Dogs Bark

Art Is No Game! - - The Fabelmans (2022, USA, 151 min) - - 21 February 2023

Strongly recommended. The Fabelmans is a movie of modest aims yet - - like family itself - - a complex and painful pleasure. There’s little indication in the Fabelman household of an emergent major artist, despite the affection of both parents. But Steven Spielberg’s (Lincoln) memoir explains how it could happen. Much of this delight emerges from the well-deserved, Oscar-nominated performance of Michelle Williams (Wendy and Lucy); however, Paul Dano (Little Miss Sunshine) as Dad and Gabriel LaBelle’s (The Predator) unaffected Sammy contribute mightily. All the acting is wonderful . . . Judd Hirsch (Ordinary People) as Uncle Boris and wonderful Julia Butters (Once Upon A Time In Hollywood), as Sammy’s sister. The period-perfect production design by Rick Carter (Lincoln) and Karen O'Hara (The Color of Money) is also worthy of its Academy recognition. It's interesting that the story foreshadows Spielberg’s two directing Oscars, Saving Private Ryan and Schindler’s List. The Fabelmans may get him a third.

 

The Movie At The End of The Universe - - Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022, USA, 139 min) - -20 February 2023

Recommended. With eleven Oscar noms, Everything Everywhere All At Once should be an overwhelming experience. It’s certainly a sensory and narrative assault; however, the message of these loud parts - - that we need to be nicer to each other - - gets a bit garbled. Daniel Kwan with Daniel Scheinert - - collectively known as "the Daniels" - - directed and wrote the movie. Imagine Charlie Kaufman and Douglas Adams collaborating on Interstellar; you get the gist. Must say, the acting of Michelle Yeoh (Crazy Rich Asians) and Ke Huy Quan (Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom) - - as a couple beset by both the IRS and cosmic nihilism - - is worthy of a nod and arguments could also be made for Jamie Lee Curtis (Halloween) and Stephanie Hsu (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel). Any of the technical award nominations, particularly Paul Rogers’s editing, are also solid. However, the story is a little long and occasionally over the top.

Delightfully Bad Robot - - M3GAN (2022, USA, Color, 102 min) - - 14 January 2023

Recommended. To be sure, there is nothing deep about M3GAN - - newcomer Gerard Johnstone’s (Housebound) blockbuster horror flick - - and the plot is kinda dumb. There’s a slight nod to the fear of screens replacing human friends, parental subversion, and Frankensteinian arrogance but this is only used to disquiet the audience, not sermonize. The boss of M3GAN is M3GAN - - as she clearly knows - - and she animates the true horror. With a face resembling the nine-year-old Scarlett Johannsson (can’t wait for the SNL skit!) and the patience of Hannibal Lector, she is the ultimate enfant fatale. I never stopped rooting for her. Like all great horror, there’s a black underbelly of humor to the script . . . never allowing the audience off of the meat hook of disturbia. Fortunately, with the exception of M3GAN’s “owner,” Cady (Violet McGraw, Black Widow), most of the characters range from vile to just stupid so the mayhem seems OK.

Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter is Nuts! - - Don’t Bother To Knock (1952, USA, B/W, 76 min) - - 8 January 2023

Strongly recommended. For most Marilyn Monroe fans, Niagara is her best film noir, probably because of MM’s characterization as a sizzling femme fatale. The smart money is on Don’t Bother To Knock with no reliance on her innate sexiness . . . only her thespian chops. She is a hottie here, but it’s her psychosis, channeling her mentally ill mother, that makes her scary herein. And Marilyn also exudes the debilitating fragility that only she could summon for a part. Second-billed to Richard Wydmark (Kiss Of Death) - - who’s sane (but just a heel) - - and his loopy laugh making Monroe seem dangerous by association. Added in is the premiere of Anne Bancroft (The Graduate), singing a couple songs, and a wonderful spot for Elisha Cook, Jr (The Maltese Falcon). Brit Roy Baker (A Night to Remember) helmed the picture. Supposedly, MM drove him mad, too . . . until he saw the finished film.

The Hapsburg Flip - - Corsage (2022, Austria/German, 114 min) - - 6 January 2023

Recommended - - For various reasons, Empress Elisabeth of Austria, Sissi, is the most filmed aristocrat of all time. Romy Schneider (The Cardinal)  played her ad nauseum. Supposedly, the lady was beautiful and stylish but why another film version this year? Filmmaker Marie Kreutzer (The Ground Beneath My Feet) gives her middle finger to that complaint and presents a point of view that is interesting, relevant, and delightfully strange. The responsibility for justifying all this sits on the lovely shoulders of Vicky Krieps (Hanna), who build upon her enchanting performance in The Phantom Thread to establish an Oscar-worthy turn, her performance enhanced by the love of the camera and generally lyricism of Judith Kaufmann (Two Lives). Many of these shots are breathtaking. Also worth noting is the performance of little newcomer Rosa Hajjaj as Archduchess Marie Valerie Mathilde Amalie, aka, Sissi’s beloved daughter. She gives us the ultimate mom-crashed offspring.

Disquieted Man - - The Banshees Of Inisherin (2022, Ireland/UK/USA, Color, 114 min) - - 17 December 2022

Not recommended. It's worth noting that there’s no Inisherin. The name was invented by Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) for his eponymous new movie, filmed on spectacular Achill Island. And following that fanciful theme, the characters that populate his Irish village seem the unpleasant variety of Celts - - stubborn, brutish, and stupid - - stereotyped in numerous other films. The point of it hinges on two former friends, Pádraic (Colin Ferrill, In Bruges) and Colm (Brendan Gleeson, In Bruges) who have fallen out because one thinks the other too boring to endure. The spat escalates to the point of gross, and possibly allegorical, self-mayhem . . . off camera, the 1923 Irish Civil War rages; however, the characters are so under-written that the motivation is unclear and the story, uninteresting. The only sane person on the island is Pádraic’s sister (Kerry Condon, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), but she, inexplicably, departs. Nice landscapes, though.

Dutch Angling - - Amsterdam (2022, USA, Color, 134 minutes) - - 10 December 2022)

Recommended. Although the reviewers are of mixed opinion, Amsterdam is a very entertaining film for those willing to travel there in director/writer David O. Russell’s (Silver Linings Playbook) madcap murder mystery. The complicated story is much like Russell’s American Hustle, a screenplay loosely ripped from history, fast action, and a stellar cast . . . in this case led again by a goofy Christian Bale (Ford v Ferrari). Actually, it’s more of a troika, with lovers John David Washington (BlacKkKlansman) and Margot Robbie (I, Tonya) pulling alongside. The trio are hired by Taylor Swift (Cats) - - yes, that Taylor Swift - - to find her father’s murderer, assisted by a retired WWI general, played by Russell pal Robert Di Niro, (The Irishman). If you weren’t bothered by the absurd plot of The Big Sleep, you’ll do just fine in Amsterdam. The ending is rather unappealing as the repetitious nature of history is driven home . . . repeatedly.    

Pinched Toes - - Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams (2020, Italy, Color, 120 minutes) - - 2 December 2022

Not recommended. I approached Luca Guadagnino’s (Call Me by Your Name) documentary whimsically, being one who never questioned a wife’s need for rooms of stylish shoes . . . this enthusiasm primarily aesthetic, rather than carnal. I just appreciate good taste in shoes. Sadly, there is little whimsy in Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams. The film seems an unremarkable visualization of a Wikipedia article. We get little insight into the man or his creative soul, although his tenacity is well represented. Although the film stolidly depicts his opening of his silent-era, Hollywood store, the “Shoemaker to the Stars” behind the counter is never revealed. Understand,this guy created Gloria Swanson’s Sadie Thompson pumps, Marilyn Monroe’s gold stilettos, and Audrey Hepburn’s little black ballet flats. He sold riding boots to Rudolph Valentino. Interviews with most of the Ferragamo progeny, manic Martin Scorsese and - - always delightful - - Deborah Nadoolman-Landis are helpful but they can’t polish this clodhopper.

  

And Blood At The Root - - Till (2022, USA, Color, 130 min) - - 5 November 2022

Recommended. Because of his age (14) and the trivial nature of his "crime" (whistling at a white woman), the murder of Emmett Till still haunts Mississippi . . . and all of us. Till’s murder was less than many similar crimes, but was dramatized by his mother, Mamie, deciding on an open-casket funeral and publishing horrific photos of Till in Jet magazine. Her desire to force society to stare into the consequences of racist violence is the movie’s linchpin, well explained by Nigerian-born director/screenwriter, Chinonye Chukwu (Clemency) and the powerful performance of Danielle Deadwyler (The Harder They Fall). Deadwyler is supported by Jalyn Hall’s (Shaft) Emmett Till, his happy-go-lucky personality underscoring his awful fate. If there is a flaw to this wrenching film, it’s the incomplete story. After all of the drama, we are left with little to learn about Mamie’s subsequent fate, other than agony and anger understandable . . . but ultimately unsatisfying.

It's A Slow Death - - The Deadly Companions (1961, USA, Color, 93 min) - - 23 August 2022

Not recommended. Over a ten-year run, from Ride The High Country in 1962 to Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid in 1973, Sam Peckinpah’s direction dominated the Western movie, and for good reason. Probably no filmmaker other than Ford was as innovative in the genre or as successful with audiences . . . and in a much less sympathetic time. But he had to start somewhere, and The Dangerous Companions was his kindergarten. He had two veterans recently paired in The Parent Trap, Maureen O’Hara (Rio Grande) as a dance-hall girl and Brian Keith (The Violent Men) as an embittered ex-Union officer; however, Peckinpah had none of the auteur-ity employed in The Wild Bunch, his masterpiece. There are moments of quiet, quirky intensity - - particularly Chill Wills (Giant) as a loony gambler - - and this is Sam’s introduction to Strother Martin (Cool Hand Luke) . . . but the pace and logic of the plot are just awful.