Interstellar (2014) – Review

Review: Interstellar is magnificent – a marvelous display of technical and aesthetic splendor on a massive scale built around the deeply moving and emotional story of a father and daughter.

The film takes place in the not too far away future. The Earth’s crops have begun to die out, leaving the world in a state of hunger, humanity’s population gravely thinning out. The environment too has become more severe, dust storms engulfing towns and cities, resembling the Dust Bowl crisis during the Great Depression. Man’s time on Earth has come to an end. Meanwhile, former NASA pilot Cooper has become a farmer (as Earth needs food, not pilots), raising his young son, Tom, and daughter, Murph, after his wife passed away. Mankind has become a race of farmers and caretakers, desperately trying to cling to what the Earth has left, giving up what they now believe to be the wasteful and childish ideas of exploration and discovery. Cooper still believes in progress, however, as an engineer. He raises his children to think critically and not be content with their place (putting him and them at odds with the general population). Tom, however, is content to be a farmer when he grows up, but it is clear that Murph has the spirit and imagination of an explorer and/or scientist. She discovers a gravitational anomaly that leads her and Cooper to a secret NASA base (they have gone underground due to their public unpopularity). Cooper learns that NASA is working on a last ditch effort to save humanity (certain that Earth’s last substantial crop, corn, will too soon die out). A mission through a newly discovered wormhole (which appeared around the same time as many other strange gravitational anomalies across our solar system) to search three potential habitual planets in a new galaxy that would otherwise be outside the reach of mankind. If one of these planets can support life, maybe mankind has a chance. Cooper agrees to go on the mission, piloting the spacecraft, knowing that he will likely never see his family again, leaving his daughter Murph heartbroken. Cooper feels he must go. He along with three other astronauts are humanity’s last, best chance (and Cooper’s only chance to save his family). Like any review, there are going to be some spoilers in the discussion of the film. Be warned.

Interstellar begins on Earth, which has become an almost uninhabitable planet, slowly killing off mankind as crops are one-by-one overtaken by blight. Writer-director Christopher Nolan (who co-wrote the film with his brother Jonathan Nolan) takes something very much rooted in reality – the fact that humans are devastatingly altering the Earth’s environment – and projects it forward to an apocalyptic climax. People living in this wasteland talk about the past (our present) with distain – our greed and carelessness put us on the path to our own destruction. There is also a clever nod to the idea that seems to be popular today that space exploration is a waste of our resources. In Interstellar’s grim future, people believe that space exploration was all an elaborate scam, perpetrated to bankrupt the Cold War era Soviet Union, as they tried to match the U.S. bomb for bomb and beat them to the Moon (and beyond). It was a waste of resources, exemplifying the decadence of the past. Their textbooks have been altered to teach this to students, now believed to be the truth.

Nolan, with Interstellar, seems to be trying to once again spark interest in space exploration, in discovery – something that was very much a part of our culture (at least for those alive during the U.S.’s NASA missions). Growing up in the 1960s-1980s, every child dreamed of being an astronaut, exploring the wonders of space, leading to the overwhelming popularity of science fiction (films like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars – all of which are big influences on Interstellar). But something changed within our culture, within us. We no longer look up to the stars and dream. Technologically speaking, this is a grave tragedy, as NASA’s scientists greatly pushed technological advancement forward as they frantically worked to conquer the great unknown. The majesty, grandness and beauty of Interstellar will hopefully reignite our imaginations, our drive to explore (something that seemingly has always been a part of what makes us human, but has somehow been lost) and our willingness to take risks – to make our dreams into reality. Nolan screened The Right Stuff to invigorate his crew with this spirit of discovery.

Technically and aesthetically, the film is utterly spellbinding. The visuals are unlike anything else in modern cinema (greatly trumping last year’s Gravity by comparison, which I thought was fantastic as well on a visual level, but this film is on an entirely different level of beauty and grandeur). I highly recommend seeing it in IMAX, as the film has over an hour of footage that takes advantage of the formats expansive 70mm film stock (here is a list of IMAX theaters, for real IMAX look for theaters with the 15/70mm screens). Interstellar is a marvel alone for its technical and aesthetic achievements (most of which were created in camera – which is very uncommon today).

Yet, to sustain the audience for the film’s long runtime, there must also be substance. Many have accused Nolan’s work of lacking emotion in the past (something I do not agree with, but it seems to be the general consensus among critics). Interstellar is different. It is Nolan’s most emotional film. The story is very simple. It is about the relationship between Cooper and Murph. She feels betrayed when he leaves. He has left her to grow up without parents, abandoned to die on the Earth while he potentially restarts humanity on a new planet. Nolan mines this relationship for all its dramatic emotion. Due to relativity caused by a black hole called Gargantua, Cooper loses twenty three years in only a few hours, watching his children grow up through a series of video messages, unable to send return messages. This scene is tragic, as Cooper realizes what he is giving up. His motivation is to get back to his children, but visiting each of these potential planets advances time greatly for Earth relative to the short amount of time he has spent on the planets. Cooper realizes that he may not be able to see his children again, which crushes him.

Nolan’s character development is very good as well. The first act stage setting, detailing the relationships between the characters, goes a long way, paying off profoundly as Cooper and Murph’s relationship develops. We understand why Cooper must go, but also the loss felt by Murph. Seeing Cooper’s children age (and grow up without him) and his devastation at the very real realization that he will likely never see them again also crushes us as well.

Cooper and Murph are also mirrored by Dr. Amelia Brand and her father Professor Brand. Amelia leaves on the mission while her father stays behind working on a solution to save the people on Earth. There is a plan A and plan B. Plan A sees humanity rocket off the Earth on a massive space station (Professor Brand just has not solved the equation allowing it to be possible, but he is confident he will), while Plan B sees Cooper, Amelia and the two other astronauts repopulate humanity on a new planet with hundreds of embryos that they have brought along. Murph is devastated by her father leaving and Amelia is also devastated when she learns the truth that plan A is a lie, enacted to bring people together, to work together supporting plan B. Professor Brand had already solved his equation long ago, but it was a dead-end. It was his intention all along for plan B to be humanity’s salvation. Amelia cannot believe that her father would betray her by lying to her and Murph, learning the truth as well, is consumed by the idea that her father knew and left her to die on Earth. Here again, Nolan achieves real emotional resonance, drawing the audience further in. Seeing Murph’s anger towards Cooper is heartbreaking for us as well. We care deeply about these characters. We want to see them succeed. Thus, the action plays on a much more emotional level for us. We are completely engrossed.

The action is thrilling. Interstellar has a number of grand action sequences that are very entertaining, both on a visual and dramatic level. Nolan is a master of building tension; and this film has a number of agonizingly tense moments that grab you and do not let go. The film also uses the idea of evil very well. The film postulates that there is no evil in nature, only in what humans bring with them. Thus, in a new galaxy, untouched by mankind, the only evil is that of man. This plays out wonderfully through the character of Dr. Mann. He is described by the crew as “the best of all of us”. Dr. Mann is one of the twelve scientists who left ten years prior to Cooper’s mission to scout potential planets and relay the data that they find. Dr. Mann has sent back his data with the message that his planet has incredible potential. Yet, things are not as they appear on his planet when Cooper and Amelia arrive. Dr. Mann is overcome by his own mortality, prioritizing his own survival over anything else. He falsified his data so that the team would come to his planet to save him. Nolan again does a great job of creating characters that seem to mirror each other. Both Cooper and Dr. Mann are presented as heroes who sacrifice everything to save humanity; however, when everything is on the line, their true natures take over. Cooper proves himself to be selfless while Dr. Mann is selfish. Mankind’s drive to survive makes him able to be either selfless or selfish, good or evil, hero or villain, brave or cowardly (and sometimes both). Dr. Mann is the film’s villain, but he is not really a villain in the classical sense. More so, he is just a man who has given in to his own weakness.

Getting back to the narrative, Nolan is well known for his plot twists. Interstellar, as said above, tells a very simple story on a massively grand scale. While it does contain a number of plot twists, they are not the point of the story, and honestly they are not really big twists to those paying attention (as well as those with an understanding of film structure – or those who have just seen a lot of movies). Everything is clearly telegraphed to the audience (generally a staple of good storytelling). Again, Nolan has created a film that seems to transcend what we typically think of as a blockbuster. While it does have similar elements (big action sequences, plot twists and a grand scale/scope), Nolan seems to have a much higher ambition. He wants to make a sci-fi epic that is visually compelling, emotionally engaging and thought provoking, along the lines of classics like 2001: A Space Odyssey (which he fantastically pays homage to through some great tongue-and-cheek dialog from the astronauts' robot companion TARS) and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. These types of films are almost completely non-existent in today’s cinema (which is sad). I think Nolan succeeds in his ambition.

The science of the film is also a big element in its construction. The Nolan Brothers worked closely with physicist Kip Thorne (who serves as an executive producer) on the script, the feasibility and look of the film. Interstellar relies on the audience’s understanding of wormholes, black holes, relativity, and other scientific principles and theories. It sounds like a tall order to get all this information across without the film being bogged down in its science. Nolan, here, succeeds spectacularly as well. The film is paced wonderfully to keep things moving. The exposition and science are woven expertly into the dialogue, leaving the audience informed and never bored (something Nolan probably learned writing and making Inception, a film in which he creates the character of Ariadne just so everything can be explained to the audience). Everything is also shown visually as well, taking advantage of the majesty of the film’s beautiful imagery.

Interstellar, however, is also a film that is likely to prove to be somewhat decisive for viewers. There are elements that can potentially feel very hokey (mostly stemming from Murph’s ghost and the twist involving what it actually is). It is again a film about a father and daughter; thus, its resolution is going to be about these characters, their relationship. The film takes such big risks with its narrative in the third act that they are not going to work for everyone. Yet, it is these risks that also create the film’s most emotionally captivating and powerful moments. Thus, if they do feel overly hokey, the film will possibly leave you disappointed; but, if they engage you on the intended emotional level, the film works beautifully.

Nolan is an optimist. While the film begins with the potential end of humanity, it ends with hope, a confidence that we can be better, that we can once again reach for the stars. It is Nolan’s most beautiful and touching film. Interstellar is grandiose due to its striking imagery and ambition; but it is a film that exceeds its blockbuster label, resonating on a much more emotional level, getting at the core of what makes us human – our ability to love, to endure and to look up at the stars, imagining our place among them, seeking out the unknown.

Technical, aesthetic & acting achievements: Christopher Nolan has now made nine feature films. Nolan began his career with the micro budget (a sparse $6,000) crime drama mystery/thriller Following. Despite the small budget, the film foreshadows the narrative themes and storytelling style that Nolan is now famous for. He then made his breakthrough film, Memento, a mystery thriller that stormed the world of independent film and made Nolan a star overnight. He came to Hollywood, first making Insomnia and following it up with his brilliant The Dark Knight trilogy (Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises), representing the heights to which genre (superhero/comic book) filmmaking can achieve. Between his Batman films, he made a wonderful film about dueling magicians, The Prestige, and a massive action thriller that assumes that the audience is actively engaged and not just a passive, distracted observer waiting to be cheaply entertained with Inception. That brings us to Interstellar. Nolan’s films have operated on a massive scale (especially the last three), both narratively and physically – Nolan integrating more and more IMAX footage with each film. He is a director who makes spectacles in the classical sense – grand epics that thrill us while also challenging us dramatically and emotionally. He is an auteur in the truest sense of the word; and yet unlike most other auteurs working today, he makes films intended to be blockbusters. He does it better than anyone else right now. It is his gift to take on such an immense scale and scope with his films and not lose their dramatic and emotional cores. While his films are blockbusters, his characters are just as rich and well developed as any in cinema. Interstellar is both his most ambitious and his most personal (shooting under the title Flora’s Letter, named for his daughter). It is also maybe Nolan’s most polarizing film, stemming from the narrative risks he takes. I think Interstellar is a masterful work, daring to be a blockbuster that aspires to be original and thought provoking (similar to the grand epics of the past, like Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey) when Hollywood cinema has become reductive, constantly recycling the same ideas over and over, afraid to take risks because missteps today are too costly. Nolan worked his way up with his marvelous films, Inception probably being the key stepping stone, allowing him to aim high and swing big. I, for one, am glad he did. Interstellar is an incredible cinematic experience.

As stated many times above, Interstellar is a wonder of aesthetic and technical majesty. Composer Hans Zimmer’s score is breathtaking (it very well might have been my favorite part of the film). It is different than anything else found in other current blockbusters. Zimmer’s music is grand and beautiful, completely emotionally engulfing the viewer (here is the main theme). It resonates incredibly well with the striking visuals, creating a full emotional experience (I wish I could go back and see it again for the first time and hear the music again for the first time). Filling in for Wally Pfister (Interstellar is only Nolan’s second film not shot by Pfister, the other is Following), cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema delivers stunning work. The photography in the film is astounding, arresting and wondrous. Nolan’s characters and their emotional journey are the core of the film, but Hoytema’s photography is just as big a part of Interstellar’s power and grandeur. Production designer Nathan Crowley does a wonderful job as well. Although the film does take place in the future, his work feels very much rooted in the past, representing a society that has suffered a grave setback. His spacecraft designs are very utilitarian, looking like they were put together in a hodgepodge fashion using many eras of technology (with digital and analog options). Earth does not look very futurist either (matching the idea that humanity is on the decline), as if technological advancement came to a halt and maybe even regressed.

The cast of Interstellar is very good. John Lithgow, Ellen Burstyn, Casey Affleck, and Wes Bentley are good in small supporting roles. David Gyasi plays Romilly, one of the four astronauts on the mission. His role is fairly small, but Gyasi does a lot with it, showing the emotional and physical toll that the mission takes on his character. He is excellent in the film. Bill Irwin plays TARS one of the robots that accompanies the astronauts on their mission. Irwin gives TARS a wonderfully sly wit, providing the film's best comedic moments. Michael Caine plays Professor Brand (possibly a surrogate for Kip Thorne), the principal scientist at NASA and the chief engineer behind the mission to save humanity. Caine brings a weighted gravity to his performance that is very effective. The reveal of his grand lie is one of the more powerful moments in the film. Matt Damon plays Dr. Mann, an astronaut/scientist who puts himself ahead of mankind’s survival. Damon does not often get to play the villain, but he is very good at it. Dr. Mann does terrible and cowardly things. Damon is so good at being overly self-justified and sleazy, creating a great character in Dr. Mann. Mackenzie Foy plays Young Murph. She is very good, showcasing Murph’s intelligence, wonder and absolute devastation when her father leaves her. Foy sets the stage for Jessica Chastain who plays the character grown up. Chastain plays Murph as a character who has been hurt. She is still haunted by the decision her father made, unable to forgive him. Yet, it also makes her determined to do her part in saving humanity, as she works with Professor Brand on his equation and preparing for plan A’s success. Chastain’s best moments come when she discovers that plan A is a lie, reigniting the heartbreak she felt when her father left, but also strengthen her resolve to find a way to save humanity even more. Anne Hathaway plays Dr. Amelia Brand, also one of the astronauts. Hathaway plays Amelia with a certain naivety that when crushed opens her up to becoming stronger as a person (to some extend mirroring Murph’s resolve in the face of plan A being revealed as a lie). Hathaway is very good, transitioning from her naivety to real strength. Matthew McConaughey plays Cooper, taking on the responsibility of being the audience’s surrogate in the narrative (their way into the story). It is very difficult to play the everyman and still create a full character. McConaughey does this particularly well (he is having a fantastic year – winning an Oscar, giving what might be the year’s best performance in HBO’s True Detective and now delivering yet another fine performance in this). He is likable, yet does not pander. He is a rebel in the classical sense, yearning for something more than being a farmer. He gets his wish, but at a great cost. The audience feels for him, cares about him and wants to see him succeed – all key elements to the film working. His performance achieves all these things and more.

Summary & score: Interstellar is a monumental achievement of acting, aesthetic and technical triumphs. It is a blockbuster that dares to be so much more, filled with rich characters, moving drama and real emotional resonance. 10/10

The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) – Review

Review: The Wolf of Wall Street is an insane, hysterical, and utterly compelling look at the American Dream (i.e. what has become a culture of consumerism and materialism run amuck). The film is about Jordan Belfort, a stockbroker who worked his way up from peddling penny stocks to owning and running his own brokerage firm – making millions of dollars in the process, allowing him to live a lavish and extravagantly debauched lifestyle. However, not all his business practices are legal, leading to an FBI investigation. Belfort has the money to fight it, but will his ego allow him to skate under the radar?

With The Wolf of Wall Street, director Martin Scorsese has made a new kind of gangster film, one that somewhat adheres to the genre conventions (the rise from nothing to become powerful, not being able to walk away, and the eventual fall), but plays so much more audacious. In some ways, the film feels a lot like Casino (minus all the violence). It is essentially the story of a man who can see all the angles (in this case the ability to sell anything to anyone) but is ultimately pulled down and betrayed by those closest to him.

It works very well in this way as a character piece, but what makes it so electric and engaging is that Scorsese brings the audience into a world and into the psyche of a man that are held as the ideal in popular culture (extreme wealth and privilege and all that comes with it – who does not dream about being grotesquely rich) only to twist it revealing the drug and sex fueled cultural underbelly of Wall Street, and the men and women who operate seemingly without morals to make as much money as possible while exploiting their most exaggerated desires, degrading humanity with the power of their cash. It is a world that seems so enticing, even in its darkest, most dehumanizing moments. The audience is as much thrilled as they are shocked and/or incensed by what Scorsese shows them. This wildly inappropriate lifestyle (compared to their normal average daily lives) just seems too much fun (even if they hate to admit it), despite being utterly shallow and vain. If only for a moment, the audience is swept up by the striking charisma of Belfort and lose themselves in the never-ending party (much like Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby).

What makes the film so much different than Scorsese’s past gangster films however is that The Wolf of Wall Street, while structurally abiding to the formula, plays as a comedy – an insane and amazing comedy. The film is probably the funniest film of 2013. Scorsese is also completely fearless with the material. He allows scenes to be milked for every piece of comedic gold (something that often pays off with great and wonderful rewards – for example the whole sequence following Belford’s consumption of the lemon Quaaludes). Scorsese also goes big with the performances he garners, which fits the tone fantastically. Everything feels a bit over the top, yet everything works perfectly within the context of the tone and the narrative. Scorsese is able to find the perfect balance of comedy and character.

However, the film is not going to work for everyone. It is extremely graphic and crude, which will have a polarizing effect. Belfort is also a mostly unlikable character. He is downright despicable, in fact. And yet, Scorsese’s direction and Leonardo DiCaprio’s performance create a man who completely commands the screen, and like with the best antiheroes in film history the audience cannot help but find themselves rooting for him (despite disagreeing with everything he is). Belfort is charismatic and charming – and even though the audience knows he is destined to fall (as that is what the genre dictates must happen), part of them wants to see him win. Although, some will find him unredeemable and will be unaffected by his charm, and for those viewers the film will likely lose a lot of its infectious appeal.

Something that is also very interesting about The Wolf of Wall Street is what it says about America (and really the rest of the world that is now also beginning to buy into the culture of materialism, consumerism, and plain greed). Really, there is nothing to like in these characters. All of them are awful people, but again the audience cannot help but find them and their lifestyle magnetic and alluring (even if it is soulless and empty). Have we as people become so consumed with greed that we want the world at the cost of everyone else? That is what Wall Street is founded on. It is an industry built on getting rich on clients’ money without regard for their wellbeing, yet clients continue to line up in droves. Trading stocks is no different than gambling for the average investor, and many brokers will say anything to push their product because all they care about is the commission (as the clients are already hooked by the thrill of the roll of the dice). The whole financial industry really is just a cesspool of greed, allowing the rich to great richer at the cost of everyone and everything else. Scorsese’s film clearly details the people and culture of this industry. As exaggerated as the film may appear, this is what Wall Street is actually like, what the people are actually like – and yet people continue to give them their money, because they too want their chance to be rich. Each stock holds the promise of something spectacular, just like the turn of each new card or throw of the dice. Humanity very well may already be lost – Scorsese is just reminding us how we got here.

The Wolf of Wall Street is completely entertaining. It is contagiously funny. Using charm and the allure of the American Dream, it pulls the viewer in, exposing them to the crazy world of the Wall Street broker – a world that is at the same time unbelievable, engrossing, and disgusting.

Technical, aesthetic & acting achievements: The Wolf of Wall Street is everything one has come to expect from a Martin Scorsese gangster film, yet unlike anything else the director has done to date. The film grabs the viewer from the start and does not let them go until the credits – whether they are watching with giddy joy or shocked disgust. It is probably premature to say this (being that I have only seen the film once), but it might be my favorite Scorsese film (my other favorites are Taxi Driver, Goodfellas, and The Departed). I just found it to be incredibly funny, captivating, and thoroughly compelling (and maybe it makes me deplorable, but I loved every minute of it).

Scorsese uses music extremely well in his films, and The Wolf of Wall Street is no different. The film features a fantastic soundtrack, with iconic songs that give the viewer a sense of the time period of each sequence and sets the stage tonally. Rodrigo Prieto’s cinematography is fantastic as well (probably the best work of his career to date). His collaboration with Scorsese gives the film a heightened feel, as if the characters and their world exist on a different plain of reality (which in many ways it does). Bob Shaw’s production design is also top notch. While the characters feel very big and maybe even overblown at times, his work seems to ground everything in reality, as everything looks and feels honest to the world.

The performances in the film are brilliant. Jean Dujardin is a lot of fun in a small supporting role, while Kyle Chandler brings a dose of ‘everyman’ to his supporting role as the FBI agent investigating Belfort. Jon Bernthal is great as Brad, a member of Belfrot’s inner circle. He plays the quintessential New Jersey meathead type. Matthew McConaughey is also fantastic as Belfort’s mentor and inductor into a world of loose morals and unbelievable greed (continuing his very strong year, which also includes Mud and Dallas Buyers Club). Newcomer Margot Robbie is wonderful as Belfort’s second wife Naomi. She almost steals every scene she is in – scenes opposite other brilliant actors and great performances – as she just pulls attention towards her (and not just because of her looks). She has a great energy epitomizing a person using whatever they have to socially climb. Jonah Hill also steals scenes as Belfort’s best friend and business partner Donnie (it is his best work to date). Hill plays Donnie to be just a complete asshole, constantly presenting himself as an antagonist in every situation. He is utterly unlikable, and yet so dynamic. Leonardo DiCaprio turns in one of his best performances as well as Belfort. At first he seems like a sincere, nice guy – but once he gets a taste of the lifestyle that money can afford him, the complete abandoning of morals is intoxicatingly freeing. He can do whatever he wants, literally (or so he feels). DiCaprio just has a lot of fun with the character, which in turn translates full on for the audience who also has fun with him.

Summary & score: The Wolf of Wall Street jumps off the screen, forcing the viewer to experience something powerful (be it sheer jovial excitement, utter amazement, scornful shock, or discernment). It is a modern masterwork that showcases the dark side of the American Dream. 9/10 

Dallas Buyers Club (2013) – Review

Review: Dallas Buyers Club is a good character drama built on a great leading performance. The film is about Ron Woodroof, a Texas electrician and rodeo bull rider who contracts the HIV virus in 1985. Woodroof must face the social stigma of the disease, and worse – he must fight against the pharmaceutical industry (having both the FDA and medical community in their pockets) to get medication that might actually help him and others (similarly afflicted).

The film functions both as a character drama and a social/political drama. The character drama focuses on a man who essentially loses everything and needs to rebuild his world anew. Woodroof can be characterized as a man’s man. He works hard, but probably parties harder, engaging in lots of illicit drugs, sex, and alcohol. This lifestyle leads to him contracting the HIV virus, which in the 1980s was completely associated by the general population as being a ‘gay disease’ (before HIV, it was commonly referred to as GRID – gay-related immune deficiency). Thus, Woodroof is suddenly stricken with not only the disease but a social stigma as well, isolating him from his friends and the world he previously knew.

Director Jean-Marc Vallee does a good job with the character moments. When the audience first meets Woodroof, he is not a particularly likable character (especially when held to modern social conventions). And yet, Vallee is able to show the humanity within the man and the struggle he must take on, which the audience can relate to and connect with – and from a place of compassion, they do. A transformation begins both with Woodroof and the audience’s perception of him. Woodroof morphs into a hero. While initially motivated by selfish needs, he ultimately becomes a redeemed character and altruistic. And, the character flaws that the audience may have initially seen as negatives suddenly become charming and a sign of inner strength. Vallee takes an unlikable character and transforms him into a heroic character that the audience cares about – no small feat.

Dallas Buyers Club is a very good character drama, which is what it primarily functions as, but it is maybe an even more interesting social/political drama. Character dramas built on strong performances and similar narrative structures are somewhat common in Hollywood’s pseudo-independent cinema, but this film also explores a topic that is not commonly investigated in pop culture: the shameful corrupting of America’s healthcare system by the pharmaceutical industry. People are probably peripherally aware of how pharmaceutical companies manipulate healthcare providers and rig the system, but there are not too many mainstream dramas that really get at the heart of their unscrupulous practices (here are a few that touch on the subject to varying degrees: The Fugitive, Love and Other Drugs, Brain Candy, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, and The Constant Gardener).

With Dallas Buyers Club, Vallee does take a pretty direct approach to showcasing how the pharmaceutical companies impede treating patients in favor of profits, but the focus is more on the character of Woodroof than on the actions of Big Pharma. The issue here, however, arises from the narrative featuring Big Pharma buying off doctors and the FDA to promote its own drugs while condemning other treatments that might actually save lives (while their drug, in the wrong dosage, was leading to patients developing full blown AIDS as their systems were being ravaged by this HIV treatment) is much more compelling than the character drama. Woodroof tries to fight back, but he is too small. It might have been nice to see Woodroof as one of many characters at different levels in the overall struggle to fight Big Pharma in hopes of getting better HIV treatments to patients in America. This is a narrative that is begging to be told, while character dramas narratively structured like Dallas Buyers Club are common (not to take anything away from Woodroof and the amazing work he did).

The result of these complementary yet competing narratives is that Woodroof’s narrative starts to lose steam and begins to feel drawn out and overly long, leading to the audience losing their connection to the characters to some degree. Vallee’s narrative just does not feel efficient and tight, which holds what is otherwise a great film from being something special. The slow pacing dissipates the overall emotional impact of the narrative, which is this film’s essential component in its ability to resonate deeply with viewers.

Dallas Buyers Club ends up as more an exhibition of a great performance than a great film itself. Vallee has structured the whole narrative to support the lead performance (as well as a couple principal supporting performances), but somewhat at the cost of making a strong overall film.

Technical, aesthetic & acting achievements: Jean-Marc Vallee is a director gifted with the ability to garner strong performances and create a great visual style for his narratives (which can also be seen in his films C.R.A.Z.Y. and The Young Victoria). Dallas Buyers Club offers what is probably Vallee’s most visceral character work, but of his three best films it is probably the weakest structurally. That said, I am really looking forward to his next: a character drama called Wild featuring writer Nick Hornby scripting and Reese Witherspoon starring.

Working with Vallee, cinematographer Yves Belanger and production designer John Paino create a very realistic and rough visual style for the film. Belanger seems to mostly rely on natural lighting sources while probably also employing some color desaturation as well. The film looks a bit washed out, which fits tonally really well. Paino’s design work finds Woodroof inhabiting what can only be described as a very abrasive, grainy, and tough world. It also keeps everything grounded in support of the performances, as everything looks natural.

As said above, Dallas Buyers Club is built upon and centered on its central character/performance. However, there are some good supporting performances as well. Griffin Dunne, Denis O’Hare, and particularly Kevin Rankin are strong in small roles. Jennifer Garner is good as Dr. Eve Saks, a doctor who follows Woodroof’s case and starts to buy into what he is saying about other treatments. Garner is always good at mixing a cute personality with a sense of inner strength and determination, which servers her well in this role. Jared Leto (after taking an acting hiatus) returns as Rayon, Woodroof’s partner in establishing the Dallas Buyers Club to get medication to those in need, reminding everyone of his talent. Rayon is a complex and troubled character (whose drug addiction is ultimately his downfall despite all he knows about treating his illness) and Leto plays him beautifully. Matthew McConaughey is fantastic as Woodroof. 2013 has been a very strong year for him as an actor. With Mud and now Dallas Buyers Club (and he still has a supporting role in The Wolf of Wall Street coming up in December), he has delivered two of his career best performances. His Woodroof is scared underneath it all, but a scrappy fighter to the very end, not to mention a bit of a charmer too (playing off McConaughey’s natural charm).

Summary & score: Dallas Buyers Club succeeds as a performance drive character drama, but it feels like it could have been something much more. 7/10

Mud (2013) – Review

Review: Mud is an engrossing coming-of-age story and strong character drama. The film is about Ellis and Neckbone, two teenage friends who go out to a remote island along the Mississippi River to claim an abandoned boat as their own. However, when they find the boat, there is a drifter named Mud living in it. Mud tells them that he is waiting for his truelove Juniper, but hiding from the law after killing a man who hurt her. Taken by his plight, the boys decide to help Mud reconnect with Junipter.

With Mud, writer-director Jeff Nichols seems very interested in exploring the concept of love. At home, Ellis sees his parents’ relationship coming to an end and he does not understand how that can be when they loved each other (at some point in time). To him, love is a powerful agent – the storybook definition in which it conquers all. The deterioration of his home life shakes his confidence in love, which directly plays into why he is stalwart in his desire to help Mud despite all the warning signs (like the fact he is a murderer). He hears Mud’s story about being with his truelove Juniper and it restores the myth for him – a myth that he seems very set on protecting. He is very naïve. Ellis also engages in a relationship with a girl a few years older than him (a high school girl when he is probably in the eighth grade). He thinks that it is as easy as being nice to her and protecting her (because that is what he got from Mud’s story), and in the moment she is taken with him. She likes the attention, but for her there is nothing real between them. For Ellis, though, he is committed and thinks they are in love. He is destined to be hurt and jaded by the rejection (making him even more invested in seeing Mud and Juniper reunited and living happily ever after).

Nichols also explores this theme with the supporting characters that surround Ellis. He sees an upset woman fleeing Neckbone’s uncle’s house yelling that a woman should be treated like a princess. He also hears the story of his reclusive neighbor, a marine sharpshooter who was deeply in love with a woman but she died in childbirth (as did the child). He never loved again. Nichols uses all these stories to create a specific psyche for Ellis – one that allows him to see Mud and Juniper as storybook characters destined to be together, their love being pure with only evil forces keeping them apart. In this mind state, Ellis feels like it is duty to help them be together.

Ultimately, and obviously, Ellis going to be let down and hurt by the people he believes in, because it is all fantasy. In this way, Nichols is also telling a coming-of-age story. Ellis needs to be hurt in order for him to grow up. His friend Neckbone is clearly more skeptical and yet still goes along because he believes and looks up to his friend. He does not have the heart to outright tell Ellis what a fool he is being, rather he backs him up and supports him like a friend should. Mud is also equally naïve, but not due to being inexperienced like Ellis. His naivety stems much more from a place of self-deception. Like Ellis, Mud needs to be hurt to finally come to terms with himself, grow up, and move on.

Nichols starts to transform his main theme of storybook love into friendship. The film almost only shows broken relationships, but the friendships between Ellis and Neckbone and the boys and Mud are both very powerful. While it is unrequited love that helps them grow up, it is friendship that builds them back up and gives them the strength to move on. Nichols handles the material very deftly. It is touching without a hint of cheesiness.

In addition to Nichols’s superb command of the film’s narrative themes, he also develops the characters fantastically and efficiently. The film has a lot of supporting characters, all of whom are important to the plot and the main characters’ dramatic journeys. Thus, Nichols must give them all enough character moments for the audience to build connections to them. He does this magnificently. The story is told very economically, each scene playing an important role in the overall film as the drama builds. Nichols also paces the film well, which is an important and difficult job when a film is character driven. The audience must stay engaged.

While the film works very well overall (and is the best drama I have seen so far this year), the plot does take the drama into an exaggerated place in the third act. Since Nichols manages the audience’s connection with the characters so well, this is not really an issue and the audience is fully invested and willing to go anywhere with these characters. But that said, the third act does feel a little cliché in its drama being ratcheted up. The character drama seems to suddenly change into a thriller somewhat losing sight of the characters. The epilogue also feels very Hollywood (a bit like a test audience demanded a happy unambiguous resolution to the drama, so one was added – but by the same token, who does not like a happy ending).

Despite some nitpicking issues that really do not hurt the film much, Mud is a wonderful character drama, ripe with great characters and strong direction.

Technical, aesthetic & acting achievements: Jeff Nichols has made three films now. Each telling stories about families trying to make it faced with hard and changing times. His films feel very personal. He cares about his characters, which comes across in his narratives and draws the audience in. Nichols is a fine talent coming out of America’s independent cinema. He is a filmmaker to watch. I recommend all is films (his first two are Shotgun Stories and Take Shelter), and looks forward to his next.

Composer David Wingo’s score does a good job reinforcing the dramatic tone. It is at times ominous while in other moments it feels more enchanting, mirroring the drama and themes that Nichols employs in the film. Adam Stone’s photography is wonderful as well. He, along with production designer Richard Wright, gives the film a very realistic look, yet with some foreboding as well (for example: the early shot of the camera floating over the murky, foggy river – which certainly seems to signify that some dark and dangerous is on the horizon). Wright’s design, however, fully immerses the viewer in the realities of the hard lives the characters lead, leaving the fantasy aspects to the cinematography and score.

 The performances in the film are top-notch across the cast. Paul Sparks (is very menacing, which is sort of strange, as I am only familiar with him as his sniveling character on Boardwalk Empire), Michael Shannon, and Sam Shepard are all very good in small supporting roles. Despite their lack of screen time, they each add something dramatically important to the narrative. Ray McKinnon and Sarah Paulson also have small roles (in terms of screen time) as Ellis’s parents, but their dramatic moments are key to the whole narrative working, as their relationship shapes Ellis’s character and his motivations. They are both very good as well. Reese Witherspoon is a great choice to play Juniper. It is easy to both imagine her as the innocent pinnacle of Mud’s affection who loves him too and as a girl who is just using him. In different moments, she makes the audience believe each is true. Jacob Lofland, playing Neckbone, is fantastic. He is very resourceful and tough, and yet very vulnerable. Tye Sheridan, playing Ellis, steals the film (even though most will look to Matthew McConaughey’s performance, as he is the main name actor in the film). He has a true heart and is maybe the only real hero (in the classic sense) left in his weary world. McConaughey is also excellent in the film as Mud. He is wildcard. At any moment he might harm his young companions, but he is so captivating as well. He just draws the audience in, making them forget that he is dangerous and probably will hurt these kids in the end.

Summary & score: Mud is built on terrific characters and wholly engaging drama. It pulls the viewer in and never lets them go until the last frame. 8/10

Magic Mike (2012) – Review

Review: Magic Mike is more than just the spectacle of attractive men dancing without shirts on. It is a solid drama about growing up and deciding what is important in life. The film is about Mike, an entrepreneur who wants to start his own custom furniture business, but is drawn to the party lifestyle of his night job as an exotic dancer. During one of Mike’s day jobs, he meets Adam, an aimless recent college dropout, who Mike brings into his lifestyle, and introduces him to dancing. With Adam, however, also comes his sister Brooke, who challenges Mike on what he really wants out of life. Director Steven Soderbergh structures the narrative with a protagonist who is a veteran of the business looking to make a change, but he also has an outsider (Adam) who get introduced to the world as the secondary lead (when typically, this type of character would probably be the protagonist). Soderbergh does commit a lot of screen time to what could be called “eye candy” sequences (much like a blockbuster), but does not forget to give his characters, especially Mike, Adam and Brooke character moments and real drama, which ultimately is what makes the film compelling. Mike’s struggle to find himself is something the audience can connect with, as we all go through something similar when we make decisions about the future. Soderbergh also structures Mike’s character arc simplistically, which is good, because again he commits a lot of time to dancing sequences. A complicated dramatic arc would potentially have made the film more tedious and/or overly long. However, while the film works well as a drama, it does have a few issues, namely the pacing is a tad slow at times and Mike is not really the most interesting character in the film. Adam, as an outsider being drawn in by the bright lights, naïve to the consequences (much like Nomi in Showgirls), seems like he would have been a more interesting character to have the narrative follow. Rather, Adam is sort of like a younger version of Mike, thus the audience sees both the beginning and end of Mike’s career through two characters at the same time. The advantage of the outsider is that he, like the viewer, needs to be told about how things work, and thus is someone the audience can identify with more so than a veteran of the game like Mike. The other disadvantage of essentially splitting the protagonist to a degree between two characters is that the supporting characters are not given much depth. The viewers do get some insight into Brooke and a little into Dallas (Mike’s boss), but the other male dancers are just background. Mike alone is not quite a strong enough character to carry the narrative, which does hurt the film a bit. Magic Mike, overall, is exactly what it sets out to be – a good drama with lots of male stripping (for its so inclined fans), but it is not really a film about male strippers. Mike could have done anything, as really it is about him growing up and finding himself, and here it works, but only to a degree as Mike is not quite a well-drawn enough character.

Technical, aesthetic & acting achievements: Steven Soderbergh is often known for his visual style, using techniques more prevalent in the 1960s and 1970s than modern cinema (like optical zooms), but with Magic Mike he shot it in a fairly straightforward manner, allowing the performances to play. The dance sequences have more of an artistic style, and there is a drug-use scene that is done in a fairly typical distorted manner. Soderbergh, who also serves as the film’s cinematographer (something he often does), uses lighting gels or postproduction color correction in a few of the outside scenes to make Mike’s world look a little dirtier, with the sky a dirty yellow as opposed to a blue (it is very noticeable in the sandbar party scene), maybe as a comment on Mike’s lifestyle (or society’s view on it). The soundtrack for the film worked well with the tone and dancing style. Howard Cummings’s production design is fairly straightforward as well. There is nothing that stands out, as the film is presented to take place in a realistic space (though, I got the sense that despite Mike wanting to save money, he still lived a bit above his means from the design work for Mike’s house). The cast is good overall. Olivia Munn is good in what could be considered her dramatic feature debut, playing Joanna a character that just uses Mike. She serves as sort of the general societal opinion of Mike. Matthew McConaughey is also good in support. His Dallas resembles a modern and older version of his Dazed and Confused character, just trying desperately to cling to his fleeting youth. Alex Pettyfer and Cody Horn both have breakout performances in the film, and sort of steal it as secondary leads. Pettyfer plays Adam as a wide-eyed troublemaker who is just looking for an excuse to make easy money and not have responsibility (again, seeing his character arc might have been more interesting). Horn is good as Adam’s easygoing but concerned sister Brooke, who serves as the moral center for the film, and the saving grace to some extent for Mike. Channing Tatum continues to improve as both a leading man and actor. Here, he is good, but Mike is not a great character and thus he does not really have too much dramatic acting to do.

Summary & Score: Magic Mike has both spectacle and drama making for a good film. 7/10