Posted on March 9, 2012 at 8:00 am
I’m the oldest of three girls and so I have always had a special fondness for movies about sisters. I was delighted to see that Turner Classic Movies has a full schedule of sister movies today, from the classic Meet Me In St. Louis
Posted on March 8, 2012 at 6:56 pm
It takes a while to get going and is about half an hour too long, but “John Carter” has some spectacular visuals and well-staged action scenes. Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan 
Handsome but bland Taylor Kitsch plays John Carter. In an overlong prologue, we see him as an angry loner seeking a legendary gold stash and refusing to join the U.S. Cavalry (headed by “Breaking Bad’s Bryan Cranston). He finally discovers the cave with the gold, which is a storage facility used by what we would call a Martian, and a fight ends with his being transported to Mars, or, as the inhabitants call it, Barsoom. He is discovered by some of the four-armed green Martians, including their leader Tars (voice of Willem Dafoe), who is fascinated by Carter’s ability to leap huge distances and heights, thanks to the Barsoomian gravity. He is something between a pet and a prisoner, but things improve when they give him a drink that makes it possible for them to understand each other’s languages.
In the meantime, the robed messengers have delivered their super-weapon to Sab Than (“The Wire’s” Dominic West), the leader of the Zodanga, enemies of Helium, which is led by Tardos Mors (Ciaran Hinds), father of Princes Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins), who are now in an increasingly precarious position. It gets overly complicated for a while but then it picks up when John Carter gets involved with Dejah and has to fight some enormous monsters gladiator-style and there are some very cool flying ships.
The frame story adds unnecessary clutter to an already-muddled plot and Collins, an extraordinarily gifted and classically trained actress, is under-used in a decidedly un-classical role. There has been some surprising speculation about Christian themes in the storyline, but I believe it is just the typical finding-the-hero-within-after-disillusionment, down to the big reveal about returning home to discover tragedy that we see in everything from “The Searchers” to “Star Wars: A New Hope.” The most important reason it does not work well as a Christ story is that the main character is not very compelling and the narrative not very resonant.
Posted on March 8, 2012 at 6:05 pm
B| Lowest Recommended Age: | Mature High Schooler |
| MPAA Rating: | Rated R for adult situations, language, nudity, and sex |
| Profanity: | Constant very strong and explicit language |
| Alcohol/ Drugs: | Drinking, smoking, drugs, substance abuse |
| Diversity Issues: | A theme of the movie, character makes bigoted remarks |
| Date Released to Theaters: | March 9, 2012 |
| Amazon.com ASIN: | B00772HR6O |
Nick Flynn was working at a Boston homeless shelter when his father, Jonathan Flynn, came in looking for a place to stay. Nick was raised by his mother and had little contact with his father except for some letters explaining that he would soon be recognized as one of the three greatest writers in American history. Nick Flynn’s memoir, Another Bullshit Night in Suck City
Paul Dano plays Nick, a young man who has some good instincts and some talent. He is worse than directionless — he is stuck. His mother (Julianne Moore) has died and he has no place to go. He moves into a strip club-turned apartment that is barely more than a squat, selected over the other candidates because he has no family who might come in for an extended stay. He takes the job at the homeless shelter because it is the first opportunity he hears of. He is not unsympathetic but he is distant and untrained. When a resident needs a new pair of pants Nick turns to one of the more experienced aides to ask what size. The aide says simply, “Ask him.” Nick begins to see — as we do — the artificiality of the denial-based distance we maintain from people we think might ask more from us than we can give or might make us think about how fragile our support system can be. When his father (Robert De Niro) shows up in the line of people needing a bed, Nick has so many conflicting feelings he has to go numb — on his own and with some chemical assistance. He wants to love his father and he wants his father to love him. He wants to care for him but is afraid of not being able to — we learn more about why later in the story. He is not prepared to acknowledge how much he wants to be like his father (in following his dream of being a writer) and does not want to be like him (unable to finish his story). We hear their competing versions of the story but we know, as Nick does, that both are coming from him.
De Niro has one of his best roles as a man wavering between fierce pride and grandiosity. Jonathan is a man of large gestures and unspeakably selfish behavior. De Niro keeps him human without compromising by trying to make him more sympathetic. Ultimately, it is Jonathan’s lack of empathy that allows him to finally if briefly provide fatherly support and guidance in telling Nick an important truth that frees him from the past and provides direction for the future.
Posted on March 8, 2012 at 6:02 pm
Paul Torday’s satiric novel of politics, money, love, and fishing has been brought to the screen with Ewan McGregor as a government fisheries expert and Emily Blunt as an aide to a Yemeni sheik who has what seems to be an impossible dream — building a salmon fishery in his desert country.
When Dr. Alfred Jones (McGregor) receives a polite letter from Harriet Chetwode-Talbot (Blunt) about the sheik’s proposal, he dismisses it as ridiculous and sends back a curt refusal: “Conditions in the Yemen make this project fundamentally infeasible.” But bad news about conflict in the Mid-East has the Prime Minister’s press secretary looking for “a good news story from the Middle East — a big one,” and British-Yemeni cooperation on something as benign as fly-fishing seems like just the photo-op-friendly project to distract the public. Dr. Jones is directed to meet with Ms. Chetwode-Talbot (as they will continue to address one another). It turns out that some elements of the “fundamental in-feasibility” of the project are not as infeasible as he thought. For one thing, money is no object, and it is remarkable how many obstacles that clears. And the support of the Prime Minister clears away most of the rest. It’s like a benign “Charlie Wilson’s War” with fish instead of anti-aircraft weapons).
Dr. Jones makes up the most impossibly high figure he can think of, and that immediately becomes the budget for the project. Suddenly, Dr. Jones has access to the most expert engineers in the world, including dam builders from China and to the equipment that can ship millions of fish thousands of miles. Both he and Ms. Chetwode-Talbot discover the liberating feeling of imagining endless possibilities. But there are complications and dangers that come from that much freedom. There are challenges that are beyond the capacity of even the most skilled engineers. Ms. Chetwode-Talbot has a boyfriend in the military who is fighting in the Mid-East and Dr. Jones has a wife who is on an extended business trip to Geneva. Those commitments begin to seem like just another barrier once thought impenetrable, but now open to reconsideration.
Director Lasse Hellström dissolves some barriers of his own, deftly bridging genres with a story that combines political satire with adventure and romance and is not afraid to take on issues like faith and bridging cultural boundaries. Amr Waked brings dignity and charisma to the role of the sheik. “I have too many wives not to know when a woman is unhappy,” he tells Ms. Chetwode-Talbot. He persuades Dr. Jones that what he wants is not a rich man’s whim but a part of a larger vision to inspire his countrymen and for the moment at least the idea sounds less absurd to us as well. Kirsten Scott Thomas steals the show as the press secretary, whether she is sending tart IMs or scooting her children out the door as she barks orders into her cell phone. The film effectively captures the ruthless pragmatism and frequent cynicism of political trade-offs.
It captures the broadening horizons of the two Brits transplanted to the desert as well. As McGregor and Blunt root for fish “bred for the dinner table” to locate the instinct to swim upstream, we root for them to do the same.
Parents should know that this film includes strong material for a PG-13 including sexual references and a brief explicit situation, brief strong language, and wartime and sabotage violence.
Family discussion: What does Dr. Jones discover about faith? How does the project make him think differently about his own options? What do you think will happen next?
If you like this, try: “Chocolat” and “Local Hero” and the novel
Posted on March 8, 2012 at 5:50 pm
The Michelin Guide to restaurants describes the best as “worth a detour” or “worth a special journey.” They describe a tiny ten-seat sushi restaurant in Tokyo as worth the trip to Japan. If you want to eat there, call before you book your plane tickets. They are booked three months in advance for meals that can cost $300 per diner. This documentary is about Jiro Ono the owner of the restaurant and its chef, who has devoted his life to perfecting the art of sushi. Director/cinematographer David Gelb makes the sushi look utterly luscious but he also makes it look exquisite as sculpture.
The movie is fascinating because of the details we learn about sushi and the dedication and artistry of the man who has devoted his life to it. Jiro-San’s attention to every possible detail from buying the freshest and best ingredients each day at the market to the balletic gestures in assembling each piece and placing it before the customer is mesmerizing. There is a holiness in his devotion to perfection as a way of honoring the food he prepares and the people who eat it. Apprentices must work just squeezing the towels for a long time before they are allowed to touch any food and for years before what they prepare is considered suitable for the customers. And they constantly re-consider their preparation to look for ways to improve it. Jiro-San announces a major change he has implemented — instead of massaging the octopus for half an hour, they will massage it for 45 minutes. We also see Jiro-San with his son, who works in the restaurant (another son runs an off-shoot location). And we see him in a rare moment away from work, at a reunion with old friends.
Sushi was once seen as a rare treat for wealthy people on special occasions. But the success of chefs like Jiro-San has made sushi so popular that it is at risk from over-fishing. The film touches lightly but frankly on these problems. But the movie’s larger point is not about sushi or about sustainability but about the poetry and depth that come from devoting one’s life to the pursuit of perfection in the service of others.
