Drama

What makes us human: Defiance

September 13, 2009
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Overall Rating: B−
Filmmaking/Artistic: B−
Storytelling: C+
MPAA Rating: R (Realistic depiction of Nazi crimes and resistance countermeasures)

The pitch

As this film portrays the true story of Belarussian Jews who resisted the evil of the Nazis (and in some cases their own countrymen), Your Movie Monkey does not believe a humorous “pitch” is appropriate.

Mini-review

Although Your Movie Monkey is not enough of a history buff to confirm the accuracy of the claim, this movie retells the story of Belarussian Jews who resisted the orders of the invading Germans to go to their deaths. 

Led by 4 brothers, these Jews hid out in the woods beginning with the 1941 invasion, and lasting for about 3 years.  While in some cities the number of Jews was dropped from the thousands to 50 in a few short weeks, these descendants of these 1200 survivors now number in the thousands or tens of thousands.

The two eldest of the brothers, who experience or learn of the murders of their parents, wives, and children, are played by Daniel Craig (the oldest who leads the band) and Liev Schreiber (the second oldest who ends up joining the Red Army in resistance), and both do a decent job.  Schreiber’s character, Zus Bielinski, is a militant intent on revenge, while Craig’s character, Tuvya, believes that refusal to stoop to the level of the Germans is what makes them human.

The two philosophies clash often throughout the film.  As an example, the brothers decide that they will only take food from farmers “who can afford the loss”, and they take milk from a farmer who claims that if he doesn’t make his quota, the Germans will kill him and his family.  They take the milk (and Zus takes the farmer’s coat as well), but Zus believes they should kill the farmer who is a witness.  Tuvya lets him live, only to have him lead the Germans to their camp.

These moral dilemmas are highlighted in the conversations between a rabbi and an intellectual who become friends and enjoy good natured argument.  Further, the people who live with Tuvya and Tuvya himself are presented with a real dilemma when they capture a blond-haired, blue-eyed German solider, who is clearly terrified.  They find valuable information on this German who screams “Bitte, ich habe eine Frau und kleine Kinder! (Please, I have a wife and small children!”)  While Tuvya willingly turns his back, the Jews scream in return “And my brother’s name was Max!  And my mother’s name was Anna!”, and cannot resist, and beat him to death.

As a film, it seemed a little  bit plodding.  Your Movie Monkey found himself hitting fast forward on several occasions.  Plus, the characters speak a combination of their native tongue and accented English.  Your Movie Monkey finds this construct distracting… if there is to be a switch to English, just switch to unaccented English.  (It’s the Kevin Costner Theorem.)

But even with these slow pieces, it feels like an honor to watch the resolve of these people who were faced with unmitigated evil, and who choose to take everyone along with them (including the elderly and the sick), so that no one would be left behind.

The New Jack Nicholson?: The Wrestler

February 28, 2009
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Overall Rating: B+
Filmmaking/Artistic: B
Storytelling: A−
MPAA Rating: R

Overview

An interesting story by (eclectic? unusual? atypical?) director Darren Aronofsky, The Wrestler presents the gritty, realistic drama of the life of a has-been wrestler.   Mickey Rourke plays the wrester, and much like the extremely over-rated Jack Nicholson, has won accolades for what appearst to be essentially playing himself.  The relationship between Rourke’s character and an aging stripper played by Marisa Tomei seems quite believable, and the relationship between the wrestler and his estranged daughter is the basis for an Oscar-deserving scene, but if you’re uninterested in the story of  a wrestler, this won’t be your cup of tea.

Mini-review

Your Movie Monkey has some interest in wrestling, having watched it for about 3 years in the late 90s.  Watching these weekly programs, which Your Movie Monkey found much more creative than most TV sitcoms, YMM never considered that there was entire circuit of semi-pro (or even non-pro) wrestlers out there who play to smaller crowds.  It’s kind of a circuit.  (Contrarian’s wife Bella claims that all circuit folks are far more similar than they are different, be it wrestling, monster trucks, or dog shows.)

In this film, Mickey Rourke plays Jack Nicholson playing Mickey Rourke playing a washed up wrestler, Randy “The Ram” Robinson.  The kind of wrestler who, literally, has a staple gun used on him in the ring, and then gets so little money that he can’t afford rent on his mobile home  (or steriods).  The Ram was so popular in his heyday that he was the star of an Atari game.  But now, although respected by his fellow wrestlers, he has a farily horrible life.

The Ram has a heart attack during one of his matches, and begins to re-evaluate his life.  He has a relationship with a local stripper, played by Marisa Twomei, who is also an actor of sorts, in that she keeps talking about the separation of her stage life and her real life (which involves a young son at home).  He also has an estranged daughter, with whom he now feels that he should  re-unite.

Bascially we learn that wrestling is all that the Ram knows, and his relationships aren’t that great.  We also learn that Mickey Rourke has a very muscly body with a really, really strange face on top, due to many plastic surgeries.

The story is very well written and realistic and gritty.  But it won’t be for everyone.  If you have no interest in wrestling, don’t see it.  Also, Rourke’s performance is very over-rated.  He basically plays himself, like Jack Nicholson.  But if you love Jack Nicholoson, perhaps you’ll like this too.

Marisa Twomei is excellent, and Rachel Evan Wood, who plays his daughter, is phenomenal, and perhaps the best part of the show.

The show is, in short scenes, graphically violent, and has some graphic sexual content, and therefore is not family-friendly.  The relationships presented seem realistic, that is, realistically empty.  The consequence of shallowness and a life lived only for one’s self is also realistically, and sadly, depicted.

What You Didn’t See: Doubt

February 28, 2009
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Overall Rating: A
Filmmaking/Artisitic: A-
Storytelling: A+
MPAA Rating: PG-13

Overview

The best movie Your Movie Monkey has seen in at least 6 months, Doubt leaves you talking afterward, much as Memento did, about what actually happened.  Your Movie Monkey expected a bashing of the Catholic church due to their recent scandals.  The scandals somewhat set the scene, but the movie is complex and thought provoking, without taking sides (except, of course, that the needs of the kids in a particular Catholic school should outweigh the personalities and methods of the adults who are tasked with guiding them–of that, the movie leaves no doubt).

Full Review

As a teenager, Your Movie Monkey remembers seeing a story on 20/20 or 60 minutes or some similar show, about a priest who had dedicated his life to working with boys (troubled, if memory serves), and  who was accused of having inappropriate relationships.  The angle of the show was that the priest was very likely innocent, and at the time, YMM thought “how sad that this priest can’t have a heart for kids without being accused of something terrible”–specifically, at this tender age, YMM thought that the world was in general so self-centered that any act of selflessness was misunderstood and ascribed to sinister motives.

Your Movie Monkey believes he remembers the name of this priest from the show (although he will not publish it), because it was a priest who was later convicted of the crimes similar to those which had been described.

So what do we, as a society, do?  Ascribe every selfless motive as sinister?  Set up rules so stringent that the actual acts of service become exceedingly difficult to perform?  Doubt attempts to address this question, or at least, leave the viewer free to discuss it.

Meryl Streep plays a very strict nun who is the head of a catholic school in the 1960s.  She reports to a priest played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman.  The priest is young, and of a new tradition… a tradition more about meeting people’s needs where they live than a kind of blind adherence to rules.

An new, young, optimistic nun (Amy Adams) arrives, and is taught to be tough as nails by the head nun.  The new nun has a strange experience where a student of hers is called to the priest’s office, and comes back with a somewhat strange affect, and smelling of alcohol on his breath.  She also sees (later), the priest returning a t-shirt of the boy’s  to the boy’s locker.

That’s it.  That’s the facts.  The rest is conjecture.

The head nun suspects the priest of wrongdoing.  The priest of course denies it, but his method of denial (basically saying “I’m the preist, this doesn’t concern you”) of course doesn’t fly with her.  And what follows is exactly the world of contecture, the world of interpretation, and the world of the male-dominated catholic church.

So what does one do with little information?  Is the priest a misunderstood innocent, or a very clever liar?

It is because of the wrong doing of what is hopefully a minority in the priesthood that these questions must be asked.  How far does one go in the pursuit of the truth?  Is it ok to deceive, to accuse without evidence, to outright lie, in order to get there?  Doubt leaves these questions open.

The movie is very well acted (although Mery’s Streep’s accident changes a lot as the show goes on), and the characters are like those in Spike Lee movies, neither all good nor all bad.  The actress who played the mother of the boy had maybe 10 minutes of screentime, but those minutes were powerful.  She was nominated for an Academy Award for the role, and deserved it.

Your Movie Monkey does not want to give too much away, so he will stop here.  He fully recommends Doubt for those old enough to understand the content.  For younger children who cannot understand the crime of which the priest is accused, it should probably be avoided.

Your Movie Monkey will close his review with his favorite commentary from the movie, a sermon given by the priest upon being accused by the head nun.

A woman confesses to her priest that she is guilty of the sin of gossip.  The priest tells her that, as penance, she should take her finest pillow to the top of her building, and cut it with a knife.  She complies, taking her very best pillow to her roof on a somewhat breezy day, and cuts it, with the mess of feathers floating all around.  She then returns to her priest who tells her that as the last bit of her penance, she should gather the feathers that had spilled, return them to the pillow, and sew it up.  The woman protested, noting that the feathers had by now spread on the winds to many different places, and that gathering them all together would be impossible.

“And that,” said the priest, “is gossip.”

Forrest Gump Part Deux: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

January 5, 2009
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Overall Rating: C+
Artistic/Filmmaking: B
Storytelling: C-
MPAA Rating: PG-13

Overview

It’s Forrest Gump all over again, but (unbelievably) longer, slower paced, and less interesting.  The main character ages backward, but just as no one blinks an eye in the campy old Batman series whenever a woman dressed in a slinky catsuit and henchmen dressed as tiger cubs walk into a jewelry store, no one seems to notice or care.  There’s almost a 1-1 connection for everything in Forrest Gump, there’s even a “sitting in a hospital at a dying woman’s bed” bookend equivalent to Forrest Gump’s “talking to strangers at a bus stop” bookend, and a “Ya Never Know What’s Comin’ For Ya” to match “Life is Like A Box of Chocolates”.  There’s great acting (although it was IYMMHO one of Cate Blanchett’s rare misses), and it’s very fun to watch the period piece aspects, and there are some positive moments.  Oh, and, for some inexplicable reason, there’s Hurricane Katrina.   

Full Review

The story hook promises more than it delivers.  A man (Benjamin Button) ages backward, and experiences life from about 1920 to 2000.   We start with a woman dying of a Hollywood form of cancer… you know, no pain unless we need to call a nurse for a scene change or other plot device.  She is speaking in this kind of loud mumble to her daughter, and they are clearly southern (turns out to be New Orleans), and she tells the story of a man who lost his son in World War I and, in his grief, made a clock that ran backwards to symbolize the time we want back.  And then disappeared.  Then, she mumbles at her daughter to read a diary out loud, so she can hear the daughter’s voice.  It’s the story of Benjamin Button.

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I’ll take depressing stories for $800 Alex: Slumdog Millionaire

December 19, 2008
By

Overall Rating: B-
Filmmaking/Artistic: A-
MPAA Rating: R

Overview

A well-acted, beautifully shot, interesting story about an Indian youth named Jamal who grew up in the slums of Mumbai (a slumdog), who is–against all odds–in the middle of winning the big money on the Indian version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.  The question is, how?  Turns out that the answer is a long, unbelievably depressing (and fictional) story of  Jamal’s life in the slums.  Violent, perhaps realistic, the question is whether this movie is how you want to spend 2 hours of your time.

Full Review

The subject of intelligence has been of interest for quite some time, especially the concept of innate intelligence.  But of course, the problem is that the natural definition of intelligence (can he figure stuff out) becomes difficult to assess without a frame of reference.  “If there are 3 birds on a fence, and you shoot one, how many are left?”  To a kid who grows up knowing birds only as an abstract concept (that picture in the book is a bird), without being exposed to live birds, the answer might reasonably be two.  But to anyone who has been around a bird (or other animal) when a loud noise goes off (especially a loud noise that fatally wounds a buddy on a nearby fence), the right answer is of course zero.  So which answer shows more intelligence, two or zero?  The answer is, one probably can’t tell from this assessment, which is a lot of the controversy with achievement tests like the SAT.  (Perhaps a better term for these is college preparedness tests… it’s not what one can achieve, it’s how prepared one is for the very specific tasks required in college.  But Your Movie Monkey, as always, digresses.)

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Archives

Critics
Marvel's The Avengers93%
Dark Shadows42%
Think Like a Man51%
The Hunger Games84%
The Lucky One20%
The Five-Year Engagement63%
The Pirates! Band of Misfits86%
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel76%
Chimpanzee74%
Safe55%
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