Tina's December Movies

I ended the year by seeing 14 movies, bringing the total for 2011 to 161. Numbering picks up from last month, and ratings are based on a scale (get it?) of 1-5 cans of tuna fish. Movies marked with an asterisk are ones I had not seen previously.

148. Scott Turow’s Innocent* (2011) – This TV movie is a follow-up to “Presumed Innocent,” an earlier film based on author Turow’s novel. This time out, Bill Pullman plays Harrison Ford’s role as Rusty Sabich, a Chicago judge who is accused of murdering his wife (Marcia Gay Harden). This new version holds its own, despite the disadvantage of being played on TV and interrupted by commercials, but doesn’t quite measure up to the original. Still, the story is intriguing and you have to hang around to the end to know what really happened. Pullman looks a lot older here than we’re used to seeing him, and underplays the taciturn Rusty, but does a credible job. 3 cans.
149. The Last Picture Show (1971) – Bored people leading lives of quiet desperation populate this Peter Bogdonvich black and white classic. The setting is a small town in West Texas where everyone know’s everyone and everyone’s business. Once Sam the Lion (Ben Johnson, who won Best Supporting Actor) dies, most of the dying town dies with him. Even the picture show, owned by Sam, is going out of business. This is not the town in which teenagers like Sonny (Timothy Bottoms), Jayce (Cybill Shepherd) and Duane (Jeff Bridges) want to live, but they seem to be in no hurry to leave. Sex for the people in this town is just something to do, so when Sonny takes up with 40-something Ruth Potter (Cloris Leachman, who won the Oscar), no one bats an eye. This is story-telling without much of a story, beautiful filmed and evocative of the early 1950s. 4 cans.
150. Crazy Heart (2009) – It is not implausible to imagine Jeff Bridges’ character in “The Last Picture Show” morphing into his Bad Blake character in this movie. Both men – one very young, the other old and grizzled – have no real direction in life and generally don’t give a damn about themselves or anyone around them. In his Oscar-winning role here, Bridges is a country music singer-songwriter whose life is perfect for the genre. Broke and an alcoholic, he is on the road to nowhere until the love of a good woman and her son makes him want to reform. There’s a country song in there somewhere. Maggie Gyllenhaal is the woman he loves, and Robert Duvall, who played a similar role in “Tender Mercies,” is his friend. Bridges does a great job with the music as well as the role and earned his Oscar fair and square. 4 cans.
151. The Descendents* (2011) - George Clooney goes for a straight acting role in this film about a man living in Hawaii with his wife and two children when the wife is seriously injured in an accident. As he takes on the role of father, moving up suddenly from occasional parent, Matt King finds himself uncomfortable with his two teenaged daughters. He doesn’t know them, doesn’t understand them or their language, and ultimately finds out he didn’t know his wife all that well either. Throughout the movie, he peels away layers of his life that he didn’t know existed as he comes to terms with his wife infidelity and builds a rapport with his kids. Clooney wears a multitude of print shirts in this role, and the dialog often seems to end abruptly, but it is rewarding seeing him grow more comfortable as a parent even as he is less comfortable with dealing with those around him. Not a great movie, and I’ve come to expect more from a Clooney film. 3½ cans.
152. Strangers When We Meet* (1960) – If this movie were made today, some poor set designer would be chasing down mid-century modern furniture all over Hollywood and the director would have the leads naked in a hotel room. Life was simpler in 1960, but for desperate housewife Maggie (Kim Novak), it is hard to say no to handsome architect neighbor Matt Coe (Kirk Douglas) when her own husband has little interest in her. Douglas woos and wins Novak, but he has his own issues – starting with his wife and two children. She craves affection and he’s glad to provide it, eventually catching the eye of neighbor Felix (Walter Matthau, who is Felix, not Oscar in this movie). Can the illicit affair continue? Will the house he designs for a famous writer (Ernie Kovacs) slide down the hill? Will Kim Novak ever change her vacuous expressions? This movie has all the soap opera drama I could take. 3 cans.
153. Stakeout (1987) – Richard Dreyfus and Emilio Estevez play cops assigned to stake out the home of the attractive ex-girlfriend (Madeline Stowe) of an escaped convict. Dreyfus gets a close-up view when he falls for the girl, and, as you would expect, complications ensue. This is a cop-caper-buddy movie, and a combination of the byplay between the cops, the romance and the unusual action settings (a fish and a log processing plant) gives it enough of everything to keep me engaged. This is one of three movies from this era (the others are “Running Scared” and “Midnight Run”) that I always enjoy seeing again. 3½ cans.
154. The War of the Roses (1989) – Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner are Oliver and Barbara Rose, the antagonists in this dark Danny DeVito comedy about a couple who trip over the thin line between love and hate on their way to a divorce. Wealthy and ensconced in a beautiful home that she found and decorated and that he paid for, both parties refuse to move out or give an inch. Their war of words escalates to destruction of property and bodily harm. I haven’t seen Michael Douglas look so infuriated since he thought Glenn Close boiled his bunny in “Fatal Attraction.” I did not like the construct of Danny DeVito as a lawyer recounting this tale to his client while chain smoking in a way that looked completely phony even to a non-smoker. The movie is well done, but I won’t be seeing this one again any time soon. The war has ended for me. 3½ cans.
155. The Graduate (1967) – No year would be complete without at least one viewing of my all-time favorite movie, so this is how I celebrated Christmas Eve day. An outstanding cast (Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft and Katherine Ross) , stellar score and brilliant direction from Mike Nicholas make this look at society’s mores in the 1960s a classic. Is there anyone who doesn’t know the story of the young man seduced by the older woman who falls in love with her beautiful daughter? In the first year this movie was released, I saw it seven times, including twice in one day. I still love it and it still makes me think about my future – which never included “plastic.” Great, great stuff. 5 cans.
156. The Bridges of Madison County (1995) – I am on a roll this Christmas Eve, watching two of my all-time favorites. In this movie, the incomparable Meryl Streep lends subtlety and nuance to her portrayal of an Iowa farmer’s wife, stuck in a mundane existence, until a photographer (Clint Eastwood, who directed) arrives to take pictures of local bridges. She offers to assist him, and the two spend the next few days falling into one of those once in a lifetime loves. Can she leave behind her husband and children to build a new life? Or will she take the path she has led for so long and remain on the farm? The haunting score and beautiful scenery, combined with the details of the simple farmhouse, Streep’s clothes and hair, all build a reality that depicts every phase of the character’s life. This movie has a great cast, a great story and it always gives me a good cry. Definitely a chick flick on that score, but I couldn’t love it more. 5 cans.
157. The Way We Were (1973) – With the airing of this classic romance, I have now seen three of my top five all-time favorite movies in the past two days. Can it be that it was all so simple then or has time rewritten every line? If we had the chance to do it all again, would we? Could we? Nothing is simple in this movie, especially the relationship between the breathtakingly gorgeous Robert Redford and the socially aware Barbra Streisand. They meet in college and years later build a relationship that goes beyond the superficial, each admiring qualities in the other. But their bond must supersede their personal differences, and there’s the rub. I love nearly everything about this movie and can quote dialog all day long. And then there is that beautiful Oscar-winning title song. What a movie! 5 cans.
158. War Horse* (2011) – “My Friend Flicka” joins the British army in this Steven Spielberg drama. Boy raises horse, boy and horse are separated by war, boy joins army – you figure out the rest. I found this film cloyingly sentimental in tone and look (the last scene was straight out of “Gone With the Wind”). There is too much fighting (OK, I know it’s about war, but still), too much predictability and too many Disneyesque moments for me. If you see it, just bear in mind my sister’s cynical summation: “What are the odds?” 3 cans and a major disappointment.
159. Love Affair* (1939) – Before Cary Grant charmed Debra Kerr in the quintessential romantic movie “An Affair to Remember,” Charles Boyer cast a similar spell over Irene Dunne in the first version of this classic love story (Warren Beatty and Annette Bening starred in the most recent version). Maybe it is because I can never understand Charles Boyer and his French accent, or maybe it is because he always looks like he smells cauliflower entering the grand ballroom (see “I Love Lucy” for that reference), but this version – though essentially the same story, with the same lovely grandmother and the same lines that appeared in later versions – was just not as good as the Grant/Kerr movie. The lighting was gloomy at best and the melodrama was at its peak here. Still, a good start for the later version. I just cannot think of anyone who looks better in a tux – or even a suit – than Cary Grant. Sorry, Charlie Boyer. 3½ cans.
160. Apollo 18* (2011) – Since “Apollo 13” is one of my favorite movies, I thought that watching this one at a friend’s house might turn out well. Picture “Blair Witch Project in Outer Space.” The premise here is that the Department of Defense continued the Apollo space program to plant listening devices on the moon, but the flight for Apollo 18 was so secret that not even the families of the astronauts knew about it. Shot to look like the 1970s and with the low-quality, hand-held cinema verite look, the movie purports to include actual footage from the ill-fated, fictional Apollo 18 flight. With a nod to all horror movies, the film makes you want to scream, “Don’t open the hatch of that Russian space capsule” – but of course, they do. Mostly, I just wanted to scream anything and get out of the room – not because I was afraid, but because I was grossly unimpressed. 2½ cans.
161. Beautiful Boy* (2011) – This unrelentingly bleak movie is about the deterioration of a family. The husband and wife (Tony Sheen and Maria Bello) who sleep in separate rooms, communicating little and ready to end the marriage when their 18-year old son is involved in a campus shooting. Involved as in he is the shooter, kills 18 people and then himself. The couple is left to figure out what they did wrong while staying on the run to avoid the media. The don’t have the kind of supportive network we would all rely on in such horrible circumstances. All they have is each other, and there is enough blame and sorrow to destroy themselves and each other. Not exactly a fun, light romp, the movies features excellent performances and handles a difficult topic from a different point of view. Can’t say I recommend this one, but I can say I admired it. 3½ cans.