Month: December 2013

By Joe Bendel. The original Broadway production of Tracy Letts’ August: Osage County dominated the Tonys, netting best play, best lead actress for Deanna Dunagan, best featured actress for Rondi Reed, best director for Anna D. Shapiro, and another lead actress nomination for Amy Morton. Aside from Letts adapting his play for the screen, none of the Tony winners would reprise their roles in the movie version. Instead, it was clearly conceived as an Oscar vehicle for a number of formerly popular stars. Prepare for a lot of yelling and drawling when the John Wells helmed August: Osage County opens today in New York.

Pill-popping Violet Weston was a terrible mother to her grown children and remains a thoroughly rotten human being in her twilight years. Even the onset of mouth cancer has not moderated her nasty temperament. It seems she finally drove her beloved and despised husband Beverly to suicide, but the ambiguous circumstances leave some room for denial. After his funeral, the extended family gathers for a memorial dinner. The main course will be recriminations, followed by bile for desert.

Like it or not, everyone is there. Ivy is the mousey daughter who never got out from under Mother Weston’s thumb. Karen is the family’s Blanche Dubois, who has brought along her next prospective sugar daddy hubby. Barbara Weston is the only daughter Violet ever respected, because she has some backbone and attitude. Unfortunately, her relations are currently strained with her unfaithful husband and their moody tweener daughter. As if that were not enough, Weston’s sister Mattie Fae Aiken (sort of a Violet-lite) will also be in attendance, along with her laidback husband Charlie, and their awkward son Little Charles, upon whom she constantly rains down emotional abuse. The cooking and serving will be done by Johnna Monevata, the Native American domestic Beverly hired shortly before his misadventure. If a fire broke out in the house, she would be the only one you would save.

As the film starts, Sam Shepard’s wonderfully understated near-cameo as Beverly Weston suggests we are in for an acting showcase. Then Meryl Streep shuffles in, like Dwight Frye in a Dracula movie and all hope of subtlety is thrown out the window. Seriously, there has to be a chapter of Overactors Anonymous in Hollywood. Admitting there is a problem is always the first step (I’ve heard there are eleven more after that), but it’s never going to happen until critics and guilds stop hyping every Streep performance just because they’re supposed to. There are times you think Streep will end a scene by loudly proclaiming “Acting!” like Jon Lovitz’s thespian character on Saturday Night Live. The way she masticates the furniture will give audiences indigestion.

Her more-is-never-enough approach sort of works during the big dinner time smackdown. However, Julia Roberts deserves credit for hanging with her without going wildly over the top. Frankly, it looks like she is manhandling Streep for real at one point, which provides a degree of viewer satisfaction. When Roberts and Streep go at it, the movie starts to click. Unfortunately, this natural peak comes about midway through the film. Every predictable family revelation that follows feels like a letdown.

Still, Roberts’ work is consistently strong throughout the film. She also has some fine support from Chris Cooper, Julianne Nicholson, and Misty Upham as Big Charlie, Ivy Weston, and Johnnna Monevata, respectively. It is worth noting that these are quieter, more reflective and nuanced turns. In contrast, Benedict Cumberbatch proves sometimes less really is less, disappearing into the background as poor put-upon Little Charles.

When you see the film version of Osage, it is easy to understand why it was successful on-stage. Perhaps Streep’s unrestrained performance would work better in that venue, if you were hard of hearing and sitting in the back row of the balcony. On film, it is destined to rank alongside Faye Dunaway’s Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest. (Violet probably doesn’t dig wire hangers, either.) There is a lot of good work in the film version, but ultimately it is structurally unbalanced and fatally overwhelmed by its excess Streepness. Only satisfying for diehard Roberts fans, August: Osage County opens today (12/27) in New York at the Loews Lincoln Square and the Regal Union Square.

LFM GRADE: C-

Posted on December 27th, 2013 at 11:25pm.

By Joe Bendel. Her actress-sister Frances eventually became Anthony Trollope’s sister-in-law. For her part, Ellen Ternan had a much closer relationship with Charles Dickens, but she was infamously not his wife. Ralph Fiennes brings their not-so-secret affair to the screen as the director and star of The Invisible Woman, which opened yesterday in New York.

Dickens was a genuine literary celebrity—the Stephen King of his era. He even wrote serialized novels, too. Dickens also had ten children from his plain, unassuming wife, Catherine. As the Dickenses grow increasingly distant, it is not terribly surprising the novelist will eventually succumb to temptation with one of his many admirers. That will be Ellen “Nelly” Ternan.

By all accounts, Ternan was a middling actress at best, but she still caught Dickens’ eye in a production of The Frozen Deep, his quasi-collaboration with Wilkie Collins. Dickens quickly becomes a patron to the Ternan family, including her mother and two sisters, all of whom are considered better thespians than Ellen. Of course, Mrs. Ternan is no fool, but she understands the limits of her daughter’s options.

Nevertheless, this is still Victorian England, when scandal meant something. To play the part of Dickens’ mistress, Ternan will have to assume the titular invisibility. Even if she wanted to, she is incapable of flaunting social norms, like Collins and his lover. Regardless, the truth is bound to come out sooner or later, or else Fiennes’ film would never exist.

So here it is, somewhat more preoccupied with societal conventions and class distinctions than a typical installment of PBS’s Masterpiece, but not too very far removed stylistically. It is hardly an apology for Dickens, but Fiennes’ lead performance is easily the best thing going for it. He rather brilliantly expresses the passion and recklessness lurking beneath his almost painful reserve. Unfortunately, it is sort of like watching one hand clap during his scenes with Felicity Jones’ Ternan. When Fiennes is quietly intense, she is just quiet.

Frankly, Invisible must stack the deck against Dickens’ poor, anti-trophy wife to sell his attraction to the pale, mousy Ternan. Maybe we just don’t get Jones here, but it seems like most red blooded scribblers would be more interested in Kristin Scott Thomas’s elegant and sultry Mrs. Ternan. Regardless, Joanna Scanlon’s performance subverts the intended sabotage of her character, investing the real Mrs. Dickens with excruciating dignity and humility.

Certainly presentable by general British costume drama standards, The Invisible Woman is more distinguished by Fiennes’ turn as an actor than a director. There is also plenty of fine work from Thomas, Scanlon, and Tom Hollander as Collins, but the central chemistry is lacking. Recommended mostly just for voracious Victorian readers, it opened Christmas Day in New York at the Angelika Film Center.

LFM GRADE: C+

Posted on December 26th, 2013 at 2:02pm.

By Joe Bendel. Yang Zhong is sort of like Mr. Roarke on Fantasy Island, except he is always on the make. For a price, his company realizes their clients’ fantasies. He is nobody’s altruist, but lessons will still be learned in Feng Xiaogang’s Personal Tailor, which opened last Friday in New York.

Yang is the “Director of Dreams,” his right hand man Ma Qing is the “Spiritual Anesthetist,” Miss Bai is the “Fantastician,” and Xiaolu Lu is the “Caterer of Whims.” Together, they are “Personal Tailor” and they are used to some strange requests, like the creepy woman with a WWII martyr fetish in the James Bond-like prologue. Many of their fantasy scenarios are a peculiar product of contemporary China, such as the chauffeur, whose recent string of bosses were all government officials convicted of corruption. Believing he would wield power more responsibly, the driver hires Personal Tailor to put his ethics to the test.

Much of the broad humor in Tailor is not particularly suited to the American market. However, art house patrons familiar with the Digital Generation and related Chinese indie filmmakers will be amused by their next client. Having achieved every possible measure of success for his “vulgar” films, a popular director hires Yang’s team to experience the world of art cinema, which Personal Tailor equates with hand-to-mouth Miserablism.

While the first two primary assignments are played largely for laughs, the third is a sweet tale with considerable heart. To thank her for saving Ma from drowning, Yang’s team treats Mrs. Dan, a poor working woman, to a pro bono day as a Nouveau Riche industrialist. Song Dandan adds a touch of class and a strong screen presence in her “guest-starring” role and Feng’s bittersweet vibe is quite potent, making it Tailor’s most appealing full story arc thus far.

Almost shockingly, Tailor becomes quite pointed and strangely touching in its concluding sequences. Lamenting the appalling state of China’s environment, Yang disperses the team on a spiritual apology mission. It sounds corny, but it is effective. In fact, Tailor reveals it was never the farce it pretended to be, but is in fact a work of political protest. Yang and his colleagues bemoan the rampant corruption, widening class inequality, and environmental devastation just as strongly as Jia Zhangke’s followers, but in a manner far more accessible to Chinese popular audiences.

Chen Kaige regular Ge You is suitably manic as Yang, but dials it down nicely when the film gets serious. Bai Baihe brings appropriate sass and seductiveness as Miss Bai, while Li Xiaolu plays the more demur Xiaolu Lu with greater sensitivity than one might expect. Zheng Kai has the odd moment too, especially with the down-to-earth Song.

While some viewers might lose patience with Tailor’s goofiness, it is fascinating to see its serious side slowly emerge. Frankly, one would not expect such a strong critique from Feng, who has established a reputation for flag-wavers, like Assembly and Back to 1942, which China has selected as their official submission for the best foreign language Academy Award. Although clearly intended for popular audiences, China watchers should not dismiss it out of snobbishness. Recommended for those who prefer screwball comedy with their social commentary, Personal Tailor opened last Friday at the AMC Empire in New York and the AMC Cupertino in the Bay Area, courtesy of China Lion Entertainment.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on December 26th, 2013 at 1:59pm.

By Joe Bendel. He is an electrician with a Nobel Peace Prize and a Presidential Medal of Freedom. That would be none other than Lech Wałęsa, the co-founder and leader of Poland’s first independent trade union, Solidarity. Notoriously blunt-spoken and inconveniently principled, Wałęsa has become a figure of controversy in post-Cold War Europe—so much so honorary Academy Award winner Andrzej Wajda felt compelled to set the record straight on film. Representing Poland as its official foreign language Academy Award submission, Wajda’s Walesa, Man of Hope, merits serious award consideration wherever it is eligible.

Robert Więckiewicz is a strong likeness for Walesa, as Wajda would know, since the Solidarity leader appeared as himself in the director’s 1981 Palme D’Or winning Man of Iron. Revisiting the era of his classic duology, Wajda even includes brief Easter egg snippets of Man of Marble and its companion film. However, Wajda’s fictional characters are merely cinematic window-dressing, yielding to the historical record.

Brash yet reflective, Walesa was one of the few people capable of impressing celebrated Italian iconoclast-journalist Oriana Fallaci, whose interview with the still relatively young Solidarity leader serves as the film’s framing device. Even at this early stage of his career, Walesa has accepted his role as a man of destiny. Yet, as he explains to Fallaci (played with suitably charismatic flair by Maria Rosario Omaggio), it was not always so. Resolutely opposed to violence on both moral and pragmatic grounds, Walesa initially advocated more modest demands. However, he instinctively recognizes that the national zeitgeist has reached a turning point.

Wajda’s Walesa is not hagiography, except perhaps with regards to Walesa’s long suffering wife Danuta. Więckiewicz’s portrayal certainly suggests the Solidarity leader did not lack for confidence, but there is a roguish charm to his bluster (as well as the obvious historical justification). He also constantly tries his beloved Danuta’s patience, but the love shines through in all of Więckiewicz’s scenes with Agnieszka Grochowska. Still, Wajda clearly has special sympathy for Ms. Walesa, saving his greatest outrage for the abusive treatment she receives from the authorities when returning from Oslo with her husband’s Nobel Prize.

For a searing indictment of the Communist era, Wajda’s Katyn is tough to beat. While his Walesa obviously shares some common themes, it is a different sort of film. More personal in scope, it celebrates the Walesas, his comrades in Solidarity, and his unique foibles. While Katyn’s sense of outrage is impassioned and visceral, Man of Hope is celebratory and even nostalgic for the idealism and solidarity (if you will) of Solidarity’s headiest days.

Frankly, it is rather baffling that Walesa: Man of Hope has not had more Oscar buzz. How many films feature two defining figures of their eras (Walesa and Fallaci) on-screen, with a third titan (Wajda) behind the camera? It is a quality period production, with Magdalena Dipont’s design team perfectly recreating the look and dank, depressed vibe of Brezhnev-era Gdansk. Refreshingly earnest and enthusiastic, Wajda’s Walesa gives thanks for Poland’s new era of freedom and pays tribute to those who fought to realize it. It is the sort of film all American civics students should see. Highly recommended (especially to the Academy) Walesa, Man of Hope should have a considerable life on the festival circuit and eventual distribution, regardless of what Oscar decides.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on December 18th, 2013 at 11:43am.