127. The Rule* (2014) — I don’t know
anything about Benedictine monks or private schools in Newark, New Jersey, so
this documentary about St. Benedict’s was eye-opening. I knew the reputations of St. Benedict’s
accomplished athletic teams, but the school provides so much more — a safe,
nurturing environment where kids can learn academics and self-worth, even while
they navigate the sometimes scary streets of Newark. The monks follow the principles of St.
Benedict himself, which focus on community, trust, connectedness and other
qualities that are foreign to many of the students. The monks are a dedicated but realistic lot,
ceding responsibility to the students to police themselves and giving them leadership
responsibilities that they can use later in life. Any educational institution that can claim a
high graduation rate and where most of the students go on to college is a
successful one in these turbulent urban areas, and St. Benedicts has achieved that
record. I was impressed. 3½ cans.
128. Love Is Strange* (2014) — There
actually is nothing strange about this love story between George (Alfred
Molina) and Ben (John Lithgow). The
couple has been together for 39 years when they decide to get married. Immediately, George loses his job as a music
teacher at a New York Catholic high school because his marriage defies the
teachings of the church. He and Ben are
forced to sell their beloved New York City apartment and, because their friends
and relatives live in small places of their own, they have to split up, George
living with hard-partying friends and Ben bunking —literally — in the bottom
bunk in the room of his teenaged great nephew.
Both feel displaced and in the way, interfering in the lives of their
new landlords and missing their private time together. This is a poignant story that illustrates the
complications of life together and apart — and of living in the city. Molina and Lithgow underplay to
perfection. While I did not agree with the
title, I was captivated by the Chopin music used liberally throughout the
score. I haven’t liked non-musical movie
music this much since the soundtrack from “Cinema Paradiso.” It made me want to find Chopin on my iPod
once again. 3½ cans.
129. My Old Lady* (2014) — I think THIS
movie should have been called “Love Is Strange,” because in this movie, it sure
is. Kevin Kline plays Mathieus Gold, who
has inherited an apartment in France from his late father. When he goes to claim it so he can sell it, he
finds the formidable 92-year old Madame G. (Maggie Smith) living there. Apparently there is an odd practice in France
where one buys an apartment but cannot take ownership of the property until the
present owner dies. While Smith may not
be buying green bananas, she nonetheless is destined to outlive us all. This sounds like a comedy, but it isn’t. Mathieus learns things about the father he
hardly knew and meets Smith’s daughter Chloe (Kristin Scott Thomas), while we
wonder about whether they may be related since her mother had a long affair
with his father. Kline’s Mathieus is a
sad sack, bereft of money, friends and self-esteem. Normally I find Kevin Kline so charming and
engaging that I kept picturing a more appropriately sardonic Bill Murray in this
role. Love may be strange here after
all, but I didn’t find this movie either uplifting or compelling despite the
presence of Maggie Smith in the title role.
2½ cans.
130. Driving Miss Daisy (1989) — An old
Jewish woman falls in love with an old black man. OK, that’s not how this story is billed, but
the bond that develops between the persnickety Miss Daisy (Jessica Tandy) and
her obliging chauffeur Hoke (Morgan Freeman, in my second favorite Morgan
Freeman movie, after “The Shawshank Redemption”) is a special friendship. Miss Daisy is a southern lady living in a
large house by herself, getting by with the help of her son (Dan Ackroyd) and
staff. She doesn’t want to give up
driving herself to the Piggly Wiggly, but after she crashes the car one too
many times, her son hires Hoke to drive her around. At first she won’t give him anything to do
and won’t even get in the car, but, over time, the ice melts and she comes to
trust and appreciate him. This story is
about love and respect that is hard-won.
I love this movie. 4 cans.
131. Young Victoria (2010) — It’s not easy
being queen. Just ask 18-year old
Victoria, who ascends to the throne in England as the only descendent of her
uncle the king and his brothers. But
Victoria (Emily Blunt) is pushed and pulled by her mother the duchess and her
advisor, both of whom want her to turn over her powers until she is older. The poor young woman is like a prisoner in a
very lavish jail where she is not permitted to attend school or even to descend
a staircase without a helping hand. But
Victoria is stronger than she looks, and she’s not about to give it all up for
her self-centered mother and her power-hungry advisor. Besides, she is in love with Albert (Rupert
Friend), a distant cousin from Germany who may have his own aspirations. Lavish sets and costumes make this a dazzling
vision of royalty at its best and worst.
3½ cans.
132. Good Morning, Miss Dove (1955) —
Jennifer Jones plays the title character, a taciturn school teacher who we can
disparagingly call an “old maid.” She is
devoted to her students and her craft, as we see through a series of flashbacks
that show her first as an active young woman who is forced into a life of work
that was unplanned. Along the way, her
students become police officers, doctors and mothers. I remember first seeing this movie when I was
a teenager and admiring Miss Dove’s devotion, but I have to admit that now it
seems so stiff and outdated. Still,
there is always room for movies about characters who behave with honor as they
try to elevate the standards of those around them. 2½ cans.
133. Gone Girl* (2014) — This review will be
very short so I don’t spoil the story for you.
Ben Affleck and Rosamind Pike are Nick and Amy Dunne, an attractive
young couple seemingly in love with each other and living a comfortable and
happy life in the Midwest. Suffice to
say that things are not always as they seem.
If you have read the book, you’ll find this movie to be a faithful
rendering the Gilliam Flynn’s story (since she wrote the screenplay), complete
with twists and turns. Don’t try to
figure it out, just go along for the ride.
Well worth seeing. 4 cans.
134. Up in the Air (2009) — Ryan Bingham
(George Clooney) is a man with almost no baggage. Even the suitcase he carries on his nearly
daily business flights is exceedingly well thought out. He leaves no room for ambiguity in his life,
which revolves around his job, working for a firm that specializes in firing
people for companies who cannot or will not pull the trigger. He has virtually no personal life, which
suits him just fine. His big aspiration
is to get to 10 million flight miles and get a special gold card from the
airline. All that is fine until he meets
Alex, the female version of himself (Vera Farmiga) and suddenly he has to
juggle his schedule to spend time with her. Meanwhile, he is training a young woman (Anna
Kendrick, looking too young to work at anything other than a lemonade stand) to
be as detached as he is as they deliver life-changing news to emotionally
overwrought soon-to-be former employees.
The social commentary in this is stunning, as the diminished value of
people and their work is at the forefront.
Oh, the humanity — or lack thereof.
Clooney is perfect as Bingham, charming with Alex, unyielding as the
executioner. And many of the people
depicted being fired are real victims of unemployment, so their presence lends
an air of authenticity. 4 cans.
135. Stakeout (1987) — It is probably not a
good idea for a police officer to fall in love with the person he/she is
supposed to be staking out, but that’s what happens with Chris (Richard
Dreyfus) and Maria (Madeliene Stowe).
Maria’s ex (Aidan Quinn) has just escaped prison and the cops are
assigned to keep an eye on her lest the bad guy show up. So Chris and his partner Bill (Emilio
Estevez) hole up in the house across the street to check her out. This film is part buddy movie (and Dreyfus
and Estevez have great chemistry), part action movie (check out the sequence
near the beginning at a fish processing plant) and part inadvertent love
story. Stowe and Dreyfus are charming
together, and Dreyfus’ Chris is a clever guy.
This movie came out around the same time as two similar ones that I also
liked very much: “Running Scared” with Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines and
“Midnight Run” with Robert DeNiro as a bounty hunter and Charles Grodin as his
prey, who almost drives the hunter crazy.
Three fun films, fans. 3½ cans.
136. Hoosiers
(1986) — With basketball season about to start, what better movie to enjoy than
this quintessential sports classic about the disgraced coach who leads the
small-town underdog team to the state championship game? Gene Hackman is a memorable Norman Dale, a
tough coach whom the townsfolk don’t appreciate at first. In the beginning Coach Dale barely has enough
players to take the court, and the best player in school won’t even come out
for the team. Yes, the story is riddled
with the usual sports clichés, but this tale, based on the true story of an
Indiana team in the early 1950s, will win your heart as much as they win their
games. And from a basketball standpoint,
these guys look like they can actually play.
4 hoops and a holler.
137. When
the Garden Was Eden* (2014) — Speaking of basketball, this documentary from
ESPN’s “30 for 30” series examines the rise of not only the new Madison Square
Garden in the 1960s-1970s, but also its inhabitants, primarily the New York
Knicks. Until the NBA really began
rolling nationally, it seemed that only the Boston Celtics won the Championship
each year, often at the hands of the Los Angeles Lakers. But in the late 60s and early 70s, the Knicks
moved into the new Garden at Penn Station and, with the move, came the such
unique players as Walt “Clyde” Frazier, Dave Debusschere, Earl “The Pearl”
Monroe, Jerry Lucas, Cassie Russell, Phil Jackson, future Senator Bill Bradley —
who deferred his basketball career for two years so he could be a Rhodes
Scholar — and Willis Reed, whose walk onto the floor for the 7th
game of the 1970 Championship, despite what seemed like a devastating injury,
became the stuff of legend. Before the
rise of the Knicks, the Garden was the raucous home of college basketball and
the cigar-smoking, betting men who followed the game. But the Knicks brought glamour and winning
and attracted the stars to courtside.
The team that emphasized teamwork won championships in 1970 and 1973 and
hasn’t won since. But it was great while
it lasted. This film was a labor of love
for actor/director Michael Rapaport, a native New Yorker who wasn’t even alive
back in the Knicks heyday but grew up steeped in their lore. If you know anything about pro basketball,
you probably know this story, but to relive it was a real treat. 4 hoops.
138. The
Fault In Our Stars* (2014) — Any movie that starts off with the
protagonists meeting in a cancer support group for teenagers cannot end well,
but we are willing to come along for the all-too-brief ride because the
characters of Hazel Grace (Shailene Woodley) and Augustus Waters (Ansel Elgort)
are just so appealing. Hazel is going to
die someday from lung cancer that has almost killed her once, but Gus, who has
already lost his lower leg to cancer, looks healthy and recovered. The two share witty texts, become fast
friends and head out to Amsterdam to catch up with her favorite author (Willem
Dafoe) to find out what happened to the characters in the book she loves. They enjoy a romantic dinner and imbibe in
champagne as they fall in love. Gus is
cute as can be, and Hazel, sporting a cannula for oxygen, reluctantly falls for
him since she knows one of them will end up alone. This movie is a good example of the book
being better than the screen adaptation.
Something about the dialog just made it pop off the page, where, when
delivered by the characters on screen, it seems contrived. It is little corny, a little sad, and
probably intended as “Love Story” for a generation 40 years younger than
me. Read the book instead. 3 cans.
139. The
Judge* (2014) — Smug Chicago lawyer Hank Palmer (Robert Downey, Jr.) has a
challenging client, an irascible, elderly judge who is being tried for murder
in a small Indiana town. The client, Joseph
Palmer (Robert Duvall) doesn’t want to take his attorney’s advice, and, in
fact, treats him such disdain that it hamper’s Hank’s trial strategy. Add the fact that Hank is his son, and the
matter becomes that much more complicated.
Long-festering emotions spill out even as Hank is forced to care for his
father in ways he never imagined. As you
can imagine, father and son begin to look at each other with new respect and
less venom. I’ve never been a big RDJ
fan, but he holds his own against crusty Duvall. Vera Farmiga plays Hank’s former high
school sweetheart and adds a twist to the story. I suspect that when Oscar time rolls around,
at least Duvall will hear people say, “Here comes the Judge.” 4 cans.
140. The Best of Me* (2014) — The Nicholas
Sparks formula is getting a tad too familiar:
Young, attractive, star-crossed lovers get together, break apart, reunite
years later, something BIG happens, etc.
I don’t want to give away the plot, but I did find this outing better
than the other Sparks movies I’ve seen, at least since the classic tearjerker,
“The Notebook,” which I love. I really
enjoyed this one, too, with a very handsome James Marsden as Dawson Cole, the
boy from the wrong side of the tracks (played as a young man by a very handsome
Luke Bracey, with echoes of Ryan Gosling in “The Notebook”) and Michelle
Monaghan as Amanda (younger version by Liana Liberato), the rich girl who
doesn’t care about Dawson’s trashy and dangerous family. The knight in shining armor is Gerald McRaney
as Tuck, the local man who takes in young Dawson and becomes a surrogate father
to the troubled teen. When Tuck dies, Dawson
and Amanda are summoned by his lawyer to dispose of his ashes and his things,
reuniting after 21 years and many unhappy memories. But do you ever really get over your first
love? And is love alone enough to make
the relationship endure despite obstacles?
This is probably not a movie to which to drag the man in your life, but
it is one I can imagine myself binge watching when it hits TV and someone airs
it incessantly. It wasn’t the best of
Sparks, but it was close enough. 4 cans.
141. The Departed (2006) — Moles, rats, mobs
and tons of blood populate this suspenseful drama by Martin Scorsese. Billy (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a young state
trooper recruited by police (Mark Wahlberg and Martin Sheen) to go undercover
with the mob in Boston, which is led by Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson, looking
a bit demented, like the character in “The Shining”). His counterpart is Colin Sullivan (Matt
Damon), raised and planted in the police department to be the rat by
Costello. Each man knows someone on the
other side has infiltrated their respective organizations, and each scene draws
them closer to figuring out who is whom.
Just when you think one of them will be unmasked, there is a twist. The tension stays at a high level throughout
the story, and, by the end, you don’t know who is legit and who has sold his
loyalties to the highest bidder. This
film is also my third with Vera Farmila this month, as she plays a police
psychologist involved with both Billy and Sullivan. 4 handguns.
No comments:
Post a Comment