The Critical Filmmaker

Why do people enjoy uncomfortable, situations where people argue, whine and and embarrass themselves?  How many times can puke be funny?  When is it ever funny? Carnage is the product of Roman Polanski, whom (I'm told) likes to explore feelings of claustrophobia.  I've only seen a few Polanski films, but not enough to know of this beforehand. From the outset Carnage gives us the following scenario:  Two 11-year-old kids have an argument in the playground, one strikes the other with a branch and knocks the boy's teeth out.  Soon the parents get involved and meet at the wounded child's home to work things out. Right from the start I knew this was a bad idea, especially seeing how uptight all four parents were.  The air was so thick I could see it. After the four parents seemingly agreed to make amends and resolve the issue, the parents of the branch-wielding boy (played by Kate Winslet and Christoph Waltz) said their awkward goodbyes and headed for t...

If you want to see this film, which I recommend highly, then I suggest you do not read any summaries.  I didn't before I saw it, but after I did and I think had I read the plot I wouldn't have enjoyed it as much. Not that there's anything wrong with the plot.  On the contrary, it's well written and performed.  The issue is how much predictability do you like to observe when watching a film.  This movie is unpredictable.  I had no idea how it was going to wind up, and that's the fun of it.  Reading a plot summary could possibly give too much away without intending to.  So avoid the summary and see this film. I will say this - just to give you an idea of what type of movie it is - it's an amusing, heartwarming and funny character study. And that's all I'll say.... Oh, yes.  I almost forgot.  It's a French film with a few scenes in English, because they take place in London. That's it.

I remember watching a young George Clooney early in his career in several TV appearances.  I liked a few of them, including a failed TV series called - believe it or not - ER.  But it was a different ER.  This one had a slash through he middle (E/R) and it was a comedy. Flash forward years later and the other ER - the one everyone knows about - launches his career into the stratosphere.  Does anyone remember him in Facts of Life? I've seen a few of Clooney's post ER films and one thing I've noticed is that while many are quite enjoyable, and he does give a convincing performance overall, there is this sameness between the characters.  It's as if he's playing the same character in different situations.  His narration is also a bit stiff.  In Up in the Air and The Descendants, it's as if the same character has been transplanted from one film to the next.  When the narration started for The Descendants, I wondered if his character portrayal on ca...

There is a new film being released this weekend titled "The Last Rites of Joe May" that has a familiar ring to it.  The plot summary sounds similar to The Visitor, which was the first film I had seen at the preview screenings I attend.  It was a few years back, so this is a much belated review of that film. The similarities in plot-line are as follows:  A lonely man arrives at his apartment to find strangers living there, and initially tries to kick them out, then feels sorry for them and becomes involved in their own personal struggle. I thoroughly enjoyed The Visitor, despite some concerns with the plot twist midway through.  I worried at first that this would be a veiled political film about being more tolerant about illegal immigrants in the US, but if it was, I didn't notice it.  I'm not a political person and would rather not see a film with an agenda.  Fortunately, this one didn't seem to have one. As a whole it was a heart-warming story about ...

Based on the French film by Patrice Leconte, this delightful tale depicts what can happen when people from opposite sides of the tracks meet and discover that the other person lives a life they had craved so much. Donald Sutherland and Larry Mullen, Jr. (drummer for the rock band U2) star as two men who cross paths and wind up being unlikely friends.  Sutherland is a retired college English professor who is tutoring high school kids, while Mullen is a bank robber who arrives in Sutherland's town to rob the local bank.  Mullen's character (simply named The Thief in the credits, but has a name in the film) is suffering from a migrane headache.  He enters a drug store seeking a prescription drug, but when the pharmacist refuses to sell it to him without a prescription, Sutherland (credited as The Professor), happens to have just bought a bottle himself, and passes on a few pills to the robber.  And here starts the shaky beginning of what becomes a beautiful friendship...

Oranges and Sunshine is an interesting, compelling film based on the true story of Maragaret Humphries and her response to hearing that millions of British children were shipped out to Australia and used as slave labor. It's a shocking revelation that's very difficult to imagine.  Young children led to believe that their parents were dead and promised a sunnier life in Australia, when in truth their parents were very much alive, believing their child was dead.  Yes, the child was snatched from the parents.  They were not given voluntarily. And that sunny life?  Well, it might be sunny in Australia, but the kids didn't enjoy that life there.  Most were abused and sent to manual labor. The film delves into Margaret's (Emily Watson) battle with the government to bring attention to this issue and to reunite these people with their families.  Now adults, they have deep scars from what happened to them.  Hugo Weaving and David Wenham star as two of ...

This was overall an enjoyable film.  It had a sometimes realistic feel to it, and a sometimes comedic, farcical nature to it.  It was difficult at times to tell if they were taking themselves seriously or not, but that didn't bother me as much as you'd think it might.  I guess it's because my day job is in the corporate world, and my company has had its share of lay-offs.  So I found myself connecting to both aspects of this film quite nicely. What impressed me about this film was how they tackled the problem they were facing.  I really liked how they spent all night in meetings discussing the issue and working toward a resolution.  It felt very realistic to me.  For some reason I had expected it to drag over a few days, but it didn't.  The sense of urgency was strong, the attitudes of management was amusing and had a touch of realism to it. Another interesting aspect involved a couple of the characters making accusations along the lines of "I...