The Hater

Posted on March 17, 2022 at 12:30 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
Profanity:	Strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol, vaping marijuana
Violence/ Scariness:	Tense confrontations, oblique reference to suicide
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	March 18, 2022

Newcomer Joey Ally takes on the challenge of writing, directing, and starring in her first film, “The Hater,” the story of a far-left political speechwriter who ends up running in a Republican primary in her a right-wing community. She is better as a writer than a director and better as a director than an actor, but the screenplay is strong enough to overcome some rookie mistakes.

Ally plays Dorothy, as in Oz, who is fired in the film’s first few minutes after a viral video appears to show her burning a flag at a demonstration. She has to leave Washington to return to a place she could not wait to get away from, her home town in Texas. Her grandfather (Bruce Dern in grumpy mode) is not happy to see her, but she reminds him that she is half-owner of the house, and he lets her in.

She tries to find a job with a progressive candidate or cause, but no one wants her. Then she sees that there is a primary coming up, and her childhood nemesis, Brent Hart (Ian Harding), is running unopposed. His father is a Senator. He twice took the local high school football team to State. He is handsome and personable. The Democrat who will run against him is a woman who has already lost three times. There seems to be no way to beat him.

Unless.. .If Dorothy runs against Brent and defeats him and then withdraws, according to local rules the Republican party cannot nominate anyone else, and so the Democrat could win. So, she goes out to collect some signatures to get on the ballot. It does not go very well until she accidentally goes viral again, this time for defeating an armed robbery in a convenience store. She looks like a gunslinger, but really it was just muscle memory from color guard in high school.

Dorothy’s one-time high school friend (Meredith Hagner), whose husband is deployed in the military, opposes Brent because he plans to tear down the community center where she works. So, she signs on as Dorothy’s campaign manager. And Glenn (D’Angelo Lacy), Dorothy’s best friend and roommate from Washington, shows up for a Red State make-under. Off with the nose ring. On with clothes from her late grandmother, picked from boxes in the attic.

The best thing about the movie is its refusal to make any character one-dimensional or completely unsympathetic, especially when we find our own expectations challenged.

NOTE: I have a connection to this movie because my daughter, Rachel Apatoff, was the costume designer. Needless to say, the costumes, which are an essential element of the film, are brilliant.

Parents should know that this movie has very strong language, discussion of abortion, and some drug use.

Family discussion: How did Dorothy shade the truth in her campaign comments? How did her father’s death affect her choices? Which character would you vote for?

If you like this, try: “Dick” and “In the Loop”

Turning Red

Posted on March 3, 2022 at 5:25 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	4th - 6th Grade
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG for thematic material, suggestive content and language
Profanity:	Schoolyard language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Fantasy violence
Diversity Issues:	Diverse characters
Date Released to Theaters:	March 4, 2022

Maybe think of this as “Outside In.” Pixar’s latest is like a bookend to one of its all-time best, “Inside Out.” That was a brilliant exploration of the inner life of a girl as she is beginning to feel the conflicted, intensified emotions of the middle school years, by creating characters representing her inner feelings of fear, disgust, joy, and sorrow. In “Turning Red,” we have another girl coping with puberty, but this time it is the girl herself who manifests the turmoil of adolescence in the most literal terms, turning into a huge red panda whenever she feels strong emotions.

Meilin Lee (Rosalie Chiang) is a 13-year-old living in Toronto who is confident. She tells us the number one rule is to honor your parents and she is very proud of herself for being a straight-A student and following the rules. She has loyal and supportive friends and is good at everything she tries. And being an official adult, at least in the eyes of the Toronto Transit Commission which no longer lets her ride for the children’s rate, has her feeling that she has it all on lock.

So you know that means it’s time for things to go south, right? Or maybe more like north, as Meilin’s pituitary gland is where the trouble is starting. Meilin likes to feel in control. Numbers and rules and predictability are her comfort zone. But life has many ways of reminding us that control is an illusion, and puberty is one of its most powerfully uncontrollable. “Inside Out” was a brilliant, illuminating depiction of the more cognitive and emotional side of developmental stages in the middle school years. “Turning Red” is about the even messier side, and there is very little in life that is messier or out of control than the early years of adolescence. All of this is presented in “Turning Red” with understanding, compassion, and a lot of humor — both the good humor of empathy and the downright hilarity that Mother Nature provides so we don’t all perish of humiliation during those years.

It is very rare that a movie makes me remember how much translating I have to do to immerse myself in most films. Even those made by women are rarely able to present unfiltered female perspectives. The male experience is still the assumed norm. With “Turning Red,” I felt like an ESL student taking a break to see a film in my native language. That is not just because it is the story of a girl or even because it deals with that first time when a girl’s “red peony is blooming.” It is because it is the story of the relationship between a mother and daughter (actually three generations of mothers and daughters), told by people who deeply understand both sides of that relationship and the sweetly sad experience of separating as an essential part of growing up. Co-writer/director Domee Shi was the first woman to direct a Pixar short film, and she won an Oscar for it. That was “Bao,” the story of a mother who missed her now-grown son and wished to have him as a child again. This film has the same empathy and insight. It is about emotions — recognizing and accepting them — as much as it is about hormones.

“Turning Red” does not try to explain itself or generalize. It recognizes that essential principle of storytelling — the more specific it is, the more universal. And so, while at least one male critic so far has thrown up his hands and said he is not the target audience (that did not stop him from reviewing it) and went on to dismiss whoever the movie might be directed at as very small, in fact the intended audience for any well-told human story is anyone who is human, and in this case anyone who has puberty in his, her, or their past or future and especially anyone who may be living with, teaching, coaching, or otherwise interacting with young people. Anyone who thinks that the experience of being a young girl is just too far outside of their perspective to relate do is definitely in need of stories that illuminate that experience, if only to understand the other half of the human race.

The film has wise and witty depictions of the fierce loyalty of middle school friends and the simultaneously delicious, terrifying, and embarrassing feelings of visceral physical attraction both direct (the boy behind the cash register) and indirect (a boy band so adorable you may find yourself wishing you could attend a concert and scream along with the fans, thanks in part to songs by Billie Eilish and Fineas). Pixar always has humor, but this one has more laugh-out-loud moments than we’ve seen from them before. And it has a joyful lesson about embracing the messiness that is clearly a heartfelt message from the kind of imaginative weirdos who go to work for Pixar to help us love the weirdos inside ourselves.

Parents should know that this movie deals frankly with puberty and hormones. There are some scenes of fantasy peril and some difficult family tensions.

Family discussion: How can you be a friend as loyal as Meilin’s? Would you have made the same choice that she does? What do we learn from Ming’s relationship with her own mother?

If you like this, try: “Inside Out”

Uncharted

Posted on February 17, 2022 at 5:28 pm

B +

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for violence/action and language
Profanity:	Strong language, several s-words
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Alcohol, scenes in a bar
Violence/ Scariness:	Extended action/video-game style violence, many characters injured and killed
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	February 18, 2022
Date Released to DVD:	May 9, 2022

“Uncharted” is most likely exactly as good as you hope it will be, and I say that as someone who hoped it was going to be a chases and stunts movie that was fun to watch. It achieves the primary goal of based-on-a-video-game movies, which is that the non-stunts parts like storyline and character don’t get in the way of the stunts parts, which are the reason we are there. There is just enough story and character to add enough emotion to the stunts to take the place of the engagement we feel when we are controlling part of the game.

It helps a lot that the two characters we are supposed to root for and identify with are played by Mark Wahlberg as Sully and Tom Holland as Nate, who bring their established star quality and connection to the audience to fill out the thinly drawn characters they are playing. Holland really takes over as a full-on action hero, even more than he is able to in the Spider-Man movies because there is no mask; he has to act his way through all of the action scenes and did I mention that the stunts are truly wild?

“Uncharted” begins with a “Fast and Furious”-level action scene that is absolutely bonkers. Huge chained-together cargo bundles are hanging out of a plane and Nate is hanging from one of them by a foot caught in the strap until he isn’t, and falls or jumps from one bundle to the other as bad guys are shooting at him and, yes, a fire-engine red sports car comes driving out of the cargo hold, which, let me remind you, is still in the back of a plane that is in the actual, okay green-screen but it looks actual, sky.

It’s the classic MacGuffin: lost pirate treasure. We don’t need to know anything else. We’re on board. Literally; pirate ships are involved and made to do things their builders could never have anticipated. There are objects that must be retrieved in order to find and access it. And there are people who team up and sometimes un-team up and sometimes fight each other to get it. That’s the storyline.

But mostly, there are some wild stunts, on land, water, and in the air. There are nods to (barely disguising lifts from) Indiana Jones, the “Fast and Furious” and “National Treasure” and “Pirates of the Caribbean” series, but hey, this is a movie where the heroes are thieves, so steal from the best. There are villains, meaning people who also want the treasure and are willing to take more extreme measure to get it. There is something between retaliation and revenge, the oldest of them all: “You killed my brother.”

The little hints of plot, motivation, and character never get in the way of the stunts, which are a hoot.

Parents should know that this movie has a lot of carnage for a PG-13, with video-game-like peril, injuries, and deaths. Many minor characters are killed without blood or consequences. Characters use strong language (many s-words) and drink, with scenes in bars.

Family discussion: How did Sully and Nate decide who they would trust? How did that change? How were their reasons for finding the treasure different?

If you like this, try: The Indiana Jones and “Fast and Furious” and “National Treasure” movies

The In Between

Posted on February 11, 2022 at 12:30 am

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for sexual content, brief strong language, and some thematic material
Profanity:	Brief strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Reference to a drunk driver and alcohol abuse
Violence/ Scariness:	Fatal car accident, sad death, scenes in hospital
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	February 11, 2022

Should a movie have a happy ending? We may guess that the teenage couple who debate this critical question in their very first conversation are destined for each other. We may guess which category this film falls in from the opening scene, a fatal car accident. We will see the story unfold back and forth between that night and 102 days earlier, so we can see how they met and fell in love and the events that led up to and followed the crash.

They meet when Skylar (Kyle Allen of “A Map of Tiny Perfect Things”) and Tessa (Joey King of “The Kissing Booth” movies) are entire audience for a French film called “Betty Blue.” Tessa is about to leave when she realizes that there are no subtitles. But he takes the seat next to her and offers to translate as he has seen it before and he speaks French.

They debate the value of a happy ending. As we will learn, Skylar has two loving parents he admires and is close to. He is an outstanding student and athlete and has been accepted at Brown. He believes in happy endings because the world has treated him kindly. Tessa, who lives with people who are not her parents and would rather interact with the world behind a camera, has experienced loss and she is determined to make sure she never risks feeling pain again. She cannot help falling in love with him, but cannot bring herself to say the words that come more easily to him.

Like “Ghost” and “Truly Madly Deeply,” this is a story of love and loss. Tessa is just fine at a remove from other people, taking photos and not talking to the adults she lives with. But Skylar is irresistible. Impossibly so, like beyond perfect, handsome, humble, funny, smart, and one hundred percent devoted and supportive even when she is challenging. But that’s almost okay because Allen has a lot of charm and carries it lightly and because it is depicting the heightened emotions of teenage first love. We can accept that we are seeing him through Tessa’s eyes.

King is transitioning smoothly into more grown-up roles and she is very appealing here, especially as we see Tessa’s relationship with Skylar evolve. We can see how desperately she wants to find connection and allow herself to be loved, even as it terrifies her. The movie is about 20 minutes too long, but so sweet it is hard to hold that against it.

Parents should know that this movie includes discussion of family loss, abandonment, and dysfunction including a mentally unstable parent, foster care, and divorce, brief strong language, and a teen sexual situation.

Family discussion: How do you decide when to protect yourself and when to make yourself vulnerable? Why was it important for Tessa to hear her own words?

If you like this, try: “Every Day,” “Before I Fell,” and, also starring Kyle Allen, “A Map of Tiny Perfect Things”

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.