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Reviews
May '17 Digital Week II
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Wednesday, 10 May 2017 03:18
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Blu-rays of the Week
Kiju Yoshida—Love + Anarchism
(Arrow Academy)
One of the unsung luminaries of the Japanese New Wave, director Kiju Yoshida has made relatively few films, his reputation hinging on the three features in this must-have boxed set: his magnum opus, 1969’s epic Eros + Massacre, presented in its 165-minute release version and the stunningly original 215-minute director’s cut; and his subsequent features, 1970’s Heroic Purgatory and 1973’s Coup d’Etat.
Yoshida’s political trilogy (simultaneously hip and historical, free-form and rigidly structured) are screaming to be discovered anew thanks to flawless hi-def transfers that bring to life his ingenious B&W compositions, along with contextualizing extras: intros by scholar David Desser and Yoshida, commentaries by Desser and a 30-minute featurette about Eros featuring Yoshida.
Brain Damage
(Arrow)
Frank Henenlotter’s grubby 1988 gorefest introduces a brain-eating parasite named Edgar who finds a willing young idiot to do his murderous bidding: this is the kind of tongue-in-cheek horror flick where a young woman, ready to perform fellatio on our hero, instead ends up with Edgar in her mouth, and he burrows through her mouth to suck out her brain.
There’s definitely an audience for this type of low-budget schlock, but credit must be given to Edgar creator Gabe Bartalos, who comes up with a crafty little monster. It looks good and grainy on Blu; extras include interviews, featurettes and a commentary.
Serial Mom
(Shout/Scream Factory)
John Waters’ silly 1994 satire has grown in relevance since then, as Kathleen Turner’s murderous middle-class mom who gets off in a sensational trial remains one of her best, most deadpan creations.
Although the movie keeps beating the same dead horse for 95 minutes, the collection of misfits in Waters’ cast—Sam Waterston, Ricki Lake and Matthew Lillard as Turner’s family, Patty Hearst as a juror and Mink Stole as a bitchy accuser—makes it a fun watch. The hi-def transfer is solid; extras include two commentaries (one by Waters and Turner and one by Waters solo), featurettes and a conversation with Waters, Turner and Stole.
Things to Come
(Sundance Selects)
After an auspicious career start (All Is Forgiven, The Father of My Children and Goodbye First Love), French director Mia Hansen-Løve has regressed with her shallow 2014 feature Eden and her latest, with a somnambulistic Isabelle Huppert as a philosophy professor with a long-term marriage, two teenage children and a psychosomatic mother who suddenly finds herself unmoored; as she says: “I got divorced, my children have moved out, and my mom died. I’m free.”
Instead of an insightful look at a woman beginning a new life, Hansen-Løve makes a meandering soap opera that not even the redoubtable Huppert can save. The director’s unerring eye and beautifully composed shots look ravishing on Blu-ray, at least.
CD of the Week
Mahler Third Symphony—Budapest Festival Orchestra
(Channel Classics)
It takes a village to perform Mahler’s monumental Third Symphony—if not as many as his Eighth (the aptly, and only slightly exaggeratedly, titled “Symphony of a Thousand”)—thanks to a large orchestra, two choirs, alto soloist and a conductor who can marshal all of those forces into a cohesive whole that plays some of Mahler’s most sublimely emotional music.
And that’s what conductor Ivan Fischer does with his Budapest Festival Orchestra, Cantemus Children’s Choir, Chorus of the Bayerischer Rundfunk and singer Gerhild Romberger, all of whom perform brilliantly in this magnificent 95-minute journey through one of Mahler’s most momentous compositions.
Broadway Review—Paula Vogel’s Play “Indecent”
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Saturday, 06 May 2017 03:54
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Indecent
Written by Paula Vogel; directed by Rebecca Taichman
Opened April 18, 2017
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| The cast of Indecent (photo: Carol Rosegg) |
When two women kissed on a Broadway stage in 1923 in Sholem Asch’s God of Vengeance, it caused a scandal. The show was shut down, something that didn’t happen during many European stagings since the Polish-Jewish playwright Asch wrote it in 1907. But the unique prudishness of the United States—even in a culturally rich and ethnically diverse city like New York—demonstrated that intolerance rears its ugly in many ways.
Paula Vogel’s play Indecent follows the complicated and haunting history of God of Vengeance, from its first reading in a Warsaw, Poland, literary salon to its being enacted one act at a time in the Lodz Ghetto by performers who don’t know if they’ll get to perform the last act before the Nazis round up everyone. An acting troupe is introduced, and the performers are seen onstage and off, their personal lives intertwined with the fictional but very real characters they play in Vengeance. Pivotal scenes are reenacted from various productions of the play, giving a real sense of not only its historical importance, but also its enduring dramatic interest.
Indecent is stimulating without being particularly illuminating, despite an early image of ashes spilling out of the characters’ clothing powerfully evoking what happens to concentration camp victims. But even if it’s admittedly manipulative, Vogel and her sensitive director Rebecca Taichman make effective use of Brechtian stage devices that allow the non-linear narrative to flow more interestingly than it might have otherwise.
The klezmer-like music performed onstage is nicely integrated into the drama, with the versatile instrumentalists joining in on the action at times (the ingenious choreography is by David Dorfman). The outstanding performers, all of whom play multiple roles, are led by the winning actress Katarina Link, whose intimate scenes with Adina Verson—not only in their censored onstage kiss but their warm offstage relationship—are the linchpin of the plays God of Vengeance and Indecent.
Indecent
Cort Theatre, 138 West 48th Street
indecentbroadway.com
May '17 Digital Week I
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 02 May 2017 23:09
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Blu-rays of the Week
I Am Not Your Negro
(Magnolia)
Remember This House, a book James Baldwin never finished, survives in manuscript form and is a personal reminiscence of three civil rights leaders who were murdered: Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr.
Director Raoul Peck’s powerful documentary—nominated for an Oscar this past year—makes intelligent use of Baldwin’s own words (voiced by Samuel L. Jackson) to make the persuasive case that Baldwin’s views on racism in America have never been more relevant. The film looks splendid on Blu; extras are two Peck interviews (one of them an hour long) and Jackson interview.
Animal Kingdom—Complete 1st Season
(Warner Bros)
Based on the gritty 2010 Australian film that garnered an Oscar nomination for Jacki Weaver as the matriarch of a petty crime family, this new series moves the action to the heart of southern California, a more uneasy fit than in the Outback.
Still, Ellen Barkin is fun as lead villainess Janine “Smurf” Cody, who keeps her four sons under control, and the series goes off on interesting tangents after a prolonged set-up over the first few episodes. The hi-def image is excellent; extras include deleted scenes and six featurettes.
Detour
We Are X
(Magnet)
In Detour, a straitlaced young man goes on a drinking bender and finds himself “befriended” by a crazed redneck and his stripper girlfriend; too bad that this derivative road-trip drama is not nearly as interesting as writer-director Christopher Smith thinks.
We Are X is NOT a documentary about the legendary L.A. punk band but instead a fascinating look at the popular Japanese rock outfit that’s been led for decades by Yoshiki, an intense and conflicted artist. Both films have exemplary hi-def transfers; extras are deleted scenes, featurettes, interviews, and (on We Are X) live performances and a fan video.
A Dog’s Purpose
(Universal)
Based on W. Bruce Cameron’s best-selling novel, this sanctimoniously sappy drama about a reincarnated dog’s various lives with various owners—good, bad and indifferent—is a guaranteed crowd-pleaser that makes no bones about rubbing our noses in its canine cuteness and tear-inducing melodrama.
Adorable dogs notwithstanding, director Lasse Hallstrom has come a long way (down) from his breakthrough classic, My Life as a Dog, for which he got Oscar nominations for writing and directing way back in 1988. The film has a natural look on Blu; extras include deleted scenes, outtakes and two featurettes.
The Rounders
Spencer’s Mountain
(Warner Archive)
Henry Fonda, in a long career, made several forgettable movies. Like these two: 1964’s The Rounders teams Fonda and Glenn Ford in a frivolous western about a couple of aging cowboys dealing with a bucking bronco.
1963’s Spencer’s Mountain—a predecessor to The Waltons—finds Fonda playing a father of nine in this sweetly unassuming if too saccharine family drama. Both films have luminous hi-def transfers; Spencer extras are vintage featurette and vintage Fonda interviews.
The Wheeler Dealers
From Hell It Came
(Warner Archive)
1963’s The Wheeler Dealers is a harmless and rather pointless Arthur Hiller romantic comedy with an amusing James Garner as a typical Texas millionaire and glamorous Lee Remick as a hard-edged New York gal who falls for him.
1957’s From Hell It Came has one of the most absurd monsters ever—half-man, half-tree—terrorizing whoever crosses its path. It’s so bad that it might be worth a look just for its extreme lousiness, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. The hi-def transfers are excellent.
Broadway Musical Reviews—“Bandstand” and “Anastasia”
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Monday, 01 May 2017 23:07
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Bandstand
Book & lyrics by Robert Taylor & Richard Oberacher; music by Richard Oberacher
Directed & choreographed by Andy Blankenbuehler
Directed & choreographed by Andy Blankenbuehler
Opened April 26, 2017
Anastasia
Book by Terrence McNally; lyrics by Lynn Ahrens; music by Stephen Flaherty
Directed by Darko Tresnjak
Directed by Darko Tresnjak
Opened April 24, 2017
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| Laura Osnes in Bandstand (photo: Jeremy Daniel) |
I saw Bandstand in 2015 at New Jersey’s Paper Mill Playhouse as The Bandstand. Losing its definite article isn’t the only change for Broadway, as this sentimental but affecting musical about a group of bebop-playing WWII vets from Cleveland who enter a songwriting contest that takes them to Manhattan has dropped some fat and added more inventive movement courtesy of director (and Tony-winning Hamilton choreographer) Andy Blankenbuehler.
But its ace in the hole remains Laura Osnes, who plays Julia, widow of a soldier killed in the war who starts singing with the band after Donnie Nowitski—her husband’s closest friend in the army who was in the foxhole when he was killed—checks in on her as he promised he would.
Osnes is the emotional center of a show that also generously allows each of the bandsmen—scarred by the war in his own way—to work out his demons by playing the music he loves. And Blankenbuehler has ingeniously visualized those ghosts and the weight on each vet’s shoulders with astonishingly effective choreographed movements.
Richard Oberacher’s toe-tappingly swing-inflected music at times digs into a well of melody and emotion, notably for the mournful but exhilarating climax, “Welcome Home,” which Osnes knocks out of the park with her impassioned, nakedly soul-baring vocal performance.
Corey Cott is a likable piano-playing Donnie, Beth Leavel a sturdy presence as Julia’s mom (still a thankless role, unfortunately) and the actors playing the band members—Joe Carroll, Brandon James Ellis, Nate Hopkins, Geoff Packard and Joey Peroa, all playing their own instruments—give as good as they get as dramatic and musical foils.
But it’s up to Osnes—backed by fierce instrumental backing by the onstage sextet—to bring Bandstand home by putting us through an emotional wringer for a few glorious moments.
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| Christy Altomare in Anastasia (photo: Matthew Murphy) |
Anastasia is the latest critic-proof Broadway musical. I don’t know how long it will run, but the legions of satisfied youngsters in the audience—how many parents can afford to pay Broadway prices to bring their kids to see it?—demonstrate that it’s being done right. At least for them.
Based on two movies—the 1956 drama for which Ingrid Bergman won the Best Actress Oscar and the 1997 animated movie with Meg Ryan, of all people, voicing the title character—the musical is a hodgepodge that never decides on a direct course but instead meanders, hoping to keep both kids and parents happy. Six songs (including the Act I climax, “Journey to the Past”) are from the 1997 version, and the rest are new, undistinguished ones from the same team of Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty.
Terrence McNally’s rambling book precariously balances outright fantasy (Anastasia survived the Russian royal family’s 1917 slaughter by the Bolsheviks) and historical drama (Gleb, a Bolshevik apparatchik, tracks down Anya, a girl who purports to be Anastasia, and is caught between his duty and his attraction to her).
Despite the silliness, director Darko Tresnjak’s staging is filled with handsome trappings: dreamy ballet choreographed by Peggy Hickey, enticing costumes by Linda Cho, agreeable sets by Alexander Dodge and, best of all, consistently imaginative projections by Aaron Rhyne which make liberal use of HD photography to show off two of the world’s most beautiful cities, St. Petersburg/Leningrad and Paris, where the action is set. Too bad the show is longer than it needs to be: at least 20 minutes could be cut, like the lame attempts at humor, endless ballroom scenes, and appearances by the ghosts of the dead Czar’s family to haunt our heroine’s dreams.
As Anya, supple-voiced Christy Altomare credibly transforms from street-sweeper with amnesia to elegant princess. Derek Klena’s Dmitry, who falls for Anya, is appealingly goofy, and John Bolton’s Vlad—Dmitry’s friend—gets the most out of his comic moments. As Gleb, Ramin Karimloo looks uncertain but compensates with strong singing, and Mary Beth Peil’s regal Dowager Empress doesn’t condescend to her part or the material.
Overlong, not tuneful enough, too derivative: Anastasia is all that and more. But for those who just want a pretty package, it will do nicely.
Bandstand
Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre, 242 West 45th Street
bandstandbroadway.com
Anastasia
Broadhurst Theatre, 235 West 44th Street
anastasiabroadway.com
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