Fifty Shades Darker

Posted on February 9, 2017 at 5:19 pm

Ibsen had it right in “A Doll’s House.” When his heroine walked out and slammed the door at the end of the play, he left it there. She didn’t come back in two sequels. Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson, wearing bangs, the universal signifier of adorkability), despite her name, is not that resolute. In “Fifty Shades of Gray” she was a shy college student introduced to the Red Room of Pain and the world of bondage and submission by fabulously handsome and fabulously wealthy and fabulously troubled Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan). As he explains to her, it is the submissive who has the power in the relationship. The dominant inflicts pain but the submissive sets the limits. Ana set the ultimate limit by walking out on Christian at the end of the first film. But just days later, he comes to a photography show featuring six huge portraits of Ana, buys them all because he doesn’t want other people gawking at her. The woman who just left him nevertheless consents to let him take her to dinner (“because I’m hungry”), and then invites him to dinner. After first insisting there would be no sex and then that they need to take it slowly, of course they end up having sex, and pretty soon he’s spanking her again, but only after she asks for it.

Maybe if you turned off the sound, it all might seem less dull and silly, like the kind of high-end perfume commercials they only show before Christmas and Valentine’s Day. With the sound on, it alternates between syrupy pop songs and clunky dialogue. Fans of the books may enjoy seeing the characters on screen but those unfamiliar with what I will generously call the storyline will find it more like a random series of what I will generously call events. Putting the book on screen reveals its essential flimsiness, its origins as “Twilight” fan fiction showing through. As with “Twilight,” this is the story of a girl whose purity of heart is so powerful she is able to tame the ultimate predator. Like “Twilight,” he is surrounded by a large, complicated, powerful family, most of whose members should have been jettisoned for the movie version because they do not add anything. Unlike “Twilight,” which was explicitly envisioned as a romance without sex (until it wasn’t), this is a shipper, with lots and lots of sex. While there is much talk about a “vanilla” sex life, there is also a lot of naughty stuff with fancy lingerie (where did it disappear to between the apartment and the party?) and sex toys (“That is NOT going in my butt!” Ana says merrily at the sight of a pretty set of Ben Wa balls).

While both Ana and Christian are supposed to be driven for professional achievement, they do not spend much time actually working. Ana loves her job as an assistant to Jack Hyde (Eric Johnson) the head of fiction for a small independent publisher. About half an hour after we realize he is a scummy guy who is trying to have sex with her, she realizes he is a scummy guy who is trying to have sex with her. So of course Christian has him fired and Ana gets his job. Seriously, I have seen six year olds playing with Barbies who came up with more believable workplace storylines.

Meanwhile Ana is bothered by Christian’s past, including an abused drug addict mother who died of an overdose, a suicidal ex-sub who is obsessed with him, and the older woman who seduced him when he was 15 and introduced him to the pleasures of pain (Kim Basinger, herself a pioneer of pretty, soft-focus soft-core S&M in “9 1/2 Weeks”). And Ana is trying to get Christian to tell her about his past, which begins with her drawing a line with red lipstick around his scarred but super-jacked chest to delineate what she should and should not touch. She apparently redraws it on him every day because it is still there days later, no smudges.

Sam Taylor-Johnson brought some humor and a woman’s perspective to the first chapter. She also streamlined it to remove irrelevant and distracting details, left in here for no reason. How does Ana not know Christian’s housekeeper and why is there a scene of their first meeting? Also, there are a lot of lacy little underpants in this movie, mostly being removed. There is also a situation where a lot of misery would have been avoided with a phone call or text message and yet it doesn’t happen, for no reason other than prolonging the agony.

This sequel, reportedly with more involvement by the author, is lackluster fan service. I’d even call it vanilla.

NOTE: Stay through the beginning of the credits for a teaser of part three, coming out in time for Valentine’s Day 2018.

Parents should know that this movie includes very explicit sexual references and situations, sexual harassment, extensive nudity, sex toys and issues of bondage and submission, very strong language, peril including a gun and a helicopter crash, and spouse and child abuse.

Family discussion: Why did Christian tell Ana not to touch his chest? Why did Ana care so much about her job?

If you like this, try; “Fifty Shades of Gray” and “9 1/2 Weeks”

A United Kingdom

Posted on February 9, 2017 at 5:12 pm

B +

Lowest Recommended Age:	Preschool
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for some language including racial epithets and a scene of sensuality
Profanity:	Some strong language including racist epithets
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Social drinking
Violence/ Scariness:	Peril, threats, violence including street fight
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	February 10, 2017

In Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Lysander says, “aught that I could ever read/Could ever hear by tale or history/The course of true love never did run smooth.” It may just seem that way because the most enduring loves are those where challenges bring the couples together instead of tearing them apart. To quote Shakespeare again, this is the love that “looks on tempests, and is never shaken.” “A United Kingdom” tells the true story of a love that triumphed over the most intense opposition from both families and at least three countries.

Seretse Khama (David Oyelowo of “Selma” and “Queen of Katwe”) is studying law in post-WWII London when he meets Ruth (Rosamund Pike of “Gone Girl”) and they are instantly drawn to each other. They share a love of jazz music and a passionate commitment to the public good. Before they realize what is happening, they are deeply in love. Seretse explains that he is not just another law student; he is heir to the throne of his country, and his uncle is acting as Regent until he returns. He asks Ruth to take time to think about marrying him but she does not need time to think.

Even though they have already experienced some unpleasant, even threatening responses to their relationship, they believe that their good intentions and mutual devotion can overcome any obstacles. They will see that post-war optimism about a new era of tolerance and mutual commitment to continuing the progress toward freedom tested more intensively than they could have imagined.

Ruth’s sister is sympathetic, but she correctly predicts that their father “will hate him on sight. He is cleverer than him and he is black.” And indeed, he says, “You may deserve a life of insults and shame, but what about us? I can’t see you again.”

And then they go to Botswana, where his uncle and the community see his marrying a foreigner and a commoner as a betrayal, calling into question his loyalty and his ability to understand them. Has his time in London caused him to abandon the ways of his people?

And might his uncle have other reasons for wanting to stay in power?

The British government, in the form of the wonderfully condescending Jack Davenport (“Pirates of the Caribbean”), is even more disturbed. They have important business and political interests in the region, particularly in the adjoining country of South Africa, which is in the middle of adopting the 20th century’s most viciously racist laws, known as Apartheid.

Director Amma Asante (“Belle”), the British-born child of Ghanaian parents, has a sure sense of the worlds she is depicting. The Botswanans and their land are portrayed as respectfully and “normally” as the Londoners, with no sense of quaint or lesser “otherness.” And while the culture is not entirely equal (apparently only men vote), the female characters, including Seretse’s sister, have dignity and agency. This is a true love story, not just between Seretse and Ruth, but between the filmmakers telling this story and the people and the country where it is set.

Parents should know that the theme of the movie concerns an interracial marriage that was objected to by both families and their governments. There are some scenes of peril including racist street thugs, some strong language including racial epithets, and a sexual situation.

Family discussion: How did Ruth prove her sincerity to the Botswanans? Why did the British government intervene?

If you like this, try; “Loving” and the BBC program about Seretse and Ruth Khama.

Classics of African-American Cinema Now on Netflix

Posted on February 7, 2017 at 3:42 pm

Netflix has a superb collection of early films made by and for African-Americans, including the silent film, “Body and Soul,” with Paul Robeson as twins. These are a treat any time, but especially appropriate for Black History Month.

PBS: John Lewis — Get In the Way

Posted on February 7, 2017 at 3:16 pm

Congressman John Lewis was the youngest person to speak at the March on Washington organized by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. This week, PBS will show a documentary about Lewis, a key figure in the civil rights movement of the 1960s and a genuine statesman and hero. Despite more than 40 arrests, physical attacks, and serious injuries, John Lewis remained a devoted advocate of the philosophy of nonviolence. He was one of the leaders of the SNCC and a Freedom Rider and his three-volume memoir March is a best-seller and the first graphic book to be given a National Book Award.

A film by Kathleen Dowdey, “John Lewis – Get in the Way” is the first biographical documentary about John Lewis, an inspiring portrait of one man cast into extraordinary times and his unhesitating dedication to seeking justice for the marginalized and ignored. The film spans more than half a century, tracing Lewis’ journey of courage, confrontations and hard-won triumphs.

At the age of 15, John Lewis’ life changed forever when he heard Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the radio. It was 1955, during the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and Lewis listened with rapt attention as the young preacher called for resistance to the harsh injustice of segregation. Notably, Dr. King exhorted those listening to fight not with weapons but with proven tools of nonviolence.

Lewis embraced Dr. King’s spiritual call with a fervor that would determine the course of the rest of his life. A student activist in the vanguard of the Civil Rights Movement, Lewis was arrested and jailed for the first time during the Nashville lunch counter sit-ins in 1960. A front-line general during the 1961 Freedom Rides, he was repeatedly assaulted by angry, unrestrained mobs.

Related Tags:

Biography Race and Diversity Television

The LEGO Batman Movie

Posted on February 6, 2017 at 5:26 pm

“The LEGO Batman” movie is not just sure to be one of the funniest movies of the year, with laugh lines that come so fast it is impossible to catch your breath before the next one. It is also the most astute mash-up of love letter and take down of a popular culture icon since the brilliant “Galaxy Quest.”

“The LEGO Movie” was an unexpected blockbuster, sweet and very funny, surprisingly ambitious in scope. This spin-off is more focused, its basic structure very much in the tradition of the DC Comics character as created by Bob Kane and Bob Finger and as interpreted through the Adam West television series of the 1960’s, the Dark Knight comics and movies, and the Tim Burton movies, all of which get quick, understated, very clever nods so deeply enmeshed in the history and culture of Bruce Wayne/Batman and his world as to satisfy the heart of the most devoted fanboy. There’s even a plane from McGuffin Airlines.

The movie opens on a black screen. In case we don’t understand why, LEGO Batman explains that “all important movies begin with a black screen” and edgy music and logos. Just in case that isn’t pretentious enough, there’s also a quote on the screen…from that great philosopher Michael Jackson.

The Joker (Zach Galifianakis) has a great big bomb and is getting ready to blow up Gotham. This is very serious as it turns out Gotham is held up only by, well, pretty much a table. Batman comes in to take the bomb and save the day — also to break the Joker’s heart because he won’t acknowledge that the Joker is the most special and important of all of the villains. Pro tip: when you confiscate the Joker’s big “unnecessarily complicated” bomb, disable it before you stow it in the Batcave museum.

Gotham saved, Batman goes home to a lonely lobster thermidor dinner and a solo screening in his home theater, where he has a collection of mostly-cheesy romantic comedies. When he’s not responding to the Bat Signal and saving the day, he roams around Wayne Manor gazing pensively at old family pictures (note that on that last shot of his parents outside the theater, the nearby street sign says “Crime Alley”). But of course it would not be a Batman movie without some fancy society gala, so he dons his tux and goes to Commissioner Gordon’s retirement party. Barbara Gordon (Rosario Dawson) is taking over and to Batman’s dismay she tells the crowd that she plans to stop relying on Batman for all of Gotham’s crime-fighting needs. (After all, even with all his skill, Gotham is still constantly being attacked by deranged and very colorful bad guys.) She wants to involve more people in law enforcement. Batman is not at all happy about this. Furthermore, he is so distracted he sort of accidentally agrees to adopt an enthusiastic orphan with big anime-style eyes (Michael Cera as Dick Grayson).

Joker has come to a similar conclusion and he decides to team up, too — with the inhabitants of Superman’s Phantom Zone, including just about every literary bad guy anyone 12 and under might know, from Harry Potter’s Voldemort to King Kong and Oz’s Wicked Witch of the West.

The jokes come very fast, usually understated and references to pop culture, which adds to the feeling of being in on something. And the visuals are delightful, perfectly evoking the adorable clunkiness of the LEGO universe. The flames are made of plastic and the guns go “pew pew pew” instead of “bang bang bang.” But the cleverest idea of all was understanding that the very same qualities that make Batman, especially in his Dark Knight persona, so compelling work even better if he acts petulant and childish instead of a brooding and mysterious. The playground-style taunts are funny because they are real and relatable, no matter how old you are.

Parents should know that this movie has cartoon-style action and peril, with no one hurt, some schoolyard language and potty humor.

Family discussion: Why is it hard for Batman to rely on other people? Why does he like to watch romantic comedies? How does he feel when he sees all the other Justice League superheroes at the Fortress of Solitude? Why does the Joker care how Batman feels about him?

If you like this, try: “The LEGO Movie”