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Film and the Arts
July '15 Digital Week I
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 07 July 2015 22:03
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Blu-rays of the Week
Merchants of Doubt
(Sony Pictures Classics)
Following his breakthrough documentary Food Inc., an expose of the food industry, director Robert Kenner tackles an infinitely larger problem for our democracy and our world: the spin doctors who have, against all odds (and available evidence), produced skepticism among the public about scientifically settled subjects like climate change.
Some of them gleefully discuss how they fool people (including themselves): there is no fear of accountability for such despicable sleight of hand, as the political points scored are too important. The movie looks fine on Blu; extras comprise Kenner's commentary. Toronto Film fest Q&A and deleted scenes.
(Decca)
The Flying Dutchman
(Deutsche Grammophon)
The Metropolitan Opera's production of Giuseppe Verdi's Otello—an opera which nearly matches Shakespeare's original—has been around for years but gets the dramatic job done, as does Renee Fleming's beautifully sung Desdemona: her rendition of the final "Ave Maria" is as prayerful as it is touching. Johan Botha's Otello is too broad, but Falk Struckmann's feverish Iago is the ultimate in villainy.
In his abortive Zurich staging of Richard Wagner's The Flying Dutchman, director Andreas Homoki sets the ship's action in a corporate boardroom, which may be modern but which illuminates nothing; at least Bryn Terfel in the title role and Anja Kampe as the heroine Senta give glorious performances that allow one to appreciate the musical side. Both operas look and sound excellent on Blu-ray; Otello extras include interviews.
Pit Stop
Spider Baby
(Arrow USA)
Director Jack Hill made sloppy, low-budget genre pictures that have become cult films, like 1969's Pit Stop, a straightforward if undistinguished action flick about figure-eight racing that's notable mainly for an early appearance by who would later become Oscar winner Ellen Burstyn.
1968's Spider Baby is another beast entirely: this amateurish drama about a demented family is weird enough to stay interesting, kind of like a car crash that draws gawking rubberneckers. Both films have been nicely restored on hi-def; extras include commentaries, interviews and featurettes.
(PBS)
In this new adaptation of the series of novels by Winston Graham about a man who returns home to England after fighting in the American Revolution, only to find his sweetheart betrothed to another man, Aidan Turner makes a smoldering Ross Poldark and Eleanor Tomlinson a sultry Demelza, the wild young woman he brings to his home as a servant and, later, his wife.
This eight-part, eight-hour mini-series was shot on visually spectacular Cornwall locations, but fast-paced storytelling and good acting make it soar. The Blu-ray looks fantastic; extras comprise interviews, featurettes and commentary on the first episode.
Serena
(Magnolia)
Although director Susanne Bier's melodramatic instincts overwhelm her serviceable material (the relationship between a timber baron and his independent young wife in Depression-era North Carolina), this isn't the fiasco that some critics have made it out to be.
If Bradley Cooper is little more than a one-dimensional pretty boy as the husband, Jennifer Lawrence again gives a fiercely committed, honest portrayal that compels one to keep watching even when her director, co-star and scriptwriter (Christopher Kyle) let her down. The film's photography (by Morten Soborg) glistens in hi-def; extras comprise deleted scenes and featurettes.
(Lionsgate)
This, yet another Noah Baumbach picture whose biggest frame of reference is other movies—and so has little of substance in its characters and their relationships—steals brazenly from Woody Allen's far superior Crimes and Misdemeanors (among other films) with a hackneyed generation-gap plot about a floundering documentary maker dealing with sundry professional and personal crises.
Baumbach tries having it both ways by simultaneously laughing at and with his own characters, regardless of age, but he doesn't have the finesse to pull it off; and any movie that makes Charles Grodin dull and unfunny is in trouble from the get-go. The film does look good on Blu; extras are behind-the-scenes featurettes.
Woman in Gold
(Anchor Bay/Weinstein Co.)
The true story of Gustav Klimt's painting of Adele Bloch-Bauer (now at the Neue Galerie in Manhattan), which was stolen by the Nazis, and how her elderly niece Maria Altmann sued the Austrian government for its return is routinely dramatized by director Simon Curtis, who has a solid anchor in Helen Mirren's trenchant portrayal of Maria.
Although Ryan Reynolds shows little charm or intelligence as her American lawyer, Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black) is as superb as Mirren as the younger Maria. At least Curtis doesn't condescend, as his Germans and Austrians are allowed to speak their language instead of heavily accented English. The film looks splendid on Blu; extras comprise Curtis's commentary, making-of featurette and Neue Galerie press conference.
First Peoples
(PBS)
This fascinating multi-part series examines our common ancestry by exploring where the first people to roam the planet came from, where they migrated to and how much of their DNA can still be found in our own, tens of thousands of years later.
The five one-hour episodes of First Peoples—set in the relevant areas of Asia, Australia, Europe, Africa and the Americas—comprise interviews with and discoveries by archeologists and genetic experts to enlighten viewers about ongoing explorations of our ancient, and current, history.
Human Capital
(Film Movement)
Director-cowriter Paolo Virzi’s probing drama about the global economy after the stock market collapse zeroes in on a dysfunctional family whose teenage son is accused of hitting a man while drunk driving.
Virzi juggles his story's strands effectively and the acting is estimable: although Valerie Bruni Tedeschi’s fine but unexceptional performance as the boy’s mother has gotten plaudits, they rightfully should go instead to Matilde Guidi’s lancingly truthful portrait of a friend of the son who holds his fate in her hands. Extras are a making-of featurette, deleted scenes, music video and a German short film, Job Interview.
(PBS)
Italian cycling champion Marco Pantani—lone winner of both the Tour de France and Giro d'Italia races in the same year (1998)—was part of a doping scandal on the heels of his return to racing following a near-fatal accident; then, in 2004, his lifeless body was found in a hotel room, victim of a drug overdose. How did this champion athlete and celebrity end up dead at age 34?
This documentary, directed by James Erskine, features emotional interviews with family, friends and competitors, along with archival footage of international news coverage and of Pantani himself to create a sympathetic but still-relevant cautionary tale.
Off-Broadway Reviews—"The Qualms," "Of Good Stock," "The Spoils"
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Thursday, 02 July 2015 23:32
- Written by Kevin Filipski
The Qualms
Written by Bruce Norris; directed by Pam MacKinnon
Performances through July 12, 2015
Of Good Stock
Written by Melissa Ross; directed by Lynne Meadow
Performances through July 26, 2015
The Spoils
Written by Jessie Eisenberg; directed by Scott Elliott
Performances through June 28, 2015
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| Kate Arrington, Jeremy Shamos and Sarah Goldberg in The Qualms (photo: Joan Marcus) |
Having won the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award for his 2010 world premiere at Playwrights Horizons, Clybourne Park—a play far worthier in theory than in execution—Bruce Norris returns with his latest, The Qualms, again indulging in his predilection for words—mainly, parsing what people say to one another—to the detriment of all else.
Swingers Gary and Teri have invited newcomers Chris and Kristy to a party at their beachfront condo where, after drinks, hors d'oeuvresand small talk, the invitees—who also include friends Deb and Ken, and Roger and Regine—pair off for wife- and husband-swapping. The other couples' relaxed and carefree attitudes intrigue Kristy but unnerve Chris, who starts arguing with the others on the slightest pretext about anything.
If you go to this play for sex or nudity, don’t bother, since Norris isn’t interested: a short scene when each partner pairs off with another is short-circuited by Chris erupting angrily after Regine teases him with face slaps. Chris then insults Deb's weight, Ken's androgyny, Gary's hippier-than-thou temperament and Roger's tough-guy persona, resulting in Ken finally knocking him down and Chris becoming a pariah among a pretty liberal group of people, which embarrasses Kristy, who’s obviously itching for spice in their (her?) life.
After setting up this uneasy situation among normal, everyday people, Norris short-circuits it by having Chris go too far, to the point where it becomes apparent that being aggressively pedantic and jealous would almost certainly have prevented him from even attending this party, however enticing the thought of an orgy might have been in the abstract. Despite such implausibility, Jeremy Shamos plays Chris with such intensity and brilliant bitchiness that he makes us at first root for—then, later, against—him, even when Norris ramps up his reactionary reactions against the others.
Really, there's not much of a play here—a late appearance by a delivery man is designed to extend the flimsy plot for a further few minutes with cheap laughs, while Teri’s final monologue adds little—but Pam MacKinnon's skillful direction and an accomplished cast get the job done. Although Shamos is the stand-out, Sarah Goldberg’s appealingly smoldering Kristy and Noah Emmerich’s hilariously matter-of-fact Roger are not far behind. And it all takes place on Todd Rosenthal’s astonishingly enticing set of Gary and Teri’s condo that’s almost (but not quite) in Ikea-like bad taste.
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| Jennifer Mudge, Heather Lind and Alicia Silverstone in Of Good Stock (photo: Joan Marcus) |
The set is also the thing in Melissa Ross's Of Good Stock, where master Santo Loquasto—winner of 3 Tony awards and 18 Tony nominations, along with 3 Oscar nods for Woody Allen's Zelig, Radio Days and Bullets Over Broadway—has fashioned a Cape Cod summer cottage so warmly enriching and homey that anyone would want to kick the actors out and move in.
Not that Ross's play is totally negligible; far from it. Exploring how three grown sisters have been screwed up by their famous novelist father's legacy—along with how he treated them and their saintly mother while alive—Of Good Stock introduces down-to-earth Jess, the oldest, fighting cancer and living in the family house (now hers) with food writer husband Fred; headstrong Celie, the youngest, who arrives with her latest boyfriend Hunter, one of 13 siblings from Missoula, Montana; and high-strung Amy, the middle one, newly engaged to Josh and flaunting her impending wedding to the consternation of the others, even her fiancé.
Ross, whose characters and dialogue alternate between funny and poignant, acerbic and sentimental, sweet and crude, has engagingly written about a too-familiar subject. But her ear at times turns tin: everyone drops F-bombs as casually as DeNiro and Pesci in Raging Bull, which wouldn't be bad if the play's pivotal scene—the sisters, outside the house at the dock after a night of drinking and arguing, finally let their feelings out by yelling "Fuck Dad," “Fuck cancer,” ad nauseum at the top of their lungs—didn't go over the top with the same expletive. Having the F-word already scattered throughout the play sucks the emotion out of what should be a powerful moment of catharsis for the sisters and the audience.
Slickly staged by Lynne Meadow, the play features several fine performers, with Jennifer Mudge’s Jess as subtle as Alicia Silverstone’s Amy is shrill. Still, a decent production of a decent play on an outstanding set is a not-bad way to spend a couple hours.
 |
| The cast of The Spoils (photo: Monique Carboni) |
Jesse Eisenberg, who specializes in narcissistic geeks as an actor, has been writing those same parts for himself as a playwright. His last play, The Revisionist, was insufferable; his latest, The Spoils, is less so, but still wears out its welcome long before it ends. It concerns Ben (Eisenberg, of course), a borderline sociopath who enjoys mocking everyone and everything, mainly his roommate Kalyan from Nepal, along with Kalyan's Indian girlfriend Reshma, who at least sees through Ben.
Eisenberg piles incident on top of incident as Ben embarrasses others and himself as he loutishly talks and talks, and insults and insults: it's amusing for a while, but a little of it goes a very long way, as Eisenberg the actor and Ben the character aren’t as charming and Archie Bunker-ishly loveable as Eisenberg the playwright thinks they are. A 75-minute one-act might work, but 2-1/2 hours and two acts don’t.
Not once but twice Ben goes into a lengthy—and unnecessarily explicit—description of a dream he once had about Sarah, a childhood friend he wants to take from Ted, another grade-school buddy with whom he just reconnected; then there’s the entire second act, which comprises another long and unfunny digression, this time of all of the characters punning on the phrase "I can't believe it's not butter," followed by desultory showdowns between Ben and each character in turn.
The final moments—Sarah’s lone memory of Ben as a nice person (albeit in grade school), dragged in out of left field in a belated attempt to bandage his reputation as a jerk—are a playwright’s desperate but failed attempt at meaning. But with Scott Elliott's lively directing on Derek McLane's purloined Manhattan apartment set and finely tuned performances by the cast (even Eisenberg in his motor-mouthed, single-minded way), I can’t believe it’s not better.
The Qualms
Playwrights Horizons, 410 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
playwrightshorizons.org
Of Good Stock
Manhattan Theatre Club, 131 West 55th Street, New York, NY
manhattantheatreclub.com
The Spoils
The New Group @ Signature Center, 480 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
thenewgroup.org
June '15 Digital Week V
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 30 June 2015 13:14
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Blu-rays of the Week
Feuersnot
(Arthaus Musik)
Richard Strauss's second opera, while nowhere near as memorable as the masterpieces Elektra and Salome (which followed and made his career), contains enough of the composer's typically sumptuous melodies and signature vocal writing to make it worth hearing, and this 2014 Palmero, Italy, staging does the job.
Thanks to heroic singing by Nicola Beller Carbone and Dietrich Hentschel as the central lovers, it's a pleasantly diverting musical experience. The Blu-ray looks fine, the music sounds tremendou, and the lone extra is a making-of featurette.
(Lionsgate)
If John Travolta isn't very credible as an expert art forger working on a new project (a famous Monet canvas) while dealing with his grumpy father and terminal ill son in Philip Martin's middling melodrama, there's partial compensation in the supporting performances.
Christopher Plummer makes an amusingly grizzled grandfather and Tye Sheridan a believable dying teen, while Jennifer Ehle has a nice cameo as the kid's estranged mother and Abigail Spencer punches up an underwritten detective role. The movie looks sharp on Blu; lone extra is a short featurette.
Get Hard
(Warner Brothers)
When you pair Will Farrell and Kevin Hart in a movie about a rich banker going to prison who hires a thug (so he thinks) to prep him for the big house, you know exactly what you'll get: a lot of racial—if not outright racist—jokes and gags, many going on too long for meager comic returns, especially in the longer uncut version.
Director Etan Cohen knows what viewers want, so lets Farrell and Hart go through their usual shtick, providing hearty laughs amid the dross. The hi-def transfer is first-rate; extras include deleted scenes, a gag reel and Farrell and Hart interviews.
(Arrow USA)
Even by the usual standards of Japanese director Takashi Miike, The Katakuris (2001) is demented and daffy, its surrealist touches, claymation sequences, song-and-dance numbers and even karaoke scenes adding up to a lot of initial delight but, since it shoots its black-comic wad early, it becomes a limping, draggy farce by its end.
Those movie buffs who are on Miike's wavelength will no doubt get more out of it than the rest of us; it must be said that you won't see anything like it, for better or (mostly) worse. The Blu-ray image sparkles; extras include a Miike commentary and interview, making-of documentary and cast interviews.
I Am Evel Knievel
(Virgil Films)
In the 1970s, among the most famous men in the world was a death-defying motorcycle-jumping stuntman who made headlines even when he failed spectacularly, as when he fell into the Snake River Canyon or crushed many bones attempting to jump 13 buses.
Evel Knievel the icon is profiled in this hagiographic but still interesting documentary by directors Derik Murray and David Ray: his sons, wives, fans and friends (like Matthew McCoanughery, Kid Rock and Guy Fieri) attest to his being a rock-solid symbol of the American pursuit of happiness. The hi-def image looks decent; extras are two featurettes.
Survivor
(Alchemy)
This action flick, directed by James McTeigue (who made his debut with V for Vendetta), makes scant sense, but once it gets going—after special agent Milla Jovovich, lone survivor of an explosive attack, is simultaneously tracked by and tracking assassin Pierce Brosnan—it rarely lets up during its diverting 90-minute running time.
The finale, set in Times Square on New Year's Eve, stretches credulity to the breaking point, but so what? This definition of mindless fun looks superb on Blu-ray. Extras comprise a featurette and deleted scenes.
The Who—Live at Shea Stadium 1982
Rolling Stones From the Vault—The Marquee Club 1971
Rolling Stones From the Vault—The Marquee Club 1971
(Eagle Rock)
The Who's final tour as a functioning band—for its underrated It's Hard album in 1982—stopped at Shea Stadium for two nights; this hard-hitting two-hour show, mixing then-new and classic tunes like "Eminence Front," "Cry If You Want" and a Quadrophenia medley, was filmed the second night. Roger Daltrey's vocals had toughness and feel he's since lost, Pete Townshend was in exceptional wind-milling form, and John Entwistle's bass and Kenney Jones' drums were in lockstep throughout. Extras comprise five songs from the first night at Shea.
The Rolling Stones were at their peak at the time of this 1971 London concert, even if it's only 8 songs in 38 minutes (with 4 songs from the yet unreleased Sticky Fingers showcased): Mick's cutting vocals, Keith Richards and Mick Taylor's guitar interplay and the rock-solid rhythm section of bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts take center stage. The accompanying CD includes the same tracks; extras are alternative takes of "Bitch" and "I Got the Blues."
DVDs of the Week
Marcel Ophuls and Jean-Luc Godard: The Meeting in St-Gervais
(Icarus)
Legendary directors Marcel Ophuls and Jean-Luc Godard sat down for a discussion in Geneva, Switzerland, which begins by Godard's childhood reminiscences of World War II after seeing Ophuls' classic 1972 documentary epic The Sorrow and the Pity, which prompts Ophuls to candidly discuss the film's initial hostile reception in France.
The two men's engaging 45-minute conversation about their films and their lives remains fascinating throughout, especially for fans of the directors, although it has the feel of a DVD extra rather than its own full-fledged release.
(Film Movement)
Aidan Gillen's excellent portrayal of Tom, a man whose life has unraveled since his beloved teenage son died in a tragic car crash, provides the emotional center of director Simon Blake's atmospheric, hard-hitting thriller.The intensity of Gillen's acting is sometimes difficult to watch, but it's equally difficult to look away from, especially when events spin out of control once Tom becomes embroiled in a local gang feud. Extras are deleted scenes and Gillen/Blake interviews.
Stop The Pounding Heart
(Big World Pictures)In this slow-moving but absorbing hybrid of documentary and unscripted drama, director Roberto Minervini introduces a strictly religious couple and their 12 children who live on a farm in the American South: the kids are home-schooled, and we watch as teenage daughter Sara deals with unknown feelings after she meets a young man.
Sara's confusion over what her own faith and her parents taught her provides Minervini with the heart of his film, and with utmost delicacy he creates a low-key, uncondescending exploration of an insular community; in Sara Carlson he has found the perfect vessel for his spiritually questioning filmmaking.
Music Review—The New York Philharmonic's Finale(s)
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Sunday, 28 June 2015 22:55
- Written by Kevin Filipski
New York Philharmonic
Performances June 10-13, 17-24, 2015
Various locations, New York, NY
nyphil.org
Honegger—Jeanne d'arc au bucher/Joan of Arc at the Stake (Alpha DVD)
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| Cotillard (center) in Joan of Arc at the Stake (photo: Chris Lee) |
The New York Philharmonic ended its current season with indoor and outdoor finales: an overdue Avery Fisher Hall hearing of Arthur Honegger's emotive oratorio Joan of Arc at the Stake with a powerful Marion Cotillard was followed by 50th anniversary celebrations of the orchestra's city parks concerts (with a final indoor concert on Staten Island).
Cotillard was the main draw for the Honegger concert, and she did not disappoint, finding expressivity and subtlety in the title speaking role of the French teenager condemned to death for heresy in 1431. But Honegger's vibrant oratorio, sensitively played by the Philharmonic under music director Alan Gilbert, is the real deal: unafraid to combine high and low, sacred and profane, secular and liturgical in his majestic setting of Paul Claudel's poetic text, Honegger provides heroic musical moments for two choruses, soloists, speakers and orchestral players.
It's too bad that this unimpeachable work was so clunkily directed by Côme de Bellescize, who takes what Honegger's music so slyly, even sarcastically alludes to—the jury as sheep, the judge a pig, the secretary an ass—then adds cartoonish costumes and a leaden way of unnecessarily literalizing everything to make a far from ideal staging of this eloquent masterpiece.
To better experience Cotillard's sublime portrayal in Honegger's towering oratorio, track down the new
DVD on the Alpha label (right) of a 2012 Barcelona performance: his emotional music and her brave, fearless portrayal shine through far more than in Bellescize's trendy staging. And the close-ups of Cotillard's tear-filled face at the finale are far more satisfying than straining to watch her standing behind the orchestra at the rear of the Avery Fisher stage during the climax.
A few days later in Central Park, Charles Dutoit conducted a program of French music and Stravinsky’s Petrushka ballet. The mood was festive right from the opener, Hector Berlioz's Roman Carnival Overture, while Camille Saint-Saëns' Third Violin Concerto had Renaud Capuçon as the triumphant soloist. After intermission, Petrushka and Ravel's La Valsewere played to appreciative applause, even if it was nearly impossible to hear the subtleties of Stravinsky outdoors.
But that quibble couldn't ruin a beautiful night, capped as it was by a rousing fireworks display.
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