Posted on June 6, 2011 at 8:00 am
B+| Lowest Recommended Age: | Middle School |
| MPAA Rating: | PG |
| Profanity: | Mild language |
| Alcohol/ Drugs: | Drinking |
| Violence/ Scariness: | Characters in peril, injured and killed, some graphic and disturbing images |
| Diversity Issues: | Reflects the racial and cultural prejudices of the era |
| Date Released to Theaters: | 1975 |
| Date Released to DVD: | June 6, 2011 |
| Amazon.com ASIN: | B0045HCIZE |
Director John Houston’s “The Man Who Would Be King
Posted on June 2, 2011 at 6:19 pm
Malick has only made five films in nearly 40 years. Each of them has had a meditative quality, a haunting voiceover, exquisite images, and themes centering on the loss of Eden. “The Tree of Life” begins with a quote from the Book of Job, but even though very sad events befall the O’Brien family this is not the story of good people whose faith is tested by a series of unbearable losses. It is an exploration of how we fit into the grandest possible scheme of things, how the patterns repeat in the division of cells to make complex systems, the development of mechanical formulas so singular that they merit a patent, the awakening of the first adult thoughts in a child, innocence and loss, harsh reality and ethereal imagination. 
Mr. and Mrs. O’Brien are so archetypal they do not even have first names. They are just Father (never Dad) (Pitt) and Mother (pre-Raphaelite beauty Jessica Chastain). Pitt sheds his movie-star charisma for his Missouri roots, showing us a mid-century man from Middle America, every line of him as straight as the slide rule that like O’Brien himself is about to be out of date. He loves his three boys fiercely and fights down his own tenderness to teach them the lessons he thinks they must have to survive. He is all that is hard and logical and precise and mechanical. Mrs. O’Brien is gentle, almost silent, so in tune with nature she seems to float through it.
The movie’s near-miracle is the way it evokes the muddy, let’s-break-something boy world. Sending a frog up in a rocket, racing behind a truck spewing clouds of DDT, shoving against each other like puppies, holding in wonder a neighbor’s neglige, the heartless, heedless, long, long thoughts of a boy’s life are beautifully portrayed.
It is easy to understand why this film was both booed at Cannes and given its highest honor. I admired the film’s audacity but winced at its pretentiousness. There are some moments of stunning beauty and power. But other parts seemed overdone and empty.
(If you want to know what I think the ending means, send me an email at moviemom@moviemom.com — and tell me what you think it means!)
Parents should know that this film includes an offscreen death of a child with devastating parental grief, children’s play results in death of an animal, a father is strict with children and his wife to the point of brutality, some dinosaur violence, some disturbing existential themes.
Family discussion: What is this movie about? How do the creation scenes relate to the story of the family? Why is there so little dialog? What is happening in the end on the beach?
If you like this, try: the short film “Powers of Ten” and the other films by Terrence Malick including “Days of Heaven” and “Badlands”
Posted on June 1, 2011 at 3:15 pm
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Posted on May 31, 2011 at 3:36 pm
“Franklin & Bash” is a new lawyer show on TNT. It is about two brash, rule-breaking best friend lawyers who join a very conservative, old-school law firm. It is sometimes silly but it is sexy, funny, and fun. And it stars two guys who have been acting since their teens, Breckin Meyer (“The Craft,” “Clueless,” “Garfield,” “Robot Chicken”) and Mark-Paul Gosselaar (“Saved By the Bell,” “NYPD Blue,” “Passing the Bar”). Like the characters they play, they do not take themselves seriously, but they take their work seriously.
I spoke to them about what they learned as child actors and how practicing law is like being in show business.
What did you do to get comfortable with the legal language and procedures?
Gosselaar: I was on a show called “Raising the Bar” for two seasons. The creator of that show was a public defender in the South Bronx. That was much more letter of the law — he was on set all the time and tried to make sure we stayed as true as possible because it was so important for him. He wanted to teach America about what it was really like. I interned for a week at the Bronx defenders’ office. So the set-up was not at all like what we’re working with now but Bill Chase, one of the co-creators is an attorney and we have questions or don’t understand something or a pronunciation he is there.
Meyer: Yeah, like “objection” — how do you say that? And this word, “law…..”
Gosselaar: We’re much looser on this show, of course, but the law is the catalyst for the stories. You get the great stories of struggle and conflict and the way our characters relate to the clients. And in a way, putting on a trial is like putting on a play.
You play long-time friends but you did not know each other before the show. How do you create that sense of history and chemistry?
Meyer: You always cross your fingers that first you even get along with the other actor, second that you have something in common. Mark-Paul and I had more in common with each other than we even knew. We both started acting very young and have consistently worked. We’re both family guys, both have kids.
Gosselaar: Our personal lives parallel each other, too.
Meyer: And our work styles. We both show up knowing our stuff, and then we will have fun with it. We take the work seriously but not each other at all. That’s where the fun comes from on the show — the drama comes from the cases and having now been bought up by this white-shoe law firm, how do you stay true to fighting for the underdog when your firm is working for the corporation you are fighting against? But the fun is in these two guys and we were lucky that we really get along. We are shooting in LA but we shot the pilot in Atlanta and it helped a lot, being “sequestered” there away from our families. Normally we finish and go to our houses. In Atlanta we’d have dinner and work on the script — part was we had nothing else to do but part of it was we loved the show and wanted it to work. The script was so good — if we could elevate that, it would be amazing. We worked non-stop, more than on anything else I can think of, around the clock, and neither one of us ever said, “Uncle.”
Tell me about working with the wonderful Malcolm McDowell (“Clockwork Orange,” “If…”), who plays the head of the law firm.
Meyer: He’s everything you want Malcolm McDowell to be. He’s funny, he’s intense, he’s terrifying, and he is so sweet! He is a living legend. He’s done a thousand movies and is 287 years old. If anyone has earned the right to be a diva, it’s him. But he showed up on set exactly the way we do, knowing his stuff and wanting to have fun. It sets the bar for everyone. It sets the tone for a really nice set where everyone’s free to try and fail. And he has the greatest stories known to men. He’s worked with everybody.
I’ve seen the first episode, but tell me about what’s coming up later in the season.
Meyer: Beau Bridges comes in as my dad, a litigator. James Van Der Beek comes on as the ADA’s fiance, who needs a lawyer. We go into the backstory.
Gosselaar: Our characters evolve. We began with the personal injury and smaller-time pot cases. Now we’re doing more corporate, some murder trials, and in the third episode a woman who was fired for being too hot, but it isn’t your conventional vision of what hot would be.
Meyer: That’s one of our favorites.
Gosselaar: And Jason Alexander comes on as a Bernie Madoff-type character.
You both began as child actors so you have had a lot of opportunities to observe the way that movies and television work. What did you learn from watching the grown-ups around you?
Gosselaar: Don’t be an ass.
Meyer: Don’t be a jackass. It’s a job. Know your stuff.
Gosselaar: Take pride in what you do. It has to stem from what we saw around us at home. Our parents instilled in us how important it is to take pride in what you do.
Meyer: No one in my family is in the business, no one in his family is in the business. That helps, too. Even though we were in the business, we grew up out of the business. There are times to have fun and goof off and we were kids, but it was a job and we saw it that way. We were looking at the work, so we avoided the sense of entitlement. There’s a lot of luck to it, too, but you have to be determined, and we both were. And it’s the only I knew that I am mildly good at.
Posted on May 27, 2011 at 3:56 pm
Bruce Marchiano spoke to me about playing Jesus in a touching new film called “The Encounter.” A group of stranded travelers come to the “Last Chance Diner” out in the woods. The man behind the counter tells them he is Jesus. It takes some of them longer than others to hear him. He has also played Jesus in “The Visual Bible.”
It’s quite a challenge for an actor, isn’t it?
It is in the sense of the responsibility, but it isn’t in the sense of the simplicity of it. When you’re Jesus, what you do is you just LOVE people! No matter who they are, what their circumstances, their arguments against you, you just pour love into their lives, along with all the truth and the holiness and everything.
That relates to my favorite part of the performance — the way you listened. Not all actors can show that, but for Jesus, I think it is very important.
If anybody listened, it was Jesus. We think of him as talking all the time but there is nothing more fundamental than his ear for people’s hearts. A woman once asked me if I get tired of playing Jesus. No! I’d do it all day long every day.
How did you come to this project?
As a hired actor it all happened very quickly for me. I had played Jesus before. Out of the blue I got an email from the director, who I had never met before, asking me if I’d be interested in playing Jesus in this film. He sent me the script and we met for coffee. I always have to say, “I have a different angle on this thing.” For me, it’s about all the love and heartbreak over people’s pain, that’s the most important thing to get across. David said, “Amen” and the next thing I knew we were working together. So often we get a man who’s detached and a little bit aloof. But as evidenced by the choices He made in his life, there’s nothing aloof about Him.
I laughed when one of the characters said it was like a “Twilight Zone” episode because I was thinking the same thing.
That was David’s concept, to make it almost “Twilight-Zone-ish” — so it worked!
Movies like this are like modern-day parables, a different mechanism for delivering the same message.
You’re exactly right. As Christian movies often go, we’re all working for pennies on the dollar but with a passion for bringing the gospel to people in new and savvy ways. One of the things I appreciated about it was that unusually for Christian movies there was a grittiness and realness to the setting. I don’t like it when they look Hallmark card-ish and not real. And Jesus was a blue collar guy with a scruffy beard.
And Jesus serves in it, too. Does it spill over into your daily life?
I sure hope so! When I did the first one I had remarkable experiences, not weird and supernatural, just understanding His heart in a new and unique way. And the same thing happened with “The Encounter.” At the end of the film when the guy makes the choice to go his own way, I just spontaneously broke down weeping, profusely. It was a little uncomfortable for a lot of the crew! Some of them had a hard time picturing Jesus being affected like that but it helped me to understand the depth of his heart in a fresh and unique way. There were two projects I turned down. Jesus has to be loving people and crying tears over their pain. If people don’t understand that, they’re missing the point. In another one they hired a director who didn’t know the Lord. How can someone direct that story if he doesn’t have access to the spirit of God?
