Nobody Knows Hollywood

It’s unfortunate to watch a good film premise become what “The Interview” ended up being. The promise is there, as Rogen said in a December 2014 Rolling Stone interview “… now that we have people’s attention, maybe we can focus it on something slightly more relevant…while still doing shit we think is funny.” Sadly, the shit outweighs the relevancy, and the shit just ain't that funny. Dave Skylark (James Franco) is a cross between an Entertainment Tonight and TMZ style television host. His producer, Aaron Rapoport (Seth Rogen) is frustrated because he knows the sensationalistic work they do has little social value or meaning. This irony is one of the big misses of the film. When North Korea’s Supreme Dictator Kim Jong-un (Randall Park) turns out to be a fan of Skylark and invites him to Pyongyang, the CIA steps in with the command to kill. Yes, it’s silly, but there are high stakes and a lot of (potential) fun to be had. Sadly, Rogen, who also Directed and Co-Wrote ...

Director: Matthew Vaughn Year: 2015 Check your expectations and deep-seeking logic at the door and you’ll likely find Kingsman: The Secret Service is a fantastic, ultraviolent, homage-heavy ride through the well-worn space of spy films. For what it is, it works very well. Director Matthew Vaughn (Producer on Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, as well as Director of X-Men: First Class and Kick-Ass) has played in this space successfully before, so this shouldn’t be a surprise.  “First and foremost,” Harry Hart/Galahad (Colin Firth) says, “we are gentlemen.” That line of dialogue in the trailers, however, might have you looking another direction, which is what Vaughn wants. Because, this ain’t that kind of movie, bro. The brutal violence and occasionally deep blue language wouldn’t have the same impact if it ran throughout.   It opens with a fairly standard spy scene generically subtitled “1997 in the Middle East”   (you know, where ...

What is the Resonance Rating (RR)? Traditional movie ratings include stars, thumbs up or, in the case of the San Francisco Examiner, the funny little man in the theater, who ranges from jumping out of the seat with applause to leaving it empty all together. The general idea of the rating is to give a quick look at the reviewer’s overall judgment of the film; In other words, how good or bad was it. That’s a metric I will consider with an added measure, with a nod toward what I see as a film’s greatness. Greatness is an obsession of mine. What makes things great? Who makes things great? How long do they remain great? I will rate movies based on how they make me feel and how long I believe they’ll stick with me. This is the Resonance Rating. I think the measure of a great movie is often not known for ten years. “Does it hold up?” is the common phrase. This is still highly subjective of course, because what resonates for me may not for another, but it takes away the s...

Director: Director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu Year: 2014 The battle begins within Riggan (Michael Keaton) who is a Hollywood has-been, once an A-lister known for his turn as superhero Birdman, a caped crusader on the silver screen, who is now looking for admiration, respect and flight anew as an actor on Broadway in a Raymond Carver remake he has penned, is directing and will play the lead role in. “Ambitious,” Mike (Edward Norton) mutters in reply to the news of Riggan’s triple-threat intent. Riggan’s lawyer/manager, Jake (Zach Galifianakis), paces around like a mad man, wildly spewing that everything from the critic that hates him to the actor that will sue them will be both the death of them and somehow be alright. Meanwhile, backstage in the ladies dressing room: “Why don’t I have any self respect?” Lesley cries. “You’re an actress, honey,” Laura says. Indeed they are and it only gets better from there. The style rules in this slick, darkly funny, ex...

Director: David Fincher Year: 2014 “ All we did was resent each other, try to control each other – cause each other pain ,” Nick complains to his wife. “ That’s marriage ,” Amy replies. Gone Girl is a film that at the very least leaves you wondering what the hell you just watched and at best flattens you with the possible depths of depravity in humanity against the backdrop of the sanctity of marriage. Make no mistake: this is a great film with a dark soul. If people at the office go to see the film make sure you have a few extra jugs the next day because this is the water cooler film of the year. “ When I think of my wife ,” Nick (Ben Affleck) begins.   “ I always think of her head. I picture cracking her lovely skull, unspooling her brains trying to get answers. What are you thinking? How are you feeling? What have we done to each other ?” Quick, empty shots of the Missouri town at dawn are followed by our opening to the action, “The morning of the ...

In Wild, Reese Witherspoon gets much darker than some viewers may be used to seeing her. It’s not that she’s never led (or followed, depending on your perspective) a character down a dark path before, but many, including this reviewer, tend to think of her as one of America’s Sweethearts, a label that gets applied to favorite female leads that are simply likeable. The pitfalls of such labels include not being taken seriously, though one would think in Witherspoon’s case she would have shed that with her Oscar win in 2006 for her portrayal of June Carter in Walk the Line. There’s also at least a little bit of a sexist overtone to that label and, in now admitting understanding that, I’ll refrain from its use any further. The devil in Witherspoon’s character, again a portrayal of a real-life woman, though far less famous, is in the complexity and duality. Cheryl (Witherspoon) is a woman wracked with pain, anger, guilt and a dark history of her own creation based on how she r...

ADD:*THE POLITICKING AND MARKETING EFFORT PUT INTO GETTING THE AWARD *IF I WAS TO PICK ONE MASSIVE SNUB IT WOULD BE DAVID OYELOWO B/C OF THE DEPTH OF THE ROLE, IMPORTANCE OF THE CHARACTER AND SKILL DISPLAYED IN THE PORTRAYAL Every year, the greatest drama about the greatest film dramas of that year (because comedies aren't allowed to win Oscar) occurs right after the nominations are announced: the Snubbies. These are the famous howlings of those who didn’t get nominated or those on behalf of those who didn’t get nominated. This year is no different. The outcry of Jennifer Aniston’s lack of nomination for her role in Cake seems to miss the point that most people just didn’t like the movie that much. SCREAM: But it's about her performance! Not the film! Retort: How many Oscar Winning performances come from films that were received with a largely lukewarm response? The howling about Selma’s Director Ava DuVernay not getting a nod (thank you Rev. Al Sharpton) seems to b...

Director: Clint Eastwood Year: 2014  Resonance Rating: 3.5 ripples (out of 5) American Sniper opens with an awful moral choice: Chris Kyle (Bradley Cooper) is a Navy Seal and sniper covering his fellow troops from a rooftop in a war-torn, rubble-pile of a city in Iraq. He spots a woman and a young boy walking out of a building. They shouldn’t be there but they’re not necessarily doing anything wrong - yet. He sees the woman hand the boy a high-powered grenade. He sets the boy in his site and places his finger on the trigger. His partner warns him that he’ll be “fried at Leavenworth” if he’s wrong. He asks for visual confirmation on the ground or alternate viewpoints. No one can confirm. If he doesn’t pull the trigger and the boy is there to kill, he will watch perhaps dozens of his fellow troops die. What will he do? The film almost begs: what would you do? The film is, in its entirety, about difficult choices regard roles in society, particularly as they pertain to “good ...

Director: Wes Anderson Year: 2014 Wonderfully colorful and whimsical, loaded with cracking dialogue and ridiculous characters, The Grand Budapest Hotel has perched itself as an excellent alternative to the field of much darker candidates in this years crowded Best Picture race. This is a story about the power of stories and the importance of listening for them. For, as we are told early on by Zero Moustafa (F. Murray Abraham), great storytellers do not, in fact, labor over the creation of their stories incessantly, they simply wait for people to spill them. And cult hero/Director Wes Anderson delightfully spills this one all over us. Costume, set design, and cinematography are all under Anderson’s watchful and brilliant guidance here, with delightful twists, turns and surprises in every frame. If it were style for the sake of itself, which, admittedly, I have felt about some of Anderson’s earlier work, it would be distracting. But everything adds up here. Every actor, and it is...

We begin with a young boy, Mason Jr. (Ellar Coltrane), staring at the clouds – what is this life all about? He seems to wonder. We finish with him, 13 years later, grown into a young man, just moved into his college dorm and immediately eschewing the conventional orientation for a walk in nature with his clearly liberated roommate and a few young coeds. The film ends with Mason Jr. looking out at nature from above with a beautiful girl by his side. He’s happy. He’s high. He’s allowing the moment to seize him rather than the other way around – if that sounds confusing, you’ll have to see the film. Boyhood is a bold film that audiences should probably have a bit of preparation for before they go in. Then again, even as I write that I think, no, they should know nothing. The duality exists in my fear that people won’t appreciate this beautiful film for what it is: an experience. It is devoid of the usual plot points and structure. It’s just life. It happens right in front of ...