Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

Posted on March 3, 2016 at 5:20 pm

When Michiko Kakutani of the New York Times reviewed the book that inspired “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot,” the memoir of journalist Kim Barker about her days covering US military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan, she wrote:

What’s remarkable about “The Taliban Shuffle” is that its author, Kim Barker — a reporter at ProPublica and the South Asia bureau chief for The Chicago Tribune from 2004 to 2009 — has written an account of her experiences covering Afghanistan and Pakistan that manages to be hilarious and harrowing, witty and illuminating, all at the same time.

It’s not just that Ms. Barker is adept at dramatizing her own adventures as a reporter — though she develops the chops of a veteran foreign correspondent, she depicts herself as a sort of Tina Fey character, who unexpectedly finds herself addicted to the adrenaline rush of war.

And now that book is a movie, and the role of Ms. Barker is being played by non-other than Tina Fey, who also co-produced. As always, her work is whip-smart and original. This is not Liz Lemon goes to war, it is an impressively sensitive dramatic performance.

But Barker’s story has been movie-ized, giving it the “inspired by” rather than “based on” designation, and removing the “r” from the character’s name to create some space. The real Barker was a print journalist, but making her a television correspondent to make it more cinematic. And the various love interests are fictional. It is disappointing that the movie makes the impetus for the assignment a combination of professional and romantic ennui. Barker was a dedicated journalist looking for a big story.

But much of the essence of it is the real deal, starting with Barker/Baker’s plan to spend three months in Afghanistan that turned into three years, and the ramped-up intensity of spending days embedded with the military, frantically editing the story, and then trying to obliterate memory and consciousness with some hard-core partying, only to start over again. Baker is inexperienced but dedicated and smart. She quickly impresses the cynical General (Billy Bob Thornton) who sees embedded journalists as a bother and a risk. And she quickly bonds with the other woman reporter (Margot Robbie), who shows her the ropes and asks very politely if she can sleep with Baker’s hunky security guy.

Alfred Molina is excellent, as always, as an Afghani official, though we should be past the time when European actors are cast as Middle Eastern characters. And maybe we do not need any more stories of Western characters discovering the mysteries of the other side of the world, with illuminating life lessons from exotic people. We don’t want this to be “Under the Tuscan Sun” but with war instead of sun-ripened Italian tomatoes, and it gets uncomfortably close at times. But the thoughtful script from longtime Fey collaborator Robert Carlock keeps the film from making war be just a growth experience for a reporter looking to shake up her life a bit, and the contrast between what the war does to the people trying to tell the story, knowing that the people back home just change the channel anyway give the story a sobering weight.

Parents should know that this movie has constant very strong, crude, and colorful language, drinking, drugs, smoking, wartime violence with some graphic images, characters injured and killed, sexual references and situations, and nudity.

Family discussion: What was the most important story Kim Baker reported? What did she mean when she said it “started to feel normal?”

If you like this, try: The book that inspired this film, The Taliban Shuffle, and the film “The Year of Living Dangerously”

Gods of Egypt

Posted on February 25, 2016 at 5:36 pm

“Gods of Egypt” has more gods than IQ points. There are some grand and striking visuals and some well-staged fight scenes, but there are also effects that look like they were created for a 64-bit computer game and lines of dialogue that make cheesy sword and sandal epics of the Steve Reeves era look like Noel Coward. It may be pretty to look at, but this is a big budget wheel of cheddar.

The producer and director have both apologized, too little and too late, for making a film based on Egyptian mythology without a single Egyptian actor. The gods are played by Australian Geoffrey Rush (Ra, the sun god and father and grandfather to the other gods), Danish Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Horus, god of air and libertine turned hero), Scotsman Gerard Butler (Set, angry and ambitious god of the desert), American Chadwick Boseman (Thoth, smug god of wisdom), and French Elodie Yung (Hathor, goddess of love). And then there are a few humans, Australian Brenton Thwaites as an Aladdin-style street thief called Bek, and imperious as always British Rufus Sewell as Urshu, Set’s obsequious architect. Given the results, I imagine the Egyptians are relieved not to be a part of it.

The ponderous opening narration informs us that ancient Egypt is the cradle of civilization and so the gods decided to live there among the humans, though they are much taller and have gold for blood. As the story begins, Horus wakes up bleary following an orgy as he is about to take over as king from his wise and progressive father (Australian Bryan Brown). But his uncle Set arrives, kills the king, and plucks out Horus’ super-special eyes. Horus, humiliated and blind, retreats to his temple to sulk and drink. And Set enslaves the entire population to build structures for his glory and decrees that only the rich will obtain eternal life.

Zaya (Australian Courtney Eaton, very appealing) is the servant of Urshu, and the beloved of Bek. With access to Urshu’s architectural drawings, she shows Bek where Horus’ eyes are hidden. She believes that if Horus’ sight was restored, he would be able to defeat Set. Bek gets through an Indiana Jones-style series of traps to retrieve one eye, delivers it to Horus, and persuades him to fight Set and get back his kingdom.

There is visual splendor on a scale Cecil B. DeMille could only dream of, with sumptuous production design by Ian Gracie and costumes by Liz Keogh. But some of the CGI effects are less persuasive than Ray Harryhausen‘s stop-motion miniatures, and a few of them, like Ra’s flames and a sort of sand-based version of Skype, look like they came from a 64-bit video game. The mis-matched sizing of the gods and humans is more silly than impressive. The dialogue is a mish-mash of pretentious claptrap about the Journey and comments like “death is not the end” and “never doubt a man fighting for the one thing as powerful as any god — love.” Occasionally there are painful attempts at humor, as when Bek tells Horus to run from danger: “Mortals do it all the time!” or when Hathor brags that she is “the goddess of too much.” The mythology of ancient Egypt is fascinating and meaningful. This movie is not. It cannot decide whether it wants to be campy or thrilling, but it really does not matter because it fails at both.

Parents should know that this film includes extended sword and sorcery peril and violence with many characters injured and killed, monsters, disturbing images, sexual references and situations, and brief strong language.

Family discussion: Why did Ra treat his sons differently? Why does he say he wants human destiny to be uncertain?

If you like this, try: “Clash of the Titans”

Risen

Posted on February 18, 2016 at 5:38 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for Biblical violence including some disturbing images
Profanity:	None
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol
Violence/ Scariness:	Battle, swords, crucifixion, characters injured and killed, some graphic and disturbing images
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	February 19, 2016
Date Released to DVD:	May 23, 2016
Amazon.com ASIN:	B01BZ4DOGQ

“Risen” is a sober, reverent story of Clavius (Joseph Fiennes), a Roman soldier ordered to witness the crucifixion of Jesus and prevent his body from being stolen. When the rock placed in front of the tomb and sealed by Clavius is moved and the tomb is empty, Pilate (Peter Firth) is worried that the Jesus’ followers will use this disappearance as proof of His divinity, so he sends Clavius to investigate. His journey will take him to Galilee, and what he sees there will transform everything he thinks he knows.

Fiennes brings Clavius to life with a vivid, thoughtful, sensitive performance, showing us the depth of his loyalty and sense of honor. The way he walks, stands, and rides communicates a lifetime of battles fought and won. He is a man confident in his strength and very aware of the brutality on both sides. At first, he is governed by duty, which we see in the opening battle scenes, in his prompt appearance before Pilate following the battle, not even taking time to clean up, in his acquiescence to taking on a new aide (“Harry Potter’s” Tom Felton, excellent as Lucius) who has not come up through the ranks because his father is Pilate’s friend.

We see that he might have made a different decision about how to respond to the Sanhedrin’s concerns about Jesus, but he follows the orders and makes sure that Jesus is dead and that the tomb is sealed. And we see him speak to his own gods placing a tribute on the shrine to ensure that his prayers are heard.

One of the film’s most powerful sections is an almost “Law & Order” scene with Clavius interrogating witnesses to try to figure out what happened to the body in the tomb. Each encounter tells us something different about Clavius and, indirectly, about the impact that Jesus (called Yeshuah) has had on his followers.

The cinematography by Lorenzo Senatore is beautiful, lending dignity to the story, and Cliff Curtis, a superbly talented performer of Maori heritage who is famously able to play a remarkably wide range of ethnicitys makes a warm, appealing Jesus, kind, compassionate, and a little mysterious. But the focus of the story is wisely on the (fictional) Roman, who is the stand-in for the audience as a witness to the resurrection.

Parents should know that this film includes Biblical-era violence including battle scenes, torture, and crucifixions, with characters injured and killed and disturbing and briefly graphic images.

Family discussion: When did Clavius first begin to believe and why?

If you like this, try: “The Robe,” “Spartacus,” and “Ben-Hur”

Touched With Fire

Posted on February 11, 2016 at 5:12 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Not rated
Profanity:	Strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking and drugs
Violence/ Scariness:	Mental illness, suicide attempt, risky behavior
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	February 12, 2016

Movies are fascinated with mentally ill people but they usually do not do a very good job of portraying them accurately or compassionately. Too often they are serial killers (“Silence of the Lambs”). Even worse, many times they are adorable wise fools (“Benny & Joon,” “King of Hearts”), somehow tuned in to a finer way of thinking. We very seldom get to see them as people. But “Touched With Fire,” named for the book on bi-polar disorder by a doctor who herself is bi-polar and written and directed by Paul Dalio, who is bi-polar, has a sense of deep understanding of the characters that makes it very compelling.

Dalio takes us inside, literally shifting the color scheme and the walls of the sets so that we not only see the characters experiencing a manic high but get a sense of how thrilling, liberating, and exhilarating it feels. He is also deeply compassionate to the family members. Christine Lahti and Griffin Dunne show us the endless and sometimes exhausting love, fear, and pain for their children.

Dalio and his characters, Marco (Luke Kirby) and Carla (Katie Holmes) feel kinship to the many artists who were bi-polar, from Van Gogh to Hemingway (we see a list in the film’s closing credits). The manic cycles of bi-polar disorder can spark a kaleidoscopic geyser of artistic energy. Marco and Carla are both poets with wild, vivid word choices. They meet in a mental hospital and are immediately drawn to one another, triggering a manic episode that catapults them into ecstatic happiness. But the down cycle and the consequences of their behavior create complications.

Dalio is very good at conveying the subjective experience of mania and the family dynamics and the poetry and speech of the two main characters limns the uncertain line between art and madness. Holmes and Kirby both give performances of enormous sensitivity and insight. But Dalio’s very diligence about fairness to everyone and some didactic discursiveness are better for therapeutic purposes than narrative purposes. In its best moments, it is a thoughtful, compassionate film that shows how art can help to both heal and express thoughts that are otherwise dangerously uncontainable.

Parents should know that this movie includes themes of mental illness and medication, with attempted suicide and risky behavior, strong language, sexual references, and abortion.

Family discussion: What was the best way for Marco’s and Carla’s parents to respond to their news? Why did Carla and Marco make different choices?

If you like this, try: the book by Kay Redfield Jamison and Mark Ruffalo’s performance in “Infinitely Polar Bear”

The Finest Hours

Posted on January 28, 2016 at 5:53 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of peril
Profanity:	Some mild language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Social drinking
Violence/ Scariness:	Intense scenes of peril, characters injured and killed
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	January 29, 2016
Date Released to DVD:	May 23, 2016
Amazon.com ASIN:	B019PQ0NZG

“In the Coast Guard they say you gotta go out. They don’t say you gotta come back in.” It was a big nor’easter storm off the coast of Massachusetts. It was February 1952, so communications technology was limited. And not one but two tankers split in half. The most experienced Coast Guard crew went off to rescue the first one. When word came in that a second one was sinking, four young men, all under 25 and two who had never been on a rescue operation, took a small boat out into the storm.

That second ship was the Pendleton. Knowing that they had no more than two to three hours before their half of the tanker would sink into the icy storm-tossed waves, they had to decide who would be in charge. “No officers, no rules, every man for himself,” a crew member says. But they realize they must choose between the man who wanted to take the lifeboats or the engineer they did not know as well who said he had a plan (Casey Affleck, understated and compelling). “They may not like you, but they know to listen to you,” one member of the crew admits.

Based on the true story as told in the book by Michael J. Tougias and Casey Sherman, screenwriters Scott Silver, Paul Tamasy and Eric Johnson efficiently introduce us to the characters and the challenges they are facing. Chris Pine plays Bernie Webber, a departure from his usual cocky, confident roles. Bernie is a little shy, but very sincere, and he believes in the rules, not in a rigid way but in a careful way. When we first see him, he is about to see the girl he has been talking to on the phone for the first time and he does not want to get out of the car because he is afraid she will not like him.

And of course she does like him. Her name is Miriam (British actress Holliday Grainger, last seen as an evil stepsister in “Cinderella”). Director Craig Gillespie (of the wonderful “Lars and the Real Girl”) gives them just enough time to get invested in their relationship — and to get us invested in it — before the storm comes in.

Gillespie really gets going when the storm does, though, and those scenes are powerful and exciting. We are in the small boat with Webber as the window shatters and the compass is wiped out. The boat is tossed around like a cork, at one point completely on its side, with monster waves crashing down. And we are in the Pendleton’s engine room as seams burst and beams come down. And then we are back on land, as Miriam tries to find out what is going on, tries to get the commanding officer to bring the rescue team back, and then learns what it is to love a man who risks his life as a part of his job.

In a film like this, the most important job of the director is to make sure we understand how daunting, even impossible, the task is, and then to make sure we get to see what goes into surmounting the obstacles. Some of that is missing here, as when we are told that there are too many men on the Pendleton for the small boat to carry, and then somehow it carries them. The compass is out, there’s no communication, and yet somehow Webber’s crew finds the Pendleton. It may be that no one knows how it worked, but it undercuts the drama to skip over some of those details.

The quiet heroism of these characters is movingly portrayed, and these days, when heroes are hard to come by, this is a touching story of selflessness, courage, and dedication, and exactly the kind of story that Disney tells best.

Parents should know that this story concerns a real-life catastrophic storm with many lives lost. There are scenes of very intense peril, some mild language, and social drinking.

Family discussion: How did the men on the tanker decide who should be in charge? How did Bernie decide when to follow the rules and when not to? What did Miriam learn from her visit to the widow’s house?

If you like this, try: “The Perfect Storm” and “The Hunt for Red October”