Calvary Review

Forgive me Father, for I have threatened---Brendan Gleeson as a well meaning priest who received an anonymous death threat and Aidan Gillen as one of many suspects in Calvary
                                                   Now that Phillip Seymour Hoffman has unfortunately left this earth, there are very few actors who stand out to me as being able to match his acting ability. Hoffman had a special knack for making even the most ordinary characters fascinating. The only actors that come to mind that still have that level of skill are Christopher Walken, Paul Giamatti and Brendan Gleeson. There has never been a film that displays Gleeson's great ability to carry an entire film and then some than the dark comedy Calvary. His performance is magnificent and, although there are many other interest characters and ideas in the film, he makes this film as wonderful as it is. If writer-director John Michael McDonagh (who also work with Gleeson in the criminally underrated The Guard,) were to have picked a lesser actor for the lead, the whole project would have most likely gone to shambles.

                                                   In the film, Gleeson plays Father James, a nice and caring priest who receives an anonymous death threat in the confessional booth. Once this threat gets out, Father James starts to look at everyone in the town a different way. The head doctor (Aidan Gillen) suddenly becomes a slimy man. The goofy butcher (Chris O'Dowd) becomes someone who seems suspiciously silly. Even that guy who hangs out at the bar all the time (Killan Scott) becomes a crazy drunk. In fact, the only two people Father James can seem to trust are daughter Fiona (Kelly Reilly) and an old man (M. Emmet Walsh, who is always a delight to watch) with a special habit for writing. The film is told as a whodunit but McDonagh was clever enough to not make the film all about that. This is not to say that's not a lot of what grasps the audience. The whole idea of who this potential killer is and why he wants to kill Father James of all people sticks in the audience's mind throughout. Although the potential killer does give an explanation of his motivation in the confessional, the audience still wants to know more and who.

                                                     The film's location is beautiful, giving the film a very quaint and voluptuous feel. This is also one of those films I love that's set in its own world. As with Fargo or the overlooked Cedar Rapids, this is set in a town where everyone seems to know everyone. For a mystery such as this one, that is particularly effective because it gives everyone equal suspicion. There are no characters who are hidden in the background and thus anyone could be the potential killer.

                                                     As I previously mentioned, Gleeson is wonderful here. He plays Father James as a kind, sympathetic man but also can brilliant pull off the moments in which he has no choice but to put his foot down and be aggressive. The audience feels his pain as everyone starts to quickly turn against him and the audience feels the weight of the threat that he feels. Everyone else from Gillen to O'Dowd to Scott to Reilly are excellent but Gleeson makes this film. He is a truly palpable presence and this is Oscar-worthy stuff. I'm disappointed about the fact that The Academy is probably going to ignore a film as small as this come Oscar season because Gleeson definitely deserves a nomination.

                                                    The film becomes increasingly more suspenseful as the reveal gets more and more questionable. There are multiple people attacking Father James in plain sight for seemingly no reason but who did it out of sight? This question is gripping from the first second of the film to the reveal. Calvary has a wonderfully old fashioned feel to it and is damn delightful. Unfortunately, it probably won't find any kind of audience due to its religious subtext, which does admittedly become a bit too much for the last half hour or so. While the film is sometimes unnecessarily poky and the plot starts to take a back seat to the mystery when things become a bit bogged down, this is still definitely worth seeing. Gleeson's unbelievably impressive work alone makes this worth the price of admission.
(4 out of 5 Stars, The film is rated R for sexual references, language, brief strong violence and some drug use)

Boyhood Review

The world is all around----Ellar Coltrane as Mason, who grows up from 5 years old to 18 years old for the audience in Boyhood
                                 Theodor Geisel, better known as legendary author Dr. Seuss said “Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.”  Boyhood is a rare film about what life is that completely follows that quote. There may never be another film that is more true to life, or more beautiful about the wonder of existing than writer-director Richard Linklater's groundbreaking drama. This is a stunning, breathtaking, marvelous film from the first frame to the last. The film also has a daring premise, which gives the fact that the overall outcome is so wonderful that much more weight. This is a film that should be seen at least once by everybody. Although it deals with a lot of mature themes, I think the best audience to experience this film are young people. I'm talking 4-12 years old here. This is the kind of film that will open up the mind of young ones and will allow them to get an early start on figuring out what their life may become. 

                                  The film stars newcomer Ellar Coltrane in a breakthrough performance as Mason, a normal kid who goes through the ups and downs of everyday life as he attempts to find out what his purpose is. These include a bothersome sister (Lorelei Linklater,) his messed up and resentful to one another parents (Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette,) and even an abusive step dad (Marco Perella.) The great thing about all of these events is that all of them are universal and none are done in the fashion one would expect from a film. 

                                 The script proves to be much more than just a series of events from a childhood. By gathering all of these seemingly insignificant pieces of a life together, Linklater has brilliantly shown what growing up is like. It's not fun, as much as most people like to think so at a young age. It involves more and more work as time goes on and one's perspective of the world changes as they grow up. As a youngster, people see the world as a series of events that they are simply observing. However, once people get older, they realize that, unfortunately, a lot of those events, even the terrible ones have a direct correlation to them. This stringing together of these moments brilliant portray what it's like to be young and ambitious only to discover it takes a lot more than simply trying. It takes time, energy, dedication, self motivation and even a lot of luck.

                                The film works as a time capsule as well. It's cool to see a film in 2014 where kids are riding skateboards and bikes to the long gone rap hit "Soulja Boy Tell 'Em." Also, the acting is phenomenal. Coltrane plays the character of Mason incredibly well, giving him depth and heart that the audience  never could have imagined such a normal person could have. He transcends the normality of Mason and turns him into someone extremely fascinating and very special. Hawke and Arquette give nomination worthy work as the parents who can't seem to get their own lives straight. Linklater's daughter, Lorelei is wonderful as the sister who cares a lot about Mason, even if she doesn't have the best way of showing it. Perella is especially nomination worthy, giving a creepy performance as Mason's abusive step dad. Perella makes the audience believe that the character is in the theater with them. 

                                Many other characters pop up through Mason's journey and none of them are looked down upon by Linklater. Even when the audience is under the impression that Linklater is going to point his finger at them and laugh, he does no such thing. For example, Mason's boss at a fast food restaurant is goofy but also genuinely sweet and caring. Another good example are two older teens that Mason and his friend hang out with. At first, it seems these teens will be mean and abusive to Mason and his pal. However, they turn out to be teens who just like joking around with the two to make them feel welcome. This kind of underplaying and remarkable insignificance is what makes Boyhood the most beautiful film anyone is likely to see all year, if not for the rest of the decade.
(5 out of 5 Stars, The film is rated R for language including sexual references, and for teen drug and alcohol use)
**Note: As with the recently released documentary Life Itself, the MPAA has continued to stupidly make films that deal with mature themes rated R while shoot em up action films and mind numbing thrillers get the PG-13 treatment. As with Life Itself and as previously mentioned, Boyhood is a film that will inspire all ages to want to do a lot with their lives and be better people. Apparently, all the MPAA cares about is whether or not it will affect box office scores, or so it seems given their track record. Shame on you, MPAA.

Get On Up Review

Say it loud...I'm James Brown and I'm proud---Chadwick Boseman as musical legend James Brown, through his best (and worst) days in Get On Up
                                                        It's always odd to watch a film that has only two or three genuinely great things about it that make the rest of the film look terrible. It's even more odd to watch when the rest of the film beyond these few things is actually kind of terrible. Such is the case with the James Brown biopic, Get On Up. Chadwick Boseman and Nelsan Ellis as so fantastic as Brown and Bobby Byrd...two musical giants that they reveal how dull and messy the rest of the film is. These two performances are among the best biopic performances of all time. I'm talking Daniel Day Lewis in Lincoln or Jim Carrey in Man On The Moon level work here. However, I started to wish that the performances be less than they were. If the leads weren't so great, it would have been much less likely that I reflect on everything that's so wrong about the film. Boseman and Ellis embody these men with great passion, still smartly underplaying them. Too bad the film couldn't do the same.

                                                      The film is directed by Tate Taylor, who between this film, The Help and Pretty Ugly People, has established himself as a man who takes not just realistic but downright true stories and has a way of turning them into fantasies. This wouldn't be that bad of a thing if Taylor weren't so heavy handed about it. The screenplay is written by the Butterworth twins (Jez and John-Henry,) who wrote the under appreciated Edge Of Tomorrow from earlier this year and decided to write this film in that same world. If it sounds like I'm being too harsh about how much of a fantasy this films across as, consider this. There is a scene at the very beginning of this film in which Brown, a much older and loony man, goes into an insurance office. Brown has a private restroom there because the insurance office is "Man's World Insurance." When he discovers someone has done their business in his private restroom, he runs out to his truck, gets a shotgun and demands to know who.

                                                      There is a way to do that type of scene that would have been extremely effective. However, that scene turns Brown into a cartoon character. Boseman manages to get over that hurdle to some degree with his amazing portrayal but the film keeps weighing him down. One can see the strains on his face as he tries to make that scene anything more than laughable. I digress. Ellis is also fantastic as Bobby Byrd, Brown's right hand man who manages to stick by him through all the highs and all the lows, no matter how low the lows get. He gives significantly more depth and heart to the character of Byrd than there had any right to be and Ellis makes me want to see what he's going to do next with his film career.

                                                      This film also has a non-linear structure in which it will bounce from one part of Brown's life (his childhood, let's say) to another part (towards the end of his life, where he became crazy, let's say) without ever having a set path. While this does lend a somewhat unpredictable feeling to the film, it also comes across as desperate. Non-linear structure is fine if it doesn't feel so much like it's just there to add some substance. That's the feeling it has here and it ironically takes away a lot of the potential substance. Also, the film has that whole Jersey Boys talking directly to the camera concept going on. I'm not completely opposed to this concept but as with Jersey Boys, it feels out of place here and gives the film a bit of a non-cinematic feeling.

                                                      There is a scene towards the end of the film involving Brown and his estranged mother (Viola Davis) after one of his concerts. I do not want to give anything away but I do want to point out it is an extremely heartbreaking scene. This scene, as well as Boseman and Ellis's jaw dropping performances are so great that they made me realize just how great the film also could have been and ultimately wasn't.
(2 and 1/2 out of 5 Stars, The film is rated PG-13 for sexual content, drug use, some strong language and violent situations)