Love Shack

If you want proof that romantic comedies aren't just for young, idealistic people, Enough Said ought to be enough to justify your argument. It's been quite the surprise over-achiever the past month, defying all expectations for a film starring a former Seinfeld alum (seriously, have you SEEN Jason Alexander's career?) and from a director whose name most people would never recognize. Sadly, the biggest reason this movie has seen such success has to be the unfortunate passing of star James Gandolfini, the talented actor dying of a heart attack this past June. Crude as it may seem, many theaters who otherwise might have passed on this indie title grabbed it for the sole purpose of making a buck on his name. I'm certainly not condemning that decision - it's a business after all, and as it is the most financially successful title of director Nicole Holofcener's career, it's certainly not hard to agree with their logic.

It's no movie about nothing...

Regardless, I'm glad Enough Said has stuck around long enough for me (and hopefully, you) to go see it. The story follows single mother Eva (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) as she goes day-to-day working as a masseuse, unhappy at the thought of her daughter (and best friend) moving away to college in just a few short months. At a party she is becomes acquainted with both professional poet Marianne (Catherine Keener), with whom she strikes up a friendship, and charming fellow divorcee Albert (Gandolfini), with whom she begins a romantic relationship. As she grows to know each person, she learns all the bad habits of their respective exes. But as she learns more and more about Marianne and Albert, she realizes that they have more in common with one another than she ever would have expected.

Eva forgot to turn off her phone before the movie.

What's probably most refreshing about Enough Said is its differing cast. We've seen this same brand of story dozens of times featuring younger actors and actresses learning about the past lives of their significant others, but rarely have we done so from the perspective of a single parent, and even less from an older perspective. Louis-Dreyfus has been acting on television for years, and witnessing her performance, it's surprising that this is her first major big-screen role since 1997's Deconstructing Harry. Sure, her work here will be familiar to anybody who has seen her during her decades-old career on television, but her easy charm and likable personality make for an easy leading actress. The supporting cast is full of familiar and appreciable sorts, from veterans Keener (a Holofcener regular), Toni Collette (rocking her native Australian accent for a change), and Ben Falcone, to a trio of talented young actresses - Eve Hewson, Tracey Fairaway and Tavi Gevinson - who all are given scene-stealing moments thanks to a script (also Holofcener) that makes great use of its supporting cast in propping up the romance between its two leads.

They know what makes a trip to the movies great.

And that's where the absolutely wonderful performance by Gandolfini comes in. He might not get as much respect as more handsome men with half of his talent (mainly because half of his post-Sopranos roles were remarkably similar), but here we have distinct evidence that this man is in fact one of the great actors of our era. As resident "giant teddy bear" and a hopeful romantic, Gandolfini's performance makes you fall as quickly as Eva, while making even his supposed faults endearing in their appearance. Albert is a role that many lesser actors would have gotten absolutely wrong, but not this man, who commands the screen by his mere appearance and surprising wealth of charm.

Because I needed a picture of somebody else.

The differences also extend to the story, which focuses on that limited time until your only child (and if you're single, your main companion in life) leaves you all alone to go away for school. Eva's difficulty with that event rests front and center, as she struggles to finish knitting a blanket and becoming closer to her daughter's best friend. Thankfully however, the film never tries to imply that Eva needs a man to complete her happiness, as it is pointed out that she has friends more than able to keep her occupied. Still, her loneliness and fear of not having anyone to share intimate items with is also present, and really complicates he relationships with Marianne and Albert, especially when it comes to the idea that she might have to sacrifice one relationship to be happy in the other. It's a nice twist on the genre, and one that Holofcener manages to tell without relying on added exposition, voice-overs or unnecessary dialogue. The director trusts her audience enough to understand what's going on without hand-holding, a move much appreciated by those tired of the overly-complicated cliches that make up the bulk of these kinds of tales.

In the end, it was the laugh that did it.

Even without the added attention from Gandolfini's untimely passing, Enough Said proves itself a funny, smart and unerringly sweet romance story geared towards an older generation but able to be enjoyed by any audience. Waitress is the last example of such a broad acceptability, although Holofcener's work never gets quite as dark as that under-seen classic. Instead, Enough Said is light-hearted enough to appeal to everyone, whether you're looking to recover from a bad day or simply want to keep those good feelings flowing. It's been silently running while bigger blockbusters have been taking up the bulk of everybody's attention, and while I wouldn't recommend this over absolute must-sees like Gravity or Captain Phillips, it's one you would be probably be surprised by should you give it a shot at your theater.

Open Letters Monthly: Zero Dark Thirty

One of the most important moments of our generation is easily the attack by extremists on September 11, 2001. If you were to ask ten people on the street, nine would be able to tell you exactly where they were when news of the first plane crashing into Tower One. Since then, we as a nation have been subjected t constant conflict in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and other countries around the globe in what has become known as "The War on Terror." While it has yet to come to a close, 2011 saw an end of sorts when a covert task group succeeded in killing Osama bin Laden, leader of al Qaeda and the man responsible for organizing attacks on our home soil.

Director Kathryn Bigelow has been trying to make this film since the success of her last Middle East war tale The Hurt Locker, and what she succeeds in bringing to the big screen takes everything you thought you knew about the War on Terror and turns it on its ear. Maya is a CIA operative newly stationed in Pakistan after the 9/11 attacks. She single-mindedly dedicates herself to finding and eliminating her country's greatest threat, and sees many friends come and go for almost a decade. Finally, when all hope seems lost, one tiny lead will finally lead her to the end of her mission and the safety of her country.

Zero Dark Thirty is directed by Kathryn Bigelow and stars Jessica Chastain, Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Joel Edgerton, Mark Strong, Jennifer Ehle, Edgar Ramirez, Mark Duplass and James Gandolfini. It is the #1 movie of 2012.

Click here to read the full review on Open Letters Monthly.

Lollapolooza

My father used to be in a band, back when he was a young man living in Atlantic City, New Jersey. I don't recall the band's name, but my sister and I did hear stories of many of their gigs and experiences before they went their separate ways, and my father came north to be with his childhood sweetheart (yes, my mom), and a relatively "normal" life, which thankfully involved kids. That brief, music-filled moment in his life is the target of director David Chase in Not Fade Away, his feature film debut. Chase, who is best known as the creator and Emmy-winning showrunner of The Sopranos, attempts to capture what made music so important in the 1960's, with the emergence of so many iconic rock & roll icons seemingly at once.

Set in a Vietnam-era New Jersey suburb, high school student Douglas (John Magaro) and his friends decide to form a band, inspired by the rise of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. Despite the grumblings of his working class father (James Gandolfini), Douglas is certain that stardom is in his future, especially when a freak accident shifts him from drummer and backup singer to becoming the group's front man. But infighting, domestic problems, and the realities of the world interfere, and soon they threaten to not only derail Doublas' musical journey, but his relationship with the love of his life (Bella Heathcoate).

Chase definitely has a healthy appreciation for the musical arts, and puts it on full showing any chance he gets here. He definitely realizes and explores the music discoveries that made that period of time so great, from The Beatles' appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show to the Stones showing off for Dean Martin. It's not just rock that gets attention, but also R&B legends like Bo Diddley, James Brown and Elmore James who get praised as inspirations. The band themselves, dubbed the "Twylight Zones" (after Doug's favorite television show), also put on performances of sorts, with excellent cover and original songs dotting the film's playlist. It helps that the soundtrack is cobbled together by legendary musician and Chase collaborator Steven Van Zandt, who does a great job matching the music to the mood the director is trying to achieve, and the result is easily one of the best soundtracks I've heard this year.

Unfortunately, that music mainly becomes a cushion between the audience and the badly-told story to which they're subjected. It's bad enough that the protagonist is someone we grow to dislike over the course of the film; Magaro's Douglas is a churlish young man who does a few things right but most of the time comes off as a pompous - though growing - jerk. Obviously the movie is designed to give him the big revelation and redemption at the end, but by that point we could really care less. What's worse is that every single character and plot thread has been done to death in other, better movies. One character even screams at Douglas about his relationship to Heathcoate's Grace, calling the former high school loser and the former prom queen's eventual pairing "a cliche". What that person (and Chase himself) fails to realize is that everybody in the movie meets that criteria. We've got a diva frontman whose jealousy makes him go too far (Jack Huston), a scheming yes-man who's only in it for his own success (Will Brill), the aforementioned popular girl (Heathcote is at least better here than in the horrid Dark Shadows) and her psychotic, drug-inducing artist sister (Dominique McElligott). Then there's Douglas' family, a pastiche of blue-collar poor families from the era. Playing his mother, Molly Price wears curlers 24/7, goes outside to do yard work in her bathrobe, complains about her wealthier family members, and threatens to commit suicide when she's stressed out. I'm still not sure what to make of Meg Guzulescu as his little sister, who occasionally narrates the story and is otherwise completely useless (actually, she's useless as a narrator as well, but anyway...). Only Gandolfini is even decent, and to be honest you have to believe that Chase (who also wrote the screenplay) created the role with him in mind, as it plays to his strengths and nothing else. Nobody else comes anywhere close to feeling anything unlike cardboard cutouts.

For almost two hours, we're subjected to characters we don't care about going through motions and time jumps and off-screen events that trigger real-time consequences. The narrative could have been forgiven if the final product were not such a jumbled mess, but as things stand you'll barely be able to keep people and situations straight and people's looks swiftly altering in short spurts of time. The music covers up any connections that scenes may share, and while it's nice to listen to, I'd appreciate if it weren't used as a crutch. There are only a few actual "character moments", the most effective being a dinner chat between Douglas and his estranged father. Unfortunately, the scene only barely scratches any deeper meaning behind the characters, and any momentum it develops is quickly and utterly lost.

David Chase has often complained that he's stuck working in television, unable to transcend to the hallowed grounds of moviemaking. But if the films he's going to produce are anything like Not Fade Away - self-important, semi-biographical and thoroughly un-entertaining - then HBO was doing society a favor for all those years. Van Zandt's soundtrack is exemplary, and anybody wishing to relive the music of the sixties will probably find something to keep them going. But the fact is that those people already own these songs on CD or digital (and likely a few on vinyl), rendering the idea of paying for a ticket to see this moot. This isn't the film you are looking for, and if it is you might just be searching the wrong medium for your good times.

Hit Me Baby

So which is the real Killing Them Softly? One is the film that competed for the Cannes Palm D'Or this past spring, and received decent reviews overall, to the tune of 79% on Rotten Tomatoes. It was supposed to secure star Brad Pitt a Best Actor nomination and steal a lot of attention from bigger blockbuster titles during the awards season. The second film is one reviled by audience-goers, given a rare "F" rating on Cinemascore and bombing badly when it was released almost three weeks ago. That's a fairly wide gulf, and while critics and audiences have certainly disagreed on what makes for quality movie time (just look at any Twilight flick), rarely do their opinions appear so disparate when it comes to a potential Oscar darling. So which one is the film you should expect if you go to the theaters?

Frankly, I'm shocked that so many critics could get past the frenetic opening credits sequence to really get into the film based on George V. Higgins' 1974 novel Cogan's Trade. The jagged and frankly pointless opening sequence sets a tone that resonates through the entire film. As to the story, it focuses on the effect of two amateur goons (Scoot McNairy and Ben Mendelsohn) knocking over an underground card game, and the mob hitman (Brad Pitt) who is hired to find and make an example of them. The tale is set to the background of the 2008 Presidential election and the financial crisis that defined both that year and election, and as we see, not even the criminal underground is safe from the recession.

You just know it won't end well for these guys.

Actually, looking at the recession's effect on even criminal markets was a fascinating take on the subject, and in all honesty it's likely the main reason so much critical affection was given to this title. Every character has stories of falls from grace, for instance James Gandolfini as a hitman whose depression has spiraled into passions for booze and prostitutes. The economy is such that probation systems cannot help many reformed criminals, so that those men are forced back into the game to survive. Mob bosses are forced to work together by committee rather than risk alienation by carving their own path, and assassins must offer discounts to remain competitive. It's a unique take on the typical crime drama, and changes the rules and politics of the mob system. The violence is also stylish, with director Andrew Dominik taking the extra effort and making each hit feel like a visceral, important and rare occurrence.

Richard Jenkins is always good, no question.

Unfortunately, while Dominik has a flair for the visual, he rarely indulges it in film chock full of talk, questions, pondering and tons and tons of plot exposition. 100% of often-excellent performer Richard Jenkins' scenes take place with him sitting down and not doing a whole hell of a lot. The cast is full of talented performers but Pitt, Gandolfini, Ray Liotta and Sam Shepard are largely wasted on explaining basic concepts to both one another and the audience. Pitt especially feels pointless, spending most of his time talking instead of actually doing anything of interest. Only Mendelsohn and - most especially - McNairy stand out acting-wise, with Mendelsohn playing nicely as a grubby do-anything character with little-to-no morals and a penchant for disaster. But while his partner is amusing at best, McNairy actually manages to achieve the rare feat in this picture of being someone to root for. As the young Frankie he is forced into a corner as both a character and actor, and McNairy impresses with ample charm and talent. It's a shame most people won't see him in this, as he won't likely get recognition from the his excellent work on Argo, which saw him take on a much different appearance.

Could it possibly be a crime movie without this guy?

While I get why Killing Them Softly has received some positive press, I feel that this was a case in which a movie was overrated thanks to the quality of its cast and a few good moments than for being the powerful, allegorical tale that it was surely meant to be. It's certainly making up for that now, and might be remembered as among the year's worst. Killing Them Softly gets a few things right and doesn't skimp on the blood, but the rest of Dominik's work is a boring, trite and completely unsubtle waste of an hour and a half. Skip at all costs.