Death on the Nile

Posted on February 10, 2022 at 5:39 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol
Violence/ Scariness:	Murders, gun
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	February 11, 2022
Date Released to DVD:	April 4, 2022

Agatha Christie’s 1937 novel about a murder in Egypt has been sumptuously brought to screen by Sir Kenneth Branagh, who directed and stars as super-sleuth Hercule Poirot. (It was previously filmed with Peter Ustinov in 2009.)

For this version of “Death on the Nile,” Branagh worked again with his outstanding “Belfast” cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos and production designer Jim Clay, and their work here is never less than breathtakingly exquisite, matched by the fabulous costumes designed by Paco Delgado and JobanJit Singh, worn by some of Hollywood’s most glamorous stars. It is beautiful to look at, and to listen to, with a superb soundtrack that includes sultry songs by a nightclub performer (Sophie Okonedo, the highlight of the film). But as with Branagh’s previous Poirot film, there are some confounding choices that distract us from the reason we’re there, which is to have just enough information and almost enough emotional involvement to enjoy the puzzle. For some inexplicable reason, Branagh and his screenwriter, Michael Green (“Logan”) think that we need to understand Poirot’s backstory, which Dame Agatha knew very well we did not. In 33 books, 2 plays, and more than 50 short stories, she wisely never told us more about Poirot than that he was proud of his “little gray cells,” his Belgian heritage (he is often mistaken for French), and his impressive mustache and that he sometimes spoke of retiring to plant vegetable marrows. This film begins with an un-Christie, un-canon flashback to Poirot’s WWI combat experience, and it (and the coda at the end) add nothing to the story.

The story has more than enough love, betrayal, melodrama, and yes, murder to fill a movie. In fact, to my recollection, it adds at least one murder to the Christie original for, again, no particular reason. This is a darker story than “Murder on the Orient Express,” but the tone of the film, and even the stunning images (people and settings) are off-kilter with the carnage of the story. There’s a reason that the stories by Christie and her imitators are called “cozies.” Unlike noir mysteries, they are comparatively neat and civilized. Noir is rotgut whiskey and bathtub gin. Cozies are afternoon tea with lemon curd and clotted cream.

It begins (after we get the flashback out of the way) with two devoted friends, both beautiful, high-spirited young women. Jacqueline (Emma Mackey) is poor and Linnet (Gal Gadot) is very wealthy. Jacqueline tells Linnet she is madly in love with Simon (Armie Hammer) but they need money to get married. Linnet immediately offers her whatever she needs as a wedding gift, but Jacqueline says that what she wants is a job for her fiancé. If Linnet will hire him as her estate manager, that’s all they need. Linnet agrees, Simon asks her to dance to celebrate and…in the next scene, it is Simon and Linnet who are married, celebrating in Egypt. Jacqueline, almost mad with jealousy, has followed them. To feel safe, Linnet invites a group to take a boat to see the famous tomb at Abu Simbal and other sights along the Nile. She tells Poirot that having money means it is impossible to trust anyone.

The other passengers include the blues singer and her accompanist/manager niece (Letitia Wright of “The Black Panther”), Poirot’s handsome young friend Bouc (Tom Bateman, returning in the same role he played in “Murder on the Orient Express”) and his protective mother (Annette Bening), two middle-aged British ladies (underused Dawn French and Jennifer Saunders), Linnet’s lawyer (Ali Fazal) and doctor (a sincere, melancholy, toned-down Russell Brand). Jacqueline joins the group as well. When someone is murdered, it turns out that many of the passengers may have had motive and/or opportunity. Poirot will have to ask questions and ultimately gather all of the surviving group in one room to tell them which of them is guilty.

Where will the next Branagh/Christie all-star mystery take place? Following a train and a boat, which conveniently limit inquiries to the people on board. Maybe an airplane? A submarine? Despite its shortcomings, I’ll be along for the ride.

Parents should know that this is a murder mystery with some grisly and disturbing images. There are also sexual references and characters use some strong language and drink alcohol.

Family discussion: Which clues did you miss? How do the songs relate to the story and characters?

If you like this, try: the original “Murder on the Orient Express,” “10 Little Indians,” and more Christie-based movies and television series as well as her books.

I Want You Back

Posted on February 10, 2022 at 5:23 pm

B +

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for some rear-end nudity, brief sex scenes, drug use and language
Profanity:	Strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol and recreational drug use
Violence/ Scariness:	Punch
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	February 11, 2022

Yes, the title song appears in the romantic comedy “I Want You Back” along with a bunch of other lively and well-chosen selections, but it might as well have included another classic hit single, “Breaking Up is Hard to Do.”

Two characters are devastated by being dumped by their significant others in the movie’s opening scenes. Emma (Jenny Slate) is at a restaurant with Noah (Scott Eastwood), her boyfriend of 18 months, who offers her some of his steak because he says she needs to get more iron. “Are you trying to be the nicest, sweetest, cutest boyfriend in the world?” she says lovingly. Nope, he’s about to tell her that he’s met someone else. Peter (Charlie Day) is attending a birthday party for the young son of friends when Anne (Gina Rodriguez) tells him that after six years together she wants to break up because she wants “a bigger life,” not “making salmon and watching ‘Dancing With the Stars,” which is what she says is all they ever do.

Emma and Peter work in the same office building and they meet when they are both sobbing in the stairwell. When they discover they are there for the same reason, they go off to get drunk and sing sad karaoke, including “Oughta Know.” They christen themselves the “Sadness Sisters” and after a couple of commiserating meetings and a lot of cyber-stalking of their exes’ social media, they hatch the kind of plan you only (I hope) see in rom-coms; they are each going to break up the new relationships of their former significant others. Emma will seduce Logan (Manny Jacinto of “The Good Place” and “Nine Perfect Strangers”), a middle school drama teacher and Peter will befriend Noah. And so, Emma volunteers to help out with Logan’s middle school production of “Little Shop of Horrors” and Peter hires Noah as a personal trainer.

Slate and Day are better known for more heightened comedic roles — and for their distinctive husky but sometimes squeaky voices. But here they are wonderfully warm and endearing as two good people who are very sad and a little lost. Plus, they get strong support from comedy all-stars Jacinto and Rodriguez, Eastwood is game, and we get to see Slate in a wild blonde wig singing “Suddenly Seymour.” The skillful and witty screenplay by Isaac Aptaker and Elizabeth Berger (“Love, Simon” and “This is Us”) makes them three-dimensional characters. As we see Emma interact with an unhappy 12 year old stagehand and Peter out at a club with Noah we have more reason to want them to find happiness than just seeing them mope in a bar about their break-ups. It also makes some of their antics a little less crazy. Slate and Day are an appealing couple and that puts the rom in the rom-com.

Parents should know that this movie has mature themes including sexual references, a proposed threesome, nudity, strong language, and alcohol and drug use.

Family discussion: Why do Peter and Emma see each other differently than Noah and Anne saw them? What bothered them the most about their breakups, their hurt pride, their fear of being alone, or their affection for the people who broke up with them?

If you like this, try: Another movie with a title taken from a song that is about two people who join forces after break-ups, “Addicted to Love”

Moonfall

Posted on February 3, 2022 at 5:30 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for violence, disaster action, strong language, and some drug use
Profanity:	A handfuls of bad words
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Medication and marijuana
Violence/ Scariness:	Extended and intense natural and unnatural disaster, mayhem, floods, earthquakes, looting, guns, suicide, explosions, monster, sacrifice, characters injured and killed
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	February 4, 2022

If movies had IQs, this one would be in the low double digits; it may even leave the viewer’s IQ a couple of points lower. But, hey, this is a Roland Emmerich end-of-the-world special effects extravaganza and it has tsunamis and looting and nuclear bombs, and chases and explosions and more explosions, so if that’s your jam, by all means go for it.

And you can probably preserve those IQ points by just not paying too much attention to what there is of a plot or to some weird elements like the unnecessary reference to “our friends at SpaceX” and a character wondering “What would Elon do?” There’s an endorsement of religion, perhaps to counter a plot turn that undermines some core beliefs of some faiths. A moment that is supposed to be tender and heartwarming as characters reconcile in the face of mass extermination is awkward and random. And the movie does not seem to know how to make the most of genuine big movie star and brilliant actress Halle Berry, stuck much of the time with exposition, cheering other characters on, and wrinkling her lovely brow to show concern.

This is one of those movies where a “fringe” (other people might use the word “crackpot”) “scientist” (not if your definition includes peer review) is the only person who has figured out that the moon is hollow because it is mechanical, constructed, as in not natural. That is space-obsessed KC Houseman (John Bradley), who has a cat named Fuzz Aldren, an English accent, and a tiny following in conspiracy-minded corners of the internet.

What the actual scientists have begun to figure out, and which KC believes confirms his theories, is that the moon’s orbit is shifting and this is deeply concerning because it moderates our home planet’s wobble on its axis, leading to a relatively stable climate and causes the tides. So if it gets out of whack, even a little, it affects everything on earth, from our days and months to our oceans. And if it gets too much out of whack, it collides with us, causing massive tsunamis and earthquakes and ultimately killing everyone. Furthermore, “city-sized pieces of moon debris” hitting the earth could destroy everything.

In other words, it’s a big deal and someone better figure out a way to stop it. In other other words, this is basically “Don’t Look Up” without the satire. That means that most of the people in any kind of position of power either lie (nice cameo by Donald Sutherland who wisely says his lines and gets out), dither around, throw nuclear missiles at everything or or duck out. Most of the people not in power descend into “everyone for himself” chaos. So only our scrappy little group working outside the system can save the day. They do accept help, though, from techies, scientists, and the military.

That team consists of our fringe “scientist,” and astronauts Jo (Halle Berry) and Brian (Patrick Wilson), one the closest of colleagues but estranged for ten years following a failed mission where their colleague was killed. We go back and forth between their mission to somehow knock the moon back on course and the perils faced by their children trying to get to Colorado, which for some reason has been picked as a safe place. That’s Brian’s college-age son (Charlie Plummer) with his mother, her Lexus-dealer second husband (Michael Pena) and their young daughters and Jo’s young son and his nanny. I did enjoy the Roche limit developments that took advantage of the gravitational changes as the moon approached earth.

The sketchy storyline borrows shamelessly from “Superman,” “Battleship Earth,” and “Contact” without adding anything new. Explosion movies don’t need to be smart but they shouldn’t be this dumb. “Everything we thought we knew about the universe is out the window,” a character says. Maybe they should have thrown this script out of the window at the same time.

Parents should know that this film has end-of-the-world scenes of massive natural and un-natural disasters, guns, suicide, looting, sad deaths including a parent who sacrifices himself to save his child, a handful of bad words, marijuana and medication.

Family discussion: Who would you see if you were interacting with the AI and why?

If you like this, try: “2012,” “Independence Day,” and “The Tomorrow War”

Cyrano

Posted on January 31, 2022 at 6:48 pm

A-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG for some strong violence, thematic and suggestive material, and brief language
Profanity:	Brief strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol
Violence/ Scariness:	Sword fights and battles, characters injured and killed
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie, but transphobic humor
Date Released to Theaters:	February 4, 2022
Date Released to DVD:	April 18, 2022

“Cyrano” is a gorgeous film, a true labor of love. The basis, of course, is one of the great classic plays of all time, Edmond Rostand’s 1897 Cyrano de Bergerac, inspired by a real soldier/writer. Jose Ferrar won an Oscar for his performance as the title character in a 1950 film. The story of the man who cannot tell the woman he loves how he feels because of the way he looks has been adapted and rebooted many times, with probably the best known Steve Martin’s Roxanne and most recently set in a high school in “The Half of It.” Everyone can identify with a character who is afraid to approach the object of their affection and everyone would like to identify with a character whose wit is as ready and sharp as his sword. In the original and the Steve Martin version, the main character’s rapier-like comebacks to a thoughtless bully are a highlight.

In the original and “Roxanne,” the impediment is a nose so big that the Cyrano character believes no one can see him as a romantic partner. In this swooningly romantic new version, set, like the original, in the 17th century, the physical obstacle is size. Writer Erica Schmidt adapted the play as a musical to be performed on stage by her husband, actor Peter Dinklage (“Game of Thrones”) as Cyrano, and ravishingly lovely Haley Bennett as Roxanne. They play those parts in this film, directed by Bennett’s significant other, Joe Wright (“Atonement,” “Pride and Prejudice”)

Roxanne is loved by three men: Cyrano, the handsome but better-with-a-sword-than-with-poetic-love-letters Christian (Kelvin Harrison, Jr. of “Waves”), and the selfish, predatory De Guiche (Ben Mendelsohn). Cyrano has been her closest friend and confidant since childhood. De Guiche is pressuring her to marry him. Her maid reminds her that she has no money and no other options for supporting herself. But one night at the theater, she glimpses Christian, a newcomer to the military unit where Cyrano serves, and she loses her heart to him. Cyrano agrees to ghost-write love letters from Christian to Roxanne. He pretends it is to help the new recruit but in reality it is to have his one chance to tell the woman he loves how he feels, even if the letters are signed by someone else.

In a way, Schmidt is giving her words to the man he she loves so that we can see him the way she does, gallant, mordantly witty, a brilliant actor, and a person of deep and generous humanity. A scene where he is almost about to dare to hope that Roxanne will say she loves him, the emotions that flicker across his face as he is almost successful maintaining his composure is one of the most touching moments on screen this year.

With Schmidt and Wright creating the words and images for the people they love, in spectacularly beautiful costumes (Massimo Cantini Parrini and Jacqueline Durran) and settings (Sicily filling in as 17th century France) with music and even some dance numbers, the unabashed romanticism almost bursts out of the screen. Bennett makes a lovely Roxanne, clever and spirited but allowing her own romanticism to blind her to the love that is already hers. Mendelsohnn seems to specialize in bad guys these days, and this is another strong performance, De Guiche’s brutality glimpsed under a very thin veneer of suavity. Harrison makes a gallant Christian. But it is Dinklage who is in every way the heart of the story. Just as we get to see Cyrano finally use his own words under cover of darkness to play the part of the man whose outside matches his inside, in this film we get to see Dinklage take center stage, with a performance of heart-stopping vulnerability. Rostand would be proud, and so would the man who inspired the play that continues to capture us more than a hundred years later.

Parents should know that this film includes brief strong language, sexual references, sword fights, and battle scenes, with characters injured and killed.

Family discussion: Should Cyrano have told Roxanne how he felt? If so, when? Is there a time when you misjudged someone based on looks or when you were misjudged?

If you like this, try: “Roxanne” and the Ferrar and PBS versions of “Cyrano de Bergerac”

The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild

Posted on January 27, 2022 at 5:53 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Kindergarten - 3rd Grade
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG for some action and mild language
Profanity:	Schoolyard language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Extended carton-style peril, fire, no one badly hurt
Diversity Issues:	Disabled character
Date Released to Theaters:	January 28, 2022

At this point, it almost seems as though the Ice Age movies are going to go on longer than the Ice Age itself. This latest chapter, like the recent 4th episode of “Hotel Transylvania: Transformania,” is straight-to-streaming with some sound-alikes replacing the original top-talent voices, but continues in the spirit of silly humor combined with warm tributes to the importance of family.

Since many in the intended audience or even their teen-age babysitters were not yet born when the first “Ice Age” movie was released in 2002, this sixth in the series (not counting video games, television specials, and short films) begins with a recap in cave-painting style, letting us know how the various characters met and decided, even though some of them were natural predators and prey, they would become a family and protect each other. That includes Manny the gloomy mammoth (Sean Kenin replacing Ray Romano), Sid the silly, sibilant sloth (Jake Green replacing John Leguizamo), Diego the grumpy saber-tooth tiger (Jake Green replacing Denis Leary), and Ellie the warm-hearted mammoth (Dominique Jennings replacing Queen Latifah). But those characters are all at the edges of this story, which focuses on Ellie’s two “brothers,” the goofy possums Crash (Vincent Tong) and Eddie (Aaron Harris), and the swashbuckling weasel with an eye-patch, Buck Wild (returning Simon Pegg).

Ellie has cared for Crash and Eddie since the death of their mother, who took Ellie in when she was alone and frightened. But they are chafing under her efforts to keep them safe and want to go off on their own. “She’s smothering us with reasonable advice!” they complain as they dream of a cool bachelor pad where they can do whatever they want. This fantasy setting includes a bling-y necklace and a hot tub. So they go off on their own and end up in the Lost World, where giant spiders and enormous carnivorous plants live with dinosaurs and mammals. They are rescued by Buck Wild, who first appeared in 2009’s “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs.” His Edenic garden-like area, with all of the animals living together in peace, is being attacked by a monomaniacal dinosaur named Orson (Utkarsh Ambudkar), who has returned from being banished and wants revenge. He was bullied when he was young for being small and having a big head, but he is proud of his large brain and believes it will help him take over so that he can be the boss.

Buck wants Crash and Eddie to leave because he cannot keep them from getting into trouble while he is fighting Orson. “What they lack in intelligence,” he says, “they make up for in fumbling ineptitude.” And Buck is not sure about accepting help from an estranged friend named Zee (Justina Machado), a skunk-like creature with a Batman-style utility belt. Meanwhile, Diego, Manny, Ellie, and Sid are out looking for Crash and Eddie to bring them home.

As with the other films in the series, this chapter entertainingly combines goofy humor for both kids and adults with some heart-warming lessons about standing up for what is right, working together, taking responsibility, and the families we choose. The younger audience members will enjoy outsmarting Crash and Eddie and adults will enjoy the cultural references. Yes, a character claims to “love the smell of stinky gas in the morning,” just like Robert Duvall loved the smell of napalm . Characters work out their differences, sometimes by “using feeling words,” sometimes by apologizing, and characters discover courage and strength they never realized. Some even come to understand that even families who love each other sometimes have to let go, but they can always come home.

Parents should know that this movie has references to loss of family members and a disabled character who is very capable. There is extended cartoon-style peril with fire and an authoritarian bully.

Family discussion: When should you plan and when should you improvise? What made Buck and Zee stop being friends and how did they get to be friends again? Why didn’t Zee want to tell anyone her real name? Why does Orson want to be the boss?

If you like this, try: the other “Ice Age” movies