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Film and the Arts

Director Peter Berg's Illuminating Look At "Patriots Day"

Details: Parent Category: Film and the Arts; Category: Reviews; Published on Thursday, 22 December 2016 16:38; Written by Brad Balfour

Patriots Day
Directed by Peter Berg
Screenplay by Peter Berg, Matt Cook and Joshua Zetumer
Starring Mark Wahlberg, Kevin Bacon, John Goodman, J.K. Simmons, Michelle Monaghan, Alex Wolff.

With workman-like efficiency, veteran director Peter Berg uses his latest film, Patriots Day, to provide some insight into what happened, who it affected, and how everyone reacted to the 2013 Boston Marathon terrorist bombing. This action-packed "whodunnit" offers an opportunity to make a little sense of something that should never have had to be understood. Dramatizing the dual remote explosion of two pressure cookers placed near the finish line serves several purposes — to celebrate survivors, first responders and investigators while providing a breakdown of just what took place before that day, at the bombings’ moments and the week that followed.

patriots day poster Though he’s not a director who does things with an “arty” touch, his sure-handed work here offers enough details and nuance that makes this film a bit more than just a big-budget TV movie. From the start, stories of the essential participants — Police Commissioner Ed Davis (John Goodman), Sergeant Jeffrey Pugliese (J.K. Simmons) and nurse Carol Saunders (Michelle Monaghan) — are interwoven as the day begins. Once the bombs explode — unflinchingly shown in graphic detail — Special Agent Richard DesLauriers (Kevin Bacon) joins this visceral chronicle that suspensefully delineates the ever-expanding manhunt for the culprits.

Included in the cast is Berg regular Mark Wahlberg as Police Sergeant Tommy Saunders — a composite of several key figures — who joins other law enforcement figures in a race against time to track down the bombers before they try again, even possibly, in New York. Though Wahlberg’s sincerity gives life to this stitched-together character, we could do without his mundane speech-ifiying.

Much to Berg’s credit, he tried to give attention to one or another detail that lends insight into most of the players, from those who died, who were maimed, and who discovered the killers, or contributed to the capture of the Tsarnaev brothers; he even examines their lives as well including that of converted Muslim wife Katherine. But this film doesn’t delve that deeply into their motives or psychology; it instead focuses more on how the aftermath of the bombing impacted on the lives of everyone involved — and how they’ve survived ever since.

Without being overbearing about it, Berg’s Patriots Day serves several notions so that this a film worth viewing and talking about afterwards — especially since incidents like this one keep happening. It’s no work of profundity but the more we can analyze what happened before, the better we can get at preventing future attacks.

December '16 Digital Week III

Details: Parent Category: Film and the Arts; Category: Reviews; Published on Wednesday, 21 December 2016 04:35; Written by Kevin Filipski

Blu-rays of the Week

Creepshow 2

The Driller Killer
(Arrow)

The first Creepshow (1982) was fun, but its 1987 follow-up Creepshow 2 is far less memorably more of the same: its three segments have their moments (especially the third, with Lois Chiles’s manic performance as an adulterous wife who keeps running over the same man), but the overall effect is of desperation and a far cry from the original.

Abel Ferrara’s insane Driller Killer (1979) stars the director himself as a tortured artist turned title murderer: if you’re into Ferrara’s twisted worldview, by all means help yourself. Both films have excellent restored transfers; extras are interviews, commentaries and features, with Ferrara’s documentary, Mulberry St., on Driller.

In Order of Disappearance
(Magnet)

Stellan Skarsgard’s intense performance as a grieving father who tracks down those drug dealers responsible for his son’s fatal overdose is the obvious reason to watch director Hans Petter Moland’s muddled but entertaining black comedy.

The violence seems real, pouring out of the father’s sorrow and revenge, which Skarsgard plays perfectly, even during the film’s final (and intentionally ridiculous) shootout. There’s a superior hi-def transfer; extras are brief interviews.

The Man Who Skied Down Everest
(Film Detective)

Bruce Nydnik and Lawrence Schiller’s Oscar-winning 1975 Best Documentary is a still-astonishing chronicle of the 1970 quest by Japanese daredevil Yuichiro Miura to climb and ski down the world’s highest mountain.

Douglas Rain’s narration (from Miura’s own diaries) is at times redundant, but the incredible camerawork, which catches seemingly every moment of this superhuman attempt—including some of the most amazing feats ever shot—is what makes this a classic of its kind. The film looks splendid on Blu-ray.

Otello
(Sony Classical)

Giuseppe Verdi’s classic opera might even outdo Shakespeare’s play for dramatic intensity and sorrowful tragedy, and Bartlett Sher’s new Met Opera staging catches all of that, thanks to sensitive conducting by Yannick Nezet-Segun and exceptional playing by the Met Orchestra.

Then there are the emotionally rich portrayals of Aleksandrs Antonenko as Othello, Zeljko Lucic as Iago and Sonya Yoncheva as a heartbreaking Desdemona. Both the hi-def video and audio are impressive.

Sully
(Warner Bros)

In Clint Eastwood’s absorbing if not particularly resonant reconstruction of the celebrated “Miracle on the Hudson” in 2009, Tom Hanks gives a functional but unilluminating portrayal of one of America’s most celebrated heroes, airline pilot Sully Sullenberger.

Far better because less encumbered by hero worship is Aaron Eckhart as the unsung co-pilot; in the thankless role of the worried wife phoning husband Sully, Laura Linney is all classy understatement. The film, a relatively brief but still padded 96 minutes, looks fine on Blu; extras comprise three making-of featurettes.

DVDs of the Week

Disorder
(IFC)

Alice Winocour’s involving thriller centers around a wonderfully complicated central relationship: a French Iraq war vet with PTSD becomes a bodyguard for the trophy wife of a wealthy businessman, and when deadly home invaders arrive, his skills come in handy to save her, her child and himself.

Deftly combining action with introspection, Winocour has made a volatile drama buoyed by superb performances by Matthias Schoenaerts and Diane Kruger.

Little Men
(Magnolia)

Ira Sachs’ latest New York City-set comic drama is a well-observed but meandering study of teenagers who become friends amid the linked difficulties of their family lives: even at 85 minutes, the film feels stretched out, as if it’s little more than a sketch turned into feature length.

Sachs’ usual strength is his cast, and Little Men is no exception: the boys are truthfully played by newcomers Theo Taplitz and Michael Barbieri, and there’s good work from Alfred Molina, Talia Balsam, Jennifer Ehle and Greg Kinnear as the adults in their lives.

The Pond Theatre Company Inaugural Production - Mike Leigh’s Abigail's Party

Details: Parent Category: Film and the Arts; Category: Reviews; Published on Monday, 19 December 2016 02:57; Written by Brad Balfour

Abigail's Party
Written by Mike Leigh
Directed by Lee Brock
Starring Lily Dorment, Colleen Clinton, Sarah Street, Nick Hetherington and John Pirkis

Anytime there’s an opportunity to see something created by award-winning British playwright/filmmaker Mike Leigh, it’s usually a worthwhile experience — though it’s not necessarily a pleasant one.

While rife with humor, The Pond Theatre Company’s recent production of Leigh’s 1977 play “Abigail’s Party” makes for an engaging, sometimes frustrating, work. It’s not frustrating because of any flaws in the writing, acting or staging — in fact the prim and proper setting of a 1970s English middle-class living room offers an ideal setting for the acidic and dark experience that was offered on this stage. The Pond, a brand new theater company focused on Irish and British plays (this is its inaugural production) did a bang-up job with both this cast and the direction by Lee Brock.

Rather, it’s the characters themselves that make it torturous, not because of any artificiality in dialogue or action; rather, it’s because the people are so real you want to step on stage and smack them few times throughout the two hours that commences here.

Pop songs insinuate themselves throughout the play which reveals the banality of these characters as they come in and out of this living room. Once the boozing begins, the action gets launched and the acidic dialogue really kicks in.

None of the characters are particularly bright or interesting; they really have nothing significant to say. And most annoying is Beverly who pushes everyone into guzzling more drink — as if to excuse her own angry, stupid uptightness and her need to justify her own failings which get smoothed over by intoxication. Though it seems like she just wants everyone to enjoy themselves she’s really catalyzing chaos through her own self-loathing.

abigail cast The basic action is deceptively simple. Set in the London suburb of Essex, Beverly (Sarah Street) and Laurence (John Pirkis) invite new neighbors Angela (Lily Dorment) and Tony (Nick Hetherington) over for a welcome drink. They’re joined by Susan (Colleen Clinton), another neighbor whose 16-year old daughter Abigail is having a party at her flat. She’s come to the neighbor’s flat to escape the party’s outward chaos only to experience an inner turmoil stirred up in this tacky living room.

As they drink throughout the night, they comically and tragically drop their guard — and emotional disaster ensues. The anger inherent in much of Leigh's material is really present here with little ornamentation. His goal of flailing the English middle class is succinctly accomplished. And this early work of his illustrates the evolution of themes he explores in later plays and films.

Much like American playwright Neil Labute, Leigh unapologetically shows how ridiculous people can be in the most conventional of settings but, unlike his fellow playwright, they aren’t entirely unredeemable — just boorish.

Sadly, this play’s run has ended but there are more productions coming up in collaboration with the Barrow Group (a 30-year-old award-winning theater company) at their West 36th Street home.

For future productions go to: www.thepondtheatre.org

TBG Theatre at The Barrow Group
312 West 36th Street, 3rd floor
New York, NY 10018

866-811-4111

www.barrowgroup.org

December '16 Digital Week II

Details: Parent Category: Film and the Arts; Category: Reviews; Published on Wednesday, 14 December 2016 13:34; Written by Kevin Filipski

Blu-rays of the Week

Fellini’s Roma

(Criterion)

Federico Fellini’s impressionistic 1972 kaleidoscope of the world’s greatest city—or at least the center of the world, as any Romans will willingly say—came out between his delightful TV movie The Clowns and sentimental childhood journey Amarcord.

It’s filled with dozens of indelible images, including a stupendously wordless final sequence of motorcycles racing through the streets of the city at night, that compensate for its share of longueurs. The hi-def image looks superbly grainy and film-like; extras include a commentary, deleted scenes, and interviews with director Paolo Sorrentino and Fellini friend/poet Valerio Magrelli.

Henry—Portrait of a Serial Killer

(Dark Sky)

Director John McNaughton’s 1986 cult film actually seems rather mild today, its clinical depiction of a murderer actually shows him as less evil than others he comes across—a dubious decision morally, if defensible dramatically, as shades of grey are better than simply a black and white portrait of a monster, played with shading and subtlety by Michael Rooker.

The low-budget film looks quite good on Blu-ray; many extras include director commentary and interviews, deleted scenes, outtakes and featurettes.

It’s Always Fair Weather

(Warner Archive)

This underrated 1955 musical was co-directed by star Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, who team for this rollicking if cynical saga highlighted by two unforgettable solo sequences: Dan Dailey does the honors in the hilariously drunken “Situation-Wise,” followed by the truly remarkable turn by Kelly himself doing a creative and head-spinning tap dance—on roller skates!

Warner Archive’s hi-def transfer isn’t perfect—there are scenes in which the colors get muddy—but it’ll do. Extras comprise a retrospective featurette, three musical number outtakes (and one audio-only song), vintage Kelly and Cyd Charisse interviews and two classic cartoons.

Sudden Fear

(Cohen Film Collection)

Joan Crawford appropriately chews the scenery as a successful Broadway playwright who falls for a middling actor (played with appropriate menace by Jack Palance) in this tautly-made 1952 thriller by director David Miller, who imbues a palpable sense of fear through the foggy B&W photography of Charles B. Lang, Jr., and an intense score by Elmer Bernstein.

The film has received an acceptable hi-def transfer, while the lone extra is an audio commentary.

Suicide Squad

(Warner Bros)

Director David Ayers’ extensively messy anti-superhero saga is, in its extended Blu-ray cut, 134 minutes’ worth of sequences linked most tenuously as it tries to get viewers to root for the assorted low-lifes given security clearance by a desperate U.S. government to track down and eliminate terrorists.

As others have noted, in a cast filled with slumming stars—Will Smith, Viola Davis, and Jared Leto as a Joker more unhinged than Heath Ledger’s—it’s the irresistible Margot Robbie who steals the show with her alluringly insane Harley Quinn. On Blu-ray, the film looks fine; extras include featurettes and a gag reel.

DVDs of the Week

Homo Sapiens

Almayer’s Folly

(Icarus)

Austrian iconoclast Nikolaus Geyrhalter (Our Daily Bread) returns with Homo Sapiens, his latest thought-provoking documentary, whichtravels from Fukashima in Japan to Ohio—and many locations in between—to record man-made places where man is no longer present: by showing states of natural decay and/or neglect by humans, the film artfully implies that nature—growing in and around these abandoned places—will flourish after we are gone from the scene.

It’s too bad that, in 2011’s Almayer’s Folly (her final feature prior to her suicide last year), Belgian director Chantel Akerman adapted an early Joseph Conrad novel about a Dutch trader in the Far East to little dramatic effect.

Zoo—Complete 2^ndSeason

American Gothic—Complete 1^stSeason

(CBS/Paramount)

In the second season of Zoo,the worldwide animal takeover has reached epic proportions: although there’s something inherently silly about the series, there is some amusement watching lions, tigers, rhinos, birds, bees, etc., terrify people to within an inch of their lives.

A lively if overly familiar dramatic series, American Gothicfollows a sordid saga of murder in the history of a prominent family from Boston. A solid set of actors (led by Juliet Rylance and the ageless Virginia Madsen) helps keep this from becoming risible: but it still was cancelled after its first 13 episodes. Extras on both sets include deleted scenes, gag reel, featurettes and interviews.

CD/DVD of the Week

Rush—2112 40^thAnniversary

(Mercury/Anthem)

Its breakthrough 1976 album2112 made Rush one of the top prog-rock groups, consolidating—and, to these ears, improving—their sound with Permanent Waves (1980), Moving Pictures(1981) and Signals(1982), still its three best albums. Hearing 2112 today, there’s undeniable dross (“Lessons,” “Tears”), but the musical confidence is there in spades for the band’s peerless instrumentalists: drummer Neil Peart, guitarist Alex Lifeson and bassist Geddy Lee (the less said about Lee’s vocals and Peart’s lyrics, the better).

This 40^thanniversary set includes the original album, a second CD that includes new versions of 2112 tracks by the likes of Dave Grohl with Taylor Hawkins and Alice in Chains, and live tunes from Rush’s 1976 and ‘77 tours. There’s also a DVD featuring a healthy segment of a 1976 concert, a new interview with Lifeson and producer Terry Brown, and looks at Billy Talent recording “A Passage to Bangkok” and Grohl/Hawkins doing “Overture” for the second CD.

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