And NBC’s Next Live Musical Performance Will Be….Peter Pan!

Posted on January 19, 2014 at 3:27 pm

NBC pledged to follow up it’s live production of “The Sound of Music” with another family musical and they’ve announced what the next one will be — another classic that originally starred Mary Martin, “Peter Pan.”

There have been many versions of James M. Barrie’s classic story since he first wrote it as a play and novel in the early 20th century. It was a revolution in the theater back then — not just the flying but the audience participation as everyone had to clap to bring Tinkerbell back to life. Mary Martin starred on Broadway in the 1954 musical with songs by Mark “Moose” Charlap, with additional music by Jule Styne, and most of the lyrics were written by Carolyn Leigh, with additional lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. Martin and her co-star Cyril Richard (who played both Mr. Darling and Captain Hook) performed the musical on television in 1955, setting a viewership record. Martin did two more versions on television and later productions starred Sandy Duncan and Cathy Rigby, who played Peter on Broadway and on the road from 1990 until 2010.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1s3VfxCYqXs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sye2NanCYHI

Who should put on the tights and flying harness for this new production?

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit

Posted on January 16, 2014 at 6:01 pm

There are three conclusions to draw from this reboot of Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan character. First, it plays like an infomercial for NSA access to, well, pretty much everything. Second, no matter how attractive the actors and how thrilling the score, there is no way to make it exciting to watch someone banging on a keyboard and staring intently at a computer screen as the “loading” indicator creeps along. Third, when spy movies run out of other ideas, they conclude that the fate of the United States and the rest of the world is not enough to hold our attention, so it must be time to kidnap the hero’s girlfriend.

Chris Pine (“Star Trek’s” Captain Kirk) takes over the role of Jack Ryan from Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford, and Ben Affleck to play Tom Clancy’s egghead action hero, Jack Ryan, PhD. Bringing him up to date, we see him as a student at the London School of Economics, helplessly watching the terrorist attack of 9/11 on television, then enlisting in the Marines, being shot down, saving two of his men despite the gravest of injuries, and then, in rehab to learn to walk again, meeting two people who will change his life. One is Cathy, a pretty med student (Keira Knightly, with an American accent). The other is a guy in a suit named Harper who recruits Ryan to work for the CIA, deep undercover…on Wall Street. I really liked the idea that the government would recognize the threat to national security from the too big to fail financial institutions, but it turns out that isn’t it. Ryan was sent to Wall Street to spy on the same old bad guys we always spy on, Russians, this time trying to manipulate our financial markets.

Director Kenneth Branagh’s biggest mistake was in the casting of the villain: Kenneth Branagh. We know he’s evil because he has a sleek, spare, shiny black office and he sits there grimly, listening to an ethereal aria and beating up a guy who was clumsy in giving him a shot. Branagh seems to enjoy playing bad guys — most recently in “The Wild Wild West,” “Rabbit-Proof Fence,” and “Pirate Radio.” He’s better at playing the uptight bureaucratic type (or the self-important type as he did in “My Week with Marilyn”) than the larger-than-life bad guy needed for a Bond-style film. In fairness, the screenplay, originally written as a stand-alone and then adapted for the Jack Ryan character, lacks the Tom Clancy magic that makes his stories so absorbing, the authenticity of the technological details and the depth of character. Compare this pallid Russian bad guy and his generic compatriots to the superbly crafted, complex Soviet characters in “The Hunt for Red October,” from Sean Connery’s captain to Joss Ackland’s diplomat. The other big problem is the increasing ridiculousness of the storyline. The United States has such a crackerjack team in Moscow that we can send in the espionage equivalent of magic elves to secretly remake a luxury hotel room that has been shattered in a shoot-out/fight/drowning so that in less than a couple of hours it is like new, with just a little wet grout (and of course the removal of the dead body) to show that anything had been changed. And yet, when they need to do the one thing any spy team should learn on day one, breaking into a secure location, the only one who can do it is our boy Jack, the PhD from Wall Street? Once the break-in takes place, it just gets silly, with a lot of intent people banging on keyboards and getting instant access to thousands of data sources and a series of increasingly implausible bang bang with even less plausible banter. Ryan is the increasingly implausible Swiss Army knife of superspies, equally adept at hand-to-hand combat, stunt driving, and hacking.

You’ve got to grade January releases on a curve, and by that standard, it barely passes muster. In any other month, it would be strictly wait for DVD.

Parents should know that this film includes extensive scenes of spy-style peril and violence including chases, crashes, and explosions, guns, knives, drowning, fights, and terrorism, references to painkiller dependency and abuse and alcohol abuse, and brief strong language.

Family discussion: Does this make you feel differently about how much access the government should have to private data? What qualities make a good spy?

If you like this, try: the other Jack Ryan movies, especially “The Hunt for Red October,” and Alfred Hitchcock’s “Torn Curtain”

The Legend of Hercules

Posted on January 9, 2014 at 11:20 pm

Director Renny Harlin has made a Hercules epic with drab, washed-out cinematography, poorly staged action scenes, incompetent acting, bad hair, terrible computer effects, and dialogue that lands more heavily than the title character’s punch. Even at just over 90 minutes it feels much too long. Harlin is way too fond of halting the acting with a slo-mo pause or freeze frame. By the last half hour it was worse than repetitive; it was an infuriating tactic for prolonging the end of the film. Talk about adding insult to injury.

In the first of two 3D Hercules movies scheduled for 2014, “Twilight” hottie Kellan Lutz plays the legendary strong man. Instead of sticking with the perfectly good Labors of Hercules storyline that has captivated audiences for thousands of years, this movie goes straight for the generic sword and sandal epic — there’s the Tessarakonteres with galley slaves whipped to row harder, the battle scenes with soldiers wielding swords and shields, the combat to the death in an arena with thousands of the least persuasive computer-generated audience members ever. There’s some argle bargle about whether our hero will accept his destiny and there’s a love story. There’s even, heaven help us, a going into battle pep talk so beyond Lutz’s capacity that he sounds less like a demigod than like he’s ordering a round of beers for the fellows.

Hercules is the son of Queen Alcmene and Zeus, the leader of the gods. Alcmene has already had a son with her husband, the cruel despot King Amphitryon (Scott Adkins). She prays to Hera for help, and the goddess gives her permission for her husband, Zeus, to give Alcmene another son, who will be half-god and will bring peace back to the kingdom. Amphitryon knows the boy is not his.

We skip ahead 20 years to see Hercules (Lutz) frolicking with the beautiful blonde Princess Hebe (Gaia Weiss). They are in love, but she is pledged to his angry and jealous half-brother, the heir to the throne. Soon, Hercules is sent away on a mission that will turn out to be a trap. He is taken prisoner, sold into slavery, and forced into gladiator-style combat to the death.

The actors were cast for their muscles and fighting skills rather than their acting. That would not be so bad except that they are called upon to spout clunky dialogue in fake — and highly variable — English theater-style accents. But what really takes all the air out of this balloon is its very premise. If Hercules has super-powers and the protection of his Olympian father, it dissipates any dramatic tension or sense of genuine peril. And when the crowd goes wild and starts yelling “Hercules! Hercules!” it is impossible not to think of Eddie Murphy, and wish he would show up to pick up the pace.

Parents should know that this movie includes sword and sandal-style epic action with a extensive fighting and battles, characters injured and killed, also murder and attempted suicide, sexual situation and some sexual references.

Family discussion: Why did Hercules resist his destiny? Why did he give up his special powers for the final battle?

If you like this, try: the original “Clash of the Titans” and Russell Crowe’s “Gladiator”

Lone Survivor

Posted on January 9, 2014 at 6:00 pm

Director Peter Berg is as good as it gets when it comes to putting a particular kind of male chemistry on screen. If he was writing instead of filming, he would dunk his pen in testosterone, beard stubble, and sweat. Whether it is the small town Texas football community of “Friday Night Lights,” the disastrous bachelor party of “Very Bad Things,” or the aliens and explosions of the under-rated “Battleship,” Berg understands the rhythms of guy-talk that circles around the still core of pure masculinity. There are nearly as many f-words per minute in this film as in the record-breaking “Wolf of Wall Street.” But there the language was used to show off, to convey bravado, for shock and awe. Here the heirs to a long tradition of colorful military argot almost have air quotes around the language. It’s almost a mirror image; on Wall Street, they use bad words to seem tougher. These Navy Seals use bad language with irony — they know that no words can be as tough as they really are or express what they have really seen and done. For them, the inadequacy of even the most provocative language is the joke.

This is the true story of a disastrous Navy SEAL mission in Afghanistan, based on the book Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 by Marcus Luttrell. We know from the title and from the earliest moments of the movie that Luttrell, played by Mark Wahlberg, will be the only one still around at the end of the movie. And so, we steel ourselves, knowing we will spend just enough time with the characters to become attached to them before they are sent off on a doomed mission to take out a ‘bad guy” in Afghanistan and start getting killed.

As in most military dramas, real and fictional, there are archetypal characters. There’s a new addition and a hardened vet. And there is Luttrell, a medic, a witness, like Ishmael in Moby Dick the survivor who carries the stories of the others with him.

This is not “action violence,” with super-effective weapons on our side and endless just-misses from the enemy, along with exciting explosions and instant death. This is messy, dirty, blood-gushing and agonizing wartime violence. Berg pays tribute to these men by showing us that their courage, dedication, and skill were unparalleled and the tragic stupidity of war presented them with a series of awful choices and unthinkable danger. At one point, when they have been spotted by (apparent) civilians, including a young boy, they stand there and discuss their options — let them go and risk having them tell the enemy where they are, tie them up and risk having them die of predators or starvation, or kill them, preserving the mission but putting into question the larger issues, from what happens when it gets reported on CNN and what we are fighting for if that is who we’ve become. That may be the most heartbreaking moment of the film — until the end, when we see the real faces of the brave young men who died. They knew what they owed us. Perhaps this movie will help remind us what we owe them.

Parents should know that this movie includes constant wartime peril and violence with many characters injured and killed, children in peril, guns, explosions. There are very disturbing and graphic images of characters being hit with bullets, many sad deaths, as well as constant very strong and sometimes crude language.

Family discussion: What elements of the training and briefings were important to helping the SEALS do their job? What more did they need? Who was right in the discussion of what to do when they were “compromised” in being spotted by civilians?

If you like this, try: “Act of Valor,” with real-life Navy SEALS playing fictional versions of themselves and “We Were Soldiers,” about the early days of the American involvement in the Vietnam War.

The Wolf of Wall Street

Posted on December 24, 2013 at 6:30 pm

A-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Adult
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for sequences of strong sexual content, graphic nudity, drug use and language throughout, and for some violence
Profanity:	Constant very strong and crude language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Every possible kind of substance abuse
Violence/ Scariness:	Peril including a crashed helicopter and a sinking ship
Diversity Issues:	Diverse characters, insensitive treatment of little people
Date Released to Theaters:	December 25, 2013
Date Released to DVD:	March 28, 2014
Amazon.com ASIN:	0345549333

Jordan Belfort is a selling machine the way a shark is a killing machine. Every single element of his being is optimally designed for just one purpose, with no extraneous or pesky attributes like a conscience to slow him down. And so, when he interrupts the story right off the bat to make sure that we see the color of his Lamborghini was white (like in “Miami Vice”) not red, he knows it will encourage us to believe that he cares about making sure we get the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. It’s his version of it, anyway, as told in his book, The Wolf of Wall Street.

Belfort actually doesn’t spend much time on Wall Street, but those magic words make for a better sales pitch. The man knows how to tell a story. He gets a job on Wall Street at age 22, a “smile and dial” position where he is supposed to get 500 people a day on the phone and ready to talk to a broker who will pitch them some stocks. A senior broker (a still painfully skinny post “Dallas Buyers Club” Matthew McConaughey, perfectly capturing the insanity of people who make a ton of money pretending they understand something that makes no sense) takes him out to lunch. He tells the waiter to keep the liquor coming, and explains to Belfort the key lesson: brokers are not there to make money for the clients — they are there to make money from the clients. He also advised Belfort to keep his lower half, uh, relaxed, and his upper half, uh, stimulated. This is advice that Belfort will take, uh, to heart.

But first he has to lose his job when Wall Street firm collapses following what we then called a crash back in October of 1987, but now, having recalibrated following far greater financial disasters, we call a momentary dip. Belfort then discovers a whole new world of not-quite-legal penny stock brokerages on Long Island (director Spike Jonze has a very funny cameo as his new boss) and soon he is running his own boiler room operation out of what once was a car repair shop. This was, in fact, the inspiration for the terrific movie “Boiler Room,” starring Giovanni Ribisi, Ben Affleck, and Vin Diesel. He gives his firm a made-up name, brilliantly constructed to sound established, solid, and vaguely familiar: Stratton Oakmont.

Here Belfort learns two more important lessons. First, there’s no such thing as bad publicity. A story in Forbes that calls him a reverse Robin Hood, stealing from the poor to make money for himself, gets him an avalanche of job applicants eager to join his Merry Men. Second, too much is never enough. Belfort does not fall into every possible kind of addiction and substance abuse; he embraces it. There are mountains of drugs and hookers in this movie, plus a helicopter crash (while Belfort was high), sinking a yacht “suitable for a Bond villain” that once belonged to Coco Chanel (while Belfort was high), midget tossing and a crazy-hilarious conversation about the parameters of midget-tossing (and, in passing, the ethics), a near-naked marching band in the brokerage, and then more drugs and hookers. This is all in the book, and screenwriter Terrence Winter told Joe Nocera of the New York Times that “when he interviewed the F.B.I. agent who finally nailed Mr. Belfort, the man said, ‘I tracked this guy for 10 years, and everything he wrote is true.'” That includes the macabre but over-the-top hilarious scene of a drug overdose that leaves Belfort incapable of standing or speaking coherently that comes at the worst possible place and time. The cocaine and ludes are not nearly as powerful as the most intoxicating substances of all: greed mixed with testosterone and pure id.

“Is this legal?” Belfort cheekily asks us as he explains what he is up to? “Absolutely not!” He knows we are not interested in the details. We are too busy being dazzled by the excess and how much fun everyone is having with it. By now, Belfort has left his pretty first wife (big-eyed Cristin Milioti, the mother from “How I Met Your Mother”) for a second, spectacularly beautiful wife he calls “The Duchess of Bay Ridge” (Margot Robbie, nailing the accent and the attitude). He has houses, horses, Coco Chanel’s yacht, and two security guards, both named Rocco. He is taking a hospital’s worth of pills and a “Scarface”-load of cocaine. And an FBI agent (“Friday Night Lights'” Kyle Chandler) is looking into his activities. We know he’s serious because he has one of those cork boards with pieces of paper thumb-tacked onto it to keep track of the case.

Like his “Goodfellas,” Scorsese’s storytelling here is utterly mesmerizing, with brilliant performances in every role. DiCaprio is electrifying. If Stratton Oakmont was still around, there would be a line of eager applicants around the block tomorrow. In smaller roles, Rob Reiner, as Belfort’s father and compliance officer, “AbFab’s” Joanna Lumley as a willing accomplice and “The Artist’s” Jean Dujardin are stand-outs, and Jake Hoffman (son of Dustin Hoffman and Anne Byrne) is just right as shoe designer Steve Madden, whose company was taken public by Belfort’s firm. In one brief but key scene, Stephanie Kurtzuba beautifully creates a complete and compelling character who tells us a lot about her life and about Belfort as well.

And like “Goodfellas,” this is the story of a ruthless entrepreneur that illuminates the best and worst of the American spirit, big dreams, ambition, energy, focus. We know Belfort is a crook who exploits the trust of people who don’t know better but we can’t help being sold ourselves because he makes it look like so much fun. And we know that while he spent less than two years in jail, where he played tennis and came out to a lucrative new career as a motivational speaker and got to be played by Leonardo DiCaprio in a Martin Scorsese film, the real Wolves of Wall Street will love this movie. And then they’ll go back to their hundreds of millions of dollars, houses, horses, and two security guards named Rocco who, along with the loopholes they made sure stayed in the laws, will protect them from even the slap on the wrist faced by Belfort.

Parents should know that this film has NC-17-level content with extremely explicit and mature material, with explicit sexual references and situations including orgies and nudity, extensive drinking and drug abuse, crooked dealings and fraud, constant very strong language, peril, and some violence.

Family discussion: Why were Belfort’s colleagues so loyal to him? Why were the customers so willing to be cheated? Was justice done?

If you like this, try: “Boiler Room” (also inspired by Belfort), “Goodfellas,” and “Wall Street” and Michael Lewis’ books Liars Poker and The Big Short.