Movie Reviews: Tolkien

Tolkien
directed by Dome Karukoski

This was a tightly focused, though ultimately not very revealing look at J.R.R. Tolkien, the famous academic and author of "The Lord of The Rings", "The Hobbit", "The Silmarillion" and several other fantasy stories, most of which were set in his imagined pre-historical world of Middle-Earth. It's not easy to make compelling films about writing, and this isn't one of them. Writing is usually a solitary activity that takes place internally in a writer's brain. How do you dramatically depict that process visually so that it will resonate with people watching it?

Perhaps smartly, the director doesn't attempt to do that. Instead the director focuses on what he can visually express: Tolkien's gift for languages, Tolkien's fascination with Northern mythologies and heroic tales, Tolkien's budding romance with and fierce love for the woman who would later become his wife, Tolkien's experiences during World War I, and Tolkien's platonic love for his close friends at King Edward's School at Birmingham.

Movie Reviews: Road Games (2015)

Road Games (2015)

directed by Abner Pastoll

This 2015 British-French co-production referenced the 1981 Australian-American film of the same name that starred Stacy Keach and Jamie Lee Curtis. The 2015 movie is a thriller with twists , not a gory horror film. I thought that the movie missed its mark. Road Games has a lot of misdirection. 

But I quickly guessed the major plot twist. The other mysteries weren't interesting or made no sense. 

I enjoyed the bucolic settings. Road Games is set in rural France. Road Games looked great but could have spent more energy on establishing the difference between urban and rural living. Jack (Andrew Simpson) is an apparently charisma free British young man who vacationed in France with his girlfriend. 

Book Reviews: Bad People

Bad People
written by Jeremy Bates

Because paid work has become more demanding, I haven't been able to do much reading. I want to change that. I hope to read at least three or four new books a month. Lacking the time to sit down and enjoy say, something the size of War and Peace , I chose a collection of short stories, or as the author describes them, short novels. 

Collections of shorter works don't take much time to finish. If you read a bad story,  you can find a good story in a few pages. The author has less time to go on and on; he must quickly grab your attention and keep it. The author must put up or shut up.

Jeremy Bates is talented. There aren't many authors who can rework 2500 year old stories into modern thriller tales so skillfully that you're halfway done with the story before realizing what happened.

These are thriller tales with some explicit sex and violence. There are no ghosts, ghouls, vampires, or other supernatural entities. Bad People is about well, bad people--though who the bad guy is may not always be obvious. There are four short novels.

"The Mailman":

In 1985 Mick Freeman is a Los Angeles record executive who is searching for the next big rock band. Mick thinks he's found them in The Tempests, a drug addled group that reeks of danger. Unknown to Mick, his wife Jade has become bored. Mick doesn't make her motor run any more. Jade is a housewife. When the new twenty year younger handsome mailman Ronnie makes a move, Jade reciprocates. Complications arise.

Movie Reviews: The Panic In Needle Park

The Panic In Needle Park
directed by Jerry Schatzberg

I hadn't watched this 1971 movie about the romance of two New York City heroin addicts. I knew it had soon to be superstar Al Pacino's first leading role, which caught The Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola's eye. 

Coppola thought that Pacino had the gravitas and intensity to play Michael Corleone and used this film to persuade skeptical Paramount producers and studio executives of Pacino's skill. Watching this movie it seems impossible that anyone couldn't have recognized that Pacino was destined for greater things. 

Hindsight is always 20/20. Many actors and actresses do wonderful work in one movie and then for whatever reason never touch greatness again. So who can really tell. This movie reminded me of similar later movies such as Requiem For A Dream, Leaving Las Vegas, and Drugstore Cowboy. This film has an anti-drug message but it transmits that message without preaching or turning its characters into caricatures. 

The film's characters are lowlifes but they're not always doing lowlife things. They have hopes, dreams, and fun like anyone else.

Movie Reviews: San Andreas

San Andreas
directed by Brad Peyton

This is an over the top 2013 disaster movie that used every action movie cliche and threw in an amazing number of fanservice cleavage shots. 

The director and writer(s) ensured no matter what was happening on screen that the cleavage of the two lead actresses (and most secondary ones) was always on display. 

Someone drowning? Show some cleavage. Building on fire? We need some cleavage shots. Deep conversation between estranged spouses? That goes better with cleavage. Someone dangling from a helicopter? Someone climbing rubble? Someone discussing events with co-workers? What better time to show some cleavage. Snicker. 

Michigan Democrat Fights Back!

It seems that some Democratic elected officials are finally waking up to the fact that when someone hits you, you hit them back. Harder. It's the only way to deal with people in real life. Turning the other cheek or assuming that your presumed audience will see through the lies is an excellent way to lose respect and lose elections. As the saying goes "A lie can travel halfway around the world and back again while the truth is lacing up its boots."

The new Republican tactic is to call Democrats pedophiles and child groomers. One Democratic Michigan State Senator, Mallory McMorrow, recently let everyone know she didn't appreciate anyone, in particular the Republican Senator Lana Theis calling her  a "groomer" in a fundraiser email. This sort of forceful rebuttal to lies could and should become part of a Democratic rapid response playbook.

Senator Lana Theis accused me by name of grooming and sexualizing children in an attempt to marginalize me for standing up against her marginalizing the LGBTQ community...in a fundraising email, for herself.

Hate wins when people like me stand by and let it happen. I won't. pic.twitter.com/jL5GU42bTv

— Mallory McMorrow (@MalloryMcMorrow) April 19, 2022

Movie Reviews: Angel Face

Angel Face

directed by Otto Preminger

Angel Face is a 1953 film noir that, like Chinatown two decades later, has some Freudian undertones. These were not usually explicit. It was the 50s. When you think about them you might get the heebie-jeebies. This movie didn't use WW2 as a backdrop but did use wealth and corruption as the story environment.

Depending on whom you spoke to, the director was known as a demanding perfectionist auteur or as a sadistic bully.

There is a famous story that Preminger required too many takes of a scene where Robert Mitchum slaps Jean Simmons. Preminger wanted the scene to be realistic; he refused to let the slap be faked or toned down as Mitchum wanted to do. After Preminger kept insisting that Mitchum slap Simmons harder, Mitchum lost his temper and slapped Preminger in the face with his full strength, sarcastically asking him was that the right force or should he do it again. 

Preminger fled the set. Preminger tried and failed to get Mitchum fired. The studio owner, Howard Hughes, had attempted to seduce Simmons, although she was married. In revenge for being rejected by Simmons, Hughes had insisted that Simmons fulfill her studio contract with Preminger as the director.