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Reviews
Tom and Jerry (2021)
Funny and nostalgic but a bit too long
For those of us who watched Tom & Jerry as kids, this is a wonderful mix-up of old and new. It brings back happy memories. It's a nice combo of animation and live action, with great shots of pre-Covid Manhattan. I laughed a lot. There is slapstick, but also a lot of clever and witty touches that you have to be paying attention to catch. The animation is exquisite. And there are a lot of other animated animals, who help the feature length time move along. The chase scenes are excellent. The weakness is the plot involving a celebrity wedding at an ultra-posh hotel, and maybe the fact that Tom & Jerry are going to have a hard time carrying a feature length movie along no matter what. I think a good 20 min could have been chopped and it would have been a better movie. Chloe Moretz does a good job as the main live action person....the only human who seems to be able communicate with Tom and Jerry and to treat them as equals.
Les frères Sisters (2018)
Thoughtful Western
Wow! I went to see this knowing that horses would be ridden shots would be fired, and blood would be spilled, but not much else. I put my trust in Jacques Audiard, my favorite French director, directing his first English-language film. This is rich with moral complexity, like some of his earlier films, like "A Prophet" and "Read My Lips."
This is a western that has a lot of action, as do most. But it's as much character-driven as it is plot driven. I especially liked John C. Reilly as Eli, the older, and much more mature of the two Sisters brothers. The rest of the cast is outstanding...especially Joachim Phoenix as the other brother, Charlie, and Jake Gllendaal, as a frenemy.
It's also interesting to see things that were new, or new-ish inventions, that were mostly unknown to people of 1852, when the film is set. Things like toothbrushes and flush toilets.
A satisfying film, with food for thought at the end.
Phantom Boy (2015)
A Wonderfully Good French Animation feature
I went to see this at the 2016 New French Cinema Festival at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago. I thought it would be interesting. It was much better than I had imagined. It's set in a contemporary animated version of New York City. Well, recent-past contemporary. There was a billboard advertising "Wicked" very much in evidence.
It's about an 11 year old boy named Leo who is ill with an unspecified disease. He ends up for a long stay at a Manhattan hospital. He discovers that, since he got sick, his spirit can leave is body and fly around. He can see and hear what's happening in distant places. In one very brief scene, we see Leo's spirit relaxing in the torch of the Statue of Liberty, looking toward the south end of Manhattan and the Brooklyn Bridge. Nicely drawn.
Meanwhile, a criminal mastermind, with the requisite henchmen and a bitey small dog, has gotten his hands on malware that can destroy the internet-of-things. He starts with a citywide (or at least Manhattan-wide) demonstration of his potential power to shake down the mayor for a gigantic amount of money.
In the hospital, Leo meets a maverick cop with a broken leg. He admires cops, and lets the cop in on his secret talent. Audrey Tatou voices Mary, a journalist friend of the cop, who will play a big rôle in the action that unfolds.
So, the overall film is sort of like a comic featuring a supervillain. But it's not so 2-dimensional. Leo's parents are worried sick as to whether he is going to pull thru or not (which his spirit can eavesdrop on when they think he's not around). Their tenderness and support is nicely nuanced. And Leo also has a baby sister, perhaps 4 or 5, who really cares about her big brother.
Likewise, the cop and the journalist have an interesting love-hate friendship that morphs into something more.
It's also very funny. When at the beginning, Mary runs into the cop (before his broken leg)in a grocery store, she looks at his his market basket of selections and says "pizza and chips?! What are you trying to do, commit dietary suicide?"
A good film for adults, and for some kids. It has things for both. There is lots of animation out there, but not so much that really catches my attention. But a subtitles-only release at this point, which leaves out younger kids.
As I write this, the US box office after being open 1 week, is about $4300 (one screen). If it won't bother you too much to hear supposedly tough-skinned New Yorkers speaking French, then, by all means see it.
Entre les murs (2008)
"The Class" a Class Act
We've all seen movies where a a charismatic teacher turns around an underperforming class, which comes to adore him. Think "To Sir With Love", "Dead Poets Society" and so on.
There's no magical Hollywood ending in "The Class;" it's gritty, real movie about one teacher and his French class in a middle school in a poor Parisian neighborhood. Many kids are from immigrant families, from places like Morocco, Mali, and China. We follow the teacher and class through one academic year.
The teacher, Mr. Marin, has been at the school for 3 or 4 years. He's had some of the kids, in previous years, but he doesn't quite understand the kids for all his obvious good intentions. Nor do the kids understand him, nor are they willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
On the first day, a history teacher asks Mr. Marin if maybe they could coordinate the history his class will be covering with the literature selection that the French class will do. Mr Marin shoots down one suggested book after another, as "too hard" for the class, including Voltaire's "Candide." And "Candide", is one of the most accessible French novels around." This sure seems like an unconscious judgment that the kids are not capable of this.
Right off, there's a culture clash between the teacher and the kids. He writes a sentence on the blackboard to demonstrate a vocabulary word using the name "Bill" and one girl challenges him, asking why he always uses honky names in his examples. He asks them what names they would like to see him use and the class deliberates this. They eventually come up with a name they like better.
We see him attacked by the kids as he explains the imperfect subjunctive ("If I were you..".) It's used more in French than English, but still not exactly an essential in the French language either. But still, to write well, and get a decent office job, it's one of those things that matters. But the kids complain that they've never heard anyone use the subjunctive in their lives. So Mr. Marin has to make the case that there is ordinary spoken French of the neighborhood, but also the spoken and written language of the majority French culture. And you have to be able to navigate among the various "French" languages. Absolutely true, and yet not something that seems very real to these kids.
We get to know some of the individuals in the class better. Wei is a Chinese boy, older than the rest. Self-deprecating about his "poor French" (which didn't sound that bad to me...but maybe it was just his modesty.) Wei works hard and is respectful to the teacher.
Suleymane is from Mali. He doesn't come prepared to class most of the time. He's generally withdrawn & angry. When kids do "self-portrait" projects, Suleymane wants to do one mainly with photos from a digital camera. He's better at visual images than with words. Mr. Marin helps him a bit with this, and posts the finished project on the bulletin board. Suleymane is flabbergasted that the teacher wants to display his project, because he thinks the teacher really doesn't like him. He doesn't get that, for whatever strictness Mr Marin has and whatever punishments he might mete out, he's really on Suleymane's side.
Esmeralda and Khoumba are two girls, good friends, who are smart, self-assured, and are in a running tug of war with Mr. Marin over respect. He thinks that they are insubordinate and disrespectful. And they think he is disrespectful of them.
Things get ugly when, after class, he demands an apology from Khoumba for what he sees as her disrespect. And things turn even uglier when he calls Esmeralda and another girl "pétasses," a word that can mean "stupid tarts" or "skanks/sluts." He means the first meaning, which is mildly pejorative, but, of course, Esmeralda thinks that he is dissing her in a big way with the second meaning. Events spiral out of control when Suleymane comes to the girls defense, and in a verbal match with Mr. Marin he gets so angry that he leaves the class without permission, accidentally hitting Khoumba with a piece of metal on his way out. This chain of circumstances paves the way to an expulsion hearing for Suleymane.
What works so well in this film is that nobody's the hero and nobody's the villain. Just human beings struggling in an imperfect educational system. Across a cultural divide. A BIG cultural divide. François Bégaudeau, who wrote the book the film is based on, and the screenplay, and is himself a teacher, more or less plays himself. He gives a wonderful performance, willing to show himself warts and all. And he shows the rough and tumble way a teacher has to keep control of a confrontational class. Especially if he is not going to just be the strict disciplinarian but try to connect with his students.
The kids are not young professional actors, but real kids from similar backgrounds who auditioned for the parts and then were given acting lessons. Some of the content was improvised by the kids and Bégaudeau. This looks and feels like a documentary, but it's really a work of fiction, bringing into sharp focus how the French educational system serves or doesn't serve kids like these.
Laurent Cantet is a director looking for an honest portrayal of classroom dynamics. He works hard to get portrayal where things don't always work, but there's no simple way to pin blame. The subtle dynamics of people within an institution.
I found myself mesmerized. I don't know if everyone will be so interested in a classroom movie. But if you think you might be, don't miss this powerful film.
This won the Palme D'or at Cannes in 2008, with a unanimous jury.
Voces inocentes (2004)
An Incredibly Vivid and Powerful Film
This is a sensitive and detailed account of 11 year old Chava, portrayed movingly by Carlos Padilla, growing up during some of the most violent times during the civil war in El Salvador in the 1980's. The army forcibly conscripts kids at 12, so his mom is worried about what's going to happen to him. She wants him in before curfew every night, but he forgets sometimes, because basically he's just a kid trying to have fun.
The level of violence is amazing. I've seen horror movies and standard Hollywood thrillers with much more gore, but the random violence here, and the degree to which we empathize with this kid and his family touched me deeply...I was stressed during some scenes and crying by the end. It seemed like an almost daily occurrence for the US-backed army and the leftist guerrillas to engage in firefights that had submachine gun bullets whizzing through the whole neighborhood.
Too bad this is only playing on 2 screens in Chicago, a city of 3 million people.
Yet, even amid what was one of the more brutal civil wars in the last few decades or so, Chava plays with his pals, gets a part-time job calling out stops on a bus, and shyly courts a girl he has a crush on. There are even a few things to chuckle slightly about during the lighter moments, as when Chava's radio plays the 80's hit "I Will Survive".
If you can handle the violence and cruelty that are inextricably mixed in with kindness and hope, definitely see this movie. It may well be some of the most powerful film-making you will experience this year.
I Heart Huckabees (2004)
A Wonderful Movie...though a little muddled
It's hard to have a movie about big ideas that has a plot that captivates us. I can think of Wallace Shawn's "My Dinner With Andre" which I found fascinating, even though it was basically talking heads in a restaurant. But not much there for people who like action or conflict.
I think "I Heart Huckabees" engages us more than "My Dinner With Andre", but, even so, it's not a film for everyone. Some people will find it silly and pretentious. I thought it was out-of-left-field hilarious.
Dustin Hoffman's and Lily Tomlin's Existential Detective Agency is a great concept. They weren't really existentialists (existentialism basically says humans make their meaning in a meaningless world)...more like Buddhists...we're all connected...if we clear out our fears and judgments and quiet down we can be happy, at peace, and out of conflict. Personally, I think the Buddhists are fairly right on about this stuff, although it's not easy in practice. I'm not playing favorites with the Buddhists...there are a lot of other groups/religions/philosophies with similar deep insights.
Of course, Jason Schwartman's Albert, though he sees that this sweetness and light might be nice in the abstract, he is, like most of us, too wedded to his emotional stuff...especially that Jude Law's Brad is the bad guy....the guy that got him marginalized from his own enviro group and, as far as Albert is concerned, sold the organization down the river. As long as he's hanging on to his hatred of Brad, and his thoughts of revenge, he's not going to tune in on any peace or happiness. You can have peace from the menu OR revenge, but not both at the same time.
So of course he leaves the existential detectives for Isabelle Huppert's Catherine, who really is an existentialist. She doesn't call him on his grudge, and sleeps with him besides...seemingly a much better deal than Dustin and Lily. But he ultimately does connect with Brad after having gotten revenge on him, when the two of them have both basically lost everything they held dear. And he starts to get what the detectives were telling him from the get go.
That's my boiled-down take. Others I'm sure will disagree with me. I thought it was filled with laughs...especially where Albert and Mark Wahlberg's Tommy have lunch with the Sudanese "Lost Boy" and his family. Also the scene where Dustin and Lily confront Brad over his anecdote about Shania Twain and he starts to get what they're saying (after denying it, of course). And, of course, Naomi Watts morphing into the "Amish bag lady"
I think the whole thing could have been edited a little more. It's somewhat chaotic and muddled, and if it lost 10-15 minutes it might have made it a tighter film. But of course life is chaotic and muddled...OK maybe not at the deepest level, but it sure seems that way most of the time.
I think IHH is hilarious AND thought-provoking. That's a rare combination and one that works for me.
Thanks, David Russell. "Three Kings" was a great movie. "I Heart Huckabees" is another.
Place Vendôme (1998)
Deneuve...good...Place Vendome...bad
I love French movies, and Catherine Deneuve is one of the actresses I like the best. In the 90's, she has done outstanding work in Thieves/Voleurs and My Favorite Season/Mon Saison Favori.
I was extremely disappointed in this film...a diamond scam film that has been done before, and better. It does have some good points: there is a very nice vintage noir atmosphere, and Deneuve gives a nuanced performance has the alcoholic wife of the owner of an upscale jewelery store (in Place Vendome...Paris, hence the title). He commits suicide and she is suddenly thrust into a world where there is no one to take care of her and she must find her own resources.
She does a nice job of this, but unfortunately, the film didn't make me care very much about her or any of the other characters. The plot involving stolen diamonds is convoluted, and doesn't appear to make make much sense. It looks like it was re-written too many times and some of the motivating scenes and explicatory scenes got left out.
I really wanted to like this movie, but I felt like this was perhaps the worst movie I've ever seen Catherine Deneuve in.
It's not bad like a really bad Hollywood movie is godawful bad, with explosions and trash talk trying to fill the emptiness, but it's just dull and not fun.
Two stars.
If you are looking to rent a film with Catherine Deneuve, try "Thieves" or "My Favorite Season"
-Bruce
Novia que te vea (1994)
A Witty Mexican Jewish Comedy
This is a film about two Jewish girls growing up in Mexico City in the 60s. One is from a Sephardic Jewish background...her relatives came from Turkey to Mexico. They speak Ladino, the language the Jews in Spain spoke when they were kicked out by Columbus' backers Ferdinand and Isabella. She has a big family. The other has only her parents and one uncle...everybody else died in the Holocaust.
This is nicely observed, very funny coming of age film. It was a big hit at the Chicago Latino Film Festival. All my friends that saw it liked it a lot.
I don't think your local Blockbuster has this one, but you can buy it.
The title they used in the US release was "Bride to Be", although there is an older film with that same name.
Vénus beauté (institut) (1999)
Good Bittersweet Movie
This movie has some fine acting. It is driven by character rather than plot. Nathalie Baye, as Angèle, plays a 40ish beautician in Paris. She has had a traumatic childhood and has been burned in love so she limits herself to one-night stands where she is in the driver's seat. Then a man obsessively falls for her and she has to decide whether to open up to love, or at least the possibility of it. This does not play out quite the way it would if this were a Hollywood high concept movie.
There are many minor characters, affectionately drawn. Some pieces of Angèle's past never quite get explained or resolved, which some people might complain about, but, hey, life is a lot like that.
This film is set in Paris, right before and right after Christmas. (I also saw "La Buche" at the same theater, also set in Paris at Christmas, also very good)
The jazzy score is particularly nice.
This is not exactly an upbeat Christmas movie, but it's well worth seeing.
Unbreakable (2000)
A turkey just in time for Thanksgiving
I give credit to anyone who is trying to come up with something fresh. But this was DULL and BORING. Even a good Bruce Willis and Samuel Jackson can't save a dodo bird plot. I kept waiting for something to happen, and almost nothing did. The ending seems tacked on and negates the entire movie.
This movie seemed to have a certain amount in common with Phenomenon (w/John Travolta). Phenomenon is a much better movie.
If you still feel really gung ho to see this movie, wait until it comes into second run or video. You'll probably thank me and have 5 bucks more in your pocket.
-Bruce
La bûche (1999)
A Good Flick
I really liked this movie...more what a real family goes through getting together for Christmas than many screen depictions, complete with breakups, family secrets and skeletons. Maybe you won't like this if you don't like to go to the movies that feature disappointment and bitterness. But it's leavened with some very funny stuff, too, just like real life. Interesting, because Daniele Thompson, who directed, wrote this with her son Christopher.
The American Christmas carols on the soundtrack are a little nauseating...I hear too much of them in department stores...but it is a reflection of the Americanization of France and this holiday.
The acting is well-done. I especially liked Claude Rich as the father and Charlotte Gainesbourg as the youngest daughter. I generally love Emmanuelle Beart, who plays the most Martha Stewart-like of the 3 sisters, but she has a probably the smallest role here.