Day: May 6, 2015

The Dolph Lungren-Tony Jaa Team-Up: LFM Reviews Skin Trade

By Joe Bendel. If testosterone were enough to solve a problem like human trafficking, Det. Nick Cassidy could pretty much lick it single-handedly. Even with the whole world allied against him, Cassidy will still basically take that one-angry-cop approach. Fortunately, he will eventually team-up with a Bangkok copper proficient in Muay Thai. At that point, all bets are off in Ekachai Uekrongtham’s Skin Trade, which opens this Friday in Los Angeles.

Serbian gangster Viktor Dragovic stands atop a global trafficking empire, but the most important hub is in Thailand. Much to his regret, one of his more talented sons is killed by Cassidy during the course of an operation on the Jersey docks. In retaliation, Dragovic gets Biblical, killing Cassidy’s wife and daughter and leaving him for dead. The thing is, you can never leave a cat like Cassidy dead enough. Despite about fifty bullets wounds, Cassidy drags himself out of the hospital and hops on a plane to Thailand for some stone cold vengeance.

Sure, so far, so good. However, things get a little dicey when corrupt FBI Agent Eddie Jones frames Cassidy for the murder of Bangkok cop Tony Vitayakul’s partner, about five minutes after landing. While Cassidy works his way through Dragovic’s organization, Vitayakul pursues the rogue cop. He also frets over his girlfriend, Min, a victim of trafficking now serving as an undercover informant.

Just get a load of this cast: Tony Jaa, Dolph Lungren, Ron Perlman, Michael Jai White, Peter Weller (as Costello, Cassidy’s crusty captain), and Celina Jade. You’re probably thinking: “what, no Michael Ironside?” He must have had a conflict. Needless to say, if you have Jaa and Lungren fight each other and then square-off against Perlman and White, you are on psretty solid ground.

Indeed, Jaa’s moves do not disappoint. The indestructibleness of Lungren’s Cassidy becomes almost a running gag, but let’s face it, the man looks like a tank. White clearly enjoys getting his villainy on as Jones, and he hasn’t lost a step since the criminally under-appreciated Falcon Rising either, while Perlman chews the scenery like an old genre pro. Jade shows off a few moves here and there, but the Legendary Assassin star is definitely the one who gets short-changed in the action department.

Skin Trade follows in the long, noble tradition of taking a serious issue (often with tragic implications) and turning it into an exploitation movie. To his credit, co-writer-producer Lungren started developing the idea when he read about a particularly egregious trafficking case, so consider your consciousness duly raised. He and his co-writers display a style similar to his character’s, relentlessly plowing straight ahead. At least it’s serviceable and the action sequences deliver plenty of red meat. Come for the martial arts and stay for the payback when Skin Trade opens this Friday (5/8) in Los Angeles, at the Sundance Sunset Cinemas (and New Yorkers can catch it on June 12th at MoMI or get it now VOD via iTunes).

LFM GRADE: B

Posted on May 6th, 2015 at 10:39pm.

LFM Reviews D Train

By Joe Bendel. There are two kinds of people—those who look forward and those who look back. Dan Landsman is definitely a rearview mirror kind of guy. As he gears up for his high school reunion, he will painfully illustrate why such a neurotic approach to life is so deeply unprofitable. Prepare to squirm when Landsman makes a last ditch effort for popularity twenty years after graduation in Jarrad Paul & Andrew Mogel’s D Train, which opens this Friday in New York.

After college, Landsman stayed in the same Pittsburgh suburb, attending community college, taking an office job, and marrying the nicest girl from high school who would talk to him. At every meeting of the high school alumni committee, he offers up a textbook example of trying too hard. Smarting from the rejection he continues to invite, Landsman hatches an unlikely plan to convince Oliver Lawless to attend the reunion, so he can hopefully ride on his coattails of coolness.

Lawless was the sort of roguish popular kid everyone wanted to hang with. After graduation, he left for Hollywood, where he barely scrapes by on commercial work. However, Landsman and their fellow alumni see him as the embodiment of all their unfulfilled dreams and aspirations. Landsman will indeed trek out to California to woo Lawless, but the cover story he fabricates about a potential business meeting inconveniently blows up in his face when his technophobe boss, Bill Shurmur, insists on accompanying him. Nevertheless, Landsman manages to meet-up with Lawless, but things get a little out of hand, with much awkwardness ensuing.

The good news is Lawless is coming to the reunion. The bad news is Lawless is coming to the reunion. Frankly, you may never see another film that so thoroughly confuses humiliation with humor. D Train is a truly a cringe fest. Anyone with a shred of empathy will be extremely uneasy watching Landsman’s degradation, but Paul & Mogel keep pouring it on. It gets to be punishing—for the viewer.

From "D Train."

You have to give Jack Black credit for taking it and liking it. As Landsman, his desperate neediness is uncomfortably convincing. It makes you think he could do an entire postscript to Kevin Pollak’s Misery Loves Company by his lonesome. On the plus side, believe it or not, James Marsden turns some surprisingly nice moments as Lawless and it is always amusing to watch Jeffrey Tambor do his thing as Shurmur.

It is hard to judge D Train, because the cast always hits their marks and inhabit their characters pretty credibly. Eventually though, all the piling-on poor Jobish Landsman just makes you shake your head. This year, there were at least two films at Sundance that used Erasure’s “A Little Respect,” but Seoul Searching is exponentially more fun because it remembers both the good and the bad of high school (and Korean culture camp). Honestly, it is a real shame Paul and Mogel were apparently so unhappy during high school, but hopefully making this movie helped them work through some of their issues. An exhausting film, D Train will should bring out Jack Black fans nonetheless when it opens this Friday (5/8) in New York, at the AMC Empire.

LFM GRADE: C

Posted on May 6th, 2015 at 10:38pm.

Lighter than it Sounds: LFM Reviews 1001 Grams

By Joe Bendel. Drug dealers will tell you the weight of kilos can vary quite considerably. Scientists also suspect this is true, but they must prove it with data. Towards that end, Marie Ernst will be lugging the Norwegian prototype kilo to a conference in Paris, where a new international standard will hopefully be set. With her life at a crossroads, the trip might just offer an opportunity for personal discovery as well in Bent Hamer’s 1001 Grams, which opens this Friday in New York.

Ernst’s day-to-day responsibilities largely entail certifying various public pumps and scales to ensure the measurements are on the up-and-up. It is the sort of solitary detail-oriented work she seems to be well suited for. Having recently divorced her caddish husband, she has no real social life to speak of. Aside from her father Ernst Ernst, the director of the laboratory, Marie Ernst has little meaningful human contact. When her more garrulous father falls ill, she assumes his place at the Paris conference, where there are plenty aloof delegates quite like her. However, the institute has a surprisingly smart and engaging gardener named Pi (an unmeasurable constant, you see), whose company she finds pleasant.

Unfortunately, Ernst will have to deal with some family business before she can finally take control over her own life. Worse still, she has a mishap with the Norwegian national kilo. In isolation, all the fuss over a weight in a bell jar seems rather ridiculous, but Hamer makes the characters’ passion for precision measurement look like a noble eccentricity.

From "1001 Grams."

As a filmmaker, Hamer is one of the few stylists who can rival the whimsical visuals of Wes Anderson and even Jacques Tati. Frame after frame in 1001 Grams has such a strikingly composed look, one wonders how long it took Hamer to artfully arrange each scene. There is always the danger that sort of self-consciously idiosyncratic approach can descend into overly precious quirkiness. However, 1001 Grams is permeated with such maturity and grace, it never becomes cloying or shticky in any manner.

Ana Dahl Torp plays Ernst with a profoundly Scandinavian reserve, but the way she slowly and subtly expresses her stirrings of an emotional awakening is beautiful to behold. Laurent Stocker of the Comédie Française comes across like a nice earthy chap as Pi, while Stein Winge adds gravity and humanity as old Ernst Ernst, but Torp must quietly carry 1001 Grams for long stretches on her own. It is a feat she repeatedly pulls off quite remarkably.

There are numerous references, analogies, and call-backs revolving around the act of measurement that could have been absolutely grating in the hands of another filmmaker. Yet, Hamer makes them feel effortlessly light. He fluidly guides the pieces together into a seamless whole. A truly lovely film, 1001 Grams is highly recommended for general audiences when it opens this Friday (5/8) in New York, at the Lincoln Plaza Cinemas.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on May 6th, 2015 at 9:59pm.

LFM Reviews Maggie @ Tribeca 2015

By Joe Bendel. The zombie apocalypse has come, but the everyday mundane rituals of life continue. For instance, NPR is still broadcasting (and providing exposition), which is about as dull and trivial as life gets. The cities are like demilitarized zones, but those who reside in the countryside continue on relatively undisturbed—unless one of their family members is infected. A rugged Iowa farmer with an Austrian accent must deal with his daughter’s painful transition, ominously known as “the turn,” in Henry Hobson’s Maggie, opening this Friday in New York, following its world premiere at the 2015 Tribeca Film Festival.

Like many infected teens, Maggie Vogel ran off to the big city rather than putting her family through the pain of her turn. Checking into one of the nightmarish government field hospitals is not an option, but unfortunately that is where she is forcibly detained until her father finds her. While she is still lucid, she will have time to make her goodbyes to family and friends, but it clearly will not be easy.

Maggie always adored her twin step-brother and step-sister and got on reasonably well with her step-mother. However, Caroline Vogel’s top priority is clearly protecting the twins, which creates friction with Wade. The local sheriff and his jerkweed deputy are also anxious to whisk Maggie back into custody, but it is hard argue with a man the size of Wade Vogel, who is holding a shotgun. Vogel obviously intends to cling to every last hope and does not care what some county employee thinks about it. However, Maggie Vogel is only too aware of the reality of her situation, because she can see it in the mirror.

There have already been a number of anti-genre deconstructions of the zombie film, such as BBC America’s post-zombie cure series In the Flesh and the Canadian feature The Returned, so Maggie’s focus on the intimate human drama of the zombie uprising is not so unusual anymore. Still, Hobson (the title design for The Walking Dead) and screenwriter John Scott 3 carve out a small niche, where zombies are contained (more or less), but not cured. Still, what makes Maggie work so well is the first rate cast.

Believe it or not, that starts with Arnold Schwarzenegger. This is finally the sort of film he should be pursuing for his post-politics return to the big screen. Let’s face it, he was a disappointing governor who just continued all the fiscal problems he promised to stop, but he still has an awful lot of accrued good will with movie fans. Up until Last Action Hero he was batting nearly one thousand, if we make allowances for Red Sonja. He has a reassuring screen presence that gives comfort and inspires confidence. As Vogel, he is able to build on that reservoir of good feeling, creating a surprisingly tender portrait of a father facing the unthinkable.

As the titular Maggie, Abigail Breslin gives a refreshingly smart and subtle performance, conveying a powerful sense of how quickly she has grown up as she faces her fate. Although she is likely to be overlooked, Joely Richardson is also terrific as the step-mother trying her best, despite her very human failings. In fact, it is the intelligent, heartfelt rendering of the Vogel family dynamics that really elevates Maggie.

Yes, Wade Vogel kills a handful of zombies, but the film is highly likely to disappoint fans expecting a vintage 1980s Schwarzenegger film. However, it suggests he might be able to pull off a third act comeback, after all. Appropriately moody and shockingly touching, Maggie is highly recommended for sophisticated genre fans when it opens this Friday (5/8) in select theaters, following its premiere screenings at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival.

LFM GRADE: A-

Posted on May 6th, 2015 at 9:58pm.

LFM Reviews Saint Laurent

By Joe Bendel. Last year, Jalil Lespert’s Saint Laurent biopic was the first out of gate, simply but aptly titled Yves Saint Laurent. Now, Bertrand Bonello follows with the even more basically titled Saint Laurent. Evidently, the next filmmaker who tries his hand at the celebrated fashion designer’s story will have to call it Laurent, or maybe the evocative YSL. Regardless, the second duly follows the first, boasting a more famous French cast but lacking the blessing of YSL’s longtime partner, Pierre Bergé. Break your Mondrian dress out of mothballs for the American release of Bonello’s Saint Laurent, which opens this Friday in New York.

For the backstory, refer to Lespert. Bonello picks the film up in 1967 and just runs with the era’s excesses. Saint Laurent is poised to explode globally and Bergé, his partner (both in love and business) will make the deals to fully exploit his notoriety. Unfortunately, as the chemically infused parties blur into each other, Saint Laurent becomes increasingly preoccupied with the sexual charms of model Jacques De Bascher. From time to time, Bergé will even create a bit of a scene, but he can usually get the faithless designer to come home whenever he buys a new piece for their remarkable art collection.

That is kind of it. Bonello’s film is a rather static portrait that luxuriates in the hedonistic surface of YSL’s life and never digs into the iconic figures’ inner workings. To judge solely from the film, it is absolutely baffling how an uptight square like Bergé and a drug-soused sex addict like Saint Laurent could ever be a couple. There is no explanation of their relationship, except for an admittedly brilliant scene of them admiring a newly acquired painting. Bonello’s take on Saint Laurent is entirely an example of style over substance, but what dazzling style it is.

Although Saint Laurent spends most of the film lounging on a couch, Bonello’s camera darts and pans restlessly, soaking up the debauched nightlife. He makes inspired use of split screens, evoking a fashion magazine’s layout. Frankly, this is probably the most visually dynamic film of the year—and that counts for a lot.

Arguably, the cast-members are just accessories to the ensemble Bonello creates. Gaspard Ulliel’s Saint Laurent is a lifeless cipher who is rather unpleasant to spend time with. Helmut Berger’s third act appearance as the designer in 1989 adds little depth, serving mainly as a curtain call. Jérémie Renier conveys some of the maturity and determination of Bergé, but the film stacks the deck against him, largely portraying him a jealous lover. Adding color if not substance, Louis Garrel out-preens Maria Callas as De Bascher, while model Aymeline Valade exhibits enough snap and verve as model Betty Catroux to suggest she might have potential in a film with actual human interaction.

Bonello’s film is all about the gloss, which is why it is so seductive. This is probably the version Saint Laurent would enjoy more, whereas Bergé would better appreciate Lespert’s approach, even if he were not more closely associated with it. Indeed, he deserved better treatment from Bonello, especially considering how he stood up to the Chinese government’s bullying when he was liquidating the collection he amassed with YSL. Pointedly, he offered to return two Qing Dynasty bronzes they claimed if they started to “observe human rights and give liberty to the Tibetan people and welcome the Dalai Lama.” Of course, that is a little outside the scope of either film. Bonello’s Saint Laurent is an immersive work that overwhelms the senses, but leaves little emotional trace behind. For those in the mood for something flashy and slick, Bonello’s Saint Laurent can’t be topped when it opens this Friday (5/8) in New York, at the Angelika Film Center.

LFM GRADE: B-

Posted on May 6th, 2015 at 9:57pm.

LFM Reviews Our Neighbor, Miss Yae @ MoMA’s Japan Speaks Out

From "Our Neighbor, Miss Yae."

By Joe Bendel. She is the girl next door, both in a strictly literal sense and in terms what that expression typically evokes. Her sister is not, even though she has recently moved back in with Yae-chan’s family. Awkwardly, both sisters will become rivals for the attention of the same neighborhood boy in Yasujiro Shimazu’s Our Neighbor, Miss Yae, which screens as part of Japan Speaks Out, MoMA’s upcoming retrospective of early Japanese talking pictures.

Yae-chan is a high school upper-classman with eyes for Keitaro, a university freshman still living at home. He is not very romantically inclined, preferring to spend his free time eating and training his younger brother for the Koshien little league championship (memorably depicted in Umin Boya’s Kano). It would not surprise anyone if Yae-chan and Keitaro ended up together, which would be just fine with their respective parents. However, the return of Yae-chan’s older sister Kyouko complicates everything.

Arriving unexpectedly one night, Kyouko announces her intention to divorce her husband and move back in. Naturally, her parents are a bit flummoxed. Divorce is not unheard of in their era, but it is still far from commonplace. Of course, they must be very mindful of appearances. Both fathers are lower middleclass middle-managers, who have not exactly distinguished themselves in their careers. Still, everyone gets used to having Kyouko around, except maybe Yae-chan, who becomes increasingly frustrated by Keitaro’s apparent interest in the older woman.

Shimazu was a master of Japanese shomin-geki (home dramas), predating the master of masters, Yasujiro Ozu. Neighbor will surely bring to mind the look and vibe of Ozu’s classic films, but it feels worldlier and less delicate. We need not place it in terrarium for its own protection. Frankly, there is no way this endearingly innocent family film would have passed Hollywood’s Hays Code.

From "Our Neighbor, Miss Yae."

In fact, Neighbor is a richly ambiguous film in a number of ways, particularly with respect to Kyouko’s marriage. While her parents assume she has left her unseen hubby out of general flightiness, Shimazu offers enough hints for twenty-first century Westerners to suspect there were darker, more abusive reasons Kyouko rejects her married life. As a result, it is hard to determine with certainty whether Neighbor is a feminist or anti-feminist film, but that makes it much more intriguing.

Yet there is no better reason to watch and enjoy Neighbor than Yumeko Aizome’s wonderfully sensitive yet lively performance as Yae-chan. Just as Shimazu prefigures Ozu’s masterworks, her work is reminiscent of Setsuko Hara’s Norikos. She makes emotional resiliency something rather breezy and cute.

Neighbor is the sort of film that will inspire nostalgia in viewers for a time they maybe never really knew. There is something very appealing about the casual mi-casa-su-casa intimacy shared by the two families, even when unsettling reminders of what of the early 1930s meant in Japan obliquely seep in (like Keitaro’s German homework). There is a messiness to the resolution that also rings true to the unruliness of life. Very highly recommended, Our Neighbor, Miss Yae screens this Wednesday (5/6) and Saturday the 16th at MoMA, as part of the upcoming Japan Speaks Out film series.

LFM GRADE: A

Posted on May 6th, 2015 at 9:57pm.