This is an eerie story that also takes place in its own world. It’s not so much a mutated reality, as it seems to self-consciously take place in the land of its genre. Like Tim Burton, Wes Anderson, and David Lynch films Stoker has a very stylized vision, selective in fashion to the point where one might wonder what the decade is, in the film.

It stars the excellent Mia Wasikowska (Alice in Wonderland and Jane Eyre) as an awkward and shy teenager whose father has just died. Living with her mother, played by Nicole Kidman, they are visited by a previously unknown uncle. The uncle is played by Matthew Goode, who like Ryan Gosling, has a talent for looking like a walking and smiling mannequin, so perfect looking, you wonder what in the world is hidden away in that head of his. The uncle’s vampiric presence has the young girl’s curiosity engaged and his past becomes the mystery of the film.

Park directed Oldboy, one of the darkest thrillers I’ve ever seen, which takes you on a twisted journey that contains the substance of Greek tragedy. Stoker has a screenplay that imitates many movies from the genre, especially Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt, and does very little to put a spin on the ideas movie fans are used to. Written by Prison Break star Wentworth Miller and Erin Cressida Williams (Secretary), this movie plays with ideas of the killer beneath the most unlikely of characters, but it is the director with amazing framing and psychologically effective images of horror who keeps this movie afloat… until the vague material sinks it. 

This is one of many bad thrillers that are great at getting you involved in the hope that the revelations will have a profound impact, but only manage to underwhelm in the end, leaving you wishing there had been no answers to any of its questions.