by Christina Waters | Jan 11, 2017 | Home |
Seven Golden Globes? No way! I saw La La Land, and La La Land was no Manchester by the Sea. Light, upbeat, feel-good, fun to watch, catchy tunes, Ryan Gosling—but nowhere near the award-grade film that some others were. So what’s the deal? I think I figured it out.
True to its breezy, glitzy, dreamy title, La La Land delivers a retro loveletter to the entire idea of show biz. In this small but charming film the “city of stars” is romanced in both Cinemascope and cotton candy colors and plays as a sunsplashed backdrop for the tale of two star-crossed lovers and the tension between their love and their dreams. (Old story, ambitious Hollywood wannabees meet, share their dreams, fall in love, and then—think A Star is Born, Singing in the Rain, etc). Director Damien Chazelle‘s decision to avoid irony in making this love story liberally laced with singing and dancing was a smart one. And by casting non-singers and non-dancers in the key roles he also guaranteed that we would be swept up—or not—in the simple, age-old story of pursuing a dream while negotiating romance, without being forced to compare each musical number with Busby Berkeley and the golden age of Hollywood songfests.
A feel good film for an angst-ridden era, such is the story of barista/acting hopeful Mia (Emma Stone) and lounge pianist Sebastian (Ryan Gosling), who is hellbent on playing authentic jazz in a club of his own one day. As the couple keeps meeting, and running into each other here and there, Chazelle peppers each scene with sudden bursts of sung soliloquey or exuberant dance play. Given the enormous appeal of the two leads, we simply go with whatever they want to show us, and upon their chemistry the film hitches its Golden Globe-winning star.
Sorry, but unlike the Golden Globe judges, I cannot find an Oscar for Best Picture in this well-trodden scenario, no matter how poignant the rags to riches tale. I can feel the two actors working their way outside their comfort zones, although the sauciness of Stone’s enormously expressive face and gestures elevates her slender vocal abilities and simple dance steps. What she may lack in Cyd Charisse chops she almost makes up for in sheer upbeat energy. Gosling too appears to be counting the beats to his dance moves, but he is utterly convincing when he sits down at the piano. Yes, he actually did do his own playing.
BUT—should a film win the Oscar just for lifting our spirits in the old college try Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland way? Should it sway the Motion Picture Academy just because it revives a genre long gone fallow and for which Hollywood was once universally famed? Hmmm – maybe that’s actually what IS going on here.
Here’s the deal: It’s impossible not to see La La Land as a blatant promotion for Hollywood itself, for movies watched on the Big Screen, for the entire golly gee enterprise of Show Business! And anyone who’s ever dreamed of seeing her name in lights will find much of this movie downright inspiring. And undeniable fun. It is a cry for attention from an increasingly cash-strapped industry attempting to wrestle viewers away from Netflix, Amazon, and the comfort of home live streamed movies. Whether giving itself a lot of awards will coax Millenials out of their couches and into the high-priced seats in theaters, is anybody’s guess. And mine is that awards of this type amount to marketing selfies—we say we’re great so you should agree. La La Land does no harm, but it’s no more a daring revival of the musical genre than any Geico commercial.
by Christina Waters | Dec 26, 2016 | Art, Home |
It’s taken a week for me to recover from the emotional impact of this film. The unflinching tale of a family’s tribulation and one man’s inescapable heartbreak is easily the finest film I’ve seen in 2016, showcasing not only director/writer Kenneth Lonergan‘s deft weaving of pain and memory but a powerful central performance by Casey Affleck. Affleck is Lee Chandler whose older brother Joe (Kyle Chandler) has suddenly died leaving Lee the sole guardian of his nephew Patrick (Lucas Hedges).
For reasons we only gradually come to understand, Lee has been working as a janitor and handy man in Boston, and leaves to return to his New England hometown Manchester by the Sea to settle his brother’s estate and get his restless nephew in gear. The nephew and uncle, forced together by death, begin an awkward attempt at achieving some sort of bond, and their struggle to accept each other forms the mesmerizing heart of the film.
Lonergan’s directorial magic lies in opening the story simply, letting us very gradually fall under the spell that Affleck’s raw affect and simple gestures create. His face reveals—or conceals—a catastrophic past that defines the rest of his life. Only gradually, stitching back and forth, moving through time in the non-linear way of real life, does the film show us the source of Lee’s pain. We begin to understand why the nephew and uncle are so haunted by tragedy, and why they keep moving closer to some kind of relationship that might, just might overcome all the pain.
The film, whose plot sounds searingly downbeat, is a work of genuine incandescence. Manchester by the Sea is a beautiful piece of filmmaking. It sails easily on the simple clarity of the coastal setting, the bare and poignant winter landscape, the bits of easy humor as we watch young Patrick’s attempt to navigate his high school popularity despite his father’s death. We learn that Patrick has an estranged mother, that Lee has an estranged ex-wife, played with uneven passion by Michelle Williams. The situation grows clearer with each scene.
But it is Casey Affleck’s film. Every moment, every nuance of devastation, every implication of a personal world lost is etched on his raw face, a face equally capable of existential confusion and gentle hope. His is an effortless performance of desperation and occasionally uncontrolled rage, and the director seems to know better than to interfere. The film refuses to smooth the edges of life that happens in the way that all life does. Chance intervenes and everything changes. Nothing is ever the same. Yet life continues. An uncontrived loveletter to the pain of being human, Manchester is a film I need to see many more times. It feeds some need deeper than that for cheap laughs and fairytale endings. Go see it before the Oscars.
by Christina Waters | Dec 5, 2016 | Home |
How wonderful to see Fantastic Beasts, and where to find them—this latest tale of magic, darkness, and colorful creatures— without ever having read or seen any of the Harry Potter films. I was in a unique position bringing no expectations or prior acquaintance with this highly lucrative genre to the new film starring Eddie Redmayne and the latest wave of breathtaking CGI.
J.K. Rowling has apparently moved beyond the cloistered realm of the HP series and sets her dark tale of magic and alternative love in the 1920s New York, where we first meet nerdy wizard Newt Scamander (Redmayne) a botanical curator of rare and magical animals who arrives from England determined to capture examples of species existing only in the new world.
Lucky for him, and us, that the awkward collector meets up with sister magicians Queenie (Alison Sudol) and Tina (Katherine Waterston) who in their astonishing ways help him in his mission. Help also arrives, against all odds, in the form of a hapless and rumpled pastry entrepreneur Kowalski (Dan Fogler) who runs into Redmayne in a bank (delicious fun!) where he (the baker) is unsuccessfully seeking a loan.
Fantastic Beasts is set in a powerful urban web being woven by the forces of both good and bad wizards, as well as crusaders against wizardry such as Mary Lou Barebone (Samantha Morton), a sadistic evangelist who is torturing her disturbed son Credence Barebone, played with charismatic discomfort by Ezra Miller. Working to foil every least effort of our quartet of protagonists—only one of whom is a no-maj (non-magician)— is the powerful and malevolent Percival Graves played by Colin Farrell whose own magical powers unleash astonishing seismic (and time distorting) explosions and implosions afflicting the cityscape. The plot may drift in and out of credibility—this is a film about fantastic beasts and magical powers after all—but the filmmaking sweeps us away in a way can that can only be called CGI-noir.
Given my innocence of the entire Harry Potter oeuvre, I can only guess that Rowling’s previous wizardry stories deal with the same rich and predominant meta-theme as does Fantastic Beasts. It is about difference, being different, being gifted and Other in all the alternative ways of the 20th century (and of course of every other century as well). The film’s sympathies are with characters who cannot be easily identified or categorized, whose special powers mark them as social outcasts. The metaphor is not heavy-handed, although it is obvious, and the theme of social injustice threads easily through the visual dazzle of fabulous beasts and the wizards who can—occasionally—control them.
Terrifically entertaining, the film’s dark subtext leaves an imprint. The imprint clearly points to many a sequel in which we learn whether Newt and one of the lovely wizards will become lovers, or whether strangely good/bad Percival Graves will emerge in his full identity. Meanwhile, it’s a gorgeous eyeful with just enough dramatic traction to reward adult viewers as well as younger ones.
by Christina Waters | Dec 2, 2016 | Home |
- Hitting our stride now! Two Santa Cruz “Inside the Flame” events coming up. Please SAVE THE DATES! Tuesday December 6th we’ll have some dinner, some wine, and I’ll read a bit and reveal a lot @ Gabriella Cafe. Afternoon Prosecco Party at Soif, December 11th—complimentary bubbly and apps, books for sale, and a few choice tales.
- Tuesday, Dec. 6 Gabriella Cafe Salon. Dinner at 6pm, followed by reading from Inside the Flame at 7:15 p.m. Come for some food and wine, and stay for some tasty Q&A. http://gabriellacafe.com/
- Sunday, Dec. 11, 3-5 p.m. Soif Wine Bar Book Party. Plan to come for Prosecco, appetizers, purchase books, and savor lots of backstory (and laughs) about how it finally got written. Make reservations to join me for dinner afterwards. http://www.soifwine.com/
I look forward to sharing Inside the Flame with all of you. I’ve also listed these activities on my Facebook business page: ChristinaWatersAuthor. If you haven’t already, please give that page a like !
by Christina Waters | Nov 28, 2016 | Home |
Since this film will be gone by the time you read this, there isn’t much point in offering an actual critique. Allied is a film loosely structured around Brad Pitt’s ability to wear suits and Oscar-winner Marian Cotillard’s inability to spin straw into gold. The film is also a spy caper set in both Casablanca and London during WWII. To be honest, spy—yes. Caper—no.
There are questions that cry out to be answered—in addition to the most obvious and over-arching question: “Why was this film made?”—and I’m going to try to tackle them one by one.
1) Why should we believe that the French seductress and the Canadian (yes, Canadian) dullard have formed an actual nuclear family?
Because Brad Pitt’s character, a wing commander in the Canadian RAF, is carrying a baby.
2) Is it just me or does the field costume worn by Cotillard in this desert target-practice scene, doesn’t it look a whole lot like a Lara Croft super military babe outfit? (is she actually attempting to impersonate Angelina Jolie? And if so, why?) [See my final comments below.]
3) Had the previously talented director Robert Zemeckis (Back to the Future; Forrest Gump) taken some sort of sedative during the filming of Allied? Has he suffered some brain injury? Is he in a coma? Was he even present during the making of this movie (nevermind the complete absence of scriptwriters.).? We may never know.
4) Is this film simply a showcase for Brad Pitt’s interest in expensive clothing? Witness this casually elegant dressing gown, obviously silk, and clearly keyed to his bronze hair and tanned skin.
5) Was this film made to re-establish the flaccid love affair American filmgoers once had with the physically bodacious Mr. Pitt? There are several vigorous couplings —two of which feature the buttocks of Mr. Pitt—and which are intended (we must presume) to show us that the leading characters are really falling in love. If not for these energetic couplings, there would be absolutely no movement, facial or otherwise, shown by the aforementioned Mr. Pitt.
Let’s take another look at this image. We see here the family unit: mom (obviously French, viz. the beret), and dad (we know this because he’s carrying a child).Now look closely at Brat Pitt. See the expression on his face? That is the height of his acting ability. That’s it. A blank look of vague discomfort, plus a change of clothes intended to signal “domesticated” and a prop (the kid). This expression is Pitt’s Benedict Cumberbatch moment. Here he’s letting out all the stops. You’re looking at Pitt acting his guts out, emoting at the top of his game.
6) Perhaps Brad Pitt was the one in a coma. He is a dry husk. I’ve seen driftwood display more animation than he does in this film. Seriously. He is insanely boring. I was yawning tears and making a shopping list during the final interminable hour. Which leads me to,….
7) If this film was a gamble that some sexual friction would erupt between the two leading stars, (remember “Mr. and Mrs. Smith?”) and thus foment some fabulous behind-the-scenes gossip on the part of “E” or “People Magazine” – a quick glance at the performances would put that all to rest.
Brad Pitt appears to be either confused, or slow-witted—or both—throughout this film. I can only imagine how much fun Cotillard had running home to her actual sweetie every night after filming and regaling him with her imitations of Pitt attempting dramatic expression.
No actress could have fallen in love with this stiff, especially one stuck with the grinding task of acting opposite him. Cotillard has enough effervescence to light up Versailles, but even her charm and vivacity seems to bounce off Pitt’s buffed pecs and fall, lifeless, onto the soundstage floor.
The truth behind the Brangelina break-up may amount to something as simple as Jolie’s patience being pushed to the limit. Brad Pitt, never the sharpest pencil in the box, has turned into a wooden dummy incapable of impersonating a flesh and blood man, tuxedo or no tuxedo. The truth hurts.
