End of the Year Wrap Up

It's that time, when we look back at the last year and consider our accomplishments and our failures. Everyone has high and low points that make up their lives, and some of us feel the necessity of sharing that information with others. This blog is focused on movies, so you won't read about car troubles, health issues, tax problems or insurance frustrations. There are other venues for that. Here, we talk about movies and the experiences in our lives that surround our movie going. As a blogger/podcaster , it is easy for me to inventory some of these things that I do each year, because there is a record of them. 

So, here we go.

Top Ten Films of the year. Look for the video for this at the end of this post.

10. Godzilla Minus One

I would never have thought I'd have a Godzilla movie on a "Best Of" List, but here it is. It narrowly beat out "Spider-Man: Into the Spiderverse", and it may have done so because of recency bias. This was a great Kaiju film that shows all those "Transformer/Pacific Rim/Monarch based Godzilla" films, how this should be done. Give us characters we care about before you start killing them of making them just plot devices for the destruction of the big monster. This is a film from Japan, with all Japanese actors and I had to read subtitles, but it was still more engaging to me than "Godzilla vs. Kong". 

The special effects seem to combine the traditional man in a suit wit some CGI to make Godzilla come to life. There are a couple of scenes of mass destruction, which mix the actors with the CGI work pretty effectively. There is a nice sense of Japanese  redemption after the war, and there is no real finger-pointing about the atomic weapons, making this a non-political but still philosophical story.

9.  Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

There seems to be a lull in the love of comic book movies. The DCEU has never taken off the way it might be expected to, but even the vaunted MCU has petered out. "Ant-Man and the WASP :Quantumania" fell flat, and "The Marvels" was a huge financial flop, and did not do much better critically. Fortunately we got this final entry in the Guardians franchise, wrapping up loose story lines, but more importantly exploring the origins of our favorite misanthropic marsupial. 

Although the soundtrack selections are not as familiar as the other entries, there are still several awesome needle drops. The set pieces in the movie are inventive, but the passageway battle leading to the conclusion is the best. "No Sleep til Brooklyn" was a great choice and I am not a Beastie Boys fan. 

The film also contains the most emotionally wrenching scene in all of the MCU. Make sure you have Kleenex handy.

8. SISU

 This is a second non-English language film on my list. It is a simple story of retribution and revenge against Nazis, so there is no equivocation about who the bad guys are. This film contains some of the most over the top violence on screen this year, which is precisely why it ended up on my list. It is always satisfying to see the injustices of the evil, being corrected in the most direct way possible.

Our hero is hardly heroic, he has no dialogue until the very final moment of the movie. Still, he made us laugh a few times at his determination and brutality. If all of Finland had been like him, the Nazis might have decided to skip the rest of the war and go home and hide. 

The score for the film is almost as brutal and is a nice counterpunch to the laughs that some of the violence provokes.   I may not be a good person, I loved this too much.

7.  Sound of Freedom

The brutality of "SISU" is imaginary, the story in this film is equally brutal, but it hits home in a completely different way, one that will not make you laugh, and certainly not comfortable. This movie sat on a shelf for three years because the studio was timid. The producers bought back the rights, released it in an innovative way, and hit paydirt financially but also artistically. 

Let me warn you, the opening scenes of the movie will make you sick, especially if you are a parent. Nightmares begin this way and the truly terrible truth is that these stories are real. Jim Caviezel looked so different to me, that I did not realize he was the star until halfway through the film.  That may also be a function of the suspense that this movie manages to build as well. The final segment may have been invented for the movie, but it plays very realistically and will tighten your sphincter. 

6. Maestro

Netflix does not always make it's films available to theaters. One of the reasons that the AMC Best Picture Showcase has vanished is that the theater chain won't play a film that was not offered to it for screening. This year, Netflix did make the film available to exhibitors, for one week. 

That is a ridiculous window for fans who want to see a movie, and I was fortunate that I had a local theater that made the effort to get the movie, otherwise it would not have been included on my list. Bradley Cooper, co-wrote, directed and stars in this unusual biopic about a towering cultural figure of the 20th Century.

This is not a greatest hits, by the numbers story. I focuses more on the relationship of Leonard Bernstein to his wife than on his compositions and conducting. Carey Mulligan is fantastic as Felicia Montealegre, the actress married to bi-sexual Bernstein.

5.  Wonka

I did not have high hopes for this film. I did not think that we needed another version of Roald Dahl's famous chocolate maker. I was wrong. This was exactly what we needed at this holiday season. A well made, beautiful story that families can enjoy together.

Add on top of everything else, it is a musical, and the songs are great. There is not a show stopper that you will be whistling on your way out of the theater, but the songs are tuneful, utilitarian for the story, and you can actually understand the amusing lyrics.

The other thing that is great about the movie is that it respects the 1971 Gene Wilder film, while still being it's own movie. There are subtle nods to the production design of that fifty year old movie and to the performance of it's star. 

Oh yeah, we also get the cranky Hugh Grant as a cranky Oompa Loompa. 

4. Air

This is a movie about a shoe. 

Okay, it's really a movie about how the Nike Company became the biggest firm in shoe business, by nabbing Michael Jordan at the start of his career. It's about how the shoe came about, how it was marketed and how consumer demands are both met and created by clever people in the industries that they work in. 

Matt Damon, Jason Bateman and Ben Affleck portray the key men behind the scenes at the biggest marketing coup since Evian filled a plastic bottle with water. Viola Davis shows up as the iron-willed mother of the future superstar, and we can see where he gets his determination from

3.  The Holdovers

The grown ups are still here, and they are still making quality films that are not aimed at teen aged boys. Alexander Payne bounces back from the underwhelming "Downsizing" to score with another entry into the private schools boarding genre. Dead Poets Society", The Emperor's Club" and ""Scent of a Woman" have a companion, and it features the formidable Paul Giamatti. 

Mr. Hunham is not warm and fuzzy like Robin William's Mr. Keating. He is prickly, demanding and he smells bad. Da'vine Joy Randolph  provides a little warmth, and she is likely to win the supporting actress Academy Award, but in the end, the movie reflects the times, sometimes bitter and cynical. 

This will be a Christmas movie to add to your annual viewing pleasure, and it will add pleasure to your annual holiday viewing. 

2. Oppenheimer

The good half of last summers Barbenheimer phenomenon. This is another biopic, but it is not just about Robert Oppenheimer, but also about his progeny, the atomic age. It is a WWII movie without combat, a spy film without spies, and a heroic scientist who ends up being treated like anything but a hero.

Christopher Nolan should be polishing up his speaking skills, he will be giving a multitude of acceptance speeches this winter as he collects award for writing, producing and directing this film. 

Cillian Murphy is hypnotic as the title character and will give Bradley Cooper and Paul Giamatti all they can handle in competition for acting honors.

This is a film that justifies the existence of the more high end theaters out there, with IMAX/XD/70MM. The sound design on it's own might be enough to justify seeing the movie

1. Guy Ritchie's The Covenant 

Originally called "The Interpreter", the film's title was changed to "The Covenant", and then because there is a 2006 film with that title, the director's name was added to the title. Regardless, it is certainly a change of pace from the kinds of films Ritchie is known for. He had another film out in March, and both of them were largely ignored. The fate of "Operation Fortune: Ruse de guerre" was deserved, but the neglect of this film is unfathomable. 

This is a gritty war film, set in Afghanistan, and reflects the shameful way we treated many of our allies in that conflict. This is based on a real story, one that is harrowing for both of the individuals at it's center. It is also a great piece of suspenseful film making, that kept my body tense for two hours. 

The performances by Jake Gyllenhaal and Dar Salim will go unrecognized by Awards groups but they will be remembered by you.  

Film Breakdown

I saw 120 films in theaters this year, what is truly amazing to me is how they divided up.

I was perfectly divided between new films and those that were revisits. As a fairly recent transplant to the Austin Area, I needed to find a supplier of classic films, living in Southern California made finding screenings easy. Fortunately, I found a dealer for my addiction pretty quickly. In addition to the Fathom Events at the chain theaters, Alamo Drafthouse provided some excellent opportunities to see older films on the big screen. All of that however was dwarfed by my new favorite place, The Paramount Theater in downtown Austin. 

In fact, we were at the Paramount so often, that Erin, from their outreach program, reached out to us to interview and included us in the latest fundraising e-mail update.

 

I can hardly wait for the 50th Summer Season at the Paramount this coming Summer.

Throwback Thursday Project

My plan had been to post weekly on this project, but I was at so many movies during the week, I fell behind by October. The 1975 project will continue for the next few months, bit here is a piece of data for the films I did cover.

There were six 1975 films that I had not seen before, including an obscure Robert Shaw film that I had to buy on VHS thru ebay to be able to own it. Also, the same year he won the Academy Award for Cuckoo's Nest, Jack Nicolson appeared in the hard to locate "The Passenger".

The Lambcast Podcast

I'm the host of the LAMBcast, the official podcast of the Large Association of Movie Blogs (The LAMB). Each week we have guests on the show who talk about movie related subjects. Of the fifty shows we did this year, I hosted forty six, and guest hosts covered the rest. The shows broke down like this:

Obviously we had twelve Movies of the Month, but we also averaged one new movie each month. There are several theme shows that included doing lists like :Off the Beaten Path, Roll Your Own Top 5, and Blindspot Alley. We had two draft shows, including a very fun 1980s Fantasy Film Draft. If you have not listened, you can find the shows on most of the services, i-tunes, Spotify etc. The easiest is Podamatic.  

YouTube Channel

Starting last April, I also began posting the Lambcast on YouTube. Instead of five talking heads, each show features images from the movies we are talking about and some connective illustrations as well. 

 

It is a time consuming process, but I am picking up some tech skills as I try to make the content as interesting as I can.

Top Ten Favorite Films 2023  The Video

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom

 

Remember when you were a kid and you got a new box of crayons with dozens of colors that you hadn't had before and you wanted to use them all, whatever you were drawing next? Well that's the way James Wan has gone about making the Aquaman movies, like “they gave me a whole bunch of money so I'm going to spend it on stuff that I think looks cool”. And for the most part it does look cool, but does it make any sense? No it doesn't. That doesn't mean that you can't have some fun anyway.

This Is the End of the DCEU as we know It. None of the actors who have been playing the recurring characters for the last decade are coming back. A new team has taken over the direction of all of the comics in the DC world. And the planned sequels have been canceled. This is the final film in what was the original phase of those movies, and Aquaman was always the silliest of characters and the most outrageous of visuals and the one that seems closest to the spirit of what a comic book should be. Fortunately they cast Jason Momoa as the titular figure who we also know as Arthur Curry. His physique, his long hair and his general demeanor have been key elements to making the silliest of characters one of the most fun things in the DCEU.

This film continues a few plot lines from the previous movie and doesn't contain any guest appearances by the superheroes of the Justice League. We do get a return by Nicole Kidman as Arthur's mother, and Patrick Wilson also returns as his half brother. Yeah I don't know if people will remember why Dolph Lundgren is a king but not married to Nicole. It doesn't matter because it doesn't make sense anyway. The villain returns and has been given greater powers and is even more malevolent than before. His main motivation is now simply revenge for the death of his father, and if it takes destroying the whole world to accomplish that he doesn't care. Randall Park is also back as Dr Shin, a character that I have no memory of from the original film but again it doesn't matter. And if you can't tell what his story arc is within the first minute and a half of the movie you've never seen a movie before.

Again the world is filled with fantastical creatures, colorful vistas and technology that is far beyond that which is known currently. That's another one of those comic book inventions, where ancient civilizations were so far ahead of our modern times that we look antiquated by comparison even though they were centuries before us. I think you'll have a hard time trying to figure out why all of this technology has stood up to being at the bottom of the ocean for nearly two Millennia, but if you're spending time trying to come up with an explanation for that you're missing the point of this movie. And the point of this movie is to have some fun, pretend that the things that are happening are real, and enjoy the oversized personalities that the main characters represent.

Except for the visual images there is nothing new or innovative about the story. In fact when in doubt, the screenwriters simply steal from other films, books and myths to make up the events that are taking place. You can have a lot of fun looking for the Easter eggs that represent other films, for example the black trident might as well be the One Ring. There is literally a character that is a direct rip off of Jabba the Hutt, and he's voiced by Martin Short. Heck they even throw in a reference to the MCU, when Aquaman makes a disparaging comment about his brother and refers to him as Loki. About the one original thing that this movie produced is that at the screening we saw at an AMC theater Nicole Kidman's promo for AMC was missing. Maybe there's something about a conflict of interest in having that play in front of a film that she is starring in, but that still doesn't make any sense. It's also noticeable that Amber Heard has had her role substantially reduced, she has maybe 10 lines in the movie. Her main value is to show up with her supersonic powers just in time to help out Arthur when he is stuck.

There are battles galore, and animals that are right out of the Jurassic Park series, and a long sequence that involves running through the jungles on an island trying to escape those creatures. If it wasn't for Peter Jackson, Steven Spielberg, and a whole bunch of other creative people who came before him, director Wan may have nothing to work with. They even crib from Willow by having a child who is endangered by the villain's plot . Still it looks great, the colors are a lot of fun and there are some silly jokes that most of us could probably enjoy. This is not a film that anybody's going to remember 10 minutes after seeing, but you will enjoy it for the 2 hours that you're watching it. I just don't know if you'd recommend it to anybody after having done so.

Look if you like the first Aquaman you're probably going to like this one, it's cut from the same cloth. It's full of colorful visuals, outlandish characters, familiar plot points and the leads are attractive and humorous people. For my money Patrick Wilson steals the movie on a regular basis. His dry delivery with some snarky overtones is a nice compliment to Momoa's casual bravado. It's like a gumbo that has to come together just right in order for the flavors not to undermine each other. Still I think you're going to have to add some sauce to make this palatable to most people's tastes. In other words if you like this you're probably already all wet.

Ferrari

 

Director Michael Mann Returns to the big screen with a biopic about Enzo Ferrari, the founder of the sports car company. This was a film that was highly anticipated and one that I had looked forward to a great deal. I've admired some of Mann's other films a lot, including “Last of the Mohicans” and "Manhunter”, two terrific films from nearly three decades ago. But like many of the directors who have come back to the screen this year the results were decidedly mixed.

The subject matter should be fascinating for people who are excited about cars. I'm not a huge racing fan but I have appreciated several movies in recent years that featured car racing as their main subject. Both “Rush” and "Ford versus Ferrari" were entertaining films and they made my best of the Year film list. Heck I even liked “Speed Racer”. The problem I had with this film is that it is less about racing and cars than it is about Ferrari and his love life. Although there is supposed to be a duality in his commitment to his wife and his mistress which is then mirrored by his desire to be successful on the racetrack and to achieve financial stability for his company. That parallel does not sustain itself very long in the movie. The domestic drama overtakes the racing issues and shoves them off stage.

Adam Driver has been made up to look older, thinner and more Italian so that he can play Ferrari. For the most part he seems adequate in the role, although most of the time his voice is low-key and he sometimes mumbles his words. Although his accent seems reasonably accurate, as is often the case when dialect and sounds are being used to convey a language rather than the words themselves, it is sometimes difficult to understand what is being said. It might as well have been in Italian to begin with.

There is a plot line about the financial instability of the Ferrari company in the 1957 timeline in which the movie is set. That story never gets completely explained once it has been set up. The idea that winning the Big Race at the end of the film will result in sales of automobiles that will be significant enough to rescue the company from its financial cliff needs to be Illustrated for us to both understand and care. But the script and the director have decided that once they've explained it in a piece of dialogue, there is no need to elaborate further. This means that the stakes of the race don't seem as significant and important as they should be. Heck, there are no scenes in which the participants go over the cars, except after an accident.

The race scenes themselves are pretty exciting although there are times when it was difficult to understand what was going on. For example in the major race that it caps the film, there are five drivers for the Ferrari team, and they all drive the red Ferrari Color cars. It seems however that some of the Maserati cars are also red, and because the drivers are wearing helmets and goggles it is often difficult to tell which car it is we are looking at at any given moment. In fact it was not until the end of the scene that I realized that a driver who had lost his car and had to get a ride from one of the Ferrari drivers was in fact driving a Maserati rather than being a member of the Ferrari team. A point like that is very confusing when you are at the climax of a film.

It seemed to me that the whole point of the film was to highlight two spectacular crashes that occurred and were turning points in Ferrari’s story. I'm not sure that we needed to see the crashes in the spectacular detail that is provided by the film. However the one crash that occurs close to the end of the film is devastating to watch and of course that means that it is quite dramatic. Unfortunately the car crashes are the only dramatic things that seemed to happen in the story. Confirming the ugly belief that the real reason people watch these kinds of races is to see the crashes. I suspect that the real reason people will see this movie is to watch these scenes. Not a very pretty thought.

Enzo is supposed to be torn between Penelope Cruz who plays his wife and Shailene Woodley who is his mistress. Neither of them is given very much to do in the film, and we barely know their characters at all. Woodley especially is underutilized, with only a brief flashback to explain how she and Ferrari got together, and that appears to be the extent of their 12-year relationship. With Cruz it was a little bit clearer that there were elements of the marriage that were important to these characters, but that does not really get used in the story except in one scene where it is made clear that an incident in the family's past is responsible for most of the division between Ferrari and his wife. This could have been a rich vein of drama to explore, but it simply gets used as a plot point to give a short hand for why the couple's marriage is on the rocks and why the wife resents the mistress, even though she seems accepting of the infidelity.

This is a good film but it is not a great movie and the reason is that the script does little to engage us. Frankly there's so many scenes that go on far too long that I was often slightly bored. That's not something that should be happening in a movie where car racing is involved. I could recommend the film to people by saying it is a reasonable biopic about the man, but not about the legend of the car. And I think for most audiences they have very little interest in the man without also being interested in the car. So the movie is simply imbalanced.

The Boys in the Boat

 

Everybody loves an Underdog Story. When they happen to be true it makes them even more compelling. George Clooney has directed a film that takes the underdog motif and uses the 1936 Olympics as a way to engage the audience in a rooting interest. The rowing team at the University of Washington was a consistent loser to the University of California team for 20 years, but the coach at Washington found eight men who could pull together and overcome their tradition of losing to become winners. The story however does not stop with a success against a local rival. There is also the little guy against the entrenched forces, the rich and well-off against the poor and struggling, and eventually Western democracy against Nazi totalitarianism.

Clooney seems to have an affinity for historical settings, three of his best have fallen into that category. I think the film “Monuments Men” is his best work, but that's not to undermine “Good Night and Good Luck “ which was another piece set after WWII. He also did a quite good job with a football film set in the early days of the NFL. So it appears that the Depression era United States is a palette  that he feels comfortable painting from. The visualizations of the era are authentic, in fact it is a little disconcerting that the shanty town at the beginning of the film is labeled Seattle, but the year 1936 could easily be replaced with 2023. The idea that widespread homelessness accounted for much of the trauma of the 1930s is a little depressing when we look at contemporary times. Maybe we'll get lucky and some extraordinary story will grow out of these times. For now we have the story of the 1936 Washington Huskies eight-man crew.

Actor Joel Edgerton is nominally the lead, but he is supported by several actors that you will probably not recognize. The story does require that the rowers work as a team and that may be one of the reasons that there is not an individual story for everyone. For the most part we get entry into these events through the experience of a single man who is struggling to work his way through college and takes up rowing simply to be able to earn a living and pay for school. I'm not sure if the NCAA existed in this time era, but it sure looks like some of the boosters would be violating what used to be the rules of College athletics, at least before NIL.

The real main character is Joe Rantz, who is trying to get through college after having been abandoned by his family at age 14. There are others on the team who have gone through similar struggles but the focus here is really on the athletic event and the hard work that it takes for a team to truly become excellent. So except for a love story and a brief callback to the past, even Rantz's story is limited to the team. 

Edgerton as the coach is relentless in finding ways for the team to mesh. As entertainment a movie like this can't really be an instructional film on how the sport of rowing works, but we get enough detail and we see a few examples that let us know how each person's behavior and skill contributes to the team effort. In addition we get a little bit of personal story about the coach and his struggles to keep the team going in the face of limited success and budget shortfalls, and Joe Rantz  and his romantic relationship with a coed at the University. Neither of these side paths takes up much time, which is a good thing because we have at least three major competitions that provide plenty of drama.

Obviously the team manages to be successful so they can end up in Germany for the 1936 Olympics. So the outcome of some of those contests is a foregone conclusion, but director Clooney, like most people who make these films, has found a way to make those kinds of foregone conclusions entertaining and suspenseful. It helps that we got some details about how the crew develops a strategy and in particular how this group, who are actually the JV team at the University, managed to be a force to be reckoned with. I assume that it is relatively accurate when it comes to the way this event was covered by the media. I know that in contemporary times you're not going to get 100,000 people showing up for a crew race between college teams. But in 1936 the world was a different place, Sports occupied a preeminent place in the culture because there were limited entertainment alternatives, and because it was radio friendly. Maybe the radio friendly thing is the thing that draws Clooney to a story like this.

I'm not familiar enough with the story to say if all of the drama that takes place at the Olympics was in fact historically accurate, but I can say it felt authentic. The showdown at the Olympics is the major set piece of the movie, and it requires some elaborate production design, multiple teams representing different countries to be portrayed on screen, and a special guest appearance by Adolf Hitler himself.

As inspiring as it is to see other nations challenging the Third Reich on the field of sports, the emotional high point for me came earlier when the team had to find a way to finance their way to the Olympics. After having struggled to qualify it seems that only Elite schools would be able to go because they had the financial resources to do so. The University of Washington team had to find what would be a substantial sum of money in order to make the trip. It is in this section of the film that real sportsmanship is demonstrated by somebody who has only been a very tangential part of the story, and in fact would be classified as an antagonist. At least until that moment when we all choke up at the gesture that is made by someone who understands what sports is supposed to be about.

It was a little curious that the actress Hadley Robinson who appears as the romantic interest in this film, was in the film we saw last night "Anyone But You”. Congratulations to her for having two films that open in the same week. That is fairly unusual and is usually an indication that an actress is on the cusp of a breakthrough. The Romantic subplot is not overdone, but it does help give us something to focus on other than the grinding preparation of the boat and team.

I found the movie quite fulfilling, it touched me in an emotional way at a couple of points, and I learned a lot more about the eight man crew and the sport of rowing than I ever expected to know. Although the events occurred nearly a hundred years ago, I think the story still resonates because we all love underdogs, we admire sports, and in our heart we want the good guys to win.

Anyone But You

 

For some reason romantic comedies get a bad name, especially among cinephiles. I suppose the reason is that they are so formulaic and as a consequence hold very few surprises for the audience. Of course comfort food is the same way, not very challenging but something that people still enjoy. So to me, a good romantic comedy is like enjoying a familiar entree of a favorite food type. It may not be as interesting as something new, but it offers a lot of satisfactions, if done right.

The new romantic comedy “Anyone But You”  follows a large number of paths created by the films that have come before it. An attractive couple gets together, develops a relationship, but then some unexpected antagonism separates them and the rest of the film concerns whether or not they will overcome that barrier. Of course it's also necessary that the two people involved appear to despise each other when in fact they are very attracted to one another. So it is no big surprise that this is exactly what happens in the current movie. The only things that are innovative are the scenarios and the characters that come into play, in attempting  to make it a more interesting path.

In the case of this film, the couple who were initially brought together and then separated, turn out to be connected to two people who are going to connect with one another. One person is the sister of a woman who is getting married to the sister of the other person's best friend. Naturally they then must travel to a destination wedding, providing them with opportunities to show how much they dislike each other well at the same time being surrounded by romantic trappings that will bring them together. In a somewhat farcical nature, the other people in the wedding party are interested in pushing the couple together, for their own reasons.

Glen Powell and Sidney Sweeney play the attractive young people who do have a connection, but through their own faults have pushed one another away. Since it's a contemporary story, the wedding that the two are involved with will be between two women, and it will take place in Australia. This gives plenty of opportunities for outlandish behavior, and for the other characters to plot, plan, and tell stories, which will prove embarrassing but also set the stage for reconciliation. Some of the plot devices are completely ridiculous, and some don't seem to go very far. The bride's parents are interested in seeing their daughter, who is the sister of the bride, back together with the boyfriend that they have known since they were children. The ex-girlfriend of the boy in the story also shows up creating a romantic complication, along with producing a physically imposing romantic rival to offer amusing comparisons with.

I don't know Sydney Sweeney from any shows or films that I can remember, but she's as cute as a button and a nice match for Powell. Glen Powell has been in two or three movies in the last year where as a supporting character he stood out enough that he now deserves leading man status. He may be in the early Matthew McConaughey stages of his career. Hopefully whatever other romantic comedies he does will not sink to the depths of some of the movies that McConaughey made, but will stay relatively solid like this one.

It's amusing to see Dermont Mulroney and Bryan Brown as the elder Statesman in the film, when 30 years ago, they would have been the lead. They still have some of that charisma that made them charming in the 70s 80s and 90s, but they have aged out of most romantic plots and now are consigned to the Geezer role. Nothing in the story is hurt by the fact that it takes place in Australia, with its beautiful coastlines, fantastic vistas, and interesting local fauna. There's a great scene, at least from a romantic comedy point of view, that takes place with the Sydney Opera House in the background. It's an example of some of the striking views that can be found in parts of the world that haven't been used to the death for locations in movies.

There are a few good laughs in the film, and the story is not too insulting to our intelligence. The leads are attractive, some of the supporting cast is appealing and there are some funny moments that deal with a musical cue. That should be enough for a pleasant afternoon at the movies, or date night with your honey. It was the day after Christmas and I was happy to say that the theater was full, there were lines at the concession stands, and I saw lots of families and couples going to see other movies. Maybe the film business isn't doing as well as it might be hoped, but this screening at the theater that I went to gives me hope. All you need is something that's mildly entertaining, maybe a little provocative, and gives you a couple of laughs, and the audience will show up.

Wonka

 

To say I was dubious about the new Wonka film starring Timothée Chalamet would be an understatement. The original film with Gene Wilder is of course a favorite of my childhood, and even the Tim Burton version with Johnny Depp is well liked in this household. I've never been a huge fan of 

Chalamet he seems to be a little wan and a sort of the Hipster version of what's hot right now. This has led me to be skeptical of any of his films.

Chalamet was however, solid in the Dune film and I look forward to seeing the second part next year. So it was with uncertainty that I approached this movie. I tried to avoid reading reviews before I see a film for myself, but sometimes the general tone of a review can come across in a single sentence on a Facebook post or in an Instagram message. The ones that I did see in regard to this film we're a lot more promising. Most of the comments seem to suggest that the film was exactly what it was supposed to be a light frothy holiday entertainment. To my great pleasure that is an accurate assessment. Wonka was a complete delight and exactly the kind of film that a family can enjoy in the holiday season. It may not be serious, or a great piece of art, but it was a great entertainment.

Those of you who are not aware of it, let me point out that Wonka, is also a musical. The idea that there would be singing and dancing through the film raise some suspicion, but our lead is talented enough, and the songs for the most part are tuneful full of play and fit the story. I was especially impressed by the opening song and the choreography that went in putting together the dances that accompany it. As it is, the director of this film, Paul King, directed two of my favorite films from the past several years. He is responsible for putting "Paddington" and its sequel "Paddington 2" up on the big screen and both of them have a wondrous, friendly, attitude which made them completely delightful. Although there are hateful villains, and obstacles to be overcome, the optimism and positive attitudes of the lead characters of all three films make each of these movies so much easier to enjoy than other films in the family market.

Happily this film is not merely a repeat of the story that we have come to know. It is in fact it kind of prequel story so that we get a sense of what Willy Wonka was like as he started his chocolate factory. The idea presented here is that Wonka has always loved chocolate as a result of his mother's care and recipes. He has become a world Traveler by working on cargo ships traveling the seven seas and finding amazing ingredients to add to his chocolate concoctions. At the start of the story he is prepared to join the chocolate producing community in the heart of the big city and is trying to connect with his potential customers. This stacks him up against three rivals who have in essence, created a cartel to reduce competition. The three owners of the of the competing chocolate companies are clearly the villains of the piece, they have no connection to their customers and see them as somebody available to fleece rather than people that they want to please. This means that Wonka's approach will be completely different and a threat to their status.

One of the complications that Willy Wonka faces is that he has become indentured inadvertently to a cruel mistress and a thoughtless Brute. He has in essence been Shanghaied into working in a laundry, under slave-like conditions. So his approach to trying to begin a chocolate Empire also requires him to overcome these circumstances. The woman who has him in her thrall is played by Olivia Colman and she is impressively vile and funny. Wonka finds himself in the company of others who have become similarly trapped, and they form an alliance to both escape their circumstances and create a candy Utopia.

There are several nods to the original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, some of which are very noticeable but a few of which are very subtle. Among the most noticeable is the design of the chocolate store which strongly resembles the main room in the original film's Chocolate Factory. Also Willy is dressed in the same kind of velvet purple set of tails that adorned Gene Wilder back in 1971. Here he also walks with a cane that is in affectation rather than a necessity. Much like the magician that he is suggested to be, the cane becomes a prop that he uses to Dazzle his customers and to establish an identity. I did notice that the start of the film does have a similar kind of setting that Paddington did. Alone in a strange city our protagonist is taken in by strangers. Of course in the Paddington stories The Strangers turn out to be a benevolent family, but here in Wonka, it is a much darker turn.

Throughout the film there are many clever characters who provide humor and something for Willie to struggle against. Much like the original film Slugworth, is presented as a competitor and a threat. In this film it is much more direct in the way the character of Slugworth is presented. There is also a police official who is bribed by the cartel to run Wonka off. He is bribed by chocolate, because he has a sweet tooth that can never be satisfied. Hysterically his character gains weight throughout the film to the point where he actually has difficulty moving, standing up, or getting out of a car. It may be a little indelicate to present a character as having a weakness that makes him fat, but it does make us laugh and the actor, Keegan-Michael Key, plays it hysterically.

Production design is another big selling point of the film. Some of the candies are whimsical, the boarding house/laundry, is grim, and the Chocolate Factory at the end we'll make everybody who is a fan of the original film happy. Also the musical score borrows heavily from the original films songs and we get a reprise of Gene Wilder's showpiece song from 1971, presented with genuine affection and respect by Chalamet.  I have no hesitation and suggesting this movie to any of my readers. You will be very happy walking out to the theater with a smile on your face, even if it is just from the cantankerous Hugh Grant playing an Oompa Loompa who has attitude and his own individuality. I think a little Hugh Grant adds in measurably to the Delight that this film creates. He is not overused, but the CGI transformation of him into the character is amusing, and contrasted with his lines and behaviors should make you laugh.

I was not expecting it, but I'm happy to say that Wonka will be going on my list of favorite films from 2023. And in the long run Timothy Charlemagne Maybe making even greater inroads in my opinion toward him. However director Paul King is in my opinion a real treasure, and I hope that he and his co-screenwriters continue to come up with enjoyable fanciful ways to entertain the audience, I appreciate it.

Maestro

 

Leonard Bernstein was one of the Towering figures in the culture of the 20th century. A conductor, a composer, an intellectual and a humanitarian he was also a man who had a conflicted emotional life and who's personal relations seem to have complicated all of his history. Director actor Bradley Cooper has attempted to create a biopic that does justice to this man, in a short 2-hour period. That he largely succeeds has to do with the tools that he used and the choices that he made. Cooper also co-wrote the script and I suspect the combination of his direction and screenwriting is largely responsible for the way this film feels different than a traditional biopic would.

One of the immediate indications that the film is going to be different is in the way it plops us down directly into the story with very little setup. Although we start with a key incident in Bernstein's life, most of the film does not attempt to highlight the key moments in his life but rather reflect the way he lived that life. Bernstein got the opportunity to conduct for the first time on a live radio broadcast very early in his career. The event made him a national figure almost immediately. Cooper stages this at the beginning of the film in a very interesting way with very limited concert footage and instead a creative setup of the situation, and then a follow-up with a press conference that seems to provide plenty of narrative explanation without forcing the issue too much.

The dialogue in this film is delivered in a rapid manner with occasional opportunities for the characters to speak over one another. This however does not feel like a cluttered Robert Altman script but rather a more natural form of conversation. Cooper's script, along with the way he has directed the actors, makes these moments feel very much like we are watching home movies of these conversations and events rather than something that is being restaged for the film. Bradley Cooper and actress Carrie Mulligan both deliver their lines at a quick pace but one that seems to reflect the characters rather than the technique of the filmmaker.

The film focuses on the marriage between Leonard Bernstein and actress Felicia Montealegre. The fact that they are focusing so much on this relationship makes it key that the actors treat the characters as people rather than merely parts that are being played. Cooper for his part does a fantastic representation of Bernstein who had well-known mannerisms, vocal patterns and an appearance. There's been some controversy about his use of a prosthetic nose to create a closer resemblance to Bernstein, but that use seems to simply be a typical dramatic tool that actors have been using for centuries. Anybody who takes umbrage at this tool seems to be looking for something to create controversy, rather than genuinely being concerned about some ethnic slur. Mulligan's character is less well known so it's hard to say that her performance is spot on, but it is easy to say that it is very effective. In many ways her role is the key one in the story since Bernstein is largely reflected in the relationship that he had with her, rather than focusing on his musical accomplishments.

In addition to the script taking a different path in order to make this biopic stand out, Cooper uses a couple of cinematic techniques that do the same thing but, I do think that they draw a little attention to themselves. The first third of the movie is in black and white. It looks beautiful and it feels appropriate for the time period, which I suspect was the point that Cooper was trying to make in the first place. The last half of the film is in color and it also looks distinctive to the time periods of the 60s and 70s, the era which makes up the majority of the period that the film covers. The other technique that looked obvious to me but I'm not quite sure what it accomplishes, is the use of a 1: 33 aspect ratio. When we are dealing with the black and white section of the film, that aspect ratio might resemble a television of the time, so I can see that in creating something that is supposed to resemble real life, the artificial box shape would actually feel more realistic to an audience that recalls that time from what they saw on television. It was not clear to me why we continued to use that aspect ratio when the film transitioned to color. We only get a widescreen presentation at the very end as the credits begin to roll.

In addition to his brilliance Bernstein was a bit of a libertine when it came to his sex life and in the later parts of his life, perhaps to the use of cocaine. This film never suggests that drugs were in any way a help or a hindrance to Bernstein's career or relationship. The sexual issues however, are in fact, the main point of conflict in the relationship between him and his wife. Felicia apparently was aware that Leonard took lovers of both sexes and well not necessarily approving, had accepted that that was part of his persona. As we watch the avuncular and outgoing Bernstein go about his daily life we can understand at least a little bit how he seemed to embrace all of his Passions with little regard to the conventions of the day. His wife seems to simply expect him to behave with some discretion, and it is divergence from that expectation that leads to the tensions that come up occasionally. Even knowing that he was not always faithful to her, Felicia seems to be Lenny's most ardent supporter. Cooper depicts the main conflict as occurring when it's possible his daughter, as a young adult, begins to hear rumors about his infidelities. In this script it appears that Leonard was not ashamed so much of the fact that he was unfaithful to his wife with other men, but rather that he is forced to lie to his daughter because of the conventions of the day and the limitations his wife has imposed on him.

In no way is the suggestion made that Leonard Bernstein had anything other than love for his wife. Rather, the way Cooper has portrayed him is simply a reflection of his ebullient personality and his unwillingness to contain his passions, both for music and for sexual satisfaction. Bernstein does not come across as somebody who is being thoughtless of his partner, but rather has someone who is so enamored of his own lifestyle that he is unaware that sometimes, even though his wife knows of his infidelities, he has hurt her. Although same sex relationships are part of his history, they occur largely off screen in the film.

There are references to Bernstein's musical accomplishments throughout the film but most of that is presented in a very offhand manner. There are only three or four moments where the music dominates the narrative. That is not to say that the music is tangential in this story, quite the opposite. We know that Bernstein is a figure far above the average composer of the 20th century. Two illustrations show us this in the film. There is a sequence of a Broadway ballet featuring three sailors in which Bernstein and Felicia ultimately participate, and which shows how his music can transport us into a different world. Most film goers will recognize that this is the source of the material for the film “On the Town”. The second major musical sequence that is a key component, both of the drama and of the character that is being portrayed, is the segment where Bernstein conducts a piece of music by Mahler in the National Cathedral. The music itself is a moment of elevation, but the portrayal of Bernstein by Cooper in this moment, is also sublime. It also marks a point in the drama where the maestro and his wife reconcile after a particularly unpleasant separation.

As I was watching the movie I was not sure if I was really enjoying it or if it was just presented in a mannered  way simulating the characters in the time period. However the longer the film went on and the more I have thought about it since I finished watching it, the greater degree of respect I have for the movie. It is growing on me even now as I'm writing these words. What I initially thought might be a solid film is turning into one of my favorite films of the year. And most of that has come the deeper I have thought about the movie and the way it has been made. 

This is a Netflix film and congratulations to them on producing something so artistic and worthy, but shame on them for having it in theaters for such a limited amount of time and continuing to pursue creating a streaming audience rather than a theatrical audience. This movie is only scheduled to be in theaters for a short period of time. Maybe the fact that it is in an aspect ratio that fits an old television will make it seem like this is an appropriate choice, but I think in the long run audiences will find it a disappointment if they experience this at home rather than in the theater with an audience and a terrific sound system. I'm not in charge of these things but if I had my way this would be a movie that would stay in theaters long enough to collect honors and awards at the end of the year and then move to home video where a wider audience will discover it, but maybe not appreciated as much.