The Reel World

Should you pursue your dreams at any cost? If your life seems bleak and hopeless, should you go for broke and bet everything on what you believe? These questions are even more relevant to people who are creative artists, because they will often be told that their dreams are hopeless and unattainable. The rewards can be great, but the odds of succeeding are easily a million to one. Sing Street takes place in 1985 and is about young kids writing songs and making music videos. The parents, Robert (Aiden Gillian, Petyr “Littlefinger” Baelish from Game of Thrones) and Penny (Maria Doyle Kennedy, Siobhan Sadler from Orphan Black) are struggling like almost everyone in Dublin in those days. They have to send their younger son, Cosmo (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo) to the free Catholic school run by the priests called Synge Street instead of the expensive fee-based school he had been going to. The older stoner brother, Brendan (Jack Reynor, Transformers: Age of Extinction) has already quit college, so that helps out with expenses as well. Before I go any further, I must say that this film strikes a brilliant balance early on between hard reality and dreams and fantasy. It is a funny, touching, and exhilarating entertainment above all else. It harkens back to all those movies over the years like Footloose and Fame that just want kids to have fun.

The 1980’s were when music videos and mainstream rock music really picked up steam. Hall and Oates, Duran Duran, and The Cure are all musical reference points in this movie. Cosmo is struggling to cope with problems at home and problems at the new school. His one bright spot is the beautiful teenage girl who lives across the street from the school. Raphina (Lucy Boynton) is sophisticated and stylish and says she’s leaving soon to be a model in London, but she lives in a home for orphaned girls. Cosmo gets her to believe that he’s in a band and that he’d like her to be in a video. It’s all a lie, but Cosmo soon gets to making it a reality. That’s why most kids want to become musicians, isn’t it? To get the girl.

"Suit Up!"

When I was a kid we had something called a toy box. Do kids even have such things anymore? Inside we were supposed to keep our toys when we weren't playing with them. Inside mine there were dinosaurs, cars with track, army men, spaceships ... and yes, superheroes. To open the toy box meant to prepare yourself for imagination and fun. Sure, the box got crowded after a while, but I was always filled with some kind of anticipation when I looked inside. Today going to see a Marvel movie is very much like lifting the lid on a toy box. There are so many cool things inside that it kind of staggers the imagination these days. It's a delicate clockwork with an ever-growing number of moving parts. So many, in fact, that it appears impossible that any of them can be given enough attention so that they can develop and grow. That's usually what kills most comic book film franchises in the end. Filmmakers try so hard to outdo the one before that the only way they believe it can be done is to add more pieces until it all topples from its own weight. Captain America: Civil War has more moving parts than ever before, but just when you think it can't possibly get any better...it does.

"Let's go find you a fish."

I've been told enough times that it is often not a good idea to meet your heroes. It's too often impossible for anyone to live up to expectations, particularly when they are already up on a pedestal in our minds. All humans have their flaws, and Ernest Hemingway was no exception. I never met him. He killed himself around the time I was busy being born. I often joked to my writing professors that he feared my arrival. The truth is that he had so many demons. It isn't a secret today, and it wasn't then, at least not for anyone familiar with his work. But Denne Bart Petitclerc did meet Hemingway after writing him a bit of a fan letter in 1957. The result was that Petitclerc was invited into Hemingway's inner circle at a time in Hemingway's life where his demons were beginning to catch up with him. Place that encounter in the larger environment of Castro's rebel uprising in Cuba at the time, and you might have an interesting story. Petitclerc certainly thought that he did. He wrote a screenplay and shopped it around for decades even up to his own death in 2006. Unlike the many fish on Hemingway's line and tackle, no one bit. It's possible that Papa Hemingway In Cuba is the reason.

Ever since writer/director Jeremy Saulnier came out with his gripping revenge film Blue Ruin, fans have been patiently waiting to see what he’d do next.  If you have not had the chance to see Blue Ruin and you are a fan of the revenge genre, it’s a film that is certainly a must-see and is one of the few films that lives up to the hype that surrounds it.  The problem with doing such a strong and powerful film so early in your career is that expectations seem to just skyrocket, and it seems there is just no way you can make everyone happy.  As a fan first and critic second, I know I’ve been guilty of doing this in the past. It’s almost impossible to not get excited, and at the screening for this film I know I was not the only one with high expectations.

On top of the high expectations, the group I viewed the film with was restless after having the film delayed as well, so this only seems to be another strike against the film before it’s even had a chance to play.  I mention all this for the simple reason that this film reminded me of the importance of shutting out all expectations and simply letting the film stand on its own merit.  This is important because I feel Saulnier knew the expectations he had, and instead of playing it safe he did something that very few filmmakers are willing to do any;ore, he simply made a movie that is not just gripping and intense, but most importantly, it was fun.

"You must be kidding."

It is the most requested photograph from the White House archives. I'm talking about a photograph of Richard Nixon with The King. This particular King's kingdom wasn't a nation or political group. Of course, I'm talking about Elvis Presley, the King of Rock and Roll. The meeting occurred in the days before Nixon installed his infamous recording equipment and long before that fateful break-in at Watergate. So no one really knows what was said in the meeting. Now director Liza Johnson attempts to take us behind the closed doors of the Oval Office on that fateful day in December of 1970 when the leader of the free world met with the leader of a generation. Elvis And Nixon is a whimsical look at what might have been said that day. I can't tell you how close she got to the truth. I can tell you this story is worth telling anyway. It was certainly worth watching. Take it from a long-time history teacher. American History was never this much fun.

“There is another story. One that comes long before...happily ever after.”

An unseen narrator — an uncredited Liam Neeson, wisely choosing not to show his face in this film — intones these words at the start of The Huntsman: Winter's War. He's talking about the saga involving a certain magic mirror and Ravenna (a still-captivating Charlize Theron), the wicked antagonist from 2012's Snow White and The Huntsman. But as this flat, uninspired prequel/sequel hybrid unfolds, it becomes clear that this “other story” is essentially an unimaginative mish-mash of Disney (shades of Frozen and Brave are added to the Snow White framework) and Tolkien.

For the Gasparilla International Film Festival, to nab the latest film from writer/director Richard Linklater is kind of a big deal. GIFF was the second festival to show Everybody Wants Some after its debut at the acclaimed South by Southwest festival.  With the film being lauded as a spiritual sequel to Linklater’s cult hit Dazed and Confused, I had to admit I was a bit skeptical about this film and its ability to even match up to its predecessor; after all, it was the indie darling that helped launched the careers of Matthew McConaughey, Ben Affleck, Milla Jovovich, and many others.  This ensemble of talented up-and-comers managed to capture this cinematic lightning in a bottle about high school, and for me it’s a film I manage to watch at least once a year when I come across someone who hasn’t yet seen the film. So how does the film hold up in the face of such expectations?  For me this isn’t just a fun film, but I’m taking a stand and calling this the best party film to date (and yes, I’m daring to say it’s better than Animal House.)

It’s time to take a trip back to 1980, a time before social media was ever a thing, and when cars came with tape decks filled with cassettes and people who had record collections were not hit with being called hipsters.  The star of this film for me is the music that is beautifully strung through the film, whether we’re listening to Van Halen, Sugar Hill Gang, or The Knack, what we have is a great assortment of music to set the tone of the film, and we get a musical bag of ear candy to indulge.

"This is the law of the jungle..."

Disney appears to have a law that all of its classic cartoon features must now be made into live-action films. As I've mentioned in my review of the original classic The Jungle Book, the animated feature was the end of an important era at Walt Disney Studios. It was released about a year after Walt's death and was the last film he supervised from beginning to end. In the wake of Walt's death the studio experienced a sharp turnover and complete retooling of the animation department. With only the nine old men to carry the traditions of Walt into the future, The Jungle Book would forever mark a distinct milestone in the history of animated feature films.

Comic book movies are the preeminent form of movie entertainment in this day and age. I use the term broadly to include all sorts of fantasy books and ancillary offshoots. There is the Marvel Universe and the DC Universe and other universes that include Star Wars, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, The Hunger Games, and endless variations. As consumers we become fans of a particular fantasy world from which we gain great personal pleasure. Religion is also a source of orientation for most of the world. We believe in various versions of God in which to invest our emotions fervently and honestly. There is a clear difference between fantasy and religion, but then we have YouTube, which is becoming increasingly crammed with “information” that crosses the line between fantasy and reality. Many people who are obsessed with superheroes and fantasy characters may not believe in God. People who believe in God may find comic books silly. The fact is that myth and legend are intertwined with fantasy and religion to this very day. We all live in a real world, and all of this is beyond our understanding if it were indeed real.

Midnight Special is a movie that starts from a religious framework. A young boy, Alton Meyer (Jaeden Lieberher) has been kidnapped by his father from a religious cult. The cult is run by Calvin Meyer (Sam Shepard) and, though it’s not clear, he is probably the father of Alton’s father. Roy (Michael Shannon) has taken the boy to bring about prophesy that the boy has foretold. The cult is apparently centered on words the boy has said as a new scripture. The government is actively involved in recapturing the boy, but for reasons of national security. Numerous FBI and military personnel are involved in the hunt, but the de facto head is NSA agent Sevier (Adam Driver, better known now as Kylo Ren from Star Wars: Episode VII-The Force Awakens). Roy has enlisted a state trooper friend, Lucas (Joel Edgerton) in this highly illegal endeavor. Everyone is committed to the quest by the force of religious fervor.

Have you ever had a traumatic loss? Have you ever lost someone and felt numb? How did you feel about the person you lost, and was it different now that they were gone? Do you think you acted appropriately about the death? Did you care about what people thought of you, or were you in your own little world? Were you ever the same again? Demolition stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Naomi Watts, and Chris Cooper, and is directed by Jean Marc Vallee. Vallee has directed two outstanding and Oscar-nominated films in the last couple of years, Dallas Buyer’s Club (Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto won Best Actor and Supporting Actor) and Wild (Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern nominated). Jake Gyllenhaal has been on a fantastic run of totally committed and intense performances (Prisoners, Nightcrawler, Everest, Southpaw, Enemy, End of Watch) for the last few years, and Demolition is no exception.

Davis Mitchell (Gyllenhaal) has a great life. His wife adores him and has an incredible job as an investment banker working for her father, Phil (Chris Cooper). In the narration he mentions that he probably shouldn’t say how much his firm manages, because it would be unethical, but he does anyway ($6,000,000,000). He seems blissfully oblivious to problems in life. Then in an instant his wife is gone. She was killed in an accident while driving and talking to him sitting next to her. He escapes unscathed.