Category Archives: Reviews

“Fire in the Hole, Bitch.”

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One of the beauties of Breaking Bad TV series was that no truth occurred without consequences: dead bodies needed disposing; stolen money had to be laundered; sins did not go unpunished.

And so it goes with El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie, the searing new film from Netflix and series creator Vince Gilligan. Taught, tense and forever-time-hopping, Camino is a fitting bookend to one of the finest shows ever on television.

Written and directed by Gilligan, Camino deftly maintains the momentum of the series, even though it ended six years ago, thanks to star Aaron Paul, who always gave the show its sense of levity and, despite being a meth-sling dope dealer, likability as Jesse Pinkman. Despite some missteps on the big screen recently like Need for Speed, Paul demonstrates his range again in Camino. The movie looks terrific, sounds great and if you’re a fan, is filled with references and cameos that are sure to amuse show diehards.Image result for el camino breaking bad

Like many Breaking Bad episodes, Camino picks up immediately where the last scene left off. In this case, its aftermath of the 2013 Breaking Bad finale, with Jesse driving away from the bloodbath that left a lot of neo-Nazis, and also Bryan Cranston’s Walter White, dead. While some series viewers may have assumed Jesse drove off into the sunset, true Breaking Bad fans know the series settles for no such tropes. Jesse remains a fugitive in Camino, on the run from both cops and criminals, who are  sometimes hard to tell apart.

Bad was always a stylish thriller, and in Camino, Gilligan directs just as energetically with a bigger-looking budget and flashier pyrotechnics. In many ways, Camino serves both a reunion show and an alternative series finale (although the original one was terrific).Image result for el camino breaking bad

But make no mistake: with Walt left for dead in the Bad finale, Camino is Jesse’s story through and through. Flashbacks allow dead favorites like mentor Mike (Jonathan Banks), girlfriend Jane (Krysten Ritter), and Walt himself prod Jesse toward a lifestyle change: “Only you can decide what’s best for you,” one character advises him.

But what’s best, Jesse and Camino decide, is a little retribution sprinkled with a lot of freedom. It’s a simple theme, and fodder for countless films and TV series. But in Gilligan’s hands, you’ll find little that resembles a stereotypical film or series.

Part of what makes Camino hum is not the continuation of a compelling story, but the unexpected prequel-izing it does with characters we thought we knew, particularly Skinny Pete (Charles Baker) and Todd (Jesse Plemons). We knew Pete was surprisingly sophisticated (he once memorably  tickled the ivories in a BB episode), but Camino establishes him as a near-paternal friend. Baker is mesmerizing; at a little over two hours, it’s a shame Camino couldn’t fit him into more scenes.Image result for skinny pete play piano

The true jaw-dropper, though, is Plemons (Fargo TV series). Todd was always an only-half-detestable killer who was hardly one of the series’ multiple evil geniuses. Here, though, his sociopathic tendencies are on full display. In one scene, he sings the virtues of a bystander he killed without a second thought. In another, Plemons provides the funniest scene in the movie as he drives down the highway after an atrocity, crooning to Dr. Hook’s Sharing the Night Together, signaling like a kid for a passing big rig to sound its horn.Image result for el camino jesse plemons

Camino‘s final showdown lets Gilligan indulge his love of movie Westerns, which always informed the series. It may feel reminiscent of the show’s final episode, Felina, with its meticulous planning and execution. But, like Felina, it’s an example of the pinpoint technical proficiency and directing that runs through Camino.

If any elements of the movie disappoints fans, it may be the lack of surprises and plot twists. But this is, after all, supposed to be Breaking Bad’s final exit. Gilligan couldn’t afford any more questions that needed answers.

Instead, Camino‘s larger purpose may be for us to moderate our perspective about the show. Gilligan always described the series as Mr. Chips becomes Scarface, which was always Walter’s story. But perhaps Gilligan realized just how much narrative truly belonged to Jesse. And if you believed Jesse got short shrift in the finale, Camino goes a long way to making that narrative equitable. Either way, fans will remember just how good it can feel to break bad.

Isn’t It Rich?

Joker trailer

Joker may be the most anti-comic comic-book movie ever set to film. Violent, grim and deliriously unconcerned with superhero tradition, Joaquin Phoenix’s rubber-bodied portrayal of Batman’s arch nemesis has, like Heath Ledger’s performance before him, permanently altered the definition of a comic-book villain.

Directed by Hangover and Old School veteran Todd Phillips, Joker is a superhero story as might have been imagined by Travis Bickle, and this fractured entry into the DC Comic Universe is by far the most deranged installment yet. Joker feels as informed by Taxi Driver and Network as by DC Comics, and that’s the joy of the 70’s-infused origins story; It dovetails nicely with the DC Universe, but never quite feels borne of it.Image result for taxi driver movie

Joaquin Phoenix is the titular character, Arthur Fleck, an odd, lonely guy who lives at home with his mother (a wan Frances Conroy) he love-hates. Arthur works for a grimy rent-a-clown business, and nothing ever goes right for him. That’s clear from the moment we meet him: spinning signs in downtown Gotham he gets jumped by a mob of punks.

As Arthur’s decline continues, he gets angrier and more isolated as the world’s saddest punching bag. When Gotham’s social services close down, Arthur learns he can no longer receive counseling there, or get his meds. (He carries around a little laminated card that he holds out whenever he laughs inappropriately, which reads, “Forgive my laughter, I have a brain injury.”) The one bright spot of his dreary life is watching a Johnny Carson-style talk-show host, Murray Franklin (Robert De Niro), on television. Arthur dreams of being a stand-up comic and someday being on the show. Like Bickle, Fleck will eventually get his wish, but not before a dramatic transformation.Image result for robert de niro joker

As you’d expect, Arthur’s downhill slide continues. He’s beaten up by a group of drunken Wall Street suits and draws a gun on them that he got from a co-worker (another Taxi Driver nod). Before long, Arthur becomes an Occupy Wall Street-style vigilante folk hero representing working stiffs tired of corporate manipulation. He inspires the masses to don clown masks, march in the streets and carry “Kill the Rich!” placards as they face off against city authorities.

All the while, the movie paints a painfully human portrait of Arthur, another break from superhero tradition. Arthur may have found a neighbor love interest, played by Zazie Beetz, but it could all just be in Arthur’s mind. So, too, may be his suspicion that he’s more a part of the Bruce Wayne’s family tree than he once thought. But in the mess that is Arthur’s brain, reality is always a guess at best.

Some scenes in Joker can’t help but fall into the trope-blender of all superhero films, and Batman fans will surely take exception to the re-writing of some age-old Caped Crusader canon. But Phillips and Phoenix are clearly unconcerned with Dark Knight conventions (or breaking from them), and the climactic scene of Arthur nearing his big TV break builds much the same tense dread of Bickle’s inevitable showdown with pimps and drug dealers. If Dark Knight left you asking it to send in more clowns, there’s no such worry with Joker. They’re already here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMQPeovhP7w

 

When the Moon Hits Your Eye

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In the Shadow of the Moon is the sum of many parts that don’t quite add up. Part crime noir, part action film and part sci-fi adventure, Moon resembles The Terminator cross-pollinated with Seven, yet never quite matching either film’s punch.

Director Jim Mickle has balanced genres before, with standout movies including Cold in July and We Are What We Are. But an odd hodgepodge film like this needs a charismatic anchor as versatile as its subject matter, and Boyd Holbrook, while an apt lantern-jawed protagonist, doesn’t quite have the nerve and ambition of his material.

Holbrook (Logan, Narcos, The Host) plays Tom Lockhart, a Philadelphia cop whose life forever changes on a night in 1988. Just before his pregnant wife (Rachel Keller) goes into labor, Tom stumbles upon one of the strangest cases in the history of the city of brotherly love. A concert pianist, bus driver and fry cook all die at the exact same time, their brains literally oozing out of their eyes, ears, and mouths. All have puncture wounds at the backs of the necks and a suspect soon surfaces, a young black woman in a blue hoodie (Cleopatra Coleman). Lockhart and his partner (Bokeem Woodbine) soon track the woman, who seems to know a good deal about Tom, including that his wife is about to have a baby girl. Image result for in the shadow of the moon netflix bokeem

After what appears to be a violent end to a strange story, Moon jumps ahead to 1997, when it appears  a copycat is repeating the same crimes as nine years earlier. But what if it’s not a copycat? What if it’s the same person as in 1988, brought back on the nine-year-cycle of the blood moon? Every nine years, Lockhart goes deeper down the criminal rabbit hole of a case that may hold the future of our entire civilization. Now playing a criminal hunter instead of fugitive, Michael C. Hall also stars, portraying a cop whose job appears to be to call Lockhart crazy every nine years in his thickest Philly accent.

While Moon occasionally strikes procedural gold (it often looks like an updated version of Zodiac), Holbrook and Mickle take the story so seriously it never gets time to romp in the cinematic playground that is b-movie sci-fi. If anything, the closer that Holbrook and Mickle get to the core of the case — that someone is injecting victims with a parasitic isotope — the more dull the case becomes.The problem is that buy disulfiram uk Moon makes little effort to keep its viewers mystified, so the audience isn’t going to be nearly as blown away as Mickle and screenwriters Gregory Weidman and Geoffrey Tock seem to assume we’ll be.Image result for zodiac movie

Part of the movie’s stumbles are due to pacing. The film, which is two hours long, hopscotches through five different time periods that are spaced nine years apart (1988, 1997, 2006, 2015, and 2024). In each time frame we learn a little bit more about what’s happening, and every new revelation seems more far-fetched than the previous. While there is tragedy along the way (Locke has to raise his daughter by himself), that doesn’t substitute for character development. Holbrook isn’t a bad actor, but he’s called only to don more stringy and bedraggled hair as time marches forward, and the aesthetic change doesn’t suffice for an emotional one. None of the movie’s performances are bad; but none particularly stand out, either.

The conspiracy, ultimately, is all about race, and there’s a mad scientist (Rudi Dharmalingam) bent on erasing centuries of hate. But even topicality can’t save this Netflix project from expositional bloat. In the Shadow of the Moon’s title is meant to make a larger statement about reversing the cycles of racism. And the film is pointedly proud of being woke. You, however, may not be by the time the credits roll.