Reviews

Sure, it's a mix of comedy and some poignancy that seems to whipsaw you from one place to another, but it kinda almost works. The comedy is pretty funny - sometimes very broad comedy. And the development of the relationship between Fred (Rogan) and Charlotte (Theron) is nice to watch. Both have well-defined characters that start to work out their idiosyncrasies and eventually find the real romance between them.

It was a bit hard to believe the original premise, that Charlotte, the "youngest Secretary of State ever" would not have a lifestyle of power and association that is so strong that they could succeed to one of the highest, most powerful offices in the federal government and yet that strength of will to achieve their goals didn't fence off an encounter with someone of limited success and influence like Fred.

But if you suspend your disbelief and let the story unfold, it's fun and rompy with a nice ending to remind us all that true love will overcome the most difficult circumstances.

There was an interesting set of moments, one right after the other, when Fred discovers that he not only might not know Charlotte that well or even Lance, but himself. I thought that was a missed opportunity for more, but given the pace/rhythm of the movie, it was mentioned and then the movie moved along. It was a plot point, but it was one of the more interesting, almost-lost moments.

We watched this because of the "talented musician and dancing" tagline.

Perhaps that tagline oversells the movie a bit.

The acting is fine. The cast is fine. The intent of the story is poignant.

But the actual plot is, in a word, unbelievable.

There is an entire town in North Dakota that regularly sends its best and brightest off to war, and they return broken--or not at all.

And the entire town is traumatized, generation after generation, by their deaths.

But the boys go off to war, friends and family stay behind, and the cycle continues

BUT ALSO this tiny town in Western North Dakota somehow becomes the host of the statewide high school cheer dance off which is filled with cheer teams from across the state all dancing in the most suggestive poses and steps and outfits possible, something that notoriously conservative North Dakota is known for.

These two threads are maybe connected.

But how they are connected is a thread too fine to see.

None of these people *for generations* will talk about their grief.

And yet they are completely accepting of Las Vegas showgirls as cheer squad. Because that's how small towns are in America's heartland.

It's not a terrible movie. The actors are fine, and the production values are good.

But ultimately this film just doesn't land.

3/10 stars.

Avoid this completely.

We generally will watch anything for fun as we are relaxing by the fire after a busy day in the Christmas season.

This film had promise. The initial setup seemed like a good start. A puppeteer in NYC fails at a must-make-it job and then returns to her parents' home in Maine, convinced she is finished in life.

A "quirky" cast of characters intersect with her life, especially when she has a flash of insight about a mysterious past even when she narrowly escapes death.

But the clews in her premonition aren't enough to solve the mystery, so she tries to recover her past through hypnosis and then by repeating the near-death experience.

Then, near the end of the movie, she has a flash of insight and finds the real meaning of the dream/premonition because -

Ope. The movie just ends.

Yikes.

We watched this with another couple and all of us shouted our dismay at this terrible, manipulative ending. NOTHING THAT HAPPENED IN THE FILM MATTERED.

The protagonist "learned something special." Everything else was just a set of MacGuffins.

The puppeteer aspect? DID NOT NEED TO BE A PART OF THIS AT ALL.

The near-broken down car? What?

The "Chekov's gun" in the first scenes? (The walkie talkie.) Not used to advance the plot in any way that mattered.

The love interest? More like the love skim and turn away. Not a single spark between them.

Nothing made sense with regards to plot or pacing or character development or anything that makes a movie something that is more than 90 minutes of colorful lights on the screen.

I do not fault the actors. They played their roles well, but their roles/characters were limited by the script, and as usual with these Christmas movies, they couldn't make obvious inferences from events or ask the right questions or learn from previous mistakes.

This was a terrible script.

I think about how there are so many directors and producers and actors and stagehands and all the rest who are looking for work, and Netflix throws money at these films that seem to be put together by a film crew working as hostages.

It seems that the film itself was recomposed in the editing room, but it still didn't make sense.

Beautiful film that felt very real. Kevin Hart is known for his comedic chops and for his over-the-top style of comedy.

But he has more than that, and this film lets him show much more of who he is.

There is no one right way to handle the death of a loved one. We all have to balance our feelings, our imaginations, our realities, our fear of the changes to our lives. And in this film, Hart, playing the real-life person, has outbursts of grief and rage and destructive outbursts as well as tender moments of deep connection and understanding with himself as well as the people around him who try to love him in his pain and isolation.

The character of Maddy is a standout star. Melody Hurd holds herself well in a demanding role for a young child. She feels believable in her forthrightness as well as in her need of her father. DeWanda. Wise, playing Swan, feels (and looks like) a bit of a young Whitney Houston, but she handles her role competently.

Unfortunately I was not as impressed with Hart's wingmen, Lil Rel Howery (Jordan) and Anthony Carrigan (Oscar), who felt too cardboard-ish as the clueless men who think that you can power through grief. But I'll give them some grace as I imagine that we're seeing them through the eyes of the protagonist and not as they are in real life. Alfre Woodard (Marion) and Frankie Faison (Mike) play Hart's in-laws, and handle their small roles well.

Is this an absolutely great movie? Not really, but not because of talent or production. Hart and The film itself is going to pull us into a very private moment of grief with a young child, and it is very good for what it is trying to accomplish. My eyes were drawn to Woodard who always makes her role as big as she wants them to be, and of course Hart "exceeded my expectations," as they say. I was expecting a much more comedic movie and role, as I knew nothing about this film before I saw it, and while the movie itself was much deeper and more emotional than I expected, Hart was perfectly cast here.

Kudos to the entire production team for creating this gentle, emotional, rich film that faces not only death but how we have to grapple with it.

I'll admit I knew nothing about this character or story before I watched it, so I had zero expectations. And it's in French, with English subtitles!

But I loved it. Omar Sy is perfectly charming as a thief--or is he?--who is a raconteur and a pursuer of justice and sometimes a picker-upper of stuff that's quite valuable.

The first episode sets up Lupin for us--Arsene Lupin, the main character, is Senegalese living in Paris where he was (apparently) born and raised. A series of unfortunate incidents, revealed throughout these episodes, helps us understand what has shaped him, and helps us understand what is driving him.

There are plenty of twists and turns, and we learn that Lupin is way more than we first understood in the first episode. But what those understandings are would be spoilers--let's just say he is a deeper and richer character than just a happy-go-lucky thief with light fingers and a wide smile.

I loved hearing it in French because there is a flavor to patois that you don't get from an English translation. It appears to be set and filmed mostly in Paris or environs, and the sets are wonderfully detailed.

This is at once a high-concept fantasy and a very real-feeling story.

I wanted to like it more, but if anything, the writing from the first episodes just didn't carry over into the following episodes. I hope they can find their groove and make this into a stellar series that lasts more than eight episodes. (The first four are available now as "Season 1.")

Sometimes a movie is just a movie. It entertains. It thrills. It chills. It amuses.

But sometimes a movie a slice of life so real that you are in the film, right alongside the characters, wondering if your own actions will help ensure the triumph of right over evil--and maybe a little bit scared that you will be the one with the flashlight and the gun and the key and the belt and access to the electrical switch.

I found myself in such a place with this movie. Sure, everyone likes to be the hero of their *own" movie--that's part of being human. But I was wincing and blinking at the sheer terror that is meted out to our brothers and sisters, casually, confidently, with the assurance that such cruelty is the way of the Lord. (The movie subtly weaves the church in with the injustice, noting that the presence of the community of believers is the effectual working out of injustice--it's planned and ordained by the Good Lord Himself. I'm a believer, and a sinner, and I'm daily appalled at the fallenness of my own people. But, that's a discussion for another time--it is not this movie's theme.)

I have seen Michael B. Jordan (Bryan Stevenson) in other movies, and have enjoyed his presence. (Who doesn't like him as Killmonger? C'mon.) I just want to say, his acting here is incredible--and perhaps because it is representational. His journey in this movie from holding a strong, confident belief that right will prevail through the middle where his confidence is broken to the end where he is wiser, grateful, but much more knowledgeable about how things "really work" is a sobering delight to watch. This is *acting*.

Jamie Foxx (Walter McMillan) is caged despair and rage and nearly erased hope. There is only a metal screen left in his world as the view to the rest of society, a society that saw him as guilty of capital crime a year before he was convicted. Any Black man can be picked up and criminalized because every Black man is guilty. That's the appalling truth at the end, spoken aloud to the audience in the courtroom because often the judge, jury, and audience want to believe that Justice-with-a-capital-J is what drives us. It's not justice, though. It's free-floating anger and fear, and it's revenge against an inchoate enemy. But God is good, y'all, and even though the system is set against the character of Walter--a touch of spring appears after a 500-year-long winter: Walter is finally seen.

The other characters are all fine, and I note with pleasure that this is a Black story centering Black characters with Black redeemers. This is not a white savior movie. (And thank God for that. Enough with movies like Green Book.) Brie Larson's Eva is an assistant who pops in when needed, and Tim Blake Nelson's Ralph is the pivotal villain who is manipulable in his fears by the system determine to find a Black man--any Black man--guilty. He's finally led to tell the truth. He is not the hero for doing so, but merely no longer impeding justice in his fears.

There is an awful secret in America about existing as Black, a secret that is discoverable if we have the slightest curiosity, and this movie does not demand that we see it. It does, however, provide an opportunity in the privacy of a darkened theater to consider whether we are going to seek our own ways, or if we will seek just mercy. And then, maybe, we'll decide to move.

Nine/Ten stars for a bit of over-the-top music and montages. They are wonderful to experience, satisfying conclusions of our own hopes at redemption, but I think in comparison to the rest of the movie they take us out the moment. It's not bad to do so, because it does ground us in our own reality. It is a slight fault in the craft of the movie-as-a-movie. Otherwise, the movie is just outstandingly created, shot by shot, in a way that leaves you breathless at the creativity and strength of the production team. Costumes are invisibly accurate to the times, and sets and lights are wonderfully done--it is difficult to light Black skin appropriately, but the combination of skillful lighting and filming keeps the actors from disappearing into shadow.

I had no expectations of this other than it has been getting mad props from my friends all over America who've already seen it in the past few days since it opened.

The gist of the story is a singular black cop on the otherwise all-white Colorado Springs police force who on a wild impulse decides to interact with the KKK. Because he is young and impulsive, he dials the KKK directly and uses his real name. Because a black man would not be able to fit in, he enlists the help of a white cop for in-person interactions, but keeps his phone interactions, especially with David Duke. (Yes, THE David Duke.) One thing leads to another, and the KKK thugs in Colorado Springs are broken apart--but his work is shredded and the police department decide to pretend nothing happened at all.

All this is most wonderful, especially the final scene in the first part, which is a final phone call between the black cop and David Duke. The audience broke up shouting and laughing at this, and it was emotionally satisfying.

But the movie isn't over.

This final scene is followed by intercuts of recent actions in today's America, and the mood of the audience--and myself--changed to one of sober reflection and emotional distress. In summary: nothing much has changed, and even the heroism of many people has done almost nothing to affect the rise of Naziism and fascism and race-hatred in America.

With all that said --

The movie is very well constructed, and feels very late-70s. I enjoyed seeing and hearing the lives of people living in that time--costumes and sets and dialog were pretty much spot on. The entire premise was believable even though the story comes about because an eager black cop decides to take on the KKK and then finds he can't get by without the help of his friends.

The movie would be one, complete thing had it ended at the phone scene--and yet the movie would not be complete without the codicil that confronts us with our world of today, where the KKK and Nazis and fascists and white nationalists and alt-rightist are sometimes clowning--but are becoming more and more bold and more and more invasive and more and more successful.

Charlottesville happened not just because people don't stand against Nazis at all levels, from the farm house to the White House, but because too many people feel "it just can't happen here."

Good work, Mr. Lee and others.

So the best thing about this is the rawness and humanness of the people--both the people you feel for when you hear the awfulness of their pain at their loss remembered from 50 years ago (June 21, 1964), and the people you feel bewildered by as they express their frank racism and express astonishing ignorance about people.

The story of Cheney, Goodman, and Schwerner is perhaps well-known. Goodman and Schwerner came down from New York, eager to do the right thing. They joined up with James Cheney, a native, and attempted to get people to register to vote or otherwise simply express their civil rights. They were arrested for speeding, jailed, and then released.

Somehow (!) the Ku Klux Klan was notified that the three were traveling in the area. Three or four dozen men of Neshoba and the surrounding area attacked them after they were released, beat them, tortured them, really, and then killed them. (James Cheney, as the black guy, was especially tortured.) They buried the three in an earthen dam, and dozens and dozens of people were told about this act, as the men boasted of their actions to shut down the troublemakers.

There was some activity in 1964 to indict these men, but nothing happened to most of them. Some served a few years for civil rights violations, but no murder charges.

Forty years later, many of the culprits were still free. One of them, the ringleader, a preacher named Edgar Ray Killen, was still talking about it.

A coalition of citizens got together just to talk about the situation, to find ways for reconciliation. Gradually they got more and more attention until the State of Mississippi took Killen to trial for the murders of these young men who were simply trying to help ordinary Americans exercise their civil rights.

I won't tell you the ending. It's not what I expected.

I will say that the documentary was extraordinary, because it comprises interviews of people from both sides of the situation--some who support the three guys, some who support the actions taken against them. (It is just astonishing to me to hear such racism be expressed so openly and proudly.) Somehow the filmmakers got people to trust them to open up and pour out their ideas and the secret things of their hearts.

An excellent documentary not just for the subject matter, but also for the quality of the production and the craft that was used to get people to talk.